Is gender 100% bullshit? Or not

[speakingwoman]

Big question!

So, biology is a stable reality (I have been reading the well-written Hands Across the Aisle site)

Some bits of biology are visible and tangible e.g. our wider hips.

That changes some behaviours (our gait is different to men’s gaits).

And our hormone mix is different.

Where does biology stop and gender start?

Presumably the people who hunt boar have to teach children how to hunt, which is itself a nurturing behaviour.

Presumably the people who hunt boar have to teach children how to hunt, which is itself a nurturing behaviour.

Yes, there must be a lot of that. Also: '"Be sure to aim for the jugular, this is how you do it."

I lurk in some weird places online, and MRAs/incels etc are quick to throw out the accusation that mothers are just as likely to be violent as fathers

I've seen that too. They go on about infanticide alot and how woman are more violent then men because they are violent to kids. I've also heard them say men are only violent because they are smacked by their mothers whereas daughters don't get smacked.

But in which case is male violence sex or gender? Does society condition men to be violent towards women, or is it innate. Do men choose to be violent, or do they choose to not be violent? Is there a default?
Assuming we agree that being violent is a negative trait, this reads to me like men are violent and women are not. Which isn't true. Men's violence is more destructive because of their physical strength, ability to impregnate, and the structures of power they have created to exclude women and deny them justice after the fact. They also are violent more often. So it seems to me that men are just better at violence, and because it is easier for them to be violent (excused, hidden, females are smaller, etc) it makes it more likely still that they will continue to be violent. It's the structures of law and justice that free us and allow us to exist as equals. So the places with a breakdown of law and order women suffer the most.

There's seriously no doubt that older men can nurture younger males. History is full of it. They tend to train them to be heroes, though.
Youngest person to swim the Channel

@Radardetector
It's not a good idea to extrapolate animal behaviour to humans. Yes, lions and chimp males are territorial and fight each other, but the ladies are no slouch on this front. (Have you seen a lioness in full hunt mode. That's not gentle nurturing beast!) Yes stags clash antlers, but this isn't the Same as inventing guns.
Penguins make great dads, male bower birds love a bit of arts and crafts and dancing.
Biologically closer species, like apes and rats frequently live in matriarchal societies and the females can be just as 'violent' as the males.

Most giraffes prefer gay sex, some chimp species have sex with deer, really the animal kingdom is not equivalent to humans.

If we viewed violence as the result of societal factors and not innate to biological sex we'd be in a better position to improve behaviour.

Radar but there is a discussion to be had about why we pretend women are never violent. To me it's sexist in itself. The idea of the pure and loving woman who never hurts anyone is demeaning; that person lacks agency. Genghis Khan had agency! We choose to follow the law, we choose to be considerate or to avoid violence; it's a conscious decision not just a default. We treat female murderers like circus freaks, whereas in fact it's rare but normal. Japan is closing police stations due to a lack of crime but Japanese people still murder, just less often. We wouldn't consider them unable to commit murder, we recognise that as a nation they choose not to kill each other at the rate Hondurans do.

Also the whole apprenticeship system - being taught as a child how to be an artist, a stonemason etc.

If we viewed violence as the result of societal factors and not innate to biological sex we'd be in a better position to improve behaviour.

You can "view" it as a social construct but if it is innate (not saying I know it is just that it could be) you won't get anywhere.

We didn't build social norms on nothing. Women and men will have had different behaviours and so taken on different roles in the early stages of humanity. Society has then evolved around those innate behaviors. Over time somthing like women nurturing their own young, morphed into all women are nurturing and so should only take on caring roles in society.

Obviously women being nurturing is a false stereotype. But society imposed that role on us because we have an innate instinct to care for our own young.

Although surely anyone, male or female, who has no nurturing response to a newborn baby has a serious psychological impairment.
I meant to comment on this. I disagree completely. I think anyone who doesn't recognise the incredible fragility and vulnerability of a newborn baby has an impairment but many people are afraid of this and so nurturing is the furthest thing from from their mind. They want to put the baby somewhere safe and leave it there (someone else's arms!) I've seen it in women as well as men, and invariably the conversation that follows describes their discomfort and embarrassment at not having the nurturing switch click on. Men and women from large families seem to have had more practice with babies so it comes more easily but that desire to nurture someone else's child, even family, quite often isn't there in nice, normal people. Sorry.

@Turph

When did I say women arn't violent. Saying men are more violent and aggressive is not the same as saying women arn't.

Of course they are but in much lower numbers. Possibly because women are more empathetic, less driven to dominate and less sexually motivated. Women are also weaker and so more aware of potentially coming off worse in a physical altercation - hense why female murderers often choose poisoning. But yes women can be and are violent, but on a much smaller scale then men.

Turph, why sorry? It's obviously true, and sad that anyone feels embarrassed by the lack of the alleged instinct, which AFAICT is largely down to oxytocin and then habituation. Or else very strong social schooling into overcoming a natural revulsion.

That depends on what we mean by nurturing. I don’t mean that people have a desire to remove a child from a present mother and take over the care.

But the basics of nurturing, a desire to care for and protect the young and vulnerable, is shown in almost all humans who are old enough to understand they are separate to others.

Radardetector By it's very definition if a particular sex role is socially constructed (and therefore reinforced) you will see it repeated widely across that sex. You seem to be using the widespread presence of sex based norms / stereotypical behaviours as evidence that they're socially constructed. A similar example would be if I pointed out that people under the age of 30 must be naturally much more adept with their thumbs and that this is a skill people lose after the age of 30. It must be a natural aptitude since it is so widespread. Ignoring the impact of smart phones altogether.
Brilliant

Even the tag 'feminine' is starting to bug me.
Because if there's two women, you and me. You like cooking, I hate it.
Why do you get the tag feminine and I do not? Who decided to link your preferences with our sex - rubberstamp approved - and detach mine from our sex?
Why isn't hating cooking feminine and loving it not?

Because all gender is, is an invented means to rubberstamp expectations of our sex.
Some of our sex will happily naturally possess those traits and meet expectations, some will not, and of those who do not, some will learn to conform, some will eventually accept or like it, and some will not.

Gender is just a uniform mould we are expected to fit, like Cinderella's slipper. A few will fit it naturally, some will amputate toes and some aren't interested in wearing glass on their feet at all.

All behaviours are socialised.

You can ask, why do women behave like this, why do men behave like that.

It's not a mystery. Just look at what is socially expected and accepted in society and you can see why people behave the way they do.

If female nurturing skills were not based in any biology, I believe we would not be here right now, we would have become extinct a long time ago

I wonder why we don’t want to value this immensely valuable female behaviour

I'm sorry but this is a load of crap. If males had wanted to, they could have annihilated females eons ago. They didn't because they wanted to protect the human race. They wanted to nurture their offspring.

@Radardetector
Let's take all the boys in our culture, and tell them all, every day, to suppress emotion, suppress their nuturing instincts, in favour of other attributes.
For some, this is going to be ok. But for others it's going to be really damaging. Some will just turn into dickheads (your a-hole boss) a small number will go entirely nuts (incels etc).

If we then say toxic masculinity is innately male, biological and unchangeable, we don't question the cultural suppression of boys human instincts.

Sure, there is a data correlation between being male and being violent. But you cannot prove causality...

I suspect all humans can be violent given the right provocation . But to me a key part of being human is using our brains to overcome limitations of our biology, which I think comes with our complex language and our focus on art and music.

, women learn alternative behaviours because otherwise they will lose more often in a violent encounter. . Males may learn that it's manly to be strong and tough.

Argh. Bus

Just imagine living in a time when women were built like rowers! that's a society where men think twice before committing sexual assault.

There is no evidence of that. Men are stronger even than strong women. If women could protect themselves from rape by being stronger we would have a lot more emphasis as a culture on women bulking up.

Morning all!

I very much enjoyed the “War of the Sexes” podcast on Infinite Monkey Cage.. Two very good guests. Thanks for the recommendation.

Armed with this thread, I was able to pick a hole in Steve Jones’ argument. He said men’s higher murder rates tell us that there must be a difference twixt men and women. But we don’t need that hypothesis. It could just be that they are bigger, and the most important thing in the socialisation could just be that boys are told they will grow up “big and strong”. Violence is the use of power on the weaker.

Enjoying Turphs posts this morning.

Honestly we should be recognised as a university..... :)

The point is, biological sex changes with age, external factors such as diet and environment and so on.

You are getting confused. Biological sex is about primary and secondary sex characteristics. Your genitals, your chromosomes. There are 2 sexes. Biology doesn't change. Even if, let's say a man is in an accident and loses his penis, his sex hasn't changed.

Absolutely your hormones might and your personality might over the years but again that isn't your sex actually changing.

“ women learn alternative behaviours because otherwise they will lose more often in a violent encounter. . Males may learn that it's manly to be strong and tough. “
Yes

“Argh. Bus”
Yes.

all behaviours are socialised

Truly, that is so incredibly naive. It’s a nice clean thought but so incredibly incorrect it’s scary that you go around thinking that.

You are a proponent of the blank slate theory.

Massively proven to be wrong over and over