<sigh> Sorry, flamingo here again - boys vs. girls...?

[FlamingoBingo]

Debate with my brother on my FB page at the moment.

1. can anyone on my FB please come and help me out?

2. can anyone help me form a good coherent argument to this:

"It's a valid point that we've lived under a patriarchy since humans first existed but this is a legacy of our ape ancestry and is completely natural. A chimp colony has 1 alpha male, chosen by the females, and every other male is a second c...lass citizen with no right to mate. Imagine being a man in those circumstances!

Men and women are different, men ( generally) have more developed spatial awareness and are more likely to take risks (thanks to higher testosterone, and wanting to look cool in front of girls) - useful for hunting and building stuff. Women (generally ) have higher emotional intelligence - useful for building relationships and alliances. We're like 2 sides of the same coin, different but necessary."

I've said something about us living in a patriarchal society since organised religion took over, not since we were apes, and asked him for some links to evidence for what he says. Any other thoughts?

Seriously, they all stalk around in CGI'd muscles clad in nothing but loin cloths imitating Sean Connery. It's a hoot.

God you're brother's annoying, isn't he FB?

Emasculating men IMO, means taking away their unearned privilege.

That's what most men mean by emasculation.

"I just fundamentally disagree that pink being a girl's colour and men calling each other girls has any link whatsoever with violence towards women. If I said a woman was very manly I think she'd take that as an insult too.''

Women don't insult other women by calling them 'manly' or 'boys'. Men don't insult women that way either so that is a completely irrelevant point. OTOH, men (and some women) use 'girls' as an insult. If a man is 'girly', he's emotional, physically weak etc - you can just insert any characteristic that men despise here because that's all femininity is basically, all the qualities that aren't 'good enough' for men.

I would ask your brother, if it isn't that women are despised by men, what other possible reason could there be for using the word 'girl' as an insult.

Yes he's annoying...and he does like to wind me up. But also he loves me, and (see my post on the feminism chat thread), he won't dump me as a friend if we disagree. He's providing very good practice!

He was over this afternoon, and he did end up agreeing with a lot of what I was saying, but he disagreed with other stuff. He's willing to keep debating though! He just keeps banging on and on about how men are genetically programmed to hunt and fight and compete etc. I just kept saying 'but even if they are, that doesn't mean they have to hate women - you don't hate women and you like aggressive 'man' things'.

Let's accept his (wrong) premise that men are programmed to hunt and fight and what not - OK, so what? Why does that mean that we have to have pink as a girl's colour, when it was a boy's colour right up untilt he 1920's?

Will look it up, SAF - thank you.