Are Humans Hard Wired to Prefer Men as Leaders?

[DrZoidberg]

In Western civilization in the Middle ages, it was men keeping women from being educated and literate. That is like how white America kept slaves illiterate. What we're looking at is patriarchy. The thread should be titled, Are Men Hardwired for Patriarchy? since women didn't control policy. In colonial British America, only 10% of men were literate. But less women at 1%. Newspapers were abundant in 1789 and by a century before women's suffrage very widespread. There were still a monement to keep women uneducated. The first woman wasn't admitted to Harvard Medical School until the 1940's. Education is not a requirement to vote. Why? Because classes of people have been kept uneducated to keep them out of power.

I don't like this line of reasoning. For most of human history getting any education was a rare privilege. Not even all nobles learned to read and write 300 years ago.

200 years ago the vast majority were peasants and lived in abject poverty. They couldn't use an education even if they had one. It would have been a waste of resources.

It wasn't until the 20th century there was any point expanding education.

In this context saying that men kept women from getting an education because of patriarchy is silly. They also kept most men from getting an education. Where was the patriarchy for these men? Not much of a conspiracy for these guys.

What a surprise that we start getting feminism at the same time as the expansion of the middle class.

I'm not saying that women shouldn't have been educated before this. But it's a bit silly getting upset about unfairness in one dimension while ignoring unfairnesses in every other dimension

 

[Emily Lake]

I don't like this line of reasoning. For most of human history getting any education was a rare privilege. Not even all nobles learned to read and write 300 years ago.

200 years ago the vast majority were peasants and lived in abject poverty. They couldn't use an education even if they had one. It would have been a waste of resources.

It wasn't until the 20th century there was any point expanding education.

Which countries are you talking about here? Because 200 years ago was in the midst of the industrial revolution, and the majority were NOT living in abject poverty. Yes, poverty still existed, especially in isolated rural areas... and still exists today. But not as broadly as you seem to think. Public elementary schools have been around in the US since the mid 1800s.

In this context saying that men kept women from getting an education because of patriarchy is silly. They also kept most men from getting an education. Where was the patriarchy for these men? Not much of a conspiracy for these guys.

What a surprise that we start getting feminism at the same time as the expansion of the middle class.

I'm not saying that women shouldn't have been educated before this. But it's a bit silly getting upset about unfairness in one dimension while ignoring unfairnesses in every other dimension

It kind of sounds like you're saying that we shouldn't talk about the fact that nearly all women were treated as property and had no agency or rights of their own throughout the vast majority of human history... because not all men had that either.

I've heard that same kind of argument before. It still comes up. Apparently we can't address the disadvantages of women until every single man has had all of his disadvantages addressed first.

 

[Gospel]

What in the world did I just read? None of it makes sense for some reason. Is he saying that not all educated Nobels were men 300 years ago? So confusing.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

In this context saying that men kept women from getting an education because of patriarchy is silly. They also kept most men from getting an education.

And? As I've written before...and this is now the 4th time in this thread, patriarchy is a scam like religion or the Republican Party. There is an upper echelon of elite men getting the most benefit who have tricked the rest of men into the system because of relative benefit they receive such as over women. The system is highly not maximized to benefit the vast majority of men which is why the types of other societies under discussion are superior.

I'm not saying that women shouldn't have been educated before this. But it's a bit silly getting upset about unfairness in one dimension while ignoring unfairnesses in every other dimension

I am not getting upset at all in one direction or frankly upset at all in any direction. Take a closer look at what I wrote:

Men are not hardwired to want patriarchy. However, men are hardwired to want to create offspring and this makes patriarchy a fairly stable system until it is overthrown by a superior system like a working democracy where everyone's standard of living is improving and opportunity to mate is likely.

When we discuss hardwiring, I have to bring up standard of living and opportunity to mate because those metrics are related to biological imperatives. Having rule by men only isn't.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Unless you're in the middle of nowhere it's still a trivial risk.

A trivial risk to whom, exactly? Clearly, you aren't the one taking the risk, nor are you the one dealing with the ramifications if the risk is realized. You're very cavalier about handing off risk to other people as no big deal.

If you're not in the middle of nowhere you're in a situation where someone might walk in at any time and where screams are likely to be heard. It's also almost certainly a place with only one exit. That's not where a rapist would want to attack. The sorts of places that are low enough traffic that it wouldn't be an insane risk for a rapist are places that probably should have one-hole unisex toilets instead anyway.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

They haven't been widespread for centuries. You have the scale wrong.

I'm saying that in the time before newspapers someone who pretty much lived at home wouldn't have much information on which to vote.

I think you’re the one with the scale wrong, Loren.

In the first two decades of the 17th century, more or less regular papers printed from movable type appeared in Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands. The Dutch “corantos” (“currents of news”), which strung together items extracted from foreign journals, became the sources for English and French translations published in Amsterdam as early as 1620. Rudimentary newspapers appeared in many European countries in the 17th century, and broadsheets with social news were published in Japan in the Tokugawa period (1603–1867).

https://www.britannica.com/topic/newspaper

Wrong yardstick--I'm not talking about the first newspapers, but when newspapers became widespread.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

They haven't been widespread for centuries. You have the scale wrong.

I'm saying that in the time before newspapers someone who pretty much lived at home wouldn't have much information on which to vote.

That wouldn't seem to be a statement where gender would matter.

You're forgetting the times--the man went out and worked, the woman stayed home and took care of the home and children. In the absence of news sources that reach into the home she would be pretty poorly informed.

 

[Rhea]

They haven't been widespread for centuries. You have the scale wrong.

I'm saying that in the time before newspapers someone who pretty much lived at home wouldn't have much information on which to vote.

That wouldn't seem to be a statement where gender would matter.

You're forgetting the times--the man went out and worked, the woman stayed home and took care of the home and children. In the absence of news sources that reach into the home she would be pretty poorly informed.

Oh, wait, you thought women were ALONE in their homes? All week, every week? That they did not congregate at all?
And you though all the women stayed home? There weren’t large numbers of women working at menial jobs?

Fascinating.


What dumb little creatures they were. Needing their men to understand the world for them.

 

[Rhea]

I believe you've both not fully grasped the point I was making, and have inferred a number thoughts from my post that I don't actually have. Try reading it again and realize I'm not the enemy, and don't have time to expound in detail about every point.

Similarly, is it possible that you have failed to grasp our points?

I've been a staunch supporter of women's rights for over a decade now,

~takes a deep breath~
And I, for over 50 years now.

and I understand that, culturally, women have had very serious, and very real issues throughout history. What I was challenging initially when I responded to Jimmy Higgins was the generalization that our entire history has been marked by women's oppression, that oppression was a universal, conscious choice by men, and that every woman felt they were struggling

Ah, have you inferred a number thoughts from my post that I don't actually have?

Let me ask you this, Rousseau, just as a thought experiement.
Do you think we mean that every single member of an oppressed class must be struggling all of the time? Or are you thinking that in order for it to be a conscious and universal problem, that it must be EVERY person ALL the time? By this logic, would slavery be “not universally bad” if you can find an enslaved person who did not feel they were struggling?

I’ll tell you that there were some women who did not feel they were struggling by being denied the right to have credit in their own name. But it was nevertheless a conscious choice by men to deny it and it was universally denied.

.

I don't challenge this to undermine the very real struggle women have faced, but to highlight that the picture we're actually looking at is far more complicated. It's easy to take a few data points from the past century and generalize about thousands of years of history, and perhaps billions of people across the globe.

Honestly, NO SHIT it is complicated. We who have lived it for fifty years can tell you that.

And when someone tries to tell us what we think (“you’re trying to be sexy”) and how we think (“you don’t make decisions, you operate on instinct”) or tries to tell us we are “taking a few data points from the past century...”


Rousseau, you really gotta know how bad this sounds. Maybe you want to re-read, and pause and think about the myriad experiences you’re witnessing. And the women’s history that perhaps you don’t understand as deeply as you think.

I just feel a friend would tell you what this sounds like.

 

[DrZoidberg]

I don't like this line of reasoning. For most of human history getting any education was a rare privilege. Not even all nobles learned to read and write 300 years ago.

200 years ago the vast majority were peasants and lived in abject poverty. They couldn't use an education even if they had one. It would have been a waste of resources.

It wasn't until the 20th century there was any point expanding education.

Which countries are you talking about here? Because 200 years ago was in the midst of the industrial revolution, and the majority were NOT living in abject poverty. Yes, poverty still existed, especially in isolated rural areas... and still exists today. But not as broadly as you seem to think. Public elementary schools have been around in the US since the mid 1800s.

I'm thinking about more than just reading and writing, but gaining enough knowledge to be able to specialise in industry.

These two are connected.

I guess, what is considered abject poverty is subjective. Industrial workers 200 years ago worked 12 hour days, for meagre salaries and where instantly replaceable.

In this context saying that men kept women from getting an education because of patriarchy is silly. They also kept most men from getting an education. Where was the patriarchy for these men? Not much of a conspiracy for these guys.

What a surprise that we start getting feminism at the same time as the expansion of the middle class.

I'm not saying that women shouldn't have been educated before this. But it's a bit silly getting upset about unfairness in one dimension while ignoring unfairnesses in every other dimension

It kind of sounds like you're saying that we shouldn't talk about the fact that nearly all women were treated as property and had no agency or rights of their own throughout the vast majority of human history... because not all men had that either.

I've heard that same kind of argument before. It still comes up. Apparently we can't address the disadvantages of women until every single man has had all of his disadvantages addressed first.

Don't twist my words into an argument I never made. I never said we shouldn't discuss it. It is interesting why the social structure that reduced women to property emerged.

What I did say is that the lack of education for women doesn't prove much in a world where extremely few were educated. What exactly is it proving? Male plantation slaves weren't educated either. Is that evidence of the nefarious matriarchy at play? Of course not.

You are not very good at reading and understanding my posts. This is the third time in a short time where you've read pretty extreme things into my messages I never said. It seems like you've reduced me to some sort of conservative caricature and you will project that onto anything I say. Please stop. There are more dimensions in any discussion than being for or against. It is also possible to discuss nuances of either position.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

They haven't been widespread for centuries. You have the scale wrong.

I'm saying that in the time before newspapers someone who pretty much lived at home wouldn't have much information on which to vote.

That wouldn't seem to be a statement where gender would matter.

You're forgetting the times--the man went out and worked, the woman stayed home and took care of the home and children. In the absence of news sources that reach into the home she would be pretty poorly informed.

Out, as in outside? On the farm or mill or mine? What in the heck happens there that made males more enlightened?

 

[Emily Lake]

I'm trying to imagine how this discussion would go over if it were asking whether humans are hardwired to prefer white leaders. And if the discussion were circling around how black people have been historically so poorly educated that they wouldn't be informed enough to vote, so it wasn't a big deal that they weren't allowed to vote. Or how some black people did just fine under Jim Crow, so really it's not reasonable to talk about the historical oppression of black people.

I just can't see that discussion continuing for 170 posts, and receiving such civil and polite replies.

 

[DrZoidberg]

I'm trying to imagine how this discussion would go over if it were asking whether humans are hardwired to prefer white leaders. And if the discussion were circling around how black people have been historically so poorly educated that they wouldn't be informed enough to vote, so it wasn't a big deal that they weren't allowed to vote. Or how some black people did just fine under Jim Crow, so really it's not reasonable to talk about the historical oppression of black people.

I just can't see that discussion continuing for 170 posts, and receiving such civil and polite replies.

You already tried to pull that on me, and you crashed and burned. You then ignored my reply. And here you are doing it again. If you have arguments, present them, instead of this nonsense of trying to shame those you disagree with into silence. I don't think anybody in this thread doesn't see right through this nonsense of comparing it to racism.

Nobody thinks that racism and sexism have the same roots or psychological causes. I suspect that neither do you?

 

[DrZoidberg]

In the world's most feminist and gender equal country gendering of chosen jobs are more extreme. Not less. When social pressures are off women to conform we see more extreme traditional female roles.

https://www.economist.com/graphic-d...ceiling-n-mar_article&utm_term=int-politics-w

 

[Angra Mainyu]

A problem with at least nearly all (very probably all) of these threads is that they are for nearly all posters fights between people convinced matters are in a specific manner, not discussions aimed at finding truth. What percentage of posters are trying to figure out whether humans are hard-wired to prefer men as leaders? What percentage is not accusing their opponents of unethical behavior all the time (even without saying it)?

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Do you agree that men are not hardwired to prefer patriarchy?

 

[DrZoidberg]

A problem with at least nearly all (very probably all) of these threads is that they are for nearly all posters fights between people convinced matters are in a specific manner, not discussions aimed at finding truth. What percentage of posters are trying to figure out whether humans are hard-wired to prefer men as leaders? What percentage is not accusing their opponents of unethical behavior all the time (even without saying it)?

It is interesting. The debate tactics in this thread have been thick with low blows. It's clearly a sensitive topic. And reading comprehension hasn't been great either. I've spent more time in this thread defending things I didn't say than having to defend things I did say. I get the impression that it's more on this thread than other threads.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

You're forgetting the times--the man went out and worked, the woman stayed home and took care of the home and children. In the absence of news sources that reach into the home she would be pretty poorly informed.

Out, as in outside? On the farm or mill or mine? What in the heck happens there that made males more enlightened?

Jimmy, in colonial times, everyone was atheist so no one went to church and talked politics before, during, or after. No one gave sermons related to political issues of the day. There were no social opportunities to communicate or neighbors. Everyone was isolated. Also, husbands never told their wives anything. Everything changed in 1920 when suddenly newspapers existed everywhere and suddenly women could all read, but up until that time newspapers were not widespread and so they could only be distributed to the right-hand side of the tables, not the left-hand side.

 

[Trausti]

We’ve yet to have a female dictator; but I’m rooting for Kim Yo-Jong.

 

[Elixir]

We’ve yet to have a female dictator; but I’m rooting for Kim Yo-Jong.

A List of Female Dictators