h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

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And neither of them particularly mean anything.

I mean, I am a woman. W-O-M-A-N (as the song goes . . .) And I cannot wear high heels, nor have I ever mastered wearing lipstick. I keep forgetting I have it on and it ends up getting smeared all over the place . Heck, I only mastered wearing mascara a few years ago.

But somehow I am definitely feminine. Just ask blicky.

az

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Same here. I leave worrying about that sort of stuff until the caffeine allows my inner "ubermensche" to kick in.

Noggin

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Noggin

So, Noggin, how would you describe your 'inner Ubermensch'?

<> (Noggin)



Oh, don't be such a silly billy, I meant that he saw me as a woman, not as some weirdo possibly dyke-b*tch-mannish persona simply because I have a strong personality.

Along with MoG am looking forward to hearing about what your inner Ubermensch means.



az

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With my tongue firmly in my cheek.

Noggin

What I find fascinating is the rather shakely line bettween male and female. Both male and female sex and gender.

Just for the record sex refers to the biological aspects of what makes us male and female. For example having a XX or XY configuration, or having breast or chest hair. Gender refers to the social aspect, for example having long hair, wearing make up, playing football, etc, as well as that inate sense of being male or female.

There are people that fall bettween the sexs and people that fall bettween the genders.

I'm in the middle of writting an essay on congential adrenal hyperplasia, - a condition where amoung other things high testosterone is produced in the uterus. This isn't a problem if you have a male child, but if you have a female child she is virlised - that is that she may have a enlarged clitoris that may look like a penis, and may have fused labia.

What's fascinating is if these children are raised as girls then *Most* of them will be happy being girls, but if they are raise as boys then *most* of them will be happy being boys.

Yes there are several, very well publised cases of children who were assigned sex by doctors which they then choose to change at a later date. But there are far more less publised cases of children who were assigned sex by doctors who didn't choose to change it. Who are happy in their assigned sex.

(I"m thinking of the John/Joan case of a child who was treated by John Moony and has featured on many TV documentries).

I can't work out why we have gender, why do we expect boys to act one way and girls to act another? It's just a social construct. I really don't belive that men and women are fundamentally different.

I know that there are lots of books - Men are from Mars Women are From Venus, or Why Men don't listen and women can't read maps that say that men and women are different.

I think with all human characteristics, height, strength, ability to read maps, we're all on a bell curve. With a lot of them men are more likely to be at one end of the bell curve than the other.

Just because *most* men may have a particular characteristic - the ability to read maps say, then that doesn't mean that 1) all men can read maps or 2) that all women can't read maps.

For instance if you needed something removing from a shelf that was above your reach and there was a very tall woman nearby you would ask that woman, and not wait for a man to arrive 'because men are taller than women'. This woman can do the job that you need doing.

"I really don't belive that men and women are fundamentally different."



You either don't know many of either, or you know a really rather odd cross section of both, I think.

Rationally, if one is confronted by a generalisation (e.g. "all/most women/men are/tend to be [insert characteristic]") then one should consider only two things:

1. Is it true?
2. Is it *useful*?

What you should never, ever tack onto that list is "Is it *fair*?". Fairness is irrelevant.

For instance, despite whatever liberals might like to think, I can make generalisations about black people that get a "yes" to both those statements. Example: "Black people have a much higher chance of having sickle-cell anaemia than do white people." This is demonstrably true, and it's useful. It's not "fair" - but who said life had to be fair?

Similarly, the generalisation "the average man is taller and stronger than the average woman" is both true and useful. Any four year old can produce a counterexample, but that proves nothing. I can generalise that it's hot in Majorca, and you can counter that you've spent several cold wet days there. But it's still a hot place...

The only difficulty with generalisations is when those who do not conform to them come up against societal traditions based on them. That does not reduce the usefulness of the generalisation one bit, any more than a thunderstorm makes Majorca a rainforest. It just means that people *should* engage their brains a bit more and look beyond the generalisations. Unfortunately, that requires people to search around in their mental toolbox for another way of thinking, and that's more effort than most are capable of or can be bothered doing. And when the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

H.

Yup I do know an odd cross section of people

Most of my friends consist of:

1. people I met at the uni LGB
2. Medical students
3. People I met on h2g2

What I meant was that I don't think that there's a fundamental difference in the way men and women think.

I don't think that generalisations along the lines of 'Men are less in touch with their feelings are useful'.

<> (Z)

Quite right. My brother has just started seeing a girl who really thought that men don't really have feelings and just go along her merry way. My bro is one of the most thoughtful guys (if not THE most thoughtful) if have ever met and is very definitely in touch with his feelings. He is putting her straight on the matter.

As Hoo said, people have trouble (or are just plain lazy) with seeing past generalisations it's much easier to deal with what you have experienced or been told about.

Ice.

>>"What I meant was that I don't think that there's a fundamental difference in the way men and women think."

But what does that actually *mean*?

There are definitely different ways of thinking - even within one individual, there are many subsystems in the brain to process different kinds of information.
Different people seem to vary both in the quality of their various subsystems, and the relative use they put them to, and there does appear to be some *general* *average* difference between men and women regarding performance and/or usage bias between the various systems.

There isn't '*A* way men think' and '*A* way women think' that can be simply compared as if there was only one man and one woman in the world.

There may not be a 'fundamental' difference, but there can still be an average difference that isn't simply a social construct.

>>"What's fascinating is if these children are raised as girls then *Most* of them will be happy being girls, but if they are raise as boys then *most* of them will be happy being boys."

Studies of CAH girls raised as boys or girls can be interesting, but not necessarily applicable more widely. I presume that even someone coming from a fairly rigid hormone-driven-brain-sex perspective could easily argue that a person with an intermediate-sex brain due to intermediate hormone levels might be expected to be more malleable in gender terms than average.

The devil's advocate in me would wonder what basis was used to decide whether to raise child X as boy or girl - parental whim, coin tossing, or some more or less educated medical advice?.
Is there much variation in the physical appearance of CAH girls on a male-female axis?
If so, does the appearance correlate with hormone exposure, and so possibly with effects in the brain?
Is it *possible* that doctors are often good at guessing what the correct gender might be to raise a child as?
Did the CAH girls raised as girls turn out on average as typically 'feminine', or were they relatively tomboyish?

>>"I can't work out why we have gender, why do we expect boys to act one way and girls to act another?"

The most simplistic answer is that (for whatever reason) they *do* act differently. It is a generalistion, and not always an accurate one, but it can still be useful *in the absence of any other other information about individuals*.

Biologically speaking, it is undeniable that in many mammals, males and females express systematic differences in some kinds of behaviour. It seems pretty clear that those behaviour differences are not simply social, so there clearly are potential mechanisms for wiring up brains with different behavioural biases (or possibly different skill biases) depending on the sex of an animal.
Those mechanisms (which in mammals are presumably hormone-driven deviations from a basic female body plan) are unlikely to affect all animals precisely equally, so there will likely be variation in both male and female behaviour.

The *extent* to which sex-based differences happen in any given species presumably depend on the evolutionary history of the species. The scientific approach for any given species is presumably to set out to determine how large the differences are (if any) in various areas. If it turns out that there aren't any detectable ones, that's fine, but one can't set out with default assumption that there aren't (or shouldn't be) any *average* differences.
It may well be that average differences are not huge, but that doen't mean that they are entirely insignificant, or that any differences must obviously be down to social factors, except to people who have prejudged that there aren't any differences.

Presumably most behaviour will be common between the sexes anyway - animals of either sex still have a huge amount that they have to do in order to stay alive, but the commonalities don't make the differences any less different any more than the commonalities between me and another man make my relative strengths and weaknesses any less true or potentially relevant *in the right circumstances*.

I'm in agreement that there are fundamental differences between women and men that can't be accounted for by socialisation. Just because there are more than 2 genders, or there is no definitive line between sexes doesn't mean there is no such thing as sex or gender.

Biologically men are never going to be able to give birth, and women are never going to be able to impregnate other women. That these biological differences also have psychological expression is obvious if one accepts that there is no gap between body and mind.


However socialisation does account hugely for our concepts of gender and they are often culturally specific. Part of the problem is when the societal view of women or men is not based on reality eg the idea that men are stronger than women is only true if you measure strength in certain ways (and in the West the measuring has been done to keep women and men in proscribed roles eg men are strong and must look after women who are weak).


Going back to the idea that men don't understand their masculinity but women understand their femininity - While this is a generalisation, it does appear to be true. Gender roles (in the West) have changed alot in my lifetime, and it does appear that women have adapted to this more easily than men. It's not uncommon to hear some men expressing confusion or anger about masculinity and changing roles (and if the term masculine doesn't work juts substitute maleness).

Presumably the straight biological role of women (give birth, raise children) does rather define what women end up doing much of the time for a large part of their adult life, even if it's multi-tasked with many other duties.
Impregnating a woman doesn't *necessarily* involve anything like as much commitment to future activities, so there has been more inherent flexibility in what men could do (whether smart or dumb), or the risks they could take either once they had sired a few children or in the expectation that doing something quite dangerous may have a good *average* payoff in terms of breeding success even if the odds are against survival.

It is easier for a man to be largely an indivdualist but still end up with offspring. In fact, it's quite possibly *easier* in a modern society, since an obsessive individualistic male with some talents may well be able to accumulate enough wealth over a long lifetime to attract and support one or more young fertile women.
A women who works single-mindedly for 30 years to accumulate a nice big cash pile is probably out of luck in terms of breeding.

Whilst I agree that generalisations can be unhelpful & misleading, I believe that there are definite differences between males & females in their biology, physiology, mental processes, behaviour & so on.

The social effect is an interesting consideration. People tend to behave differently in a same sex company than mixed or opposte sex. This has been touched on in considering a mother's influence in bringing up children. I wonder if single sex schools also have an impact on gender behaviour?

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Having a sister who's main area of research is gender issues, (She's a lecturer and researcher on the subject) I am very aware of such matters and think carefully about how my kids are brought up. One of the main influences for how I bring them up is whether or not they will get bullied at school (more to do with my son than my daughter) but also to encourage them to explore anything that they are interested in. Not to assume that because he is a boy that he will bo 'into' cars, trains, footie etc and similarly with my daughter.

He started to school last year and straight away huge gender issues came up. He now won't play with girls, he is in a 'Star Wars' gang who don't include girls. He is also able to tell the gender of every colour!!

Amazing.

My daughter is encouraged to like pink by her nana, my husband and his girlfriend although she doesn't really have a preference for trousers or dresses yet (she's nearly 3). She likes getting muddy and messy and is a great climber. Very unafraid. It will be interesting to see what happens when she goes to school.

I have lots to say but no time to say it in!

Girls in my opinion are more bullied than boys because of gender.

Here's why I think that.

How many records sell to men? How many compilations are realeased specifically for men?

None that I have seen.

On the other hand there are plenty of records released specifically aimed at women. You can tell by the "styling" of the artist all greased six pack and coiffed hair. You can even tell by the name of the compilation *The best chic flix hits IV* or some such.

Females are taught to know their place and not question what they get thrown at them this is not entirely true of today but if you look back it was more true in the past.Now Im not knocking any individuals in this conversation for being complicit in these trends.


The fact is though that any boy who turned up where I worked and behaved the way most girls do Id be really worried he was being bullied. If I offered a pool cue to a boy and he shyed away from it or gave him the chance to run a group and he hid his face behind a freinds shoulder alarm bells would be ringing but with girls its what Im used to and I KNOW that girls dont want to be like that.I have to accept the differences as they stand to a large extent and only *push* change slowly because to do otherwise would just be p*ssing into the wind.

There are some more sensitive souls out there but as the women here would attest women arent naturally shrinking violets. I think they suffer from a society that compartmentalises their roles and from being around people (both men and women) willing to deride their "unladylike" choices.

This Im happy to say is changing, but it still happens. Even today I was struggling to get some girls to overcome the notion that focusing on their education would make them "swatty" and uncool. I encounter far less unwillingness from boys to embrace education. This despite the fact that girls are more amenable to education. This is once again down to stereotyping what girls lack in thrust they gain by being more amenable to instruction in the class.

Gender stereotyping is a double edged sword for boys too. We scout around and put themselves into more things because we see fewer limits on our remit as men. The other side of this is that young men inparticular feel that there are often areas they are lacking skills or acheivement in, in the quest to be a real man.

Teenaged boys and young men have the higest suicide rates. There is a commonly recognised phenomenon amongst 20s and 30s women now who are angst ridden about wheher they should be carrer women or mothers and if they are working mums if they are devoting enough time to the little ones.

Id agree that people arent fundamentally that different but our intentions and actions can be different if we make them that way.

one love

In Reply to:

<> (Potholer)

What utter rubbish! You don't need to state your sexuality to see whether you'll get into the sack do you?! Using certain suggestions towards certain people in certain ways is how you do that, surely? Who you end up in bed with is dependent on many more factors than sexuality. Compartmentalisation of relationship status only restricts or allows those who place certain constraints or rules on their conjoinment NOT their sexual preference.

You don't have to be gay to fancy men only. You don't have to be a lesbian to fancy women only. You don't have to be a heterosexual to find the other gender/sex (the terms are so fraught with androgyny!) attractive. That's my point. Sexuality is fluid and is only compartmentalised by those who fear their definition could be misconstrued. Strange, in that it is inately fluid and thus YOUR sexuality is YOUR construct.

A case in point is the "Metrosexual" or SNAGs (sensitive new age guys) of the new Millennium who place looking good and personality couture as important as being masculine. Sometimes it's very hard to know whether someone is gay by how they look these days. Any prejudice to someone who has sculpted hair, good skin, dashing smile and a wardrobe from a catwalk COULD be gay or COULD be straight.

Perhaps, in the coming decades, the blinkered view of dress defining someone will vanish. Perhaps. I doubt it. However the question of sexuality and the compartmentalisation of it will rage for the rest of time, unless people stop having pre-conceived ideas and recognise that, in essence, it really doesn't matter whether you like Arthur, Martha or both.

>>"Sexuality is fluid and is only compartmentalised by those who fear their definition could be misconstrued."

I think for most people, sexuality really *isn't* that fluid in practice, which is why most people don't see a huge problem with having useful simple categories to describe sexuality.

>>"Sometimes it's very hard to know whether someone is gay by how they look these days..."

Well, that's hardly new - there always *have* been people who either couldn't be immediately categorised by their appearance, or who would be categorised wrongly. Quite possibly a large majority of some orientations at times.

>>"However the question of sexuality and the compartmentalisation of it will rage for the rest of time, unless people stop having pre-conceived ideas and recognise that, in essence, it really doesn't matter whether you like Arthur, Martha or both."

Isn't the idea that sexuality is fluid precisely as pre-concieved as the idea that for most people it's pretty well static?
Even if there are people for whom is *is* flexible, that doesn't mean it is flexible for everyone. The best you could say is that it *can* be flexible.

Having *categories* doesn't necessarily imply being *judgemental*, and neither does lacking generally understood categories necessarily preclude judgementalism.
Even if there weren't explicit words, unless people in general didn't have any pattern to the sex of their sexual partners, then as far as who-mates-with-who is concerned, people would still mentally classify other people in some fashion, and people who were scared of (or who didn't like) people who made different choices to them would still be able to find people to attack.

<> (potholer)

I agree with this point to a certain extent. It is, however, those who vehemently stress their sexuality as beign rigid who create dilemmas for those who really aren't that bothered.

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Semantics surely? Sexuality *is* fluid/flexible for everyone - it is expressed inately in your point. If it *can* be flexible, it *is*, it depends upon whether you allow yourself to acknowledge that and how you define your own appropriation of the term which constrains it. However, I do take your point that it is just as negative to compartmetalise sexuality as fluid than being non-fluid. Having said that, all opinions have some ora of judgement, otherwise they wouldn't be opinions.