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I think you're both being unfairly piled on, and also kind of missing the point and being a little disingenuous about it (hence the pile-on).
Helen Andrews, from what I can tell, is not arguing that there should be zero women in "male" professions and that all women in such fields should step aside and let a man take her place, let alone is she going full Serena Joy. She is arguing that "feminization" (changing the norms in a field to cater to women's preference) is harmful and contributing to the "wokening" of these fields. This can be true without taking the position "Therefore we should exclude women from these fields."
I understand that you don't like femaleness being associated with lack of rationality, objectivity, or vigorous discourse, but this is hardly a novel argument. Even the most hardcore gender essentialists don't usually claim that no woman can be smart and rational and meritorious, able to hold her own in a male field. Helen Andrews certainly does not seem to be claiming that. If you resent the implication that there are probably relatively few women who should be considered qualified- well, you can't have it both ways and argue as you do against the encroachment of gender ideology (that says gender is a social construct and a man can be a woman) but also object to any implication that sex differences might be disadvantageous.
Yeah, but she nowhere gives a solution to the problem. How to prevent a feminised society? Well the simple and quick answer is: bar women from those jobs and those positions. How many women in a profession is "too many"? If the answer is "compete on meritocracy" then let Mrs. Andrews show that she is better than the men she beat out for the job. That there is no man at all in the entire USA better qualified or better at the job than she is.
I do wish there was more respect given to honour, but men have cast that aside just as fast as women did. See how "honour culture" is not a compliment, but has connotations of inequality and fast resort to violence instead of negotiation. Conflict versus mistake, if you will.
Yes she does, right here:
"Feminization is not an organic result of women outcompeting men. It is an artificial result of social engineering, and if we take our thumb off the scale it will collapse within a generation."
She then goes into some specifics such as getting rid of anti-discrimination laws.
TBH I don't think you read the article; or if you did it was apparently with so much bias that you may as well not have. This is the straightforward answer to the question which your entire blustering performance has revolved around her not answering, thus allowing you to fill in your own preferred boogeyman and cantilever your eye-rolling dismissals out to infinity.
The worst part, to me, is that this would work for you, too, almost anywhere else. But not here, in one of the last remaining places where male modes of discourse are allowed exercise. Hence the downvotes.
I think Andrews has not thought through what she is proposing. She seems to imagine that "taking the thumb off the scale" will mean ladies like her get to keep the positions they have colonised, because she's just so smart and male-brained. I think it's entirely possible that junking anti-discrimination laws will result in "well it was great knowing you, Helen, but we need new blood and new male blood in particular so say hello to Tim, who will be replacing you".
And again, nobody is answering the real question I am genuinely asking: what is the perfect ratio for society? 50/50 male/female? Majority male? The ladies get to run their little cafés and knitwear shops, bless their hearts, while the men do the real work of the world? Given that Andrews is a political commentator amongst other things, I imagine she feels her views, opinions, and insights are valuable, but in the Men's World Redivivus, is there a place for her?
I'm mostly sitting this one out, but I've seen several people answer you: no one knows and it doesn't matter, just stop tipping the scales. What's your answer to: why is this question supposed to matter at all?
It's also a bit strange watching you fight on this particular hill, given how often you make a point of how Catholic you are.
"Tipping the scales" requires that we know what the endpoint should be. "We'll know it when we see it" is a recipe for disaster, because no matter how you change the ratios, there's always the argument that "no, go lower and then it'll all be great!" So 60% female profession becomes 50/50? Still not good enough, society too female? Go down to 40% female? 30%? 0%?
Because some on this very thread have argued for 0%, that smart women should be having unstressed babies instead of going to work like a man in a man's job. I don't think Andrews would accept that, but she's set up that argument.
Yeah, I'm Catholic and broadly complementarian, but we're equal opportunity for female religious leaders (not priests and deacons, I'm heading that one off before it begins) and saints. One of the big sticking points for the entire Reformation was the veneration of Mary and how her worship was seen to be displacing that of Christ, after all!
EDIT: As I said, I'm an older generation than Andrews. I do think she's unaware of the fruits of the fights won before her which fruits she enjoys; she grew up with "of course I can apply to study this; of course I can enter that career; of course I can go forward for that job" where this is 'fish swimming in the water' for her, but for my generation and the one before, it very much was not "of course you can do that". For example, I bet she has no idea about the marriage ban and that if you told her "Okay, now you're married, time to quit your job!" she'd laugh at you, and coming back with "Nope, sorry Helen, it's law. Now trot off home and look after your husband like a good little woman" would not fit her mental model of "society too female, let's fix that by meritocratic competition".
But why though? We can see the hand applying pressure to the scale, we know the exact force with which it is doing so. We don't know the weight of the object being weighed, so we can't tell you the result you'd see sans the extra force, but we can tell you pretty precisely what the force is. We can measure it in subsidies for feminist projects, in women-only scholarships, in quotas, in anti-discrimination laws that don't apply to men, etc.
But no one here seems to want to target specific ratios. If you get rid of the specific measures people are complaining about, and the ratios don't change that's absolutely fine.
Right, one of the thing that attracts me (back) to Catholicism is how it has honored roles for both, but from what I understand it's also pretty clear about men and women having different natures (hence the exception you had to head off right from the start).
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Because it is patently clear you are not "genuinely asking". You are staking a position of female superiority, and leveling that oh-so-stereotypically-female weapon of scorn at anyone who cares to dispute it and claim that in fact, something about women may be causing problems. There's no answer to that, and no point in trying.
Given that I got banned for emoji usage, I'm probably tempting the wrath of the mod gods here, but fuck no.
I don't believe in female superiority any more than I believe in male superiority. I do believe the problem, if it exists, is not "too many women in that job". Men can be bitchy, backstabbing, boot-licking, and players of political games in work every bit as much as women. Every guy who put on a suit and tie for a middle manager job is a bold, truth-seeking, risk-taking innovator? Really, Helen?
How many women is too many women, Nybbler? How many men is too few men? Or too many?
Honestly, Andrews' article reminds me, from the other side, of Houston, Houston, Do You Read? by James Tiptree Jr. where I didn't agree with the position there (women indeed superior) back when I read it as a teen. And I don't agree with the opposite position (men indeed superior).
We have different abilities and different gifts, and we need a mix of both to survive and indeed thrive as a society. No boots on necks, no matter who is wearing the boot; side-by-side into the future!
Fuck yes. It's entirely predictable that if someone makes a claim stating or implying that something about women is causing a problem, you will respond exactly how you responded here. A lot of people (and not just women) do; that's actually part of the problem. No one has a problem believing that e.g. male tendencies towards aggression or risk-taking might cause problems in some situations, but the counterpart is unthinkable to many.
If I truly were arguing for female superiority/supremacy, Nybbler, you would be in no doubt.
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I doubt you can develop a hard and fast rule unless you say "literally any." The thesis seems to be that at some point you reach a critical mass that is "too many." If you don't want to absolutely exclude women but you also believe there shouldn't be so many that they change norms, then you'll have to have some pretty vigorous gatekeeping and resistance to change, which presents its own problems. But the fact that she doesn't have a solution doesn't mean she isn't pointing at a real problem.
How does this follow? Advocates of meritocracy don't usually claim that any given system is going to be a perfect meritocracy. Andrews can believe she is good enough without necessarily believing she's better than literally every other man in the country.
Honor culture rapidly devolves to "might makes right." Achieving a culture that respects some concept of "honor" but doesn't just use that as an excuse for "do violence to anyone who offends you" is not a problem I think any society has solved.
She also doesn't need to, nor does she need to (as the previous poster) prove "That there is no man at all in the entire USA better qualified or better at the job than she is".
To have perfect meritocracy, she obviously just needs to prove that she's better than the best man in the country who applied for a job in her field and was turned down. She doesn't need to be better than Bari Weiss or Ezra Klein, she just needs to be better than the marginal next-best candidate.
There is room in America for more than one journalist.
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