A Precious Gift to Give or Get This Holiday Season

A Classic from 1994. Twenty-two women expressing Good Will Toward Men.

Gift a year of Medium and send this URL to your friends or loved ones:

https://malefriendlymedia.medium.com/list/good-will-toward-men-as-expressed-in-1994-1ced17427aaa

Good Will Toward Men is a collection of interviews I conducted in 1993 and 1994 with twenty-two women, most of whom identified as feminist, who were ready, willing and able to talk not just about men’s advantages as men and women’s disadvantages as women, but also about men’s disadvantages as men and women’s advantages as women.

Perhaps more than anything it is a book of much-needed care and empathy for men.

And it is posted as a series of stories right here on Medium for you to give as a gift to remember for people who do not yet have a paid Medium membership.

Praise for Good Will Toward Men

• “With the heart and soul of our society focused around gender struggle, Jack Kammer’s passionate and intelligent Good Will Toward Men may help us move away from unproductive divisiveness and empty, simplistic blaming, toward a new gender conviviality. This is a courageous book that steps outside the gender neurosis of our time, offering much-needed, if difficult, fresh perspectives on the efforts of us all to be individuals.” — Thomas Moore, author of Care of the Soul and Soul Mates
• “Good Will Toward Men moves beyond the old. tired rhetoric of women’s rights vs. men’s rights. The powerful and intelligent female voices in this book herald a new era of cooperation and mature partnership between the sexes based upon gender justice, mutual understanding and respect.” — Aaron Kipnis, Ph.D., author of Knights Without Armor, co-author of Gender War, Gender Peace
• “Jack Kammer deserves high praise for providing a lively forum for independent women who care about men and who are strong enough to disagree with politically correct gender discourse.” — Eugene August, Ph.D., Alumni Chair in the Humanities, University of Dayton
• “If you want to really understand the increasingly complicated relations between men and women, then Good Will Toward Men is a must read.” — Bob Berkowitz, host, CNBC’s “Real Personal”
• “The first step toward ending the battle of the sexes is to listen, listen, listen with compassion and good will to both sides. Jack Kammer’s book presents fresh, thought-provoking material for us to listen to.” — Marvin Allen, M.A., psychotherapist, author of In the Company of Men: A New Approach to Healing for Husbands, Fathers and Friends
• “Good Will Toward Men is a well-reasoned invitation to replace blame with understanding, hostility with compassion, and bitterness with reconciliation. It calls for a dialogue of inclusion that could defuse the battle between the sexes that only perpetuates the cycle of wounding. An open-minded reading could go a long way toward healing the pain of betrayal felt by both men and women. A refreshing respite from the hardened attitudes and inflammatory rhetoric that lead to more misery for everyone.” — John Amodeo, Ph.D., co-author of Being Intimate
• “Good Will Toward Men shows us how our thinking regarding men requires some change. This book will help our relationships with men.” — Jan Halper, Ph.D., author of Quiet Desperation: The Truth About Successful Men
• “An important book, bound to stir controversy and, if read carefully, to stir the dialogue between men and women.” — James A. Levine, Director, The Fatherhood Project, Families and Work Institute
• “This wonderful book makes enchanting reading. The many voices of these diverse, intelligent women make powerful testimony for sanity and humanity. This is an important early step toward amnesty in the war between the sexes.” — Katherine Dunn, author of Geek Love
• “In Good Will Toward Men, we are treated to America’s first view of the genuinely liberated woman: women who believe as much in responsibilities as in rights; as much in men’s goodness (and evil) as in women’s goodness (and evil); women who are internally secure and therefore not politically correct. The great man behind these women is Jack Kammer, who seems to know when to listen and when to confront. Good Will Toward Men will create good will toward women. It will help turn the women’s and men’s movements into a gender transition movement. It will help turn the war between the sexes into love between the sexes.” — Warren Farrell, Ph.D., author of Why Men Are the Way They Are
• “Kind words are the white flag both sides in the battle between the sexes need to see more often, and Jack Kammer’s book is filled with them. For too long, the discussion of gender has been dominated by those who shout their rhetoric loudest. Good Will Toward Men contains many smart observations by clever women willing to speak the truth softly but with courageous insight.” — Denis Boyles, editor-at-large for Men’s Health Magazine
• “Good Will Toward Men is a wise, brave and long overdue book. Free of malice and ideological cant, the women here speak truths that millions of us, men and women both, will recognize from personal experience.” — Harry Stein, former “Ethics” columnist for Esquire
• “Jack Kammer does a fine job of facilitating the dialogue, bringing out a different perspective without alienating or polarizing the women he talks to. This is a fine book and I hope it’s widely read, because it’s badly needed.” — Herb Goldberg, Ph.D., author of The Hazards of Being Male
• “A great and important book. Good Will Toward Men is a masterpiece that begins the bridging of the gender gap. It is water in the desert of gender-polarization and will become a rallying point for women and men of good will.” — Doug Gillette, co-author of King, Warrior, Magician, Lover
• “Jack Kammer has given us the book we need as we move toward a necessary reconciliation between men and women in this culture. Good Will Toward Men presents the views of twenty-two fair-minded, optimistic, intelligent women who have broken through the wall of politically correct rhetoric and made some judgments of their own. A hopeful, healing book that is, I trust, the start of our next revolution.” — Asa Baber, “Men” columnist for Playboy
• “A powerful and deeply moving book aimed at dissolving the absurd war between the sexes. While respecting the legitimate needs and grievances of women, the contributors to this volume sensitively and compassionately illuminate ‘the man’s story,’ about which so little is known. Every man owes a ‘thank you’ to the women interviewed in this book.” — Nathaniel Branden, Ph.D., author of The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem
• “A provocative book that makes us take another look at what women really think about men. It leads the way to calling a truce in the battle of the sexes.” — Carol Cassell, Ph.D., author of Tender Bargaining: Negotiating an Equal Partnership With the Man You Love
• “This book opens up the conversation between men and women in ways they have never been opened before. Jack Kammer provides the catalyst that can push our understanding of men’s and women’s roles to new heights.” — Geoffrey Greif, Ph.D., professor of Social Work, author of Single Fathers
• “Good Will Toward Men offers significant new perspectives on the pressing issue of gender-based discrimination. The diverse women whose lively, forceful voices make up this eminently readable book all agree on one compelling conclusion: that women can never enjoy personal autonomy, liberty, or equality so long as either women or men remain strait-jacketed by society’s gender-based stereotypes. A welcome and needed book.” — Nadine Strossen, National President, ACLU; Professor of Law, The New York Law School

The twenty-two women and their topics

1. Cathy Young, writer, speaking about the perils of the victim mentality and how it disempowers men.
2. Judith Sherven, Ph.D., therapist, speaking about women’s unrealistic expectations of men and how men can deal with them.
3. Helen Fisher, Ph.D., anthropologist, speaking about the roots of patriarchy and the fact that it was not an evil, selfish, oppressive male conspiracy.
4. Doris Caldwell, R.N., drug-abuse counselor, speaking about the special, race-based stereotypes against African-American fathers
5. Laurie Ingraham, MSW, therapist speaking about women’s prejudices toward men and how men can effectively respond in constructive ways
6. Karen DeCrow, attorney, president of NOW, 1974–1977; speaking about how to end the battle between the sexes
7. Barbara Dority, anticensorship feminist, speaking about sex and sexual imagery
8. Char Tosi, founder of Woman Within; speaking about how women can embrace their feminine shadow and how men can deal with it courageously
9. Jane Chastain, America’s first female sportscaster, speaking about her happy experiences working with men who are stereotyped as being uncaring oppressors of women
10. Gayle Kimball, Ph.D., women’s studies professor speaking about 50–50 parenting and the need for improved social support for fathers
11. Claudia Valeri, writer, editor, broadcaster, speaking about compassion and gratitude for fathers
12. Ruth Shalit, writer, speaking about a rape protest run amok at Princeton University
13. Suzanne Steinmetz, Ph.D., sociologist, speaking about domestic violence against men
14. Audrey B. Chapman, therapist and trainer, speaking about the special dynamics of African-American male-female relationships
15. Jane Young, writer, professor of English, speaking about the societal notion of the “disposable” father
16. Rikki Klieman, attorney, law professor, speaking about her experiences defending clients against false allegations of rape
17. Carolyn Baker, Ph.D., consultant in human development, speaking about female longing for healthy masculinity
18. Carol Iannone, Ph.D., professor, speaking about the politics of feminist scholarship
19. ArLynn Leiber Presser, attorney, writer, wife of a divorced father, speaking about American attitudes toward divorced fathers
20. Ellen Dublin Levy, advocate for children, speaking about the barriers fathers face in bulding relationships with their kids even in intact marriages
21. Sandra Rippey, U.S. Navy Reserve officer, speaking about sexual harassment and counter-productive sexual harassment training in the Navy
22. Elizabeth Herron, educator in women’s empowerment and gender reconciliation, speaking about partnership with men

Enjoy and share Good Will Toward Men on Medium here. Happy Holidays.