Quote from dandy00brandy

However, do you find anything wrong with a feminist who simply notices that women still make $.76 for every dollar a man makes?

Yes, because it's a lie, Brandy. This may be the most important lesson you need to learn about feminism: they are at war with men and the first victim of any war is the truth.

http://money.cnn.com/2006/02/21/comm...hadi/index.htm

OK, Brandy,

I'm gonna pull the same old stunt that I did when I was in college and ask for an extension.

I have been contemplating your questions all day, and I am finding that it takes me longer to reply than I though it would.

I would request an extension from you, perhaps allowing you to plagiarize my material if you so choose in exchange. Though, the syllabus is still missing...hmmm.

Regardless, I will finish what I am writing... it's just getting more detailed than I thought it would.

I will finish, regardless of the circumstance.

Mainly, however, I have found that most of our discussions (in the all female class) have been directed towards women's oppression. It has become somewhat of a feminist class. My teacher, Dr. Lisa Ross, is a feminist herself but, although I believe I can learn a lot from here, I would like to hear some contrasting views.

Some contrasting views would certainly available here but without a reference point this could prove difficult. Just what is this women's oppression you mention discussing. I've yet to be convinced that women are, or have ever been, oppressed as a class in western culture. I find it disturbing that this is being presented as truth in our universities.

I am Glad you are on OUR team!!!CELTIC DRUID SIR ...I AM SMILING from ear to ear as I write!!!
That posting of yours is to me priceless I am now copying it to my hard drive!
talk about hard evidence how much more do we bloody need!!!

Re: The Wage Gap Myth!

I sure do, considering the claim is an outright feminist fabrication and has been thoroughly debunked many times. I can't believe people still fall for this nonsense. Essentially any gender disparity in earnings is the result of choices, maternity breaks, career decisions, an unwillingness to commit 60-80hour weeks, a consistency in job history etc to name a few. Basically it's about the choices men and women make.

Thanks Brad, sometimes no matter how much empirical evidence you pile up, for those that have a vested interest in maintaining the lie - is a very powerful incentive indeed in ignoring the blatantly obvious, regardless.

Remember we have truth on our side. Feminists have a socially accepted defunct ideology, that filters and distorts the truth according to their own agenda.

However it only requires the average man or woman, to "step outside the box" and scratch the surface to realise much of what they have learned thus far, is a lie or at best pure hyperbole. Some fear doing so, as what they may discover may turn their whole world perception upside down.

For those that have the moral fortitude to do so, can then either choose a 'new' path of egalitarianism upon their findings, or in a cowardly fashion slither back into the darkness of feminism's all enveloping insidious eternal shadow.

1. How has your life been impacted by the gender you are?

2. Have you felt certain advantages, privileges, disadvantages, discrimination, or limitations?

Brandy, I must admit, I am having a really tough time answering questions #1 and #2, because they are so infinitely intertwined… therefore I will answer them together, with the use of a personal analogy that takes the frame of debate out of gender and rather to “what really is the ‘impact’ of disadvantage?”

First off, I must ask, who is framing the debate? And how can a person of advantage or disadvantage honestly be able to frame a debate unless they have the fully omniscient ability to be both, for an equal time, in equal situations? It is entirely futile to pose such questions because a man will never truly know what it is like to be born with a vagina and all of the social conditioning that goes along with it, nor will a woman EVER truly know what it is like to be born with a penis and live a life accordingly. Let me make this clear, no-one on earth can answer this! We can talk transgender issues until we are blue in face, but they are essentially self-defeating arguments, arenÂ’t they? For even someone who is transgendered does not truly know what it is like to be the opposite gender from birth. Nor does Dr. Lisa Ross have even the foggiest clue to what it has been like to experience everything I have experienced in my over 1.135 billion seconds of existence on earth as being a male (at slightly over 36 years old). She could go and get herself a penis made by some crackerjack surgeonÂ… but she will never be me, nor will she ever have my experiences. How can anyone purport to be so wise to frame this debate without being a blatant fool?

Brandy, if you are a philosophy minor, then surely you have been enrolled in Philosophy 101. Did you write an essay based on PlatoÂ’s (not sure if this is the right guy anymore, itÂ’s been a while) question of how to define piety without using current examples of religion? How did you do on that essay? Same goes for gender! How can you define it? How can Dr. Ross possibly hope to do so?

Anyway, on to my analogy. I have red-green colour blind deficiency. Period. No fair about it! It’s the way it is. How has my life been impacted by this? Is this an advantage or a disadvantage? Also, can I explain to you what my life is like because of it? I can attempt to, but eventually we will have to admit that neither of us can ever know anything. I have a terrible time mixing up green and brown. Can you ever explain to me the difference between green and brown? Can you definitively prove to me the that the blue sky that I see in my mind’s eye is in fact portrayed as the exact same colour that you see when you say blue sky? How do we know that I what I call blue is not actually the color in my mind which you would call yellow in your mind? Do you understand the chuckle I get when someone asks me what colour the trees look like? Especially when they ask me how I know they’re green, to which I can only reply, “How do you?”

How has my life been disadvantaged? Well, there are many obvious disadvantages, I suppose. There are advantages too. People never know I am colour blind unless I tell them. How do I get away with it, they ask? Well my mind has trained itself to identify certain colours as different shades of the same colour, which I identify as the correct colour. Therefore I might see red and pink as the different shades of the same colour and I recognize that particular shade of red as the colour pink. This is how I rarely mix up green and brown. Also, when I am driving at night, a green “stop light” looks just like a street lamp-light, so my brain has trained itself to look for the familiar rectangle and from a long distance I can pick one out and distinguish which light is on. I do not look for the colour green to stand out amongst the other colours. It is futile and I could get into accidents.

A few years ago, it was time to knock off one of the 100 things to do before I die list, and I did a career change and learned how to fly. I knew colour blindness would be a “disadvantage”. If your radio goes out at night, the airport will guide you in by use of lights – and therefore I necessarily must be able to distinguish the colour green. I cannot, so I am “limited” to VFR-Daylight only. This limits me from flying fixed wing aircraft at night for commercial purposes, therefore I learned to fly helicopters instead, for most of that industry only flies during daylight and if my radio goes out I’ll just land near a phone both and call the guy at the airport.

Now, am I disadvantaged? Possibly, depending on how you want to frame the debate. When I go for my medical exams, the doctors are amazed at the intensity of my eyesight, that I can read the bottom lineÂ… is this perhaps because of my eyes being trained to pick out stop lights throughout my life?

We were taught during training that a good pilot never just merrily flies along when “he is not busy”, rather that a good pilot is always looking for places to emergency land just in case of, well, emergency. When I ask “old” pilots what to do if you are flying over dense bush, they say if you have to drive it into the trees, look for the lightest shade of green, as these are usually trees that are young and will easily break away. Also, pilot’s are continually trying to determine the direction of the wind… one of the best ways to do so is by noticing the different shades of green that the bottom of a tree’s leaf has from the top of it. Given that I have been trained my whole life to recognize shades of green rather than the colour green, am I a truly a disadvantaged pilot? It depends on who is framing the debate.

Brandy: IsnÂ’t that a pretty rainbow, Rob?
Rob: Yes it is, Brandy. It really is.

3. Do you think gender is mainly due to biology or culture?

Obviously, gender is due to the culture that is derived because of biology. How could it be any other way? What is the goal of someone trying to deconstruct such a logical marriage of the two? Who can be so smart to divorce the two in a way that is not completely deconstructive to society? I am not this smart. Neither is Dr. Lisa Ross. DonÂ’t ever let her tell you that she is. Why shouldnÂ’t your campus Physics Department have an actual functioning nuclear warhead to play with?

4. Do other demographic variables interact with your gender to significantly affect your life (e.g., sexual orientation, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, etc.)?

Yes. My sexual orientation is heterosexual. Period. I like girls; I think they are sexy and alluring. I should not be ashamed of this. I should not be made to be ashamed of this by the social constructs that ideologies such as feminism purport to be “fixing” by implementing its wrongful and destructive plans for androgynous gender reconstruction. My heterosexuality is a liability to feminism and feminism attacks me for being male.

Yes. I am Caucasian. Period. Politically Correct ideologies continually tell me to apologize for being white. I will not. I am not more wrong than someone who is Asian, Native American, Black or Hispanic. What is the goal of the PCism which rises to race hatred moral levels and tells me I should apologize for the color of my skin?

Yes. I am a heterosexual, Caucasian, male who has been raised in a society with high qualities of education and wealth. I am the last politically correct target for hatred on earth because of my socioeconomic status. It still doesnÂ’t make it morally correct for people to degrade me because of it. What is the goal of an ideology that teaches hatred towards me simply because of what I cannot control?

5. How do you perceive the term "feminist" and do you consider yourself a feminist? Why or why not?

I perceive the term “feminist” to be synonymous with supremacist hate movements such as the likes of the Nazis. Feminism has me in its sights. When I hear $0.76, I question the lunacy of belief in this. I question whether this should be considered a hate crime and whether the people who spout such nonsense should be imprisoned for using propaganda to purposefully mislead the masses into committing crimes against people because of the very nature of their birth. I question why people do not know that this $0.76 argument has been made illegal over 40 years ago and why people would not positively seek out such an imbalanced pay schedule for the purpose of suing said employer into the poor house while the “disadvantaged” employee could retire on the windfall. It is a mute point argument. It has been twisted to be misleading. The bigger question is: “Who is framing this debate and what is their purpose?”

I question the wisdom of those who refuse to acknowledge such tremendous amounts of research on Domestic Violence which contradict feminist ideologies and the corruptiveness of trying to cure it with the “Duluth Model”. http://www.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm I question the validity of someone’s Ph D if they insist on continuing down a wrong path even when there is overwhelming evidence that they are wrong. I question the validity of academia and what it tells me because of this. I question why Ph D feminists have not addressed these issues properly and without fear in “their quest for the truth.” I question the morality of feminism that ignores that which contradicts it while at the same time is so willing to create more Domestic Violence and Rape hype, which leads to further destruction of harmony between the genders.

Ask Dr. Lisa Ross what she knows of social/relational aggression and if women are prone to such behaviour as Crick & Grotpeter have illustrated in regard to “girl bullying.” Ask yourself if it is possible for a woman to bully a man in the same way. Find a modern definition of Domestic Violence and compare it to relational aggression. Ask Dr. Lisa Ross why this has not been brought to the attention of the public and the multi billion dollar Domestic Violence Industry. Ask her if she believes the Domestic Violence Industry should be expanded or deconstructed. What are the implications of passing more laws and creating more intrusive government?

I question an ideology that says it’s OK to bash men because of thousands of years of oppression. The “thousands of years of oppression” theory is just that, a theory. Prove it, feminists. Only one man was Abraham Lincoln. Thousands of men were named John Smith and they lived in camps far away from home, building things like railroads. Aside from their first goal of sending money to feed their wives and children, their second goal was to be the guy holding the hammer instead of the guy holding the spike.

How can past wrongs be fixed by future hatred? My parents grew up in Nazi occupied Europe and suffered more directly from real oppression than you or I could ever logically argue in the same regard. Can you tell me why today they donÂ’t hate Germans for being German? Can you imagine a world where they were allowed to? Can you imagine a world where they are encouraged to?

Brandy, I will not give you list upon list of examples. You are a student in academia. You are mandated to seek the truth without fear of the answer you receive. It is a journey you must do on your own, for I cannot argue you into my beliefs unless you are willing to search as much as I have. This will have to be your journey.

I am anti-feminist because I believe feminism is a supremacist hate movement based on propaganda and lies. Make no mistake. I am anti-feminist.

6. Do you think gender relations are getting better or worse? How so?

What do you think I think? And why? What is a self-fulfilling prophecy and why does feminism have the apparent goal of ridiculing and degrading masculinity? What is the feminist purpose of androgynizing the genders?

Why? Why? Why?

---

Dr. Lisa Ross should not ask questions such as she has about the advantages or disadvantages of gender, unless she purposefully intends for you to be stumped. Otherwise, I would recommend that you refuse to answer to such lunacy until she can definitively argue why a Grizzly Bear is advantaged over a Shark, and logically conclude why it is so. Ask her if teaching a shark to walk on its fins while giving the grizzly bear some flippers will solve this problem. If she cannot answer appropriately, her Ph D is a sham. She has absolutely zero knowledge of what it is truly like to be a male, twelve Ph DÂ’s will not help her in this regard. Those three men were well within their rights to drop out. What would you say to me if I purported to be more of an expert than you on subjects such as PMS?

Ask yourself, and ask Dr. Lisa Ross, why the debate is being framed in such a way and why a course such Psych 350 is taught by the Department of Women’s Studies rather than in the Department of Anthropology, where it should rightly be studied under “Social Anthropology?” What is the end goal of feminism? Is it harmony between men and women, or is it destruction of society? What is the goal, Brandy?

BTW, thanks for bringing these questions to us, for I truly did enjoy answering them.

Rob Fedders, proudly Anti-Feminist, 36 years of age.

ps. Syllabus?

Rob, I'm not having a go at you personally, but you avoided the "core" question of " 2. Have you felt certain advantages, privileges, disadvantages, discrimination, or limitations?

You devolved and meandered into optical deficiency perceptions and problems, and totally missed the opportunity to express a male point of view regarding the status quo - to be digested by the masses.

Ok, I realise much of this was presented via various presented "analogies" but maybe the possible "target" audience (20 year olds aren't as politically and socially evolved as we would like to believe.)Take this as constructive criticism, hell I might be wrong.

I realise you have taken a long time to compose your response, and appreciate that. I just felt you didn't address that specific question sufficiently. Don't take this as a personal attack, I love your work and enjoy reading your "art." The rest of your response is excellent.

Celtic Druid,

I understand that, and that's why I struggle so much with that question. What is advantage or disadvantage? What is real male or female disadvantage? That is why I say it all depends on who is framing the debate. Is not the disadvantage of a woman being pregnant also offset by the beauty of being pregnant? Is PMS a disadvantage? How could you get pregnant without it? It's all in who frames the debate, which feminism does so eloquently. It is why they are continually able to move the goal posts.

Is a shark disadvantaged to a grizzly bear? How can you ever argue that unless you frame the debate? A shark is disadvantaged by not having feet only when one says he is out of the water. Then the grizzly will kill him easily. Throw a grizzly into the ocean and the shark will shred him.

How can you frame the debate of any advantage or disadvantage in regard to gender without taking into account all things of the environment. For every disadvantage there is an advantage. It's a futile question. It's a state of mind and feminists use it to falsley sway people every day.

How can one feel about it unless the debate is properly framed?

That's my belief anyway, and why I chose to answer that way, because I don't think I can answer it. There are far too many variables to take into account.

(BTW, no worries about criticizing. I'm a big boy)

Rob, you're response encapsulates why I'm happy you're a member here. Sometimes I'm harder with those that I admire, and demand more, then those who contribute almost nothing.

I don't want to imply that homosexuality is a defect, but there is a high correlation between lesbianism and a hormone abnormality/infertility. Lesbians who are very "butch" likely do have an excess of male hormones.

I really liked hearing about this because. I have always heard that male homosexuality is more complex than that of a females. I mean to say that men generally know or have some idea that they are gay from the time they learn about sexuality. Also, they tend to be more fully homosexual than bisexual. Lesbianism has been viewed as being more a choice or a feeling that, like most feelings do, changes. Hearing about this "abnormality" (please, i dare someone tell me what is normal!!!) in hormone levels is new information for me. At first I wanted to say that this made complete sense. However, I feel like testosterone is shared by both men and women...it is linked to aggression and sexual drive, but can it claim to be linked to sexual orientation? Of course the facts you presented were merely correlational and a "third variable" (perhaps fourth or fifth) is likely to exist. Still, any clue to a biological answer to lesbianism is still needed.

Imagine how awful it would be if you feel so out of place in your body that you would want to butcher your sexual organs to make it "right!"

I just wanted to hit on this because, in my psychology of gender class, we had a suprise transgendered speaker recently. She had been born male, but had pretty much always known she felt out of place in her male body. I think she put it, "drowning in a sea of testosterone." ..something like that. She is due for her sex-change operation very soon. She has never been happier. It was just a real eye-opener to hear it in person from someone who really knows that this condition (?) isn't so much a choice. It's biology.

And you may have heard the theory that the hormonal environment in the womb contributes to male homosexuality.

Definitely. I've heard that the more male children a woman has, the more likely each subsequent male child is to be homosexual. This is why I liked hearing about your information about female biology and homosexuality.

One more thing is that when children are born hermaphrodites, the doctors usually want to "fix" it right away so they can label the child either a boy or girl. (Usually girl, I think) But sometimes they choose wrong, and the child ends up being physically a girl but mentally a boy! There is so much evidence that sexual identity is more a function of brain chemistry than socialization.

This was a big issue in our last reading for class! In it, the story mentioned one doctor who preformed sex-correction surgery on babies. He always made them into girls. Apparently society thinks the penis has to meet higher standards of appearance than a vagina. Granted, we can't very well look down and examine ourselves, and I've never actually seen what I constructed vagina looks like, but I feel like there still has to be some obvious difference between a constructed vagina and a 'real' one. Moreover, the doctor in this story had never done follow-up on his patients either way... to see if the were pleased or not. He kept on assuming that making a hole instead of a pole was the way to go. I say let the kids decide!

Your perception is defunct.

Rob, I will start my admitting that I got pretty emotional while reading this. I enjoyed actually feeling your passion as you stated your views and questioned the appropriate material. Also, thank you for forcing your views into words while not forcing them down the readers' throats! That is all too easy to do. You have truly embodied your ideology of a "quest for truth" as you so mentioned. Thank you.

Same goes for gender! How can you define it? How can Dr. Ross possibly hope to do so?

I will defend her here because I do not believe she was looking for concrete answers. I believe the purpose of this paper is to examine the way society (although generating very low generalizability with such a small sample size) views both gender and feminism. I hope you can see how the average person (I mean to say, most people have not studied or been enriched by topics of feminism in an academic or educational setting and have, therefore, not analyzed the philosophy, psychology, etc behind it) would simply oblige and answer as best and honestly as they can.

A few years ago, it was time to knock off one of the 100 things to do before I die list, and I did a career change and learned how to fly.

Totally off topic: I recently took a trip to Las Vegas, Nevada. I loved the flight experienced (minus the cramped atmosphere and bad food)! The view was amazing and it gave me such a different perspective about our world. Okay, that may sound silly but I still enjoyed it. ...I want to say that I share your interest in flight and have seriously considered learning to fly a plane either recreationally or as a career.

Now, am I disadvantaged?

A question that could possibly take essays to answer. Your careful anaylsis proved here yet again. Is it truly a disadvantage for women to be thought of a delicate and in need of a man's care? Is it an advantage, as society/feminists would have us believe, for men to be expected to work and provide for their families. Although some women strongly value independence and self-success of sorts, and I am not saying that I do not, I would have no problem with living comfortably off of the money my man made. I do not find this to be a sign of feeling inferior or portraying "anti-feminism." Hell, I'm lazy. I can still be active in the community, if that's what makes me happy. Also, a big topic is biology. Is it a disadvantage for women to be the carriers of children? It is all in how you look at it. It's only a disadvantage if you aren't weak enough to deal with it!

Brandy: Isn�t that a pretty rainbow, Rob?
Rob: Yes it is, Brandy. It really is.

HA!
Not just a gender issue here...personal perception is something that can never fully be conveyed onto anyone else.

Obviously, gender is due to the culture that is derived because of biology. How could it be any other way? What is the goal of someone trying to deconstruct such a logical marriage of the two? Who can be so smart to divorce the two in a way that is not completely deconstructive to society?

Rob, I have debated this same issue in class. The readings in which true androgyny is represented as a real ideal to aspire to, in my belief, is complete bull! Biology influences gender. There is no way around that. Culture, too, has a big impact on gender. You say "culture...is derived because of biology." Is it then possible that biology is derived partly by culture? Male still take predominantly masculine jobs (i.e. construction, law enforcement, etc.). These fields tend to increase testorone levels in one way or the other. Hence, many men in the working world show signs of higher masculinity. Could this not be the case starting for both females and males at a young age? We place girls in situations where an increase of estrogen is optimal, while placing boys in situations exactly the opposite.

Oh, and I want to make note that my defense of my teacher here still stands. The question was not posed to find a correct answer for either stance. It was simply a poll (?) to gain insight into how the majority of society may feel.

Why shouldn�t your campus Physics Department have an actual functioning nuclear warhead to play with?

Wow, Rob.

My heterosexuality is a liability to feminism and feminism attacks me for being male...Politically Correct ideologies continually tell me to apologize for being white...I am the last politically correct target for hatred on earth because of my socioeconomic status.

One of my interviewees, a male my age, answered this question in complete opposition. I believe he is either very ignorant or naive. He also is a caucasian male and noted that, because of this, he does not feel that society has any problems with him. He has not experienced any prejudice against him. Maybe he is not looking hard enough.

I perceive the term �feminist� to be synonymous with supremacist hate movements such as the likes of the Nazis.

Although I am finding most people would agree with this, I do not think it is an all-encompassing definition. Feminists are like all women, completely different across the wide spectrum of characteristics. Of course, there exists a 'normal' that must be recognized, but variations also exist that you have not recognized. I do not believe that all feminists hate men and want superiority, as I do not believe all anti-feminists should 'hate' all feminists.

I question why people do not know that this $0.76 argument has been made illegal over 40 years ago

Legalities. Oh, legalities. This I want to incorporate into my previous response. When African Americans were made legally equal (not just seperate but equal) to all other American citizens, they were not automatically treated as equals by everyone. Women's equality is legally justified and any attempt to hender a person in any way on the basis of their sex may hold serious consequences, true. This does not mean that women are automatically accepted as equals, especially in the workplace. Do you blame blacks in history for fighting against their injustice? My idea of feminism is fighting to uphold this legally created equality. I do not pretend that we (women) have not come a long way or that times have not changed. However, there was a time when feminism was desperately needed and I believe there are stereotypes even today that only serve to 'disadvantage' women. People who place feminism as the top-most of their priorites may be somewhat living in the past because most men and women have gotten over the idea the women are not as good as men. This priority only leads people, understandably, to believe that feminists now want supremacy and not equality (I am not ignoring that there are woman who fit perfectly into the definition you gave, but I do not think it can be rightfully justified as being the only one). This is how I feel whenever someone of colored skin blames me for their oppression. But, I would like to point out a few studies. One deals with sex and intelligence. In this instance, volunteers were asked to read either a paper by a Jane or a John. In fact, it was the same paper. The results show that the paper by John was rated significantly better than the one by Jane. Females are still viewed as less competent, even when the same people admit to not holding any sexist views. (Also, fat people are were deemed less competent than skinny individuals by a similar study). Another study is on racism. Participants of both white and black skin were asked to view an image that was flashed quickly on the screen and then rate it accordingly. The images were of either black or white males holding an object. Even though few weapons were actually used in the images as objects, most participants (race aside) were found to have a higher degree of prejudice towards the images of black men. That is, they assumed that the black males in the picture were holding a weapon more often than the images of white males. I hope that all made sense.

Ask Dr. Lisa Ross what she knows of social/relational aggression and if women are prone to such behaviour as Crick & Grotpeter have illustrated in regard to �girl bullying.� Ask yourself if it is possible for a woman to bully a man in the same way. Find a modern definition of Domestic Violence and compare it to relational aggression.

True, women have been known to beat on their men. As far as I know, however, men are still more than twice as likely to physically abuse a woman than for it to be the other way around. I feel like feminism is a lot about statistics. Statistically (supposedly, although, thanks to everyone who proved my prior knowledge of the $0.76 wrong and provided necessarily examples, I am now pretty scared and apprehensive about displaying any facts that I have recently learned about gender issues) women are still shown to fall prey to ignorant sexists in a variety of areas and, if true, this is something that should rightly be fought against. Still, I will not ignore that women's driving aggression is sky-rocketing, spousal abuse administered by women has been increasing, and we all know women who gossip more and hurt more people emotionally than any of the guys we know (well, in most cases ?). I feel like the question you posed of any possibility is obvious. Biologically, though, testosterone levels increase aggression.. and we all know what that means for men.

Only one man was Abraham Lincoln. Thousands of men were named John Smith and they lived in camps far away from home, building things like railroads. Aside from their first goal of sending money to feed their wives and children, their second goal was to be the guy holding the hammer instead of the guy holding the spike.

I think Karl hit on this, too. He feels like men are made to always put women first. Care for women, work hard for you women. Both ideals that I am perfectly okay with! Altough, of course, I feel the need for reciprocal conduct on the part of these women. Woman may just not realize what all a man does for her on a regular basis. Men may not realize what all a woman goes through for her man. Men may not realize how prominant sexism still is in society (even if displayed strictly at a subconscious level). Women may not want to recognize that their own realization of the existence of sexism creates for them the self-fulfilling prophecy that you mentioned previously.

I would recommend that you refuse to answer to such lunacy until she can definitively argue why a Grizzly Bear is advantaged over a Shark, and logically conclude why it is so.

As a philosphy student, I have taken a lot of interest into the rising popularity of environmental ethics. This comment really hits home. Humans advantaged of sharks or grizzly bears? I would love to be able to live underwater. I would love to be able to carry 10x my body weight like an ant. Heck, wouldn't it be advantagous if I could produce my own fruit like some plants? I have come to believe that attempting to give any reasoning as to why anything is better, worse, or equal to anything else only leads to prejudice. Defining qualities that put organisms into definite groups marks differences and supports a need for separation. Equality is one humanistic ideal that I believe does more harm than good. Because, basically, one group always has to deem another as having equal status. This is just like saying you are the popular group and we think you're good enough to join us at our lunch table.



Here ends my remarks. Thank you so much for you insight. Thank you so much for your time. I am also very glad to hear that you enjoyed answering these questions and helping me out! I still have a lot more to think about!

ps. I will try to type out the introductory part of the syllabus sometime very soon for you. Apparently you cannot paste anything here and she does not have it posted online. Is it possible for me to attach a file here? That'd save me a lot of trouble and give you much more information!

Lol, Brandy. I was busy hammering away on the computer about some further issues while you were composing your response. Thanks for your reply. If you will allow me a few days to again do some pondering on what you said, I will attempt to formulate a proper reply.

In the mean time,

Celtic Druid,

You were quite right to criticize my response to question #2. As I said, I really struggled with that one, and perhaps if you will indulge me, I can elaborate on my struggle with that question for in many ways it does relate directly to many of the issues which we discuss.

How can any open ended “definition” of advantage or disadvantage, freedom or limitation make absolutely any sense unless the debate is strictly outlined by certain limitations of its own? Leaving such a definition open gives way to a “weighting”, if you will, of certain levels which are strictly created by the individual and I believe are impossible to discuss. This “weighting” is strictly personal and is therefore nearly impossible for anyone to study accurately unless it is put inside a very definable boundary.

Ponder something like Beethoven’s deafness. Whether his deafness was an advantage or a disadvantage can be flipped over like a coin quite easily, can’t it? Of course, in relation to walking down the street and not knowing if a horse and carriage was about to run him over, he is quite easily viewed at a disadvantage to me and it can be argued as such when we talk about his deafness being a safety disadvantage. But very easily, if one wants to talk about music, we must view his deafness as a possible musical advantage. What his mind must have been like to be able to “hear” music in his brain, which may possibly have been greatly enhanced by his advantage of being deaf. Now all that is left is for the individual, Beethoven, to decide whether his safety disadvantage outweighs his musical advantage. Given his focus on music, he may very well have viewed his deafness as an unfair advantage he possessed over others. How can you or I ever decide this for him? We can never do so, for it is a personal choice that only the individual can make – quite literally. It is purely a state of mind.

We don’t consider ourselves disadvantaged to birds because we can’t fly. Yet, in that specific example we are very much disadvantaged. However, we choose to look at birds as disadvantaged to us because they do not possess minds that can enable them to fly at the speed of sound. It is strictly a state of mind in how you choose to look at it, and which you choose to value most.

Therefore, we often hear that women are disadvantaged in say… high level corporate positions. Often this is blamed on women “being forced” to spend more time on their families. So, if we wish to only look at women’s involvement with their families as a disadvantage because of the hindrance it causes directly in “corporate ladder performance”, then I cannot deny it’s a disadvantage. But to ignore that the same woman, in the same situation has also been given a countering advantage in that she knows her children well and that she is able to satisfy some motivation deep inside of her to raise good children who will flourish in society… Well, who is calling what a disadvantage or advantage? How can anyone truthfully say anything about studying this without also studying the individual’s value-system-weighting? And since it is very strictly individual, how can defining anything as an advantage or disadvantage be anything less than a personal value system?

In fact, even my trusty foe, feminism, has advantaged me in some ways. I have learned how to use a computer much better and I have decided to use my endless yacking on forums to improve my grammar, punctuation and spelling by paying closer attention to it. Now all that is left for me to decide is whether I find the disadvantage of how feminism negatively affects my life to outweigh my desire to improve my computer skills and my desire to rejuvenate my sorely neglected writing skills. I think you know where my value system lies, so I won’t expand. But it’s still a personal value system and it must be incredibly difficult to study because each individual is infinitely different.

Go figure, the first good thing I’ve ever said about feminism.

Brandy,

If you are interested, here is a link to a Yahoo Group that I keep. http://ca.groups.yahoo.com/group/Nat...an_Masterhood/

There are a lot of links inside which are directed towards specific articles I've come across on the internet. They are loosely categorized in certain different areas and as well there are several links to various forums and websites in regard to many gender issues. Though, be forewarned, they are not very feminist friendly.

Quote from dandy00brandy

Men may not realize what all a woman goes through for her man. Men may not realize how prominant sexism still is in society (even if displayed strictly at a subconscious level). Women may not want to recognize that their own realization of the existence of sexism creates for them the self-fulfilling prophecy that you mentioned previously.

All these never ending discussions! Men like to get on with things, not talk all the time. That's why they used to tell women to shut up and get their work done. They can't do that anymore. Nowadays they try to shut women up by giving them almost everything they demand. Not a good strategy, because they just keep demanding more and more. Finally, the balance of power between men and women will be completely lost (this is already the case, but many people don't see it). There remains a third option to make a woman stop arguing: not to let her into your life in the first place. An option more and more men are choosing.