The "hunt"... This is who we (men) are...

[com7fy8]

One time, a gang was beating me and I understood I was going to die. So, I relaxed to see how the LORD would take me to my next experience. And I prayed for God to have mercy on them. So, facing death was not a rush thing, but a preparation time.

I do death drills . . . like how a school fire drill is treated like there is a real fire.

There are people who are very special to me, and ones who might be significant in my life; at times, I pray and I might go through some sort of experience that one of these has died. And I relax and submit to how God has me be and what He has me doing, how He has me relating with ones who have not died.

So, possibly if our focus of attention is on the dying and things connected with that, practically, our attention needs to be to God and submitting to Him.

 

[aiki]

Maybe instead of looking for what it means to be a man in Star Trek episodes, you should look to the God-Man, Jesus Christ, for the supreme example of manliness. It seems to me that for a great many reasons you will not find a more perfect example to follow. Did Jesus lead young men into the bush to kill animals? Did he encourage men to do things that spike their adrenaline and provoke a repressed primal instinct to destroy other living creatures? No. On the other hand, he wasn't a wilting flower in feminine clothing, shrieking about being triggered, and hurt feelings, and safe spaces. Jesus didn't go about thumping his chest and punching his enemies in the face but he wasn't a simpering, passive-aggressive metrosexual, either. It isn't for no reason we are told to "look unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our faith." (Hebrews 12:2) He's the greatest man who ever lived and it is in him, not Warf the Klingon, that we see how a true man ought to be.

 

[Paidiske]

For me, the circumstances for that feeling are very different. I'll share a little, because part of the lesson, I think, is that men are different, and it may even be in our genetics.

Different.... from one another? From women? From animals? I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.

I will admit I'm deeply uncomfortable with an unspoken undertone in this thread that women are somehow inferior to men.

 

[brinny]

Different.... from one another? From women? From animals? I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.

I will admit I'm deeply uncomfortable with an unspoken undertone in this thread that women are somehow inferior to men.

Where did you read or see or detect that undertone in this thread?

 

[Paidiske]

Where did you read or see or detect that undertone?

- The talk of men being "different"
- The putting down of the feminine (see aiki's post)
- The talk of "unbiblical" views of males and females (which is often code for "women no longer accept their place under men's authority)
- Talk of blurring the genders and men losing their role, and upholding the "traditional" family (which again, is usually code for distress that women actually get an education and jobs and don't stay home as homemakers any more)
- Talk of the world wanting to redefine men and women

And so on. The overall impression I'm getting is, "Women now interact with men in the world as our equals, and we're not coping with what that's doing to our self-image."

 

[brinny]

- The talk of men being "different"
- The putting down of the feminine (see aiki's post)
- The talk of "unbiblical" views of males and females (which is often code for "women no longer accept their place under men's authority)
- Talk of blurring the genders and men losing their role, and upholding the "traditional" family (which again, is usually code for distress that women actually get an education and jobs and don't stay home as homemakers any more)
- Talk of the world wanting to redefine men and women

And so on. The overall impression I'm getting is, "Women now interact with men in the world as our equals, and we're not coping with what that's doing to our self-image."

Men and women ARE different.

Whose self-image are you referring to, by the way, in the last part of your last sentence?

 

[Vicomte13]

Different.... from one another? From women? From animals? I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.

I will admit I'm deeply uncomfortable with an unspoken undertone in this thread that women are somehow inferior to men.

What I meant was that humans differ, one from the other. I was taking up the original writer's sentiments about hunting, specifically, translating the impulse into one of sensing being linked to nature, and then expressing my own thalassophilic expression of what I hold to be the same sentiment.

I was referring to humanity, not masculinity.

I doubt humans differ along gender lines when it comes to their "aspect" in this regard.

Where I would say there almost certainly IS a marked difference in outlook between humans of different genders would be particular ways the two emotionally approach and react to sex and the sexual experience and the sex drive.

But that wasn't where I was going, and would probably not go there on a Christian website, as that particular topic makes a lot of religious folks squeamish.

 

[Paidiske]

Thanks, vicomte, that makes sense. I wasn't singling your post out in particular, more wanting to comment on what seemed a trend in many of the comments.

 

[aiki]

- The talk of men being "different"

Men and women are different. That's not a put-down, that's reality.

- The putting down of the feminine (see aiki's post)

I criticized femininity in a man. In a woman, femininity is perfectly right and good.

And so on. The overall impression I'm getting is, "Women now interact with men in the world as our equals, and we're not coping with what that's doing to our self-image."

I think this is a matter of you seeing what you want (or expect) to see, whether its actually there or not.

 

[Paidiske]

Men and women are different. That's not a put-down, that's reality.

Physiologically, sure. But people often seem to want to take it beyond that, without credible evidence for their claims.

I think this is a matter of you seeing what you want (or expect) to see, whether its actually there or not.

In that case, my mentioning what I saw gives us all a chance to clarify, which is a good thing, no?

 

[Dave-W]

The truth of our identity is not in our hormones or biology.

Since God designed our hormones and biology, I believe it is an intrinsic part of our identity.

 

[Paidiske]

Since God designed our hormones and biology, I believe it is an intrinsic part of our identity.

Do you really think an adrenalin high, a testosterone surge, a melatonin slump, tell us what it means to be human (as a man or a woman)?

 

[Dave-W]

Do you really think an adrenalin high, a testosterone surge, a melatonin slump, tell us what it means to be human (as a man or a woman)?

Whether you want to go with a Creationist model or an evolutionary model, Male humans have historically had to take the brunt of hunting, gathering food, defending their own young and their communities. Either God or nature has equipped us to do just that. It is part of who we are as males.

The idea that it somehow makes us "superior" to females is ludicrous. Just different.

But to try to tone down that part of us and make us more the nurturers I also see as problematic.

 

[Paidiske]

It's not about trying to make anyone anything. It's about allowing each person to be who they are, without boxing them into narrow stereotypes. Some men are nurturing. Some women are aggressive. And vice versa; some men are aggressive and some women are nurturing. And that's fine; if that's who they genuinely are, not who they are because they're performing a role society has told them they have to perform.

(I suspect that through much of history - and certainly pre-history - women shouldered the survival-skills load as much as men, from necessity, but that's a point that can neither be proven nor disproven here).

 

[aiki]

Physiologically, sure. But people often seem to want to take it beyond that, without credible evidence for their claims.

There are well-researched and well-established general differences between men and women in how they think and behave. A quick Google search reveals many articles - both scholarly and not - delineating those differences and their impact upon job hiring, advertising, learning, etc. It is an ideological notion, not a scientific fact, that proposes that men and women do not - and ought not - fit into general categories of behaviour and psychology. The reality, the truth, is that they do.

 

[Paidiske]

There are well-researched and well-established general differences between men and women in how they think and behave. A quick Google search reveals many articles - both scholarly and not - delineating those differences and their impact upon job hiring, advertising, learning, etc. It is an ideological notion, not a scientific fact, that proposes that men and women do not - and ought not - fit into general categories of behaviour and psychology. The reality, the truth, is that they do.

As averages, sure, there's some truth to that. But the thing is, not everyone fits the average.

Take spatial reasoning, for example. It's one of the skills which - on average - men are better at than women. I - a woman - happen to have better spatial reasoning than most men (and thereby, most women, too). It doesn't make me less a woman or more manly, though, although it might have meant I'd have made a good air traffic controller (stereotpyically male job).

And as long as there are exceptions - (up to one third of the population is a pretty big section to be "exceptions" to some supposedly inviolable rule) - then the rule is meaningless at an individual level for either predicting strengths or prescribing professional and social roles.

And that's why I argue against this stuff when it gets brought up, because people who don't fit the stereotypical gendered boxes shouldn't have others trying to force them into them.

 

[aiki]

As averages, sure, there's some truth to that. But the thing is, not everyone fits the average.

Of course there are exceptions to the rule but this doesn't diminish the fact of readily observable general differences between the sexes in both appearance and behaviour.

And as long as there are exceptions - (up to one third of the population is a pretty big section to be "exceptions" to some supposedly inviolable rule) - then the rule is meaningless at an individual level for either predicting strengths or prescribing professional and social roles.

"Up to" one-third of the population? "Up to" one-third is not the same as one-third. In any case, there remains two-thirds (or more) of the population who fit very well into the general distinctives of the sexes and whose psychology, behaviour and skills in a general way may be predicted.

And that's why I argue against this stuff when it gets brought up, because people who don't fit the stereotypical gendered boxes shouldn't have others trying to force them into them.

Has someone forced you into a box of stereotypes? I don't see that happening to the women around me. Quite the opposite occurs: In my neck of the woods, women are given more than their fair share of opportunities and supports to do whatever they feel inclined to do.

This trend of thinking of the sexes as identical and/or fluid is beginning to backfire on women. In the news recently, a young woman was made to compete against a transgendered man in a mixed martial art fight and in short order was beaten and had her eye socket badly fractured by a blow.

Transgender MMA Fighter Destroys Female Opponent

I suspect this is only the beginning of this sort of thing.

 

[Paidiske]

"Up to" one-third of the population? "Up to" one-third is not the same as one-third. In any case, there remains two-thirds (or more) of the population who fit very well into the general distinctives of the sexes and whose psychology, behaviour and skills in a general way may be predicted.

I was thinking of a bell curve, where 2/3rds of the population are within one standard deviation from the mean. This leaves about 1/3 of the population more than one standard deviation from the gendered mean on any measure. It's a very crude measure, though.

But my point was that population level statistics are meaningless at an individual level.

Has someone forced you into a box of stereotypes?

They've certainly tried. Everything from the genetics lecturer who told me "women don't belong in science" to the seminary which kicked me out when I fell pregnant (and lots of other stuff too).

This trend of thinking of the sexes as identical and/or fluid is beginning to backfire on women. In the news recently, a young woman was made to compete against a transgendered man in a mixed martial art fight and in short order was beaten and had her eye socket badly fractured by a blow.

Transgender MMA Fighter Destroys Female Opponent

I suspect this is only the beginning of this sort of thing.

My comments are not touching on the question of transgenderism, but only on the normal healthy range within each gender as we actually find them in real life.