I've noticed lately that there is a lack of understanding when it comes to men. We have all of these organizations for women to be among other women, and yet anything that has mostly (if not entirely) men is viewed as bad. For example, the Boy Scouts of America has started to allow girls in because it's sexist not to allow girls. (Now, internally, most members of the BSA who agreed to let in girls are doing so due to dwindling numbers of members, but that's besides my point.) And yet, we continue to have the Girl Scouts of America. I've heard people say the Girl Scouts sucks. So reform it. And there's already co-ed Venturing Scouts. Let us guys have time to develop among other men alone. (Also, let's not even get into the logistics of letting teenage boys and girls alone in the woods together.) This wasn't forcing us into stereotypical gender roles as men. It was helping us build skills and confidence as men to be able to tackle the world. Sometimes, men have to be with other men.

I had a co-worker in college who said that fraternities were sexist because girls aren't allowed to join. Yet she saw no problem with keeping sororities as "WOMEN ONLY." My favorite example of missing the point of the organization/event is one from college. During Homecoming Week, we had an event called Mr. UMP which was a male beauty pageant named after our university, University of Missing the Point (UMP). The event was amazing for three reasons - (1) it was sexist towards men and that was the joke, (2) it allowed men a time during the busy hectic year to goof off, (3) it allowed men to express themselves on a pretty female-focused campus. It was unbelievably fun to watch the most masculine men parade around goofing off as if they were pieces of meat. It was a joke we were all in on. During the talent portions, it allowed us to show off sides of us that we didn't normally show. Everyone had an amazing time. My senior year, the Gender Equity group wanted to have a representative compete which was fine. All the sororities had a guy represent them in very cheesy ways. But they had a female student represent them. It wasn't ideal but it was just a one time thing. And this girl was a pretty butch lesbian, so she wasn't much different than the guys and we enjoyed it.

I'm now two years removed from it and this year, my old roommate sent me a picture of the flyer for the pageant this year. It is now Mx. UMP - a completely gender-neutral/gender-inclusive pageant where anyone can show off. It completely misses the point of why we did the event. It was meant to be a silly, whimsical event for guys to goof around and have a good time. And women could enjoy watching us goof off. Now, it's nothing. It might still be enjoyable to watch, but it completely misses the intention of why we did the original pageant.

I am all for integrated organizations when we have the ability to also let people spend time amongst their own gender. If we decided as a society to get rid of ALL single-gender organizations, I would be okay with that. However, we cannot let a double standard exist. Male-only organizations are not to exclude women. They are to let men grow into men in the same way that female-only organizations strengthen women. We need equality not hypocrisy.