Hopper wrote:
Re education - obviously any number of educational reformists would have looked at the system when boys were doing better, and want to do something about it, to bring girls up that level (as they have in regard to class, race, etc). But in terms of mainstream discourse in the UK, the girl/boy disparity only became newsworthy when boys started falling behind.
My point in this not being educational ability/attainment itself, but that the assumption was that boys would always do better than girls. Whilst many knew of this assumption, they'd have been derided as do-good man-hating feminists when pointing it out. It was only when the assumption was called into question that it became visible. That is, in mainstream discourse, it is not a problem when boys outperform girls - that's just how it is, and how it should be. It is a problem when it's the other way around.
This is what I talk about in all this, what I'm referring to. There is no a priori reason for things to be as they are, yet as soon as that consensus, that 'just the way it is', is threatened, 'we' have a problem. It is still assumed people have a place, a role. Once that would have come from God, but now from Nature. Certain people are supposed to be a certain way. When they're not, when they reject that alloted role and place, it is their behaviour that is called into question, rather than the assumption.
If girls do tend to be more subserviant, that's a bad thing. Indeed - as you'd expect - I would say that, socially, it is more acceptable for a boy to be disobediant than a girl, and there are far more models - and so variety - of disobediance for a boy to look to than a girl. I have HUGE concerns and criticisms of the education system anyway. But then the education system is part of the economic and political system, so that's no surprise.
I don't think it matters which gender is doing worse in education. If either girls or boys are falling behind in education then there is a problem.
Hopper wrote:
Sweetleaf wrote:
AspieRogue wrote:
Sweetleaf wrote:
I don't wanna read the article right now, but I can agree that sometimes males get the short end of the stick, especially with some of the weird specifics in pedophilia laws. I mean what the hell an 18 year old can get charged as a sex offender for life if he has sex with a 16 year old....even if they are dating, I mean WTF. But that is just one example...I think it should be more fair for sure its not like females never abuse males.
(Take note, Hopper & Vex) We need more aspie women with the same attitude as Sweetleaf.
Of course I mean even in my city I hear of homeless shelters that only accept females or transgender males and that bothers me since there are heterosexual males who can't get help because of gender I mean its blatant discrimination and if I went there I would probably say something about it and get myself kicked out.
Regarding paedophilia laws - yes. I remember reading of one case way back, an 18 year old male and a 16 year old female (what's more, the actual age difference being not much over a year, rather than nearer two years), had been going out for a few years, and the girl got pregnant. Because the boy was then put on the sex offender's register, he couldn't see his own child.
I think that close in age exceptions should still apply even when one party is above the age of consent and the other under the age of consent.
Hopper wrote:
I was kicked out of my home at 18. Whilst the local authority would help me, allocation of council housing (in the UK, 'council housing' is housing owned by the local authority) was based on points for vulnerability - all else being equal, a woman was considered more vulnerable when homeless than a man - not because a woman in herself is any less able to get through a night of rough sleeping than a man, but because of how other people would view a homeless woman as opposed to a homeless man. The central thing in all this, of course, is that any arguments over 'vulnerability' are beside the point, and would only serve to obscure the main problem - what was needed was a good housing stock and funding to help anyone who came to them homeless.
They should be helping all people who end up homeless, not making value judgements.
13 Oct 2012, 2:09 am
