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Posted: 7/14/2009 5:56:13 PM | Do you find it hard to understand women?
Would you be able to envision life as a woman?
I read something quite fascinating:
"According to at least some anthropologists, women have had to get awfully good at understanding what it would be like to be a man. Men, on the other hand, are rarely forced to think about life in a woman's Manolos.
Anthropologist David Graeber makes this precise point in an essay about women and imaginative identification. He argues, for instance, that women imagine life as a man every day of their lives. As he explains it:
A constant staple of 1950s situation comedies, in America, were jokes about the impossibility of understanding women. The jokes of course were always told by men. Women's logic was always being treated as alien and incomprehensible. One never had the impression, on the other hand, that women had much trouble understanding the men. That's because the women had no choice but to understand men.
Graeber continues:
Faced with the prospect of even trying to imagine a women's perspective, many recoil in horror. In the US, one popular trick among High School creative writing teachers is to assign students to write an essay imagining that they were to switch genders, and describe what it would be like to live for one day as a member of the opposite sex. The results are almost always exactly the same: all the girls in class write long and detailed essays demonstrating that they have spent a great deal of time thinking about such questions; roughly half the boys refuse to write the essay entirely. Almost invariably they express profound resentment about having to imagine what it might be like to be a woman. "
If you can imagine being a woman or what it is like to be a woman (truthfully), do you see this as a strength or a weakness? Why? | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:09:29 PM | Men aren't driven to expose, refine, define or embellish their feminine side. Their friend's don't want to see it, women are known to be repulsed by it....unless you're James Blunt.
In small doses, it can be cute. Truthfully though, even for the guy, it's potentially exhausting and not very rewarding.
Women on the other hand DO embellish a masculine side and envy powerful women and men.
Ironically, for men, a powerful woman can be a turn-off. Not so much intimidating, but men don't feel comfortable being submissive all the time.
YMMV. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:11:06 PM | Follow up, is it impossible for two equally powerful people to be together? Based on what you said.
Explain why a powerful woman is a turnoff? | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:11:47 PM | To the above poster, speak for yourself, I do not have a feminine side.
holy crap, what's next, let's see if men can wear pantyhose?
This is why I'm glad my kids are in school abroad.
What's a powerful woman? I trained hundreds of women in the Military who could eat
this modern day independent woman for lunch, and yet all of them cried like babies.
Don't believe the hype. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:14:23 PM | | What is scary about having a feminine side (assuming such a thing exists)? You said "holy crap"... like the notion startled you. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:15:11 PM |
Faced with the prospect of even trying to imagine a women's perspective, many recoil in horror.
I think that's overstating things quite a bit. Granted this question doesn't come up all that much but I have a hard believing a majority of guy recoil in horror at the thought of imagining the woman's pov.
In the US, one popular trick among High School creative writing teachers is to assign students to write an essay imagining that they were to switch genders, and describe what it would be like to live for one day as a member of the opposite sex. The results are almost always exactly the same: all the girls in class write long and detailed essays demonstrating that they have spent a great deal of time thinking about such questions; roughly half the boys refuse to write the essay entirely. Almost invariably they express profound resentment about having to imagine what it might be like to be a woman
This sounds like an anecdote that has been passed down from generation to generation. Not true, but makes a good story.
I don't think women are all that hard to understand. Granted I've changed jobs over the years yet have always been in careers that have a higher percentage of women so maybe I'm not the norm. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:15:37 PM | | I would say if you ask most men what their life would be like as a woman, they would tell you they would be a whore. LOL | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:25:46 PM | "Gent" provided the example; Guys don't like to admit/say they have a feminine side. Everyone has both sides. Everyone.
What's a turn off about a "powerful woman?" First off, there's a difference between someone who's "bossy/****y" and someone who is over-confident, successful and... maybe easy going.
A woman with all the right ideas, who's got all the answers right or wrong-- Most girls and guys would rather have the yin/yang. A positive balance of power, sub/dom and control/uncontrol. This is what makes the world go round.
Can two "same type" people be a couple? Sure. In this world, anything is possible. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:26:04 PM | I have no idea why any man or woman would define themselves as being "powerful"
Compared to what or whom makes them think they are powerful?
When any person, male or female can overcome their mortality, then
I'll see them as being powerful. Drive by a graveyard one day, so that you can see the reality that we are all on common ground. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:29:26 PM | Funerals. Wakes.
However, many people DO face death in comfort.... after the other stages...
It's called the Kübler-Ross model. Most everyone does the same thing. Almost doesn't "count".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C3%BCbler-Ross_model | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:29:28 PM | ^This.
I'd like to know what requirements makes someone powerful also, whether they are man or woman. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 6:55:06 PM | | I am afraid to show my feminine side because there is a very thin line between being "sensitive" and being a wuss. Full masculinity results in being considered chauvinistic. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 7:23:29 PM | While its true we are instict driven, humans can dictate their actions through logic more so than other animals so the masculine and feminine areas become much more mixed. How do we define whats masculine and feminine this day in age other than sexual preference?
Aggressiveness? Independence? Courage? Kindness? Ambition? Dominance? Pity?
While you could assign certian traits to a label and call it a masculine or feminine trait, that same trait could also be seen in many females or males. Especially within modern society.
Men tend to mainly show whats considered masculine traits especially early on because women are more attracted to it, after a while he may open up to what could be considered more feminine traits if hes comfortable with his own masculinity. Although you could argue that its not really a feminine side, just as females could have whats considered masculine, so is it really male/female sides of each other?
I dont find women difficult to understand more than I would any random male to understand.
As far as your question is concerned I think it would be a strength for any person to have a better understanding of male and female perspectives. Knowledge is power no matter what it may be. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 7:45:23 PM | | I've known women who are reasonable and women who are not. The difference is in how they think, of course. Meanwhile, I have only very rarely known a man who does not think reasonably. To simplify things for the sake of brevity, there is thinking in order to make sense in a rational way, and then there is thinking to feel right. In my experience with women who think to feel right at the expense of making sense rationally, I can understand them well only by focusing on the emotional aspect of their ideas. So I expect that when a man is talking with a woman and expecting her to be making sense as he would, but instead she is operating in a mode made for emotional satisfaction, he will be at a loss and she will seem incomprehensible. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 8:14:49 PM | What many men fail to realize when they characterize a woman's position is that it is somehow fueled by emotion and his is not. Men are just as fueled by emotion as women. Their philosophies and actions and everything else... just different emotions and the end result being... they will consider what benefits them to be 'rational' and what does not benefit them they will attempt to characterize as 'irrational'. Vice versa. Women will see men as thinking irrationally, 'ie. "with their penis"' when it is convenient for them.
No one has a monopoly on logic.
Also there is more than one formula for logical framework... utilitarian... socratic/syllogistic...classically liberal..etc. | |
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Posted: 7/14/2009 9:41:21 PM | Now a days, being a woman has become much more acceptable is society in the sense that women have fought and fought for the same rights and privileges that men have, i.e. employment.
Women still have an upscale battle since there are still some “old fashion” men out there who forever will still see women as the lesser of the sexes.
Take Blacks for instance. They have been looked down upon for eons and they are still scaling that mountain. At the same time, the US now has a Black president! What does that tell you about people’s perceptions?
All I know is that I am always proud to see all that women have accomplished today and I am sure that if I was a woman… I’d be buying stocks in Energizer cause I would be buying tons of toys that need them! Boy you women are lucky for that… and you all have boo… never mind | |
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Posted: 7/15/2009 4:26:01 AM |
According to at least some anthropologists, women have had to get awfully good at understanding what it would be like to be a man. This is probably because over the past 4 decades women have had to work for a living, and so they better understand what men are up against. Men, on the other hand, are rarely forced to think about life in a woman's Manolos. Men still can't get knocked up. They may understand intellectually what a burden and danger that is, but they can't experience it. So no empathy there. | |
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Posted: 7/15/2009 5:06:02 AM | | Ive always found its easier to understand the life of women than it is to understand the life of a man. (not some deep seated gender crisis) More simply i always tend to look at situations better when considering it from a womans point of view, this is especially apparent in arguements where the male side of things seem very alien and backwards to me and people tell of "womans logic" and "mans logic" yet they never seem to counter in the midpoint between the two, sadly it all comes down to stereotypes where guys think a woman thinks this and women think guys think that. So even if we could understand and think like a woman, would it be correct? Or is it we all just think the other gender thinks like tv tells us too. | |
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Posted: 7/15/2009 5:24:27 AM |
"According to at least some anthropologists, women have had to get awfully good at understanding what it would be like to be a man. Men, on the other hand, are rarely forced to think about life in a woman's Manolos.
Those anthropologists are wrong. Most women do not understand men. They simply state what men think (or rather, what women think men think) and no amount of men telling them that they're wrong will convince them otherwise.
The results are almost always exactly the same: all the girls in class write long and detailed essays demonstrating that they have spent a great deal of time thinking about such questions; roughly half the boys refuse to write the essay entirely. Almost invariably they express profound resentment about having to imagine what it might be like to be a woman. "
Or else, these boys realize what an exercise in futility such endeavor is, and most men don't like to lose their time. By the way, it would have been interesting to know how close were those "long and detailed essays" to the truth. | |
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Posted: 7/15/2009 5:33:02 AM | | Above is correct, women class themselves as knowing what a guy wants but instead fall into the catagory of knowing what a stereotype guy thinks. If a guy says "i know how a woman thinks" youd all jump on your high horses and give the "every womans different" lecture. whereas if a woman says it.. its laughed off even if we protest. Its not so much guys dont know how to think like a woman, its that most of us dont bother because even if we did it would be seen as incorrect. | |
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Posted: 7/15/2009 9:20:17 AM | I am a woman and don't understand women. I don't understand men. In fact, I don't understand humans. I do, however, understand cats. | |
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