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If I was a woman I would also object to the tone of this statement too. I recognize what you’re trying to say and still would dispute a lot of it, but it lends support to a number of prejudicial ideas that do, in fact demean women.
If you’re a woman for instance who violates the “nice” and “nurturant” stereotype, you can often find yourself being penalized in hiring and evaluations. In a man’s world, that’s part of who we are. A woman does it and she’s a bitch. In my own experience of 1 personally, the best bosses I’ve ever had have been women. I’ve had good and bad of both, but the best female boss I had vastly outstripped the best male boss I had. The worst boss I ever had was a 40+ year old spinster who acted like a Stalinist and was an idiot.
Who is more prudent? Who is more happy-go-lucky? Who is more practical? Who is more imaginative? Who are better educators? Men or women? I really don’t know. And there’s a thousand questions you could subject this analysis to. The one categorical area men unambiguously tower over women in is raw physical strength and force. The average man could wreck the shit out of the average woman in a physical fight. Okay, fine. One can win that argument.
I think acknowledging sex differences can be harmful at times, insofar as it can play into the hands of others who want to serve some bad ideas. I think the harm of ignoring sex differences is far worse. Biologically men and women are different enough that you don’t have to agonizingly compare individuals for every trait, you can aggregate experiences.
I’m a pretty far right leaning guy but there is a basic point to be made that women do face significant social deprivation in traditional societies. And that downward pressure can in turn suppress inborn personality traits. And if you always have to modify your expressions to meet the tendencies of your culture’s social norms, it’s going to warp how you view the other gender. Yes, the same thing can also be said about men. But one interesting feature about egalitarian societies is that they’re simpler in one respect. Both sexes are freer to do what comes naturally. And that’s for better and worse.
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