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Comment by mantas | Hacker News Reader

You may want to do some research on this thing called „hormones“ and how they differ in both genders.

Hormones don’t raise kids in particular gender norms, don’t carve them a place in society, don’t feed them gender-based culture 24/7. They do have a physical impact, impact on sexual development, their sex, reproductive function, temperament, but gender is a human invention.

All those differences do impact roles in society. They let women breastfeed. They give men greater physical strength. Other biological differences make women become pregnant. These will affect roles in society.

I am a proponent of paternity leave. The counter argument is always based on biological differences. So are the arguments for not having women in many roles in the armed forces.

> gender is a human invention.

That is a tautology. It is by definition.

Where exactly is the physical strength of males necessary in modern society?

The only circumstance in which there are men strong enough to so something that women can't do is at the most elite level of athletics. Any role relevant to society that would require that level of strength, we have machines for, because the majority of men and women are not elite powerlifters, and because they probably need way more strength than is safe even for those elite athletes to require all the time.

And then yes women can give birth and breastfeed (though it doesn't seem like being raised on formula alone is much of a problem these days). I don't see why those biological features need to affect roles as much as (some) people seem to think they should.

People with different skin colours have different resiliences to sun exposure, but just because the sun is a big part of our life doesn't mean we NEED to shape society around those biological differences.

> Where exactly is the physical strength of males necessary in modern society?

Bricklayers? Much manual labour. Some women can do it, some men cannot, but far more men can do it than women.

> People with different skin colours have different resiliences to sun exposure, but just because the sun is a big part of our life doesn't mean we NEED to shape society around those biological differences.

We have very simple fixes for that - such as clothing and protective sun creams. The same does not apply to physical differences between men and women.

> I don't see why those biological features need to affect roles as much as (some) people seem to think they should.

Not as much as some people think they should. It really depends what specific views you are thinking of. There are important differences: for example, women do initially need more parental leave to recover from giving birth. I think its a good idea to give men as much, but with different timing. Pregnancy has huge physical effects for quite a long time.

It goes both ways too. There wold be real social advantages to having more men becoming nurses (which can benefit from physical strength) and teaching (so boys, especially disadvantaged boys, have male educated role models).

> We have very simple fixes for that - such as clothing and protective sun creams. The same does not apply to physical differences between men and women.

Brother do you hear yourself. Your key example, the thing holding your entire argument together was brick layers. Fucking... brick layers.

And you think we don't have anything to eskew gender differences? Brother, look around you. 99.9999% of jobs can be done by men and women thanks to modern technology. Including fucking war!

Because you know what's stronger than men? Guns. And you know who can hold guns? Women. So, there you go, that's why the US army accepts women.

// Where exactly is the physical strength of males necessary in modern society?

Almost every flight I take, a woman asks (or appreciates the offer) for me to help put her bag in the overhead compartment.

My wife appreciates that I can can carry a double stroller with the kids on it up a few steps.

The fact that you can't think of such examples might reveal more about you than about the necessity of strength in modern society.

While this is true, these are nothing burger examples. The world will not crumble if you don't help a nice lady put her luggage in the overhead compartment.

Yes, as a man, our "strength" is mostly for show and is redundant in modern society. Also most men are not even very strong because we live sedentary lives. Because - surprise! - 99.9999% of all economic activity has nothing to do with strength.

This isn't ancient Rome and you aren't a spartan. Most men are fatties sitting at an office job. They don't have, nor need, strength. They need statins and metformin.

There's lots and lots of jobs where physical strength makes a fuckton difference. I don't see construction workers, garbage people or figherfighters using exoskeletons yet.

Also, ask women how their mood and abilities swing during their cycles. Both menstrual and life cycle with menopause and stuff. Some have it easy, but many women I know have quite big swings in both cases. And yet modern society requires one to perform the same day in day out. Which works out pretty well for men, but for women... I'm not so sure.

There are women construction workers, garbage people, and firefighters. There are much better reasons why these fields have disproportionately fewer women than a biological barrier to the required level of strength.

I am interested to hear what career or societal role you think a women cannot or should not do because of menstrual related mood swings. Because it clearly isn't President of the United States or billionaire CEO.

There're always exceptions. But so far what I see it's 100-to-1 if not worse. And I'm not at all surprised that women ain't exactly keen of lugging around heavy weights. Especially due to damage it can do to women-specific health. Or reduced abilities abilities after childbirth for many women. Of course nowadays many women don't care about their reproductive health nor give births, so maybe we don't need societal norms around this anymore?

I don't think that women cannot or shouldn't do something. I see they don't exactly enjoy to suck it up and do the job regardless of their body needs.

We as a society used to tell boys to „man up“. Now that's frowned upon (and that's good). But now we started to tell girls and women to „man up“ and ignore their cycles. And both are just as bad. At least we should give teenage girls and young-to-middle-age women few extra days off school/work in a month. Scheduling might become a nightmare with irregular cycles though. Dealing with menopause for significant portion of women is awful too. But I've no idea how modern economy could deal. Besides giving them much more lax during that period in life. But on the other hand, if they get same pay, it's quite natural that their colleagues wouldn't be happy about it.

I somewhat agree with you, but I think there is an underlying cause. We are generally not accepting of individual differences, needs, and commitments outside work. We have improved in some ways (e.g. with regard to making adjustments for disability) but there is a long way go.

> Besides giving them much more lax during that period in life. But on the other hand, if they get same pay, it's quite natural that their colleagues wouldn't be happy about it.

More "lax" working conditions all round.

I think individual specialty and massive group specialty is somewhat different.

For individual specialty (be it skills/abilities or lack of them), people can choose career or life paths accordingly. E.g. I’ve met a dead/mute constructions dude. He specialized in line of work where he works solo. If I accidentally wasn’t home while he was here, I wouldn’t have ever noticed.

On the other hand when you have massive groups with some specialty that match similar pattern… Over time it becomes a „norm“. It's not like some people decided what gender norms we should have a millennia ago and rolled with. It was rather a society trying to accommodate some groups of people with some skills and abilities and gender norms becoming a thing were a side effect.

As for more lax working conditions all round, it would be nice. But I’m not sure how modern economy would handle that in a fair way. And once you start institutionalizing more lax conditions for certain groups… I want to see that shitshow.

I think many men should be much and much more careful about lugging heavy weight as well. This never ends well for their health either.

When was the last time you spoke with a woman other than your mother?

Nice insult. But what's your point? That women do not tend to have hormones-induced mood swings?

Our "gender based culture" wasn't imposed on us by space aliens; it's something we humans came up with ourselves. And given that basically every culture divides people by gender (as opposed to by height, hair color, or fingernail shape), it very much indicates that there is a biological component to gender.

> but gender is a human invention.

So you don't believe a person can be transgender, right?

What you call „gender norms“ is the result of society trying to contain said differences.

Physical possibilities are differences, drives are different, temperament and it's swings are different. Also many other differences. But hey, let's hide all the differences, strengths and weaknesses... And pretend everyone is equally good at everything.

We need equality, not sameness. Brute-forcing equality-through-sameness sucks on both sides. I'd say girls and women are more affected though. But men ain't taking it easy either. It's a hill I'm willing to take downvotes on.

Well prepubescent children have very similar hormone make up. That's why young boys have no muscles and have the same sort of body as girls. The only reason we can tell them apart at all really is because of long hair and the color pink.

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