Just four months ago, the appointment of a Minister for Men and Boys in Victoria was being celebrated as an innovative move to address growing concerns about the manosphere.
That was under then Premier Jacinta Allan.
Now with Ben Carroll at the helm, the portfolio has been scrapped in his new-look cabinet unveiled this week.
Sure, Premier Carroll did promise in his opening speech that he was not Daniel Andrews and was not Jacinta Allan, and his cabinet reshuffle presented a strong opportunity to prove the point – but scrapping such a portfolio before the chance to see where it could go does seem premature.
While there were some reservations about how the Men and Boys portfolio would be approached, including from one of our regular columnists, Rita Nasr, the appointment of MP Paul Edbrooke to the role sent a message about how seriously the state was taking the manosphere’s scale. It elevated the issue of the rise of sexist and misogynistic attitudes among boys and men, and the need to intervene before harm and violence escalates.
Academics, including Professor Steven Roberts and Stephanie Wescott at Monash University, wrote at the time about the political significance and the substantial opportunities and risks of such a move. They said the key will be to follow the evidence, however uncomfortable that may be. They also noted how the portfolio creation seemed to recognise how much misogyny is now circling, including in research highlighting how much manosphere content is being shared in Australian schools and the normalisation of sexist and violent attitudes among some boys.
And the Men and Boys portfolio was key to Edbrooke’s elevation into cabinet for the first time in April. He’s now arguably got bigger and better things, perceived as a “winner” of this week’s reshuffle, and is now taking on police, emergency services, multicultural affairs, and crime prevention portfolios.
Carroll said that his deputy, Gabrielle Williams, will take on responsibilities for gender equality, which presumably now include the “men and boys” aspect – although the portfolio is called “women and gender equality” and comes in addition to Williams’ other major responsibilities.
Monash researchers urged the new minister to name misogyny as an increasingly mainstreamed ideology, one that research shows is a predictor of all forms of violence.
All forms of violence. That is not just domestic and family violence and sexual violence, it’s violence in schools, in workplaces and i the community.
Indeed, just yesterday at the Royal Commission into Antisemitism, Sara Meger from the University of Melbourne outlined her research finding that misogyny is a major cause of extremism in young men. She shared her survey of 1100 boys aged 13 to 17 and 2300 adults, finding that a person’s “attitudes about the permissibility of violence against women” was the most likely predictor of a person being susceptible to violent extremism, more so than religion or political views.
Meger also outlined how young boys and men aged 10 to 24 are “massively over-represented in our countering violent extremism efforts”, in line with a discussion she recounted from a representative of the Department of Home Affairs.
On Wednesday, Premier Carroll said his cabinet reshuffle demonstrated how his government is “going to do things better, more efficiently and more effectively.”
It seems there could be plenty of efficiencies to gain in a portfolio focused on the rise of the manosphere, including “efficiencies” that could save lives.