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Kepler
Joined: 24 Sep 2007
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 Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 8:50 pm Post subject: |
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Maybe it's not so bad in Sweden.
"The American concept of dating originates in high school � complete with prom and making out in the backseat of a car. In Sweden, in comparison, kids can�t get their driving licenses until age 18 but parents sanction co-ed sleepovers.
"The American rules of the dating game are quite straightforward: Guy asks girl on date, girl says yes if she doesn�t find guy�s shoes objectionable, guy takes girl out to dinner, girl interviews guy about his occupation and future earnings prospects, guy pays for dinner, guy walks girl to front door, girl invites guy in if he successfully passed the test.
"All of the above goes out the window when it�s time to start dating in Sweden. It�s not entirely clear who is supposed to take the initiative, who is supposed to pay and what is supposed to happen at the end. Usually, you give up trying to figure out the answers to these questions and just let the alcohol make all of the decisions."
http://www.thelocal.se/8903/20080614/ |
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Koveras
Joined: 09 Oct 2008
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| Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2011 12:17 pm Post subject: |
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| Here's a good title - Sex and Character by Otto Weininger. The pdf is online, but it's not for the timid. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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MollyBloom
Joined: 21 Jul 2006
Location: James Joyce's pants
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Kepler
Joined: 24 Sep 2007
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| Posted: Sat Jun 25, 2011 11:32 am Post subject: |
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It looks like men have still yet to be liberated from traditional roles and expectations.
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The possibility of losing your job is bad enough. But for men, unemployment status can also make it more likely their wives will divorce them, a new study finds.
Whether or not a woman had a job, however, had no effect on the likelihood that her husband would decide to leave the marriage, the researchers said.
The findings reveal that despite more women entering the workplace, the pressure on husbands to be breadwinners largely remains, according to researchers at Ohio State University.
In addition to upping the chances their wives would leave them, unemployed men themselves were more likely to initiate divorce � even if they reported being happy in their marriage � than guys with jobs. [6 Scientific Tips for a Successful Marriage]
Unlike unemployed men, unemployed women were less likely to initiate divorce than their employed counterparts. Employed women were more likely to initiate a divorce than women with jobs, but only when they were highly unsatisfied with the marriage.
"These effects probably emanate from the greater change in women's than men's roles," the researchers write in a forthcoming issue of the American Journal of Sociology. "Women's employment has increased and is accepted, men's nonemployment is unacceptable to many, and there is a cultural ambivalence and lack of institutional support for men taking on 'feminized' roles such as household work and emotional support."
A woman's unemployment status or decision to enter the work force is not a violation of any marriage norms. Instead, the researchers found that employment provides women with financial security, which enables them to leave a marriage when they become highly unsatisfied with their husbands.
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Yahoo News: Unemployment Can Spell Divorce for Men, But Not Women |
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Goochmon
Joined: 10 Sep 2009
Location: Gwacheon
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 9:12 pm Post subject: |
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I haven't read ALL of the 17 pages of debate here, I am not one with any background study of feminism. I would however, as an exercise like to propose what my life would be like should I take on a stereotypical female role in society. Take it as satire, it may pull up some issues or provoke some thoughts not considered. It is not intended to insult or marginalize anyone.
So my wife is a corporate lawyer, I went to university to study law as well, but I gave up my career to raise my children. I love being an at home dad, I love my kids and I am one hell of a great cook. I take pride in keeping a clean home, taking care of the bills and managing the errands. Lately there have been a few issues my marriage has been struggling with.
I suspect my wife is cheating on me, she spends all her time at work, goes out for drinks with her co-workers and is always "too tired" when she gets home stinking of booze and aftershave. She cut up my credit cards because apparently I'm spending too much money just trying to look good for her. Sometimes I think about leaving if I could but I have nothing other than my family. I have no where to go and no way to support myself, I couldn't leave my children and I couldn't take them with me. All my guy friends criticize me for being the Beta to her Alpha and I know they're just having a laugh but I just don't feel like I'm one of the boys anymore. At least now that summer is here I can take the kids outside and tan by the pool in the back yard. I like to invite some of the neighborhood at home wives over for afternoon cocktails. I wouldn't cheat on my wife but if I wanted to I certainly could. Sometimes I think my wife is jealous of me because of how well I get along with the other ladies on the street while none of them really associate with her.
No relationship is perfect but I always wonder what things would have been like had I decided to follow my career path and my wife raise our children.
THE END
I don't mean for any of this to be offensive, just something which might be humorous or thought provoking without being serious and argumentative. A lot of social issues that aren't blatant and visible, still exists in a much more subtle and complex way. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 10:23 pm Post subject: |
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Sweden really is the Saudi Arabia of Feminism.
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STOCKHOLM � At the "Egalia" preschool, staff avoid using words like "him" or "her" and address the 33 kids as "friends" rather than girls and boys.
From the color and placement of toys to the choice of books, every detail has been carefully planned to make sure the children don't fall into gender stereotypes.
"Society expects girls to be girlie, nice and pretty and boys to be manly, rough and outgoing," says Jenny Johnsson, a 31-year-old teacher. "Egalia gives them a fantastic opportunity to be whoever they want to be."
The taxpayer-funded preschool which opened last year in the liberal Sodermalm district of Stockholm for kids aged 1 to 6 is among the most radical examples of Sweden's efforts to engineer equality between the sexes from childhood onward.
Breaking down gender roles is a core mission in the national curriculum for preschools, underpinned by the theory that even in highly egalitarian-minded Sweden, society gives boys an unfair edge.
To even things out, many preschools have hired "gender pedagogues" to help staff identify language and behavior that risk reinforcing stereotypes.
Some parents worry things have gone too far. An obsession with obliterating gender roles, they say, could make the children confused and ill-prepared to face the world outside kindergarten.
"Different gender roles aren't problematic as long as they are equally valued," says Tanja Bergkvist, a 37-year-old blogger and a leading voice against what she calls "gender madness" in Sweden.
Those bent on shattering gender roles "say there's a hierarchy where everything that boys do is given higher value, but I wonder who decides that it has higher value," she says. "Why is there higher value in playing with cars?"
At Egalia � the title connotes "equality" � boys and girls play together with a toy kitchen, waving plastic utensils and pretending to cook. One boy hides inside the toy stove, his head popping out through a hole.
Lego bricks and other building blocks are intentionally placed next to the kitchen, to make sure the children draw no mental barriers between cooking and construction.
Director Lotta Rajalin notes that Egalia places a special emphasis on fostering an environment tolerant of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. From a bookcase, she pulls out a story about two male giraffes who are sad to be childless � until they come across an abandoned crocodile egg.
Nearly all the children's books deal with homosexual couples, single parents or adopted children. There are no "Snow White," "Cinderella" or other classic fairy tales seen as cementing stereotypes.
Rajalin, 52, says the staff also try to help the children discover new ideas when they play.
"A concrete example could be when they're playing 'house' and the role of the mom already is taken and they start to squabble," she says. "Then we suggest two moms or three moms and so on."
Egalia's methods are controversial; some say they amount to mind control. Rajalin says the staff have received threats from racists apparently upset about the preschool's use of black dolls.
But she says that there's a long waiting list for admission to Egalia, and that only one couple has pulled a child out of the school.
Jukka Korpi, 44, says he and his wife chose Egalia "to give our children all the possibilities based on who they are and not on their gender."
Sweden has promoted women's rights for decades, and more recently was a pioneer among European countries in allowing gay and lesbian couples to legalize their partnerships and adopt children.
Gender studies permeate academic life in Sweden. Bergkvist noted on her blog that the state-funded Swedish Science Council had granted $80,000 for a postdoctoral fellowship aimed at analyzing "the trumpet as a symbol of gender."
Jay Belsky, a child psychologist at the University of California, Davis, said he's not aware of any other school like Egalia, and he questioned whether it was the right way to go.
"The kind of things that boys like to do � run around and turn sticks into swords � will soon be disapproved of," he said. "So gender neutrality at its worst is emasculating maleness."
Egalia is unusual even for Sweden. Staff try to shed masculine and feminine references from their speech, including the pronouns him or her � "han" or "hon" in Swedish. Instead, they've have adopted the genderless "hen," a word that doesn't exist in Swedish but is used in some feminist and gay circles.
"We use the word "Hen" for example when a doctor, police, electrician or plumber or such is coming to the kindergarten," Rajalin says. "We don't know if it's a he or a she so we just say 'Hen is coming around 2 p.m.' Then the children can imagine both a man or a woman. This widens their view."
Egalia doesn't deny the biological differences between boys and girls � the dolls the children play with are anatomically correct.
What matters is that children understand that their biological differences "don't mean boys and girls have different interests and abilities," Rajalin says. "This is about democracy. About human equality." |
I have no problem with children being allowed to play how they want and "be who they are." That's not what's happening here. Quite the opposite, this institution is trying to artificially shape children into a very specific type of person. |
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NovaKart
Joined: 18 Nov 2009
Location: Iraq
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| Posted: Mon Jul 04, 2011 8:22 am Post subject: |
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| For a society so intent on gender equality I wonder why it took them so long to get rid of male conscription which only ended last year. What an awful double standard. |
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recessiontime
Joined: 21 Jun 2010
Location: Got avatar privileges nyahahaha
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| Posted: Mon Jul 04, 2011 9:44 am Post subject: |
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| Goochmon wrote: |
I haven't read ALL of the 17 pages of debate here, I am not one with any background study of feminism. I would however, as an exercise like to propose what my life would be like should I take on a stereotypical female role in society. Take it as satire, it may pull up some issues or provoke some thoughts not considered. It is not intended to insult or marginalize anyone.
So my wife is a corporate lawyer, I went to university to study law as well, but I gave up my career to raise my children. I love being an at home dad, I love my kids and I am one hell of a great cook. I take pride in keeping a clean home, taking care of the bills and managing the errands. Lately there have been a few issues my marriage has been struggling with.
I suspect my wife is cheating on me, she spends all her time at work, goes out for drinks with her co-workers and is always "too tired" when she gets home stinking of booze and aftershave. She cut up my credit cards because apparently I'm spending too much money just trying to look good for her. Sometimes I think about leaving if I could but I have nothing other than my family. I have no where to go and no way to support myself, I couldn't leave my children and I couldn't take them with me. All my guy friends criticize me for being the Beta to her Alpha and I know they're just having a laugh but I just don't feel like I'm one of the boys anymore. At least now that summer is here I can take the kids outside and tan by the pool in the back yard. I like to invite some of the neighborhood at home wives over for afternoon cocktails. I wouldn't cheat on my wife but if I wanted to I certainly could. Sometimes I think my wife is jealous of me because of how well I get along with the other ladies on the street while none of them really associate with her.
No relationship is perfect but I always wonder what things would have been like had I decided to follow my career path and my wife raise our children.
THE END
I don't mean for any of this to be offensive, just something which might be humorous or thought provoking without being serious and argumentative. A lot of social issues that aren't blatant and visible, still exists in a much more subtle and complex way. |
I have some very very bad news for you:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-467390/Househusband-backlash-high-flying-wives-ditch-men-em-em-wanted-stay-home.html#ixzz1PwDHA5s1 |
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