Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Men kill bambies while women cross stitch: To the folks who shut down Sixteen Volt's blog, you'll be happy to know that I plan to write twice as much about how men and women are different, and just to please you, I'll make an effort to document those differences that reflect poorly on women. But today, I'll be nice.

While someone with a very active imagination might be able to think that women are turned away from male-dominated fields, it simply is not credible to say there is something called "hobby discrimination." People pursue certain leisurely activities because they find them pleasurable, pure and simple. And it's not like mommy and daddy assigned you a gender-appropriate hobby. The General Social Survey tells us that 23% of men went to an auto race last year versus 10% of women (and I'm sure half the women were dragged there by their husbands). Revolutionary conclusion number one: men like cars more than women. Almost half (47%) of women did arts and crafts in the past year, while only 31% of men did (and the differences are much sharper for whites since black women are not "craftsy"). Revolutionary conclusion number two: women like toll painting more than men. Fifty-one percent of men hunted and/or fished last year. Only 27% of women did the same. Revolutionary conclusion number three: men like to catch stuff more than women do.

I can document this kind of thing for people, but all experience tells us the men and women use their free time to do different things. My wife is repulsed when I watch a violent film: I fall asleep when she grows flowers. Hobbies are the free expression of who you are much more than what society says you should do as a member of a particular gender group, and they show us that men and women are different.

3 comments:

  1. Anonymous1:24 PM

    Two bits says that "anonymous" is a spammer.

    But let's make the comment topical. How much are you willing to bet that most of the people who respond to that sort of solicitation are female?

    In other words, that flavor of spam on this blog is an effort wasted.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous6:55 PM

    I believe it's "tole" and not "toll" painting. And, yes, I'm a woman.

    ReplyDelete
  3. See, I assumed it was troll painting (as in treasure trolls) and not toll painting. But then again, I'm not female..

    ReplyDelete

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