In Message Fri, 23 Apr 1993 09:04:09 -0500, [log in to unmask] writes: >In response to statistical findings that most of our message posters are >male, K J Fisher responded... > >>Or could it be--he said with great reluctance, fearing the worst--could >>there be just a one in a gazillion chance that men are, on the whole, >>more aggressive than women? > >My personal response to this "suggestion" is that while manifestations of >aggression by males are taught and reinforced by our society (thus passed >down from generation to generation), this is in and of itself not a >justification for positing that men are, _on the whole_ anything. > >To assume the extent and limitation of one's attributes on the basis of >gender is sexism. > >Any more questions about aggression????? > > >Jill Boldenow >U of MN I'm a bit confused by this definition of sexism (especially since I don't think most feminists would agree with it). It seems to suggest that saying there are any differences between the sexes is by itself sexist. Perhaps the sex/gender distinction is crucial here. Perhaps it is the suggestion that there are characteristic differences between GENDERS that is sexist. But this still can't be right, because there must be some differences between genders if we are to identify different ones. If I'm reading between the lines correctly, what Jill is saying is that gender characteristics are taught and reinforced by society, and not dictated by biology. Even if this is true (and it might well be), it still strikes me as fair to say men are more aggressive than women if society consistently teaches them to be so. And saying so is not only not sexist, it's an important step in coming to terms with the function of gender in society, which is to say it is important to feminism. In fact, I think feminists have been saying that men are more aggressive than women for a long time. But there is a further problem with this conception of sexism. The assumption here is that gender characteristics are purely the creation of social convention. Social teaching and reinforcement are certainly significant processes in the so-called "construction" of gender; no one would deny that. But the evidence doesn't support the assumption that biology dictates nothing to gender. The jury is still out, but a rather substantial body of evidence suggests that gendered behavior IS strongly influenced by biological factors. Of course, we are likely to ignore such evidence when it is inconvenient, as when some psychologist suggests that men and women differ in cognitive abilities. And I'm not saying they do. I'm only saying that we are not likely to talk about this idea much. And this lack of discussion is due to our political commitments, not to the quality of the evidence or arguments on either side. When such evidence suits our political commitments, however, we are happy to trot it out, as when we argue that homosexuality is not a choice, but a biological given. I hesitate to re-open an old can of worms (too late, I know), but this is one example why someone who is NOT a right-winger can become irritated with PCness: our theoretical positions are sometimes more a matter of political commitment than of full consideration of evidence and argument. I realize that all theorizing has political implications, but putting our political commitments first makes for bad theory and ultimately, I think, bad politics. So let's not be so quick to use the label sexist for statements that not only haven't been shown to be false, but are quite possibly true. ___________________________________________________________ James Peterson University of Notre Dame [log in to unmask] (219)631-7160