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From: cs1@oddjob.UUCP (Cheryl Stewart)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.flame
Subject: Now is the time for all good men...
Message-ID: <742@oddjob.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 22-May-85 17:48:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: oddjob.742
Posted: Wed May 22 17:48:52 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 23-May-85 04:40:30 EDT
Reply-To: cs1@oddjob.UUCP (Cheryl Stewart)
Organization: U. Chicago, Astronomy & Astrophysics
Lines: 42
Xref: watmath net.women:5201 net.flame:10041


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". The
psychology of this is phenomenally powerful...it does not demand that anyone
change his concept of "manhood" to one of "personhood", but rather that a female
of our species be considered part of mankind.  It also acknowleges the fact
that it IS a "man's world", and it does not place any importance in radically
changing that man's world into a "persons world".  It rather puts the burden on 
individuals to live up to cerain standards of job performance, self-reliance,
and social dominance necessary to survive in an unchanged man's world.  
     
If everyone were a "man",
it would be no longer possible to speak of "women's work" any more
than people can get away with referring to manual labor as "nigger's work".
It would just be too impolite, and asking for a stylletto heel right between 
the eyes (or a nike in the nuts as the case may be).  

Furthermore, the use 
of the word "man" to refer to a human being of either sex would force men to
consider social, financial, intellectual, technical and scientific accomplish-
ments as something very, very different from simple biological endowments.
If you're the best man for the job, you're the best man for the job--no matter
what your plumbing, parentage or early social environment was like.  The push  
for THIS kind of change in the use of the language would have a different 
connotation from the bleeding-hearded whine "but we're all people, aren't we?"
associated with mutilations like "to each his/her own". Rather, it says,
"Dammit, I'm as good a man as you, and what I do is just as important as what
you do, and if you have a dispute with me, you'd better prove it."  

And dammit, this is a good idea, a new idea, and a lot more worthwhile than
than the drivel about rape and high-heel sneakers I've been reading about 
in this newsgroup lately.  Is the idea just too simple and effective a solution
to gender-connotation discrimination?  What, will it put you professional
feminists out of business?  Let's hear the yeas and nays.  What do you think
of Glenda Jackson as the next Doctor Who?  Jeanne Kirkpatrick for president?
Grace Jones the new 007?  Or are you just waiting for these men to go soft and
make aerobic workout records like Jane Fonda. (He's gone soft, hasn't he?  Used
to be something of a politician. Too bad.)

It just makes too much sense to argue with, doesn't it?

                              Cheryl Stewart, BMOC