Science Determines Women Are Aggressive

[xoxoxoBruce]

How aggressive is the human female? When the anthropologist Sarah B. Hrdy surveyed the research literature three decades ago, she concluded that “the competitive component in the nature of women remains anecdotal, intuitively sensed, but not confirmed by science.”

Science has come a long way since then, as Dr. Hrdy notes in her introduction to a recent issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society devoted entirely to the topic of female aggression. She credits the “stunning” amount of new evidence partly to better research techniques and partly to the entry of so many women into scientific fields once dominated by men.

Well duh, ask Lorena Bobbitt.

link

[Clodfobble]

“To a large degree the media reflects trends that are going on in society, not creates them,” said Dr. Ferguson, a psychologist at Stetson University. He found that women’s dissatisfaction with their bodies did not correlate with what they watched on television at home. Nor were they influenced by TV programs shown in laboratory experiments: Watching the svelte actresses on “Scrubs” induced no more feelings of inferiority than watching the not-so-svelte star of “Roseanne.”

But he found that women were more likely to feel worse when they compared themselves with peers in their own social circles, or even if they were in a room with a thin stranger...

Of note, Minifobette told me this morning that she is fat. I'm sure I don't have to tell any of you that this is not something she's picked up either at home or in media--she doesn't even watch any live-action shows. But she was quite adamant about it, as well as the fact that no one at school told her this, she just 'knows it all by herself.' The instinctive competition starts at five freaking years old.

[orthodoc]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

Well duh, ask Lorena Bobbitt.

Or try playing on a girls'/women's field hockey team, or worse, wrestling on a girls' high school wrestling team. Be sure to bring a big first aid kit.

[xoxoxoBruce]

I've seen some nasty shit go down in girls high school basketball game. And I'd certainly be afraid of the UConn ladies on the court.

[lumberjim]

Originally Posted by orthodoc

...or worse, wrestling on a girls' high school wrestling team. Be sure to bring a big first aid kit.

Ok! Where do I sign up? Oh wait. You said high school. That's creepy. Sorry. Are there milf teams?

[xoxoxoBruce]

Settle down Mr Kaufman.

[Big Sarge]

I served with some females who were far tougher and even scarier than male troops in my unit. I have seen them best many a male soldier, including myself, in the saw dust pit during combative training. Army combative training is basically hand to hand combat training

[DanaC]

Newsflash: society's warped view of gentle and passive femininity doesn't apply to all women.

The map is not the territory.

[DanaC]

Also: how did they manage to determine that the media has no impact? All they managed to show was that women didn;t feel worse about themselves after viewing a particular show/magazine/film. They couldn;t possibly have factored in the impact of being surrounded by those images of femininity 24 hours a day, and the second-hand effects from a very young age of all the adult in their life having been surrounded by such imagery 24 hours a day and how that shapes overall views of girlhood and womanhood.

[footfootfoot]

Dana, you're so cute when you're angry.

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by DanaC

Also: how did they manage to determine that the media has no impact? All they managed to show was that women didn;t feel worse about themselves after viewing a particular show/magazine/film. They couldn;t possibly have factored in the impact of being surrounded by those images of femininity 24 hours a day, and the second-hand effects from a very young age of all the adult in their life having been surrounded by such imagery 24 hours a day and how that shapes overall views of girlhood and womanhood.

That wasn't all they showed. They also showed that women did feel worse about themselves when placed next to an in-the-flesh attractive woman, and even worse beyond that if there was also a man in the room.

Media is a reflection of society, not the other way around. Real-life experiences will trump media exposure every time. If you believe that media makes women feel bad about themselves, you must also believe that to some degree videogames make young males more violent. (And maybe you do. But I'm guessing you don't.)

[DanaC]

No, I don't believe the media 'makes women feel bad about themselves' in such a direct way. And real life experiences are more impactful (though accessing media is a real life experience anyway ;p)

Media is expressive of culture but it is also a co-producer of that culture. Or rather, the people and organisations who produce media are an important part of the social discourse through which we mediate knowledge and cultural expectations.

Thin models in magazines don't make girls anorexic. But they contribute to a culture in which such a disorder can readily flourish. They contribute to, because they are an expression of, gender norms and expectations.

I don't believe violent games and movies lead to increases in violence - there is a distinction drawn between real life and fiction in the minds of most viewers and players. But there are aspects of films and games which feed into the wider cultural expectations of what it is to be a man and what it is to be a woman. Usually the more subtle aspects.

[eta] I expressed that badly in the earlier post. It's the confident way they dismiss cultural impact that bothered me.

[footfootfoot]

Of the many anorexic girls I know/ have known, all of them were starving themselves as a way to control some aspect of their life which they felt was out of their control.
I wonder if it is possible that equating anorexia with pressure to be thin is akin to thinking rape is about sex.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Four graduates of the US Marine Corps' Infantry training.
I know they can kick my ass, just hope they don't want to.

[orthodoc]

Originally Posted by footfootfoot

Of the many anorexic girls I know/ have known, all of them were starving themselves as a way to control some aspect of their life which they felt was out of their control.
I wonder if it is possible that equating anorexia with pressure to be thin is akin to thinking rape is about sex.

You've hit the nail on the head (but then, you always do ...). Anorexia is all about control.