The Home of Steven Barnes
Author, Teacher, Screenwriter


Sunday, March 14, 2010

Writer's Circle

Tananarive found a great site called Ning.com that seems to have fantastic functionality for the creation of blogs, IM'ing and so forth. We've started a community called "The Writer's Circle" that is already pretty active, and you may want to check it out:
www.thewriterscircle.ning.com

Have fun!
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I grasp that more single-parent households are headed by women. That CERTAINLY means the average mother is bonded more closely to her children than is the average father. But the exact same thing is true in the animal kingdom: the female is bonded more closely than the male to those offspring in almost every case. Now, one can take the position that this means that she is "more mature." And I can respect that, even if I disagree with it. But to me, the urge to push limits, explore, or even reproduce with multiple females isn't "immature," it's adhering to a biological reproductive strategy which we are slowly making obsolete. I dislike the fact that males are biologically designated protectors/aggressors...and then get blamed for it as if they asked for that role. This most disturbingly expresses itself in the following conversational thread I've heard dozens of times:
Males control the world, to the detriment of women. The fact that men live a shorter period of time, and die more often of violence (especially in war) is brushed off because "men cause the wars." Oh...so if my father died on the beach at Normandy thinking he was defending his family and country, his spilled guts and agony means nothing because Hitler or Churchill or whoever was a man? That seems horrifically callous. And what if a queen is in control? To my knowledge, every queen in history sent male armies off to die. Does that make her a mass murderer of men? Or a simple pragmatist, understanding that this is what males are better suited for? And if nature did it, does that make males less "mature" or simply bred and conditioned for certain roles in life, many of which are not to their advantage at all? And here's something I consider as massively hypocritical as anything men ever say: If someone says that men create most of the wars, I mention that they also create most of the art and science. Now...THAT's just a coincidence of society, of course, created by men's oppression of women. Uh...so if we're worse at something...it's our fault. And if we're better at something...it's our fault. That's just fabulous. Good luck with that.
That's exactly the kind of logic men used for centuries to pat themselves on the back that women were inferior.
Women who spout that stuff would, if they were men, be the most sexist males around. Men who feel that way? Well, there used to be plenty of women who supported the idea of male superiority. I'd love to sit down a dozen males who think women are superior and a dozen women who think males are superior at a roundtable and listen to the conversation. That would be hysterical.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Now, one can take the position that this means that she is "more mature.""

If one doesn't mind being pretty condescending to individuals who can't or won't have children.

"I dislike the fact that males are biologically designated protectors/aggressors...and then get blamed for it as if they asked for that role."

Blaming the whole group sucks! It's totally unfair to all the guys who know better and aren't aggressors.

Blaming individual aggressors, male or female, instead of going all "he can't help it, it's his role" (or "she can't help it, motherhood is stressful" when a woman broils a much younger person in a hot car), helps discourage onlookers from doing that stuff
themselves.

"And here's something I consider as massively hypocritical as anything men ever say: If someone says that men create most of the wars, I mention that they also create most of the art and science. Now...THAT's just a coincidence of society, of course, created by men's oppression of women. Uh...so if we're worse at something...it's our fault. And if we're better at something...it's our fault."

Sometimes it's hypocritical, sometimes it's just "sure women have had fewer opportunities to do massive good deeds, but our foremothers had fewer opportunities to do massive bad deeds too.

"For example, the opportunity to be a head of government is both the opportunity to do massive deeds both good and bad, so what else can we expect when some demographic groups have more of that opportunity than others?"

Anonymous said...

"To my knowledge, every queen in history sent male armies off to die. Does that make her a mass murderer of men? Or a simple pragmatist, understanding that this is what males are better suited for?"

If she started it, then of course she was a mass murderer of men on her own side as well as troops and civilians (of all genders) on the other side(s)! >:(

If she didn't, then I'm thinking *neither.* How many monarchs get to raise armies from scratch instead of relying on at least some of the troops their predecessors left them? I don't know how often a queen of an invaded country was a simple pragmatist, sending male troops understanding that these were who were already being taught to fight in the society she inherited and understanding that trying to raise a female army might be less realpolitikally feasible ("they can't fight!" "does this mean *I* can't be a knight?!" "don't draft me!" "WTF?!" "what about our navy???" "yay, more chaos = more of a chance for me to seize the throne!!!")

BTW, speaking of troops and gender, including the female fighters of Dahomey the way you did in _Zulu Heart_ was awesome. :) Do you know yet when you can send book #3 to the publisher?