Men's place in feminist analysis and work has been a highly divisive issue.

Case in point, the White Ribbon Campaign, an organisation set up in Toronto by university professor Michael Kaufman and municipal politician Jack Layton. Kaufman first delineated WRC principles (on national TV) the day following École Polytechnique Massacre, precisely as mainstream media were railing against feminists who dared try and keep interested men from the occasional all-woman vigil.

Suzanne Jay: What were the principles that Kaufman and cohort put out about WRC?

In Thunder Bay, Ont., on December 7, 1989, these women wore white ribbons, as a gesture pointing to and opposing men's daily war against them. It is arguable whether the white ribbon maintained that meaning when men appropriated it for a high-visibility P.R. campaign in support of men allegedly ending violence.

SJ: Do you think that the ribbons maintained their meaning when worn by men?

Since then, white ribbons have been sent no-questions-asked to the Head of the World Bank, to political men of all stripes, to anchormen, to any father figure who'll wear one. Tag one on around December 6 (and now Fathers' Day) and you make all men look good.

The notion of accountability - first defined, I think, by U.S. anti-violence feminist Barbara Hart - is a useful criterion to test the cost-effectiveness of male inroads in feminist theory and practice. Despite supportive work by local profeminists, the WRC leadership remains pointedly not accountable to national or regional coalitions of feminists fighting male sexist violence on a daily basis. Repeated requests that WRC not compete with these groups' funding have not been honoured.

SJ: About local organizing, you state "they and some women tried to get regular men to wear the ribbons and were rebuffed." Why did you do this? It sounds as though you supported the campaign, that's why I'm asking you to clarify.

On the contrary, during its first fundraising campaign, the WRC raised a lot of money with the explicit promise that some of it would be turned over to feminist organisations. That campaign netted WRC upwards of $250,000. According to extensive research of Queen's University graduate student Bobbi Spark*, women's groups did not receive a cent from those revenues. Instead, WRC spent all the money on itself (salaries, rents, PR material, etc.) and on an even larger fundraising effort that did not turn a profit but comfortably established WRC's national and international fame.

Western Canada WRC members have tried to challenge the WRC leaders on their collaboration with power brokers such as the World Bank, no friends of women. They have been ignored and vilified, as I have when I raised these issues as far back as 1994. Indeed, WRC leaders are accountable to no one but to the media and to international bodies such as the UN, who fly WRC cadres to key "hot spots", in an apparent strategy of creating added entitlement for male technocrats on gender issues in select countries. How profeminist are these international bodies? What is their interest in funding/promoting men instead of women on gender issues?

Also, how does WRC organising work dovetail with international efforts by Male Lobby groups to re-empower men in The Family, through State intervention? Why is WRC now including Fathers' Day in its annual schedule of showcasing men and men's issues?

SJ: I think this is very valuable history and analysis. Women's groups here are so resigned to the WRC that many "hook up" with them just so that they don't get left out or left behind especially when it comes to media coverage. Do you know what is happening now with the money they raise? Are they still keeping it all and what are the annual revenues now? Rape Relief is interested to know from someone who has the information.

To get back to the local level, I - like others, mostly women - have approached men asking them to commit to wearing a white ribbon. I have mostly been snubbed. I have also seen the ribbon eagerly taken up by the worst kind of guys. Batterers have worn white ribbons to court, or used white ribbons to try and blend in truly progressive events such as the Men's Walk Against Male Violence. I have heard WRC leaders make excuses for such abusers, rehashing discredited theories about what "makes them" do it, decrying the "male condition".

And I have seen women bitterly attacked and censored for daring to raise any of the above issues. As if men had to be the future of feminism, let no facts stand in the way.

This is not to say that men cannot or should not be opposing sexism and supporting feminism. Some do and don't hog the credit. Some do and don't keep the money. Some do and don't guilt-trip or savage women in their lives. It's just that, so far, most men - including WRC cadres - aren't doing that, despite all the reasons we all have for hoping that they do.

SJ: Also you say "that men do not let the facts stand in the way." What do you mean by this?

*SPARK, Bobbi, "Men's Movements: Wolves in Sheeps' Clothing", Queen's University, 1998.