Earl Silverman, founder of the only abused men’s shelter in all of Canada, has killed himself. After 20 years of fighting for the forgotten, the overlooked, the marginalized, and the sneered at, he closed his shelter due to lack of resources, and today closed out his life, because no one gives a damn about men and boys.
The last I spoke to him, he’d just managed to get some mainstream media attention in the face of the sneering feminist media hungry lawyer there to “debate” him and who tried his best to minimize anything Earl had to say. Earl did great, but still, nobody cared enough to do anything. He privately outlined a strategy for me for finally getting someone in the government to pay attention, after decades of futility, and I didn’t think it would work. I tried to be encouraging and supportive, but I probably wasn’t encouraging enough.
Today he hung himself and I’m pingponging between crying and shrieking rage.
If you’re a male, you’re disposable mother*****. If you’re abused, it’s your fault. If you’re poor, it’s your fault. If you’re out of a job, it’s your fault. If you’re desperate, it’s your fault. If you’ve had your children and all your possessions and most of your income stripped from you by an insane family court system and a vindictive and abusive ex-, it’s your fault. You’re “privileged,” don’t you know, because you’re male.
I cheerfully await some of the feminists who will likely be dancing on his grave and/or giving their usual stupid bullcrap song and dance about how what caused the indifference was their phantasmagoric lie of “The Patriarchy” or “toxic masculinity” when they’ve lifted not a god damned finger for 40 years to help men and boys and spread lie after lie about how most of the victims of abuse are women and hardly any are men. I also look forward to the conservative traditionalists shaking their heads and looking the other way, just like the hypocritical jerks who say nice things about manhood but don’t actually do a god damned thing for men and boys that most of them are.
If you’re male in this society, you are a disposable utility, and that’s all you are. Earl recognized it, tried to do something about it, and finally gave up.
And here’s my prediction: almost no one in the mainstream media will bother writing one word about this. Because Earl was a man, and nobody cares about men and boys.
*Update*:
More here.
Dean Esmay is the author of Methuselah’s Daughter. He has contributed to Dean’s World, Huffington Post, A Voice for Men, Pajamas Media. Neither left nor right wing, neither libertarian nor socialist.