Men and Feminism - Men's Liberation Movement

Men's Liberation Movement

The men's liberation movement began in the early 1970s as consciousness-raising groups to help men free themselves from the limits of sex roles. Proponents of men’s liberation argued that male bonding is a mechanism to conform men’s identities to a single sense of masculinity, which reinforces patriarchy. In lieu of such bonding, the men’s liberation movement called for open acknowledgment of the costs of masculinity: men’s entrapment in their fixed role as the breadwinner of the nuclear family and the taboo against men expressing emotions. Most significantly, this movement made it acceptable for men to be open about their emotions while maintaining their masculinity.

The link between the biological male sex and the social construction of masculinity was seen by some scholars as a limitation on men’s collaboration with the feminist movement. This sharply contrasted with sex role theory which viewed gender as something determined by biological differences between the sexes. Other key elements of the men's liberation movement were the ideas that genders are relational and each cannot exist without the other, and that gender as a whole is a social construction and not a biological imperative. Thus, second-wave profeminist writers were able to explore the interactions between social practices and institutions, and ideas of gender.