In the conversation of a more gender just world, are we forgetting the men?

Young men in America today inhabit a country that is very different from the one that existed 50-60 years ago. That was when men from the middle class had jobs that paid decent wages, adequate to provide for the family and realise the American dream. Factory workers, equipment dealers, and gas station workers could afford quality food, a house, garden, road trips and vacations. Women were in the workforce in large numbers, but the role of the man in being the “provider” was dominant and well recognised.

Globalisation and the loss of manufacturing jobs have led to the hollowing out of the middle class with their wages being stagnant (and even lower). Two incomes and multiple jobs are now a necessity for survival for millions of middle-class families. The man is no longer the sole “provider.” The large proportion of single parent homes — particularly amongst women without a college education — means that many boys grow up without a male/father figure at home or even at school, where the teachers are overwhelmingly female. And studies have shown that the absence of a stabilising father figure severely impacts life outcomes for boys, while not affecting girls so much.

At the same time, the focus on women’s empowerment has led to women going well ahead of men in educational achievements in the US. A recent report in The Stanford Review pointed out that today women in the US are more likely to go to school, college, graduate and get better paying jobs than men. Women outnumber men by 7 per cent among Stanford’s undergraduates; Harvard has had a female majority for seven years in a row in its undergraduate programme. In the next five years, for every man graduating college, there will be two females graduating.

Women also benefit from a far more supportive environment than existed a few decades ago, whether it be special government initiatives for girls, increasing efforts to get more women into STEM, corporates seeking to increase women’s representatives on boards and in senior leadership (although women still have a long way to go on all these fronts). Stanford has 14 “women-only” academic and pre-professional organisations, while not a single male-only equivalent exists.

There are some parallels with India. In India too, in the CBSE Class XII results for 2023, the pass percentage was 6 percentage points higher for girls compared to boys. The central and state governments have a slew of schemes specifically targeted at women including those for free education, access to property titles, wealth creation and skilling and free public transport. In the corporate sector, minimum requirements for women’s representation on boards have been prescribed and there is a greater effort to increase women’s representation at all levels of the corporate ladder.

Across the world, including in India, society and media are now much more vocal about patriarchy and how it has historically disadvantaged women. The “MeToo” movement made headlines all over the world, bringing into sharp focus the topic of male predatory behaviours. “Male toxicity” is an oft-bandied word. On the podcasts I listened to, men highlighted that this discourse has made them defensive, hesitant in approaching women and forming romantic relationships — they fear being misunderstood and accused of predatory behaviour or harassment.

Gender norms and ideas of masculinity are changing, and many men lack clarity about their role and place in society. On numerous podcasts, men highlight that they are directionless and don’t know what is expected from them. They don’t know what it means to succeed and how to succeed. Many said they feel empty. The incidence of substance addiction, suicide and incarceration for young men in the US is multiple times that for women. Young men who feel marginalised and “put down” perceive that women’s achievements are more visibly celebrated than men’s. A popular podcaster pointed out that the media highlights the male gender more strongly in negative stories about men and de-emphasises gender in positive stories about them. Whereas in the case of women — if the woman is successful (or say a victim of a crime), her gender is emphasised more than it would be in a negative story about women. There have been occasions when I have heard my colleagues in the corporate world say that a woman was promoted or hired to a senior position on account of her gender.

Will this “battle of the sexes” play out in India? There is no doubt that women’s empowerment has a very long way to go. Women are still severely underrepresented in several sectors and in the top echelons of politics, the business world and civil society. Women are woefully missing from our public spaces in India. We need to see health outcomes for women improve significantly. Women’s safety is a serious area to address. So, we do need to continue and even accelerate the efforts to empower, encourage and celebrate women. Nevertheless, as a society we cannot afford to ignore the potential backlash this creates in young men and its impact on how they perceive their access to opportunity and their place in society. The Indian context is different from the US, and some of the US nuances may not be immediately relevant in India. But the underlying sentiment of a young man paraphrased as “why should I have to pay the price for the patriarchy enjoyed by previous generations when I don’t have the benefits that patriarchy provided” is not irrelevant here. Our conversations and initiatives need to change to recognise these sentiments and sensitivities — if not addressed, their implications for societal health and stability are profound. It is not too early to begin.

(The writer is former corporate leader, CRISIL and ONI)