(On a sidenote, eridu did claim that “treating women different than men” is impossible, because the patriarchy is pervasive and omnipresent. Even when you think you’re treating women the same as men, you aren’t—which is why he’s against liberal feminism.)
A very small piece of evidence that eridu might have a point: A while ago, I was faced with a person who I didn’t know at the time was a transexual in transition. I felt like I didn’t know what to do or say to them. (I’m reasonably sure I just looked blank at the time, or at least we’re on decent terms since then. I haven’t mentioned that reaction to the person, and they’ve since tranisitioned to a standard gender.)
It did feel to me as though I had separate behavior sets for dealing with men and with women, and was at a loss when I didn’t know which set to apply. I haven’t explored how the sets might be different, but maybe I should.
It did feel to me as though I had separate behavior sets for dealing with men and with women
Me too, but 1) the sets do overlap by a substantial amount, and 2) I think it’s more a case of potential sexual partners vs everyone else than of women vs men—with women I’m not sexually attracted to at all, I behave pretty much the same as if they were male (except for different cultural norms such as—in Italy—kissing them on the cheek instead of shaking hands, which I don’t consider any more relevant that the use of different pronouns). (Edited to replace ″romantic″ with ″sexual″ -- I’ve introspected myself and ISTM that the set of people with whom I’d use the first set of behaviours almost exactly coincide with the set of people with whom I’d want to have protected sex if they offered, and promised not to tell anybody and to try not to let that affect our future interactions in any way—which is a somewhat broader criterion than me being willing to have a monogamous romantic relationship with them.)
FWIW, I doubt I treat men I’m attracted to and women I’m attracted to the same way. Though introspection is a decidedly unreliable source of information about this sort of thing.
There’s much less commonality in how I treat people I’m not attracted to. Or at least less salient commonality. I really don’t know what to say about it. I mean, sure, there are women I’m not attracted to whom I treat differently than men I’m not attracted to… but there are also men I’m not attracted to whom I treat differently than men I’m not attracted to. Introspection fails to provide even unreliable hints on that question.
Also, the fact that there exist both men and women I’m not attracted to doesn’t make me particularly unique; I expect that’s true of everybody. So I wouldn’t have felt especially motivated to share that data point, even were it crisper. You had started out drawing the distinction between “potential sexual partner vs everyone else” and “women vs men,” though, so I thought the perspective of someone for whom “potential sexual partner” included both women and men (well, in principle, anyway; after 20 years of monogamy it’s somewhat theoretical) might be relevant.
Your comment was also immediately voted down. I brought it back to neutral karma. I haven’t been following this conversation, but it doesn’t seem worthy of immediate downvotes...
I guess you missed the part where people (not me personally, it was just made pretty clear) are downvoting everything in this thread in the hope that everyone would stop talking?
I’d considered the possibility, but the fact that the parents were significantly net-upvoted made it seem churlish to attribute downvotes simply to the thread it’s in. It seems more plausible now that you (and at least one other person) have endorsed it.
A very small piece of evidence that eridu might have a point: A while ago, I was faced with a person who I didn’t know at the time was a transexual in transition. I felt like I didn’t know what to do or say to them. (I’m reasonably sure I just looked blank at the time, or at least we’re on decent terms since then. I haven’t mentioned that reaction to the person, and they’ve since tranisitioned to a standard gender.)
It did feel to me as though I had separate behavior sets for dealing with men and with women, and was at a loss when I didn’t know which set to apply. I haven’t explored how the sets might be different, but maybe I should.
Me too, but 1) the sets do overlap by a substantial amount, and 2) I think it’s more a case of potential sexual partners vs everyone else than of women vs men—with women I’m not sexually attracted to at all, I behave pretty much the same as if they were male (except for different cultural norms such as—in Italy—kissing them on the cheek instead of shaking hands, which I don’t consider any more relevant that the use of different pronouns). (Edited to replace ″romantic″ with ″sexual″ -- I’ve introspected myself and ISTM that the set of people with whom I’d use the first set of behaviours almost exactly coincide with the set of people with whom I’d want to have protected sex if they offered, and promised not to tell anybody and to try not to let that affect our future interactions in any way—which is a somewhat broader criterion than me being willing to have a monogamous romantic relationship with them.)
FWIW, I doubt I treat men I’m attracted to and women I’m attracted to the same way. Though introspection is a decidedly unreliable source of information about this sort of thing.
What about men you’re not attracted to and women you’re not attracted to?
There’s much less commonality in how I treat people I’m not attracted to. Or at least less salient commonality. I really don’t know what to say about it. I mean, sure, there are women I’m not attracted to whom I treat differently than men I’m not attracted to… but there are also men I’m not attracted to whom I treat differently than men I’m not attracted to. Introspection fails to provide even unreliable hints on that question.
Also, the fact that there exist both men and women I’m not attracted to doesn’t make me particularly unique; I expect that’s true of everybody. So I wouldn’t have felt especially motivated to share that data point, even were it crisper. You had started out drawing the distinction between “potential sexual partner vs everyone else” and “women vs men,” though, so I thought the perspective of someone for whom “potential sexual partner” included both women and men (well, in principle, anyway; after 20 years of monogamy it’s somewhat theoretical) might be relevant.
Did this comment go from +2 to −1 in, like, five minutes? Why? (Upvoted back to zero—I don’t think it deserves being negative.)
Your comment was also immediately voted down. I brought it back to neutral karma. I haven’t been following this conversation, but it doesn’t seem worthy of immediate downvotes...
Apparently? Not sure why.
I guess you missed the part where people (not me personally, it was just made pretty clear) are downvoting everything in this thread in the hope that everyone would stop talking?
I’d considered the possibility, but the fact that the parents were significantly net-upvoted made it seem churlish to attribute downvotes simply to the thread it’s in. It seems more plausible now that you (and at least one other person) have endorsed it.