Re: Patriarchy: Re: What Matriarchy?
Gerold Firl (geroldf@sdd.hp.com)
4 Sep 1996 20:18:29 GMT
In article <50a7jc$rfu@indus.unm.edu>, mycol1@unm.edu (Bryant) writes:
|> In article <504kgg$2ek@bubbla.uri.edu>, Susan <rgq101@uriacc.uri.edu> wrote:
|> >Well, there's Myths of Gender, by Anne Fausto-Sterling. She'e done a lot
|> >of work in the area of the biological basis of gender, particularly the
|> >more nasty abuses of sociobiology.
|> Thanks. I wonder, though, about the characterization of sociobiological
|> analyses as "nasty abuses." Just because I haven't read any that I found
|> fairly described that way doesn't mean that they're not out there, of
|> course, but I've seen such a huge backlash against evolutionary
|> psychologists' treatment of grief and rape, for example, that I suspect
|> many such "abuses" are really little more than readers'
|> misunderstandings.
I haven't seen any of these famous sociobiological "abuses" either, but
you might check out _the whisperings within_ by barash. It's a
popularization which does go for the sensationalist angle. Not bad, in
my opinion, but he does go beyond the cautious conservatism of the
acedemic scholar.
Phillip Kitchener, a bloody ignorant philosophy prof at ucsd (it's
embarrassing) attempted to write a scholarly critique of sociobiology
(I forget the name; I can look it up if you're interested. It's
copiously referenced to give the appearance of scholarly rigor, but
very poorly reasoned). In it, kitchener tries to take-on wilson and
dawkins, but can only make headway with barash.
|> >Sometimes, I think scientists use their supposed
|> >objectivity as a weapon to say things they know will make people angry.
I prefer the approach bryant advocates: the topics which make people
angry are precisely those which need to be discussed objectively. The
fact that they make you angry shows that they are a problem; the best
way to find a solution is by rational discussion.
You object to having a rational discussion of why rape exists, since it
might hurt some peoples feelings, right? How do you feel about a
rational discussion of war? Starvation? disease? All these things cause
unhappiness and suffering, but you don't object to objective analyses
of their causes; why not?
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=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=---- Gerold Firl @ ..hplabs!hp-sdd!geroldf
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