>> If we start young, really young, and simply presented all careers as gender/race/etc-neutral, and didn’t spend any energy defining special groups, what would

>> If we start young, really young, and simply presented all careers as gender/race/etc-neutral, and didn’t spend any energy defining special groups, what would happen? What would happen is that even though you were no longer consciously creating the groups, they already exist in reality because of consciously or unconsciously sexist people. What would happen is that everything would remain the same, or get worse. That said, I enjoyed the article. I think I would teach people to learn to stand to be different, and I would teach groups of people to be accepting of those that are different. The problem isn't that groups are separated, it is that people don't feel safe being the only female individual in a male-dominated group, and that in many cases they are right to feel like this as they do not pass all of the in-group tests [0]. This is just human nature and it probably can't be changed - so just be what feels right for you, and try to respect other people's right to be what they want to be. Reality is, this is probably the only possible solution: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_ingroup_identity http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_ingroup_identity [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-group_favoritism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-group_favoritism edit; I realise I've just synced with your view, but a little more depth here. Things won't just fix themselves because you choose to ignore them.