Foul the Christian

[aliantha]

ali, I would never accuse a woman of wanting to be a man. Accuse sounds so negative, and men are great. I could see why a woman would want to be one.

Really? I don't. I'm quite happy being female, thanks.

[Vraith]

Long ago, the men were far more capable of getting the food, whether hunting or farming. It made perfect sense to have the mom stay home with the kids, doing the outrageous amount of work that needed doing.

I actually don't think this is so. There's no doubt that men are generally physically strongER, but for the necessary tasks of hunting/farming/whatever, women are plenty strong enough.
The situation is born from that extra man-strength and aggression being applied to women, and the LACK of men's ability to feed babies.

The main threat to women's survival that men were better equipped to deal with was...other men.

[Worm of Despite]

Blah blah blah. How did gender get into my thread? Just shut up and admit men are the best. Sistine Chapel, bitches.

[rusmeister]

This is the problem w/most flavors of feminism. Not that women should have the freedom to do whatever they want (they should). But that they should want to be just like a man!

Why is it that as soon as a woman says she wants to work outside the home, she's accused of wanting to be a man?

I don't think it's 'as soon as', Ali. I think the problem primarily arises when a woman has children. Before she has them, she's on the same footing as a man. Afterwards, who the heck is raising the kids??? There are some things that change the dynamics of what I call "the lives of the young, the rich, and the childless". A lot of our own ideas tend to exclude the fact that the necessity of children changes our lives, and all of a sudden, not only work, but free time, etc go out the window as we are forced to grow up, stop being children, and living lives of personal sacrifice. My older brother has always dreamed of being a mechanic, but an early marriage and children drove him to work for McDonald's, where he has worked for 30 years faithfully, going to a second job in the afternoons to work as a handyman for a school for handicapped children. And even though i wish he would have pursued his dream, I respect him a great deal for doing what, as he saw it, must be done, and not what he wants to do. So the idea that we want to specially limit and dominate women is alien and foreign to me. My own view of the world is that we all have to grow up and take on responsibility, and children are a responsibility, and in the earliest years it is undeniable, if only on a biological level, that the mother is more qualified than the father to care for the baby, if only by virtue of the fact that she can feed it with her own body. When we consider the relative helplessness and protection that a pregnant and nursing mother has and needs, then it is enormous common sense to tell that woman to stay home and guard the future, while the man deals with the needs of the present. In a word, roles are, in some cases, actually logical. maybe you agree with this and we are not arguing at all. But certainly the traditionalist side is regularly hit with charges of seeking domination, when the sensible ones among us only want to see the preservation of the family, and see a threat to it when people who do not have a right to absolute freedom to do whatever they want (parents of a child) claim such rights.

Just as marriage is not a thing that anyone can declare to be whatever they want ("I declare my marriage to my pet turtle!"), so is the family not a thing that is open for 'democratic' re-definitions. These are things that are bigger than ourselves, and we will find out just how big if we insist on meddling with them, as Lewis said in his excellent essay on"Priestesses in the Church" ldolphin.org/priestesses.html

I have every respect for those who wish women to be priestesses. I think they are sincere and pious and sensible people. Indeed, in a way they are too sensible. That is where my dissent from them resembles Bingley's dissent from his sister. I am tempted to say that the proposed arrangement would make us much more rational 'but not near so much like a Church'.

Why is that domination? If we were sane, and cared about our kids, the higher value is on raising them and investing in them, not working. Therefore, why would it be dominating to claim women are meant to raise kids? They are performing the more valuable service. Its the society that doesn't place high value in investing in their own children that would look at a career as having higher value. And yet, those same people, should they win the lottery, would quit their jobs in a heartbeat. So tell me, why is that valuable?

It's human nature to believe the grass is greener on the other side of the fence. Some people who work full-time can't wait to tell their bosses to take this job and shove it. Some people who are forced to stay home all the time (childrearing, unemployment, what-have-you) can't wait to get back to work.

Why, you ask, is raising kids valued less than going out to work? Welcome to capitalism!

The "women are meant to raise the kids" line is domination because it tries to force *all* women into that stereotype. I grant you that some women are thrilled to death to stay home and raise the kids. That's their calling. I applaud them for finding it -- many people *never* find their calling.

But it's not *my* calling, and it's not the calling of a lot of women I know. If I'd had to stay home with the kids, I would have gone crazy. I need a lot more mental stimulation than second-grade math and "Hop on Pop."

And yet the Christian church would force *all* women to lay their adult, thinking brains aside for 18 years -- and lays a boatload of guilt on them if they want to do something different.

[rant] I'll tell you something else: It's a damn sight harder to both work *and* raise the kids. Y'all think it's the kids who are getting shortchanged in a single-parent household, but it's not -- the single parent is shortchanging *him/herself*. Whatever you feel like you're sacrificing as half of couple while your kids are small -- double it. There's no time to breathe. Hobbies are a distant memory. Days off? Please. Sleep? You can sleep when you're dead! [/rant]

And that "lifetime of returns"? I'm still waiting. My kids are in their 20s and I'm *still* parenting them to some degree. But it's way harder than when they were tiny, because I have no leverage when they refuse to listen to me. Parenting young adults is mostly about keeping your fingers crossed and your mouth taped shut.

That last I completely sympathize with. I mostly have it with my college student.

If there's a point where we differ, it may be on what exactly a person's 'calling' is. I'd say that if they have children, that is a priority call over what they want to be doing.

I wouldn't express everything the way 'Weez does, but I get his drift, and would express it in a slightly different way, which shifts the view from the stereotype of being "forced" (presumably by scheming patriarchs) to a perception of necessity; of the need of another (the child) that outweighs the desires, even strong ones, of the parent.

Also, you can't take all forms of Christianity and call them "the Christian Church". We specifically deny that - the simple way to put it (there ARE nuances) is that they might all be Christian (although if they deny the Nicene-Constantinople Creed I'd say not), but they are NOT part of the Church. The many forms you see have different and contradictory teachings and subsequently theologies which are NOT all compatible. So some radical fundamentalists who interpret the Bible on their own might indeed hold teachings you describe about women, but we don't. Situations vary. Some women are wives, others are not. Teachings about wives do not apply to all women, and the responsibilities of mothers do not apply to non-mothers. A mother may have a situation where she HAS to work (and very often does) - and so none of these women fall into the discussion, although when we discuss the ideal, we are going to try to figure out how to free the mother from the obligation to work at McDonald's or Taco Bell or even as a TA so that she can raise her own children instead of others'.
And the employer, encouraged by our society, is much more the one shortchanging parents of both the single and couple variety.

So the sum-up is that women without children/dependents should be free to work in whatever way they wish. Mothers and fathers have a responsibility to their children which has priority over what the parent may want. It's fine to talk about freedom - but that freedom is limited by responsibility. As to the existing situation - the excess of capitalism in our society - that is what I propose changing to fit human needs, not fit human needs to suit the capitalist.

[rusmeister]

Long ago, the men were far more capable of getting the food, whether hunting or farming. It made perfect sense to have the mom stay home with the kids, doing the outrageous amount of work that needed doing.

I actually don't think this is so. There's no doubt that men are generally physically strongER, but for the necessary tasks of hunting/farming/whatever, women are plenty strong enough.
The situation is born from that extra man-strength and aggression being applied to women, and the LACK of men's ability to feed babies.

The main threat to women's survival that men were better equipped to deal with was...other men.

I think Fist is mostly right here, because those differences - which you seem to agree on - made the particular sense to divide the work along the lines of sex, modern TV fantasies (the variety that present the differences as no difference, and women and men equally sharing all roles and so on) aside. But that last is strange to me. Sure, other men have been threats, but certainly not the main or only ones - particularly regarding survival. The threat of rape or slavery, generally speaking, could be said to be greater from other men, but survival? No. Physical strength DOES matter as soon as you lower the tech level just a little, as I discovered when I first came to a collapsing Soviet Union. Any woman who has a man isn't going to carry the heavy loads while the man watches over here. I realized that a lot of our western attitudes have been shaped by modern technology that makes strength less important. Pull that rug from under people, and it becomes obvious. Niven and Pournelle wrote an excellent end-of-the-world novel called "Lucifer's Hammer", and they rightly proposed that in a collapse of civilization, sex roles would return faster than you could say 'jackrabbit' and all talk about there being no difference would disappear. I read the fiction, and then later saw the fact for myself, on a daily basis, and became one of the men expected to use my strength to ease the burdens of women.

[Vraith]

You, Niven and Pournelle [though I liked that book in a lot of ways] all simply overestimate the number of things that threaten survival that men's brute strength advantage is necessary to overcome. It's miniscule, practically non-existent.
A non-negligible number that are more convenient if you're stronger.
But also, there is a shift in kind from a fair division of labor based on biological strengths/functions to social hierarchy, authority, and dominance.

Besides, their whole point centers on "If things became what they used to be..." Might as well say "If my dad weren't dead he could beat up your dad!" In other words things ARE different.
When the nature of the world changes, it is the traditions that are the biggest threat.

[Fist and Faith]

...and the LACK of men's ability to feed babies.

And THAT might be the key to the whole thing! Until babies can eat on their own, the mother MUST be the primary caregiver. The mother couldn't be away from the baby for more than what? A couple hours? Yes, the mother might be strong enough to do the hunting, but the father's greater strength makes it at least a bit easier for him - PLUS the fact that the mother can't be gone as long as hunting requires.

The main threat to women's survival that men were better equipped to deal with was...other men.

I think we're on a different subject now. Or at least I'm taking us there. The threat to women's survival has never been other men. Other men kill her mate, and rape her or flat-out take her to their village. The threat to women now, at least here, is her mate. I don't know if that was always the case, or just a fun new trend.

[rusmeister]

You, Niven and Pournelle [though I liked that book in a lot of ways] all simply overestimate the number of things that threaten survival that men's brute strength advantage is necessary to overcome. It's miniscule, practically non-existent.
A non-negligible number that are more convenient if you're stronger.
But also, there is a shift in kind from a fair division of labor based on biological strengths/functions to social hierarchy, authority, and dominance.

Besides, their whole point centers on "If things became what they used to be..." Might as well say "If my dad weren't dead he could beat up your dad!" In other words things ARE different.
When the nature of the world changes, it is the traditions that are the biggest threat.

Well, Vraith, you can say that to the armchair generals, but it doesn't work for me, because I've seen the difference with my own eyes and lived it. I was here in 1991 during the collapse. Some things here still ARE lower-tech base and an absence of things you guys take for granted like shopping carts, trunks of cars conveniently parked next to stores, cars themselves, delivery services, etc etc, when suddenly someone has to go and carry something half a mile or more or up nine flights of stairs, makes a HUGE difference. Sure, sometimes a woman has to make do without a man. But in those cases, the struggle can be pretty sad to watch. It is NOT miniscule, and I know because I've SEEN it. The woman alone, for example, has to carry half as much and make twice as many trips. If it is a heavy, bulky item (a sofa or washing machine, for instance), she may not be able to carry it at all, even with a friend and has to look for male relatives or friends to do the job - or hire someone for money.

Things COULD be different again. We COULD be knocked back into the 18th century or the stone age by a major disaster.
Your whole point centers on "things CAN'T possibly become what they used to be", an amazing universal negative with no support and plenty of objections. Certainly a lot of people at NASA take the idea of an asteroid strike seriously. (Leaving out a dozen other scenarios, from nuclear war to whatever)

Not sure what you mean by "a shift in kind". You'd have to make that a lot clearer for me to consider your idea.

[rusmeister]

...and the LACK of men's ability to feed babies.

And THAT might be the key to the whole thing! Until babies can eat on their own, the mother MUST be the primary caregiver. The mother couldn't be away from the baby for more than what? A couple hours? Yes, the mother might be strong enough to do the hunting, but the father's greater strength makes it at least a bit easier for him - PLUS the fact that the mother can't be gone as long as hunting requires.

The main threat to women's survival that men were better equipped to deal with was...other men.

I think we're on a different subject now. Or at least I'm taking us there. The threat to women's survival has never been other men. Other men kill her mate, and rape her or flat-out take her to their village. The threat to women now, at least here, is her mate. I don't know if that was always the case, or just a fun new trend.

Mostly agree, except on certain aspects of the last part. If the mate lives in a society that encourages him to sleep with the woman for self-gratification, to leave her when he is tired of her, to eliminate things like vows taken as solemn things that may not be broken under any circumstances - the finality of a vow, as opposed to the wishy-washiness of a commitment (the whole scene at the end of Shrek 1, and all weddings, makes no sense ("I object!") unless the couple is doing something irrevocable), when these things are eliminated, when the freedom of the individual is emphasized as the ultimate ideal, then... yeah, a 'mate' (which need not even be a husband) is much more likely to be a threat to his wife. But even then, survival threats are rare, and much exaggerated by the media (which also encourages copy-cat violence, as well).

[rusmeister]

When the nature of the world changes, it is the traditions that are the biggest threat.

This I want to take on separately.
Traditions can be good or bad. My observation is that the rule is that they are mostly good, for the simple reason that the average unit, be it family or society, passes a tradition on because they believe it to be a good thing, worthy of being practiced by their children and grandchildren. So yes, you can point to bad traditions, and I'd say that you are pointing to less than 5% of all traditions.

And this is the best defense of (good) tradition that I have ever read - and shows the undemocratic leanings of those who oppose the general idea of tradition:

But there is one thing that I have never from my youth up been able to understand. I have never been able to understand where people got the idea that democracy was in some way opposed to tradition. It is obvious that tradition is only democracy extended through time. It is trusting to a consensus of common human voices rather than to some isolated or arbitrary record. The man who quotes some German historian against the tradition of the Catholic Church, for instance, is strictly appealing to aristocracy. He is appealing to the superiority of one expert against the awful authority of a mob. It is quite easy to see why a legend is treated, and ought to be treated, more respectfully than a book of history. The legend is generally made by the majority of people in the village, who are sane. The book is generally written by the one man in the village who is mad. Those who urge against tradition that men in the past were ignorant may go and urge it at the Carlton Club, along with the statement that voters in the slums are ignorant. It will not do for us. If we attach great importance to the opinion of ordinary men in great unanimity when we are dealing with daily matters, there is no reason why we should disregard it when we are dealing with history or fable. Tradition may be defined as an extension of the franchise. Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our father. I, at any rate, cannot separate the two ideas of democracy and tradition; it seems evident to me that they are the same idea. We will have the dead at our councils. The ancient Greeks voted by stones; these shall vote by tombstones. It is all quite regular and official, for most tombstones, like most ballot papers, are marked with a cross.

This general malaise of modern thinking that only people alive NOW matter, means that nobody at all matters, for "now" changes every minute. It is the most vacant form of thinking to imagine that only 'now' matters. It excludes history and learning by implication. But I'll say no more for fear that people will miss the highlighted text. Tradition IS the democracy of the dead.

[aliantha]

Haven't read all of your posts, rus, but I wanted to post this before I forgot. It's an excerpt from an article I saw in the Washington Post a couple of weeks ago. It's written by a woman who served as an officer in the Marines in Iraq, and the title is, "Five myths about women in combat". One of the myths addresses this idea that men are stronger than women.

2. Women are too physically weak for the battlefield.

While it is indisputable that the average man has more upper-body strength than the average woman, women have different physical abilities that enable them to offer unique capabilities in combat.

Distance running is one such arena, and it’s relevant because combat can be as much about physical endurance (sustaining activity over time) as physical strength. According to a study analyzing track-and-field records and published in the journal Nature in 1992, the gaps between male and female performance narrow as the distance is extended, and some studies show that at ultramarathon distances (100 miles or more), women with equal training as their male counterparts outperform men. Researchers theorize that women’s ability to metabolize fat more efficiently contributes to their endurance and success in longer runs. Women also tolerate hot and humid racing conditions better than men because of their smaller body size, according to a 1999 article in the European Journal of Applied Physiology and Occupational Physiology.

Foot patrols involve carrying 50 to 100 pounds of equipment for miles at a time, and I’ve seen male Marines who can bench-press 300 pounds but struggle to walk two miles with 50 pounds of gear. And you don’t have to bench-press 300 pounds to pull a trigger. If a woman passes the physical requirements, why shouldn’t she get the chance to fight?

I've heard anecdotally of men who are amazed that their wives can survive the distance event that is childbirth. Usually they say they never could have done it, even if they'd had the right plumbing.

Those women who you see trying to carry a sofa aren't weak. They're simply doing work they're not physically suited for.

Any woman who has a man isn't going to carry the heavy loads while the man watches over here.

That has nothing to do with the woman's ability, and everything to do with the guy stepping in to help the little lady (in case she shows him up!).

[Worm of Despite]

I think men and women are more alike than different. 99.9% gene-commonality and all. And I also think this thread should be split.

[Vraith]

I think men and women are more alike than different. 99.9% gene-commonality and all. And I also think this thread should be split.

I agree with both of those. On the first, we just, for a number of reasons notice and think the differences more important than similarities [which isn't necessarily so.] On the second...really sorry, LF, I was part of the hijacking.

[rusmeister]

Haven't read all of your posts, rus, but I wanted to post this before I forgot. It's an excerpt from an article I saw in the Washington Post a couple of weeks ago. It's written by a woman who served as an officer in the Marines in Iraq, and the title is, "Five myths about women in combat". One of the myths addresses this idea that men are stronger than women.

2. Women are too physically weak for the battlefield.

While it is indisputable that the average man has more upper-body strength than the average woman, women have different physical abilities that enable them to offer unique capabilities in combat.

Distance running is one such arena, and it’s relevant because combat can be as much about physical endurance (sustaining activity over time) as physical strength. According to a study analyzing track-and-field records and published in the journal Nature in 1992, the gaps between male and female performance narrow as the distance is extended, and some studies show that at ultramarathon distances (100 miles or more), women with equal training as their male counterparts outperform men. Researchers theorize that women’s ability to metabolize fat more efficiently contributes to their endurance and success in longer runs. Women also tolerate hot and humid racing conditions better than men because of their smaller body size, according to a 1999 article in the European Journal of Applied Physiology and Occupational Physiology.

Foot patrols involve carrying 50 to 100 pounds of equipment for miles at a time, and I’ve seen male Marines who can bench-press 300 pounds but struggle to walk two miles with 50 pounds of gear. And you don’t have to bench-press 300 pounds to pull a trigger. If a woman passes the physical requirements, why shouldn’t she get the chance to fight?

I've heard anecdotally of men who are amazed that their wives can survive the distance event that is childbirth. Usually they say they never could have done it, even if they'd had the right plumbing.

Those women who you see trying to carry a sofa aren't weak. They're simply doing work they're not physically suited for.

Any woman who has a man isn't going to carry the heavy loads while the man watches over here.

That has nothing to do with the woman's ability, and everything to do with the guy stepping in to help the little lady (in case she shows him up!).

S'OK, Ali. I'll wait then, until you DO read the posts. This last is really irrelevant to what I'm talking about. Suffice to say that there are answers to the question posed in the quote.

And, no, a man helping a woman has nothing to do with 'being shown up'. Maybe you project that onto men that would otherwise help you, which would be quite unfair to the men. Things like pity and agape love stir men's hearts as well as women's - and I get a sense that you've had precious little experience of (men like) that in your own life.

As to LF's comment, it was related to Christian understandings of men and women, so a split would have to take into account its original relation to the thread.

It is given from the start that men and women are both human, and have all of those things in common, so the need for nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere and a toilet, and four limbs and a nose being the standard is not on the table. What is being discussed is what is genuinely different - on the physical, mental, and spiritual planes.

[Worm of Despite]

As to LF's comment, it was related to Christian understandings of men and women, so a split would have to take into account its original relation to the thread.

I dunno. I'm just thinking the specificity of the eternal man-woman question and religion could flourish better in its own thread. I'm not offended it started on my thread. I just think the branch should be clipped and put in a pot of its own.

I think men and women are more alike than different. 99.9% gene-commonality and all. And I also think this thread should be split.

I agree with both of those. On the first, we just, for a number of reasons notice and think the differences more important than similarities [which isn't necessarily so.] On the second...really sorry, LF, I was part of the hijacking.

Well, you're learning. But I'm the master. I could start turning this thread from man-woman equality to a discussion of my love life then racism and turn it back to my Christianity in about two pages.

Don't tempt me!

[Vraith]

Don't tempt me!

Heh...I'm pretty sure Evil [and things Foul] are, historically/literarily/biblically tempTERS, not tempTED.

But...that might be an idea worth working with...Good as the Temptation...hmmm.

[rusmeister]

But...that might be an idea worth working with...Good as the Temptation...hmmm.

Hopefully, LF, this stays within the discussion of Christianity, and so passes your test of valid discussion.

In this indeed I approach
a matter more dark and awful than it is easy to discuss;
and I apologise in advance if any of my phrases fall wrong
or seem irreverent touching a matter which the greatest saints and
thinkers have justly feared to approach. But in that terrific tale
of the Passion there is a distinct emotional suggestion that
the author of all things (in some unthinkable way) went not only
through agony, but through doubt. It is written, "Thou shalt not
tempt the Lord thy God." No; but the Lord thy God may tempt Himself;
and it seems as if this was what happened in Gethsemane.
In a garden Satan tempted man: and in a garden God tempted God.
He passed in some superhuman manner through our human horror of pessimism.
When the world shook and the sun was wiped out of heaven,
it was not at the crucifixion, but at the cry from the cross:
the cry which confessed that God was forsaken of God. And now let
the revolutionists choose a creed from all the creeds and a god
from all the gods of the world, carefully weighing all the gods
of inevitable recurrence and of unalterable power. They will not find
another god who has himself been in revolt. Nay, (the matter grows
too difficult for human speech,) but let the atheists themselves
choose a god. They will find only one divinity who ever uttered
their isolation; only one religion in which God seemed for an instant
to be an atheist.

GK Chesterton, "Orthodoxy" www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/orthodoxy/

How does that sound, Vraith? (you might want the larger context to really get it; I consider that book mandatory reading for anyone who wants to either attack or defend the Christian faith. It is not for the indifferent.)

[Vraith]

How does that sound, Vraith? (you might want the larger context to really get it; I consider that book mandatory reading for anyone who wants to either attack or defend the Christian faith. It is not for the indifferent.)

Evil Rus, making me stay off topic...but less so anyway.
I was obviously playing on the differences and eliding between the challenge/provoke definition, and the seduce/entice one...but that is an interesting interpretation of that particular incident. Is it really the orthodox interpretation? Most christians and christian scholarship I know would be violently opposed to any such reading.

[rusmeister]

How does that sound, Vraith? (you might want the larger context to really get it; I consider that book mandatory reading for anyone who wants to either attack or defend the Christian faith. It is not for the indifferent.)

Evil Rus, making me stay off topic...but less so anyway.
I was obviously playing on the differences and eliding between the challenge/provoke definition, and the seduce/entice one...but that is an interesting interpretation of that particular incident. Is it really the orthodox interpretation? Most christians and christian scholarship I know would be violently opposed to any such reading.

It's consistent with Orthodoxy, mainly because we insist on the mystery of what we cannot understand, whereas the Thomist Catholic, attempting to reduce everything to terms oh human reasoning, would try to analyze it. We're OK with the idea that some things are totally beyond us - and that's one of them. So it doesn't contradict Orthodox teaching in general. I think it exaggerates the point in order to make the point - but it is an awe-ful, and awe-some point to make. I mean, shoot, if I were there, and could grasp anything of what was happening, I'd fall on my face trembling. It's a little like Lord Foul appearing to have killed the Creator himself and waving the ring as he goes about blasting the arch of Time - moments before Covenant materializes in front of him. I don't think we can grasp to the end of the implication of the omnipotent Creator, on Whom the universe depends, actually surrendering Himself to death.

[Linna Heartbooger]

I'm really enjoying catching up on this discussion... ya'll have personalities that just "leap off the page" in a discussion like this.

EDIT: I'm responding to posts from this thread HERE:
kevinswatch.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=21142