reiser@pmafire.inel.gov (Steve Reiser) (10/30/90)
In article <67971@bu.edu.bu.edu> pamela@bu-bio.UUCP (Pamela Hall) writes: > >In a sci.* news board I would expect to see respect for precise and >accurate use of words. This is not a issue of politics, but of accurate >communication which is essential for science (and certainly other human >endeavors). > >If one wishes to refer to human male behavior, use men or man. >If one wishes to refer to human female behavior, use women or woman >If one wishes to refer to human behavior, regardless of gender >differences that may arise, use human. > >It is clearly more accurate to say mankind, womankind or humankind, >depending upon what is being referred to. I have seldom found >difficulties in substituing humankind for mankind when I really am >discussing the behavior of humans, regardless of gender. I am in favor >of removing ambiguities whereever possible. >Pamela Hall Why are some many woman so oversensitive about the use of words in reference to gender. Are you so insecure that you can't accept the fact that the first Webster's dictionary definition includes ALL of the human race, bth MALE and FEMALE. It is so damn annoying to listen bitching on the net about all this gender shit. I feel that women are equal to men. Some macho jerks don't. However, if there are any women who feel insecure about inequality you've generated it in your own mind. But, if you find any men or laws that contradict what I say take them to court and you'll have my full support. But please stop whining about petty little things like this on the net unless you would to convince me that you're just a crybaby. -- Steve Reiser (reiser@pmafire.UUCP or ...!uunet!pmafire!reiser)
bevans@gauss.unm.edu (Mathemagician) (11/03/90)
In article <1990Nov1.233150.31363@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu> wp6@cunixa.cc.columbia.edu (Walter Pohl) writes: > The original article said something like "is man naturally >polygamous?" After reading that sentence, I wasn't sure whether or >not the author was referring to men, or to all people. I mean, it's >possible that men may be naturally polygamous and women aren't, or >vice versa. So the usage was in fact ambiguous. Without having read the original article, I am without the full context. However, there are two possible interpretations: 1) The word "man" was being used as a reference to males only (a rather rare usage, but possible). 2) The word "man" was being used as a reference to all of the species: homo sapiens. Now then, the "common" way of expressing 1) would have been, "Are men naturally polygamous" instead of "is man...," but as I said, that doesn't mean that the first case couldn't be true. > Oh, if only I could reach the level of rationality that you >have already acheived. Does this short lesson help you? -- Brian Evans |"Momma told me to never kiss a girl on the first bevans at gauss.unm.edu | date...But that's OK...I don't kiss girls."
pamela@bu-bio.bu.edu (Pamela Hall) (11/07/90)
In a sci.* news board I would expect to see respect for precise and accurate use of words. This is not a issue of politics, but of accurate communication which is essential for science (and certainly other human endeavors). If one wishes to refer to human male behavior, use men or man. If one wishes to refer to human female behavior, use women or woman If one wishes to refer to human behavior, regardless of gender differences that may arise, use human. It is clearly more accurate to say mankind, womankind or humankind, depending upon what is being referred to. I have seldom found difficulties in substituing humankind for mankind when I really am discussing the behavior of humans, regardless of gender. I am in favor of removing ambiguities whereever possible. In regards to the orginal posting about whether humankind is naturally monogamous (I have gathered humankind was the intended meaning, though I also confess to some initial confusion because of the language used). How would the readers of this net interpret the various types of marriage laws that currently exist? Does anyone think that they reflect a need have clear knowledge of parentage? This is in reference to the biological differences between men and women, in that women have much greater confidence in identifying their offspring then men. Pamela Hall PS If these issues have already been discussed in this thread, forgive me for reintroducing the topic.
oliver@lincoln.cs.unc.edu (Bill Oliver) (11/07/90)
In article <67971@bu.edu.bu.edu> pamela@bu-bio.UUCP (Pamela Hall) writes: >[Guess. Just guess.] > >PS If these issues have already been discussed in this thread, forgive >me for reintroducing the topic. You've got to be kidding. Isn't there an alt.beating.a.dead.horse somewhere? Perhaps we should add a list of "things we have discussed until we are bored to tears, so please keep it the hell off of soc.men for at least another couple of months" to the "welcome to soc.men" posting. What'cha say, Charleen? Bill Oliver
north@manta.NOSC.MIL (Mark H. North) (11/07/90)
In article <67971@bu.edu.bu.edu> pamela@bu-bio.UUCP (Pamela Hall) writes: > > >If one wishes to refer to human male behavior, use men or man. >If one wishes to refer to human female behavior, use women or woman >If one wishes to refer to human behavior, regardless of gender >differences that may arise, use human. In the original post the use of the word 'human' would not have been syntactically correct. 'Man' or 'mankind' would be correct. Sorry that's just the way the language is. It's no slam, it means the same thing. When one refers to 'man' or 'mankind' in this context it refers to all. Look it up. > >In regards to the orginal posting about whether humankind is naturally >monogamous (I have gathered humankind was the intended meaning, though I >also confess to some initial confusion because of the language used). I had not the slightest doubt about what the poster meant and frankly if you did one must wonder why based on your lecture on word usage. >How would the readers of this net interpret the various types of >marriage laws that currently exist? Does anyone think that they reflect >a need have clear knowledge of parentage? This is in reference to the >biological differences between men and women, in that women have much >greater confidence in identifying their offspring then men. > This paragraph looks like it might be interesting and addressing an important issue. Can you rephrase it? Look, there are some men who are otherwise sympathetic with womens' concerns who get mildly irritated at this kind of ranting. And I'm one of those men. For 25 years I have been beating your drum without resorting to this kind of irrelevance and I have seen much progress. As a matter of fact what you are saying is polarizing and unproductive. If you have an issue let's talk about it. There are a lot more burning concerns for women today than whether we should say 'mankind' or 'humankind'. Mark
jgk@osc.COM (Joe Keane) (11/08/90)
In article <67971@bu.edu.bu.edu> pamela@bu-bio.UUCP (Pamela Hall) writes: >In a sci.* news board I would expect to see respect for precise and >accurate use of words. >If one wishes to refer to human behavior, regardless of gender >differences that may arise, use human. Normally i wouldn't point this out, but you are talking about accurate use of words. The word `gender' is a linguistic term, with the possible values of `masculine', `feminine', `neuter', and maybe others. Therefore it is properly only used as an attribute of words, and not people. Most living things have an attribute called `sex', with the possible values of `male' and `female'. I hope you all now remember to use the correct word.
chi9@quads.uchicago.edu (Lucius Chiaraviglio) (11/08/90)
In article <1363@manta.NOSC.MIL> north@manta.nosc.mil.UUCP (Mark H. North) writes: >In article <67971@bu.edu.bu.edu> pamela@bu-bio.UUCP (Pamela Hall) writes: >>If one wishes to refer to human male behavior, use men or man. >>If one wishes to refer to human female behavior, use women or woman >>If one wishes to refer to human behavior, regardless of gender >>differences that may arise, use human. > >In the original post the use of the word 'human' would not have been >syntactically correct. Only slight syntactic modification to the rest of the original sentence would have been needed to make it syntactically correct. > 'Man' or 'mankind' would be correct. Sorry that's >just the way the language is. It's no slam, it means the same thing. When >one refers to 'man' or 'mankind' in this context it refers to all. Look it >up. That doesn't work. By common usage and tradition, "man" is male-specific, even when it is openly claimed not to be. This is a slam, because favoring one gender with the language acts toward the legitimizization (or more accurately, the maintainance of the legitimization of) sexism. >Look, there are some men who are otherwise sympathetic with womens' >concerns who get mildly irritated at this kind of ranting. Look, some men as well as many women see what you call "ranting" as a legitimate complaint. Furthermore, in the English language, it is EXTREMELY EASY to implement the VERY MINOR fixes required to address it. So what are we waiting for? > [. . .] As a matter of >fact what you are saying is polarizing and unproductive. It is unproductive only as long as people refuse to address the issue rationally. If you see it as polarizing, that's just too bad. > If you have an >issue let's talk about it. There are a lot more burning concerns for women >today than whether we should say 'mankind' or 'humankind'. This is true, but as I said above, this issue is not irrelevant to some of those more burning concerns. Now cut the obstructionism and obscurantism, and let's get this newsgroup back to talking about biology. -- | Lucius Chiaraviglio | Internet: chi9@midway.uchicago.edu
pamela@bu-bio.bu.edu (Pamela Hall) (11/10/90)
>In article <1363@manta.NOSC.MIL> north@manta.nosc.mil.UUCP (Mark H. North) writes: >>In article <67971@bu.edu.bu.edu> pamela@bu-bio.UUCP (Pamela Hall) writes: >> >> >>If one wishes to refer to human male behavior, use men or man. >>If one wishes to refer to human female behavior, use women or woman >>If one wishes to refer to human behavior, regardless of gender >>differences that may arise, use human. > > >Look, there are some men who are otherwise sympathetic with womens' >concerns who get mildly irritated at this kind of ranting. And I'm one >of those men. For 25 years I have been beating your drum without resorting >to this kind of irrelevance and I have seen much progress. As a matter of >fact what you are saying is polarizing and unproductive. If you have an >issue let's talk about it. There are a lot more burning concerns for women >today than whether we should say 'mankind' or 'humankind'. > I beg your pardon. I did not mean to rant. I forget sometimes how a post may be interpreted for emotional content. It is difficult when we cannot discuss things face to face. I was really complaining about imprecision, not about sexism. Perhaps as a biologist (are you also one?) I find it more confusing because I don't assume mankind = humankind since biology frequently discusses the differences among genders. I was honestly confused by the post, but then remembered that this was a public network so that the common language use must have been intended. Back to some sort of science. >In article <1363@manta.NOSC.MIL> north@manta.nosc.mil.UUCP (Mark H. North) writes: >>In article <67971@bu.edu.bu.edu> pamela@bu-bio.UUCP (Pamela Hall) writes: >>How would the readers of this net interpret the various types of >>marriage laws that currently exist? Does anyone think that they reflect >>a need have clear knowledge of parentage? This is in reference to the >>biological differences between men and women, in that women have much >>greater confidence in identifying their offspring then men. >> > >This paragraph looks like it might be interesting and addressing an >important issue. Can you rephrase it? > OK to get the ball rolling, I would suggest that many of the constraints that existed in marriage and the social values of differences among male and female behavior (which the American version has more or less done away with) were designed to control the reproduction of females so that males could be sure of parentage. For instance, the idea that if women had many partners they were promiscious, but for men that was "natural". Translated to be that men were free to cuckold another man's woman but it was her responsibility to make sure her husband was only raising his own children. Laws of inheritence which work through the male line would result in requiring women to be much more chaste, because males can only rely upon the women's word as to who the father of the child was. It always seemed to me that laws of inheritence working through matriarchical lines make much more biological sense. But then there is the question of political power. Aside; is it not true that being Jewish is determined by one's mother's religion and not one's father's ? I realise converts exist, but what is the orthodox view? Pamela Hall
pamela@bu-bio.bu.edu (Pamela Hall) (11/11/90)
Look, I am not pushing a political agenda. I apoligize for offending you. I am not particularly sensitive to word use. I was genuinely confused by the original posting. Hey, call me dense. I have been trying to think of a similar example which would have no political connotation. How about this one: In the course of conversation between two biologists, each kept referring to some set of qualities of green/yellow-green light and having disagreements about the effects of each. The disagreement was resolved when one said they were referring to 500nm the other 600nm. With this additional clarification, the discussion continued and refocussed upon the interesting aspects of biological response to these two different wavelengths. I know this is contrived, but does it make the motivation of my original posting clearer? Let's get back to the biology. Are humans naturally monogamous? Are there reasons to think that women may have a greater proclivity for monogamy than men? or vice versa? How do the various marriage laws or customs reflect (if at all) the natural proclivities of humans and where conflicts between men and women might arise? Pamela Hall
cmccaff@urbana.mcd.mot.com (Chuck McCaffrey) (11/09/98)
In article <3985@osc.COM> jgk@osc.COM (Joe Keane) writes: In article <67971@bu.edu.bu.edu> pamela@bu-bio.UUCP (Pamela Hall) wrote: >In a sci.* news board I would expect to see respect for precise and >accurate use of words. >If one wishes to refer to human behavior, regardless of gender >differences that may arise, use human. Normally i wouldn't point this out, but you are talking about accurate use of words. The word `gender' is a linguistic term, with the possible values of `masculine', `feminine', `neuter', and maybe others. Therefore it is properly only used as an attribute of words, and not people. Most living things have an attribute called `sex', with the possible values of `male' and `female'. I hope you all now remember to use the correct word. And I respond: Well, if we go by sheer numbers, most living things are neither male nor female. Even if we limit ourselves to a discussion of animals, or even vertebrates, or better yet primates, no let's limit ourselves to human beings, then even the words "male" and "female" have limitations imposed on them by linguistics and by society. Male and female are most decidedly not the only possible values. -- \Chuck McCaffrey cmccaff@urbana.mcd.mot.com 1101 E University Urbana IL 61801 \ Flashing for the warriors whose strength is not to fight, [my words] \ Flashing for the refugees on the unarmed road of flight, [my opinions] / \ And for each and every underdog soldier in the night, / \ And we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing.