Are prison populations an argument for why women are better than males?
Here in the US prison populations are predominantly represented by a huge bias or tendency to be male-oriented.
Therefore, for the sake of talking about society or culturally, does that fact that prison populations are predominantly male mean or imply that females are socially superior to males?
Therefore, for the sake of talking about society or culturally, does that fact that prison populations are predominantly male mean or imply that females are socially superior to males?
Comments (238)
The prison population as such does not tell us much. We'd need to account for factors like sentencing bias, and the different ways society treats men and women at the margins of society.
I sense a connection with your current "Unconditional Love" thread.
Now, what does "socially superior" mean? Do you mean you think maybe women are nicer than men? This is when I always ask, sarcastically, "Do you know any women?"
Would you be comfortable for someone to characterize women negatively based on perceived behavioral and gender stereotypes? If not, you should think twice about doing it with men.
Wallows -- are you trying to start a fight?
The prisons also have a lot more black men than white men. Does that imply that white men are socially superior to to black men? Prison populations tend to come from poverty. Does that mean that poor people are inferior to wealthy people? Etc. Etc. Etc.
Quoting T Clark
An apt observation.
@Wallows: Males and females are at least somewhat differently endowed and then they are socialized to be more divergent. Nature and Nurture are both responsible. Bear in mind, though, that the divergence is partial. Males and females overlap quite a bit.
I'm glad that you and your mother are getting along well, but it would be intellectually unsound to suppose that most women are like your mother.
In the much wider world outside your home men and women display a wide variety of traits, some appalling, some angelic, some good, some bad, some overtly aggressive, some passively aggressive, some moral, some crooked, etc. Sexual divergence is common in the animal kingdom. That male and female humans are divergent should not come as a shock.
There are biological, sociological, historical, psychological, etc. reasons why men end up in prison more often than females.
One (maybe recent) theory is that men are more variable than women. We tend to be dull and stupid more often than females, but we also tend to be brilliant geniuses more often than females. (That's why there are so many men in this esteemed philosophical forum, and so few women. The cream of the male crop has risen to the top of this particular milk pail.) Consequently, men end up in prison more often and win more Nobel Prizes than women. In the middle there's not much difference.
So, it follows that there should be more men in prison and more men in professorships and high priesthoods. In the middle, most men and women live lives of quiet, middling, desperation.
Yes; but, that doesn't change the fact that there are more men in prison than women.
I mean, how do you explain that?
Are YOU trying to start a fight? :P
Like you said, plenty of historical and social reasons for these things.
Kinda hard for women to get prizes and be leaders historically when they were actively banned from participating in activities that lead to such things.
The ratio of men to women in prison and in crime statistics isn't a stereotype, it's a fact.
I balk at suggesting men and women are unequal. But I simply do not support or understand wanting to ignore the facts of the world and pretend men and women behave the same way when they clearly do not.
It's much more productive to try and assess WHY they do and what we can do to encourage both sexes to do more of the good stuff and less of the bad.
I explained this already. Men are stronger and more aggressive.
Neither of these traits are necessarily “bad” or “good”. What is your point?
Men are more likely to engage in state-prohibited behavior than women are, and society tends to be more concerned about the kind of violations that men engage in than what women engage in.
There are class and race issues here too. Poor black men are at the bottom of the opportunity pool, more often than not. The easiest way for poor black men to find opportunity is through crime. In poor white societies, poor white men also resort to crime to find opportunity.
Poor women engage in crime too, but are less likely to engage in crime that is intensively policed.
But isn't it bad if these traits lead to more violence and harm in the world?
I would be very careful where you go with this. As has already been alluded to; drawing conclusions of superiority based on inverse proportion to prison population is likely to offend.
And then he could end up in prison, too.
It depends where, when, why, etc. these violent behaviors show up.
If one bunch of violent bad guys is on the loose (bad) a bunch of violent good guys need to suppress them (beneficial). ISIS, al qaeda, or Boko Haram isn't going to be eliminated by a bunch of pacifists. If you want to seize a continent or two from the natives, something more vigorous than a tea party will have to be executed.
We generally want our side to come out on top, and in a world where there is never enough to satisfy everyone, somebody is going to be oppressed and somebody else is going to be on top. It takes a certain amount of violence (sad to say) to stay on top.
Sensible Imperialistic Powers carefully sort out worthwhile fights from pointless fights. Reckless Imperialists don't and get bogged down in unwinnable fights.
I thought he did a good job of explaining. Also, the OP wasn't asking why more men are in prison than women. It asked whether the fact that more men were in prison means women are better people.
How well do you know @Bitter Crank? Of course he's trying to start of fight.
Ah, yes, endless wars and fighting. That's always so productive.
I don't really want to get too bogged down in how the "good guys" are the ones who created the "bad" ones in cases like ISIS... suffice to say that I think there are better, and yes pacifist solutions to these problems. More killing just makes more terrorists.
In any case, even if there were some cases in which (male) aggression were beneficial, it's still obvious that in most cases, historically and globally, it's very very bad news.
:rofl:
As I said in a previous post, the OP isn't about why men are the way they are, it's about whether it means women are better than men.
It can be about both issues, in my opinion.
Women have never been banned from art; they have been taking drawing and painting classes for many, many years. Yet, how many great woman painters can you name? It isn't that they can't paint well; it's just that a small number of men have been on the cutting edge. Women, for the most part, haven't. (The men are the top. Most women painters are de trop, to paraphrase Cole Porter, a superior male lyricist composer.) Yes, there are people like Clara Schumann, Lise Meitner, Marie Curie, Rosalind Franklin, Georgia O'Keeffe, Coco Chanel, Leni Riefenstahl, Jane Austin, Angela Merkel, Margaret Thatcher, and of course, the great Ivanna Trump. Exceptional exceptions.
About a year ago, a poster suggested we develop technologies so that men were no longer needed. Women would be fertilized technologically. Then steps could be taken stop new males from being born. Existing men would be allowed to live out their lives. It set off a real fire-storm of angry discussion. One poster flipped out and made a lot of noise about how it reflected on society's attitude toward men. He really went crazy and the thread was ultimately deleted.....Oh, wait. That was me.
Don't worry, they upped the dosages on my meds, so I'm ok now.
Sure. You're the original poster, so I have no objection. It's just that BC and my posts were in response to the original question.
I think the two in this case are related: it may be that social and historical influences have (generally) made women better in this respect.
As Bitter Crank has pointed out, in other respects men have benefited from these influences.
I remember that thread!
Ah, yes. The high point of my philosophical life so far.
I still remember the anger and outrage in your posts due to that thread. But, I learned something from your reaction. That even though, women haven't been treated (and in some cases still are) equally, that it's a double wrong to feel guilty about it as a male who cares about their children or jobs or homemaking just as much as the unfairly treated women have. I mean no sarcasm or wittiness in this post.
Of course their related, but, as we philosophers like to say, one is descriptive and one is normative. One is is and one is ought. They shouldn't be confused with each other.
Women were never banned from art as a quaint pastime. They were expected to give it up once married and of course never pursue it as a serious career. And we'll never know how many great female artists were simply lost to history because the art world simply would not seriously consider the work of a female artist. We would never have had Middlemarch if Mary Ann Evans hadn't called herself George.
Fun fact, one of the reasons poetry has been populated by so many females for so long is that it is one of the few arts that can be written "on the go" while having little ones playing and nagging and interrupting all day long. Picasso wouldn't have had time for all that if he'd been busy child-rearing.
I can tell you are being sincere in your response.
From my point of view as a man, it's not that I "feel guilty as a male." It's that I expect to be treated with respect.
Things didn't go well. The earth was bombarded, and life on earth was destroyed. Most of the life boats failed. It took a tremendously valiant, heroic effort to survive. By the time the last life boat found refuge on a big piece of the moon, all of the men had died saving the remnant of the species. Fortunately, a lot of genetic lab equipment had been included, and the remaining 7 women cloned themselves, hence Seven Eves. Eventually the geneticist eve figured out how to build a Y chromosome. 5000 years later, earth had been reseeded, the atmosphere was blue sky again, and everything worked out fine. Never mind how, this is science fiction after all.
By the way, two of the 7 women were exceptional devious destructive bitches.
Source for this "fact?"
I heard that in a graduate lecture a few months ago. Give me a moment to see if I can find a source.
I've read some of Stephenson's books. I didn't really like the science fiction, e.g. Snow Crash, but I loved Quicksilver.
Michelangelo to his children in the studio: "Allontanati da quella statua finita, schifoso moccioso!" ... "Get away from that finished statue, you fucking brats!"
Why do you suppose Karl Marx spent so much time in the British Museum Reading Room? "Don't you dare mess up that manuscript, you fucking brats!"
They do take up a considerable amount of time and brain power!
I'm afraid I cannot find the exact quote at the moment. Though I do hope common sense would tell you that raising 7 children pre-washing machines and refrigerators while continually pregnant was a job that left little time for leisurely painting or writing War and Peace.
Camille Paglia is a good author to read on the subject. Very saucy. 200 proof.
No, that doesn't really sound like common sense to me. How many men ever had lives where they didn't have to work long hours in the fields or factories? We don't need to take this any further. If you do find the source I'd like to take a look at it.
I'm a big supporter of keeping to the original post. If you, the original poster, thinks it has gotten off track, you have the right to try to set things straight.
A) Typically throughout history laborers have not been the ones creating art.
B) A day job ends at the end of the day. Motherhood is 24/7.
As I said, if you have information to provide beyond "seems to me," I'd be happy to look at it.
Eternal cynic.
I somehow doubt you'd listen to any sources I provide here either.
Despite my wariness of your cynicism, here's an article which supports my post. This article speaks specifically about journaling as a female literary outlet, but the social structures and constraints are the same.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/24780526?read-now=1&seq=3#page_scan_tab_contents
I am the least cynical person I know. I am, however, skeptical. It bothers me when you make a claim with potentially significant social implications with no support except your impressions. You've been around the forum long enough to know that is a common attitude here.
Quoting NKBJ
All I could get access to was an abstract. It is generally related to gender roles in literature, but I didn't see anything that backed up what you claim. It's not even that I think you're wrong, you just haven't provided any support for your position.
Journaling!
Journals, diaries, and the like are usually NOT of interest as "literature". Pepys journal is valuable as an intimate view of everyday history. Some journals, whether written by men or women, also are interesting in that way. Some are interesting as religious material, or psychological material, and so forth. I love Pepys's journals, but they aren't literary in the usual sense of the word. But let's face it: they are also a lot more interesting than a lot of formal literary product.
You might want to investigate the American author, Tillie Olsen (1912 -2007).
Back in the good old days when the University of Minnesota's radio station, KUOM, was part of University Extension, (now it just plays whatever current music students want to hear) I heard Tillie Olson read some of her own work. From one angle it was a long whine about how children, children getting sick, children having inconvenient needs, money problems, house work, and so on got in the way of her literary career. More charitably, her report is entirely reasonable.
A married working class woman with children had and still has chances of literary success just a little better than a snow ball's chance in hell--not for lack of talent, but for lack of uninterrupted time and freely available resources.
I haven't read any of her books; here is a piece you can sample immediately. As I stand ironing...
There are so many factors that warrant discussion to fully answer the question of why there are fewer female prisoners than men, but I can at least start you off with an explanatory evolutionary perspective:
As @Bitter Crank pointed out, populations of men and women have a certain amount of internal "divergence" (a tendency to display varied traits across different individuals). Let's assume for the sake of discussion that people who are in prison are there because of ultimately genetically programmed deviance (we can leave the nurture discussion for another time; I'm dealing with the "nature" side).
Just about any human trait can be measured in populations as a distribution curve (statistically). Let's use height as an example. On average women are shorter than men, but men have more variance in their height. Their distribution curves on a graph charting the frequency of different heights look like this:
Why is there more variation in the male population you ask? There's a fairly strong evolutionary argument that helps explain it:
Women have wombs (an evolutionarily critical human organ), and wombs have certain physiological requirements to be functional: hips need to be a minimum width; metabolism needs to be capable of supporting pregnancy, etc... On top of this, women are typically the primary child-rearers, and rearing children demands a particular kind of personality to be successful (patient, caring, etc...) (now we're getting closer to the crux of the thread).
The set of tasks that evolution is optimizing women for don't change a great deal; much of their energy is imperatively invested in a body that can support the necessary sex organs. Meanwhile, men of any size, shape, and personality are capable of having a working penis, and using it. Instead of growing big tits and big asses, evolution is free to roll more dice with us in order to ensure that inter-generationally we can adapt to a wider set of changing environments that require different kinds of tasks. For instance, height is beneficial in mostly open landscapes (savannah, plains, hills), but it is decidedly not useful in dense forest or jungle (for obvious reasons); we should expect to see height correlate with environment in this way, and we do!
In short, men are expendable compared to women (only a few men need actually reproduce, whereas our population numbers and growth are bottle-necked by the number of available wombs), and evolution therefore uses them as such.
It's true that men and women have the same average I.Q, and it's also true that there are more extremely high IQ men than there are extremely high IQ women (and there are also more men of extremely low I.Q). Evolution knows that women need to be within a certain range to be good parents, but it doesn't know what kind of man will be most optimal for the future environment, so it covers more bases.
If crime is at all the result of genetics, then we should see more male outliers than females. (and what is a criminal BUT a behavioral outlier?).
--------
If this perspective interests you at all, there's a wider field of study with many such useful models that are really highly insightful. I've reccomended this (free) Standford lecture series here before, and I'm proud to do so again!
DNA plays an undeniably important role, but so too does environment.
I am very skeptical of this type of simplistic story-telling about evolution. There is not this sort of one-to-one correspondence between traits and evolutionary "causes." Your explanations don't seem very plausible to me.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
I know you're using this as a metaphor, but still, evolution don't know nothing.
You can register to jstor for free to read the whole article.
And that's patriarchy.
Monday was devoted to laundry. She had a wringer washing machine, but no water heater. All the water had to be heated on a stove, carried to the washing machine, and then carried outside. All o the clothes were hung outside to dry. She prepared noon dinner for self, children and husband - the main meal of the day. Then house cleaning.
Tuesday was ironing. Wednesday - no major chores. Maybe small laundry on Thursday; Friday ironing. Saturday, bread baking. Sunday, major dinner preparation for family.
9 people to support, no car, minimal plumbing, minimal conveniences, coal burning space heater (they're dirty), oil stove in kitchen, extensive canning in the summer, and so on.
Women of her time (and even more so before her time) and her station in life could not pursue non-essential work. There was simply no time and energy to do more.
My two parents both worked very hard to provide a steady solid home environment. They were successful. But neither of them had much time for anything else.
The people who occupied the New York literary scene, people like Dorothy Parker or Mary McCarthy, were not burdened in the same way. Parker's publisher asked her why she hadn't produced anything during the last several months. Her excuse was "somebody was using the pencil." She wasn't swamped with housework and sick children.
They're not my explanations, I'm just relaying the fruits of applying an evolutionary perspective to human behavior. Sexual dimorphism and changing frequencies of traits are a part of the fundamental building blocks of Darwinian evolution (well described and well observed):
If traits are heritable, if they can vary in degree (such as height), and if they impact future reproductive success, then natural selection will act upon them.
That DNA has an impact on behavior is not exactly debatable. You can try to argue that nurture is more important in determining psychological outcomes, but you can't argue that the principles I've outlined don't also apply.
But it still has a kind of "predictive power" that essentially emerges from the "stored data" which DNA represents.
I have no problem with that. It's the story-telling about how specific traits result from specific evolutionary effects that bothers me.
Okay, yes, I agree with all that. What is your point?
I don't believe there is such a thing as "patriarchy", but if there is such a thing the proof wouldn't be in the lack of recognition anybody -- male or female -- gets for their journaling. Most people who do believe in patriarchy think that there are few women composers, famous authors, great painters, and so on because they have been suppressed, oppressed, and repressed. Fanny Mendelssohn is probably a better example of "patriarchy". Fanny, Felix Mendelssohn's sister, wrote between 400 and 500 compositions, and is largely unknown. Clara Schumann, wife of Robert Schumann, was a recognized composer and performer on her own merits. She doesn't get a lot of air time either.
Sigh. I was merely amplifying the point that working class women, one of whom I observed at close hand for years, didn't have much opportunity to pursue literary careers. That was Tillie Olsen's complaint -- without independent wealth from some source (husband, inheritance, good luck, etc.) it was very hard to have a literary career. Poor women just had to work too hard.
A) Some journals are written with a large audience in mind.
B) the article I link to says that men who pursued journaling most often did so apologizing for doing something so feminine.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Is or ever was? Cause if the latter, I think you may be beyond reason.
You're right. Sorry if my previous post seemed flippant: I'm currently responding while nkbjJR is crawling over me. :joke: can't get a break from them brats even in the 21st century!
Traits are derived from evolution. Look at 100 dogs: they all exhibit very similar traits. Why do they all have the same traits (like the ability to follow the human gaze)? Because they all carry the same traits established by evolution. These aren't all inflexible behaviors, of course. They can be quite plastic.
Story telling, as you put it, is just a shorthand method of describing evolution. A process which has been going on for a billion years is too slow to point out events. We can describe how an animal is changed by breeding (silver fox experiment, development of better milk cows, the fast growing chicken fryer, etc.) because those events have been under human control for a relatively short interval of time
So, do take the story telling with a grain of salt. Throw out explanations that run along the lines of "evolution was working toward an ape that could run fast." No. Evolution doesn't have destinations, it only has vague tendencies.
Kapesh?
First - I have no way of knowing how plausible it is and I doubt you do either. If you want to set me straight on that, please do.
Second - You didn't present it as a possible, plausible explanation. You presented it as fact.
Soooo.... When women weren't allowed to vote or own property or husbands were allowed to beat their wives that was called....?
Sure, I believe that all organisms on Earth come from a common ancestor and that they developed from that ancestor based on genetic changes interacting with the environment. That's called evolution by natural selection. The problem with the story-telling is that 1) evolution doesn't usually work in such a simplistic way, and 2) even if it does in a particular case, there usually no evidence for a particular chain of causation.
And no, evolution doesn't have "vague tendencies." It doesn't have any tendencies.
Quoting T Clark
You're objecting to a moot point (I might be wrong about the specific causes of height variation, but my point is that adaptive variation exists); I said we should expect to see height correlate with environment, and we do! I'm not wrong that we do see differences in the height distributions between different ethnic groups, and I never suggested that the causal factors I supposed are the only ones in existence. That said, environment must be a factor of some kind in genetic selection for height. You haven't added to, or taken away, anything meaningful from my original post.
Eyeballs have evolved separately dozens of times in the grand history of life on earth. We might say that evolution has a tendency to innovate and refine eyes when evolving life finds itself in a light filled environment. Creatures found in isolated caves often have no functional eyes because they have never needed to evolve them in the first place, or because their inter-generational lack of use has degraded the eyes their ancestors once had.
Evolution is the very tendency of life (or things) to adapt and optimize, to change, according to the environment it finds itself in.
Life as men and women knew it.
I'm not lauding the lack of women's suffrage, or women's lack of control over wealth (that condition was not universal), or husbands beating wives (that wasn't universal either), and so on. The relationship between men and women varied over time and place. The favored ancient society we know most about (and we don't know all that much) -- Athens -- appears to be pretty repressive toward women. On the other hand, Aristophanes' Lysistrata (performed in the same Athens) depicts women as persons with executive agency. (The wives went on a sex strike to stop a war.)
Some clay tablet records from trading cultures in the Levant show women running their own independent businesses. Rome was a mixed bag, as were the various barbarian tribes.
What is objectionable about the term "patriarchy" is that it is a retro-projection of current dissatisfactions, applied to most of history. People: men women, adults, children, slave, free, rich, poor, able, hobbled, etc. have always both accepted the world as they have found it and lived within the existing paradigm. It doesn't mean that there was an active patriarchal regime making sure that women were kept in their place.
We know that some people were definitely concerned about women's place in the world. The Apostle Paul was quite concerned that women should stay in their place, at least in church. Paul, of course, was quite influential on one particular western institution. I doubt very much that his view of things was unopposed in his own time.
It sounds like you do believe in patriarchy but you just don't want to call it that. Either way, sounds like we believe the same things.
Back to journaling: journaling has historically been considered a feminine occupation and men (i.e., those in charge of what became "the canon") decided it didn't have literary merit because of that. They did not decide that on the basis of the actual merit of the journals written by women who otherwise were, let's call it "discouraged" from writing anything of more "traditional" or "masculine" literary value.
The fact that women have worked against such odds historically and have made it into the canon DESPITE such opposition tells me that women are indeed very much capable of greatness and that the ratio of great women and great men would be much more equal had the playing field been level for the past millennia.
That's an interesting anecdote. And certainly some women are more criminal than some men. Yet the fact remains that most criminals are men.
I agree. My cousin and I both got straight A’s in high school. She did better on the ACT and for her intelligence and hard work she got a full ride to Marquette University. I had to settle for half of my tuition being paid at Loyola University Chicago. She’s a brilliant accountant, but she probably could’ve done anything. I’m an immoral lay-about, so she’s a better person than I am.
:rofl:
Well, at least you can be honest about it.
It’s been tough to admit over the years that I haven’t been the best person; but as I get older I don’t seem to care all that much anymore. :razz:
Does this ''docile'' nature influence other aspects of a person, like intelligence, creativity, etc.? I don't know. I wish it did because the world would be a much better place.
Aren’t the vast majority of serial killers men? And rapists? And drug dealers (although there might be closer to parity here)? The mob bosses? Mob enforcers? It shouldn’t surprise us that men tend to desire power more so than women, so there are more men in power. This shouldn’t be the case, though. Just look at where a history of rule by men has gotten the planet. Maybe we should let the women have there shot at fucking up as the men have. It couldn’t get any worse, and I would bet we would see improvements (dare I say).
It’s been a long time since women ‘had’ to have children. It might be difficult for them to refuse that possibility but they have had that choice for a long time. Art does take a big commitment, just look at the men who chose it over their family. Children or art, that’s the choice.
Again, you didn't just say that adaptive variation exists, which I would have no problem with, you gave a detailed description of specific body differences between men and women and claimed they were caused by specific differences in their social and biological roles.
Quoting VagabondSpectre
It is my understanding that this is not true, so I checked. The underpinnings, infrastructure if you will, of reactivity to light have been around since just about the beginning. The photoreactive proteins and structures and some of the light-reactivity related genes are present in some of the currently living organisms near the split between vertebrates and invertebrates. It's not as if vision just popped into existence in completely unrelated organisms by coincidence. There was history involved.
Evolution by natural selection, as envisioned by Darwin, only represents adaptation by specific organisms to changes in specific local environments. There is no master plan or pattern. No tendency. Dolphins and sharks both have fins and are streamlined, but it's not because nature tends toward fins and streamlining. Evolution has no direction. No guiding principle.
I think men can obviously be quite dangerous to others. Most men are not afraid of women, mentally or physically. A lot of men aren’t even afraid of each other. But I don’t think this means women are necessarily socially superior, it’s just that their weapons of choice are different.
I don’t think that’s how evolution works. It’s almost the other way around. Genes that randomly create eyes that cope with light contribute to survival, they don’t adapt to conditions. Unless I’ve misunderstood your post.
I haven't read this thread, just want to express an opinion which is factually true, yet politically in some disrepute.
From the fact that both the prison population and the Nobel prize winner population skew strongly male; we can conclude is that men have a much wider distribution of achievement. When I was in grade school I noticed that the "good girls" just did what they were told, and "did well" in school on that basis. Women cluster to the middle ... not too many serial killers, and not too many Nobels.
Now yes I should mention for the record that I am well versed in my sexual politics. I lived in the SF Bay area most of my life. So of course I'm perfectly well aware that the latter fact is very much due to the awful sexism of science. As a math person I know that when Hilbert was trying to argue the faculty into allowing Emmy Noether to become a privatdozenten at the University of Göttingen, at that time the finest center of advanced math in the world -- after all Hilbert was there -- Hilbert said, before the faculty senate: "After all we are a university, not a bathhouse!" Hilbert lost, they wouldn't let her in.
So I get all this. But still. Isn't is possible that there is some innateness in the fact that women's achievement level tends to cluster in the middle; and men's is all spread out ... a lot of criminals and a lot of geniuses. Personally I believe it's the testosterone. Drives you to the extremes.
Is it really considered bad form to mention this? I gather it is. So be it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmy_Noether
It probably is bad form to mention it, but I think you may be right.
If by "bad form" you mean unsubstantiated claptrap based on unsystematic, biased observation, then yes, it is bad form. Don't try to pretty it up with some sort of truth to power act.
You only appeared to object to a particular sub-point involving height, which wasn't actually about sexual dimorphism. That women exhibit a smaller variance in height, and a smaller average height, than men is the observation that the main thrust of my post attempts to explain (the point in question was explaining the context for adaptive divergence). The raw observation is undeniable, and the fact that men are capable of reproductive success across a wider range of heights really isn't that controversial. Evolutionary thinking along these lines is never a certainty, and though we often have mathematical models that can back them up, they're still quite persuasive without them.
Your posts always seem as if I'm attempting to oversimplify things, when in reality my intention is to provide models and questions that beget a deeper level of attention to complexity. Why is there more variance in the height of men than the height of women? You can say it's all directionless happenstance, and that we can never begin to know, but I say an evolutionary perspective (a la commonly cited reasons for sexual dimorphism) can get us started down a usefully predictive road.
Show me the skulls of a male and female of a species I've never encountered, and I might be able to predict something insightful about the behavior of the organism. Are the skulls identical in size and shape? Are there any unique features? Is one thicker than the other? If skulls are identical, we can surmise that the both the male and female of the species have a similar phenotype. That they both share the same general form suggests that they both perform the same set of tasks in general. "Pair-bonding" species which involve both parents contributing to the rearing of offspring generally have males and female that are hard to distinguish from each-other. "Tournament" species which involve male-male competition for access to reproductive females (and where the male might not contribute to the raising of the offspring) typically have very high levels of sexual dimorphism. There are exceptions, and a spectrum of causal factors to consider (humans are a notable in-between; we exhibit a high variance in sexually dimorphic traits), but at least we have something to work with.
Quoting T Clark
Photosynthesis was around since nearly the beginning (or maybe at the beginning), but photosynthesis does not an eye-ball make. You start with a patch of photo-sensitive cells on or near the skin of an organism, which can confer the advantage of knowing what direction light is coming from. Over many stages of subsequent alterations, each with their own adaptive benefit, refined eye-balls emerge. Different styles of eye-ball have followed similar evolutionary steps across a range of different organisms. Is any of this objectionable?
Quoting T Clark
The guiding principle is "what works" in the long run. "Fins" are a trait we tend to see in creatures that have evolved in aquatic environments. The principles are ultimately physical; fins happen to work well in water to create locomotion.
"Evolutionary convergence" (the tendency for similar adaptations to evolve in different organisms that exist in similar situations) is not controversial.
No, I don’t agree with that. There is no trial and error. It’s really deformities existing at opportune moments.
So you disagree.
Being tested out in the real world (to find out what deformity works (i.e: to find out who can more successfully reproduce)) is the trial and error I'm referring to.
The emergence (the sustaining of) and slow optimization of new "deformities" happens because inter-generationally they result in higher reproductive success.
I take it you don't know much about what it's like to be a woman.
Okay, but when you talk about trial and error it sounds like you mean intention.
Is being tall a deformity? If everyone else wasn’t at the time, then yes. It wasn’t an intention.
Is that a question or statement?
It’s the finding out bit I can’t get around, but maybe it’s just the words you’ve used.
Actually, ignore everything I’ve said. I think I’ve picked up the disease of this forum; just nitpicking. I’m sure we both know what evolution is.
I wasn’t talking to you. If you’re going to respond to something I say at least try saying something that isn’t completely vacuous.
But the life in each individual is beyond the categories and the fictions. Realizing that is to understand what freedom really is.
If you want to have a private conversation with someone, then PM them. This is an open discussion thread, so by participating here you are tacitly giving consent to all forum members responding to you.
In any case, I'll take your rudeness to mean you don't actually have anything to counter. :)
An observation, so technically the latter.
For example, your post just assumes that women do have a choice in having children in this day and age, when the reality is that these choices are limited to varying degrees according to geographical location, education, class, race, and many other factors.
Also, why is it that a woman must choose between children and a successful career? Men have never had to do that.
And to this day, men are less burdened by having children then women are, because women do the bulk of the work.
(And, yes, I'm generalizing. There are exceptions for everything I said.)
Of course I cannot help you if you assume “aggression” and “physical strength” are universally “bad” traits.
You either assume I’m not all that sharp or you were, for reasons known only to you, stating the blatantly obvious. Either way you’ve not presented anything for me to “counter”. Go ahead and make a point and maybe I’ll think it’s worth responding to.
I’m here to concern myself with being “polite” or “rude”. I merely stated that if you are going to reply to a question I pose then say something of substance rather than throwing a pointless question at me, maybe?
You said:
Quoting I like sushi
In my response I was trying to make a point that these traits are leading to very many bad things. So, just because the traits may not initially be bad, they do necessarily cause a lot of harm in the world. In which case we DO have to examine these traits. If men weren't so aggressive, they wouldn't cause so much harm.
That's just aggression showing through. Since there's no reason to be rude, I kindly ask you to treat me with respect. It doesn't add anything to the conversation, and just impedes our ability to exchange ideas.
If there is non-conlficting data from a broad spectrum of studies I’d ne VERY interested to see them. I understand perfectly well such assumptions may be wrong. I VERY much doubt being aggressive and strong alone makes someone “bad” or harmful to society.
Like someone else mentioned if we said the same about “young black men” then I imagine myself and many others would be quick enough to point out several other factors are being neglected.
To add, I don’t think it much different to argue that men are better than women because women are weak and lack enough aggression - there are very few people who would despute that men are on average more aggressive than women and stronger. If women were of equal strength then I think we’d certainly see a lot more women in prisons. If the top positions in society were mostly occupied by women we may also see a rise in the number of women in prisons - I’d imagine the strength factor would be more of a factor as well as societal dispositions towards alcohol.
Women look different, act different, talk different, and smell different than men. Those differences result in entirely different behaviors, some of which result in disproportionate incarceration rates for men.
You're just reciting the universal rule that all ex-wives are crazy. The other side of that rule is that all ex-husbands are assholes. That's what the wives say, not me.
I do know what I'm talking about. I said she was crazy and you were an asshole, and you confirmed both of those things. I didn't say you didn't get along with her.
An interesting distinction worth discussing. It might be that the universality of the rule is based upon reality. You have no counterexample, considering you meet the stereotype.
You sound like you still love her.
You meet the rule perfectly. In my case, though, my ex is crazy, but I am lovely beyond compare, so there is at least one instance of the rule not being applicable.
She’s the mother of my children. I don’t hate her. The love of my life is my wife, Crystal, whom I’ve been with for twelve years.
My point was that it is generally a fallacious Rule. It just happens to be true in our case.
Introducing names into this discussion tends to humanize the people we're talking about, and I'd rather think of them as hollow literary constructions we can ridicule. Also, telling me that this crazy ax murderer of yours mothered your children also doesn't help me in keeping her in non-human status.
:lol: You’re funny.
As the saying goes, you're not even wrong.
How so? I didn't mean to troll. Maybe it comes out somehow; but, you can't deny the facts presented in the OP, which is the point being made here.
Oh, I don't see it a pejorative? I mean, men do populate prisons (not only the US) moreso than women do.
The facts presented in OP?
I disagree with @VagabondSpectre, I think he's just being kind. Nothing in your OP suggests that you were trying to have a discussion about "why" you "wanted" to discuss what it meant. You specifically wanted to debate whether women are better/better socially than men because more men are in prison than women.
You've framed a ridiculous and shallow interpretation as your OP, the fact you presented is irrelevant. Here's yet another poster who thinks the ways they interpret facts are just part and parcel with the fact. You presented absolutely no evidence for why your assertion that this fact is even relevant to your argument, you presented no evidence or argument as to why this fact alone would demonstrate anything or to what degree.
This isn't your first thread which does this, most of your threads do. They get attention because of the titles in the same way people crowd around a fist fight. I can't even see any discussion of the OP in this thread, just people fighting about whether one gender is superior or how genders have been mistreated and other similar crap. You should be stopped from doing this, that's what I think and I hope some mod agrees.
Sopped from what?
Making threads like this, which just poke the hives nest, warn first then revoke the privilege to make threads or ban.
I don't get your drift, though, OK.
It’s not just this thread. The whole level of discussion generally is pathetic and petty.
Yes we did. There are posters who seek to further a discussion and there are others who shut it down. Discussions just never go anywhere. There’s no exploration, no original ideas, no testing of thoughts.
I think that's just how philosophy forums are, I've visited many and usually what you can hope for is that there will be a handful of posters you enjoy talking to.
Well, Judaka, then they’re not really about philosophy. People on this forum probably regard themselves as intelligent people but their attitudes belie that. There are posters who try to explore sensitive ideas and straight away the street fighters enter the room, we know who they are.
Sorry, that’s just letting people off lightly. You’re right,they are not special. There needs to be more humility and more genuine curiosity.
I think philosophy is really something best done alone, I just use forums to see my own ideas in a different light.
You should see what the forum is truthfully, determine your feelings about posting here and then accept what happens within the parameters of that. My understanding of philosophy forums is that most of the people here are not here to learn, they're here mainly because they want to either share their ideas or teach.
If you want to learn without being taught, discuss things with humility, you really need to identify who's going to do that with you. The only thing you can always expect is that people will disagree with you, that's why I like to come here and look for valid critique on my ideas, I know people will try their best to show me I'm wrong most of the time.
You’re an older person, aren’t you? You should’ve realized by now that you can’t control people, expecting them to conform to your ideals. I think a part of wisdom is accepting the world as it is. Otherwise you are just banging your head against a wall, and that only hurts you, leaving the wall (world) unaffected.
The wider distribution of "lots of awful, lots of great" among men than among women is unsubstantiated claptrap? It's obvious to anyone who looks, and it's been verified in study after study.
Well, here's how you "substantiated" it previously:
Quoting fishfry
"Substantiate" means to "provide evidence to support or prove the truth of." What evidence have you provided other than your memories of the good girls in school and offhand claims about serial killers?
Why not try asking a woman who she thinks is extraordinary? I would bet that she might surprise you. Perhaps men get distinguished because it’s mostly men doing the judging.
Superior in what sense? Impulse control? Less inclined to use drugs?
Careful. You might start something even more ugly than the OP. :wink:
Also, what of the seemingly fact that fathers tend to be harder and tougher with their sons than with their daughters? What does this bring out in males as they come of age?
My ex-wife’s father was abusive and hard and tough with her. Perhaps she learned to be maladjusted where most fathers treat their daughters more gently? Just a thought. Discuss.
I just read the sequence of the discussion
Yes, all of that.
I think Bitter Crank offered you the best explanation....
Quoting Bitter Crank
I don't disagree with the wisdom @Bittler Crank has bestowed us; but, how do you argue with the fact that women are more reluctant than men to engage in promiscuous activity?
Well, if you're implying there is some inherent inclination to avoid "promiscuous" criminal activity I think there are environmental factors that are influential but not necessarily biological. But I don't think this makes women superior.
Let's drop the superior/inferior thingy for a moment. If women are less likely to engage in dangerous behavior, then doesn't that make them better rather than men at being in government positions?
You write well and I'm interested in the things you have to say, but I think your "Is criticism of the alt-right inconsistent?" was just as much "poking the hives nest" as this one is.
And again, “dangerous” behaviour is not necessarily “bad” or “good” behaviour. The human needs to be bold some circumstances and reserved in others. Neither is “better” than the other. Surely you can accept that? If not I don’t really know what else to say other than you appear to want to justify whatever your position is by acting against natural inclinations.
When it comes to leadership I do think it makes sense to have some kind if King and Queen dynamic (meaning to have both men and women in positions where they can offer up their own different social perspectives). This does play a role in most world leaders with their husbands and wives providing personal council and a counter balance to their own perspective.
Ideally it would be great to have governments led by a politically astute couple, but the chances of that happening are probably not great. It woudl be VERY interesting to see two opposing parties led by husband and wife! I would imagine then that each party would be taken more seriously in that case rather than acting like the opposition is an “enemy” rather than as a protective force against making too bold or too much of a reserved political decision.
Women are at greater risk of adverse consequences than are men as a result of promiscuity. Pregnancy and childbearing have been one of the leading causes of women's deaths up until ... 1920, in the industrialized world. In the 3rd world it cans till be quite dangerous. Pregnancy and childbearing carry a greater social stigma when pregnancy results from promiscuous activity. At the very least, getting pregnant and bearing an unwanted child is highly inconvenient.
"Purity" has always been a bigger deal for women than for men -- an emphasis coming from men more than women (maybe). (I want to screw around for a few years then I want to marry a virgin. Well, there's a famous contradiction. This may be less true now than in the past.)
Quoting Wallows
So what? Risk aversion or risk tolerance has nothing to do with morality or goodness. It's probably a gene-influenced trait much more than a choice. Missionaries tend to be tolerant of risk; so do stock brokers. So do farmers. So do lots of people, male and female.
Trying to make women out to be inherently better than men on the basis of common traits is, to use the technical term, stupid.
Men and women both engage in behaviors which are morally salutary and morally corrosive.
How many kind, decent, moral men have you known? Maybe you just haven't known enough of them.
I just love stirring up bee hives. Poke, poke. :naughty:
Thanks but I am saying Wallows is a provocateur who is just as in, only, interested in causing a commotion with his threads. I'm not against sharing controversial opinions but this thread is a rudderless, free-for-all filled with people provoked by his outrageous title and comments. I think everyone will leave worse for it. I've said my piece and continuing past this point wouldn't benefit anyone.
No.
How many of you are good dancers?
I hate to be the jerk Nietzschean who's actually been violent and been in the game and been in prison(well, no I don't), but there are higher "states of being" than keeping the peace and reasonable discussion. Just like Nietzsche, I can't respect a god that doesn't dance. Just like Heidegger, I believe that war is superior to peace. The noble class has always been the warrior class (well, probably not) for a reason.
I'm not denying that discretion is often the better part of valor. I also would rather have sex than fight.
But really, I have to take the fact that I am a violent male seriously and try to use it in constructive ways. The last time I was violent, I took down a guy bigger than me who was assaulting female staff at an institution. Then the male staff showed up. They were saying to me afterwards simultaneously "thank you" and "really, you can't do that".
The other thing is that under adrenaline, you revert to how you have trained/past experiences. I know what the zen warriors were talking about with "no mind". You don't think, you just do. It's very liberating, and I have a hard time taking seriously people who haven't experienced that.
No, no, that's just it: it is very possible to control yourself if you've been trained; in fact if you're doing well, you feel the ultimate, non-thinking, robotic flow--total control of the situation. But coming down from adrenaline is a bitch. I get all shaky and anxious.
There is a huge difference between violence from anger and violence "because I have to". I've only twice in my life used violence from a place of anger and it's not at all the same feeling. It's my belief that emotions probably evolved to help us as a social creature, and I've done much self-analysis of anger and find it's always because I think some social norm has been violated ("they can't treat me like that"). Higher brain functions tell me there are no objective social norms and so I should expect them to operate for me. Rage is totally different from the sort of reptillian ruthlessness (and yet, you know when to stop) that happens when you appraise a situation instantly and realize violence is necessary.
The second time, a guy was harassing my wife at a bar. I just acted without thinking. I should’ve just informed the bouncers and got him kicked out instead of resorting to violence.
I just happened to run across the exact kind of double-bind thinking that certain people exhibit on the subject of gender characteristics. I was perusing the Opinion section of today's NY Times ... the call it opinion to distinguish it from the rest of the paper, which they want you to believe is "fact." Well nevermind that. There was a list of articles with titles and short blurbs.
One said:
[i]It’s Dangerous to Be a Boy
They smoke more, fight more and are far more likely to die young than girls. But their tendency to violence isn’t innate.[/i]
So ok! Once the SJWs have reformed society, there will be equal numbers of men and women in jail and among the science Nobel laureates. Because boys are nasty and bad, but with proper feminized child rearing, we can fix that.
And two article down we find:
[i]
What Happens When Women Stop Leading Like Men
Jacinda Ardern, Nancy Pelosi and the power of female grace.
[/i]
Ah, so women have inherent qualities such as "grace," which is presumably unavailable to men.
So which is it? Are we all the same except for thousands of years of social conditioning, which the social justice crowd will soon fix? Or are there certain qualities that are more natural to one gender than the other? [Assuming for the moment that there are two major genders, much like the two major political parties; although there are many others that we could choose to join].
It seems to me that certain people like to argue both sides of this issue depending on which gives them rhetorical advantage.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/30/opinion/sunday/boys-men-violence.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/30/opinion/women-leadership-jacinda-ardern.html
The very question is offensive. Males are much more than male criminals, so they shouldn't be judged by that measure.
I'm wondering how to delineate between the fact that males are more representative of prison populations and the fact that women don't.
Can one not draw some implications from this state of affairs?
I'm sure you can rightly draw [I]some[/I] implications from that, but "males are socially inferior" isn't one of them. I think you have a problem in this area. First it was basically that older people are wiser, more kind, more mature. And older women are motherly. Now it is men who are socially inferior and women who are socially superior. These are offensive and poorly formed conclusions. You should be more careful and more precise.
What I find a little odd is that you are yourself a relatively young male. Are you an inferior, uncaring, unwise, immature, violent criminal? Do you think of yourself that way? Do you think of others in that way, just because they happen to be relatively young and male? Do you have an inferiority complex or something?
I find these sort of statements from you on such matters offensive, and not because I am relatively young and male. If I was relatively old and female, I think I would still find them offensive.
Not sure what you're trying to say. Are you saying I'm doing what you describe above? If so, I don't see how.
I don't think I said that males are absolutely inferior than females. But, yes, they can be inferior in some regards.
I didn't say that either. I quoted exactly what you said and commented on it. That they aren't absolutely inferior doesn't address the point, and that in some regards they can be inferior doesn't address the more specific point either, so your reply effectively says nothing.
That's fine.
No it isn't, it's a logical problem.
Trolling is prohibited here.
Yes you are. Do you understand the logical problem I explained, or you do you require further explanation?
It's not that difficult to understand, so you must be trolling.
Not trolling.
The alternative isn't much better. You're telling me that you can't spot the logical problem in responding to my point about a supposed social inferiority with a point about absolute inferiority and inferiority in some regards?
Can you spot the logical problem in responding to a point about red cars with a point about plastic cars and some parts of cars?
I'm sorry, I don't see your point here.
Okay. I'm going to stop feeding you now and walk away.
That's fine.
Still the facts are that males are incarcerated disproportionately with respect to females, rendering any projected male typical hierarchy of superiority or inferiority completely and utterly irrelevant to the point in question.
So said the fox in Aesop's fable.
Quoting Wallows
The point in question was about a supposed social inferiority. I addressed the point in question. You responded to my point with a fallacy of irrelevance followed by trolling.
I don't know who brought up this notion of male/female superiority or inferiority. It's just dumb.
Might have been me actually...
All true. No denying that.
I already stated that the superiority inferiority division is irrelevant in this thread, where others thought I was trying to make such a division.
Yeah that was badly worded. Should have read,
Instead of comparing the two, can something be learned from females that makes them less representative of the prison ratio of females to males.
Or something like that.
It stopped raining so all the mud is dry and there's nowhere to wallow. Sad. Now I have to wallow in my piss. Ehh.
No time to wallow in the mire;
Come on, baby, light my fire,
Try to set the night on fire.
Songwriters: James Morrison / John Dens
I've been thinking about this discussion and I want to look at it from a different angle. About a year ago, there were a series of discussions on the forum that helped me realize I have a lot of unexamined assumptions and underdeveloped ideas about what men's and women's roles are and how men are seen in our society. I found myself writing things and realizing that I didn't really have a lot to back up my thoughts. I found those discussions really helpful.
Upshot - no matter the quality of the original post and the motives of the poster, this discussion has had a lot of value for me. You've been ranting a bit about banning this and deleting that and the low quality of the forum. The forum means a lot to me. I've found that my writing has improved and I think more clearly since I've participated. Seems like maybe you're expecting more than that. It's probably an unrealistic expectation.
I didn't say this forum was low quality, Brett did. I've posted on about four different forums thus far and this one is by far the most active. Each one has their own weird posters that you really want nothing to do with as well as people who are interesting and have good ideas. For me, I can tell when a post has been thought out, researched and really understood the topic and I can tell when people are just replying for the sake of it. A lot of BC's posts are great because they bring information into it that nobody else will, there are quite a few other good posters here too, even ones that I've yet to agree with.
I'm not against discussing women or men either, even women vs men, it's something which everyone has a lot of opinions about and I'm no different. As S said though, this was a clickbait thread which is just trolling people. It was never going to and hasn't created any kind of interesting debate because what is there to even talk about with this kind of OP and title? I'm not going to seriously debate that topic with anyone.
I post in philosophy forums for three reasons:
1. Improve my writing/Expression of ideas
2. See what kind of criticism people have for my ideas/How well I can respond to that criticism
3. Learning to listen to others and respond appropriately (in a way they accept).
1 and 3 are deceptively difficult, especially when you want to post without proofreading and spending too much time writing comments. 2 is hard, miscommunication occurs all the time and people are dealing with very different perspectives than me. I have to be the judge for whether the criticism was valid and whether I responded well, which requires me to be as impartial as I can be. It's all worth my time though and I'm glad forums like these exist.
I think miscommunication is built into the medium. Its an unfortunate trade-off, the vast exposure to different people/ideas/perspectives but via a medium that depends entirely on a very limited slice of how people communicate. (Ive read the words we use account for as little as 7% of communication we do, depending on the study)
I agree but I mostly think miscommunication occurs due to poor reading skills. Also assumptions and having an understanding of what someone means that goes beyond what they've written, which happens for a variety of reasons. I often re-read posts a week later and notice a word or two that I skipped over which pretty much completely changes what someone wrote and I'm sure they read my response and not understanding why I wrote it. Again, all deceptively difficult and I'd be immediately sceptical of anyone who thinks they're innocent of it.
Ya, I hear ya. Thats what I meant by the problematic medium, it lends itself to the assumptions etc. Im certainly guilty of it myself. The misread tone of a post is important too, where someone gets defensive for no intended reason. Semantics seem to be at the core of most disagreement here. Talking about the same thing but using different words for the same concepts.
Fwiw, I don't quite understand why people are calling this thread trolling or clickbait either besides their apparent unease with the subject matter.
:blush:
People assumed you were trolling rather than intellectually shallow. There is nothing “uncomfortable” about the topic it’s just that there’s nothing of substance to it.
I find it disconcerting to have to point this out. Maybe you’re more suited to twitter?
You may be right. I ain't as smart as I'd like to think I am. Wait, isn't that called hubris. And I'd take hubris any day rather than caring whether or not you think I'm trolling or intellectually shallow or whatever floats your boat.
Oh wait. My slow mind gets it. You would prefer I be deep and profound and pretentious, is that right?
Don’t worry, you’re not alone :)
Quoting I like sushi
It's garnered 7+ pages of comments; apparently Wallows isn't the only one who thinks the topic is worthwhile, even if they don't agree with Wallows on some matters. Wallows has a good rep. You do too, so pax.
Oh dear aren't we full of ourselves aren't we?
BC see above ... 7 pages of nonsense with people saying “wtf yuou talkin’ ‘bout?” to Wallows.
You must be full of Sushi today.
Get it?
I'm sorry if my intellectually unpretentious jokes dont taste like sushi.
Get it?
Next time don’t act astounded when people have a go at you and assume it’s because you’ve raised an “uncomfortable” topic.
Oh you seem to be very judgemental about who I am as a person. I never assume anything above and beyond what I read nor do I judge the reader for the quality of content as you say you are doing. But to be honest that's what you are actually doing, and we tend to call people like those pretentious pricks.
Just saying.
Judging by your words (and someone else pointed this put too) you’re either lacking intellectual ability or trolling. I imagine a great deal of people woudl say the same but maybe their moral sensibilities stop them from saying so. I’m just being honest not insulting. Maybe you’re very bright, but your writing isn’t.
Good luck and bye
Please don't interact with me due to your unfound sense of authority over my intellectual abilities ya prick.
No actually you haven't done that. I just happened to run across the juxtaposition of those two articles in the NYT and I wanted to make the general point that there's a double standard on this issue. I was talking to you but making a more general point, not referring to anything specifically. Sorry for the confusion.
This all seems like the ancient question of nature versus nurture. We notice that statistically men have a wider bell curve (I assume we agree on the objective fact of this matter). The question is whether it's nature or nurture. I am simply raising the question. I think it's a combination of nature and nurture. There's something in the testosterone. You on the other hand seem to think it's 100% nature, all the fault of the beastly patriarchy. Do I characterize your view fairly?
By what measure?
That, and without men's aptitude for violence humanity would have been eaten by hungry critters hundreds of thousands of years ago, or subsequently subjugated by tribes whose men did have an aptitude for violence.
Yeah, I'd like to see how that would have been possible without women to feed them and make homes and raise children...
But, that is confirmation bias, and you know it.
So, what other bias will you present here?
It's true, and you know it.
I don't know it for sure. I feel as though women can just as well carry on with the same tasks that males do with equal or even greater efficacy.
You're insinuating that women can't build homes or buildings.
What about my second argument?
Violence as a good for society? Dunno about that.
I think men and women can both build buildings and raise children and that both activities are "useful" and important.
Men typically "haven't" and "don't" do most of the work raising children.
In both cases, the scales are equalling out between the sexes.
I don't think for a second that any of this shows that women are "socially superior". I'm not really sure what "socially superior" means. If we are looking at this one factor alone (and really we shouldn't be!) the suggestion is that women are better at dealing with problems in a way that doesn't get you put in prison, but it doesn't follow that women are superior unless you actually think that verbal abuse and reputation destruction are more acceptable than physical violence as such, and I don't think that's right at all.
I should say at this point that, obviously, not all men solve issues by violence and not all women settle issues by verbal abuse and reputation destruction. Both genders are capable of both tactics, and, mercifully, lots of people deal with problems without doing any of these things.
PA
I think you used poor judgement in both situations, compared to the example I gave.
I don't think that's clear, one way or the other. I think it's obscured by prisons, and the politics that drives their use. America - and many of the contributors here are American - imprisons more of its folk than most other countries. And it doesn't work, in the sense of rehabilitation. Imprisonment is often just exacting revenge. In America, I suggest that this is usually so. There are good reasons for imprisonment, but revenge isn't one of them.
As to gender superiority, I think that's probably a mistake too. It's a mistake even to ask the question, and further confusion comes as the question is given greater scrutiny. We could frame this topic as a racist subject, by just substituting black people for women. And the question still shouldn't be asked. There is no profit to asking it, and none from any/all answers proffered.
Some women are superior to some men. And vice versa.
Some black people are superior to some white people. And vice versa.
[Repeat for all -isms.]
Pointless questions that give rise to pointless and damaging answers.
All IMO, of course.