Comment by dguaraglia
8 years ago
> If men created gender roles and gender expectations...
I'm actually kind of surprised by your ability to misreading the same thing over, and over, and over again. You are still pushing this idea that "men created gender roles" and throwing a wholehearted defense against it. Why don't you try "society normalized gender roles around the needs of the physically stronger sex" and see if that removes the edge?
> ...then a few predictions should be made, so I will state three.
I could come up with 20 predictions that do match the hypothesis. In fact, I did in my earlier post, just make my statements into predictions: "in a society that revolves around the needs of men, women wouldn't be allowed into positions of power", "in a society that revolves around the needs of men some form of genital mutilation that discourages women from exploring their own sexuality could be used as a method to subjugate them", etc. etc.
It's also hard to follow your example of "disproven predictions", as sometimes their link with the topic at hand is very tenuous. But let's take for example your first two:
1) You claim women were not used as warriors, so that's proof "men" don't control the narrative. There's plenty of arguments against your point:
a) maybe that's more to do with the fact that women as property are valuable, whereas sending a street urchin to war doesn't hurt the powerful people at all?
b) in modern societies being a "warrior" conveys power and a social position; just think about how many men in power come from a military background and connect that with the constant conservative movement to keep women out of the military
c) a battle might be won by brawn, but war at large is won by logistics; I'd recommend you read about the "home front" and how women have always played a major role in keeping the war machine humming along while the "warriors" kill each other. Maybe the "laborious home maker" gender stereotype serves its purpose better than sending women to the frontline?
2) You claim that gender roles didn't change during Queen Victoria's reign. And yet, that's exactly the timeline of her reign matches almost exactly the timeline for the Suffragette movement in the UK: https://www.bl.uk/votes-for-women/articles/womens-suffrage-t.... The Suffragette movement wasn't just about putting pieces of paper in a box, but largely about recognizing that women were equal citizens and as such should have the same rights as men.
3) I can't for the life of me identify where your long exposition about this African tribe intersected with your third point.
> "Men rights" movement is both young and split with parts that is competing with the feminist movement about positions of power
Again, our Congress is largely male. How are these "men rights warriors" trying to "regain" terrain, when they are still winning by a solid 30 to 40%?
> and the other that tries to take up torch against gender roles which the feminist movement abandoned. Examples of the later is those that fight for more women in the military, equal rights for adoption (and the right to start a family), the elimination of alimony and child support, and gender neutral efforts to reduce gender segregation.
I really can't follow what you are saying here. Are you saying that all those are feminist positions and now the "men rights" movements are trying to destroy them? I guess I have issues with some of those points being actually feminist positions (right to adoption? The elimination of alimony? When were those feminist issues?) If so, what do you think is the motivation for the "men rights" movement to attack those positions?
> If we want to stop those gender expectations then we have to eliminate those gender roles, and I would predict it would cause a huge change for gender segregation in the work market.
How so? You are saying that removing the stereotype somehow will broaden the breach that extends along the stereotypes? Sounds very, very far-fetched to me. It's like saying "letting black people work in desegregated workplaces will generate even more segregation".
> I'm actually kind of surprised by your ability to misreading the same thing over, and over, and over again.
And I am surprised by your ability to miss the point over, and over and over again.
If "society normalized gender roles around the needs of the physically stronger sex" then that mean society should maximize safety needs for the stronger sex. For every step we should see men having it superior and better than women. This is not true and has never been true.
We see more men being put in jail them women, but its the opposite for african american and white.
If "society normalized gender roles around the needs of the physically stronger sex" and we look at the results, then we could almost use the exact same data to prove that society normalized race around the needs of the african americans. They get put in jail more. They got drafted in the army more. According to you that is a sign of power and social position.
> just make my statements into predictions
That is not how predictions work. A flat earth person could say "if I predict that looking out at sea I will see an edge" or "if I look at the sun I see the face of god". Predictions need to be testable and falsifiable.
> b) in modern societies being a "warrior" conveys power and a social position;
So white men conveys African-Americans power and social position when they disproportionately drafted them? That is an interpretation that the african-american will disagree with you on. Power and social position is not granted when by force someone is put into the fire line.
> War at large is won by logistics
Its ridiculous argument that it servers men to be forced to stand in a fire line rather than be protected at home.
> You claim that gender roles didn't change during Queen Victoria's reign.
Your ability to misreading caused trouble for you. Queen Victoria's reign is infamous for rigid gender roles and trying to paint that period as a time of progressive change in gender roles flies against common knowledge.
> Again, our Congress is largely male. How are these "men rights warriors" trying to "regain" terrain, when they are still winning by a solid 30 to 40%?
They don't. "Mens rights warriors" fighting against "social justice warriors" is a boring side show and thankfully the wast majority of the population seem to not care. When they do care its because media loves to focus on it with the sad effect of increasing polarization.
The feminist position is currently define as post-modern feminism, which came from modern feminism that came from diversity feminism that in turn came from equality feminism that ended around the early 70s. Equality feminism held the idea that men and women are more similar than not and thus gender roles are an hindrance for equality. Diversity feminism holds the opposing view, and want to focus on the diversity but still keep equal outcomes. Diversity feminism won over the movement, and modern feminism is derived from that point of view. Post-modern is still being debated.
> what do you think is the motivation for the "men rights" movement to attack those positions?
The part of the movement that want equality is mostly copying the views that the equality feminism held 50 years ago. Gender roles are bad, there is more in common than differences, and anything that differentiate on the basis of gender is inherently immoral.
Example: Should all children have a human right against religious genital mutilation? Currently only one nation has such law and that is island. Here in Sweden when the political leaders was asked if they wanted a similar law, only one out of 8 established parties said yes and that was the representative for a center-right party. By happenstance she is also the only female political leader that explicitly do not define herself as feminist. I find it strange that in order to support such law the only choice for voters is the conservative right block.
A gender neutral human rights law for children against genital mutilation is directly opposed by political leaders in Sweden that identify as feminist, including the minor feminist party. Instead its a mens right argument and center-right on the political plane. The mens right argument is that the gender of the victim is irrelevant when someone is putting a knife to a child and starts cutting. It should illegal regardless if its a boy or girl. The feminist movement disagree.
> feminist positions (right to adoption? The elimination of alimony? When were those feminist issues?)
Guess which political movement and which decade that Sweden eliminated alimony among other law texts that had the word "woman" or "man" in it. If the guess is the "feminist movement" and "around the 60s" then you would be right. Currently only a handful of laws still exist which treat women and men differently, one which sadly have a profound effect on how victims of crimes get treated.
> You are saying that removing the stereotype somehow will broaden the breach
I am not sure if you intentional are misinterpreting here. Eliminating gender roles would turn the tide and finally reduce gender segregation and make society more equal. The trend for the last 50 years is an increase gender segregation in the work force, where currently only 10% of the population work in a profession which has better than 60:40 in gender segregation.