Disgraced fashion mogul Peter Nygard's own SON is helping police investigate his alleged sex crimes By Guy Adams Investigates For The Daily Mail
15 Jan 2021
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'He has become my arch-nemesis. I no longer regard him as my father . . . He is a monster. I am now here to serve in any way I can, to support survivors and the justice process and also to help expose the people who covered up his crimes.'
Kai Bickle's world came tumbling down one night in May 2019, when he attended a dinner party at a lavishly decorated mansion overlooking the golden sands of Venice Beach in Los Angeles.
The host was his father, Peter Nygard, a Canadian fashion tycoon famed for the hedonistic lifestyle he pursued at a global portfolio of high-end properties, including vast residences in Winnipeg, Toronto and Montreal, as well as New York, and, most notoriously, a Mayan-themed 'private luxury resort' in the Bahamas.
Modelling himself on Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, the flamboyant Nygard, now 79, kept a revolving harem of girlfriends. Those caught up (often completely unwittingly) in this web had included actresses Susan Anton and Jennifer O'Neill, stripper-turned-reality star Anna Nicole Smith, and a former Wheel Of Fortune card turner by the name of Vanna White.
His Caribbean parties, meanwhile, tended to attract a better class of A-lister. Past visitors to the island property had ranged from Jane Seymour and Bo Derek to Robert De Niro, , Michael Jackson and Joan Collins, not to mention and , who were photographed there in the early 2000s on an innocuous family holiday.
The 2019 bash, during one of Peter's occasional business trips to LA, was to be a more down-to-earth affair. Roughly 20 guests, including Kai, 38, and his younger brother Jessar (one of roughly ten offspring Nygard has fathered via more than seven women) had been invited for food and drinks, followed by a late-night poker game.
That was the plan, at least. But Kai never made it to the card- table. Instead, he fled the lavish premises in a state of distress, shortly after dinner, believing that he had just witnessed his father attempting to sexually assault an eight-year-old girl.
Details of this ugly development are (it should be stressed) strongly disputed, and we shall examine them later. But the incident would kick-start an extraordinary chain of events that culminated just before Christmas, with the arrest of Peter Nygard on nine charges of sex trafficking and racketeering.
Currently behind bars, with his $900 million (£660 million) business empire in tatters and the FBI poring over his computer hard-drives, the fallen tycoon has now been accused of rape or sexual assault by at least 57 women. Several of Nygard's accusers were children when the alleged crimes took place, and many claim they were drugged.
At least 57 women have accused him.
He will appear in court in Canada next week, seeking bail as he fights extradition to the USA.
It is, perhaps, the most high-profile and shocking sex case since handcuffs were slapped on Jeffrey Epstein. And in a remarkable twist, it turns out that a leading figure in the increasingly public campaign to prosecute Mr Nygard is his aforementioned son, Kai.
Upcoming documentary: ‘Unseamly’ Canadian Designer Peter Nygård True Crime Documentary
Behind the scenes, I can reveal that Kai has spent the past 18 months secretly helping both the U.S. and Canadian authorities investigate his own father's alleged crimes. Keeping his role hidden from Nygard and his associates for several months, he has worked tirelessly to assist victims, and their legal teams.
On the personal front, he has changed his name (taking up his mother's surname to become Kai Zen Bickle) and used his influence over various Nygard companies to block efforts to move his assets offshore, fearing that would allow him to flee. 'We have been engaged in a brutal battle against my father and his enablers,' is how Kai summed things up when we spoke this week.
'He has become my arch-nemesis. I no longer regard him as my father . . . He is a monster. I am now here to serve in any way I can, to support survivors and the justice process and also to help expose the people who covered up his crimes.'
Perhaps most remarkably of all, Kai recently helped two of his younger siblings, one of whom remains a minor, to sue Peter Nygard over claims he 'engineered' the rape of his own sons. In an extraordinary lawsuit filed in August, the boys claimed that their leathery, multi-millionaire father instructed one of his long-standing girlfriends (who was also a sex worker) to 'make a man' out of them.
The first of these alleged attacks (which, again, are vehemently denied by Nygard) took place in the Bahamas 2004, when the son was 15 and the woman was in her mid-20s. The second occurred in Winnipeg in 2018, when the younger child was 14 and the woman was in her 40s. Court papers filed by the boys stated that the unnamed girlfriend was instructed to seduce Nygard's son by showering in his bathroom so that he 'could see her naked'. Then she raped him.
Afterwards, she allegedly told the boy he 'wasn't bad' for a 'baby.' The next morning, Nygard's girlfriend brought him breakfast in bed, kissing him on the lips and announcing: 'Mommy's got you.' Kai says he first became aware of this appalling incident last spring, and was 'sickened' to hear his brothers' claims.
He would often yell and scream at his staff.
'We all spoke and decided the best course of action was to file a lawsuit publicly in the hope that other survivors would feel safe to come forward and also file criminally against Nygard,' he says. 'We were originally going to have me in the suit as my young brother's guardian, but in the end decided not to because it would reveal to Nygard that I was working against him . . . At the time I was [secretly] doing everything I could to improve the odds that he would get arrested.'
To appreciate the extraordinary journey taken by Kai, we must wind the clock back to the mid-1980s, when his father was one of Canada's most talked-about self-made millionaires.
The son of penniless immigrants from Finland, Peter Nygard had launched his empire in the late 1960s, with an $8,000 (£6,000) investment in a struggling fashion firm. By the time he was 30, the company had become one of North America's most successful suppliers of leisure and sportswear, while his flamboyant eccentricities, which included keeping parrots in his office and filling the lobby of Nygard HQ with bronze busts of himself, turned him into an object of public fascination.
In 1987, the party-loving entrepreneur purchased a 4.5-acre patch of the island of New Providence in the Bahamas and set about turning it into a 'dream home' where he could indulge his champagne lifestyle. Over the ensuing years, he built 150,000 sq ft of Mayan-themed buildings, stretching over a dozen 'cabana-style' residences. The buildings at Nygard Cay eventually included a casino, a disco hut (with cameras beneath the dance floor, reportedly to shoot images of revellers from below), and the world's largest sauna, a 6,000 sq ft lodge made from 2ft-thick Canadian pine logs.
In the grounds were fake volcanoes that belched dry ice, a flock of peacocks, stone cobras which hissed steam at sunset, 60 ft towers festooned with hundreds of flaming torches (lit nightly by staff) and giant statues of nude women, purportedly modelled on some of Nygard's favourite girlfriends.
At weekends, he would host lavish parties, which appeared on various TV documentaries, including Lifestyles Of The Rich And Famous.
The place became a magnet for freeloading celebrities and, while Kai believes they generally had the most fleeting and brief relationship with Nygard, photos of their visits were then plastered across company literature and websites.
Prince Andrew, to cite one example, was recorded for posterity wandering with the long-haired fashion magnate on the beach, wearing blue shorts and boat shoes.
Born in the 1980s, Kai spent the first three years of his life in the Bahamas until his mother, Patricia, left Nygard, with whom she'd had three children but never married.
They moved first to California and then to the Pacific Northwest in the U.S. Over subsequent years, he had almost no regular contact with the fashion tycoon aside from occasional visits during school holidays, where he met various half-siblings.
'He would have one family weekend per year at his lake cottage, and a few days set aside for Christmas,' says Kai of the somewhat unorthodox arrangement. 'During those times, the days were filled with activities like horseback riding or mini golf.
'He could be a very charismatic person when he wanted to be and the family weekends were very light and brief.'
In the very limited time he spent with his father during childhood, Kai saw nothing that gave him reason to suspect that Peter Nygard was guilty of criminality, though he did have a highly volatile personality.
'He would yell and scream at his staff often, and that always was upsetting to everyone around it, but he would describe his yelling as 'passion' because of his 'high standards',' Kai says.
Nygard's children were further told that he 'lived a consensual, non-monogamous lifestyle,' Kai says. 'He made speeches at dinner to family when we were together to talk about how he hoped everyone got a wonderful partner and wished that he could find that special someone, but that it wasn't the life for him.
'He also had girlfriends that were persistently with him, always two or three, and often they were around for years. He wasn't embarrassed about it. He flaunted it on TV, it was part of his brand, something he showed the whole world. He was proud of it.'
Be that as it may, rumours of predatory behaviour by Nygard —and worse — had occasionally reared their ugly head, only to be quickly suppressed: a relatively easy task before the internet.
In 1980, for example, he was charged with the rape of an 18-year-old, but the charge was dropped when the complainant refused to testify. In 1996, three female employees meanwhile filed sexual harassment complaints in the Canadian province of Manitoba.
It looked like his hand was on her thigh, rubbing.
One, a 39-year-old communications manager, said that, when called into Nygard's office, she would 'find him in a state of undress . . . with his hands down the front of his pants, fondling himself.' He settled by giving the women $18,500 (£13,600) and denied any wrongdoing.
Then, in 2010, a Canadian TV network put out a Panorama-style documentary about Nygard, focusing on alleged sex abuse and harassment of former employees.
It quoted a former stewardess on his private plane who alleged that on one journey — during which Nygard was accompanied by a troupe of topless women — he lost his temper with staff, shouting: 'You are nothing! You are garbage! I am God!'
The programme also alleged that Nygard had engaged in 'inappropriate sexual contact' with a young woman who had been brought to his home in 2003 from the Dominican Republic. Nygard denied that either incident had happened, and sued to stop the documentary being broadcast.
Fast forward to May 2019, however, and those ugly incidents were largely forgotten. Kai, who was by then in his late 30s, had worked for his father's companies for just over two years after leaving college, but quit to pursue a career in activism and health science.
Nygard's trip to Los Angeles afforded them a rare opportunity to catch up, so he attended the aforementioned dinner party in Venice Beach.
As the night wore on, he recalls becoming uncomfortable about his father's behaviour towards an eight-year-old girl, who was attending with her mother, one of Nygard's old girlfriends.
'He's got her sitting right next to him at dinner, which is usually his girlfriend chair. And he's a creature of routine. So I'm already thinking this is weird.
'He's trying to act like the Papa. It was just weird . . . I'm noticing things. I'm noticing that he's telling her little secrets at dinner. Putting his hand close to her ear and going all hush-hush.' At the end of dinner, most of the other 20-odd guests got up to adjourn to the card table. However, Kai adds: 'I'm still watching him. Her chair gets pushed back. He brings her round to him.
'She was on his right side. He brings her to his left side, with his arm around her waist, and I see his elbow change and start moving as if — it looked to me, I couldn't see, but it looked like his hand was on her upper thigh, and rubbing. That's what it looked like to me . . . Everything in my body told me he was doing something terrible.'
'I had a huge adrenaline rush and I immediately told the mother to get her daughter away from him,' he adds. 'I stood up next to him and looked in his eyes. At that moment, for me, it was like all the walls were crashing down around him . . . And I realised that, yeah, he's probably trying to groom that girl.'
Nygard vigorously denied wrongdoing, and even called Kai 'sick' for thinking as much. But Kai was unconvinced.
Then, in February last year, ten women filed a bombshell lawsuit in New York claiming that the fashion magnate had used wealth and status to 'entice underage girls' from 'young, impressionable and often impoverished backgrounds' into his home, where they would be 'plied with alcohol' and (some allege) date-rape drugs, before being taken to Nygard's private quarters, where he would 'assault, rape and sodomise' them. Court papers claimed they were then coerced into joining a globe-trotting harem of sex workers paid thousands of dollars from Nygard's company funds and trafficked around the world on his company's private jet, which reportedly boasts a stripper pole.
One alleged victim, who was just 14 at the time, claimed Nygard raped her and paid her $5,000 (£3,700).
Another said her encounter with Nygard began with him showing her pornography after which he raped her, 'causing her extraordinary trauma and pain', the suit states.
Three of his existing ten accusers were 14 at the time. Three more were 15.
Within days, dozens more alleged victims had come forward. By the summer, some 57 survivors were pursuing legal action — and the number of alleged victims had reached 100.
Kai again confronted his father, only to be told it was all 'lies' and asked to speak out publicly in his father's support. But days later a friend texted Kai to complain about a recent visit to Nygard's house in Los Angeles.
'He said he'd brought a female friend with him, who had one or two drinks and had started to feel very high. Nygard took her up to his room and aggressively had sex with her, not using a condom.
'When I heard that, I knew he was not only as bad as people said he was, but was a dangerous criminal and had to be stopped.' He duly alerted the authorities about the friend's message. In a podcast called Live To Walk Again, released this week, he revealed that he began helping both the police and the alleged victims' lawyers, who he regards as 'heroes'.
Over the summer, Kai also used official positions held in Nygard firms to block two apparent efforts to move assets overseas, amid concerns that the tycoon might flee to evade justice.
PODCAST EPISODE: Peter Nygard Discusses His Father
'Through the course of ten months I also helped several survivors to file criminally against him, and spent countless hours on the phone with survivors, lawyers and authorities,' he says. Last month Nygard was arrested on U.S. charges at a home in the Royalwood area of Winnipeg. He spent Christmas behind bars and has consistently denied any wrongdoing, saying he 'expects to be vindicated' in court.
Kai has renounced his inheritance and is working on 'making the world a better place' by campaigning to close legal loopholes exploited by sex offenders.
'I'm very happy earning my own money, as I have all my life. We've never had a trust fund or an allowance, and since his money has been made through pain and suffering, I won't accept a potential inheritance,' he says.
His father's cash, he says, should instead go towards compensating victims. 'My focus now is to help the healing process.'

Throughout its first 25 years, Major League Soccer has seen players from all different corners of the globe, each with their own career story. Whether it be a guy like Tim Melia or Chris Wondolowski who were scrappy guys that came out of nowhere to be stars in this league, or world famous names such as Zlatan, Beckham, and Henry, the league's history of big names is as diverse as they come.
Let's take a look at the best player from each country around the globe. This will be based on national team allegiance. Today, we'll be leading with Europe!
Please note that this is my opinion, and in some cases the decisions were tough; I'll be sure to add in honorable mentions where I can, or add notes.
Albania: Shkëlzen Gashi ( COL 2016-18)
Short list to pick from here, as Gashi's only competition is Jahmir Hyka and Hamdi Salihi. Gashi gets the nod, if nothing else, for his huge 2016 season, where he scored 10 regular season goals (one of which was that year's Goal of the Year) as the Rapids damn near won the Shield. The madlad then went and one-upped that with his absurd equalizer in the playoffs against the Galaxy.
His last two years weren't as fruitful, but man, when he was on he could pull something out of nowhere.
Armenia: Yura Movsisyan ( KC 2006-07, RSL 2007-09 & 2016-18, CHI 2018)
Four choices here, although in the end it's Movsisyan winning out over Harut Karapetyan, who played a couple seasons in the 90s for the Galaxy, San Jose, and Tampa Bay. The fourth pick in a strong 2006 MLS SuperDraft out of Pasadena City College, Movsisyan is mostly associated with RSL, who acquired him in a 2007 trade. With the Claret and Cobalt, he would tally 15 goals in 53 regular season appearances, and in 2009 he'd hoist the club's first MLS Cup. That'd be his last game with RSL until 2016 after some time in Europe with Randers, Krasnodar, and Spartak Moscow (even sharing the Russian PL Golden Boot in 2012/13 with Wanderson). He'd put up a similar clip of 16 in 57 before being waived and finishing his MLS career with four scoreless games with Chicago.
Austria: Daniel Royer ( NYRB 2016-pres.)
The choice here was largely Royer vs. Andreas Ivanschitz, who was a regular starter for Seattle's first MLS Cup, but I can't say no to a man with over 100 MLS matches played and three straight 10-goal seasons. In all comps, the former Austria Vienna man is just two goals behind Thierry Henry for third on the Red Bulls' all time goal scoring list.
Belarus: Sasha Gotsmanov ( COL 2005)
Gotsmanov qualifies by default as the only Belarusian player in MLS history. The Minsk native (and son of former Soviet and Belarusian international Sergei Gotsmanov) played one (1) single game for Colorado in October 2005, against RSL.
Belgium: Laurent Ciman ( MTL 2015-17, LAFC 2018, TFC 2019-pres.)
Shouts to Roland Lamah, who had his moments in Dallas, and Jelle van Damme, who played a season and a half for the Galaxy, but Ciman is the obvious choice. While he's fallen off a cliff as he's gotten older, he's a three-time All-Star and won Defender of the Year in his first MLS season; in his second, he played for Belgium at Euro 2016. At 35, he's lost a step and probably should only be used in emergencies, but at his best he was an elite MLS center back that could also be deployed at right back.
Bosnia & Herzegovina: Haris Medunjanin ( PHI 2017-19, CIN 2020-pres.)
The first one where I'm not totally confident in my pick, as Baggio Hušidić made this tricky (and as a Union fan I'm afraid of bias). But at his best, Haris is an assist machine (30 in four MLS seasons so far), and a threat on set pieces; the madlad even scored an Olimpico this year. His left foot is probably the best the Union have ever had. While his commitment to defense was nonexistent, give him the ball and he could spray a pass anywhere.
Bulgaria: Hristo Stoichkov ( CHI 2000-02, DC 2003)
One of three former Ballon d'Or winners to play in MLS (the others being Lothar Matthaus and Kaka, although "playing" is generous for the former), Stoichkov spent the last four seasons of his career in MLS, scoring 22 goals in 72 regular season matches for Chicago and DC. In his first season, a 9 goal in 18 match outing for the Fire, he also won the US Open Cup, scoring the opening goal of the final, a 2-1 win over Miami. (The winning goal, by the way, was scored by our old friend Owen Goal.)
Croatia: Damir Kreilach ( RSL 2018-pres.)
Mr. Miyagi's favorite MLS player for his crane kick equalizer in the playoffs, the former Rijeka and Union Berlin man has proven to be an excellent utility piece and core part of RSL throughout his time there, scoring 26 goals and chipping in 14 assists in 86 regular season matches and playing all over the damn place (naturally a central midfielder, he's probably still RSL's best forward). At 31, he still has a lot to give.
MLS has seen a huge influx of Croats lately, though; before Kreilach's 2018 signing there had only been four Croatian players in MLS history, two of whom barely played. Currently, there are five on active rosters.
Czechia: Luboš Kubík ( CHI 1998-2001, DAL 2001)
Czech players have had a good hit rate in MLS. In his lone MLS season, Bořek Dočkal led the league in assists, and Zdeněk Ondrášek was a very solid piece for Dallas, albeit one whose MLS time was brief.
But no. We have to go with Kubik. The sweeper was Best XI twice, in 1998 and 1999, and won Defender of the Year in 1998 helping Chicago to a MLS Cup-Open Cup double. He'd win another Open Cup two years later, before being traded to Dallas in 2001 and retiring due to injury.
So many lethal counterattacks started on the foot of this man, and he is rightfully seen as one of the greatest defenders the league has ever seen.
Denmark: Jimmy Nielsen ( KC 2010-13)
I debated going WAYYYYYYY off the board here and throwing out Miklos Molnar. His time in MLS was brief, just the 2000 season before he retired, but the man was the best attacking piece on a Cup winner. He could have balled out if he didn't retire early.
But nah. We're going with Casino Jimmy, one of the keys towards Kansas City's early 2010s turnaround. A two time All-Star, Nielsen was Goalkeeper of the Year in 2012, a year that also saw him win the Open Cup with the Wiz (on penalties, because KC and penalties, name a more iconic duo at this point). In 2013, he capped off his career by winning MLS Cup, again on penalties, while playing with broken ribs.
England: Bradley Wright-Phillips ( 2013-2019, LAFC 2020)
This league, man.
The list of English players to have represented in MLS is a long one, full of iconic names. Ashley Cole. David Beckham. Frank Lampard. Steven Gerrard. Jermain Defoe. Wayne Rooney. Hell, even Bradley's brother Shaun.
But nope. Many of those guys are the butt of many MLS jokes. BWP, on the other hand, is one of the greatest goal scorers the league has ever seen, with two Golden Boots to his name and well over a century of league goals. He was a part of 3 Shield winning teams, and made CONCACAF's Best XI in 2018.
And it all started with a quiet trial in 2013 after Charlton dumped him. This. League.
And This. Man. Even as a fan of Philly who doesn't care much for the Red Bulls, I respect this dude and everything he's done. I hope he gets another year after winning Comeback Player of the Year this year.
Estonia: Joel Lindpere ( NYRB 2010-12, CHI 2013)
The only other option here was Erik Sorga, who could dethrone Lindpere as he came to MLS at a very young age. But it's unlikely, as Lindpere was quietly very solid for the Red Bulls during his time. The Tallinn native was a two-time All-Star, and in 2010 he was named the Red Bulls' team MVP.
Finland: Alex Ring ( NYC 2017-2020, AUS pres.)
T O P I C A L
There's a few fairly talented Finns in MLS right now that could make this interesting (I really like Robin Lod's game, and Lassi Lappelainen would be excellent for Montreal if he'd stop getting hurt). Ring however has proven his worth across 4 seasons, including time as NYC's captain. Over 10,000 MLS minutes, mostly for good teams, as a defensive anchor, he will be a fantastic tone-setter for the new Austin team.
France: Thierry Henry ( NYRB 2010-14)
Oh man, as an Ireland fan I wanted to give this to literally anyone else. I am still bitter, dammit.
His best competition is probably Aurelien Collin, who has a closetful of trophies (including a Best XI and MLS Cup MVP). But no...it's Henry.
When a big name comes to MLS, what people want to see is someone who treats the league with respect. Henry did that. Not only was he dominant on the pitch, a three-time Best XI nomination, he also respected the history of the club he played for and gave 100%, even though he was getting up there in the years. He's a Red Bulls and MLS legend...as much as I curse that godforsaken hand
Georgia: Valeri "Vako" Qazaishvili ( SJ 2017-20)
It looks like the San Jose chapter of Vako's career is done and dusted. While the former Vitesse man struggled for consistency, he did put up 26 goals and 13 assists across four MLS seasons for the Quakes, including 10 while being coached by Mikael Stahre, which should probably get him and Wondo some sort of award.
We'll see what's next for him, if he leaves MLS or goes back to Europe. His only competition was Quakes teammate Guram Kashia.
Germany: Bastian Schweinsteiger ( CHI 2017-19)
I'm...actually not sure about this one. I actually changed this while writing, as I very nearly chose Julian Gressel; the former Rookie of the Year has two 10-assist seasons under his belt, and Kai Wagner has also been one of the league's better fullbacks for Philadelphia; Schweinsteiger was solid enough for Chicago in his advanced age for some very frustrating teams (and even moved positions to center back!)...but man, I don't know.
Germany is weird. For a country with such a great footballing tradition, the pickings are fairly slim. Arne Friedrich had one good year for Chicago before injuries claimed his career. Lottar Matthaus was as committed to this league as Schalke are to winning football matches. Stefan Aigner was stifled by Anthony Hudson going galaxy brain. Torsten Frings...existed.
I dunno.
Greece: Alexandros Tabakis ( ATL 2017)
The only Greek in MLS history...and our second one game wonder. Atlanta's FOURTH string keeper in 2017, he managed to sneak into a game against Minnesota with Brad Guzan on international duty, Alec Kann injured, and Kyle Reynish sent off during the match.
Atlanta lost 3-2. He's now in USL.
Hungary: Nemanja Nikolić ( CHI 2017-19)
Dániel Sallói and Krisztián Németh had their moments, but the winner is Nikolić, who came to MLS from the Ekstraklasa and immediately won the Golden Boot. His totals diminished in the three seasons he spent with Chicago, but 51 goals in 96 appearances isn't too shabby at all - it's second in Fire history behind Ante Razov.
Iceland - Guðmundur Þórarinsson ( NYC 2020-pres.)
Not much choice, 3 guys, all of whom were mostly bench guys. I almost went with Kristinn Steindorsson here on the merits of "he didn't have a penalty saved by Rodrigo Schlegel."
Israel: Gadi Kinda ( SKC 2020-pres.)
It was either him or Dedi Ben Dayan, really. And I nearly went with the former Colorado left back, but nah, Kinda is very much the superior player. The midfielder born in Ethiopia, Kinda shone brightly in his first season in KC, with 6 goals and 4 assists in his debut season. He'll be a DP next season.
Italy: Sebastian Giovinco ( TOR 2015-18)
A signing that changed an entire club.
Before Giovinco, the Reds were a laughingstock. He came in, won a Golden Boot and MVP right away, led the league in assists, made Best XI three years in a row, led them to their first playoff game, their first MLS Cup final, their first MLS Cup win, and a historic treble. And they damn near won CCL too.
The Atomic Ant was must-see from Day 1. It's not just because of him that Toronto is now one of MLS's elite...but he was a huge part of changing that culture. 83 goals in 142 games in all comps. And he dished out his fair share of assists too, with a telepathic partnership with Jozy.
Latvia: Raivis Hščanovičs ( TOR 2010)
Not much to write about here. 14 games for a bad Reds team. Gets in by default with no other Latvian MLS players.
Liechtenstein: Nicholas Hasler ( TOR 2017-18, CHI 2018-19, SKC 2019)
Another one by default. 66 games as a utilityman. Won MLS Cup and the Shield, though.
Lithuania: Vytautas Andriuškevičius ( POR 2016-18, DC 2018)
Only other choice was Edgaras Jankauskas, a forward who played 14 games for the Revs. Vytas played 37 for Portland and zero for DC.
Luxembourg: Maxime Chanot ( NYC 2016-pres.)
Another one by default but this one's an actually really solid player that finished fourth in Defender of the Year voting in 2019. We take those.
Malta: Etienne Barbera ( VAN 2012)
2 games in 2012. Only Maltese player in MLS.
Montenegro: Branko Bošković ( DC 2010-12)
Pretty much every other Montenegrin player played less than 20 games in MLS. Bošković played 43 before returning to Europe for family reasons. 7 assists in his final season though, which is technically something.
Netherlands: Johan Kappelhof ( CHI 2016-pres.)
Much like Germany, bright footballing tradition, very shaky MLS history. Which is weird because the Eredivisie exports a lot of guys to MLS.
Also, I'm excluding Kelvin Leerdam, as he is probably changing his international allegiance to Suriname.
So I'm going with 2017 All-Star Kappelhof, who I think is still fairly solid.
But really the choices aren't great. Dave van den Burgh? Roland Alberg scored a hat trick once I guess? Danny Koevermans was decent but injured all the time?
Maybe it's a hot take. It probably is.
North Macedonia: Oka Nikolov ( PHI 2013)
Never actually played, only in a friendly. Watch this space though as North Macedonia is apparently courting LAFC's Danny Musovski.
Northern Ireland: Johnny Steele ( RSL 2012, NYRB 2013-14)
Another case of shaky opposition, it was either Steele or Steve Morrow, who played 41 games for Dallas in the aughts.
Steele played regularly for a Shield winner, the 2013 Red Bulls. Easy peasy.
Norway: Vadim Demidov Ola Kamara ( CLB 2016-17, LAG 2018, DC 2019-pres.)
Adama Diomande is the main competition here. Kamara's first stint in MLS was a smashing success, scoring 48 goals in 90 regular season matches for Columbus and the Galaxy (he was traded for Gyasi Zardes before 2018). A brief foray to China followed, and while he's back in MLS with DC he hasn't quite been the same.
Still a good player on his day, maybe just the Bennyball effect.
Poland: Piotr Nowak ( CHI 1998-2002)
When I think of early Chicago, Nowak and the earlier-mentioned Kubik are the first two names that come to mind. Kubik held down the back while Nowak was the chief creator in the midfield. Three-time best XI, three-time All-Star, and MLS Cup MVP.
...can I drink my water now?
Portugal: José Gonçalves ( NE 2013-16)
Gonçalves fell off a cliff in his latter years, but in his first MLS season he won Defender of the Year and in his second he was a key part of a team that made the MLS Cup final and damn near won the thing.
Runner up here is Nani who is probably closing in.
EDIT: I also forgot to mention Pedro Santos, thanks to the Crew fans who pointed that one out. I still think Gonçalves pips him for his 2013 if nothing else, but Santos is probably closer than Nani.
Republic of Ireland: Robbie Keane ( LAG 2011-16)
A LOT closer than you think; Time Person of the Century Juventus legend Ronnie O'Brien was two-time best XI himself.
But nonono. This is Robbie freaking Keane. When we see these big name Euro guys interested in MLS, this is the man we want them to be.
Hypercompetitive and holding guys accountable on and off the pitch, and scoring for fun. 83 goals in 125 MLS regular season appearances. Best XI four times. 2014 MVP. MLS Cup MVP in 2014. A closetful of team awards including 3 MLS Cups.
This man was a baller, and frankly his departure was the beginning of the Galaxy decline into irrelevance, but that's a story for another time.
Romania: Alexandru Mitriță ( NYC 2019-pres.?)
Question mark because he's on loan and I have no idea if it'll be permanent, but he was punted out by the Pigeons just as he was really starting to break out. He scored 12 goals in his debut season last year but filled in nicely this year while Maxi Moralez was injured. EDIT: NYC fans have informed me he wasn't punted out, but was loaned out to be closer to his pregnant wife. My apologies.
Honorable mention: Alex Zotincă, who played for the Wizards and Chivas USA in the aughts. Brave man.
Russia: Igor Simutenkov ( KC 2002-04)
Not a lot to pick from here either. 49 games, 12 goals for this forward from Moscow, who now serves as an assistant coach at Zenit.
Scotland: John Spencer ( COL, 2001-04)
Give Johnny Russell another few years and he'll pass Spencer, but for now I'm leaning the latter. Spencer as a coach was frustrating as hell, but as a player he was Best XI twice and an MVP finalist once. Dude could score goals despite battling injuries in his time in MLS.
Just don't let him sign Kris Boyd. Then you lose to Cal FC. No one wants that.
Serbia: Aleksandar Katai ( 2018-19, 2020)
FROM A SPORTING PERSPECTIVE.
And mostly due to a weak pool. Runner up was probably someone like Miloš Kocić.
18 goals in 62 games for Chicago before getting yeeted back to Serbia for Bad People Reasons
Slovakia: Albert Rusnák ( RSL 2017-pres.)
He has tenure on Ján Greguš, who's the closest competitor, but Rusnák is also good. He followed up a 14-assist debut season (4th in the league) with back to back 10 goal seasons before struggling this year with injury.
Slovenia: Robert Berić ( CHI 2020-pres.)
Once he got acclimated to MLS, the goals came, and Chicago has its successor to Nikolić up top. He finished with 12 goals in his debut season, tied for second in the league with Ruidiaz and Zardes.
Also, from what I saw early on, seems like he's a dark-arts type of guy that gets in your head. That's fun.
Spain: David Villa ( NYC 2015-18)
I really didn't want to put him here due to recent allegations, and the fact that Pozuelo has already matched his MVP and two Best XI performances....
77 goals in 117 games though, that's tough to pass on.
Sweden: Zlatan Ibrahimović ( LAG 2018-19)
It's Zlatan.
He pretty much dragged a sorry LA organization to something resembling competitiveness.
What the hell did you expect?
(Anton Tinnerholm made this hard, though)
EDIT: Forgot Gustav Svensson as well in my honorable mentions.
Switzerland: Stefan Frei ( TOR 2009-13, SEA 2014-pres.)
Pretty self-explanatory, one of the most accomplished keepers in MLS history and with a closetful of hardware. And all it took Seattle to get him was a late first round pick that pinged around so much that it was eventually traded for a coach.
Turkey: Sercan Güvenışık ( SJ 2012)
5 games that year. No one else has flown the Turkish flag in MLS.
Ukraine: Dema Kovalenko ( CHI 1999-2002, DC 2002-05, NYRB 2006-08, RSL 2008, LAG 2008-10)
I'm afraid he'd break my legs if I didn't. One of the most physical and downright dirty players the league has ever seen. Made nearly 300 appearances though, and has one each of the 3 major US trophies (MLS Cup, USOC, Shield), all with a different team.
Wales: Andy Dorman ( NE 2004-07, 2013-15)
Dorman was a key part of that real good Revs team from the mid-aughts, and just beats out Carl Robinson. He made 112 appearances in his first stint, and played in 3 MLS Cup finals, though they famously lost all three. The Revs brought him back in 2013 after some time in Scotland and England, and was playing semipro in the area as recently as 2018.

What can you do as an MRA?

• Can other people with less obvious MRA accounts like me i.e. more normal looking accounts, post stuff (this is a general comment, not just for this thread) post this on more mainstream threads e.g. Finland sub, sociology, etc.... MAKE SURE you are polite, factual, avoid emotive language, avoid talking about feminism, and post high quality stuff
• Comment here particular quotes, passages, excerpts that are relevant. Especially since its such a long document, this will be useful for all of us.
• You can make these excerpts into separate threads if worthy.
• Share this on social media? (set up an anon MRA twitter, Facebook etc... MRA is thriving on social media. It is good as its a lot more activism based)
• If you live in Finland, send some emails to journalists (you can search journalists who have already discussed mens issues), and send some to politicians etc. You can easily write one letter and send it to multiple people. Maybe the individual excerpts/issues you find would be better to send (and then you could also add the whole document summary as an addendum for reference for the reader) - Finland is a small country, I dont think many users will be from there here.
• NOTE: It is good that these issues are being increasingly recognised, and more people are doing this as projects in academia. This is only growing and snowballing as more people are red pilled. Look up Male Psychology Network, they are doing fantastic work, growing and have presented an ALTERNATIVE to patriarchy conspiracy theory and are working to dismantle the idea in academia. https://youtu.be/LHYRYKCIDxk?t=591

Main Body - Here it is:

This is a chapter-by-chapter summary of Discrimination Against Men: Appearance and Causes in the Context of a Modern Welfare State, a 2009 doctoral dissertation by Pasi Malmi (University of Lapland) that provides an impressively detailed and balanced investigation of discrimination against men in Finland (the theory and results actually give almost as much detail on discrimination against women, although men will be the focus here).
Chapters 5 to 8 are the most important. Chapter 5 explains six biases that cause gender discrimination, chapter 6 delineates the patriarchal and matriarchal subsystems of Finnish society, chapter 7 examines the various discourses that justify discrimination against men, and chapter 8 analyzes a database of gender discrimination complaints made to the Finnish gender equality ombudsman, a third of which were made by men.
(Length: 1,800 words.)
Chapters 1 to 4 (introductory/background chapters)
Chapter 1 situates the perspective taken by the dissertation within gender studies. It rejects anti-feminist and anti-women perspectives, and the glorification of traditional masculinity and gender roles (e.g., the mythopoetic men’s movement). But it also rejects the “critical studies of men” paradigm, which sees men as the main causes of men’s and women’s problems, refuses to criticize feminism or women, and does not believe that discrimination against white, heterosexual, middle-class men exists (pp. 20–21).
Chapter 2 defines various relevant concepts, and explains that the findings from Finland are intended to be relevant primarily for the Northern European welfare states, and secondarily for other European and Anglo-American countries (pp. 32–34).
Chapter 3 gives a brief overview of current or traditional viewpoints on what causes direct or indirect discrimination or mistreatment of men: gender roles, hegemonic masculinity, industrial capitalism, feminism (specifically gender feminism and victimization feminism), and exploitative women (pp. 36-44).
Chapter 4 develops a theory of sociocultural evolution, which says that ideas that are simple, exaggerated, and coherent with popular paradigms generally win out over their rivals, regardless of whether they are true or backed up by evidence. This happens due to functional selection (p. 57), unintentional biases (p. 63), and interest group bias (p. 71), among other factors (see summary, p. 115).
Chapter 5: Applying the Theory to Gender Discrimination (p. 118)
This chapter develops a general theory of gender discrimination, centered on a typology of six different biases that cause gender discrimination (p. 127).
The masculine bias and feminine bias are unintentional gender biases caused by the processes that simplify, exaggerate, and mutate people’s mental memes or ideas according to their gender (p. 127). For example, a person’s conception of domestic work or childcare will be centered on their own experiences or contributions, which are partly determined by their gender, and so they will often downplay/exclude the other gender’s contributions (e.g., yardwork vs. housework) (pp. 135–138). As a result of these biases, segregated groups and networks of men or women tend to have a masculine-biased or feminine-biased culture of values, priorities, concepts, words, stories, jokes, stereotypes and beliefs that can lead to practices that discriminate against the other gender (p. 120). For example, a group of female social workers might decide that women are better custodians of children and default to recommending custody to them (pp. 141–142).
The masculist bias and feminist bias come from interest groups, networks, or movements seeking to advance the status of men or women, respectively. Masculism and feminism have sexist and anti-sexist branches (p. 143). The modern sexist branch of feminism includes theories like feminist standpoint epistemology (which gives special status to women’s feelings and intuitions) and the feminist theory of social work (interests of women and children are synonymous, social workers should identify with their female customers). It also includes stereotypes that women are unselfish, peaceful, responsible, loving, hard working, while men are the opposite (pp. 149–152). The anti-sexist branch of feminism by definition is less hostile towards men as people, but it is not necessarily able or willing to accept men’s issues: “[i]n general, the idea of the discrimination of men is perceived as bizarre by feminists” (pp. 155–158). The sexist branch of masculism is discussed primarily in the context of religion (pp. 144–129). The anti-sexist branch of masculism has little power, although it is discussed as sometimes being the source of biased statistics downplaying women’s issues (pp. 152–155).
The alpha male bias and alpha female bias are the biases of high status (wealthy, powerful, attractive, etc.) members of each gender against low status members of their gender. They are particularly apparent in high status men’s bias against male criminals (male judges giving harsher treatment, including sentences, to them compared to women) and high status women’s bias against female prostitutes (pp. 170–173).
A central point of this dissertation is that male-dominated and female-dominated organizations (the patriarchal and matriarchal subsystems) are prone to predominantly discriminate against the other gender, but it’s important to clarify that they’re not guaranteed to do so. The masculine and feminine biases (the unintentional “own gender” biases) are just two of the six biases. An organization could be more influenced by the ideological biases (masculist and feminist biases) or the biases against low social status people of each gender (alpha male and alpha female biases).
Chapter 6: Locating the Patriarchal and Matriarchal Subsystems of the Finnish Society (p. 188)
This chapter identifies Finnish society’s patriarchal and matriarchal subsystems by looking at various measures of power, including raw numbers, managerial positions, control of knowledge, and informal positions of power (p. 222).

• Patriarchal subsystem: technology, commerce, state finances, defense, agriculture, transportation, trade, corporative labor and employer organizations.
• Matriarchal subsystem: healthcare, social services, social policy, equality policy, hotels, restaurants, and some cultural services.

Not all areas of Finnish society fall into one of these subsystems.
Chapter 7: An Empirical Examination of the Memeplexes, Discourses and Coalitions that Induce Discrimination against Men (p. 224)
This chapter analyzes the discourses that justify discrimination against men, coming from sources that include sexism and feminism.
Sexism: The development of the modern misandric versions of sexism is examined, including 19th century views of men as “barbarians whose urges had to be leashed in by the forces of decency—meaning women—if civilization were to survive” (p. 233), which it attributes to the joint interests of women and upper class men. Notions of chivalry and macho masculinity also lead to institutionalized belief systems where men’s comfort, health, and even lives are considered less important than women’s (p. 238). Macho masculinity, with its aversion to men “complaining”, tends to oppose talking about men’s issues or seeing them as relevant for gender equality (p. 306).
Feminism: Certain influential varieties of feminism see women as the disadvantaged and discriminated gender (p. 247). Thus the sole purpose of equality policy is women’s advancement (p. 256) and men are largely reduced to the role of defendant (p. 270). When faced with cases requiring a choice between promotion of equality and empowerment of women, many feminists reacted by rejecting equality as outdated or as a smokescreen for promoting men’s interests over women. Under these discourses, “the empowerment of women is more important than the advancement of gender equality in all contexts, including the matriarchal subsystem of the society” (pp. 259–260). That would apply even to women’s advantage in family courts and criminal courts (p. 305).
Also mentioned is a combination (and mutation) of difference feminism and equality feminism which says that “women are superior to men in many ways, but men are not superior to women in any ways” (p. 296)—which means that when men are ahead it’s because of sexism, but when women are ahead it is legitimate and natural.
The groups and alliances that justify misandry and discrimination against men (p. 334):
📷
Chapter 8: Gender Discrimination, According to the Complaints Sent to the Finnish Equality Ombudsman (p. 346)
Complaints: This chapter analyzes 800 complaints of gender discrimination made between 1997 and 2004 and sent to the Finnish equality ombudsman (p. 348). Men were 33% of victims, according to the author’s suggestion for the best measure of actual discrimination in these cases (outcome types 3–5, p. 356). Labour market discrimination, the largest category, primarily involved women (76%), while the second largest category, discrimination against customers, primarily involved men (~60%).
Another category, discriminative legislation, primarily involved men (77%). Few complaints were made, but due to active conscription policies (lasting 5-12 months), almost all men in Finland are affected by discriminative legislation. The author classifies these complaints as discrimination, although the equality ombudsman does not, “as the Finnish equality law is not applicable to men’s obligatory military service” (p. 354).
Bias: Per chapter 6, equality policy itself is in the matriarchal subsystem of equality (e.g., 90% of employees in the equality ombudsman office are female, p. 354). The ombudsman has a policy not to comment on complaints involving custody and divorce, purportedly to not interfere with the court system, but the author suggests that it stems from a bias against men, perhaps due to prioritizing women’s status over equality or wanting to avoid a flood of complaints from men (p. 354). This is made more explicit by another comment from the ombudsman’s office saying that it is not taking action on certain cases of discrimination against men because “the main purpose of the equality law is to improve women’s status especially in the labor market”, suggesting that the law should be applied more strictly to cases of discrimination against women (p. 381).
Patriarchal & matriarchal subsystems: 57% of discrimination cases in the matriarchal subsystem of society (as defined in chapter 6) were against men, compared to 31% in neutral domains, and 17% in the patriarchal subsystem of society (p. 358).
Discrimination examples: Many cases of discrimination against women (e.g., a workplace that only required women to do extra cleaning tasks on top of their regular duties) are recounted on the same pages but we’ll look at men here.

• In the labour market: At a mental hospital, only men were appointed to night shifts (p. 374). At a school, preference was given to hiring female teachers even though men are the “underrepresented” gender (p. 376). Many traditionally feminine jobs excluded men in their recruitment material (p. 377). A workplace allowed women to wear more casual and comfortable clothing than men (p. 377).
• As customers: Favourable pricing for women in boat cruises, discotheques & dancing places, dating services, gymnastics, a theatre, restaurants, horse races, and car insurance (pp. 380–382). Also more strict clothing standards for men at a casino, higher minimum ages for men to enter restaurants, and an apartment that only allowed women (pp. 382–383).
• Government administration: Subsidy for women’s osteoporosis medicines but not men’s (from pension fund), free public screening for breast cancer but not prostate cancer, higher retirement age for men (which has been changed) (pp. 387–389).
• Legislation: Men’s complaints were all about the obligatory military or civil service of six to thirteen months (those who refuse get six months in prison, p. 390).

Likely motives: Two alternative rating methods (tables 52 and 53) find that either (certain) feminist ideas are the most common motivators of discrimination against men, or sexism and the feminine bias are the most common motivators (feminine bias meaning unintentional gender bias of groups of women, counterpart to masculine bias of groups of men). Financial motives were also frequent (pp. 401-402).
SOURCE: https://becauseits2015.wordpress.com/2017/10/22/comprehensive-research-on-discrimination-against-men-in-finland/

https://becauseits2015.wordpress.com/2017/10/22/comprehensive-research-on-discrimination-against-men-in-finland/
This is a chapter-by-chapter summary of Discrimination Against Men: Appearance and Causes in the Context of a Modern Welfare State, a 2009 doctoral dissertation by Pasi Malmi (University of Lapland) that provides an impressively detailed and balanced investigation of discrimination against men in Finland (the theory and results actually give almost as much detail on discrimination against women, although men will be the focus here).
Chapters 5 to 8 are the most important. Chapter 5 explains six biases that cause gender discrimination, chapter 6 delineates the patriarchal and matriarchal subsystems of Finnish society, chapter 7 examines the various discourses that justify discrimination against men, and chapter 8 analyzes a database of gender discrimination complaints made to the Finnish gender equality ombudsman, a third of which were made by men.
(Length: 1,800 words.)
Chapters 1 to 4 (introductory/background chapters)
Chapter 1 situates the perspective taken by the dissertation within gender studies. It rejects anti-feminist and anti-women perspectives, and the glorification of traditional masculinity and gender roles (e.g., the mythopoetic men’s movement). But it also rejects the “critical studies of men” paradigm, which sees men as the main causes of men’s and women’s problems, refuses to criticize feminism or women, and does not believe that discrimination against white, heterosexual, middle-class men exists (pp. 20–21).
Chapter 2 defines various relevant concepts, and explains that the findings from Finland are intended to be relevant primarily for the Northern European welfare states, and secondarily for other European and Anglo-American countries (pp. 32–34).
Chapter 3 gives a brief overview of current or traditional viewpoints on what causes direct or indirect discrimination or mistreatment of men: gender roles, hegemonic masculinity, industrial capitalism, feminism (specifically gender feminism and victimization feminism), and exploitative women (pp. 36-44).
Chapter 4 develops a theory of sociocultural evolution, which says that ideas that are simple, exaggerated, and coherent with popular paradigms generally win out over their rivals, regardless of whether they are true or backed up by evidence. This happens due to functional selection (p. 57), unintentional biases (p. 63), and interest group bias (p. 71), among other factors (see summary, p. 115).
Chapter 5: Applying the Theory to Gender Discrimination (p. 118)
This chapter develops a general theory of gender discrimination, centered on a typology of six different biases that cause gender discrimination (p. 127).
The masculine bias and feminine bias are unintentional gender biases caused by the processes that simplify, exaggerate, and mutate people’s mental memes or ideas according to their gender (p. 127). For example, a person’s conception of domestic work or childcare will be centered on their own experiences or contributions, which are partly determined by their gender, and so they will often downplay/exclude the other gender’s contributions (e.g., yardwork vs. housework) (pp. 135–138). As a result of these biases, segregated groups and networks of men or women tend to have a masculine-biased or feminine-biased culture of values, priorities, concepts, words, stories, jokes, stereotypes and beliefs that can lead to practices that discriminate against the other gender (p. 120). For example, a group of female social workers might decide that women are better custodians of children and default to recommending custody to them (pp. 141–142).
The masculist bias and feminist bias come from interest groups, networks, or movements seeking to advance the status of men or women, respectively. Masculism and feminism have sexist and anti-sexist branches (p. 143). The modern sexist branch of feminism includes theories like feminist standpoint epistemology (which gives special status to women’s feelings and intuitions) and the feminist theory of social work (interests of women and children are synonymous, social workers should identify with their female customers). It also includes stereotypes that women are unselfish, peaceful, responsible, loving, hard working, while men are the opposite (pp. 149–152). The anti-sexist branch of feminism by definition is less hostile towards men as people, but it is not necessarily able or willing to accept men’s issues: “[i]n general, the idea of the discrimination of men is perceived as bizarre by feminists” (pp. 155–158). The sexist branch of masculism is discussed primarily in the context of religion (pp. 144–129). The anti-sexist branch of masculism has little power, although it is discussed as sometimes being the source of biased statistics downplaying women’s issues (pp. 152–155).
The alpha male bias and alpha female bias are the biases of high status (wealthy, powerful, attractive, etc.) members of each gender against low status members of their gender. They are particularly apparent in high status men’s bias against male criminals (male judges giving harsher treatment, including sentences, to them compared to women) and high status women’s bias against female prostitutes (pp. 170–173).
A central point of this dissertation is that male-dominated and female-dominated organizations (the patriarchal and matriarchal subsystems) are prone to predominantly discriminate against the other gender, but it’s important to clarify that they’re not guaranteed to do so. The masculine and feminine biases (the unintentional “own gender” biases) are just two of the six biases. An organization could be more influenced by the ideological biases (masculist and feminist biases) or the biases against low social status people of each gender (alpha male and alpha female biases).
Chapter 6: Locating the Patriarchal and Matriarchal Subsystems of the Finnish Society (p. 188)
This chapter identifies Finnish society’s patriarchal and matriarchal subsystems by looking at various measures of power, including raw numbers, managerial positions, control of knowledge, and informal positions of power (p. 222).
​

• Patriarchal subsystem: technology, commerce, state finances, defense, agriculture, transportation, trade, corporative labor and employer organizations.
• Matriarchal subsystem: healthcare, social services, social policy, equality policy, hotels, restaurants, and some cultural services.

Not all areas of Finnish society fall into one of these subsystems.
Chapter 7: An Empirical Examination of the Memeplexes, Discourses and Coalitions that Induce Discrimination against Men (p. 224)
This chapter analyzes the discourses that justify discrimination against men, coming from sources that include sexism and feminism.
Sexism: The development of the modern misandric versions of sexism is examined, including 19th century views of men as “barbarians whose urges had to be leashed in by the forces of decency—meaning women—if civilization were to survive” (p. 233), which it attributes to the joint interests of women and upper class men. Notions of chivalry and macho masculinity also lead to institutionalized belief systems where men’s comfort, health, and even lives are considered less important than women’s (p. 238). Macho masculinity, with its aversion to men “complaining”, tends to oppose talking about men’s issues or seeing them as relevant for gender equality (p. 306).
Feminism: Certain influential varieties of feminism see women as the disadvantaged and discriminated gender (p. 247). Thus the sole purpose of equality policy is women’s advancement (p. 256) and men are largely reduced to the role of defendant (p. 270). When faced with cases requiring a choice between promotion of equality and empowerment of women, many feminists reacted by rejecting equality as outdated or as a smokescreen for promoting men’s interests over women. Under these discourses, “the empowerment of women is more important than the advancement of gender equality in all contexts, including the matriarchal subsystem of the society” (pp. 259–260). That would apply even to women’s advantage in family courts and criminal courts (p. 305).
Also mentioned is a combination (and mutation) of difference feminism and equality feminism which says that “women are superior to men in many ways, but men are not superior to women in any ways” (p. 296)—which means that when men are ahead it’s because of sexism, but when women are ahead it is legitimate and natural.
The groups and alliances that justify misandry and discrimination against men (p. 334):
📷
Chapter 8: Gender Discrimination, According to the Complaints Sent to the Finnish Equality Ombudsman (p. 346)
Complaints: This chapter analyzes 800 complaints of gender discrimination made between 1997 and 2004 and sent to the Finnish equality ombudsman (p. 348). Men were 33% of victims, according to the author’s suggestion for the best measure of actual discrimination in these cases (outcome types 3–5, p. 356). Labour market discrimination, the largest category, primarily involved women (76%), while the second largest category, discrimination against customers, primarily involved men (~60%).
Another category, discriminative legislation, primarily involved men (77%). Few complaints were made, but due to active conscription policies (lasting 5-12 months), almost all men in Finland are affected by discriminative legislation. The author classifies these complaints as discrimination, although the equality ombudsman does not, “as the Finnish equality law is not applicable to men’s obligatory military service” (p. 354).
Bias: Per chapter 6, equality policy itself is in the matriarchal subsystem of equality (e.g., 90% of employees in the equality ombudsman office are female, p. 354). The ombudsman has a policy not to comment on complaints involving custody and divorce, purportedly to not interfere with the court system, but the author suggests that it stems from a bias against men, perhaps due to prioritizing women’s status over equality or wanting to avoid a flood of complaints from men (p. 354). This is made more explicit by another comment from the ombudsman’s office saying that it is not taking action on certain cases of discrimination against men because “the main purpose of the equality law is to improve women’s status especially in the labor market”, suggesting that the law should be applied more strictly to cases of discrimination against women (p. 381).
Patriarchal & matriarchal subsystems: 57% of discrimination cases in the matriarchal subsystem of society (as defined in chapter 6) were against men, compared to 31% in neutral domains, and 17% in the patriarchal subsystem of society (p. 358).
Discrimination examples: Many cases of discrimination against women (e.g., a workplace that only required women to do extra cleaning tasks on top of their regular duties) are recounted on the same pages but we’ll look at men here.
​

• In the labour market: At a mental hospital, only men were appointed to night shifts (p. 374). At a school, preference was given to hiring female teachers even though men are the “underrepresented” gender (p. 376). Many traditionally feminine jobs excluded men in their recruitment material (p. 377). A workplace allowed women to wear more casual and comfortable clothing than men (p. 377).
• As customers: Favourable pricing for women in boat cruises, discotheques & dancing places, dating services, gymnastics, a theatre, restaurants, horse races, and car insurance (pp. 380–382). Also more strict clothing standards for men at a casino, higher minimum ages for men to enter restaurants, and an apartment that only allowed women (pp. 382–383).
• Government administration: Subsidy for women’s osteoporosis medicines but not men’s (from pension fund), free public screening for breast cancer but not prostate cancer, higher retirement age for men (which has been changed) (pp. 387–389).
• Legislation: Men’s complaints were all about the obligatory military or civil service of six to thirteen months (those who refuse get six months in prison, p. 390).

Likely motives: Two alternative rating methods (tables 52 and 53) find that either (certain) feminist ideas are the most common motivators of discrimination against men, or sexism and the feminine bias are the most common motivators (feminine bias meaning unintentional gender bias of groups of women, counterpart to masculine bias of groups of men). Financial motives were also frequent (pp. 401-402).

https://becauseits2015.wordpress.com/2017/10/22/comprehensive-research-on-discrimination-against-men-in-finland/
This is a chapter-by-chapter summary of Discrimination Against Men: Appearance and Causes in the Context of a Modern Welfare State, a 2009 doctoral dissertation by Pasi Malmi (University of Lapland) that provides an impressively detailed and balanced investigation of discrimination against men in Finland (the theory and results actually give almost as much detail on discrimination against women, although men will be the focus here).
Chapters 5 to 8 are the most important. Chapter 5 explains six biases that cause gender discrimination, chapter 6 delineates the patriarchal and matriarchal subsystems of Finnish society, chapter 7 examines the various discourses that justify discrimination against men, and chapter 8 analyzes a database of gender discrimination complaints made to the Finnish gender equality ombudsman, a third of which were made by men.
(Length: 1,800 words.)
Chapters 1 to 4 (introductory/background chapters)
Chapter 1 situates the perspective taken by the dissertation within gender studies. It rejects anti-feminist and anti-women perspectives, and the glorification of traditional masculinity and gender roles (e.g., the mythopoetic men’s movement). But it also rejects the “critical studies of men” paradigm, which sees men as the main causes of men’s and women’s problems, refuses to criticize feminism or women, and does not believe that discrimination against white, heterosexual, middle-class men exists (pp. 20–21).
Chapter 2 defines various relevant concepts, and explains that the findings from Finland are intended to be relevant primarily for the Northern European welfare states, and secondarily for other European and Anglo-American countries (pp. 32–34).
Chapter 3 gives a brief overview of current or traditional viewpoints on what causes direct or indirect discrimination or mistreatment of men: gender roles, hegemonic masculinity, industrial capitalism, feminism (specifically gender feminism and victimization feminism), and exploitative women (pp. 36-44).
Chapter 4 develops a theory of sociocultural evolution, which says that ideas that are simple, exaggerated, and coherent with popular paradigms generally win out over their rivals, regardless of whether they are true or backed up by evidence. This happens due to functional selection (p. 57), unintentional biases (p. 63), and interest group bias (p. 71), among other factors (see summary, p. 115).
Chapter 5: Applying the Theory to Gender Discrimination (p. 118)
This chapter develops a general theory of gender discrimination, centered on a typology of six different biases that cause gender discrimination (p. 127).
The masculine bias and feminine bias are unintentional gender biases caused by the processes that simplify, exaggerate, and mutate people’s mental memes or ideas according to their gender (p. 127). For example, a person’s conception of domestic work or childcare will be centered on their own experiences or contributions, which are partly determined by their gender, and so they will often downplay/exclude the other gender’s contributions (e.g., yardwork vs. housework) (pp. 135–138). As a result of these biases, segregated groups and networks of men or women tend to have a masculine-biased or feminine-biased culture of values, priorities, concepts, words, stories, jokes, stereotypes and beliefs that can lead to practices that discriminate against the other gender (p. 120). For example, a group of female social workers might decide that women are better custodians of children and default to recommending custody to them (pp. 141–142).
The masculist bias and feminist bias come from interest groups, networks, or movements seeking to advance the status of men or women, respectively. Masculism and feminism have sexist and anti-sexist branches (p. 143). The modern sexist branch of feminism includes theories like feminist standpoint epistemology (which gives special status to women’s feelings and intuitions) and the feminist theory of social work (interests of women and children are synonymous, social workers should identify with their female customers). It also includes stereotypes that women are unselfish, peaceful, responsible, loving, hard working, while men are the opposite (pp. 149–152). The anti-sexist branch of feminism by definition is less hostile towards men as people, but it is not necessarily able or willing to accept men’s issues: “[i]n general, the idea of the discrimination of men is perceived as bizarre by feminists” (pp. 155–158). The sexist branch of masculism is discussed primarily in the context of religion (pp. 144–129). The anti-sexist branch of masculism has little power, although it is discussed as sometimes being the source of biased statistics downplaying women’s issues (pp. 152–155).
The alpha male bias and alpha female bias are the biases of high status (wealthy, powerful, attractive, etc.) members of each gender against low status members of their gender. They are particularly apparent in high status men’s bias against male criminals (male judges giving harsher treatment, including sentences, to them compared to women) and high status women’s bias against female prostitutes (pp. 170–173).
A central point of this dissertation is that male-dominated and female-dominated organizations (the patriarchal and matriarchal subsystems) are prone to predominantly discriminate against the other gender, but it’s important to clarify that they’re not guaranteed to do so. The masculine and feminine biases (the unintentional “own gender” biases) are just two of the six biases. An organization could be more influenced by the ideological biases (masculist and feminist biases) or the biases against low social status people of each gender (alpha male and alpha female biases).
Chapter 6: Locating the Patriarchal and Matriarchal Subsystems of the Finnish Society (p. 188)
This chapter identifies Finnish society’s patriarchal and matriarchal subsystems by looking at various measures of power, including raw numbers, managerial positions, control of knowledge, and informal positions of power (p. 222).
​

• Patriarchal subsystem: technology, commerce, state finances, defense, agriculture, transportation, trade, corporative labor and employer organizations.
• Matriarchal subsystem: healthcare, social services, social policy, equality policy, hotels, restaurants, and some cultural services.

Not all areas of Finnish society fall into one of these subsystems.
Chapter 7: An Empirical Examination of the Memeplexes, Discourses and Coalitions that Induce Discrimination against Men (p. 224)
This chapter analyzes the discourses that justify discrimination against men, coming from sources that include sexism and feminism.
Sexism: The development of the modern misandric versions of sexism is examined, including 19th century views of men as “barbarians whose urges had to be leashed in by the forces of decency—meaning women—if civilization were to survive” (p. 233), which it attributes to the joint interests of women and upper class men. Notions of chivalry and macho masculinity also lead to institutionalized belief systems where men’s comfort, health, and even lives are considered less important than women’s (p. 238). Macho masculinity, with its aversion to men “complaining”, tends to oppose talking about men’s issues or seeing them as relevant for gender equality (p. 306).
Feminism: Certain influential varieties of feminism see women as the disadvantaged and discriminated gender (p. 247). Thus the sole purpose of equality policy is women’s advancement (p. 256) and men are largely reduced to the role of defendant (p. 270). When faced with cases requiring a choice between promotion of equality and empowerment of women, many feminists reacted by rejecting equality as outdated or as a smokescreen for promoting men’s interests over women. Under these discourses, “the empowerment of women is more important than the advancement of gender equality in all contexts, including the matriarchal subsystem of the society” (pp. 259–260). That would apply even to women’s advantage in family courts and criminal courts (p. 305).
Also mentioned is a combination (and mutation) of difference feminism and equality feminism which says that “women are superior to men in many ways, but men are not superior to women in any ways” (p. 296)—which means that when men are ahead it’s because of sexism, but when women are ahead it is legitimate and natural.
The groups and alliances that justify misandry and discrimination against men (p. 334):
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Chapter 8: Gender Discrimination, According to the Complaints Sent to the Finnish Equality Ombudsman (p. 346)
Complaints: This chapter analyzes 800 complaints of gender discrimination made between 1997 and 2004 and sent to the Finnish equality ombudsman (p. 348). Men were 33% of victims, according to the author’s suggestion for the best measure of actual discrimination in these cases (outcome types 3–5, p. 356). Labour market discrimination, the largest category, primarily involved women (76%), while the second largest category, discrimination against customers, primarily involved men (~60%).
Another category, discriminative legislation, primarily involved men (77%). Few complaints were made, but due to active conscription policies (lasting 5-12 months), almost all men in Finland are affected by discriminative legislation. The author classifies these complaints as discrimination, although the equality ombudsman does not, “as the Finnish equality law is not applicable to men’s obligatory military service” (p. 354).
Bias: Per chapter 6, equality policy itself is in the matriarchal subsystem of equality (e.g., 90% of employees in the equality ombudsman office are female, p. 354). The ombudsman has a policy not to comment on complaints involving custody and divorce, purportedly to not interfere with the court system, but the author suggests that it stems from a bias against men, perhaps due to prioritizing women’s status over equality or wanting to avoid a flood of complaints from men (p. 354). This is made more explicit by another comment from the ombudsman’s office saying that it is not taking action on certain cases of discrimination against men because “the main purpose of the equality law is to improve women’s status especially in the labor market”, suggesting that the law should be applied more strictly to cases of discrimination against women (p. 381).
Patriarchal & matriarchal subsystems: 57% of discrimination cases in the matriarchal subsystem of society (as defined in chapter 6) were against men, compared to 31% in neutral domains, and 17% in the patriarchal subsystem of society (p. 358).
Discrimination examples: Many cases of discrimination against women (e.g., a workplace that only required women to do extra cleaning tasks on top of their regular duties) are recounted on the same pages but we’ll look at men here.
​

• In the labour market: At a mental hospital, only men were appointed to night shifts (p. 374). At a school, preference was given to hiring female teachers even though men are the “underrepresented” gender (p. 376). Many traditionally feminine jobs excluded men in their recruitment material (p. 377). A workplace allowed women to wear more casual and comfortable clothing than men (p. 377).
• As customers: Favourable pricing for women in boat cruises, discotheques & dancing places, dating services, gymnastics, a theatre, restaurants, horse races, and car insurance (pp. 380–382). Also more strict clothing standards for men at a casino, higher minimum ages for men to enter restaurants, and an apartment that only allowed women (pp. 382–383).
• Government administration: Subsidy for women’s osteoporosis medicines but not men’s (from pension fund), free public screening for breast cancer but not prostate cancer, higher retirement age for men (which has been changed) (pp. 387–389).
• Legislation: Men’s complaints were all about the obligatory military or civil service of six to thirteen months (those who refuse get six months in prison, p. 390).

Likely motives: Two alternative rating methods (tables 52 and 53) find that either (certain) feminist ideas are the most common motivators of discrimination against men, or sexism and the feminine bias are the most common motivators (feminine bias meaning unintentional gender bias of groups of women, counterpart to masculine bias of groups of men). Financial motives were also frequent (pp. 401-402).

Hey all,
I just published some research on what different countries are doing to entice entrepreneurs to relocate. Whether visas, grants, mentorship, coaching... there's a lot.
Question for the group: Would you consider relocating / moving your startup post-COVID?
Content:
Visas, Incentives, and More: Here’s What Countries are Doing to Attract Remote Companies
As lockdowns ease, more than a few entrepreneurs are thinking about what’s next for them and their businesses, especially if they’ve chosen to stay remote. As news hit about remote worker visas in Barbados, or as small towns and cities are more equipped than ever to lure weary big-city remote workers, you’ve got to ask… what about the founders?
Sure, remote founders can work from anywhere just like their teams. Where things get interesting, though, is that many countries are launching programs to lure entrepreneurs to relocate their businesses or start up a new company - and with them come access to public funds, free visas, and even a path to citizenship. As governments think about recovery from COVID and general growth for the future, a handful are getting serious about offering a lot of perks to entice entrepreneurs to relocate.
All programs have three key elements to them, though in differing quantities:

1. Accelerated / extended resident visa permits.
2. Access to the country’s startup support ecosystems.
3. Funding / financial support.

So if you’ve ever thought about relocating, being an entrepreneur is one of the fastest tickets out. In this article, I’ve highlighted a mix of programs, but it’s not necessarily exhaustive. I tried to focus on the programs with unique elements or that are easy to apply for. While large funding requirements or other hurdles may not be a problem for many companies, my goal here was to highlight the programs that work for the majority of entrepreneurs, including small businesses and freelancers who recently went remote.

France: La French Tech

France has a long history of artisan entrepreneurship but less in the big tech or digital scene. However, the government is hoping to change that with its La French Tech visa programs.
There are three kinds of La French Tech visas:

• For entrepreneurs launching businesses in France.
• For employees joining French startups.
• For investors putting money into French startups.

The founder-focused program requires you to get accepted to one of France’s 30+ startup incubators and accelerators, so your ability to get in hinges on that acceptance.
France also has a unique program in the sense that it provides a 4 year visa automatically (most other programs only provide 1-2 year visas) and family members are automatically granted residency rights regardless of which visa you get. Finally, the program is diploma agnostic - it’s geared towards creative people and entrepreneurs, not necessarily only STEM grads like many other countries.
Internet connectivity is relatively high quality in cities, though it can be lacking in the countryside. If you’re relocating, check for good internet service first.
More info: https://lafrenchtech.com/en/how-france-helps-startups/french-tech-visa/

Startup Chile

Chile is hoping to attract entrepreneurs with cash, incentives, a visa, and the natural beauty of the country.
The Startup Chile program is actually an accelerator - billed as the “best accelerator in LatAm.” As part of the program, though, non-citizens are granted a one year visa to live in the country while building your company.
Highlights of the program are:

• 1 year visa.
• Equity-free funding options to build your startup.
• Up to $100k in perks / free offerings from their partners.
• Connections with local businesses for validation, testing, and customer growth.

Chile is not known for blazing fast wifi, but if you’re in the accelerator and living within city boundaries, you should be alright.
More info: https://www.startupchile.org/

Startup Denmark

The kingdom of Denmark seriously wants entrepreneurs to relocate there. Named by the World Bank as the number one country in Europe for doing business, the country wants to further attract entrepreneurs.
The Startup Denmark program is geared to helping people realize the ease of doing business in Denmark, specifically:

• Free, independent business advice provided through publicly-funded Business Development Centres in the country.
• Focused clusters for cleantech, life science, design, and sustainable energy.
• Access to funding through Innovation Fund Denmark and the Danish Growth Fund, both of which are available to non-citizens.

Internet connectivity and penetration is very high in Denmark, so high-tech companies (or even just remote companies with a lot of zoom meetings) should be just fine.
More info: https://startupdenmark.info/

Enterprise Ireland

The only English-speaking country on the euro, Ireland is a prime place for doing business. Its geographic location makes it easily accessible to Europe, the Middle East, North Africa, and North America, and its low corporate tax rate has already attracted major players including Google and Starbucks.
Enterprise Ireland has also launched an entrepreneur visa, which is specifically for entrepreneurs who can:

• Feasibly create 10 jobs in Ireland within 3-4 years.
• Raise 50,000 euros for the first founder and 30,000 additional euros per additional co-founder needing a visa.
• Be controlled from Ireland.

Despite rigid sounding rules, the visa program is actually quite flexible. For instance, the fundraising requirements can be through almost any funding option, including using your own money and not taking any investment dollars. Further, the notion of being “controlled” from Ireland is more flexible than other countries that require a certain percentage of business to be done in the country for founders to be eligible for a visa.
More info: https://www.enterprise-ireland.com/en/Start-a-Business-in-Ireland/Startups-from-Outside-Ireland/

EntrePass Singapore

Singapore took the world markets by storm in the past few decades, going from a small island nation with no natural resources to a global hub of finance and casinos. Now, the country wants to be known as a hub for global entrepreneurship.
The EntrePass in Singapore grants founders a 2 year visa to live in Singapore while building a business. Like other programs (France, for example), businesses must be accepted into an accelerator in order for the founders to qualify for a visa. However, where Singapore adds a bit of strictness is two-fold:

1. The business must be net-new or less than 6 months old at the time of application. This program is only for new businesses.
2. Your business must be accepted into a government-backed accelerator or receive funding from a government-backed investor.

The Singaporean government is usually tolerant with expats, but the laws on the island can be incredibly strict. The program can be amazing for new entrepreneurs, though, especially given Singapore’s strategic location and relatively low taxes.
More info: https://www.startupdecisions.com.sg/singapore/relocation/entrepass/

Italia Startup Visa

Known for fine leathers, fashion, and amazing food, Italy is now hoping to become known as a centre of innovation.
The country offers two kinds of visas for non-EU entrepreneurs:

• Italia Startup Visa
• Italia Startup Hub

The Visa is made for entrepreneurs who aren’t currently in Italy but want to relocate there to start / scale their business. The Hub option is for people already in Italy who want to stay and launch a business (I think Italy caught onto the fact that people sitting in gorgeous villages sipping a coffee might just want to stick around).
Visa programs came about through Italy’s “Decree 179/2012,” which is the country’s program to explicitly attract what they deem ‘innovative startups’ to the country. In general, innovative startups by Italy’s definition are technology companies that either invest more than 15% of their revenues to R&D, employ PhD-level researchers full-time, or own patents for inventions or ‘original software.’
The visa lasts for 1 year, but is renewable for another 2 years. While business taxes in Italy can be fairly high, the relatively low cost of living can balance those costs out.
More info: http://italiastartupvisa.mise.gov.it/

SMART Visa Thailand

Thailand is one of the only programs to highlight that spouses and children are automatically granted residency (along with France) - and that your spouse will have a work visa included in their residency permit as well.
The country’s SMART visa program has four tiers:

• S - Startup.
• T - Talent.
• E - Executives.
• I - Investors.

S visas are explicitly for entrepreneurs and startup founders, and have three options: a 2-year, a 1-year, and a 6-month visa. The 2-year program is for designated high-tech startups, the 1-year for incubator and accelerator-backed startups of all varieties, and the 6-month visa is intended for sales and promotion in Thai markets as opposed to setting up shop in Thailand.
More info: https://smart-visa.boi.go.th/smart/pages/smart_s.html

Startup Visa Lithuania

A Baltic country bordering Poland and Latvia by land and Denmark and Sweden by sea, Lithuania has some of the fastest internet on the planet and gorgeous medieval towns and sea views.
The visa program is part of Startup Lithuania, a government-backed organization geared towards helping Lithuania succeed in global markets.
Recognizing that many people have probably heard the name “Lithuania” but don’t know much about it, the Startup Visa program focuses heavily on soft landings with guides on how to relocate, connections to other relocated workers and entrepreneurs, and links into the country’s extensive support programs for businesses.
More info: https://startupvisalithuania.com/about-us/

Startup Estonia

The original “digital society,” Estonia is regularly in the news for how connected their society is. The internet is fast, citizenship is digital, and the country even launched a remote worker visa to entice more people to relocate.
On the entrepreneur side of things, Startup Estonia launched a Startup Visa to encourage entrepreneurs to relocate to Estonia. The program is very explicitly focused on technology-based companies with global market potential, but Estonia has the minimum required capital of all programs in Europe (you only have to prove you have around $2,000 USD for a one-year visa).
Entrepreneurs can apply for a 3-month visa to test the waters and get set up, or a 12-month visa to make the move and begin the process of permanent residency.
Like its cousin Lithuania, Estonia has beautiful scenery, sea views, and a high quality of life.
More info: https://startupestonia.ee/visa

Entrepreneur residence permits (Sweden)

Sweden is known in the business world for producing the likes of IKEA, but it’s also a welcoming country for entrepreneurs with companies of all sizes.
While Sweden doesn’t have a flashy website or dedicated startup-lingo page, the Nordic country has a Self-Employment Residency visa, which provides up to 2 years stay - with a path to permanent residency - for self-employed individuals.
The capital requirements are fairly low - you have to prove you have around $25,000 USD to support yourself while on visa - and you can apply from anywhere in the world. The primary potential downside for remote entrepreneurs is that this visa requires you to produce and/or sell the majority of your business’ goods and services in Sweden, which could be a challenge for a distributed workforce.
More info: https://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/Working-in-Sweden/Self-employment.html

Not sure about relocating quite yet?

One of the wins of remote work is that you can physically do your job from anywhere. So if you’ve been dreaming of relocating but not sure about taking the actual plunge, plan an extended working holiday.
Depending on where you’re from, most countries will allow you to stay at least a few weeks (and upwards of 90 days in some cases) with no visa or simply on a tourist visa.
If you’re planning this kind of “working holiday,” here are some places to consider visiting (that have great, accessible wifi) for when the world opens back up:
Cities:

• Goa, India
• Toronto, Canada
• Hoi An, Vietnam
• Tel Aviv, Israel
• Helsinki, Finland
• Tallinn, Estonia
• Fukuoka, Japan
• Seoul, South Korea
• Lisbon, Portugal
• Belgrade, Serbia
• Cluj, Romania

Smaller cities, towns, and villages:

• Taghazout, Morocco
• Rhodes, Greek Islands
• Koh Phangan, Thailand
• Canggu, Bali