dre@megatest.UUCP (09/10/83)
An open letter to Judy McMullan and those of her ilk:
re:
You are still having trouble making one sentence connect with the next.
If you re-read, you may notice that I did not agree that you needed no more
enemies, so I could not have been "right" about that. I thought you were
looking for more.
And if you think that your postings have not revealed your opinions on
women's issues (and a few other things as well) you do not know much
about psychology.
Perhaps you are still crying over your divorce and have decided that ALL
women are your enemy. I don't know. I wish you would go away but obviously
I can't do anything about it except start filtering your postings out with
the "newsec" program. Seems like the best idea....
--Judy McMullan
...!watmath!jamcmullan
I am not one to get angry over anything as trivial as this little tiff we
have been having here in public, but I do feel compelled to address your
eristic statements and possibly enlighten you as to the true nature of a
small group of so-called "feminists" who are really nothing of the kind.
First let's examine your statements above. You complain about logical
inconsistencies in my reply to your note. It is unfortunate that I can't
attach a neon sign which says "satire" to a news article for people like
you. Of *course* there are logical inconsistencies! It was a JOKE, Judy!
Whether you thought it was a good piece of satire or not is a matter of
taste. I did place a caveat marking the piece as "humor" at the beginning
but you apparently missed that. I'm not so egocentric as to think that
everyone will laugh at my jokes. I did receive a few pieces of mail asking
me to get out of net.women.only, which is why I am posting this to net.women.
Apparently net.women.only is only for a group of man-hating women who are
members of the above mentioned small group, but I'll get to that later.
As for my knowledge of psychology, it so happens that I know quite a bit
about the subject because I have been involved in AI research in the past
and I believe that it is necessary to understand the human mind if we are
to create truly intelligent machines. This is a rather simplistic statement
but I don't want to change the subject to AI at this point, so let's go on.
It is unfortunate that you chose to cloud the issues by bringing up the
fact that I am divorced but because it is true I will say right now that
the breakup of my marriage had absolutely nothing to do with feminism or
misogyny on my part. I do not hate women. I love them, in fact. I don't
want to get into a discussion of the circumstances surrounding my divorce
because it is really a personal matter between me and my ex-wife and has
nothing to do with this. It was a while ago, and I'm not "crying" about
it, as you put it. From your statement I infer that you have you have never
been divorced. If you had you would not have made such an oversimplification.
In fact, I have no regrets about the divorce--it was best for both of us.
Nor am I suspicious of other women because of it. It so happens that there
are several women who are my very good friends. Perhaps you find that hard
to believe. It might shatter the myth that you have constructed about me.
Now I feel compelled to reveal a few of my true opinions. Perhaps you will
psychoanalyze them in light of my previous postings. That doesn't exactly
have me quaking in my boots, so here they are:
Abortion
--------
If you kill a baby on the day it is born it is murder. If you kill a
baby on the day before it is born it is still murder. And if you kill it
the day before that it is still murder. Hence, by induction, if you kill
a fetus it is murder. The issue seems to me to be: Is murder justifiable
in some cases? I would answer yes, in some cases. There are times when
euthanasia is justifiable, in my opinion. There are also cases when abortion
is justifiable. Why bring a child into the world if you can determine,
through amniocentesis or some other procedure, that it will be hopelessly
brain damaged or deformed and will not have a life that is worth living?
On the other hand, if you have ever held a healthy newborn, how can you
approve of the wholesale slaughter that is now going on? I can't. Sorry.
I am not sure that I believe in a woman's right to have an abortion in all
cases. On the one hand, it's her body. On the other hand it's the baby's
life. If you guarantee the rights of one you must necessarily deny the
rights of the other. The baby is innocent. The mother usually is not.
ERA
---
I have no position on the ERA because I feel that its passage will have
absolutely no effect. The Supreme Court has always interpreted the
Constitution any way it pleases (witness decisions on gun control, affirmative
action, IRS seizure of property, etc.). The protections that women seek from
discrimination in the workplace are already guaranteed by the Civil Rights
Act and numerous other pieces of legislation and have been upheld by the
courts. I realize that some of this may be irrelevant to you because you are
Canadian. I'm afraid I don't know the situation up there quite as well.
Women in the Workplace
----------------------
I believe that women should receive treatment equal, not better or worse,
to that afforded men in equivalent positions. Women should have equal
freedom to pursue their careers. And I believe women are the equivalent
of men at virtually every non-physical task. There have been psychological
studies that indicate that women excel in some areas and men in others,
but these statistics only make generalizations about men and women and
say nothing about individuals. Also some of the experimental methods used
are open to debate.
I am an engineering manager. As it happens, one of my employees is a single
mother. I realize that she has special problems and duties. She would be
the first to tell you that I have been more than accommodating to her needs.
I have allowed her to bring her baby to work and have let her keep very
flexible hours. I am only interested in her output and not in how or when
the work gets done. As it happens, this is not only my policy but that of
the entire company. One thing I would never do is promote a woman based on
her gender. I believe that everyone should stand on his merits.
Genderless Language
-------------------
As the previous sentence may indicate, I do not believe in the bastardization
of English to appease certain feminist groups. I believe such words as
chairwoman, chairperson, draftswoman, drafter, etc. are preposterous
linquistic abominations. I have a friend who edits English texts for a
major textbook publishing firm. His books are required to have an equal
number of masculine and feminine pronouns so that the students are not
indoctrinated with sexist thought. This leads to mediocre English literature
texts because many great works must be excised to make room for lesser
works with the proper pronoun count.
The Feminist Movement
---------------------
Unfortunately the sensible voices like that of Betty Friedan (I don't know
if that's the correct spelling of her name so I apologize if it isn't) have
been drowned out by the leaders of such groups as NOW and NWPC. If you have
read any of Betty Friedan's recent articles you will see that she advocates
new sex roles for both men and women. She says that men and women must
become more like each other and that society must change to provide things
like daycare so that women will be freer to pursue their careers. I don't
happen to be in full agreement with this (as I will explain later), but
at least her thinking is logical. The feminist who are WRONG are the ones
who set up groups like net.women.only. They seek to divide men and women
and create an adversary relationship. I believe that in some cases the
special interest politics advocated by groups like NOW are very harmful
in that these women will vote for a candidate because of his stands on
women's issues and ignore his stands on nuclear arms, Central America,
Southeast Asia, the economy, and other issues which are of greater import
than whether we have an ERA or not. In most cases these candidates advocate
leftist positions. Whether you believe that is bad or not is a matter
of opinion (take a look at France, though.). But the point is that their
leftist positions are not being considered by those who might vote for them.
This group of feminists is the one which constantly cries that
"a woman makes 59 cents for every dollar a man makes." They want
immediate parity. It never occurs to them that it is the marketplace that
sets salaries, not the law. Women currently earn 59% of what men earn
because, in the aggregate, that is what they are WORTH. I personally know
of no cases where a woman is being paid less for the same job than a man.
I think this is an area where there has been the greatest progress in the
last ten years. The disparity between men and women will decrease in the
future as more and more women get the professional education that they have
not had in the past. I do not believe that they will ever actually catch
up because of one thing: children. Which brings us to the next issue:
Two Career Marriages
--------------------
I don't believe that two career marriages work in general if both partners
have serious career ambitions. There will come a time in the marriage
when one partner gets "the big offer" and will want to move or make some
change to which the other will be unwilling to adjust. This is certainly
not true for everyone, but I've seen it enough times to know that it is
a problem. A major problem is that college age girls today are being told
that they can have ambitious careers and children, too. But no one is
telling them HOW. I know I don't want my kids to grow up in a daycare
center, and I have a very active career which precludes my being home enough
to raise them myself. So I'd certainly prefer a traditional marriage. For
a woman to really make it in the business world and also have a family there
are these alternatives: 1) She can have a career which allows her to
work very few hours so that she can spend time with her family. Needless
to say there are very few jobs like this. 2) She can marry a "househusband."
There are also very few of these. 3) She can pay someone else to raise her
infants. This includes daycare, babysitters, etc. 4) She can take time
off from her career until the infants are old enough to go to school or
otherwise become independent. The first option is reserved for the lucky
few. Option 2 includes men who are totally content to occupy the traditional
role of wife (very rare due to some macho hangups which I believe may have
some basis in biology) and men who are willing to "share responsibilities."
The more responsibilities which are shared, the less the partners will be
able to devote themselves to their careers. Ergo this doesn't really work
for the extremely ambitious career woman. Option 3 is fine if you don't
really care about your kids. Option 4, which is chosen by most women,
means that women will fall behind in the pursuit of their careers.
Incidentally, there was a front page article on this very subject in the
Wall Street Journal a couple days ago. Tell me, feminists, what's a woman
to do?
Well if you've made it this far (I know I would have typed "n" if I were you)
you deserve a joke. Turn on that neon sign, now, just for Judy:
JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE
Q: What has hairy legs, hairy armpits, and doesn't wear a bra?
A: A man.
Ah well, I'm sure you still feel compelled to violate my freedom of speech
by censoring my articles.
megatest!dremason@utcsrgv.UUCP (Dave Mason) (09/10/83)
This is responding to a long article and certainly don't have time to
respond to all the points (and you don't have time to read it anyway).
The point I do wish to raise issue with is the question of child rearing.
I think the involvement with the children by both parents is vitally
important (and not 38 secs a day). If we have children, my wife will
probably spend the 1st year at home (breastfeeding & all that) and I will
spend most of the remaining pre-school time at home. At least part of
this time I would hope to be doing consulting etc., but that may not
prove to be possible. Fortunately my wife makes the same salary as I do
+/- 20%.
A general note: could people not respond to other postings on a point by
point basis on the net. I like to see all opinions but I don't have time to
read 3+ 1000 word essays a day. Next time instead of the f key, try r.
Thanks.
-- Gandalf's flunky Hobbit -- Dave Mason, U. Toronto CSRG,
{cornell,watmath,ihnp4,floyd,allegra,utzoo,uw-beaver}!utcsrgv!mason
or {decvax,linus,lsuc,research}!utzoo!utcsrgv!mason (UUCP)shebs@utah-cs.UUCP (Stanley Shebs) (09/13/83)
Well well well, a manager. Knew there had to be some reason for the
flakiness. Mr. Manager, your MCP qualities show through even with a
~200 line article. Just like Bonzo Ronnie, you try to say all the
right things ('I have some very good women friends', 'never seen a case
where a woman is paid less than a man', etc ad nauseam). Just because
you haven't seen a case of pay discrimination doesn't mean that it's
a myth. Perhaps Megatest (I assume that's the company) is very progressive,
but then why don't you say anything about working at home, or husband
and wife staggering working hours? My (strictly theoretical) wife
could work 8 hours while I stay home, and then I could work 8 hours,
and if some of that can be done at home, well great! It sounds quite
practical to me...
Apparently you didn't read the charter for net.women.only. I personally
wish it wasn't necessary, but there's no lack of insensitive clods who
can't wait to jump all over someone for an article. There's plenty
of misogynists who will reserve their best efforts for articles known
to be authored by women. For instance, try to express an opinion on
makeup, and then 40 guys loudly proclaim that either it's essential
or worthless, thus destroying the original discussion on brand names.
As long as there are so many *boors* on the net, things like net.women.only
will continue to be necessary...
Never met a manager I didn't mistrust,
stan the leprechaun hacker
utah-cs!shebs