Euan Semple shared a link via Twitter to this post by Leon Benjamin this morning, which cites (but does not link to) material by Paul Harris and opines that the world should be compelled to put women in charge because we are apparently more honest, more loyal, more caring, more thoughtful, more trustworthy, and much less dangerous
He goes on to point out how, if women had been running the show, there would have beenno Hitler. There is no Mussolini. There is no Napoleon. There is no Hirohito. There is no Attila. There is no Genghis Khan. There is no Inquisition. There are no Crusades. There is no Robert Mugabe. There is no Ariel Sharon. There is no Stalin. There is no George Bush; Wouldn't that be a safer and happier world?
Well, this is all well and good, but, if we're going to consider the extremes of one gender, we must weigh them up against the extremes of the other. Not every women is a warm motherly, altruistic, nurturing type. Of course, there are not a great many examples of women in positions of extreme power, so this is tricky. However, there is Jezebel. And would you really want to be governed by Imelda Marcos? Let's remember that Margaret Thatcher was behind a time of great unhappiness among blue-collar workers in the UK and is unlikely to have won personality of the month award in the Falklands. Let's consider names like Catherine the (ahem) Great, Bloody Mary and the less-than-merciful Isabella of Spain.
Have a look at this (admittedly hatemongering) site, which mentions these and a few others I hadn't heard of.
In case it seems as if I'm arguing against the case for women in positions of power, I am not. However, I am arguing against the current fashion for a blanket male=bad/old fashioned/outdated; female= good/wise/the way to go.
All humans are flawed, and neither gender has the march over the other. People should be elected to positions of power on their merit, not their gender.
Oh, and one last point to consider in the light of this quote in Benjamin's post:
I am proposing a political movement whose sole purpose is to convince all the nations of the world to change their laws so that only women can hold political office.Sarah Palin.
I rest my case.
2 comments:
Hear Hear!
And just like i commented on the other blog post...
I believe in balance and in the need for a change at many different levels of the society...
Adapting M L king's thought: what I would like to see is that people are not judged by their gender, race, status, etc, but rather by the content of their character!
We need balance. The world is made up of men and women, so why can't we co-exist in harmony? Why is there a need for one of the two to be dominant? There are and apparently there will always be good and bad people!
@Cristina I don't if it is the same where you are, but these days, TV adverts often seem to paint men as stupid creatures with only one thing on their minds. Considering how hard we fought against stereotypical depictions of women, I see no reason why these stereotypes of men should be acceptable! For goodness sake! Men and male. Women are female. Both are necessary for the coninuation of the species... and - contrary to the title of a certain book - both are from Earth!
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