Feminism

[Valmy]

Christina Hendricks IS hot while Adele well not so much. Not even comparable IMo and I´ve yet to meet anyone who thinks that comparison has merit.

I don't think I was comparing them.

[Berkut]

But that's not true. General temperature trends can be useful. It's why people have the habit of putting away their summer clothes in fall and likewise putting their winter clothes away in spring.

Similarly, attitudes that women are typically better at raising children are self reinforcing in that they encourage gender role behavior which in turn bolsters those same attitudes.

While your last statement is true, it is not evidence that there are not innate gender role tendencies.

And I've provided a lot of arguments to show that in fact there are - arguments that I think are pretty much irrefutable, or at least nobody has even bothered trying to refute them.

Going back to the basketball analogy, your argument is basically this:

"Because society doesn't think short people make very good basketball players compared to tall people, short people are in fact discouraged from playing basketball, which just reinforces the bias."

That may be perfectly true and accurate.

The error you make is the implied conclusion you are drawing however:

"Therefore, we can conclude that in fact short people are actually in general just as good of basketball players as tall people. In fact, I have many example of excellent short basketball players, like Mugsy Bowes".

That is NOT true. Short people are in fact not as good in general, even if some in particular are excellent.

The fact that society encourages gender roles does not in any way "prove" that those gender roles are only created as a result of societal pressure. In fact, if there were non-societal reason for gender specific roles, one would *expect* any functional society to reinforce those roles. Your argument actually argues AGAINST the conclusion you claim. Something as consistent and ubiquitous across myriad societies as gender specific care-giving roles cannot, almost by definition, be something that is created solely on the basis of some particular societal pressure absent any outside cause. If gender specific care-giving roles were really only a function of societal pressure, where are the examples of societies that for whatever reason have not created that pressure, and hence have gender neutrality in care-giving expectations and capabilities?

You have provided zero evidence or reason to believe that the observed gender bias in child rearing is *solely* the result of societal pressure. Basic science, biology, and anthropology argues against your claim. It is in fact an extraordinary claim that would require extraordinary evidence to even consider, much less prove.

[garbon]

The error you make is the implied conclusion you are drawing however:

"Therefore, we can conclude that in fact short people are actually in general just as good of basketball players as tall people. In fact, I have many example of excellent short basketball players, like Mugsy Bowes".

That is NOT true. Short people are in fact not as good in general, even if some in particular are excellent.

Only I'm not drawing that conclusion. I think I've already stated that I don't think height of basketball players to ability is a good comparison for gender to caregiving ability.

The fact that society encourages gender roles does not in any way "prove" that those gender roles are only created as a result of societal pressure. In fact, if there were non-societal reason for gender specific roles, one would *expect* any functional society to reinforce those roles. Your argument actually argues AGAINST the conclusion you claim. Something as consistent and ubiquitous across myriad societies as gender specific care-giving roles cannot, almost by definition, be something that is created solely on the basis of some particular societal pressure absent any outside cause. If gender specific care-giving roles were really only a function of societal pressure, where are the examples of societies that for whatever reason have not created that pressure, and hence have gender neutrality in care-giving expectations and capabilities?

I think we've a lot of people in our society who have gender neutrality in care-giving expectations and capabilities. I think RH already spoke to why it would be the case that societies in the past organized themselves the way they did - women had to focus on childbirth and rearing or society would perish. He also explained that in our relatively recent moment that we are no longer facing the same issues and don't need to rigidly follow said roles.

[garbon]

And again - if the typical woman is better than a man at raising children, why do you shrink from the corollary that we should probably have women raise kids and be skeptical of men who adopt that role when the chance to have the mother raise them is available?  If the difference is significant, why would we turn our backs on it?

[Berkut]

Why hold a position that can't be proven and you don't think should play a role in policy or attitudes?

I guess it boils down to this--I'm too honest to pretend that I don't believe that, on average, women are better caregivers than men.  I can't prove it, and I'll acknowledge that I may be wrong, but I think that I'm correct, and I'm not going to lie about what I believe.

I don't even think that is under debate - at least not honestly.

Even the "evidence" provided by anyone in this thread, anecdotal evidence, does not argue against that claim. Noting that there are particular examples of men who are excellent caregivers means nothing when talking about the general tendencies, just like pointing out that there are some relatively short NBA players doesn't mean that taller players make better basketball players.

Would anyone be willing to contest the following claim?

I claim that if one were to go out and randomly select 1000 men and 1000 women between the ages of 18 and 50, and then studied their competency at raising children, the result would show that overall the women are much, much better at it than the men.

Hell, you could do it even without actually studying anything - just have a survey, and ask the following question:

"To what extent do you agree with the following statement:

'I would look forward to and enjoy spending the bulk of my time raising and caring for children rather than working in a career'

Strongly Agree
Agree
Neutral
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
"

I bet the difference in answering that one question would be stark between men and women. Now, that doesn't prove my contention, but it is strongly suggestive when combined with the observation that one of the primary needs for being an effective care-giver to children is simply the desire to do so. I know men and women both who are terrible care-givers, and the one consistent thread in those who are crappy parents is that they almost universally don't want to be care-givers, or never thought about it and are now stuck in it.

This is why the repeated observations of some particular dad being great at it are so irrelevant. That doesn't tell us anything other than that it is *possible* for a man to be an excellent caregiver. I don't think anyone would debate that. And in fact, if you select out men who answer "Agree" or "Sttrongly agree" to that question, I bet they are on average *better* care-givers than the average woman.

But that is comparing apples and oranges. You are comparing a subset of men in that case to all women. I think the result when comparing all men to all women would be very, very obvious.

I think you see it every day. I know literally dozens of couples with children. In almost all cases, the wife is the one who is doing the primary care-giving, and it isn't because the dad is an asshole who keeps his poor wife down. It is because that is how they want it to be.

[garbon]

I think you see it every day. I know literally dozens of couples with children. In almost all cases, the wife is the one who is doing the primary care-giving, and it isn't because the dad is an asshole who keeps his poor wife down. It is because that is how they want it to be.

I don't think anyone is arguing against this.

[derspiess]

Christina Hendricks IS hot while Adele well not so much. Not even comparable IMo and I´ve yet to meet anyone who thinks that comparison has merit.

I don't think I was comparing them.

Well maybe you should have

[Berkut]

And again - if the typical woman is better than a man at raising children, why do you shrink from the corollary that we should probably have women raise kids and be skeptical of men who adopt that role when the chance to have the mother raise them is available?  If the difference is significant, why would we turn our backs on it?

First of all, what difference does the answer to your question make?

Even if your assumption is valid (it isn't, but I will adress that in a moment), it doesn't argue against the predicate. Just because a fact has a consequence you don't like doesn't make it less true. Your entire argument is basically that if what I say is true, then it leads to something you don't like, therefore lets just assume it isn't true. That is logically lazy.

Now, like I've said over and over and over and OVER again, just because the average women is better than the average man at primary care-giving, that doesn't mean that any particular man is necessarily a poorer choice than any particular woman. There are lots of variables involved beyond gender.

I don't know how I can make this anymore clear. The basketball analogy works great.

If you take 1000 random people, and sort them by height, on average those who are taller will be better basketball players than those who are shorter. That does not mean that you can reliably predict between any two players who will be the better basketball player based only on height, because there are more variables involved than just height. One guy might be 6' tall, but have an incredible shot, while the 6'4" guy might not be able to dribble or shoot.

If you were a coach looking to pick the best team possible, you would be an idiot to just grab the tallest players at each position, and refuse to consider those who are shorter. Just like society would be foolish to demand that only women be care-givers, because plenty of men will be perfectly fine at it.

*Further*, as a society we aren't even looking for the *best* care-givers anyway - as a society we simply ask that the care-giver have some baseline of adequacy. The bar for having a child is pretty damn low - damn near anyone can do it. We don't demand that every care-giver be excellent at it, just that they don't let the kid starve to death.

[Berkut]

I think you see it every day. I know literally dozens of couples with children. In almost all cases, the wife is the one who is doing the primary care-giving, and it isn't because the dad is an asshole who keeps his poor wife down. It is because that is how they want it to be.

I don't think anyone is arguing against this.

Of course not - it is blindingly obvious.

[Martinus]

I gotta say I'm with Berkut on this one.

An average woman is a better caregiver than an average man - whether it is because of socialization or some sort of natural traits is not what is being debated. That does not mean that in any particular marriage, a guy cannot be a better caregiver than a girl, or that two gay guys cannot be very good caregivers. But for example, I think that there are, statistically, fewer gay male couples fit to be good caregivers than there are lesbian couples (of course there is an adverse selection in case of gay couples who have children, with the ones who have them being probably stastically more likely to be above-average caregivers than an average straight couple, simply because their choice to have a kid is much more conscious and is not an accident or even going "with the flow" of biology).

[The Minsky Moment]

From an anthropological perspective, that is simply not possible.

Societies do not "get it wrong" over tens of thousands of years, and in every single case.

Bad news for liberal democracy.
Good news for warlord kleptocracies though.

The basketball analogy works great.

I disagree.  There are objective and observable physical reality that confer an advantage for height in basketball.  Height and reach makes it easier to obstruct another players shot on the basket, to shoot over a defender, and to get rebounds.  Other than the ability to breast feed, there is no similar physical connection between gender and ability to child rear.

[HVC]

We still have the powerful corrupt leading the masses. We just get to pick and choose our powerful corrupt leaders

[merithyn]

Since this was completely ignored the first time I posted it... ... I'm bringing it back up. It's a part of an actual study that shows that boys are just as emotionally reactive as girls until they are taught not to be. Since I believe that empathy and emotional reaction are the two most important aspects of parenting, it falls in line with my assertion that women being better care-givers is TAUGHT, not INNATE.

My issue with this line of thinking is that I believe that care-taking isn't innate, but rather taught. In general, girls are taught to take care of things while boys are taught to compete for and against things. So long as we see that as just how things are rather than a societal thing, like Berkut said, it's not likely to change.

Here's an interesting excerpt from a fairly well-known book on Child Development:

Some researchers suggest that male infants are more emotionally reactive than female babies, but that culture socializes boys to express less emotion as they get older (with the possible exception of anger). As a result, boys become less skilled at understanding both their own and others' emotions. As this view predicts, research shows that by adolescence there are clear gender differences in the expression of emotions, particularly of negative ones.

There's a lot more at that link, but this, to me, says more about why boys are less likely to be care-takers than girls.

[derspiess]

I'd hardly consider that conclusive evidence, Meri.

[Valmy]

it falls in line with my assertion that women being better care-givers is TAUGHT, not INNATE.

That is impossible to prove though.  Besides what if there was compelling evidence your assertion was wrong.  Would that change anything on how you view things?  I do not see how it is relevent in my mind one way or the other because people vary on the individual level.  I have seen researchers that suggest just the opposite on the sensitivity part.

I do find it frustrating that somehow I am subconciously but decisively and every effectively teaching my kids gender roles while I seem to have so much trouble getting them to stop throwing food off the table