to think that men and women ARE different?

[bejeezus]

I hold feminist views, erring on the side of radical feminist. I dont call myself either, as Im not well read enough, I dont think...

Its an on going theme...that people accuse Mumsnet of being a misandrist site. I dont believe it is; and I agree that the misandrist POV would be those saying 'its because he's a man' 'men do that' etc etc when OPs accuse their OHs of not doing fair share of cleaning/childcare/going to strip clubs etc etc. And the man-supporting POV would be'hes a grown up, of course he should do his fair share' etc etc

BUT...SOMETIMES....I think there ARE valid reasons, that the men in question may appear to be, but not be, useless;

For example, women have evolved to have better peripheral vision and ability to multi-task than men, because of them predominantly doing the childcare

For example 2; my dad and numerous other men I know, who are not sexist or useless in any way cant find things. My dad often calls my mum or one of us to help him-if something is 'not where it usually is'. I dont know the evolutionary (or other) basis for this, if there is one, but in this case it isnt because they believe it to be womens work at all

This is ridiculous. It is well known that hunter gatherers organise themselves in a variety of different ways. In some societies, the survival of a child is highly dependent on the support of grandparents. In some societies, the child's survival is highly dependent on paternal input and in others not at all. In some societies, child survival is dependent on maternal input and in others it doesn't have any correlation beyond the age of two years old if the mother lives or dies.

Nobody could accurately predict which group would organise in which way without a huge amount of contextual information. Yet people are claiming to know how women and men organised themselves during the Palaeolithic and then claim that as an explanation as to what happens now. But we don't now. It could be any one of a variety of different ways that hunter gatherers organise themselves now, a combination of these ways, or something entirely different.

We really do not know.

Which species, LRD?

And what does your comment about autism tries to prove?

So then are you saying that in humans, the physical differences are minor, and therefore not important/significant?

lueji - think species like peacocks, lions, etc.

I'm not trying to prove anything with teh comment about autism.

abs - no, I think the physical differences are interesting, but they're not huge. Some species have much bigger differences between males and females. Humans don't really - it's subtler.

We don't know for sure SeaHouses, but...

The average life expectancy was barely over 30 (from skeletons found), and few grandparents would be available.

Obviously, women didn't go alone, but when distributing meat in the group, do you think males would give to children not related to them? Would they be likely to protect them if attacked?

If fatherless children didn't survive, human pairings would be much stronger. But if it was easy to survive without a father, then we would have a society of single mums. That is the point.

And these pay off-risk calculations are not based on what happened in pre-history, but are constantly done at an unconscious level. At least in most people. Exceptions for gold diggers, of course.

Do you mean average life expectancy? If that was 30, what with childhood mortality, you'd think there'd be loads of grandparents around.

I don't understand the bit about males not giving to children not related to them? Surely (as in most small-group societies), you'd be related quite closely to a lot of the group? And there would be a good genetic advantage to, for example, a man caring for his sister's children, no?

LRD's comment about autism is an example to demonstrate that we might think that something is very different between men and women, but in fact we are just looking at it differently.

Remember that the Victorians believed that things like politics were too taxing for women's little brains.

In the dodgy cave girl semi porn books (otherwise known as Earth's Children, starting with Clan of the Cave Bear) the protagonist accidentally invents the patriarchy by figuring out (and telling everyone) that havign sex made babies and therefore babies belong to men as well as to women.

Until then (in the books) it was all very free love and men would support a baby born to their mates without any thought that the baby actually "belonged" to them. Once they believed that babies could belong to men, they wanted to prevent "their" women from having sex with anyone else.

trills - I'm not sure I'd go so far as to say 'in fact', because I don't think my comment is anything more than an observation that sometimes, we think things have been established to have physical causes, then we find new research suggests it's not quite so simple.

That's all.

Average life expectancy was low because lots of people died in childhood and lots in old age, not because lots of people died at about 30. Certainly there was a risk of women in childbirth though, but grandparents were not a rarity.

Yes, In HG societies meat is frequently collectively distributed between everyone, far more so than is the case with gathered food.

No, lack of fathers caring for particular children does not mean children were raised by single mothers. We are talking about collective groups.

If we are talking about innate characteristics, then the society that would have created those would be the one that existed in the environment of evolutionary adaptation, because that was when our species evolved. Making decisions now is about responding to the cultural situations that exist now.

I love Jean Auel.

I am about as convinced by Ayla as Evo Psych, though.

Lions don't pair for life. They have harems.

Peacocks are polygamous.

Which is what I was saying.

Human males are bigger than females (not hugely, but they are) because humans are not strictly monogamous. Examples of that abound in our society and are the cause of much grief, mostly for women, because most of us want monogamy to raise our children.

Good point, I shall revise to "In fact it's not quite as simple as all that".

Yes, lueji. And lions and peacocks, unlike humans, look very very different from lionesses and peahens.

So I am not sure that I agree with abs about human males and females being physically very different.

Hence my comment in reply to her.

trills - always a winner.

They are sufficiently different.

Not a lot, but they are. And they want to be. God forbid that a male dresses as a female, but females dress like males all the time.

Yes, men are hunters. For dinner tonight me and a group of men are going to scare a herd of cottage pies into stampeding over a cliff.

Everybody is different. Everybody should be valued. Everybody should be respected. Apart from: Ma

oops. Posted halfway through post!

Actually, 'they' don't always want to be.

And I do not think you've defined 'sufficiently' except with regard to this same circular argument. Now it's 'men and women look a little different, so that shows that men and women must have evolved to be a little different'.

seahouses will you just stop saying such reasonable sensible things on every fecking thread I go on?

It's like I am a shadow.....did yooou everrr knoooow that youuurr my heeeeeeeroooooo!

BusinessT Remember that the Victorians believed that things like politics were too taxing for women's little brains.

Oh yes. i wonder how our decendents will view this type of debate?

Lueji - (1) you have ommitted the survival chances of your errant BIL's offpsring. (2) right oh - so women need protection but fall for bad boys who are useless to them and their offspring?

it is probably because I am on MN too much today. Don't worry, EG, I have to go and get on with some stuff shortly anyway!

We are talking averages and majorities. It's tiring to write most and usually all the time.

And I didn't say or propose 'men and women look a little different, so that shows that men and women must have evolved to be a little different'.

Although, how do you propose that men and women got to look different, that men are on average taller and stronger than women, if not by natural and/or sexual selection?

Nope Lueji, you are trying very hard, I can see that, but your arguments aren't washing.

All of the arguments you claim are biological can be explained through social conditioning. If you can cite references, I might entertain them, but you are still making wild assumptions about human behaviour and still picking and choosing examples from the animal kingdom to "prove" your theories.

Do you have any views on the different physical characteristics of people of various ethnic origins. It is true that they tend to have differences in physical appearance from other ethnic groups (just as some varieties of the same species of animal will have differences in appearance - domestic cats, for example.) It's true that some ethnic groups are more prone to different health conditions. You'll even find data to show that "usually" people from some ethnic groups perform better in academic tests than those from others.

Would you extend your argument then to show that differences between ethnic groups are also "important," aren't particularly socially conditioned but based on biology and that some ethnic groups "naturally" have more aptitude in some skills and practices than others?

Just wondering how far your argument that "differences are important" stretches, that's all.

lueji - what are you saying then?

What conclusions do you draw from the fact men and women look slightly different, that rest on anything except making up a pretty story about what might have happened in prehistory, but can't be proved except by ... reference to the fact that, um, men and women look slightly different?