6 ms·

The Myth of the Fairer Sex

19 points by jamesbritt 16y ago

sophacles 16y ago
I like the author's attitude: "Lets do this thing, and empower women, fight for gender equality, and change the world, but lets be realistic about it. Lets own the problems on our side and fix them." In my experience, anything that begins with "Define X as the agent of good" falls into the trap of "X does $BADTHING therefore $BADTHING must be good", and credibility is lost (it also works in reverse, "define X as the agent of bad..."). On the other hand "Define $IDEAL as the goal" has a tendency to look for good from all directions, and address the bad wherever it comes from.
- samatman 16y ago
  I would strongly prefer "Define $IDEAL as the standard of behavior that is expected", lest we get more cases of "$BADTHING leads to $IDEAL and is therefore good".
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
Tamerlin 16y ago
This does remind me of an interesting bit of historical trivia. I've been practicing martial arts for 27 years -- tae kwon do, shotokan, Goju (traditional pre-Japan Okinawan karate), Wing Chun, Aikido, Jujutsu, Aikijutsu (i.e. Aikido for combat), Kobudo (Okinawan weapons)... and Feeding Crane Gung-Fu. Of them all, Feeding Crane is by far the most violent and brutal style I've seen yet. It's also the only one developed by a woman.
- autarch 16y ago
  The legend of Wing Chun attributes its development to a woman too, though it seems like the real origin is unknown.
  - Tamerlin 16y ago
    Wing Chun is derived from a branch of Feeding Crane -- Wing Chun was, I believe, one of the Feeding Crane designer's descendents -- though it may be rather that she was a trainee rather than actual family. That at least is based on the geneology that Liu Chang I (Grand Master of the Feeding Crane school) showed us when he was here teaching a seminar on Feeding Crane. Bruce Lee was on his chart also -- on the Wing Chun branch. There's some uncertainty in that, of course. Only the Okinawan karate history is actually harder to find than the traditional Chinese :) (The modern, flashy wire-fu stuff doesn't count, it's not traditional, or even particularly old.)
jacoblyles 16y ago
It's annoying how the author equates "being good" and "voting for leftist policies". "Women have a long way to go. Some of them even still vote Republican. The horror!"
tomjen3 16y ago
Of course, the Beast of Auschwitz was female (http://militaryhistory.suite101.com/article.cfm/irma_grese_beast_of_auschwitz http://militaryhistory.suite101.com/article.cfm/irma_grese_b...)
- kaitnieks 16y ago
  But was she the beast she was claimed to be? http://www.cwporter.com/grese4.htm http://www.cwporter.com/grese4.htm

19 points by jamesbritt 16y ago

I like the author's attitude: "Lets do this thing, and empower women, fight for gender equality, and change the world, but lets be realistic about it. Lets own the problems on our side and fix them." In my experience, anything that begins with "Define X as the agent of good" falls into the trap of "X does $BADTHING therefore $BADTHING must be good", and credibility is lost (it also works in reverse, "define X as the agent of bad..."). On the other hand "Define $IDEAL as the goal" has a tendency to look for good from all directions, and address the bad wherever it comes from.

samatman 16y ago
I would strongly prefer "Define $IDEAL as the standard of behavior that is expected", lest we get more cases of "$BADTHING leads to $IDEAL and is therefore good".

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

Tamerlin 16y ago

This does remind me of an interesting bit of historical trivia. I've been practicing martial arts for 27 years -- tae kwon do, shotokan, Goju (traditional pre-Japan Okinawan karate), Wing Chun, Aikido, Jujutsu, Aikijutsu (i.e. Aikido for combat), Kobudo (Okinawan weapons)... and Feeding Crane Gung-Fu. Of them all, Feeding Crane is by far the most violent and brutal style I've seen yet. It's also the only one developed by a woman.

autarch 16y ago
The legend of Wing Chun attributes its development to a woman too, though it seems like the real origin is unknown.
- Tamerlin 16y ago
  Wing Chun is derived from a branch of Feeding Crane -- Wing Chun was, I believe, one of the Feeding Crane designer's descendents -- though it may be rather that she was a trainee rather than actual family. That at least is based on the geneology that Liu Chang I (Grand Master of the Feeding Crane school) showed us when he was here teaching a seminar on Feeding Crane. Bruce Lee was on his chart also -- on the Wing Chun branch. There's some uncertainty in that, of course. Only the Okinawan karate history is actually harder to find than the traditional Chinese :) (The modern, flashy wire-fu stuff doesn't count, it's not traditional, or even particularly old.)

jacoblyles 16y ago

It's annoying how the author equates "being good" and "voting for leftist policies". "Women have a long way to go. Some of them even still vote Republican. The horror!"

tomjen3 16y ago

Of course, the Beast of Auschwitz was female (http://militaryhistory.suite101.com/article.cfm/irma_grese_beast_of_auschwitz http://militaryhistory.suite101.com/article.cfm/irma_grese_b...)

kaitnieks 16y ago
But was she the beast she was claimed to be? http://www.cwporter.com/grese4.htm http://www.cwporter.com/grese4.htm