Horizon - is your brain male or female NOW (9pm bbc2)

[SevenZarkSeven]

DH just pointed it out for me

So going to watch - hope I don't need to feel the RAGE too much

Anyone with me?

He is also proving his own point! Not unbiased.

Sorry Toast. Think that's what you said.

Yeah, he's used to this torture

But is it important from a feminist perspective that men can cope more with pain?

oh, of course, medicine set up from male perspective ...

men can cope more with pain

Can they though? She experienced more pain, but they still kept their hand in for an equal length of time. So surely the result is that she can cope with more pain.

Did they say that overall women couldn't keep their hand in water as long? I thought they just rated their pain as higher.

Just said to DH now

and am a bit behind you all

I feel far less uncomfortable with the idea that there may be physciological differences between men and women - sense of smell, eyesight, pain and so on, than the brain stuff.

For obvious reasons I guess.

You;re right - she reported more pain compared to him

Not sure what that actually proves. That men really don't feel the same level of pain, or whether they're culturally programmed not to admit it?

thatstoast I thought the self-scoring thing was silly

so all it might be proving is that men like to look hard.

didn't really understand how that proved anything. Can't they put brain thingys on and see if the pain areas are being activated more etc

also commented to DH that IME women tend to fill in surveys and things in a straigthforward fashion while men are more likely to fuck it up for a laugh, put something for the sake of it, think why should I tell them this etc etc etc

It's not just social conditioning but physical too. An Eskimo, male or female, can tolerate cold weather better than someone from the middle east.
The body reacts and evolves to conditions it's subjected to.
The mind obviously does too. I wonder if women who worked in the munitions factories during the war would have developed better manual dexterity than,say,a nurse?
That would have been a better experiment to conduct regarding brain behaviour.

xposts

Yup Seven, at the end it moved away from brain differences to physiological. That isn't such a biggie for me, unless I'm missing something.

Except of course, for painkillers and other medicines being designed for men rather than women.

Really, I have no problem with the idea that there might be innate differences between men and women. I have a massive problem with this information being used to 'prove' that women can't drive well, they can't be a CEO or a doctor, that men can't rear children etc.

Anyway, this was fun. I have to go do my chores now hollow laugh

oh well, you'll enjoy your chores thatstoast, what with women being so good at them

oh, have assumed you're a woman Time for me to get to bed

I couldn't help but notice that they kept saying things like "despite a lot of opposition to this research..." and "this study was heavily criticised but..."

Said that to DH as well thatstoast

poor bastard he gets this all every night

YY if there are differences then OK in a world which wasn't violently sexist, where the results wouldn't be used as justification for keeping women fucked over.

Course it screws men who want to do "feminine" things as well obv.

Whole set-up is a crock of shit and this sort of stuff being used to justify it makes me so mad.

Other thing is you can see it from the very start. If it were "different but equal" then it wouldn't be men (generally and as set up in this prog) saying yes well that's fine to me and women (generally and as set up in this prog) saying NO it's not innate it's learnt because the underlying thing that never gets verbalised is that that the "differences" in our society = women are inferior. But no-one ever says that, of course. It's just there though right there everywhere this huge subtext.

I'm from the far north (genetically and socially), DH is from Brazil. Guess who can cope with cold better? We were once locked out of our car on Redcar beach in January. I had to keep him warm. On the other hand DH described having root canal work as a pleasant experience. Weirdo.

Wasn't impressed with that pain test at all, different people feel pain in different ways, just look at the discussions about labour and how much it hurts. Also, did you notice that despite all the talk about how we experience pain differently they couldn't actually point to any drug that is more effective in one sex than the other.

You would think Horizon would be above this uncritical upholding of status quo/

bloody hell

bbc link about the prog

A line near the end says "The programme contains lots of fascinating studies which can be used to support either camp" BUT ALL of the examples in the piece are for male/female innate difference.

Looking at that I think Prof Roberts did well to get any "nature" arguments in at all angry

oooh

not angry

or maybe both

Prof Roberts "nurture" arguments that should be

fukit

going to bed

Is my brain male or female? No. Perhaps I'm a freak and should immediately begin partial gender reassignment Which parts to reassign?

Is it worth iPlayering or will it be bad for my blood pressure?

Gina Rippon's usually good though.

I noticed this was on last night and avoided it like the plague. Very glad I did now. Gah.

Ebearhug I wouldn't bother tbh. There wasn't anything conclusive in it and the testing methods looked a bit flawed.

I looked here to read what people said after writing my own blog on it. Particularly as I do have B-G twins and I was a child in 1970s.
mrstaraplumbing.com/2014/09/30/is-there-such-a-thing-as-a-male-or-female-brain/
The thing that stood out to me was that the Extreme Male Brain research might be interesting for the 1% of people with autism but I counldn't see how it was at all relevant to the other 99%.

It was presented as evidence for biological differences but seemed irrelevant and the very fact that the theory was give the title of the Extreme Male Brain" simply reflects and strengthens the sexist assumptions about male and female abilities.

or did I miss something.

I never understood the 'equal-but-different' argument. If we're equal but different, how come we aren't being paid £60,000 a year for childcare and charging consultancy fees for household admin?