One is that whites have to give up the belief that blacks are innately inferior to whites but this alone won't fix things. As long as enough whites to politically matter believe that blacks want to "punish" them if they get the chance they will take steps to preempt this possibility and there will be continued tension and conflict. Obama looks like a big step in fixing this.

My thought is that this kind of thinking, or at least the promotion of the idea that these effects are one of the most important drivers of American society, has been of tremendous help to the right wing in screwing the country over the last 40 years.

provides a huge motive for people in those groups to believe that they need to stick together so that the people who believe this don't get into a position of power where they can put the obvious consequences of their beliefs into action. Acknowledging historical fact is one thing, dealing with the emotional responses to those facts is something quite different. Many people don't admit even the basic facts but overreaching provides the perfect excuse for them to refuse to do so.

and most men are used to having their personal lives run by women. There isn't really much of a barrier. Many whites would have preferred to vote for a "white Obama" if he was on the ballot, but he wasn't so they voted for the black one. The same thing will happen with a woman. One thing about Palin that everyone can agree on is that she is NOT in any way submissive to men, so if the women beloved of the most regressive, "traditional" right wing segment of society isn't it's pretty clear that the whole idea is dead.

understood that the only reason a middle class existed or could exist was govt. support to unions, or some govt action to counteract or mitigate the effects of the tendency of unregulated markets to concentrate everything at the top. Thanks to 30 years of right wing propaganda most people, educated and otherwise, apparently have been induced to forget this.

Actually it is very likely that they will try and do both. Where they are the majority they will try and gain as much autonomy on the state, or local, level as they can and where they are not they will do as much to obstruct and sabotage the political initiatives instigated by the majority as they can and will attempt to gain as much political power as they can by hiding their true agenda. Actually isn't this what they have always done?

(since if there are no men good enough women will go without), women on the other hand are ONLY competing against other women (because men will always sleep with SOMEBODY).

women do/are all of the same things, yet for some strange reason it doesn't make them repulsive

it's true that they don't need the support but the aversion to sharing their wealth with a professional/financial loser is an equally strong motivation to avoid failure like the plague. In any case the taint of loserdom is an instinctive turnoff anyway so why would any woman want to get involved with one regardless of her financial status.

it's hard to explain what, apart from ideological blinders, could cause you to fail to notice that this is already the case. In advertising, soap operas, local news, anywhere were people are picked for some reason other than that they are ALREADY famous the men are screened by attractiveness standards that are as strict as those applied to women.

that is the difference. Everyone likes attractive.

this is actually a real issue in relationships I think. Any normal woman who wants to can sleep with (not have relationships with but sleep with) all the hot guys she wants to before she decides to "settle down". Exclusively straight average men can't do the equivalent.

and ideological and political posturing over these issues in defiance of logic and evidence doesn't help find whatever solutions might exist (I'm not accusing you of this). On the other hand you can't necessarily expect people to be happy about things. How much obnoxiousness does it take to destroy all the content of an argument.

This is exactly the point it CAN'T be practiced both ways at least not by equal numbers of people. All the average women in the world who want to can have all the one night stands with hot guys that they want, because men are horny and hot guys will sleep with average women (200 lbs of extra blubber is not average..yet). Average men can't have all the one night stands with hot women that they want. Average GAY/BI men can of course have all the one night stands with hot GAY guys that they want.

social arrangements used to provide some help in this area but no longer do. Women on the other hand are interesting if they have all their body parts in approximately the right position. The downside for women or course is that all the OTHER women in the world have just as easy a time "impressing" men. Which facts exactly explain the results of the originally cited study.

but they absolutely regard any thinking about sex, gender, relationships and psychology as their territory and don't welcome intruders who don't pay them the proper "respect". Obviously there may be political considerations here.

because that hasn't been their position before and it isn't what the laws and initiatives they get passed say. IF that is their ONLY concern how about we don't call ANY of the legal contracts marriage? Call them ALL civil unions and then the term "marriage" can be maintained in perfect purity under the complete control of the churches. Everyone will be happy and the problem will be solved. Apparently this is all the right wing wants after all. Should be a simple matter to implement.