aspacia!
Uh-oh…you’d better watch out, somebody’s stepped up to label you an ‘angry woman talker’. Proceed with caution, as you have now been weakened, they’ve ferreted out your innate female foolishness; that is to say the word’s out that you’re incapable of containing those irrational and unpredictable female emotions that will be your undoing in this den of reasonable, rational and oh-so-secure males.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!!
Thanks guys, I needed a good cleansing laugh.
Well, that sounds good in theory, doesn’t it? For instance, men are better at throwing and women have more dexterity. Men are better at mentally rotating shapes and women are better at visual memory. Men are better at solving word problems, women are better at the calculating.
(Oh wait, was I supposed to stick to the ‘men are more intelligent and women are better socializers’ theories put forth by several of our esteemed fellow ILP’ers thus far? Sorry!)
You’d think we’d get that and find a degree of equanimity and happiness in creating and celebrating balance, no?
On the surface, you might think that a particular engineering problem can only be solved by the particular skills (note that I didn’t write ‘superior’; that’s just what those with sexual bias reading this are concluding…) that men, statistically, tend to display more often. But suppose that said task can be accomplished either by representing geometry or by representing individual landmarks. Girls tend to rely on the landmarks, and boys on the geometry. And both can solve it!
But wait…my god, what a despicable, feminine take on things! Where’s that innate masculine drive to stand alone upon yonder hill, flag raised (so to speak), one foot placed before the other in the timeless symbol of leadership, ready into battle, drenched in noble cause, defender of the truth whatever the cost…
[i]“…for look there, friend Sancho Panza, where thirty or more monstrous giants present themselves, all of whom I mean to engage in battle and slay…”
“Look, your worship,” said Sancho. “What we see there are not giants but windmills, and what seem to be their arms are the vanes that turned by the wind make the millstone go.”[/i] - de Cervantes
In the end, balance is relative and, even more problematic, in constant flux. Its achievement can’t even be evaluated until after the fact, by which time you’ll be pretty assured that things have shifted some.
IMO, what matters most is how power is defined and perceived and, ultimately, negotiated. It’s my experience that when a woman and a man with similar understanding along these lines meet up, then that’s great fortune for both. It’s rare, though. So if you got it, savor it. (sigh)