Optimizing men and women

[HydrogenBond]

The timeless battle of the sexes is due to the misunderstanding that results simply because men and women are different; they have different needs and motivations. Culture is trying to reduce the difference between men and women, because it is working under the assumption that males and females are bascially the same and the difference is merely a function of cultural conditioning, without any basis in natural instinct.

 

The current situation of the feminization of men is an example of female's trying to turn men into what they think men should be. The question is, can someone, who has never lived in a man's body know exactly what is best for a man? The same holds true for men trying to change women into a model of a women without really knowing what it is like to be a women. An analogy is an athlete who has good skills in basketball. We then give them a coach who knows little about the game. The odds are the athlete's natural talents will be corrupted.

 

The women's movement began to help women overcome the ideal that men created. This ideal was in the men's best interest, but did not optimize the needs of the females. The females, rightfully so, broke the mold to become more in line what what women saw as optimized for themselves. But they kept going, turning men into something that was more convenient for them but less optimized for what it is to be a man. This is a political and emotional topic that goes beyond reason. To help restore reason I would like to create a scenario.

 

Picture a few decades in the future. The males are all finally feminized. As a way of balance, culture decides that now it is the males's turn to teach females how to be masculine, i.e., masculinization of women stirred by the males. To begin the masculinization of women, the males decide to get rid of all those things that culture does to train women to be feminine (there is no natural female instinct, right!). We need to start young, so for now on, no dolls for girls. These have nothing to do with a young girl practicing maternal instincts, according to the latest thinking. It is an old sexist ploy so it won't be missed. Instead they will be given boy "toys"; things like trucks and blocks, etc., for the spatial imagination.

 

Since little boys are typcially rough and tumble, we also need to get rid of all those pretty soft clothes; all the bows, ribbons, etc. The goal is masculine women and this cultural programming has nothing to do with their innate natures or future needs, right; it is just stereo-typed and sexist.

 

Typically girls, at a much younger age, demonstrate more self control than boys. Boys tend to be free spirited longer. To turn the girls more masciline, we need to change culture and school in such a way as to make it more difficult for the girls to settle into self control. So we need to keep the environment in a flux. This will keep the girls restless, disoriented and unable to settle very easily. The boys may not notice, since they may not be paying close attention anyway.

 

Since boys like competition more than girls, we also need to make culture much more competitive. Again the goal is masculine women. Competition has many uses. The most obvious is that it helps to define a pecking order. It begins physicial and evolves from there. But there are also other important reasons for competition. Competition forces one to exceed their comfort zone. The idea of females preferring a stable comfort zone can't be instinctive, it had to be conditioned by culture. Competition will help the female stay outside their comfort zone. This trains the masculine girls to be able to push harder in life. When you spouse pushes you, you will be able to go much longer because of practice.

 

The females also need to learn to hide their emotions if they wish to be made more mascline. You also need to be able to hide and endure pain. You can still feel these things, you just can't wear them on your sleave. In the world of competition, such outward signs, will make you a target, like a wounded animal. This will attract fellow pack members to push you out of your confort zone. The members of the pack want a strong team and will try to make all members stronger. Weakness means more training. This training will be helpful when the girls enter adulthood and begin their monthly cycle. They will need to man-up. Any signs of weakness or nagging aggression can invoke aggression by others pushing you further out of your comfort zone.

 

Also women will need to learn not to ask for directions. What this teaches you is self reliance. Anyone, including a small child can ask for directions. It takes practice to be self reliant and one should practice when they can, starting with innocuous things. There are sayings; the buck stops here and it is lonely at the top. To be a leader, you don't always have the luxury of getting directions. You can give directions from the top, but you need to be able to be self sufficient at the top. The head of a household has to be self reliant, since the buck stops there. They have to learn to be men, self reliance is a big part of that. Learning to make your own directions prepares you when you get lost in life.

 

Separate toilets for urination are no longer allowed. This is sort of a pack thing connected to male bonding and trust, i.e., team scent. Females you will need to remember to leave the toilet seat up. One of the dominant males might use that as an opportunity to push you out of your comfort zone, until you remember.

 

You got to learn to be rude and crude and be impervious to insults. What this does is make you less vulnerable. Without this skill you will pushed out of your comfort level more often, until the lessons of how to be tough skinned are learned. This training will prevent distractions in life.

 

The list can go on. This is a fully hypothetical scenario taken to the extreme macho. To make females more masculine, using the instinct of men as the guide, will take most females out of their game. The natural feminine wiles would have to be eliminated (the female version of competition and dominance) and they would have to use skills that aren't part of their natural make-up. They are not designed to be males. Their natures follow a different set of principles. The same is true of females making males more feminine. This is taking males out of their nature. Both scenarios are selfish.

 

Personally, I believe that the females should be responsible for teaching females how to be females. While males should be responsible for teaching males how to be male, with neither sex allowed to have more than a secondary influence, via marriage/relationship.

[Erasmus00]

The "feminization" of men seems to be one of your hobbyhorses. I've asked on other threads, and I'll ask again- What evidence do you have for this? How is this occuring?

 

The current situation of the feminization of men is an example of female's trying to turn men into what they think men should be.

 

So you believe women are actively "feminizing" men? What evidence do you have? Do they have some agenda? Are there secret, large meetings of women where they discuss what they want men to be?

 

Typically girls, at a much younger age, demonstrate more self control than boys.

 

What evidence do you have for this?

 

Since boys like competition more than girls

 

Again, support this.

 

I could go on and on. These type of posts seem like the worst kind of armchair psychology. It seems as if you are building up a theory based on the idea that girls are made of sugar and spice, while boys are made of snips, snails and puppy dog tails.

-Will

[maikeru]

n/a

[maikeru]

Separate toilets for urination are no longer allowed. This is sort of a pack thing connected to male bonding and trust, i.e., team scent.

 

I don't think toilets have anything to do with male bonding and trust. I like the fella next door to keep to himself, and you can trust I'll do the same.

[HydrogenBond]

If you look at culture from 50 years ago, the men wanted the women at home barefoot and pregnant. This was not enforced by laws created in smoke fill rooms. It was cultural tradition, reinforced at the level of the family. Many women didn't want this traditional role begining in the 1960's. The feminist chant was male chauvinists pigs, repressing the women. The females thought there was a conspiracy; this was the feminist call to arms. The feminists even lobbied to take cheerleaders off the TV screen for many years because it was "exploiting women". Political and economic pressure was applied to force men to conform or else. There are dozens of such examples, each more ridiculous than the next. Women were a big voting block and for polititians to get their votes they did what they had to do, which was appease the big mouths. For example, it was OK for female only schools, but male only schools were sexist. The dual standard was spawned because the males didn't chose to fight back. The males didn't think they needed a stacked deck to pretent to be equal, so they let it slide. But eventually they became ripe of feminization.

 

The breakup of the family usually ends with the female getting the children. Because of the increasing rate of divorce, led by the feminist movement, many male children ended up with only a steady female role model but not always a steady male one. A stepfather may not carry the same weight as a dad who is never around. Many males grow up without even knowing what it is being a male, and assume being half-female is normal. Most don't even have any data to compare things too. The trend has been toward feminization of the males. The girls within broken homes still have a mother, so they are keeping better pace with respect to being a female. This has allowed females to make great strides.

 

Look at political correctness. This is totally illogical and should not compute within a normal male's mind. If you have a female mind, this illogic will sort of make sense. It is based on emotions and dual standards. It worked once for the feminists, why not run with it. Political correctness is not based on logic but feelings, so if it feels good it must be good? It is now even enforced by law with the number of nagging standards increasing daily.

 

Feelings is what women are experts of. A male can learn from women in these matters, but should not sacrifice common sense in the process. Do you think maybe the reason so many little boys are on attention and hyperactive drugs has any correlation to wussification? They have become unnatural and are now unwinding. Back in the old days, dad would have settled that without inflicting long term liver damage. Strong drugs are not good for a child, whose bodies and minds are still developing. A least a spanking did not cause potentially irreversible biological damage. Thats how feminine emotional thinking works, it make one thing "feel wrong: and another "feel right", without any sense of cause and affect. This is good for women's intuition but not male logic.

 

The way I look at it males and females both have their own expertise as males and females. But neither is enough of an expert in the other sex to be trusted to evolve the other sex. A good anology is taking the coach of the #1 basketball team and having him trade places with the coach of the #1 football team. They are both the best coaches in their own sports, but this exchange would cause both teams to become less than champions.

 

Continuing the scenario, the basketball coach is good at training players for stamina and finesse. While the football coach is better at training players for strength and explosive energy. The basketball coach developes broad based strategy since games are usually fast and high scoring. The football coach is better at play by play stategy since it is a broken gama and minimal scoring can cause you to win or lose the game. If they take they winning approach into the other sport it won't lead to championships teams.

 

Swap the coaches back to their natural habitat, then everything begin to click in the correct way. Instead of two mediocre teams you end up with two championships teams.

[billg]

Can you tell us what this has to do with hydrogen bonds please?

[Erasmus00]

If you look at culture from 50 years ago, the men wanted the women at home barefoot and pregnant. This was not enforced by laws created in smoke fill rooms. It was cultural tradition, reinforced at the level of the family. Many women didn't want this traditional role begining in the 1960's. The feminist chant was male chauvinists pigs, repressing the women.

 

If you consider women in the workforce, out of the home, etc as the "masculinazation of women" which I believe many would disagree with, this still has nothing to do with "feminizing" men.

 

For example, it was OK for female only schools, but male only schools were sexist.

 

This simply isn't true. There are private male only schools and female schools all over the country. What WASN'T fair was publicly funded male only military schools. Also, women in schools like the air force academy, west point and the naval academy is an example of the "masculinzation" of women, NOT the "feminization" of men, especially because these schools did not change their physical rigour for the female recruits.

 

Because of the increasing rate of divorce, led by the feminist movement,

 

How is this at all linked? Prove to me the feminist movement is responsible for an increased rate of divorce.

 

Look at political correctness. This is totally illogical and should not compute within a normal male's mind. If you have a female mind, this illogic will sort of make sense.

 

In this sentence you have a. linked the feminist movement to political correctness, b. implied political correctness is illogical, c. directly stated that the female mind is illogical. I agree with b, political correctness, like all things, can be taken to an illogical extreme. However, you didn't support at all, merely asserted without proof all three.

 

Do you think maybe the reason so many little boys are on attention and hyperactive drugs has any correlation to wussification?

 

Where is the proof? What do you have to support this? Personally, I doubt there is any correlation at all. You are making an argument, the burden of proof is on you.

 

A least a spanking did not cause potentially irreversible biological damage. Thats how feminine emotional thinking works, it make one thing "feel wrong: and another "feel right", without any sense of cause and affect. This is good for women's intuition but not male logic.

 

Your "thats how feminine emotional thinking works..." is a total non-sequiter. It doesn't at all follow from the things you have said. Also, you have asserted without proof, that spankings and corporal punishment have some value as corrections to hyperactivity disorders, which again you have no evidence for.

 

What you seem to be doing is promoting a belief that the 50s was a veritable utopia and everything was perfect because women were in the kitchen and men were in the office.

 

I would argue that everything you attribute to "feminizing men" and "masculizing women" is more appropriately related to the fact that the world is a much more fast paced place then it used to be, largely due to the availibility of information and media.

-Will

[Boerseun]

HB, I sorta see what you're trying to get at. But alas, your battle isn't against sexual confusion, it's against political correctness. And there I have to agree with you - it reaches damn near silly levels of stupidity in my neck of the woods.

 

Let me recount the ways:

Black ladies make up roughly 40% of South Africa's population. After the '94 elections, it has been deemed politically incorrect to not have 40% of governmental employees as black ladies, in any sphere. So, our airforce is now completely impotent, because there's nary a black female pilot to be found. SA lacks more than 40% air force pilots, but they receive hundreds of applications every day from able-bodied fully qualified pilots, which are rejected. Simply because they're male. Come wartime, how will sexual correctness help you? How is it 'sexually politically incorrect' to fill those 40% pilot vacancies with males, if the vast majorit of women simply finds no attraction in flying? Who's fault is it? We can go on about how unsupported stereotypes are, but the two sexes simply aren't the same.

 

I believe in giving everybody a fair chance. If there's toys in the house and your little girl always goes for the dolls, please, for god's sake, don't take it away and force a little car into her hands. Same with the boys. If he goes for the cars out of his own free will, let him be. Else, you're only going to frustrate him. If there are vacancies in the Air Force, fill them on a first come, first serve sexless basis. Any female pilots will be treated the same as males. But the moment they start trading recipes in battle, court-martial them and put them in front of a firing squad.

 

I have to differ from you, however, in your take of an intentional 'feminization' of men and 'masculisation' of women. I think what you're seeing around you are simply artifacts of equality. Some women might appear 'masculinised', simply because now, for the first time, the playing field is being levelled. Same with 'feminised' men. They can now get out of the closet without fear of being stoned. But homosexuality have been with the human race since the dawn of time. It just used to be better hidden when society used to be more conservative.

[HydrogenBond]

I am not trying to judge women. They are the experts as to what it means to be a women. I respect that. But the same is true for males. The high rate of divorce, by default, takes the tradtional male influence more out of the picture, for a lot of boys. Even if there is no conspiracy, the default result is feminization of males. The mothers are not men, and they can only do their best, out of love. The fathers of divorce are able to play longer in life, since they are not strapped down with children. The women have to balance motherhood with play. The net result is that females are force to mature because of the children and males unable to fully mature because of the lack of necessity of everyday children.

 

What the dominant mother influence in culture is doing is increasing anxiety in culture. Everything is now a risk or everything has to be done a certain way. With the men sort of in perpetual adolescence, the females don't trust the male judgement. Mother knows best. If the toy gun is felt to increase the aggression of her son, it becomes banned. The dad can complaint but mother knows best. At least in the older days, the males would try to reason this decision through and the females would respect their common sense. But feminine males aren't don't exhibit as much common sense, so mother now knows best.

 

In my experinece women's intuition is a special gift. It can generate a lot intuitive common sense without requiring an elaborate sets of arguments. But it is not perfect and can make mistakes. The male has to be able to weigh out the options to separate one from the other. The women have to feel they can trust a male's judgement is reasonable for the team and not just self serving. Women can't trust adolescent men. But they don't fully realize they helped to create this situation by requiring the males blindly follow their lead, without allowing reason.

 

If you look at political correctness, reasoning is not allowed. It is what it is and thats that. If you violate this, even with logic and common sense, a punishment will be metered out. Given enough time, I suppose common sense can be legislated out of the males. But then females create males that can't be trusted, because they lack common sense, requiring mother add more rules to control the adolescent males that their previous set of rules helped to induce. It is a cascading type affect.

 

Picture a mother with a son whom she really loves and cares for. She may show him so much love and attention that he may become dependant on her, almost like an addiction. He is less independant since so many of his needs are taken care of. Later in life, he is more dependant. The mother will sense his vulnerability, but may not be equiped to teach him how to be a man. But what she is good at is loving him and taking care of him like a mother. There lies the paradox, she is doing her best out of love but it is counterproductive to what he really needs.

 

Normally dad would have tried to break the overly dependant bond, not because he hates his wife but because he knows his son needs to learn to be independant. The maternal love, although good in the short term, can lead to long term problems. But the mother wants to cling out of love for her baby and the son enjoys making his mother happy. So if dad is too feminine, either too emotionally dependant or wants to play too much, he becomes an older son to his wife, lacking the influence to break the bonds of dependancy for his son. Dad/son loves his wife/mother and wants to make her happy, so he goes along and buries his common sense. Now his son has to play with dolls or else.

 

One of the problem I see is that there are too many fads out there in the self-help book market. For example, shouldn't a logical requirement be that anyone writing about "the key to a happy and successful marriage", be someone who has never been divorced and maybe has been married more than 10 years? Shouldn't books about child raising carry more weight if the author spends a lot of time with their children and they all turn out very balanced? Should it be acceptable to have someone buried in research or on the road selling, neglecting their children, be considered the real experts? Without common sense, this seems blind leading the blind seems to make sense, because it is done with warm fuzzy social feelings and not common sense.

 

The self help fad market sort of uses the spring fashion mentality, geared toward women and feminine-men. Look back at previous fashion trends and you often wonder what was I thinking. The fact is you were not thinking, you were under the influence of fuzzy feelings. The fuzzy feeling allows everyone to live in this collective dilusion thinking it is state of the art. With a little 20/20 hindsight, created by time, one can see it was silly. Common sense allows one to see silly when others are still stuck in the illusion of warm fuzzy.

 

With real springs fashions one can enjoy them and then put them on the shelf when summer fashions appear. Nothing about you has changed it is all superfiscial. But self help fashion can have lingering affects, especially on children. For example, the fad is to get boys to play with dolls. Things always reverse themselves because of market saturation and need for something novel. So, hyperthetically say it now becomes better for boys to play with blocks. His mother can put that old spring fashion fad on the shelf, but little Johnny is stuck with spring fashions as part of his year round closet. In other words, one event in childhood, can set the tempo for the rest of life, even after times and fads change. Females are far more likely to eat these fads up, so the son gets a double whammy out of love, concern and bad advice.

[ughaibu]

Agglomerating the two sentences, 'parasites may have evolved from their hosts as population controls' (An Introduction to Parasitology, I dont remember the author's name) and 'sexual reproduction may have evolved as a population control' (some other book, I dont remember either title or author), we can hypothesise "men evolved from women as a form of parasitic contraception". Socially the consequences appear clear, men should be sitting in the shade of trees, playing cards, drinking beer and waving condoms at passing women. Any woman able to offer a man a sustained diet of more than bread and water, which is basically what beer is, would be in a position to consider pregnancy. However, human perversity being the ubiquitous and powerful phenomenon that it is, things do not appear to be so. I suggest we collect all the dolls, stick pins in them and have a bonfire. Orbsycli seems to have made a start on this project: http://hypography.com/forums/community-polls/6748-voodoo.html?highlight=voodoo

[LJP07]

What's wrong with the way things are, were or will be, let nature take it's course, that's what I say!

[Boerseun]

'Leaving things as they are' is unfortunately not an option. After all, the only constant is change.

 

But change for the sake of change is artificial, and meaningless. Let the sexes find their own roles, and let's offer people equal opportunities in all walks of life, public and private, based on merit, and merit alone. Regardless of sex or race, if it turns out that 90% pilots are white males based on merit, so be it. If it turns out that 90% mathematicians are asian women, if based on merit, so be it. If the best legal minds turn out to black African men, so be it. And so forth. But trying to force everything into a sexless, raceless perfectly representative mix, we'll create an artificial society that will have a very shaky and unprogressive base.

 

But the exploitation of sexual confusion goes even further. For example:

 

Nivea have created a new line, called "Nivea for Men". It's a range of beauty products with the exact same ingredients as normal Nivea, that cleanses skin around the eyes and supposedly wards off wrinkles and such. Obviously aimed at the new class of so-called 'metrosexual' males, it creates a demand for something that never existed in the first place. You already get make-up aimed at perfectly straight men, and there are men buying it. Why? An artificial market created around an unneeded product. My sister and quite a lot of female friends have told me that the most difficult thing to find nowadays, is a man who's still 'a man'. Blending of the sexual roles in this case is simply market driven, aimed at men's perceived vanity, but all it does is creating more friction between the sexes. But at least the man will think he looks good, no? Imagine a man spending an hour every night 'taking off his face' before going to bed. What happened to the cavedweller who goes off clubbing lions over the head?

 

Not that I'm totally against it, of course. There should be such a thing as free choice. But these kind of things shouldn't be presented to be the norm, because they aren't. But that's what advertising would have you believe. But if we were to believe advertising, and popular culture's depiction of the average person, based on what we see on TV, all Americans are promisciuous atheist gay liberal divorced millionaire slackers. Whilst in reality, Americans are mostly religious, straight, conservative hard-working employees. Same with the depicting of sexuality on mass-media. The same with government intruding in your private life by dictating who you can or cannot sleep with, i.e. what you're supposed to do with your body, personal sexuality should well be left alone. Fair and fine - if someone's confused about their sexuality, let them make up their minds. But don't depict society as something it's not, because that'll simply increase the confusion.

[billg]

Let the sexes find their own roles, and let's offer people equal opportunities in all walks of life, public and private, based on merit, and merit alone. Regardless of sex or race, if it turns out that 90% pilots are white males based on merit, so be it. If it turns out that 90% mathematicians are asian women, if based on merit, so be it. If the best legal minds turn out to black African men, so be it. And so forth. But trying to force everything into a sexless, raceless perfectly representative mix, we'll create an artificial society that will have a very shaky and unprogressive base.

 

The problem I think is the idea that perhaps there is nothing innate about white men being good pilots and black women not, but rather that black women may not want to be pilots because of cultural standards. Yes, I agree every person should be judged as an individual. But that individual is undeniably affected by the society it grew up in. If women grew up in a society where pilots were always men, and women were generally mothers only, then is it not possible that some of the reason they dont want to be pilots is social, rather than... innate? My impression was the noble goal of "PC" was ultimately about trying to separate those difference between people which are truly personal differences from those things which are culturally enforced stereotypes. Obviously there are differences between the sexes; but how many of those differences are fundamental and how many are secondary, if you will cultural effects.

 

Nivea have created a new line, called "Nivea for Men". It's a range of beauty products with the exact same ingredients as normal Nivea, that cleanses skin around the eyes and supposedly wards off wrinkles and such. Obviously aimed at the new class of so-called 'metrosexual' males, it creates a demand for something that never existed in the first place. You already get make-up aimed at perfectly straight men, and there are men buying it. Why? An artificial market created around an unneeded product. My sister and quite a lot of female friends have told me that the most difficult thing to find nowadays, is a man who's still 'a man'. Blending of the sexual roles in this case is simply market driven, aimed at men's perceived vanity, but all it does is creating more friction between the sexes. But at least the man will think he looks good, no? Imagine a man spending an hour every night 'taking off his face' before going to bed. What happened to the cavedweller who goes off clubbing lions over the head?

 

A perfect example; beauty, in modern western culture, is not "manly". But why not? Is this blending a market driven, "unnatural" force? Or is it okay, yes, even natural, for men to be concerned about their appearance? Is it maybe a reversal of an arbitrary cultural standard of manliness, as opposed to an actual difference between the sexes?

[maikeru]

'Leaving things as they are' is unfortunately not an option. After all, the only constant is change.

 

But change for the sake of change is artificial, and meaningless. Let the sexes find their own roles, and let's offer people equal opportunities in all walks of life, public and private, based on merit, and merit alone. Regardless of sex or race, if it turns out that 90% pilots are white males based on merit, so be it. If it turns out that 90% mathematicians are asian women, if based on merit, so be it. If the best legal minds turn out to black African men, so be it. And so forth. But trying to force everything into a sexless, raceless perfectly representative mix, we'll create an artificial society that will have a very shaky and unprogressive base.

 

Some colleges here in the US, in the name of political correctness and meeting racial quotas, are actually discriminating against possible white (Caucasian) students who meet the academic criteria but don't meet the racial one. Reverse discrimination is not an equality in itself.

 

But the exploitation of sexual confusion goes even further. For example:

 

Nivea have created a new line, called "Nivea for Men". It's a range of beauty products with the exact same ingredients as normal Nivea, that cleanses skin around the eyes and supposedly wards off wrinkles and such. Obviously aimed at the new class of so-called 'metrosexual' males, it creates a demand for something that never existed in the first place. You already get make-up aimed at perfectly straight men, and there are men buying it. Why? An artificial market created around an unneeded product. My sister and quite a lot of female friends have told me that the most difficult thing to find nowadays, is a man who's still 'a man'. Blending of the sexual roles in this case is simply market driven, aimed at men's perceived vanity, but all it does is creating more friction between the sexes. But at least the man will think he looks good, no? Imagine a man spending an hour every night 'taking off his face' before going to bed. What happened to the cavedweller who goes off clubbing lions over the head?

 

Do you mind if I ask what qualities your sister and female friends would define as "manly" for a "real man"? And then yours? I don't mean this is an accusative sort of tone, just a friendly inquiry, to get closer to who men and women might consider "a man."

 

To me, traditional Western culture has often equated manliness with a number of things, such as physical prowess in love and sex (including rampant infidelity), solitude & "lonerism," physical toughness, and being uncommunicative about feelings.

 

In my own mind, I'm rather dismissive of the popular concept of "manliness" which I see as an (misguided) attempt to call men specifically to more important qualities that are recommended for every person. When people talk about acting manly, *really* what they mean is they want someone who is dependable, self-reliant, independent, thoughtful, assertive, courageous, hard-working, moderate (as in not wasteful), self-sacraficing, and honest--these, I think, are mutated into the image or ideal of the heroic manly man, who is stout as an oak, rough as the windswept plains, and has about as much character and feeling as a block of stone. Dependability, honesty, independence, thoughtfulness, etc. are qualities we desire in both men and women, whether we know it or not.

 

But there are many other ideas of manliness to be found in other cultures. In my own experience, I've looked at some when reading ancient Chinese and Japanese stories. In the Tale of the Heike, the most famous samurai epic of old Japan, courageous men write poetry, for love and war, cry when they realize death is the only fate for family and friends, and aren't afraid to speak their minds and feelings. Yet, I think these men, brave as they were, still would've been viewed as unmanly according to the modern Western ideal of manliness. What of the friends in Romance of the Three Kingdoms who swear friendship to the death, with tears and flower blossoms falling? A friendship which binds their families and futures? Or for those acquainted with the Greek stories and epics, such as the Iliad. When Old Priam sheds tears for his son, Hector, after he's been slain by Achilles? When Achilles' feelings rush up from the bottom of his soul after Patroclus, his cousin and best friend, is killed trying to rally the Greeks? None of these men of the past would fit that popular image of manliness. More important than being manly, they were fundamentally and fully human.

 

But if we were to believe advertising, and popular culture's depiction of the average person, based on what we see on TV, all Americans are promisciuous atheist gay liberal divorced millionaire slackers. Whilst in reality, Americans are mostly religious, straight, conservative hard-working employees.

 

Depends on the region, my friend. Sometimes, I think America likes to believe Hollywood's depiction of itself too. Maybe a little too much.

[Boerseun]

Great replies!

 

I'm in full agreement with both your posts, all I'm saying is that the definition of sexual roles shouldn't be decided on by marketing agencies. Governments and universities and any other institution currently applying Affirmative Action is trying to shoehorn the races and sexes into what they perceive the racial and sexual roles to be. In my previous example about South African pilots, that's just a clear-cut example of PC idiocy. My point is that every individual should be judged on merit, and merit alone. Maybe that's an angle the marketing agencies can look at. It's fair to all. And if there turns out to be any difference in racial or sexual abilities, (pilots/mathematicians/politicians etc.), trying to equalize it amongst races and sexes is clearly artificial, not?

 

If they really want equality the way they currently proclaim to do, then all professional sports should be co-ed, not? But when we have the Olympic Games, and we have the Men's 100 meters and the Women's 100 meters sprint, aren't we already acknowledging the simple fact that there are already, indeed, differences amongst the sexes? And if you take a look at the records of the past 20/30 years, it turns out that black males statistically perform better in the sprint than white males, and that the white males statistically perform better in the marathon events than the blacks. So, if we discern in sports teams between the sexes, and we want to be consistent, should we have the Black Men's 100 meters, and the White Men's 100 meters? We're already discriminating between the sexes when it comes to that.

 

To cut a long story short, if they want to consistently apply political correctness over racial and sexual lines, they simply have to reconsider sports as well, seeing as this is blatant sexual discrimination. But that, in itself, is already an acknowledgement that there are, indeed, differences between the sexes.

[HydrogenBond]

I would like to explain what I call emotional thinking. The dynamics is interesting to look at. As a way of an example, consider using the emotion fear to stimulate thought. If one was in a reality situation that required fight/flight, ones mind would be focused at the task at hand. One is not going to be thinking about what they will wear to the party next Friday. One will be trying to optimize the real time needs of fight or flight to lower the fear back to rest. Whatever it takes to get there the quickest will actually be your best course of action.

 

Consider this scenario; it is an auto analogy to the annual physical checkup, but the mechanic union pushed is to have it occur quarterly. This is way overkill, if one considered auto reliability and the amount of actual risk involved. Inspite of this, the spokesman for the push, begins to show real data that shows the tragic events that could have been avoid had they been inspected in closer intervals. Although this is real data, the spokesman does not include a sense of perspective that would allow common sense to be your guide. His goal is to induce fear with these real life tragic images. If fear is induced the fight/flight dynamics kicks in the context of this narrow data set. You can't think of the party next Friday (extrapolation into larger common sense data base) but feel the need to appease anxiety created by the data as quickly as possible. The spokeman will then give you a logic line for the quickest movement toward rest, which is the quarterly inspection.

 

Females are a little more vulnerable to this, although more and more men are just as vulnerable to the data narrowing affect that can be induced by emotional thinking. The entire process for getting the inspection is not for common sense reality, but to appease the fear that was created. So the wife becomes afraid and askes her husband if they need the inspection. If he is using common sense, he may say no, the odds are so slim. Cars have been getting better and better and in the past there hasn't bee much of a problem. But if she is still afraid of that 1 in million event, she may decide that her husband is just being cheap. You can't place a price on a human life; out children are precious and priceless and you're too cheap to spend $29.99? The husband might stick to his common sense, but he becomes aware that his wife is really upset and scared. His common sense may say" although there is no real risk, if she is distracted by the fear of something happening, maybe she will have an accident, sort of self forfilling. So all and all, maybe it is better to pay the price to appease her fear. The cultural herd is starting to move under the fear and she may not be able to resist.

 

So she goes for her inspection and all is fine, like it was even without paying the $29.99. But that donation bought her peace of mind. But the inspector, tells her although the visual inspection is perfect, see this new picture over there, that was caused by faulty wiring that we can't see with the eys. I need to use that machine over there. I won't tell you this has a one in a trillion chance of happening, only that this data is real and will make you afraid again. Also see that picture, it was due to a flaw in the frame, which requires this other X-ray machine to see. She may become a litle skepical, but part of the herd line is "your children are priceless", this extra $150 is a small price to pay, (I will remove your fear that I created for a price).

 

Picture several years go by and this becomes the normal thing to do every quarter. They saturate the TV with "real data" every season to get the herd running to their nearest center to appease fear, with no sense of perpective to allow common sense. By then common sense will be hard to use, epecially if most of the herd goes along. If you finally decided, this is bull, I not going to do it. If it has become part of cultural tradition, one's action may be considered irresponsible, not common sense. You are willing to risk the lives of your priceless children. Maybe we need to legislate to force these unnecessary risk takers from risking their children. The fear goes from the individual and grows collectively, until your "fear" of influence, has to take care of everybody, for their own good.

 

Because this inspection is big business and very profitable more and more devices will become part of the inspection. Now there are four devices for the electrical system alone. There is "real data" to show that accidents have occurred stemming from each other these four parts of the electrical system. What begins to happen, it gets more expensive. Everytime they come up with a new "real data point", a new machine or test is needed to appease the compounding fear. Now it is everybody's civic duty to have their inspections but the increasing price is creating a class division. The poor are left at higher risk (1 in a zillion) because they can't afford $500. Maybe we need to set up a social program to provide affordable inspection for all, since we fear for the poor who can only afford the $150 special.

 

Because the inspection keeps finding new data and get more expensive, there is now a push toward socialized auto inspection. The argument against is the quality of auto inspection will decrease making one have to wait longer for inspection, maybe changing to semi-annual. All the those things that could go wrong. There are hundreds of pictures all "real data".

 

This sattire shows an example of emotional thinking. Use narrow but real data, out of common sense context, to induce fear. The fear can be then be used to narrow the field of vision so the induction data is all you will be able to see. It might take one male to one female to maintain common sense balance. But with so many feminine males the herd is hard to control and seems to be feeding on the fear. I like free enterprise and if someone wants to falls for this, Oh well, but when the fear herd gets too big, it starts to force others to conform to the fear. We need more cowboys to round up the herd.

[Buffy]

I would like to explain what I call irrational logic. The dynamics is interesting to look at. As a way of an example, consider the use of ones own knowledge to drive logical decisionmaking. If one was in a reality situation that required life or death decisions, ones mind would be focused at the task at hand. One is not going to be thinking about whether Florida or Ohio State will win the national championship next Saturday. One will be trying to optimize the real time needs of making the right decisions in order to avoid bad outcomes. Whatever assessment of the facts it takes to make that right decision will actually be your best course of action.

 

Consider this scenario; it is an auto analogy to arrive at a destination. The family is going on an outing to a place that they have never been. There is some knowledge of a place along the way associated with a drunken college party. Based on this knowledge and vague directions from the proprietor at the destination, no detailed instructions or maps are obtained by the driver in spite of protestations to the contrary by the riders. The drivers pre-existing knowledge seems to be far more than enough to get to the destination based on what they know.

 

Males are a little more vulnerable to this, although more and more women are just as vulnerable to the irrational logic affect that can be induced by the emotional attachment to "pre-existing" knowledge. The entire process for getting to the destination is not for common sense reality, but to appease the need for the drivers existing knowledge to be not only adequate, but superior. So the husband becomes indignant at the request from the wife to obtain a map because of his overriding fear of being seen as uneducated and incapable of leadership without assistance. If she was using common sense, she might recognize that his fragile ego would be incapable of admitting this, and would trick him into getting a map "because the kids want to follow where we are going." But if he is afraid of being caught by the 1 in a million chance that he takes a wrong turn, he may decide that his wife might add this to all the other insults he's thrown at her over the years and divorce him and take all of his money. You can't place a price on half of a stock portfolio and a house,when its much cheaper to simply keep taking different turns and pretending that he knows where they are and where they're going. The husband might stick to his common sense and actually go look up the route on Google maps, but he is concerned that his wife might look over his shoulder and become really scornful and superior given his refusal to look up the directions in the first place. His irrational logic however says "there is no real risk, because I really know how to get there even if I was drunk out of my skull at that frat party." This of course becomes a sort of self forfilling prophecy, though because of the fact that it is really himself that he is concerned about lying to and avoiding being caught, and because of his deep seated guilt induced by his harpy mother, he has the unconscious desire to fail. The cultural herd is starting to move under the fear that his male inadequacy will be found out and he may not be able to resist.

 

So they go on their trip and lo and behold, the old two lane highway has been turned into an interstate and formerly open fields have been filled with condominiums. As a result the midpoint destination cannot be found, and since the directions obtained were only from that midpoint, the prospect of trying some random turns to get there turns into a number of permutations that makes that solution impracticable. His wife might ask him to stop and ask for directions, but since that would show the inadequacy of his knowledge--and therefore his manhood--he continues to insist that he knows where they are and inevitably ends up crossing several state lines before breaking down into either a sniveling heap--if he is a feminzed male--or starts beating his wife for being so uppity.

 

Examples of this sort of behavior among males--especially closeted conservative males who need to go out of their way to show that they're not faggots--are easy to spot everywhere:

• I can fix that leak.
  
• I can make dinner.
  
• Its much less expensive if we buy the parts and I put it together.
  
• I looked at the car, and that noise is just part of it getting old, its fine.
  
• I know Saddam has WMD's.
  

...and so on ad nauseum.

 

This sattire shows an example of irrational logic. Use of unreliable knowledge that one possesses is far more important than using common sense because to do otherwise induces massive fear of male inadequacy. The fear can be then be used to narrow the field of vision so the erroneous conclusion is all you will be able to see. It might take one male to one female to maintain common sense balance. But with so many conservative males the herd is hard to control and seems to be continually leading society into irrational strategies like the war in Iraq. I like free will and if insecure males want to continue to fall for this, Oh well, but when the neo-con Pax Americana herd gets too big, it starts to impact the entire country with the brand of being racist imperialists which will affect us for decades. We need more cowgirls to round up the herd, and whip some sense into these Neandertal men.

 

Go Nancy & Hillary,

Buffy