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From: sophie@mnetor.UUCP (Sophie Quigley)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.flame
Subject: Re: Re: now is the time for all good men...
Message-ID: <883@mnetor.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 28-May-85 12:08:41 EDT
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Posted: Tue May 28 12:08:41 1985
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>I was serious.  I really think that the generic term for a person should
>be "man", and that the generic pronouns should be "he", "him" and "his".

In your proposal you reflect the traditional belief that "male" values
are somehow more "mature" than female values.   This is a very
stereotypical belief that men in "traditional" societies have.  If you
had hung around enough women in such societies, you would have found
out that there is a balancing stereotypical belief that most women
adhere to: the belief that women are more mature than men.  This belief
accompanied by the belief that "girls mature faster than boys" is not
entirely stupid either.  Certainly, the traditional sex roles are such
that a lot more maturity is demanded from women than it is from men.
Men's traditional role is to deal with the outside world, bringing home
the bacon and spanking the kids if they misbehave.  Women's traditional
role is to do everything else, taking care of the economics involved in
running a household, raising children, in other words, figuring out a
fair and flexible distribution of all sorts of scarce resources (money,
time, affection, attention, etc...) not easy tasks.

Therefore maturity is in the mouth of the definer.  By equating maturity
with a certain gender, you are ignoring other very valid definitions of
maturity.  You are denying the efforts that women have made to cope, the
common sense philosophies that women have developed in the evolution of
humankind, in other words the history of all our contributions.  What we
need now is not a solution that negates our contributions, but a solution
that integrates it.  

Please let's not start a discussion on whether women or men are more
mature.  This article is not a claim of women's superiority but a
counter-balance to Cheryl's suggestion of equating maturity with
manliness.
-- 
Sophie Quigley
{allegra|decvax|ihnp4|linus|watmath}!utzoo!mnetor!sophie