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I am a white male. I'm not going to downvote, dismiss or attack you, just as I'm not going to downvote, dismiss or attack black people. My point was not that s

by Buge 9y ago

I am a white male. I'm not going to downvote, dismiss or attack you, just as I'm not going to downvote, dismiss or attack black people. My point was not that society is fair to women, and I'm sorry if it sounded like that. My point was that gender injustices are different from racial injustices because racial injustices are inherited while gender injustices are not. Once we get to a point where society is 100% fair racially and genderally, gender inequality will die out with the old generations, while racial inequality will live on due to its inherited nature. Racial inequality is caused by current societal problems as well as past societal problems. But gender inequality is just caused by current societal problems.

DoreenMichele 9y ago
I have studied the problem and thought quite a lot about it. I think sexism will tend to persist because there are biological differences that have substantial impacts. The fact that women can get pregnant but men cannot has a huge raft load of implications that influence the attitudes and choices of both men and women. Women I have known who thought they could live their life like a man did fine until they had a baby, at which point their assumptions of independence and self determination had an unpleasant wake up call. There may be things society can do to mitigate that reality, but most discussions I see of gender equality make zero effort to mitigate it. Instead, most people seem oblivious to its existence. This does not bode well for the possibility of creating policies that genuinely help level the playing field. I believe there are inherent challenges in creating good policies in this area, so it likely won't happen by serendipity. The current result seems to be a growing divide between the quality of life for empowered women and disempowered women. That divide seems to be strongly influenced by reproductive choices in ways that are not obvious or straight forward.
- loopdedoo 9y ago
  The implication that women can get pregnant but that men cannot is deeply harmful and transphobic. Please reconsider your assertion.
  - DoreenMichele 9y ago
    It is not transphobic. I find the position of a lot of trans people to be deeply harmful to the rights of cishet women. Claiming my statement is transphobic amounts to gratuitous mudslinging while simultaneously dismissing the very real challenges faced by cishet women. I don't mind if you live your life and get your needs met, but I quite resent the way cishet women are getting crapped all over in the process. So, no, I will not reconsider my assertion. To the best of my knowledge, it is completely 100% accurate for biological sex. I see no reason why it should be denied to serve the political agenda of a small subset of people when denying it actively harms people like me when people like me are a much larger percentage of the population.
    - dragonwriter 9y ago
      > It is not transphobic. “trans-erasing” would be more strictly accurate of the statement (“transphobic” is often used for all anti-trans discrimination, but it's not really a great generic term.) OTOH, your stated rationale: fear of trans people and the beliefs you associate with them, is precisely transphobic. > I find the position of a lot of trans people to be deeply harmful to the rights of cishet women. And that may or may not be a valid opinion, but that's irrelevant to the fact that claiming that only women can get pregnant is false. > To the best of my knowledge, it is completely 100% accurate for biological sex. Biological sex is multidimensional; the usual way legal gender is initially ascribed is based on presentation of external genitalia at birth, which while it is a biological sex trait and has a correlation with other biological sex traits, is not necessarily aligned with what, if any, functional reproductive capacity exists. The idea that “biological sex” is a unidimensional binary trait is a common but erroneous idea.
      - DoreenMichele 9y ago
        And all of this erases the very real issues I face as a cishet woman. Being lectured that I need to educate myself on the needs and issues of trans individuals and make tremendous effort to serve their political goals while my needs are trampled under foot and my name is publicly dragged through the mud is no means whatsover to win me over. When trans people can figure out how to speak to their issues without silencing cishet women trying to speak to their own, I will be happy to ally with them. But my experience so far has been that my interactions with people who identify as trans or nonbinary have been completely poisonous. I am fine with supporting their desire to live as they choose. But I am really fed up with their agenda actively harming me and other cishet women. Trans individuals get vastly more friendly, sympathetic support on HN than cishet women do. The idea that I have some obligation to invest more of my time and energy in benefitting them when they have done nothing but actively harm me is deeply offensive to me.

by Buge 9y ago

DoreenMichele 9y ago

I have studied the problem and thought quite a lot about it. I think sexism will tend to persist because there are biological differences that have substantial impacts. The fact that women can get pregnant but men cannot has a huge raft load of implications that influence the attitudes and choices of both men and women. Women I have known who thought they could live their life like a man did fine until they had a baby, at which point their assumptions of independence and self determination had an unpleasant wake up call. There may be things society can do to mitigate that reality, but most discussions I see of gender equality make zero effort to mitigate it. Instead, most people seem oblivious to its existence. This does not bode well for the possibility of creating policies that genuinely help level the playing field. I believe there are inherent challenges in creating good policies in this area, so it likely won't happen by serendipity. The current result seems to be a growing divide between the quality of life for empowered women and disempowered women. That divide seems to be strongly influenced by reproductive choices in ways that are not obvious or straight forward.

loopdedoo 9y ago
The implication that women can get pregnant but that men cannot is deeply harmful and transphobic. Please reconsider your assertion.
- DoreenMichele 9y ago
  It is not transphobic. I find the position of a lot of trans people to be deeply harmful to the rights of cishet women. Claiming my statement is transphobic amounts to gratuitous mudslinging while simultaneously dismissing the very real challenges faced by cishet women. I don't mind if you live your life and get your needs met, but I quite resent the way cishet women are getting crapped all over in the process. So, no, I will not reconsider my assertion. To the best of my knowledge, it is completely 100% accurate for biological sex. I see no reason why it should be denied to serve the political agenda of a small subset of people when denying it actively harms people like me when people like me are a much larger percentage of the population.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > It is not transphobic. “trans-erasing” would be more strictly accurate of the statement (“transphobic” is often used for all anti-trans discrimination, but it's not really a great generic term.) OTOH, your stated rationale: fear of trans people and the beliefs you associate with them, is precisely transphobic. > I find the position of a lot of trans people to be deeply harmful to the rights of cishet women. And that may or may not be a valid opinion, but that's irrelevant to the fact that claiming that only women can get pregnant is false. > To the best of my knowledge, it is completely 100% accurate for biological sex. Biological sex is multidimensional; the usual way legal gender is initially ascribed is based on presentation of external genitalia at birth, which while it is a biological sex trait and has a correlation with other biological sex traits, is not necessarily aligned with what, if any, functional reproductive capacity exists. The idea that “biological sex” is a unidimensional binary trait is a common but erroneous idea.
    - DoreenMichele 9y ago
      And all of this erases the very real issues I face as a cishet woman. Being lectured that I need to educate myself on the needs and issues of trans individuals and make tremendous effort to serve their political goals while my needs are trampled under foot and my name is publicly dragged through the mud is no means whatsover to win me over. When trans people can figure out how to speak to their issues without silencing cishet women trying to speak to their own, I will be happy to ally with them. But my experience so far has been that my interactions with people who identify as trans or nonbinary have been completely poisonous. I am fine with supporting their desire to live as they choose. But I am really fed up with their agenda actively harming me and other cishet women. Trans individuals get vastly more friendly, sympathetic support on HN than cishet women do. The idea that I have some obligation to invest more of my time and energy in benefitting them when they have done nothing but actively harm me is deeply offensive to me.