Nope. I never said there was anything wrong with that.
BUT, what qualifies as a 'manly thing'... I know hunting, shooting, fishing (or metaphorical versions of the above)...?
I find it hard to see the world split into 'manly' and 'womanly' things.... surely that attitude doesn't help anything. Sure, be interested in what you're interested in, enjoy yourself, but don't start thinking you like them because you're 'manly' or a 'man'... a woman could like any of those things, or not... it just depends what you've been exposed to sometimes.
Manly things.
Sheesh.
Hunt Is on to Find Novels Women Most like to Read.
Newspaper article by Nigel Reynolds; Daily Telegraph, September 14, 2004
LIFE is full of difficult questions. Is there a God? Why is there always one unmatched sock left in the washing machine? Do men and women read different novels?
In an attempt to crack (half of) the easiest of these puzzles, the BBC will launch a Big Read-style poll today to try to find women's favourite novels.
In a preliminary poll, 400 women from the chattering classes (a mixture of academics, publishers, teachers and journalists) have picked a long list of 40 books that shares many titles with the long list for last year's non gender-specific Big Read exercise. The new list is headed by two fairly predictable heart-throbbing classics with female heroines - the Bronte sisters' Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.
It is highly improbable that men would have voted for Beloved by Toni Morrison, the black American radical writer, or for three titles by Jeanette Winterson but they easily might have picked The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Heart of Darkness, The Great Gatsby, Catch 22, Remembrance of Times Past and The Lord of the Rings, which won the Big Read.
Distinct feminist reads such as Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch and Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jardo not appear on the new list. The preliminary poll was held by Annie Watkins, a researcher at Queen Mary's College, University of London, and Lisa Jardine, professor of renaissance studies there. They gave the 400 women the task of naming a "watershed" book, one that was "a seminal female read" and a novel that had changed the way that women saw themselves, that was an inspiration to women but also one that "offered a confirmation of your own dilemmas" or that "gave you strength". It could be written by a man or a woman.
Miss Watkins said: "I do think that women prefer women writers. I think that it's about having an ally. I think it would be more natural for a woman to write strong female characters.
"But it is complicated. Men have their own image take on women that women wouldn't have and I am certain that women like that too."
An enduring fascination for great passions explained why Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights came out top, she said.
Two entirely different types of female reader identified with the heroines - the ones who admired the passionate, risk-taking and dangerous Cathy in Wuthering Heights and those who fell for the plain, unexciting Jane Eyre, who managed to triumph in love despite her ordinariness.
www.questia.com
Richie is far better with the baby than I. It's Richie he smiles at, who can stop him crying, who can comfort him and make him laugh. I wish HE got six months maternity leave! I HATE seeing Marley's face drop when Richie goes to work
I'm a good woman, I know it, but that doesn't mean I follow a tick-box of what it is to be a woman. I'm a woman, who happens to be me, who happens to like all the things I like, and still be a woman, but not as the opposite of a man... at least not in all ways.
(I'm not saying men have to have me with them when they go fishing or whatever. I'm not saying women and the men are the same. I'm not saying anything silly or stupid. I am saying that there is no such thing as a manly pursuit... or at least no such thing that could be seen to be *exclusively* for men, that a woman might happen to enjoy... other than things that biologically require a penis that is.)
Well, regarding pursuits...I say do what you want. It's not defined by your sex (in general) but more by your ability. One's no better than the other, but there are differences and to ignore them is to ignore reality.
<>
I never ignored them radio. You were the one who said that you enjoy 'manly pursuits'... I didn't mention anything about that. I was just asking you to define a 'manly pursuit'.
I'm not a moron. I know there are differences (many) between men and women (though not necessarily the ones everyone always suggests).
Also *fergal should take a break soon because she is going into overdrive* differences don't have to mean superiorities and inferiorities... they can just be *differences*. The problem comes when people suggest one is better than the other, or more worthy, or more interesting.
We're debating something that you are already well aware of. In short, I'm not a sexist. I do believe there are things that interest men more than women and vice-versa. I do not have feminine traits, I have no issue with those that do, male or female. That said, given the choice between gutting an elk and sewing dresses, I'll probably be looking for my knife. I do know how to sew though.
From AL Kennedy in the Guardian (sorry to be repetitive in my choice of reading material):
"Once and for all, writers are human beings - they are as different from each other as any other cross-section of humanity and the range of expression and interests between male and female writers is as variable and unpredictable as any sensible psychologist (or, indeed, human being) might expect. I've just finished reading Anna Karenina - I happened to know it was by a man, but I wouldn't have assumed it was by a woman, just because it dealt with affairs of the heart and the domestic lives of several interconnected families. I kept on reading it because it was good - quite frankly, I don't give a toss who wrote what I'm reading, as long as it's good. It gives me another one of my pains when somebody tells me that love stories, or domestic sto ries are somehow a women's speciality, when Raymond Carver and Richard Ford and Ernest Hemingway and lord knows how many men plunge into them on every side. As far as I am aware, human beings' homes are quite often domestic interiors and falling in love is something human beings do. Why would they not write about it ? Why make this sex-specific?"
Oooooooh radio, so that's the sort of thing you mean.
I understand.
I'd better tell you now that I grew up in a household where it was me and my dad and my little sister. My role model was my dad, my first job was as his assistant (he was a carpenter and a builder) and I can build you an extension to your house, hang new doors, fit windows, make things out of wood, decorate, tile a roof. Anything.
You could say I got those things 'from my dad', but the fact is I was able to do them, like them now, and they are part of me. Every time I've tried to be 'more female' it has made me sad and depressed because I am not 'more female' whatever that means. I am just me.
No.. but I have occasionally caught hold of an ultra long nose hair and yanked it off... leaving tears welling in my eyes.
Does that count. Hope so... I do so want to feel manly again.
If any of you lot worked for me!! Instant dismissal boys!! and the odd girl!, if there still are any girls on this high jack assed thread left.he ha he ha....cowboy!! I think it's time to turn up the heat ladies!!!
Grinning
Tai
It's all these gender qualifications that gets people confused about their sexuality.
Oh I don't like putting together a Harley from scratch and I like sewing - I must be gay!
Oh, I like carpentry and don't fancy wearing make-up - I must be a lesbian!
There is room for all sorts, is what I'm saying, and having certain activities as gender specific helps nobody.
(my point being is that you'd been tranied to like painting your nails and dancing round your handbag since you were a boy, you wouldn't think it wasn't manly.. tis all I'm saying)
I'm not arguing with you really. I'm just saying that when you have kids and you give them gender specific toys and gender specific colours from the day they are born, you cannot then say it's down to biology when they hit adulthood. You really can't.
Tai, darling:
Is being Head check-out chick at Walmart still considered a career over there........like WOW, how utterly suburbanite......Stepford rocks, yes?
Emily: My how you remind me of one of those pesky little Advanced Order chicks at a Mc Donald's drive through.....over and over and over and over!
Your always need others to reflect your own narcissistic rabble off of...What a sookie la la.... lol.
Oh, and Emily: One can actually purchase an artificial Vagina nowadays.....they're called MEN.....very fantastic-plastic and cheap......so how real's that?
Also, one can actually blow their nose for primordial stem cells, rather than set about debauching women for 'the foetus'! Stewth, you Poms and the Yanks will be worth an absolute fortune to the genome project.....especially if they discover them in all human waste...*HINT*?
How I wish Germaine Greer was active within this forum.....she'd carve all your arses into the pure patriarchal poly-waffle it truly is...again!
Liana, Fergal and Mandylifeboats are moraly excluded from my comments here, as at least they display SOME ORIGINAL thinking is going on upstairs!
But they'll attack anyway........that's cool.....go for it.....it's called progress!
Is it not gender specific to hang on like a terrier to an argument thats been and gone (I have frequently been accused of doing that)... I am so confused.
Pages