Jordan Peterson explaining how 'identity' isn't something you can impose on others...its a negotiated position

[mooncuplanding]

Love him or hate him, this is great at articulating the pysc issues around the trans agenda

OMG there's a thread about right-wing self-styled anti-hero crusader Jordan Peterson on MN!

By what mechanism does the patriarchy account for a 5-to-1 male to female ratio of engineers, and the inverse for nurses?

womanformallyknown

wow if Scandinavia can't provide a level playing field then who will?
If only that muppet Cathy Newman had actually bothered to research the facts and have a proper debate with JP about this we might have heard something more interesting about this.
Maybe I'll go see JP in London in May and put that question forward!

The problem JP finds with letting chips fall terfrus is when the sexes choose freely we end up with all male STEM which disadvantages women since we have our needs that need to be considered in techno innovation etc. I joined the labour party thinking corbyn was a commited democratic-Ha-SO wrong. So I am more open to JP's ideas that socialism always leads to the Gulag and the Scandi countries don't reassure me from what I know about them. Free speech seems to be at the heart of things. But like alot of people here I have had my ideas shaken up and am trying to make sense of it all.

LassWiADelicateAir
Watched the video - interesting. yes would be happy to meet both. Where I diverge from JP is his attitude and descriptions of women - he hasn't got a clue about women's experience but does continue to talk about us as though he has a lived experience. That's my problem with all these guys - they don't defer to women and give us a voice about the systemic subjugation many women experience. Or take it into account. They play to a male audience but don't know where to stop. JP uses the virgin/mother/whore stereotypes from the Bible often - really pisses me off and disappointingly shallow

dogendsaredogs
So it could be argued - although there is no real evidence yet - that STEM seems to attract more men than women to its ranks. And if that is the case and it is disadvantageous for women in the long run, can a collaboration between the sexes not be a possibility? I see Patriarchy pitted against Feminism in the same way as other opposing ideologies.

But to be fair on JP, one of his arguments is that ideally you would aim to ride the middle of a snake with 2 extremes, the Right and the Left. Veer too much towards either side and you end up with (to use the best known historical figures) either Hitler or Mao/Stalin.
I believe what we are seeing with this cultish Trans ideology is what I'd call the Alt-Left.

Dissimilitude & dogendsaredogs
By what mechanism does the patriarchy account for a 5-to-1 male to female ratio of engineers, and the inverse for nurses?
& when the sexes choose freely we end up with all male STEM

Back in the 70s and 80s women comprised something like 35% of computing roles and rising. Now it's back down to 20%. So what happened to cause that? They don't know. I believe I do know and it had to do with grad intake and recruitment into big computer companies. Additionally the way to gain IT now is taught by mostly men for men plus the content and delivery in schools and Unis etc doesn't involve enough women. So it doesn't reflect the whole range of roles in IT that lend themselves to those very people and literature skills that women gravitate to and are good at. IT isn't just about technical aptitude but it's represented as such, maybe as a protectionist measure.

When you look at the stats, women are still woefully represented at high levels across all professions. Marketing of the roles, recruitment, retention, flexibility within roles as well as reward are all mostly determined by men and that reflects in the low figures for women at high levels.

Careers advice for girls/ women tends to very biased and also schools still are very tribal. But overall there's not enough research and data about why women make the choices they do and what needs to be in place to help level the playing field - that's my whole point. They make inferences that can't be proved.

For example in Germany they have affordable housing and childcare and part-time professional roles so women can return to work and still carry on caring responsibilities. The English speaking countries have withheld those conditions so women often make career choices thinking about how they can balance their future caring responsibilities with job aspirations and choose careers that traditionally offer more flexibility.

Again research and data is needed

womanformallyknownaswoman

Those arguments don't wholly stack up for me, for a variety of reasons.

One interpretation of the recent much publicised study showing gender equality correlates inversely with STEM participation is that, essentially, life quality pressures in poorer / less equal societies push women to engage more with STEM subjects because the payoff is large. There is at least a plausible argument that declining female computer science participation in the west, for example, coincides with an opening up of opportunities in many other fields, including professions (such as law and medicine) which offer greater returns. For there to be an increase in female uptake of CS, there would have to be a decline in women taking different high-status - it's the same population of people.

"Additionally the way to gain IT now is taught by mostly men for men plus the content and delivery in schools and Unis etc doesn't involve enough women"

Computer science is computer science. There is not a gendered interpretation of it. I find the argument that it needs to be 'feminised' to appeal to women somewhat pernicious. Male domination of a field didn't stop women piling into Law and Medicine in huge numbers when those doors opened, to the point that there are now more female than male doctors in the UK (and far more female medical students).

I agree entirely on your points about the remaining barriers to reaching the pinnacles of said professions.

"They make inferences that can't be proved"

I wouldn't make any claim stronger than this - the idea that differences in occupational choice are entirely down to patriarchy, or societal bias, is bunk.

I think the available evidence leans towards there being some genuine, biologically based gender differences in occupation choice. It certainly won't be the whole effect, however.

Peterson does claim it is about 'interests'

Males and females have different interests....but he is always clear to say that there is more overlap than not, it's just at the extreme ends there are significant differences. So more women are extreme in their interest of caring, more men are more extreme in their interest in STEM.

I have listened to him say this many times, he quotes empirical data. And although I have found it difficult, I think he's right.

The issue for me is how women are penalised for this biology. I agree also with him that equality of outcome is not desirable but there's something about equality of respect and I think I mean that the things that women are interested in are universally disrespected and underpaid

I've recently read Angela Saini's book on this. www.theguardian.com/books/2017/jun/06/inferior-how-science-got-women-wrong-angela-saini-review-and-the-new-research-thats-rewriting-story
She suggests a lot of it is socialisation but there are some differences as well, but a lot of overlap which is why the "I think x so have a girlie brain and am really a girl" is nonsense as there will be a significant number of males thinking that way even if it's not the majority viewpoint and there would be more if societies were less stereotyped.

YippeeKiYayMelonFarmer

"Can this be explained by socialisation- that girls are encouraged to be more people focused etc, or are girls encouraged in this because it's a typical female trait which had, until very recently an evolutionary basis?"

The differences you refer to (and which Baron Cohen studied) are present to some degree in neonates.

Male domination of a field didn't stop women piling into Law and Medicine in huge numbers when those doors opened, to the point that there are now more female than male doctors in the UK (and far more female medical students)

There are more female law students than male. There are far more female partners now than when I started. There are also far more men who do not progress beyond associate or senior associate. When I started it was assumed most men would eventually get to partner level and those who didn't weren't good enough. The "not good enough" attitude didn't apply to women. The "not good enough" attitude has gone - it is accepted not everyone wants the pressure.

There are multiple papers with the same conclusions as baron-cohen

I think it is a dangerous road for feminism to deny biological reality and that is especially what Peterson has challenged me on recently. I had been slipping into the version of feminism that white washes biology...and wants women to fit into men's roles, iykwim. I think it was going there / is doing that exactly because of the disrespect towards women's biology so it's a way of navigating the suffering and getting 'ahead'. But in the long run it's a mistake, because I think it IS a rare women who wants to fight it out in a corporation for the top job, because many / most women are just not that interested in doing that over all their other interests.

So yes, he's stalled me on going down that rabbit hole so willingly and I'm questioning is now more how do we get appropriate and equal value (not outcomes) to women's interests.

He leaves many gaps in his analysis of how women have ended up in this position, entirely dismissing the concept of a patriarchy but then at the same time quoting figures about male prominence in positions of power, so if it's not patriarchy (i.e. Men's power to make the decisions) what is it?

I think you do have to be a bit personality disordered to want a "top job". There have been studies showing a lot of people in top positions have psychopathic personalities. There are more male psychopaths than female ones.
It's difficult as we need people to run the country/ organisations but most of the people who want to do it are the last people who should be allowed to do it.

I can really recommend this article in this weekend's Financial Times by psychologist Cordelia Fine, based on her book, Testosterone Rex. I won't do a link as it's behind a paywall, but [[https://www.ft.com/content/946956e6-f2df-11e6-95ee-f14e55513608]] is a review which doesn't seem to be.

It's a very meaty article, but basically says, among other things, that the differences between women and other women, is far greater than differences between women and men. Which is what Jordan Peterson has also said. But there's a lot more, and worth the proce of the paper.

sorry, I did the link wrongly
this

....and it IS behind a paywall as well. Sorry

I think its almost impossible to investigate socialisation vs biology because of the level of plasticity to social environment of the human brain. I notice the average age of the babes in the Baron Cohen study is 36 hours. I think you can't underestimate the extreme plasticity of human infants. Im not exaggerating to say that 36 hours is already more than enough time for the effects of socialisation to have an effect. Imagine what an older child might learn in 36 hours and now translate that to an infant whose main aim the first few weeks is to bond with those that will offer protection. Its not surprising they will be responsive in what they find reward their care givers. Its not surprising that this might vary from boys to girls. Leaving aside the bias of the investigators - and Baron Cohen is invested in his theory of autism as 'extreme male brain'.
I'm not saying there definitely aren't differences but when you look at how quickly girls catch up with 'boy' things and boys catch up with 'girl things' when given appropriate support it seems to me unlikely the biological differences are terribly significant if years of socialisation can so easily be overcome.

This has become a fascinating discussion that I'd like to come back to.

I'm constantly torn by what scientific papers say on all this on both sides and what I experience in an Sen classroom: predominantly boys. Chat to our OT for half an hour and she repeatedly will talk about how boys cope with fine motor skills compared to girls.

I simply can't work out if it really is all socialisation (which I can argue till the cows come home as yes the brain is sooooo plastic) but at the same time it's difficult to completely dismiss some sort of biology at work. Unless it's that mild motor skill and communication issues are more common due to the Y chromosome, which I've seen can be a factor in a range of other conditions/ illnesses.

Hrumphing

I think the socialisation argument simply doesn't cover off the stats around interests. And especially at the extremes, like Peterson explains in the joe rogan podcast.

Socialisation simply cannot make sense of those Universal and cross cultural differences

I guess what I was trying to say earlier is there is a tendency and maybe even desire to not 'admit' biological elements to our behaviours (stemming from interest) because the interests of (not all) women are often so devalued.

I don't think Peterson devalues the interests of women personally, I think he gets that the world works best when we value all. I think he under estimates the struggle for women to create that value equality.

I don't think socialisation explaines all sex differences. It seems unlikely that the Y chromosome affects pelvis structure, muscle physiology, genital development and so many physical differences between men and women but has no effect whatsoever on brain development.
I still think there's enough overlap that if you're a male who hates maths, cars and guns and loves pink sparkly stuff and make up you're still male. male doesn't have to = macho.

Getting confused about affects and effects