Writing continues to be an important part of the Challenging Male Supremacy Project. We see our writing as a way to contribute to the work of challenging male supremacy in the context of systemic oppression, and in particular to support feminist, queer and trans struggles. PDFs of each article are available for download.
In her contribution to last year’s Kilburn Manifesto (Rustin 2013), an online statement in twelve monthly instalments about the nature of the neoliberal system which now dominates most of the ‘Western’ world and the need to develop coherent alternatives to it, Beatrix Campbell (2013) made clear the extent to which “a neoliberal neo-patriarchy has emerged as the new articulation of male domination.” Some of the key elements she identified as composing this “new articulation” include neoliberal retrenchments in welfare provision, the increasing double shift of productive and socially reproductive labour performed by women combined with persistent gender inequalities in pay, the growth of (para-)militarised masculinities “vital to the new modes of armed conflict that are proliferating across the flexible frontiers of globalised capitalism, between and within states,” and continuing high rates of violence against women and lamentably low rates of conviction for the mostly male perpetrators. As Campbell (2013) concludes, “sexual assault is a crime that by and large escapes justice.” More…
In his first book, Towards Collective Liberation (TCL), long:time activist and author Chris Crass distills lessons from his personal and political journey to synthesize a strategic, honest and challenging vision for how to build movements on the left. Placing his work within bell hooks’s concept of collective liberation, Crass pushes his readers to understand and envision for themselves what collective liberation might look like. More…
Since 2008, the three coauthors of this essay have been working together as the Challenging Male Supremacy Project (CMS). Thus far CMS has aimed to be an intervention into the organizing and activist communities of New York City, an effort to concretely shift the personal and political practices of cisgender (i.e., non-trans) men as well as form better allies to feminist, queer, and trans justice struggles and movements. Each of us has previously participated in organizing to end child sexual abuse, either with generationFIVE or other organizations that believe (1) there are systems of oppression that must be thoroughly transformed as part of this work, and (2) state systems are themselves purveyors of harm and will not provide useful long-term solutions to the violence within our communities. More…