Community Blog Round-up: Male feminists (from: www.feministing.com)

Courtney's post last week, and the subsequent comments, stirred up some thoughts that a few community bloggers added their opinions on. Since some of you suggested this in comments a few weeks back, here is a round-up of the community blog posts about male feminists.

First, the link to Courtney's original post where she stated that male feminists are underrated (and some commenters disagreed).

Next, Gular, added some thoughts in the post Can anyone be overrated?

I have been closely following the overrated/underrated post that Courtney put up a couple days ago. I find one of the trends rather confounding, and that's the pile on of "male feminists" as overrated. I think it highlights a problem that should be addressed within this, and the entire, community of feminists. It's this: male feminists are important and, more over, vital.

There are many men here on Feministing, especially as of late. They are a pretty vocal minority and I am admittedly one of them. I think it's first to start there and work into where the rest of this is going.

Moody Girl shared her thoughts in the post, Some More Thoughts on Men and Feminism.

I think the idea of male feminists as "overrated" which was lately expressed in the comments on the overrated/underrated post reflects less a desire for men to abstain from participating either on this site or in women's movements in general and more an acknowledgement of some of the problems of male participation. To say that something is overrated is not to say that it is bad or even that it is not important, but that too much attention is devoted to it. For instance, here we are, discussing the desirability of men's participation in feminism and the terms on which it ought or ought not to take place, rather than engaging in discourse that some of us might find ultimately more productive.

Last, Marc wrote the post, How men can be better feminists/allies/partners.

I am far from perfect. As a male feminist, I've stumbled, picked myself back up, learned and stumbled some more, and I am still stumbling - that is, to say, I've been in feminist movement for quite a while now and believe that part of being a feminist is about growth. I came to the feminist movement five years ago as a freshman and I am still learning and making mistakes.
As such, and in response to recent posts on this site about the involvement of men within feminism and whether they are "overrated," I'd like to make this post about how we, as men, can be better partners and allies to the feminist community.Please feel free to contribute and add your advice. It's the only way we'll learn to be better partners.

If you want to join the discussion, you can comment on any of the above threads. A reminder though: keep the comments clean and refrain from using personal attacks.