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Aine Seitz McCarthy
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Rise in media reports about perishing men

10/27/2011

4 Comments

 
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A while back, I responded to Hanna Rosin's 2010 The End of Men in a post entitled the Rise of Parents Opting for Girls at Fertility Clinics, which might give you some idea on my stance about this ominously approaching theoretical termination.  Still, the freak-out on this topic has been substantial. I just heard an intelligent policy debate from Intelligence-Squared on whether or not, in fact, "men are finished." What?? Yes.  And after the debate, 66% of voters agreed. Seriously.

Most of the discussion seems preposterous and sensational to me, however, I did like this bold comment by David Zinczenko:

Gender equality is something, we can all agree on, as an ideal. But if we are
approaching gender equality, why are there fewer women in government today than there were ten years ago? Why is it so much easier for men to hold onto their gun rights than it is for women to hold onto their reproductive rights? Not only aren't men finished, but women haven't even begun. Let's at least get to the point where the game is tied before we start writing all the men off.

And finally, as I thought more about why this freak-out about appears to be so sensationalized, I learned this:

Men control opinion journalism; only 10 to 15 percent of talking heads on opinion news shows are female and between 80 and 90 percent of a newspaper’s opinion essays are written by men, according to the Stanford Op Ed Project.

From here.
4 Comments
ironmonkey285
10/31/2011 10:18:06 am

Clearly its not "are men ahead or are women ahead," as some people wish to sensationalize. One cannot (reasonably) calibrate how to balance higher high school/college graduation rates vs lower government employment vs lower household headship vs higher life expectancy, among n other such comparisons. This is especially true given that preferences are complex, influential, and different, as noted in studies you cited in one of your previous posts.

Now that we, in the developing world, are out of the dark ages (at least as far as I'm concerned), these generalities don't hold so well, or at least don't hold so obviously. As you noted, however, differences still persist (or emerge) in various fields and institutions.

I would note, however, that the best predictor of future 'advantage' (whether in terms of $, utility, equality, political or social capital) is probably education, which may offer some insight into what this relationship will look like in the future. That said, such an advantage doesn't remotely justify such hyperbole as "men are finished".

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co je seo link
1/28/2012 10:30:01 am

Good article dude

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seo odkazy link
2/25/2012 06:45:50 pm

THX for info

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rychlé půjčky link
3/22/2012 02:39:26 am

Thank you for details

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    Aine Seitz McCarthy

    International development, economics and some pretty ambitious ideas from a stubborn graduate student clinging to her sense of adventure.


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