randy@umcp-cs.UUCP (07/16/83)
Here's a theoretical question I've been wondering about for some time and would love to get the opinions of netters on. Suppose, suddenly, the leaders of the most powerful countries were women. Not just the heads of state either, I'm imagining a complete reversal of the current predominance of men at all levels of government. Now, do you think the chances for peace would be any greater? (If nothing else, it would certainly be worth a try. Us men have had our turn and the results are pretty dismal, though not totally hopeless.) One standard response points to current and recent leaders like Margaret Thatcher and Golda Meir as examples of women who seem no more peace-inducing then their male counterparts. It may be, however, that male-dominated governments filter out all but these kinds of women in the early stages. Perhaps it all comes down to the question of whether women are in general less aggressive and more willing to negotiate than men. But then again, perhaps it doesn't. Comments? - Randy -- Randy Trigg ...!seismo!umcp-cs!randy (Usenet) randy.umcp-cs@udel-relay (Arpanet)
dr_who@umcp-cs.UUCP (07/18/83)
I agree. A world ruled by women (assuming that women had the same type of personalities that they do as things are now) would likely be more peaceful. If any of the personality differences between the sexes have biological origins, we can say that the world probably would be a better place if women ruled. And these facts seem to favor preferring women for positions of leadership where peace is an issue... -- a speculative Paul Torek, U of MD College Park
larry@grkermit.UUCP (Larry Kolodney) (07/18/83)
I second the motion of replacing all world leaders with women. It seems to me that most fighting in the world is to male agression. Most women I've known have been much more peaceful and less obstinate than males. Maybe its just social conditioning, but if you look at history you will find that matriarchical societies tend to be less warlike. -- Larry Kolodney #13 (I try harder) (USENET) decvax!genrad!grkermit!larry allegra!linus!genrad!grkermit!larry harpo!eagle!mit-vax!grkermit!larry (ARPA) rms.g.lkk@mit-ai
debray@sbcs.UUCP (07/18/83)
I'm not sure I agree with the thesis that the world would be a more peaceful place if women were world leaders. The view that women are less aggressive than men seems, to me, to be based on an essentially obsolete stereotype dating back to the days when the woman stayed at home and cooked while her man went out and conquered the world! True, many women, even today, are less aggressive than most men; however, the increasing number of aggressive women seems to indicate that that might very well be due to social factors, and not any inherent difference between the sexes. In which case, it would seem, little would be changed if all the world leaders were women. Saumya Debray SUNY at Stony Brook
sch@linus.UUCP (Stephen C. Hemminger) (07/19/83)
Look at Margret Thatcher!? More peaceful, bah humbug.
--
Stephen Hemminger, Mitre Corp. Bedford MA
{allegra,genrad,ihnp4, utzoo}!linus!sch (UUCP)
linus!sch@mitre-bedford (ARPA)ginger@ssc-vax.UUCP (Ginger Grover) (07/19/83)
Hmmm. This is interesting. Some of you think the world might be a more peaceful place if women ran things. This is a nice change from being told that women are unfit due to "raging hormonal im- balances". The guy who said that seemed to imply that women should stick to housework and raising kids. Although why the care and training of the next generation (surely our most impor- tant resource) should be left to people who regularly go bannanas is something I never quite understood. Actually, your average day-care center would probably provide the best training for government. Surely, a person capable of deal- ing well with small children on a regular basis has what it takes to handle Congress and foreign affairs? Would YOU vote for a woman for U. S. President? Send your ballots to: ssc-vax!ginger I'll summarize to the net. Ginger Grover
wisen@inmet.UUCP (07/21/83)
#R:umcp-cs:-86000:inmet:10900009:000:334 inmet!wisen Jul 20 10:21:00 1983 I suggest we resurrect Catherine the Great and her former husband, let her murder her husband again, annoint her as Tsarina, and see if she brings any peace to the world. I suspect that the aggressiveness of some world leaders has less to do with their gender than with the filters through which they rise to power. ---Bruce W.
nrh@inmet.UUCP (07/21/83)
#R:umcp-cs:-86000:inmet:10900010:000:564 inmet!nrh Jul 20 22:38:00 1983 I know! Let's replace all of the world's political leaders (men AND women) with elephant's-foot umbrella stands! Of course, this would tend to mean a certain passivity on the parts of governments..... Give me Liberty, or make me a protected special interest - Nat Howard For the record -- I've no idea what would happen if you replaced world leaders with women, but I suspect it depends very much on WHICH women, whereas my modest little proposal above has the nice feature of being independent of which brand(s) of unbrella-stands are used.
rh@mit-eddie.UUCP (Randy Haskins) (07/22/83)
What about the case (I think it was in CA; that would make sense) where a woman was found innocent of murder (or the charged was reduced. Sorry, I don't remember all of the specifics.) because of 'menstrual stress.' Make women world leaders? Okay, but what if 'that time of the month' rolls around? Do we get nuked because of 'menstraual stress?' -- Randwulf (Randy Haskins) genrad!mit-eddie!rh or... rh@mit-ee (via mit-mc)
guy@rlgvax.UUCP (07/24/83)
Of course, it could be argued that women, at least, have only a certain
time of the month when they are subject to "raging hormonal influences",
while men are constantly having their brains bombarded with testosterone...
Simply because a court case was resolved with pre-menstrual stress as a
mitigating circumstance does not mean that it's an established fact that
women regularly go crazy at certain times in their menstrual cycle. The
law makes many foolish judgements. Even if this one woman did experience
stress at that time, this does not mean 1) that it's common to all women or
2) that it's specifically due to hormonal influences. The body does different
things during different stages of the estrus cycle (is there not a tendency
to retention of water at some points?) which may produce uncomfortable
SOMATIC effects in some women; to make an analogy, would you be less under
control of your reactions if you had a headache?
Frankly, it would take a LOT of evidence to convince me that women and men
had thought patterns that differed radically for BIOLOGICAL reasons. There
may be forms of behavior that differ - I could see infant care as one
possibility, but I can't see the survival value of women caring ONLY about
their infant or men NOT caring much about their offspring - but the case
that women are less likely to be assertive, or agressive, or capable of
logical thought, or capable of understanding category theory or elementary
particle physics or music composition or whatever simply because they don't
have a Y chromosome wiring their brains up right or causing the endocrine
system to pump the right kind of polypeptides into their bloodstream does not
have any good evidence for it that I know about. The (in)famous differences
cited in things like visual ability may exist, but this still doesn't mean
"men make better mathematicians than women". There aren't that many Gausses
OR Noethers born, period. Furthermore, all such cases I've heard about have
been hotly debated on scientific grounds.
I shall have to go back and reread "The Mismeasure of Man" by Stephen Jay
Gould soon. He pointed out that claims of "science says you can't do these
things as well as we can" have been used by the powerful to keep the powerless
in their place for as long as such claims have been made.
Guy Harris
{seismo,mcnc,we13,brl-bmd,allegra}!rlgvax!guymark@hp-kirk.UUCP (07/26/83)
#R:umcp-cs:-86000:hp-kirk:16500009:000:1289
hp-kirk!mark Jul 22 07:51:00 1983
Not any man can become a world leader. The path to becoming a
world leader is one that definitely favors the ambitious and the
aggressive over the less ambitious and non-aggressive. If a world
ruled by less aggressive people would be more peaceful and if women
tend to be less aggressive than men then a world ruled by women would
tend to be more peaceful. However, this type of thinking is the same
sort of thing that has resulted in the discrimination issues that are
so prevalent today. If a peaceful world is desired then the trait
we should look for in world leaders is lack of aggressiveness
regardless of the sex. I think the female leaders the world has seen
to date have been no more peaceful than the average leader. This I
would attribute to the above stated supposition that what is required
to become a world leader today is ambition and aggression and if
women have these traits then they can make it, but the world isn't
going to be any more peaceful.
a public service bulletin courtesy of
Death Rowe
...!hplabs!hp-cvd!mark
Corvallis, Oregonrwhw@hound.UUCP (07/27/83)
In the world today, if a person who is assumed to not be aggressive, gets elected as president of the USA, the USA will then not be considered a strong ally to the other nations of the free world. What we need for a president is a person that displays a strong aggressiveness but in reality uses this aggressiveness to obtain peace. If a women can do this, great. I will always vote for a person that has enough fortitude to get the job done. The job being, keeping the USA as a world leader and being the world leader for peace. I doubt if any pacifists could really become believable world leaders, therefore I would never vote for them (either sex). -- Roy W. H. Walters (a.k.a. BTM)
root@ima.UUCP (08/02/83)
#R:umcp-cs:-86000:ima:21000002:000:326
ima!root Aug 1 15:28:00 1983
Even if you did a quick one for one swap; the women who stayed
in the top positions would be the ones who out manuvered, out
smarted, and out ran the others. All competitive qualitites.
Steve Ludlum decvax!yale-co!ima!stevel, {ihnp4|ucbvax}!cbosgd!ima!stevel,
decwrl!amd70!ima!stevel, {uscvax|ucla-vax|vortex}!ism780!stevel