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From: kenm@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca (...Jose)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Gender?  Do we need it?
Message-ID: <255E038F.11686@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca>
Date: 12 Nov 89 23:58:07 GMT
Sender: nadel@aerospace.aero.org
Reply-To: kenm@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca (...Jose)
Organization: McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario
Lines: 26
Approved: nadel@aerospace.aero.org
Status: R


	There has been much discussion of late concerning the 
necessity of gender-specific words/classes/societal roles.  While
it is all fine and good to say that women and men should have
all the same opportunities, I don't believe society should over-rule
biology.  Unless some spectacular medical advances are made, the fact
remains that only women have babies, only men can cause the fertilization
of the ova.... ie, there is a good reason for being able to tell male
from female, young from old, etc.  Moving towards an equitable society
does not have to imply a *uniform* society.  Perhaps an ideal social
system would be independant of age, sex, race, height and shoe size,
but can you imagine living in a world where we were all members of
a "default" set (whatever that is)?  So long as people are the
mammalian creatures they are, we will have differences in appearance
and behavior becasue of culture, age or sex... we can learn to ignore
those differences when they don't matter, but we can't deny nature
and pretend that we know better.... take a look around the world, and
see how much damage that attitude has done.


					....Jose
-- 
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".sig quotes are dippy"|Kenneth C. Moyle          kenm@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca 
- Kenneth C. Moyle     |Department of Biochemistry     MOYLEK@MCMASTER.BITNET 
                       |McMaster University       ...!uunet!mnetor!maccs!kenm