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For all of those men who, when confronted with the fact that March 8th is International Women's Day, ask "When's International Men's Day?" - It's today. It's the 19th November. And I decided to spend International Men's Day listing all the things that men have done to make me proud of being one. I got as far as "Mostly not being interested in celebrating International Men's Day", but that doesn't count because of the ones that are. And then when I couldn't think of anything else I decided to list all the ways that men are discriminated against due to their gender. Some men get a bit of their willy chopped off without their permission, but most of them then go on to do the same to their own sons, so it can't be that bad (plus think of all the money they save on willy brushes). But if I've missed any examples, the answer to one group of people being discriminated against isn't to say, "Well the other group of people sometimes get discriminated against too, so therefore your list of discrimination is invalid." The answer is surely, "Let's try and do our best to stop discrimination at all." It's hard to do on an individual level sometimes, but surely we can do it on a larger scale.
I am very much in favour of celebrating men and women and would rather not have a specific day to do that. But whilst International Women's Day does seem to address valid concerns, International Men's Day just seems a little bit whiny and childish. "Where's our day?" As I've said before it reminds me of kids saying, "When's Kids' Day?" on Mother's Day or a sibling crying because their brother or sister is having a birthday and getting presents (after they've forgotten they have their own presents on another day). Man up, men.
But I just want to say that even though it was International Men's Day I still had to make my wife breakfast. Surely if there's one day I get breakfast in bed then it should be today. But no. We have a long way to go, brothers.
Admittedly she did make me lunch so that goes some way to creating equality, but then she went out for dinner, leaving me no choice but to have a bagel with Marmite on it and a pack of Jaffa Cakes. Which I had to make myself! Well not the Jaffa Cakes. Ian Jaffa made those for me. And I didn't make the bagel, but I had to toast it and put the butter and Marmite on. Sometimes it's hard to be a man. Set my people free. I am a man, hear me eat too many Jaffa Cakes (hope my wife doesn't find out about that, she'll be furious with me). You can't blame me I was just feeling sad about the appalling and unfair treatment that men get in this world, where they don't always get exactly what they want.
I wanted two packets of Jaffa Cakes.
