International Men’s Day (IMD) is an annual international event celebrated on 19 November with the objectives of celebrating “The Six Pillars of International Men’s Day” and include focusing on men’s and boys’ health, improving gender relations, promoting gender equality, highlighting discrimination against men, and promoting male role models.
The theme of 2019’s International Men’s Day is “Making a Difference for Men and Boys,” and focused on promoting the need to value men and boys and help people make practical improvements in men and boy’s health and well-being.
It is an occasion to celebrate boys and men’s achievements and contributions, in particular for their contributions to community, family, marriage, and child care. The broader and ultimate aim of the event is to promote basic humanitarian values, as per Wikipedia.
International Men’s Day is celebrated in over 80 countries, on 19 November, and global support for the celebration is broad.
Additionally, the month of November is also occasionally recognized as International Men’s Month. International Men’s Day is supported by a variety of organisations including UNESCO.
International Men’s Day is promoted not as just a gendered day but a day where all issues affecting men and boys can be addressed.
“They are striving for gender equality and patiently attempt to remove the negative images and the stigma associated with men in our society”, said Jerome Teelucksingh, who revived the event after it ended in 1994.
As well as the six Core Objectives, a secondary theme for IMD has usually been suggested by world coordinators, such as peace in 2002, men’s health in 2003, healing and forgiveness in 2007, positive male role models in 2009 and ‘our children’s future’ in 2010.
