Gender Roles

[Perseus]

Instead of becoming strong women, they have become just another image of men, a substitute of the type of men they so despise. By looking down upon the women that have chosen to keep the role of houswife, they have become a more arrogant version of those men. Yes, they have entered "male territory," but they have become blinded. They don't realize that they have become just a substitute for the men of the past. While they are moving into that territory, most modern men are leaving it to enter a realm of acceptance.

This does seem to be a attitude that is either American (I don't think so and less likely to be Texan than NY) or more likely the influence of the ESFJ (Horseman) personality type atitudes. Or rather strong parental influences passed on to single males?

I other words, the above really does sound a load of crap, viewed from on the European side of the pond. Male chauvanist as even the Panda would say. Now the Panda, she ain't no Angel (INFP).

 

[Raison D'etre]

Sorry if my thoughts sound like a load of crap, but I do see things this way. I am simply stating what I think about women looking down upon others that chose the role of a housewife.

I guess I should add I don't think all women to be this way.

 

[Kidege]

Worry not, Raison D', that wasn't the European side of the pond.

 

[Perseus]

Sorry if my thoughts sound like a load of crap, but I do see things this way. I am simply stating what I think about women looking down upon others that chose the role of a housewife.

It seems rather old fashioned from the older generation schools that had Domestic Science lessons and biology according to gender. I still find one in a thousand people that are strongly of this outlook and perhaps one in a hundred that reveal this aspect after awhile. Maybe even one in ten, that would agree with you. My estimates is that 13% of the population, virtually all ESFJs may have this attitude.

It may not be very strong, but it may also be ingrained. ESFJs and INTPs cannot be more different.

 

[Ermine]

I think this all can be summed up by the fact that people can't accept being equal and different at the same time.

 

[Jesin]

Feminism is just as stupid as traditionalism (or whatever you call it). Men and women may be biologically inclined, on average, to do certain things, but if any individual is inclined differently than other men/women, there's no problem with that, either. It's not that women should be more like men or vice versa, it's that gender should not even come into consideration when making this sort of judgment. A lot of people seem to forget that.

 

[murkrow]

Feminism isn't stupid.

Women should be given equal rights as men.

Of course... I think that should be no right at all.


It's getting harder and harder to give a shit about these arguments haha.

 

[fullerene]

phew! finally got caught up on this thread. It's looked interesting for quite a while, but every time I just thought of reading 6 pages and got depressed (I hate reading ). Once it caught my attention though I just wanted to go straight through, and now I want more.

Anyway, lot of really cool observations scattered throughout here (Raison's last thoughts included in that, whatever Perseus may say). I've still yet to read Zero's article... but I'll get to that right after this. I'm also glad he pointed out how ridiculous it is to say that ignoring a situation prevents prejudice. I dunno if I'd call it heartless and ignorant... but I do think it's arrogant, because it denies the power of subconscious learning, advertising by impression, etc. Not thinking about something is how prejudice's develop.

mm... I had some thoughts too, but decided to hold them back for the time being until I shed some ignorance. Does anybody else know of any easily-accessible (preferably internet... but I guess library would be cool too) articles that are particularly insightful I should check out? I'm gonna start with Zero's article, then just start googling if nobody has any better ideas

 

[Agent Intellect]

Feminism is just as stupid as traditionalism (or whatever you call it). Men and women may be biologically inclined, on average, to do certain things, but if any individual is inclined differently than other men/women, there's no problem with that, either. It's not that women should be more like men or vice versa, it's that gender should not even come into consideration when making this sort of judgment. A lot of people seem to forget that.

co-sign.

i've never even really considered men and women being different, socially. i think there are definite differences between how the two sexes think (i'm not a title 9 kind of person) but i wouldn't say either one is suprior then the other. the biggest difference, i think, is that men THINK they are superior (bigger ego's).

 

[Perseus]

For creatives and artists the world may seem like an obstacle race trying to get published/sell their work, get recognised (so that you can sell your work).

It is the same for everyone. Perhaps not, perhaps if I was coloured, a dyke, female, in a particular incapacity club; I could be positively discriminated and be advantaged as though I had rich parents, connections with the firm (nepotism is rife in England).

"She did not really do very much. Just batted her eyelids and looked pretty. Did not even have to walk through cut glass to get a crumb to eat."

"I might get some temporary work, whilst the girls are on maternity leave."

 

[Fleur]

Theoretically women biologically is somewhat more important than men - if there was only one woman in the world, she would be able to carry only one (if we don`t think about twins) kid for nine months, and existence of humanity would be doomed; if there was only one man, he would be able to make pregnant a almost all women, so humanity could still exist.

There`s one weird thing about people`s attitude towards their unborn child`s gender - most of parents wants to have son. Maybe in last years this isn`t so marked, but sometimes it`s very well seen among elder people (I know that my grandmother is little bit grumpy because I`m not boy).

Maybe men`s long lasting superiority complex is based on "biological envy" - women carries offsprings, and, unlike most of other animal species, human females can protect themselves too (actually females is smarter, because most of them would just find a way to don`t get in danger first place).

 

[Perseus]

Of course, the big difference is that the females get pregnant and they frequently do.

 

[Thread Killer]

Of course, the big difference is that the females get pregnant and they frequently do.

Seriously. I get pregnant about once a week, I think.

...=P

 

[Ermine]

Whatever. A reasonable rate for a woman would be once every 1.5 years at the most. I wouldn't call that frequent.

 

[Agent Intellect]

Whatever. A reasonable rate for a woman would be once every 1.5 years at the most. I wouldn't call that frequent.

depends. do you mean 1.5 years between each birth, or between one birth and the next pregnancy? lol, maybe i'm just too much of a sucker for semantics...

 

[Ermine]

I mean from one pregnancy to the next.

 

[severus]

Ha, this thread reminds me of a conversation I had with my friend (who is a guy). "You all want equality, but you'll all be complaining when you drafted for a war." To which I said, "Firstly, it is unlikely we will ever have another draft. Secondly, I have diabetes, so it wouldn't bother me!"

Someone needs to work, someone needs to take care of the kids. Gender should not be a deciding factor.

 

[fullerene]

tee hee, I used to call it "equality until the check comes" when I was younger. Otherwise I think I basically agree... I'm so bad with following cultural customs anyway that I'm sure not gonna follow gender ones very much... so obviously any girl I end up with will be the same, because my lack of cultural customs would have scared her away before gender ones came up at all.

That said, I think I would be thrilled if I could get a family, have like 5 or 6 kids (obviously I'd haveta work during pregnancies), and then just gave up working to raise them instead. Trick is finding a wife who doesn't mind pregnancy that much...

 

[grrreg]

Theoretically women biologically is somewhat more important than men - if there was only one woman in the world, she would be able to carry only one (if we don`t think about twins) kid for nine months, and existence of humanity would be doomed; if there was only one man, he would be able to make pregnant a almost all women, so humanity could still exist.

There`s one weird thing about people`s attitude towards their unborn child`s gender - most of parents wants to have son. Maybe in last years this isn`t so marked, but sometimes it`s very well seen among elder people (I know that my grandmother is little bit grumpy because I`m not boy).

Maybe men`s long lasting superiority complex is based on "biological envy" - women carries offsprings, and, unlike most of other animal species, human females can protect themselves too (actually females is smarter, because most of them would just find a way to don`t get in danger first place).

MAYBE we'll all evolve into hermaphrodites some day.
you see, i think you hit the nail on the head.
women biologically reproduce but men classically 'socially reproduced.' Meaning men held positions in government and leadership in human groups far more often.
now that women are entering their social -reproductive sector, men have no where else to go, and feel nudged out of place, and intimidated because then women truly won't need them for anything, and could just sperm bank it out for the necessaries if they so choose.

what's needed is a way for men to become pregnant, of course after they come to realize everyone's role is just as important.

 

[severus]

MAYBE we'll all evolve into hermaphrodites some day.

Yes, like in The Time Machine by H.G. Wells. When I read that I thought, Wow, that is so going to happen. We get closer to it everyday.
Which begs the question, is that a good thing or a bad thing? I have no answer, currently.

 

[Apathy]

Men and Women need to have equal rights by law, however they should be treated differently. After all Men are different from Women. We each have different biological needs and responsibilites. This also means that while both sexes have the ability to do the same, or similar roles in society they each will, and should be treated differently when they are performing that role in most cases.

 

[severus]

Why and how should we be treated differently?

 

[Ermine]

Why and how should we be treated differently?

This would be best illustrated with physical differences. For example, a man shouldn't beat a woman. Why? Because the woman probably doesn't have a chance. Stuff like that. Basically being sensitive to one another's weaknesses and vulnerabilities.

 

[Jesin]

A man shouldn't beat a man, either.

 

[Wisp]

A sentient shouldn't beat a sentient, so meh.

 

[fullerene]

Yeah I'm not sure that's the best example. If a woman wants to be treated exactly like a man, I'll almost always oblige them... but the fact is that it usually isn't as satisfying as they think. The ones I've known who've integrated into our almost entirely male group of friends feel like they've lost something by not being viewed or treated as women anymore.

I really tend to think men being able to get pregnant would do pretty awful things for society too, for what its worth. It would "even the field," you all are absolutely right, but we would have just encroached into each other's reproductive spheres so that no one has anything special to them. Even if the importance was previously self-created, the overall importance of everyone will just have dropped if things even out that way.

personally I think men had lost track of what made them unique and separate from women well before they took control of and settled into the corporate sphere. I think what was going on was a semi-peaceful, if not completely natural, equilibrium that may have been better left alone... but it's impossible to judge because we don't know how things will turn out yet. For all we know ownership of the corporate world was a place of less importance than what came before it, and being jilted out of that will force us to look around and find a better place to reside... but in my opinion opening up an existing "impossible" role, although the most likely solution, would just devalue the position of women and bring everyone onto a plane of lower significance.

 

[murkrow]

I'll beat whoever I damn well please.

 

[severus]

I don't think "a women should be treated like a man." Er, maybe. More like we should all be treated the same. Not nessacerly fair, but equal. Am I alone by thinking this? I am getting a "men and women are different, so we'll treat them differently" feel from the majority of this thread.

And now I feel like I'm immature and can't do a thing about it.

 

[fullerene]

haha murkrow... you should google Maddox... you might like his writing.

mm... well, it might help to define your "equal." What do you see as the difference between equal and fair, in the way you meant it there?

 

[severus]

Equal is perfectly the same. Fair compansates for weaknesses and strengths and all other factors.
The only example I can think of is ... not good, but here goes:
You (a man) are playing some sort of multiplayer extreme rock paper scissors (where you punch/slap/whatever sicissors is the other people when you win). There is another man and a woman. If you were being fair, you wouldn't hit the woman as hard as the man. If you were being equal, you would hit them the same.
I know that is rather horrible, but it's the best I can come up with currently.

So, in the context of my last post, I meant that fair would be treating men and women differently in order to compansate for their respective weaknesses, whereas equal would treat them the exact same regardless.

I feel like fair (when contrasted to equal) is a stupid way of protecting people instead of letting them realize that they aren't good at everything and that's okay.

 

[Jesin]

What if the men are wimps and the woman's an athlete?

 

[fullerene]

ahh ok... haha I just checked your profile to see how old you were. That makes more sense now.

back when I was in high school we had a pair of girls who hung out in a clique of like... eh, somewhere between 8 or 9 and 14 or so guys, depending on how big the gathering was and how "far out" of the group invitations would extend. Now generally speaking, teenage guys will tone down their conversations to make them more female-friendly when the groups would mix (say, at a very large party that would extend across normal cliques and such), but if it were just a medium sized group of guys, nobody would think twice about what they were saying. In the most extreme example I can think of, there was a conversation about what we all had in mind for our honeymoon nights, as far as different fetishes and such . (I know, I know, such are teenage guys)

anyway, for the most part, something like that doesn't happen when there are girls around--like it or not, you get treated differently. Eventually, people just stopped keeping up any pretenses (if you could really call them pretenses... I think we just thought of it as common courtesy) around the girls who were always there, though, so it wasn't hard to figure out that nobody from the group really thought of them as girls anymore. So throughout middle school, they would always tell us not to treat them like girls or anything special, basically like you are now, but when we all grew up and eventually did, they were kind of hurt by it. Not a lot... but enough that they wanted their difference back.

So that's at least the best example I can think of of why women shouldn't be treated "equally," using your terminology.

 

[Jesin]

So that's at least the best example I can think of of why women shouldn't be treated "equally," using your terminology.

I wasn't the one who said they should be treated equally. That was severus. I haven't chosen a side yet. I'm just tossing out arguments, mostly on the side that's getting less support.

As for the kind of conversations you describe, those make me uncomfortable, and I'm a guy. Luckily, I'm for the most part blissfully unaware of that sort of behavior. The guys I hang out with are more likely to discuss computer science or philosophy (they're mostly INTPs).

 

[fullerene]

oh yah, I know. You posted that one-liner while I was typing my other one, so I didn't see it. My post was wholly aimed at sev

 

[Jesin]

Oh. Okays.

 

[severus]

@cryptonia
I do see your point, even if I am not yet feeling it.
Actually, the group of people I hang out with* is so nerdy that we're all more or less "gender neutral." Erm, androgynous? Well, let's just say none of us are the typical obnoxious horny teenagers.


*sit with at lunch and perhaps complain to

 

[Perseus]

Hermaphrodites: will we all turn into Oysters?

The Sea Horse, Hippocampus (Sixth Step to Satan)

 

[severus]

Androgynous: Being neither distinguishably masculine nor feminine, as in dress, appearance, or behavior.

Not actually hermaphrodites.

 

[Agent Intellect]

i think the example cryptonia gave is probably true in a lot of cases (maybe even most) but its not just about a double standard, its about generalizations. i know females that are not easily offended, even by the most vulgar of conversations, some of them even joining in (i'm mainly talking about the guys and girls i work with). basically, no one can really say "all girls are this or that" because just like with anyone, its completely on a case by case basis.

 

[Wisp]

Yes, but should we try to lean towards the tendencies, which DO exist.

 

[fullerene]

right.

@sev

well there are a few easy possible reasons for that. One is that because there are girls around at school, they're actively keeping conversation somewhere where everyone within the group could get along. Another could be that the nerdiness gives you some group you're already a part of, so you don't feel like you're "losing" anything by being treated as androgynous (where our school was small, so even the nerdy people integrated well with everyone else).

Much more likely, though, is the fact that those are the people you "sit with at lunch and perhaps complain to." No conversations like that would ever happen in such a public place. They're more kept to sleepovers and late nights and the like. Treating everybody equally in public isn't uncommon... but I think when it became openly noticeable that at our core we didn't think of them as girls really anymore, it became a disappointing equality rather than a satisfying one.

 

[Wisp]

I believe cryptonia's last suggestion is true. Very odd things are discussed in the dead of night...

 

[Jordan~]

Mhm, some of the most interesting conversations I've had have been at night time. People are, for some reason, so much more open.

 

[Perseus]

I never really understood this, but it has stood the test of time.

God,
the Son
Holy Spirit

People put their own meanings on it and these may be cognitive differences because of personality type. Nought specifically female.

 

[Wisp]

@Perseus

...what?

@Jordan~

Probably because, at least I, am more active and stimulated at night.

 

[Jesin]

Mhm, some of the most interesting conversations I've had have been at night time. People are, for some reason, so much more open.

I think the part of you that asks "Should I really be saying this to this person?" is one of the earlier systems to shut down. Or something like that.

 

[Jordan~]

Probably because, at least I, am more active and stimulated at night.

I find that, too.

 

[Ermine]

Mhm, some of the most interesting conversations I've had have been at night time. People are, for some reason, so much more open.

That and people seem a lot more content to confide in me at night. Odd and unsettling, but still interesting.

 

[grrreg]

i've had many marathon phone talks at night until the dawn...

thank goodness i personally don't need to worry about how much a gentlemen i am "in the presence of a lady" anymore...all my female friends are totally pervy and would take offense if i treated them like they couldn't "hear such things in their presence". Some guys though can be just as prudy, it really does depend on the person in question. Totally.

do "good manners" reinforce that behavior though?

do i open doors for women , yes.
do i open them for men? how cute is he ? and let's see that backside.

 

[Devercia]

I never really understood this, but it has stood the test of time.

God,
the Son
Holy Spirit

People put their own meanings on it and these may be cognitive differences because of personality type. Nought specifically female.

I think he is saying it because its is one of the theological topics open to interpretation.

God= God
Son = Jesus, the word, the arch angel, the lamb, etc.
Holy spirit = Gods active force, not an actual entity. Sort of like "Me, my brother, and my hand.", "I will lend you my hand"

This is my interpretation, but another may think the three a triad or a trinity or whatever based on their personality. As for Perseus' purpose for say such, I have no idea.

Feminism isn't stupid.

Women should be given equal rights as men.

Of course... I think that should be no right at all.


It's getting harder and harder to give a shit about these arguments haha.

Spot the contradiction....Ok, I'll just type it. Feminism by definition, philosophy, and member make-up is biased and not about equality. It is about advancement of women, which is a seperate concept from equality. If it were about equality it would not be called feminism and would have fought on the behalf of men on at least one occasion and would not be blind to mitigating sexist issues that men suffer in silence. This distinction is often lost on the moderate feminists who for the sake of convenience for their cause accept the support and sometimes the banter of the mysogonistic radical she-apes who are beyond understanding the concept in the first place.

I have seen too many losers of wishbone battles steal the vertibrea from the victor and call it equality.

If God could be a woman, so could Satan. You have to view equality from both sides.

co-sign.

i've never even really considered men and women being different, socially. i think there are definite differences between how the two sexes think (i'm not a title 9 kind of person) but i wouldn't say either one is suprior then the other. the biggest difference, i think, is that men THINK they are superior (bigger ego's).

I don't think it is so much about men thinking they are superior but women thinking the are inferior(in cercumstance, not actuality.) I strongly believe that a held belief that a certain social group is a victim in need of vindication is the largest contributer to sexism. It is similar to racism on the subject of reparations. No amount of money will bring Africans out of poverty. Poverty isn't about money, its a state of mind combined with bad luck. It isn't about results, its about the means to achieve them.

The notion that women are an oppressed minorty runs so deep within our culture that people overlook the whole issue and slam objectivists with politically correct thugitry. If you don't believe me, then surely you will agree that you had not spotted the inacuracy in my statement. Women are not a minority.

There was a clinical test to check how minorities befriended people of a social majority. Black participants were individually separated and put into rooms with several whites. The whites had identified the level of their racist tendecies to the researchers, but not to the blacks. the groups were allowed to socialize for a set period of time. In the end the blacks preferred the whites would had greater racist tendencies. The researchers explained that non-racist whites did not sugar coat statements and did not avoid possible sensetive issues while the racist whites felt the need to compensate for their tendencies in order to make the time enjoyable.

I think the same can happen with sexism and personality. How many of us objective INTPs have been falsely accused of extreme bias by the extremely biased?

Men and Women need to have equal rights by law, however they should be treated differently. After all Men are different from Women. We each have different biological needs and responsibilites. This also means that while both sexes have the ability to do the same, or similar roles in society they each will, and should be treated differently when they are performing that role in most cases.

This is the way to go I think. Separate but equal is much more achievable than total equality. An example is physical requirements for firefighters. there should not be different requirements for each sex, but only one set. Currently, a less strict rule set applies for women on the basis that they are inherently weaker and should be coddled for the sake of a politicians carrier at the expense of some obese burning dude. Rules like these should be abolished.