it is physically impossible to see those differences manifested in adult humans in the total absence of culture someone who is determined to deny that meaningful differences exist can never be "forced" to admit otherwise.

pretty please?

just like it is pointless for men to think that women are going to become as horny as men are if only men are nice enough to them.

That's very kindergarten of you. "I know, but i'm not telling!"

:)

but of course it never does, does it, in general I mean. Really though, sociobiology is to liberals what climate science is to conservatives; because the science impinges on belief systems they regard as sacred nothing will ever be enough. In the conservatives case it is that free markets and traditional ways of doing things are god and regulation is evil, in this case it is essential to deny meaningful innate gender differences because to admit them would make the claim that woman have access via there own emotional reactions to the universal truth for eveyone untenable and the idea that cultural and political change can create a society where men "naturally" do everything the way women want them to is revealed as an impossible to realize fantasy. Of course it may be possible to compel men to conform but, with significant exceptions, people generally prefer to think they can get their way without permanent and extreme tension.

In the time it's taken you to argue with Lecastor and others, you could have done the following:

1. stain-treated, washed, dried, folded and put away 3 loads of laundry

2. washed, dried and put a way one diswasher-load of dishes

3. swept and/or vacuumed your floor

4. scrubbed pee stains from the floor around the toilet

5. gotten lucky with your significent other

I'm back to bed now ...

>Brightstar: My fiancee is already trying to pull those power games on me.<

What--she wants you to treat her as if she's a human being?!? The nerve. Doesn't she know that your relationship with her is totally all about _your_ needs? (Eheheheheheh...)

being treated like a human being=getting everything your way

Hey, I am readily admitting that some women do withhold sex to get what they want, and most men don't.

You say that this is because of innate biological differences -- I call bullshit on that.

That women can get away with doing this much more than can men only really proves that women have more power in marriage than do men, the best argument I have heard against marriage.

What--she wants you to treat her as if she's a human being?!? The nerve. Doesn't she know that your relationship with her is totally all about _your_ needs? (Eheheheheheh...)

You continue to reiterate what this article just proved to be wrong-- the notion that men somehow want or need a slave for a wife.

So, even when your own kind (BS) tells you that men most definitely do NOT want a domestic servant, you still plow that same hoary field.

As to me and the lovely, I am quite clear to her that I am a self sufficient person and have been since I was out of the house at 18 to go to college. I can do my own dishes, laundry, I cook lots of mean dishes, etc, etc, etc.

I told my lovely that I do not NEED her for any of this. I CHOOSE her because I love her and because I feel we get along wonderfully and because I WANT someone in my life who is my partner in 'crime' as it were. We all want and need connection.

Getting back to the power games thing. She is testing me, to see what I will tolerate. Usually this involves her saying something along the lines of "I am always right, you are always wrong. is this not?". (We laugh it off now, but God only knows what horror lurks after she has the marriage papers in her hands)

Deering, you are an assclown, Because if I or any man pulled that same sort of phrase on a woman about me being always right, God help us what crap we'd hear about it.

I know you ladies despise us men and only see your own navel, so do not pretend otherwise.

By the way, this is why you women have to be broken. Your monopolies over reproduction need to be surpassed by us men any way we can accomplish it. You will or course come and help us with this so that both sexes can achieve equality, eh?

We men need EQUALS, women who will treat us with respect, not like this person in my life is trying to pull on me (something that seems innate to women, to mutilate and mold a guy's self esteem to suit her needs). I will survive, I am old enough not to fall for it, so I DO pity young men who are not as seasoned and smart.

Still, the bigger question is why women are so naturally EVIL towards us men.

Musing on what WERE the 'jobs no {American} wants to do,' it seemed that they are the sex-role defined jobs from previous decades. House-cleaning, child-care, laundry... these were done by women; lawn-mowing, car washing, seasonal preparations (tree trimming, lights, eaves cleaning)... these were done by men.

Women with full time jobs had less time / energy / interest in home chores; men saw that women were getting help, so they sought the same and many family chores became the 'jobs no {American} wants to do.'

People who do household chores are re-enforcing the shared relationship of the family {however that is defined) and maybe that is what contributes to more sexual sharing.

Would you not think that more educated people, who have more sex in general, would also have guys who were more willing to contribute to household maintenance?

That would make any correllation between the two totally coincidental.

As usual, the discussion drifts off-topic and "the usual suspects" end up jawboning about personal issues (Brightstar and his dating problems, etc.) that have nothing to do with the SUBJECT.

The subject was not whether women ought to be stay-at-home-housewives, or how necessary household maintenance jobs OUGHT to be divided up or even if the division is sex-linked (and therefore holy and unchangeable). The question was: do women REWARD men for helping out with traditionally female home maintenance jobs by giving men sexual favors?

MY comment was that this implies women don't really like sex and use it simply as a tool to get whatever they want, be it money or jewelry or help around the house. And that men are panting dogs, who will only engage in helpful, productive behavior if sex is dangled in front of them like a dog biscuit. THIS assumption is what is patently ridiculous. Women enjoy and desire sex every bit as much as men, if not more. The idea that men are chomping at the bit for sex every second of the day is somewhat challenged by all the TV commercials I see for Cialis and Viagara.

In my experience, there are plenty of lazy-ass guys out there who sulk and pout at having to do ANYTHING besides go into a job and come home, collapse on the couch in front of the tube and drink beer. They don't simply refuse to do housework -- they don't do ANYTHING, including play with their own kids, cut the grass, take out the rubbish, etc. (i.e., traditionally male tasks).

I also know plenty of lazy slob SAHMs, whose homes are filthy (not messy -- I am talking about actual filth), who don't cook or clean or launder or bake, but sit around (as the lazy-ass guys above) and watch TV all day. The idea that all, or even most, women are compulsive neat-freaks is hilarious and untrue.

Modern 21st century life has made it very easy to be a lazy slob, since we can order in pizza every night or nuke TV dinners, and send our laundry out to be done, and hire low-paid illegal aliens to clean our houses and maintain our backyards. I am not at all convinced that lazy slobs -- even rich lazy slobs whose homes are clean because someone else cleans them -- are having all this splendid, frisky sex while the rest of us moan and bitch and sulk, all while trying to manipulate our significant other into doing more of the scut work.

The subject, once again, was "is sex a currency that you can trade for household jobs". And I think the answer is bluntly "no". Culturally, we just don't find doing household chores to be sexy, or even that valuable -- if we did, the lowest members of our society wouldn't be the ones performing them.

Once again, we have left out the big part of the magic equation: if we think that men have to trade housework to get sex from women, what the hell do women use to get similar sexual favors from men? I don't know, but I can't quite see how my changing the oil in the lawnmower (yes, I do it) gets my DH all hotted up. Just isn't happening, LOL.

The answer is, as it always has been, for ALL PEOPLE to be courteous, considerate of their significant other, helpful and that EVERYONE needs to have a sense of responsibility about taking care of both their own needs and contributing to the larger good of the home and family. And that tasks are not "sex-linked", but ought to be done by the people who are most skilled at them, or most interested in doing them, in a way that divides the labor (mostly) equally.

Oddly enough, I thought we were already mostly doing this, and that argument (as I pointed out) sounded awfully 70s-ish, like arguing whether women with kids ought to be working (when most of them already ARE).

***

BTW: when I said in my earlier post that I liked flowers and chocolate, I specifically said that this was about a normal human response of "nice behavior elicts nice responses" and that this applied as much to babies and grandmas as it does to couples...i.e., I was saying specifically that I did NOT trade sexual favors for these things, simply that they were enjoyable and pleasant. When I take flowers to my 90 yr old grandmother or buy a toy for my 3 yr old niece, I am obviously not "solicting them"!

Is every behavior manipulative? Isn't it possible to talk about considerate, caring, generous behaviors WITHOUT sexual rewards? there are other forms of currency, believe it or not.