Tuesday, October 14, 2008

One woman's patriarchy is another woman's...

Leave it to the NYTimes to bemoan the last vestiges of civility in this piece - "Old Gender Roles with your Dinner".
Although the goal in many public places and in much of public life is to treat
men and women equally, most upscale restaurants haven’t reached that
point.
Then again they haven’t really tried all that hard. They’ve learned
that ignoring gender is risky, and often foolish, because men and women approach
and respond to restaurants in different ways, looking for different things.

Could those differences be attributed to differences between genders? Why must liberals celebrate diversity so fervently for everyone but women. These differences can be celebrated and honored without compromising our equality with men.

Timely anecdote:
A friend asked me to sew a button for him this weekend and another male friend turned to me and asked, "Are you going to take that?"
"Take what?"
"That sexism."
(gasp!)
I take no offense. Maybe it's because I'm an instinctually nurturing woman or maybe it's because I'm Whitney, but I enjoy taking care of others. Give me that button.

2 comments:

Sherman said...

Did your friend who asked you know that you could sew? 'Twould be be sexist if he assumed you did because you were a woman. Wouldn't be if he knew you sewed and asked you. That's because sewing is not inherent to woman-ness, even if you believe that nurturing is.

Whitney Lynne said...

My friend did know I keep a sewing kit on hand and can mend decently. I suppose I have unnecessarily associated nurturing with sewing, but the essential point is that he turned to me for care and I was happy to oblige.