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Originally Posted by fuzzy
Try and skim through it, if you have the time. It's somewhat insightful.
its pretty much useless, some examples:
@article:
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But rather than seeing culture as patriarchy, which is to say a conspiracy by men to exploit women, I think it’s more accurate to understand culture (e.g., a country, a religion) as an abstract system that competes against rival systems — and that uses both men and women, often in different ways, to advance its cause.
the current culture is still a patriarchy, it has been so for thousands of years, though nowadays its a 'patriarchy with gloves', one versed in PR, patronizing & sweet-talking, while keeping the male dominance intact - the current trend is to pump-up the numbers of suitable female followers (those who act & work as if they were men) onto higher-level positions, simply to somewhat mask the continuous male dominance - just observe such females, most of them have the same characteristics as their male colleagues, their gender rendered virtually meaningless, ie. if they would have been replaced by males it would make no relevant difference, for all intents & purposes (regarding their working position) they are copies of expected male employee prototypes
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I don’t want to be on anybody’s side. Gender warriors please go home.
sure he does, through relativization of the current situation and some kind of watered-down apologetic interpretation, its yet again that 'patriarchy with gloves' approach - a gender warrior's 'sword' may be obvious but the gloved types are more akin to back-stabbers
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“How can you say culture exploits men, when men are in charge of everything?...
The mistake in that way of thinking is to look only at the top. If one were to look downward to the bottom of society instead, one finds mostly men there too.
so what? who steers the societal changes/actions/values, who establishes, 'nurtures' or approves them? surely not those at the bottom :rolleyes:
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The tradeoff approach yields a radical theory of gender equality. Men and women may be different, but each advantage may be linked to a disadvantage.
what equality? its called multiple similarities & differences, which combined may result in something that resembles equality, but it never reaches exact equality and it is questionable whether these can be summed-up at all in any meaningful way without heavily relying on some arbitrary system of values - the radical thing here is the 'need' to paint it as something equal or the 'need' for political correctness
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Today’s human population is descended from twice as many women as men.
lol, not likely
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For women, the optimal thing to do is go along with the crowd, be nice, play it safe.
talk about stereotypes, as if women of old were some spineless housewives - those women were surely stronger/tougher than women nowadays (and men nowadays), they had to cope with much harder living conditions
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We’re most descended from the type of men who made the risky voyage and managed to come back rich. In that case he would finally get a good chance to pass on his genes. We’re descended from men who took chances (and were lucky).
adventurers get more children than stable family men? their children have a better chance to survive without one parent?
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For women, being lovable was the key to attracting the best mate. For men, however, it was more a matter of beating out lots of other men even to have a chance for a mate.
...Tradeoffs again: perhaps nature designed women to seek to be lovable, whereas men were designed to strive, mostly unsuccessfully, for greatness.
define lovable - its a combination of socially acceptable & personally acceptable, the latter being of greater importance - it has no intrinsic/necessary connection to any of the alpha male or sexy woman cliches/banalities
nature designed something? nature doesn't design, its simply a name for everything around us (that wasn't tampered with by a human and that isn't human - obviously an arbitrarily chosen selection which has no inherent special abilities)
now the patriarchal bias becomes more obvious
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And we are descended from those great men much more than from other men. Remember, most of the mediocre men left no descendants at all.
mediocre meaning those without the need to show-off constantly, those without delusions of grandeur or egoistic self-importance? the non-warriors?
great warriors with high achievements in mass slaughter & terror (aka wars/conquests/occupations), those that have little qualities for raising a family, those that aggressively took what they wanted?
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Women specialize in the narrow sphere of intimate relationships. Men specialize in the larger group.
more correctly: certain men (usually the delusional ones) take the larger groups by force (physical/mental) - others mimic them, salivating at their success, sanctioning their deprived methods, marginalizing or trivializing the intimate, leaving it for women to deal with
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Culture enables the group to be more than the sum of its parts (its members). Culture can be seen as a biological strategy. Twenty people who work together, in a cultural system, sharing information and dividing up tasks and so forth, will all live better — survive and reproduce better — than if those same twenty people lived in the same forest but did everything individually.
but it also tends to convert the members into slaves & followers of the culture (more correctly, the system - here we have 'the gloves' in action again), always securing its own upper hand & dominance over the members, drowning/chaining their individuality & personal freedom/liberty - does that also count as 'better' or maybe 'necessary sacrifice' for some illusory 'greater benefit' that somehow seems to really/substantially/exclusively benefit only those on top (somewhat also those sufficiently aligned with it) of the system pyramid?
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And one vital fact is that the scope of system gain increases with the size of the system. This is essentially what’s happening in the world right now, globalization in the world economy. Bigger systems provide more benefits, so as we expand and merge more units into bigger systems, overall there is more gain.
There is one crucial implication from all this. Culture depends on system gain, and bigger systems provide more of this. Therefore, you’ll get more of the benefit of culture from large groups than from small ones.
here we go, another globalist with some pedigree - as if that synergy effect applies always and for every size & goal - no, it applies only if everyone involved has the same goal (only for that goal and only if its reasonable enough) - in reality, the bigger the system, the more differences emerge and unless the system makes them sufficiently obedient it might become unstable, meaning forget your rights, be lucky you still have some shiny crumbs/leftovers
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As a result, culture mainly arose in the types of social relationships favored by men. Women favor close, intimate relationships.
ridiculous, see above under 'certain men'
he's not talking about culture, but rather about systems of governance
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Thus, the reason for the emergence of gender inequality may have little to do with men pushing women down in some dubious patriarchal conspiracy. Rather, it came from the fact that wealth, knowledge, and power were created in the men’s sphere. This is what pushed the men’s sphere ahead. Not oppression.
still in denial? would you say that wealthy & powerful people are not oppressive? that power does not corrupt or that high & mighty have special favorable feelings for those left behind?
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Giving birth is a revealing example. What could be more feminine than giving birth? Throughout most of history and prehistory, giving birth was at the center of the women’s sphere, and men were totally excluded. Men were rarely or never present at childbirth, nor was the knowledge about birthing even shared with them. But not very long ago, men were finally allowed to get involved, and the men were able to figure out ways to make childbirth safer for both mother and baby.
still envious (the male inability of giving birth)? so the women were able to hide their knowledge from the aggressive alpha warriors, who usually get what they want? then other 'certain men' got into into medicine, corrupting it into a commerce-based cesspool for the distribution of pharma poisons, confiscating/usurping old knowledge, throwing out natural methods, etc. - that's 'safety' for a price
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To maximize reproduction, a culture needs all the wombs it can get, but a few penises can do the job....men create the kind of social networks where individuals are replaceable and expendable.
see where he is going with that? eugenics & the like - patronizing women (oh you are so precious), supporting male dominance (go alpha warriors, the more women per man the better) + the globalism (one network to rule them all, the logical result of: the bigger the better illusion)
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Every adult female is a woman and is entitled to respect as such, but many cultures withhold respect from the males until and unless the lads prove themselves.
see the patriarchy & patronizing at work? can't be yourself, gotta prove it to some authority, one that chooses the worthy, alpha branded ones
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A few lucky men are at the top of society and enjoy the culture’s best rewards.
thats not luck, luck is something unexpected, unexplainable, unusual - these men simply figured out and/or exploited the system (designed by men) or had some help with that (like born wealthy)
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Culture uses both men and women
not culture, the system (more correctly: those representing/serving the system)
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Men go to extremes more than women
maybe, not convinced though (think PMS, emotions, instincts, protecting their children, giving birth, adapting to 'by male for male' designed systems,... plenty of extremes right there)
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The gradual creation of wealth, knowledge, and power in the men’s sphere was the source of gender inequality. Men created the big social structures that comprise society, and men still are mainly responsible for this, even though we now see that women can perform perfectly well in these large systems.
gender inequality is simply obvious: a male is not the same as a female (at least not in the physical sense), the correct term would be gender difference - as for the social structures: a slave can perform perfectly too, doesn't mean its something inevitable or desirable
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What seems to have worked best for cultures is to play off the men against each other, competing for respect and other rewards that end up distributed very unequally. Men have to prove themselves by producing things the society values. They have to prevail over rivals and enemies in cultural competitions, which is probably why they aren’t as lovable as women.
think about wars or greedy corporations or corrupt officials or.... very nice culture, eh? now go and do the same to prove yourself to the system :rolleyes:
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The essence of how culture uses men depends on a basic social insecurity. This insecurity is in fact social, existential, and biological. Built into the male role is the danger of not being good enough to be accepted and respected and even the danger of not being able to do well enough to create offspring.
sounds like something from a woody allen movie
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But that insecurity is useful and productive for the culture, the system.
and only the system matters, not its members (slaves)?
who represents/steers the system? the elite
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Again, I’m not saying it’s right, or fair, or proper. But it has worked. The cultures that have succeeded have used this formula, and that is one reason that they have succeeded instead of their rivals.
worked? but at what price and with what results...thats not success, thats a lame substitute wearing a shiny outfit
what rivals? imaginary ones i guess - also, if these rivals were using the same methods it does not matter who won
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What Men Are Good For?
that would depend on the perspective/beholder & the chosen set of values - the only universal answer is: primarily to experience their existence, secondarily: to be a counterpart to women in their relationships (physically obvious, family-wise logical) - other than that they can be good for whatever (reasonable enough) they want to do, just like women (as in similar, not same or equal)
