This critique is a continuation of a narrative that developed during the campaign. Commentators asserted that men’s loneliness, disillusionment, declining educational outcomes, under- and unemployment, and feelings of abandonment by Democrats were driving them toward Trump, the GOP, and an almost caricatured vision of masculinity embodied by pro-wrestler Hulk Hogan and UFC’s Dana White.
Yet, while there is evidence to support some of these claims, it’s necessary to trace the discussion about marginalized men back to its roots: the men’s rights movement. For over 60 years, its activists have argued that men have drawn the short end of the stick, thanks in large part to what they characterize as feminist movements that purport to fight for gender equality but instead actually prioritize women over men.
Understanding the links between the men’s rights movement and the current fixation on disillusioned young men is critical because men’s rights activists have used many of these claims to advance a political agenda that attempts to hold girls and women back.
The men’s rights movement began spreading across the country in the early 1960s in response to what activists saw as a “divorce racket” that fleeced men and coddled women. Their complaints ignored the reality of divorce at the time: the restrictive fault-based system limited access to divorce, and structural inequalities like unequal pay and pink-collar professions made it impossible for women to support themselves (and their children) after their marriages ended. Nonetheless, men’s rights activists bemoaned how family courts awarded women alimony at the expense of their ex-husbands, as well as usually granting them custody of children (and with it, child support payments) thanks to a decades-old presumption that mothers were the more nurturing parents, particularly for younger children.
This anger spawned men’s rights groups like the pertinently named Divorce Racket Busters, founded in 1960 in Sacramento, and the American $ociety of Divorced Men—pointedly using the dollar sign in its name to emphasize men’s perceived financial exploitation.
These organizations convened to fight against divorce laws and provide emotional support for men, as well as connecting them with sympathetic attorneys willing to fight for the “male interest” in court. Much like the practice of consciousness-raising occurring in feminist circles during the same years, early men’s rights organizations offered social connection and a sense of political purpose to their members.
Through these gatherings a broader argument began cohering: men faced systematic and fundamental discrimination in a changing world. This belief enabled aggrieved men to see themselves as a class and a constituency for the first time.