Happy to be women today in the UK

[mrsmuddlepies]

I posted about this on the Chat forum but no one responded and I think it is a significant piece of research.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-37600771
The level of satisfaction with being a woman in the UK today is higher than it has ever been, a huge increase on that of 50 years ago and much higher than that of male satisfaction with being men today.
A cause for celebration?

Bouncy castles are expensive to hire. Damn right I'd be chivvying kids onto it if I'd been nagged into hiring one!

In the UK men kill themselves at a rate of 3 times that of women, but the rate for men is going down at the same time as the rate for women is increasing. Worldwide, the figure is much more equal, with 1.5 men to women.

Suggesting that women merely make "cries for help" is rot. Women merely tend, even in their darkest hour, to not want to make a fuss and use methods that mean that even in death they don't make a mess. The other problem is that the single biggest indicator that someone will take their own life is that they have tried previously, which might account for the fact that middle age is the modal time for suicide in both sexes in the UK, again, when looked at worldwide, 75+ is the modal age range.

So, in summary. In the UK, more men kill themselves than women, but the rate for men is falling, while the rate for women is rising and this merely means that the UK is moving toward a more Global norm for suicide rates.

Well quite Yonic, also, it was hardly making the boys sit down and learn how to do calligraphy, was it?

Ok, accepted that it was perhaps inappropriate at the party, but is there a situationin which boys running around toy fighting would be acceptable to you to the extent that you might ask them to include the girls in their game ?

Buffy, men are not typically shamed for being anti social and wary if other men, no. Your response was dripping with sarcasm but supposing that all violence could be ended if we just sat them down and explained to them that hitting is wrong is plain daft. Do we not already do that ? So what do we need to do differently ?

Yes grow I would absolutely expect all children (boys and girls) to be allowed to play rough and tumble games in appropriate spaces I get very cross about excluding children on basis of them being a boy/girl. Totally unacceptable and very old fashioned.
xenophile great post [beer]

Damn no beer

Bouncy castles are pretty rough and tumble, like what Xeno said.

is there a situationin which boys running around toy fighting would be acceptable to you to the extent that you might ask them to include the girls in their game ?

Yup, I might even be tempted to join in, I love a bit of cardboard tube sword fighting, me, it's almost law in this house for it to happen. I'd also encourage girls who wanted to to play on the provided bouncy castle. I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here, sorry.

The point was distracted by my anecdote about bouncy castles and sword fights, it was on the previous page but I guess wasn't that interesting so I won't bother to type it out again. Let's all accept that I was wrong and there are no games that boys like to traditionally play more than girls that, are discouraged under the banner of masculinity and we can all enjoy a beer.

Buffy, yes it did make a mess but thankfully it wasn't toxic so at least that's something.

Stray comma...

Its the main reason for buying rolls of wrapping paper tbh. Given that girls and grown women do like fencing with cardboard tubes, maybe its just that gendered socialisation thing coming to the fore in a group situation?

I made both my kids HUGE swords (2 handed, as long as the smallest one was tall) from a BBQ box.. we had loads of fun with them - and it was also great exercise - the little one went from barely being able to pick it up to having an awesome two-handed overhead attack (pure barbarian that one).

They also spent a fair bit of time just holding them in poses and demanding I took pictures. So even toys made for aggression were also used for non-fighting purposes.

We can all do children's anecdotes - of all the kids I know of a similar age, you would not be able to tell the sex by their hobbies and interests, they're all a total mix. Of course we can prevent kids from fighting (seriously.. no-one can stop them bickering). My kids certainly argue, but there are not the all out punchups I hear about from my dad and his brother - because I don't allow it.

"Let's all accept that I was wrong and there are no games that boys like to traditionally play more than girls that, are discouraged under the banner of masculinity and we can all enjoy a beer."

Well, that was snide.

To clarify the anecdote before it's made out that I'm suggesting girls would never engage in sword fighting, they were beating each other over the heads with the cardboard tubes, it wasn't just a kind of fencing style thing, it was physical. They were chasing each other and whacking each other about the body with the tubes and the plastic swords, but were having a laugh. There was some "game" element to it in that it was not totally random who got the beating but i don't know what was. They all seemed to be having fun despite the game involving hitting. The old primary school had a sign saying toy fighting was banned, IME boys like toy fighting, that is all. I haven't seen girls engaged in the same sort of mass game, perhaps other posters have, like I say i accept it is anecdotal.

Yonic

Yes i suppose it was, but I felt it was immediately preceded by a snide post. A post apparently you see no fault with, I wonder why that is...

Well, maybe no one else has a problem because my post wasn't in any way snide but was, in fact, factual.

Unless you're suggesting I'm lying about the fun my boys and I have had with cardboard tube swords?

Or that I'm not clear about your point?

You said Buffy's post was dripping with sarcasm, pear, hardly pleasant and I disagree with you that was the case.

I'll agree she then responded sarcastically. Then you snided.

Xenophile

This is going nowhere...but OK....your comment about "it was hardly making the boys sit down and learn how to do calligraphy" was intended to trivialise the point that boys are prohibited from engaging in activities that they find fun as part of some misguided attempt to end all violence or something by banning behaviours deemed "masculine".

Yonic

We mustn't discourage boys from violence, because there's absolutely no evidence that what they are taught in childhood will influence their behaviour as adults. So why be spoil sports; let them bash each other with stuff. Got it.

This read like sarcasm to me, in fact one might say it was dripping

No grow, it was in answer to Yonic's comment. You know, a joke. With them. It was pretty clear it was aimed at them, what with me naming them in it. It's a bit grim that you have taken a flippant comment to Yonic so deliberately out of context. You're completely correct, this is going nowhere, but that's not down to me.

But society already does encourage children to behave in ways that it deems acceptable, that is the point. Infact it has gone way beyond that and created laws and things that forbid violence and punish deviation with enforced incarceration. None of this has, apparently, ended violence. What further education is needed to stop men being violent ? What evidence do we have that education itself prevents boys growing into violent men ?

It is generally inappropriate to play fight at a party or in school.

Why is that even remotely controversial?

If it were a laser quest party for 8 year olds, and some kids decided to sit down in the middle of it because they'd rather be colouring in, that would likewise be inappropriate.

Most opportunities kids have for rough and tumble is in unsupervised, unstructured open environments.

If people are bringing kids up to think I'll roll up to a party and do whatever I like regardless of the effort that was put in to organising it and the preferences of other people, that's selfishness. The cardboard tubes have nothing to do with it.