From: jk@panix.com (Jim Kalb)
Subject: Re: sex-role stereotypes (was Re: Challenge to Robert Sheaffer)
Date: Sat, 26 Dec 1992 23:28:33 GMT
Organization: Institute for the Human Sciences

muffy@remarque.berkeley.edu (Muffy Barkocy) writes:

>Here's a counter argument: It's better for the father to be the primary
>caregiver for small children because that gives him the opportunity to
>develop the "bond" with the children that the mother has already
>developed by carrying them around and then nursing the infant.

Easier said than done.  What reason is there to think men bond as
easily to small children as women do?  Has there ever been any society
in which it has been the men who have been the primary caregivers for
small children? 

If there are any behaviorial propensities that I would expect to be
innate in a species with an extended period of immaturity, they are
those that relate to childcare responsibilities.  It would be
astonishing if those propensities were identical in the case of the sex
that becomes pregnant and nurses and the physically larger and stronger
sex that does neither.

>So, you want the fathers to be completely stressed out from being
>required to single-handedly support the whole family (it's pretty hard
>for one person to do this these days), you don't want the father to be
>able to develop the emotional bond with the children, just to take care
>of them out of a sense of duty?  So, he'll probably emotionally neglect
>them, when he's even around, which won't be much, unless he's lucky
>enough to get a pretty amazing salary.

I was arguing for primary responsibility rather than single-handedness.
Most married mothers of small children either stay at home or take part
time or temporary positions that do not take them away form their
children nearly as much as their husband's job.  My recollection is that
such women contribute on average about 20% of the family's cash income.

I would agree that the greater women's average participation in the paid
workforce the harder it is for married couples with children to maintain
what they feel is an acceptable standard of living without the wife
doing some paid work.  The reasons seem clear enough:

(1) People's idea of an acceptable standard of living depends on how
they see other people living.  If most married women work, then
two-income couples will set the standard for what constitutes an
acceptable standard of living.  As a result, women with small children
will be pressured into working more than they would otherwise choose
to, and their husbands will sometimes become stressed out trying to
make up for the economic drain created by their wive's absorption in
childcare.

(2) An increase in the supply of labor means (other things being equal)
a decline in wages.  So the movement of women into the paid labor
market makes it more difficult for a sole breadwinner to support his
family at a particular standard.

>So, a woman should get a lighter sentence if she is violent to a man,
>since it really isn't as bad?

My point was that people should feel (and I think people do in fact
feel) that a man hitting a woman is more shocking than a man hitting
another man.  I have no special views on women's violence toward men.

>Have you got proof about the all-male combat units [being superior]? 
>How about as compared to all-female combat units?  Oh, I forgot...we
>don't *allow* women in combat, so we don't actually *know* if they are
>any good.  So, you're simply assuming that all-male units are better.

There's a summary of relevant material with references in _Feminism and
Freedom_ by Michael Levin.  In general, I would say that if women were
innately as good at organized violence as men are there would be
examples from history or anthropology of female armies.  So far as I
know, the only examples are from mythology.

>So, you're saying that because the stereotype is *already* being
>perpetuated, it *must* be what women want?  That's pretty twisted.

My view is that the existence of a way of life is evidence that it's
what people want.  Also, if something (predominant female
responsibility for childcare and domestic matters, predominant male
responsibility for public affairs) characterizes the way of life of all
known societies, we have very strong evidence that it's what people
innately want.

>>But if you compare what things were like for a child growing
>>up in 1962 and what things are like for a child growing up in 1992, I
>>come out in favor of stereotypes.
>
>Could this *possibly* be because the economic situation has changed,
>rather than because of any stereotypes?  How do you *know* that it is
>the result of people for or against stereotypes?

For some relevant statistics, I would suggest looking at "The Declining
Well-Being of American Adolescents", by Uhlenberg and Eggebeen, in the
Winter, 1986 issue of _The Public Interest_.  From 1960 to 1980, the
number of teenagers living in poverty, in large families or with
poorly-educated parents declined sharply and the quality of education
as measured by inputs (dollars spent, class size, educational
qualifications of teachers) improved sharply.  At the same time drug
and alcohol use, illegitimacy, suicide and homicide deaths among
teenagers shot up.  So the problems seem to be cultural rather than
economic.

To my mind, the obvious cultural changes to pin the blame on are those
that relate to family organization.  Since the organization of a family
is the sum of the roles within the family that the members accept and
are committed to, the cultural changes that have weakened the roles
that people accepted in 1960 (Mom mostly looks after home and kids, Dad
mostly brings home the bacon) seem likely culprits.

>I really wish that we could reverse all the societal stereotypes right
>now, so that you could live as women do for a while...then see how
>*you* like it, and whether you would be such an enthusiastic defender
>of the status quo if you weren't in the better position.  Oh, well...

I wouldn't like being a woman, but then I'm a man.  If I'm right that
the sexes differ in their average innate inclinations, my personal
preferences in the matter mean nothing.  Do you dispute that there are
some women who would be happier being born in 1937 and living in 1962
than being born in 1967 and living in 1992?

No doubt we would all benefit in discussing social issues by living
dozens of different lives in different sorts of societies.  We can't do
that, though, so the best we can do is try to understand what people are
like and do our best to build the sort of world in which they can live
the best lives they are capable of.  So far as I can tell, a unisex
world would not be that sort of world for many people.
-- 
Jim Kalb (jk@panix.com)
"Rem tene; verba sequentur."  (Cato)
Newsgroups: alt.feminism