The Confusion Between Equality and Sameness

"I was told by the founding members of the Women's Studies Department at the State University of New York at Albany that I had been brainwashed by male scientists to believe that hormones even existed, much less had any role in the shaping of our identity and character."--Camille Paglia

The quote above is from an interview recently in "Slate." Paglia is always good for some controversial and challenging notions but this quote is hard to get over. Hearkening back to the original anti-science manifesto, The Feminine Mystique, this is a simple, proud declaration of creationist-like foolishness. The opinion here is from a woman captured and overwhelmed by equality and sameness; all subsequent pegs must fit in that egalitarian hole. So Friedan felt that gender behavior was socially determined. All observation aside, Mean Joe Green and Marilyn Monroe differ only in their upbringing. It is easier if the theoretician was not raised on a farm. (Actually, it might help society if she could explain how--and why--farmers get bulls to act like that and what magic they work on steers.)

This twisted thinking is the direct result of preconceptions that demand Procrustean-like distortion of observation and analysis. And that twisted thinking is a direct result of the failure--or the fear--of coming to grips with the problematic world where people are not the same and, with that recognition, what to do next.