Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site hoptoad.uucp
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!qantel!dual!proper!hoptoad!laura
From: laura@hoptoad.uucp (Laura Creighton)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.singles
Subject: Re: career vs. relationships
Message-ID: <551@hoptoad.uucp>
Date: Mon, 24-Feb-86 21:42:41 EST
Article-I.D.: hoptoad.551
Posted: Mon Feb 24 21:42:41 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 2-Mar-86 02:35:25 EST
References: <11785@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> <660@rti-sel.UUCP> <1677@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP> <680@rti-sel.UUCP>
Reply-To: laura@hoptoad.UUCP (Laura Creighton)
Organization: Nebula Consultants in San Francisco
Lines: 24
Xref: watmath net.women:9451 net.singles:10586

In article <680@rti-sel.UUCP> wfi@rti-sel.UUCP (William Ingogly) writes:
>What are sexism and racism, anyway? It seems to me they involve the
>assumption that a person has a certain set of capabilities based on
>h/er membership in a group. 

We were discusisng this in net.politics.theory a while ago.  I still think
that sexism and racism involve the assumption that a person is *inferior*
based on he/r membership in a group.   Not everybody who reads politics
theory agrees with me.

Men have penises thus is not sexist.  Blacks have black hair is not racist.
(They have the same flaws as all generalisations --  castrated men are
still men,  and Blacks who bleach ther hair are still Blacks.)  I don't
think ``most mathematicians are men'' is sexist either -- it is reality.
``Most mathematicians are men because almost no women can think logically''
*is* sexist.

I get very worried about political movements which can't tell the difference
between a statement of fact and a slur.  Are their perceptions so warped
by their ideology that they cannot perceive what is?
-- 
Laura Creighton		
ihnp4!hoptoad!laura 
laura@lll-crg.arpa