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From: mydog!gcf@hombre.masa.COM
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Have Men Ruined the Earth?  (was: Re: Feminism's ill effects on men?)
Message-ID: <9010271727.AA19431@uunet.uu.net>
Date: 29 Oct 90 17:09:07 GMT
References: <20109001:45:10RA04@lehigh.bitnet> <18768@oolong.la.locus.com>
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RA04@Lehigh.UCAR.EDU writes:
>....  But the point I was making is that our culture's "man against,"
>"conquest of," and similar conceptions are unnecessarily competitive
>yet valued, whereas cooperative conceptual models are unnecessarily
>devalued as "weak."  The valued and the devalued are by false analogy
>connected to notions of "strong / masculine" and "weak / feminine"; in
>this context, feminism can encourage world-views in which humans work
>within natural systems without trying to dominate or annihilate them.

judy@altair.la.locus.com (Judy Leedom Tyrer)
>Your statement seems to boil down to "men have ruined the earth because
>they are inherantly competetive and women will save the earth because
>they are inherantly cooperative."  This is a prime example of the
>"everything evil is caused by men" diatribe which I think is so
>detrimental to the feminist movement.  It is sexist, patently false,
>and overly simplistic.

The fact remains that until quite recently, historically speaking, the
values of aggression and domination were associated with men and were
highly valued, and the values of cooperation and care were considered
second-rate, if not despised, and were associated with women.  This
system of values obtained for many centuries, and much of the ruin of
the earth, as well as an enormous amount of human suffering, seems to
derive from it.  So, while it may be simplistic, and seems sexist, it
is not patently false.  As for everything evil being caused by men:
for a long time, it was taken for granted that everything, period, was
caused by men, so that all evil would have to be included as part of
the territory.

Feminists, it seems to me, would have to confront this set of facts in
working out their feminism, because they would have to decide whether
they wanted to get the right to adopt the aggressive role of the
traditional male, work for some other system of values, or achieve
some mixture of the two.

>Cooperative conceptual models are necessary for team sports such as football
>(male) and the conversion of rain forest to cities (bad for the environment).

My experience, as a male, of the conceptual models for most team
sports and for corporate life as well, is that there is a good deal of
competition and domination involved, as well as cooperation.
Cooperation is partially obtained through subjugation and
victimization.  If someone would like to take issue with this, I would
be glad to provide details.

>Not to mention that women are as competitive, uncooperative, and selfish
>as men.

Are they?  They're not _supposed_ to be.  And if they are, how come
they got assigned the "second-rate" attributes alluded to above?
Should they give them up, now that they're not second-rate any more?
--
Gordon Fitch  |  uunet!hombre!mydog!gcf