Men’s Roles

In researching the women’s movement, it was important to the three of us that we also understood the role that men played. There was no universal male role in the movement. In the course of our interviews we heard stories about supportive feminist boyfriends and husbands, stories of male abortion providers who were very much supportive, men who were purposely excluded from feminist meetings and women’s spaces to give women open spaces for personal development, and even, in certain instances, men who were obstacles to women’s progress and activism.

Los Angeles Times Article

[audio:http://sites.duke.edu/docst110s_01_s2011_bec15/files/2011/04/Suzi-Woodard-mens-role.mp3|titles=Suzi Woodard - men's role]

“The men were definitely supportive, they just weren’t in the middle of it…the models that we were following were the Berkley Women’s Health Collective and the Boston Women’s Health Collective that were groups of women and it was during that early feminist time, of that wave of the feminist movement, where it really was very much about women doing women’s stuff separately from men because when women had been in groups with men, the men tended to take over, and so in order to find our own voice, and do more freely what we felt like we needed to do, at that time for a while, it was I think important for us to be meeting separately. [Suzi Woodard 1:12:03-1:13:08]

[audio:http://sites.duke.edu/docst110s_01_s2011_bec15/files/2011/04/Gilna-Nance-men-and-feminism.mp3|titles=Gilna Nance - men and feminism]

“I don’t know, really, if the husbands were that supportive or if the women just did what they did, you know, didn’t have to have that support…although, you know…well I guess that was a part of feminism…you do what you need to do and he deals with it.” [Gilna Nance 46:17-46:33]

[audio:http://sites.duke.edu/docst110s_01_s2011_bec15/files/2011/04/Lorna-Chafe-men-and-childcare.mp3|titles=Lorna Chafe - men and childcare]

“They had workshop sessions, they had I would guess forty or fifty of us were involved in the day-long town hall meeting, husbands, men, fathers were conscripted to do child care and basically it was women going to the meetings.” ~Lorna Chafe [11:07-11:30]

[audio:http://sites.duke.edu/docst110s_01_s2011_bec15/files/2011/04/Meri-Li-Douglas-unsupportive-boyfriend.mp3|titles=Meri-Li Douglas - unsupportive boyfriend]

“I mean I was dating a guy that was really frustrating and we had this conversation, and we broke up because he says, ‘Meri-Li, you have to decide, you know, you are a black woman first, you are black first, and then you are woman.”  And I thought that was, that was the end of that relationship.  I mean, I guess we were on our way out.”  [Meri-Li Douglas 9:06-9:32]

[audio:http://sites.duke.edu/docst110s_01_s2011_bec15/files/2011/04/Connie-Winstead-male-doctors-vs-clinic-owners.mp3|titles=Connie Winstead - male doctors vs clinic owners]

“The doctor who started…was the doctor who helped me get the Women’s Pavilion started, was Robert Yowell…and he is retired now but he is still in Durham.  But his perspective would be interesting too.  I mean, he really stuck his neck out for us in the sense that you know, it was, like i said, it was very much frowned upon in the medical community to be doing this kind of thing and he was a…great advocate for a women’s right to choose.  I really have a lot of respect for him.  And you know, he really supported the women who worked at Women’s Pavilion and we needed his support because the guy that owned it, the guy from Florida was kind of a real jerk and I mean none of us liked him, he was in it for the money and we all objected to that and we always…felt really uncomfortable with him and his whole group and he wouldn’t provide any health care coverage for us, even the full time people, even myself and so  Dr. Yowell gave all of us free OBGYN work because he felt like that was not right.  You know, that we should get health care.  [Connie Winstead 36:15-37:34]