Why do women do it to each other?

CorvusCorax77

Wow, nevermind. I find the reasons behind human and animal behavior fascinating, and the best way to keep one's self from understand something is to make value judgments about it. Apparently everyone else here is only interested in what they can label as immoral or unfair or sexist, and assume every statement made by anyone else is also a value judgment too. Have fun with that.

I think animal behavior is fascinating and evolutionary biology and implications for human behavior is also fascinating.

Here's my problem with it: the studies themselves apply their own cultural understandings to what the scientists are seeing- these cultural interpretations are then passed off as scientific fact that supports the existing cultural norm.

Example: scientist sees a pride of lions with one male who mates with many females. The male only mates and fights with other males. The females do all the hunting and raising of cubs.

Scientist says: the male is dominant. It is his pride. The females all mate with the dominant male and do all the work so he can protect his pride.

But it could just as easily be: female lions work cooperatively in a pride. They hunt together and raise their young. The males are so aggressively anti-social and such terrible hunters that the females will only tolerate the presence of one male in the pride, which they use for mating purposes.

See my point?

AlanTuring

I just want to say that I don't think we individuall have to live in contradiction to traditional gender roles. For me, that is just as limiting as saying I have to be a Girly girl. What we need is simply to change how we think, so each one of us can be who we are without all the negative programming getting in the way. If I wanna stay home and make babies and raise babies and I have a husband who wants to support me financially as I do that, I don't see that as being any better or worse than me being a single thirty something woman with a successful career and a gorgeous girlfriend that I come home to (or multiple lovers, or no lover, whatever floats my boat and isn't coercive or illegal!).

Definitely this, and I think this is still inexplicably one of the major issues in people being able to accept feminism, not seeing that this is the ultimate goal. There may be a few jags on the very edge who think that one can't be a feminist and a housewife, but most of us recognize that those people are both wrong and silly. :P

Saying that people can't engage in behavior that's reminiscent of traditional gender roles is just creating new gender roles defined by negatives, which would be just as destructive. The point is to help stride toward a time where people can make the decision to be a housewife or a sex worker or whatever the hell they want to be without being shoved into that role by society unthinkingly. Women (and men!) should be able to look at all of their options and choose what suits them as a person, rather than just having to march directly into being a housewife or provider or whatever the hell they're 'supposed' to do.

Wow, nevermind. I find the reasons behind human and animal behavior fascinating, and the best way to keep one's self from understand something is to make value judgments about it. Apparently everyone else here is only interested in what they can label as immoral or unfair or sexist, and assume every statement made by anyone else is also a value judgment too. Have fun with that.

I'm trying to see more, but for some reason all I can see is "Herp derp a bloo bloo bloo."

Let me make sure that I follow though - you went from "Homos are silly coz they're not propagating their genes" to "It's so sad that people are making value judgments?" It really sounds a lot like "Boy, I hate that people are calling me out on my stupid sexist horse****."

TheBraveryLover

I think your question is really more about teenagers. As a whole, I don't see women as 'mean'. Yes, some are, but not any that I associate with LOL.

QFT. It always surprises me when people have this mindset that women, in general, are dog eat dog and catty. I've experienced a few like that in my life, but the overwhelming majority of women and girls I've met and known my entire life have been wonderful and supportive. I honestly, just don't see what some women in this thread see with women, on average.

SarahtheJillianfanatic

A lot of misogynist bollocks on this thread.

Loftearmen

Lol. It may not be fair but it's the truth. Just because people don't like something doesn't make it not so.

Just because my genetics gifted me with breasts that can lactate doesn't mean I'm not capable of traditionally male occupations. The history of computer science is founded by women and one rather famous gay male mathematician, who clearly defied his biological mandate to reproduce.

What happened?

Exactly. You weren't "meant" or "made" to be [whatever] because you're a woman. You're a human being and an individual and you have the freedom and ability to decide for yourself what kind of person you want to be.

How insulting is it for someone to say you were "made" to do or be something you don't want to do or be? Loftearmen, don't you see how condescending and insulting it is to tell someone they were "meant" or "made" to do something they have zero interest in, just because they have boobs?

It is insulting. And the history of science and mathematics is full of examples where women have been kept out not by ability but by good old fashioned sexism. Who invented the compiler? A woman -- Grace Hopper. Who related the story of how the men around her were sceptical of it because they thought computers could only be used for calculating.

And what happened to Alan Turing? Treated with female hormones for the crime of having sex with other men. He later committed suicide, a man who should have been rightfully treated as a war hero.

Little things that you find in physics that speak to this discrimination against women -- check out Emily Noether, who had to teach classes under David Hilbert's name in Goettingen because women were barred from teaching at his university. ""What will our soldiers think when they return to the university and find that they are required to learn at the feet of a woman?" ....

Her discovery of conservation laws being associated with the underlying symmetries of a physical system is a cornerstone of physics.

Or say Henrietta Swan Leavitt, whose discovery of the relation between the luminosity and period of Cepheid variable stars enabled Edwin Hubble to discover the expansion of the universe. But she was unable to actually make this discovery because women were not allowed to operate telescopes!

You are talking about ancient history. That type of crap isn't acceptable today. Maybe it is among some older people who still happen to have some power somewhere. Or maybe I just don't notice it because my wife goes out and kicks the world's butt every day while I stay home and raise the kids and cook the meals and clean the house and change the diapers.

You weren't "meant" or "made" to be [whatever] because you're a woman. You're a human being and an individual and you have the freedom and ability to decide for yourself what kind of person you want to be.

Those two statements are not mutually exclusive. Your value-laden interpretation of them is where they become mutually exclusive.

I appreciate your support here. Everyone seems to think that I am intentionally bashing women by picking apart which words I used when my point was just that men and women are made differently and for that reason are more prone to exhibit specific behaviors. People who don't work in science have a way of not viewing things objectively but instead they look at it subjectively and allow their emotions to get in the way when they become offended.

Loftearmen

Nice snakes, by the way. Are those all corn snakes?

Yep, the ones in my profile are all corns. (I have a few other colubrids.)

It's sloppily applied evolutionary logic. (Which is sexist.)

The logic is not sloppy. Optimal male and female reproductive strategies are clearly different and for fairly obvious reasons, such as the fact that men have nine months to leave and get other women pregnant in the meantime. Men can make a larger number of offspring, risking a higher mortality/failure rate individually and still have an overall higher success rate. Men can also use "nest parasitism" type of strategies that aren't nearly so easy for females. The differences could cover chapters in a book, but you get the idea.

His wording might be lacking, but that is depending on expectations of how the audience might receive it. Perhaps he is used to a different audience who does not infer value judgments from facts.

Was not talking about the logic of investment strategies, but of the teleological business attached to the use of "for" etc in the bit quoted earlier.

This.

There's no designer or some sort of grand design or blueprint in evolution, which is the implication when someone invokes the teleological language surrounding "meant for". That is what makes it sloppy.

Serp pretty much answered himself though when he replied to me about Turing's legacy benefiting his family, which goes to show that there are a large variety of genetic strategies, that doesn't always involve biological reproduction for a particular individual. Thought that should be obvious.

So you are saying that belief in God makes ones' statements sloppy?

Loftearmen

Lol. It may not be fair but it's the truth. Just because people don't like something doesn't make it not so.

Just because my genetics gifted me with breasts that can lactate doesn't mean I'm not capable of traditionally male occupations. The history of computer science is founded by women and one rather famous gay male mathematician, who clearly defied his biological mandate to reproduce.

What happened?

Exactly. You weren't "meant" or "made" to be [whatever] because you're a woman. You're a human being and an individual and you have the freedom and ability to decide for yourself what kind of person you want to be.

How insulting is it for someone to say you were "made" to do or be something you don't want to do or be? Loftearmen, don't you see how condescending and insulting it is to tell someone they were "meant" or "made" to do something they have zero interest in, just because they have boobs?

I don't find that condescending at all. I believe that I was made for a certain reason as well.

Southernb3lle

LolBroScience

They are teens.

DoomCakes

Sounds like the thin one is insecure about something. She's worried that if the overweight one gets thin, that she'll be pretty or even better looking than her. So it's easier for her to be a disrespectful, pathetic ***** and put down her friend to stop her from succeeding. It's a terrible, sad sad thing. Girls do that to other girls, at least the ones who don't want to see someone do as good or better than them. In my opinion, the second you put someone down for trying, you failed.

jonnythan

Lol. It may not be fair but it's the truth. Just because people don't like something doesn't make it not so.

Just because my genetics gifted me with breasts that can lactate doesn't mean I'm not capable of traditionally male occupations. The history of computer science is founded by women and one rather famous gay male mathematician, who clearly defied his biological mandate to reproduce.

What happened?

Exactly. You weren't "meant" or "made" to be [whatever] because you're a woman. You're a human being and an individual and you have the freedom and ability to decide for yourself what kind of person you want to be.

How insulting is it for someone to say you were "made" to do or be something you don't want to do or be? Loftearmen, don't you see how condescending and insulting it is to tell someone they were "meant" or "made" to do something they have zero interest in, just because they have boobs?

I don't find that condescending at all. I believe that I was made for a certain reason as well.

What if someone told you that you were made to be a homosexual fashion designer whose favorite thing in the world was feeding babies?

Of course it wouldn't bother you because no one would say that. But you would understand the problem if that's what society expected of you and thought you should be, and you were prevented or hindered from being who you are because of those expectations and assumptions.

You fit your own sexist stereotypes, so you think the sexist stereotypes are just swell. You would have a different perspective if those expectations and stereotypes were at odds with who you were and what you wanted to be.

AGirlandHerFrenchie

I think it comes down to insecurity. I see it in men and women. I find though that women are more vocal about it or show it in more of a jealous of other women/put other women down kind of way. I find with men it's more of an over compensation thing. But really in the end it's insecurity.

Maris_Swan

I think it comes down to insecurity. I see it in men and women. I find though that women are more vocal about it or show it in more of a jealous of other women/put other women down kind of way. I find with men it's more of an over compensation thing. But really in the end it's insecurity.

^^^This.

ErinBeth7

Maybe it has to do with insecurity...

Bingo.

upgetupgetup

Wow, nevermind. I find the reasons behind human and animal behavior fascinating, and the best way to keep one's self from understand something is to make value judgments about it. Apparently everyone else here is only interested in what they can label as immoral or unfair or sexist, and assume every statement made by anyone else is also a value judgment too. Have fun with that.

It's straight-up impossible to avoid making value judgements in any human endeavour, including scientific ones, as CorvusCorax77 nicely demonstrated. See Kuhn, Popper etc etc.

Btw my comments were about the dispassionate and objective observations made by Loftearman, not you - apologies for my own sloppiness.

Debbe2

We all need to surround ourselves with supportive, caring people. Thinking its time for that person to either go back to the class herself or find a different friend or partner who better suits the supportive role. Personally I find loving and caring friends around me but I have consciously built my tight knit circle to the closest people I trust, love and can count on. Released all others to less importance in my life. Hope this makes sense to others

upgetupgetup

Serp pretty much answered himself though when he replied to me about Turing's legacy benefiting his family, which goes to show that there are a large variety of genetic strategies, that doesn't always involve biological reproduction for a particular individual. Thought that should be obvious.

True - sorry, was referring to arguments made by other people.

jensweighingin

I work out with 2 different women for accountablity and shared company. We never laugh at each other and motivate each other. Sometimes we fall doing balance moves, downward dog, etc. But then we give a hand to help that person up, not a "you can't do it". Sounds like immature teenagers, not friends. I would not be meeting any person who put me down like that at the gym or anywhere else.

AlsDonkBoxSquat

Yesterday at the gym two older teenagers walked into the body pump class. One of the teens was over weight and the other was very thin. They started the class and the thin one was not even trying and was laughing at the other who was trying to workout. She was telling her she looked stupid and the class was a joke. The bigger teen was ignoring her and kept trying but when she lost her balance (she did not fall) the thin girl said, "told you you couldn't do it." They both left.
It broke my heart to see one trying to get fit and the other "friend" putting her down!! Why are women so mean to each other?

I don't know, don't do this but there was a time when my insecurities made me a lot more judgemental. As I've come to a more internally focused self validating frame of minds and shed many of my insecurities I find that I focus more about the positives in myself and others. What i want to know is why someone would over hear this volleying back and forth and not speak up.

EvilDollee

Are you asking this about women or teenagers?

Exactly, I'm in my 30s and my female friends has always been supportive of whatever I do. But when I was a teen, other girls would come to me to talk badly about another girl, each would turned around and acted like best friends. It's a mixture of immaturity, insecurity and the need to be superior.