Pros and Cons of Being Female

I am a male and have been all my life.  So, what am I doing commenting on being female?

I do believe in free speech so I figure I can comment on most things.  Besides I am the son of a female, the brother of a female, the husband of a female, the father of females, the grandfather of females and the great-grandfather of females.  Half of all my ancestors were female.  I am a companion to women, a student of women, an admirer of women.  I have lusted after women at times in ways that might make you blush.  I did go to an all-male high school but I went out of my way to join the drum and bugle corps, in part because of the attractive girl flag-twirlers from the all-girls school across the street who were also in the corps.

When I was 18, I spent the summer working at an all-girls camp in New England.  During that time, I read Margaret Mead's Sex and Society.  I realize that Mead has come in for some sharp criticism but I have also read Jessie Barnard, Judith Bardwick, Germaine Greer and other feminists.

Ok, ok, so what about being female?  To me, the first fact is that women live longer than men.  A biologist told me that female deer, bear, wolves, etc. all also live longer when they are female. 

Second fact, the respected scholar Walter Ong relates in "Fighting for Life", various sayings and understandings of the male and the female life.  One of his collection of cultural proverbs is the Chinese one: "The female always wins because of her greater quiet."

I can hear intelligent women all over the place snickering and protesting.  As one feminist I knew had on her office door, woman to black man, "Sorry, but your 400 years of oppression just doesn't come up to tens of millennia of women's problems." "What 'winning'?", my sharp women friends say.  Women lose and lose.  Granted, they are often shunted aside, ignored, their accomplishments denigrated and their ideas appropriated by members of that other gender.  But I put it to you that much of their accomplishments don't even translate into men's language or awareness.  

If you view life from the long-term perspective, you see the value of emphasizing love and care, not winning and conquering.  In the long run, women stay connected while biologists are emphasizing the grumpiness and social isolation of the older male.  Women's ability to love and care is astounding.  I realize that this does not hold true for every woman all the time but in general, it holds.  Further, as Julia Sweeney puts it, "women have a superior ability to cooperate."  I think I might add that many seem to have a superior ability to THINK OF cooperating and to WANT TO cooperate.  I refer the interested reader to the many works by Anita Roddick of The Body Shop. 

Warning to human males: respect the power, value and insight of women!