Interesting read! I think part of what the author considers femininity is simply politeness. Women are conditioned since birth to make ourselves more palatable to everyone, so it could simply be our own internalized sexism to attempt to soften uncomfortable truths. And I do this myself, but it doesn’t stop me from speaking my mind, just in a more polite way. I’m an analytical person in higher Ed that values free speech, but some conditioning is hard to overcome. I agree, that men being outwardly argumentative doesn’t help either. Hopefully we can simply educate others in civil discourse.
I would add that it’s not merely internalized sexism leading women to be polite. We are judged far more harshly than men are for any lack of politeness. Sometimes we can see perfectly well that our behavior is driven by conditioning in certain circumstances, but we decide it’s not worth it to be impolite because the consequences for us personally will suck worse than the alternative. Still though, very bad for “getting to the truth” either way.
This is great. I do feel like developmental psych talks can be full of softball 'compliment sandwich' questions but I've never been convinced that the more adversarial mode in econ or philosophy is really generating more enlightenment or just creating opportunities for folks to show off. Plenty of "I have more of a comment than a question" vibes.
Thanks, Paul. This is the best take I’ve seen on this topic. One idea I would add: both the stereotypically male and female styles have characteristic strengths and weaknesses, not only in truth-seeking, but in other areas like parenting or cooperation. Under this view, there are healthy or virtuous ways to be characteristically male (e.g. brave, independent, principled), as well as unhealthy or "toxic" ways to be male (vengeful, domineering, aggressive). The same holds for femininity. In fact, one of the simplest ways to understand wokeness is that it provides benefit where it promotes stereotypically feminine virtues like empathy and caring, but causes problems when it enables unhealthy manifestations of these qualities, such as gossip, social exclusion, selective empathy, or mama bear aggression. This is also the simplest lens to understand the MAGA movement – it's a very unhealthy version of masculine behavior, lacking the male virtues.
I like Galef’s work, but I think she focuses too much on individual level solutions. It would be nice if each individual were optimally truth-seeking on their own. But if most people have one or another mindset that isn’t optimal for truth-seeking, it seems to me to be better to design social systems to enable these individual mindsets to work well collectively. I think this is what Adam Smith says about capitalism, and Philip Kitcher and Michael Strevens say about science, and Elinor Ostrom about traditional management of collective pool resources.
Yes, that's a good point. A friend of mine makes an even stronger argument: that while a soldier mindset is bad for individual truth-seeking, a community composed of opposing soldier mindsets can, under the right conditions, be even better than a world of scouts. (In the same way that under capitalism, individual selfishness might lead to a better world overall, even better than if everyone were more selfless.) I'm not sure I buy it, but it's worth taking seriously.
I’m glad I finished the piece before commenting. Halfway through I thought,”Half the population has a suboptimal mindset, and the other half has a suboptimal mindset. Does talk of an optimal mindset mean anything at all?!?!”
Then Paul knocks it out the park with a third option. The Scout Mindset. Thanks for the great read🧐
The thing is, everything slightly over the line of the system of patriarchy can be seen as wokeness. There can be a man who is the embodiment of patriarchy and if he decided to wear a really light pink shirt one day in a year or use the words "please" and "thank you" a bit too often, he would likely be perceived as more feminine and then the next step will be getting questioned about his judgment. Or a woman who fits a little more into the stereotypical "femininity", let's say, wearing too much makeup or not speaking about something —sometimes even an idea of her own— as if it's the only truth, refraining from interrupting someone while they're speaking might (always do seem like that, I'm just being politically correct over here) seem as a submissive trait, which in fact in a civilized world should be the most basic thing not to do. I think it all lies in the line of an internalized system. The question is: Are you on the line or have you crossed it?
Thanks for this! If typical attributes of both men and women render them unsuited to truth-seeking, humans in general must be pretty bad at it (as confirmed by everyday experience). You reject androgyny as a solution...but where do "scouting" styles come from? Scouts are also men and women. Human curiosity is the starting point, but it is generally too easily satisfied. What do you think are the motivations that keep a truth-seeker on track?
This is somewhat tangential to the "truth pursuit" agenda, but it seems to me that the collective knowledge is in an utterly bizarre denial of female-coded ("feminine"?) ways of performing and effecting aggression, violence, hostility and dominance. Almost as if they've never met a sample group of typical 14 year old girls.
On the topic itself, though.
I think OP is spot on with the claim that "standard masculine" and "standard feminine" modes of behaviour in social institutions are equally antithetical to the "pursuit of truth" and "rule of law", which are a product of Enlightenment / rationality /reflexivity -- ie modernity, itself a fairly unique not to say perverse mode of thinking and being. By framing the problem in gendered terms Andrews seems to -- hilariously -- have bought into the rad fem idea that those (roughly Enlightenment coded) ways are somehow inherently masculine.
I'd buy into a slightly different idea, though, that the pursuit of truth and the rule of law ARE indeed threatened by, for the lack of better label, more "common sensical" stances, whether aggressively militant or softly manipulative/conformist. But it's not a gender or sex war, if I was looking for a metaphor I'd say it's more a PFC vs limbic system conflict.
Thanks a lot for this article. I think this topic deserves more discussion. An excellent article on the broader topic by Francis Fukuyama is: Women and the Evolution of World Politics
Interesting read! I think part of what the author considers femininity is simply politeness. Women are conditioned since birth to make ourselves more palatable to everyone, so it could simply be our own internalized sexism to attempt to soften uncomfortable truths. And I do this myself, but it doesn’t stop me from speaking my mind, just in a more polite way. I’m an analytical person in higher Ed that values free speech, but some conditioning is hard to overcome. I agree, that men being outwardly argumentative doesn’t help either. Hopefully we can simply educate others in civil discourse.
I would add that it’s not merely internalized sexism leading women to be polite. We are judged far more harshly than men are for any lack of politeness. Sometimes we can see perfectly well that our behavior is driven by conditioning in certain circumstances, but we decide it’s not worth it to be impolite because the consequences for us personally will suck worse than the alternative. Still though, very bad for “getting to the truth” either way.
This is great. I do feel like developmental psych talks can be full of softball 'compliment sandwich' questions but I've never been convinced that the more adversarial mode in econ or philosophy is really generating more enlightenment or just creating opportunities for folks to show off. Plenty of "I have more of a comment than a question" vibes.
Thanks, Paul. This is the best take I’ve seen on this topic. One idea I would add: both the stereotypically male and female styles have characteristic strengths and weaknesses, not only in truth-seeking, but in other areas like parenting or cooperation. Under this view, there are healthy or virtuous ways to be characteristically male (e.g. brave, independent, principled), as well as unhealthy or "toxic" ways to be male (vengeful, domineering, aggressive). The same holds for femininity. In fact, one of the simplest ways to understand wokeness is that it provides benefit where it promotes stereotypically feminine virtues like empathy and caring, but causes problems when it enables unhealthy manifestations of these qualities, such as gossip, social exclusion, selective empathy, or mama bear aggression. This is also the simplest lens to understand the MAGA movement – it's a very unhealthy version of masculine behavior, lacking the male virtues.
I like Galef’s work, but I think she focuses too much on individual level solutions. It would be nice if each individual were optimally truth-seeking on their own. But if most people have one or another mindset that isn’t optimal for truth-seeking, it seems to me to be better to design social systems to enable these individual mindsets to work well collectively. I think this is what Adam Smith says about capitalism, and Philip Kitcher and Michael Strevens say about science, and Elinor Ostrom about traditional management of collective pool resources.
Yes, that's a good point. A friend of mine makes an even stronger argument: that while a soldier mindset is bad for individual truth-seeking, a community composed of opposing soldier mindsets can, under the right conditions, be even better than a world of scouts. (In the same way that under capitalism, individual selfishness might lead to a better world overall, even better than if everyone were more selfless.) I'm not sure I buy it, but it's worth taking seriously.
It’s how our legal system is structured! And I think William James makes a version of this argument in “The Will to Believe” as well.
I’m glad I finished the piece before commenting. Halfway through I thought,”Half the population has a suboptimal mindset, and the other half has a suboptimal mindset. Does talk of an optimal mindset mean anything at all?!?!”
Then Paul knocks it out the park with a third option. The Scout Mindset. Thanks for the great read🧐
The thing is, everything slightly over the line of the system of patriarchy can be seen as wokeness. There can be a man who is the embodiment of patriarchy and if he decided to wear a really light pink shirt one day in a year or use the words "please" and "thank you" a bit too often, he would likely be perceived as more feminine and then the next step will be getting questioned about his judgment. Or a woman who fits a little more into the stereotypical "femininity", let's say, wearing too much makeup or not speaking about something —sometimes even an idea of her own— as if it's the only truth, refraining from interrupting someone while they're speaking might (always do seem like that, I'm just being politically correct over here) seem as a submissive trait, which in fact in a civilized world should be the most basic thing not to do. I think it all lies in the line of an internalized system. The question is: Are you on the line or have you crossed it?
Also, I have to add that, I love Lucy.
The one point in the author's favor is that she is, herself, a woman who seems unsuited for the pursuit of truth.
Thanks for this! If typical attributes of both men and women render them unsuited to truth-seeking, humans in general must be pretty bad at it (as confirmed by everyday experience). You reject androgyny as a solution...but where do "scouting" styles come from? Scouts are also men and women. Human curiosity is the starting point, but it is generally too easily satisfied. What do you think are the motivations that keep a truth-seeker on track?
I appreciate this take.
I think most of the intense reactions to the piece are more due to the current political dynamics than in response to just the piece itself. Even typically very calm, Cathy Young, responding very strongly to it: https://www.thebulwark.com/p/right-grand-unified-theory-blame-women-helen-andrews-great-feminization
This is somewhat tangential to the "truth pursuit" agenda, but it seems to me that the collective knowledge is in an utterly bizarre denial of female-coded ("feminine"?) ways of performing and effecting aggression, violence, hostility and dominance. Almost as if they've never met a sample group of typical 14 year old girls.
On the topic itself, though.
I think OP is spot on with the claim that "standard masculine" and "standard feminine" modes of behaviour in social institutions are equally antithetical to the "pursuit of truth" and "rule of law", which are a product of Enlightenment / rationality /reflexivity -- ie modernity, itself a fairly unique not to say perverse mode of thinking and being. By framing the problem in gendered terms Andrews seems to -- hilariously -- have bought into the rad fem idea that those (roughly Enlightenment coded) ways are somehow inherently masculine.
I'd buy into a slightly different idea, though, that the pursuit of truth and the rule of law ARE indeed threatened by, for the lack of better label, more "common sensical" stances, whether aggressively militant or softly manipulative/conformist. But it's not a gender or sex war, if I was looking for a metaphor I'd say it's more a PFC vs limbic system conflict.
Thanks a lot for this article. I think this topic deserves more discussion. An excellent article on the broader topic by Francis Fukuyama is: Women and the Evolution of World Politics
Author(s): Francis Fukuyama
Source: Foreign Affairs, Vol. 77, No. 5 (Sep. - Oct., 1998), pp. 24-40
Published by: Council on Foreign Relations
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20049048
Accessed: 29/08/2009 21:51