Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1a 7/7/83; site rlgvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!seismo!rlgvax!guy From: guy@rlgvax.UUCP Newsgroups: net.women Subject: Re: innate passiveness? (and 10000 similar discussions) Message-ID: <864@rlgvax.UUCP> Date: Fri, 22-Jul-83 04:41:09 EDT Article-I.D.: rlgvax.864 Posted: Fri Jul 22 04:41:09 1983 Date-Received: Fri, 22-Jul-83 21:05:02 EDT References: <973@umcp-cs.UUCP> Organization: CCI Office Systems Group, Reston, VA Lines: 36 Several articles posted here recently bring up a point that some of the posters have missed. Namely: To what degree can you speak of a particular trait as "male" and "female" when the intra-group differences with respect to this trait are great? Consider passivity and agression. How meaningful is it to ask whether males are innately agressive and females are innately passive when you can go anywhere between the two-fisted macho man subject to raging hormonal influences to Caspar Milquetoast? An extreme example, to be sure, but how many of you would say that there was more difference between the "average" or "typical" female and the average/typical male than between, say, you coworkers of a given sex? There may be sex-linked differences in these traits, but I strongly suspect they're not of major importance relative to the total human variation in those traits. Several people have pointed out that the female political leaders that come to mind are not passive and unaggressive; quite the contrary. I am suspicious of broad sweeping statements about "women" or "blacks" or ...; usually, they merely reflect the prevailing cultural stereotype of the group in question. Consider the support those stereotypes get from our culture. I am a faithful reader of the daily funnies, and I get megadosed with the "typical household" with the flighty female and the male with the roving eye. We no longer have the blatant racist stereotypes of the type we had in comics earlier in the century, but how many action heroes are young white males? In short, before jumping to a conclusion about how "women are ..." check whether you're truly giving a reasoned response or merely repeating a cultural prejudice. (Thank you, Ginger @ Boeing Aerospace, for putting Freud and the person who cited him in their place. If his response was meant as a joke, it wasn't very funny; that line has been repeated SO many times it's become part of our cultural white noise. And thank you, those who have pointed out that asking what "women" would do depends more on who the woman is than on her being a woman.) Guy Harris {seismo,mcnc,we13,brl-bmd,allegra}!rlgvax!guy