Man Sues London School Of Economics For 'Sexism'

The esteemed London School of Economics (LSE), home to the largest gender studies program in Europe, has been hit with a lawsuit by a former Masters student claiming it teaches “systemic sexism.”
The man, 39-year-old Tom Martin, based in London, began pursuing an MSc degree in gender, media and culture at the LSE’s Gender Institute in October 2009. He withdrew six weeks later, citing “anti-male discrimination” in the coursework.

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“Its programs actively block men’s discourse and perpetuate the men-bad, women-good dialogue,” Martin told me by phone yesterday. “I want gender studies to be more inclusive for men.”
The university says it found no evidence of discrimination in an internal investigation, but as a “goodwill gesture” offered Martin a full refund in January 2010, which he accepted.
Now Martin, who is representing himself, has filed over 200 pages of “evidence” with the Central London County Court and is seeking 50,000 GBD (or about $80,000) in damages for his claims of sex discrimination, breach of contract, misleading advertising, misrepresentation and breach of The Gender Equality Duty Act, a 2007 law meant to promote equality between men and women. An LSE representative said via email, “We emphatically reject the complaint made.”
Martin, who calls himself a “feminist” and a “men’s rights activist,” said he did a line-by-line analysis of the core texts taught in the gender classes and decided they were “overwhelmingly negative on men, blamed men for women’s perceived inequalities, and complained about misogyny but never spoke about misandry [which is defined as the hatred of men].” Martin declined to provide me with a list of the texts.
“Course content and core readings are reviewed annually,” said a statement from the university. “They reflect the Institute’s concern to give as broad as possible account of some of the key debates that structure the field–debates about sex and gender, nature and culture, production and reproduction, how power should be theorised and so on.”
According to Martin, issues facing men today that require more attention include: the gender gap in college graduation rates, unequal parental leave and pay, shorter life expectancies, uneven conscription practices, more and longer criminal punishments, a greater risk of execution and “no acknowledgment” of men’s particular health threats in scientific research and major media outlets.
He’s not the only one voicing these concerns. In the U.S., the newly formed Foundation for Male Studies aims to add more interdisciplinary courses in major universities that examine men in society.
However, in an op-ed in UK publication The Guardian, author Jonathan Dee all but laughs at Martin’s claims. “The dominant ideas, approaches and insights of the vast majority of academic disciplines are produced by, for and about men,” he wrote. “Gender studies is an attempt to critique this entrenched male bias… It strikes me as utterly bemusing that one would want to direct one’s ire towards one of the few academic spaces in which the implications of biases that go largely unchallenged elsewhere are explored.”
While Martin claims he’s after egalitarianism only, some of his views may raise eyebrows. “I don’t buy that women were oppressed by men historically,” he said. “There’s a perverse incentive in gender studies to preserve the inequalities that women face.” He also believes that men are the “victims” of prostitution, that women “volunteer” into sex trafficking and that women’s “hysterical” fear of rape damages equality.

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