Women-only workplaces: good; men-only: bad

Submitted by Mastodon on Fri, 2014-11-14 23:44

Article here. Excerpt:

'Paul Elam, the founder of men’s rights group and human garbage army A Voice for Men, wants women to just leave men alone already because women are always getting in the way and then society can’t be excellent! (Men are excellent at excellence, but women are never doing excellent things, obviously.)
...
There’s just a different way that men do things with each other, and it results in excellence,” Elam said on something called the ManStream Media. “In civilization. In the aqueducts being built. To people landing on the moon and cures being found to disease.”

“I’m sorry, ladies,” he continued, “but if we want society to advance, we need to leave men alone to do their work — to do their thing and be with each other to get things done. Because that’s how it works.”

Elam was in conversation with a guy named Tom Golden, who also believes women should STFU and let men be men and make world excellence in this world of fading excellence.
...
Elam agreed that women in the workplace is the pits. In his best feminine voice, Elam said, “‘Hi! I have a vagina and a whole new set of rules! Never mind what’s worked for thousands of years, because I’m female and I know how to make 9,000 people work together to build a bridge across two miles of river!’”

Relatedly, someone should probably make a T-Shirt that says, “Hi! I have a vagina and a whole new set of rules!” I would totally wear one.'

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Comments

I don't think the author quite got what Tom was saying; he can speak for himself of course but I'm pretty sure he was referring to men engaging in what used to be called "ball-busting", and otherwise "carrying on", as it was called. But indeed, after women were added to the workplace in significant numbers with the effect it's had via various means has changed workplace culture a lot, incl. how men are expected to relate to one another.

In some ways there has been some good; some guys don't take to ball-busting, giving or getting. But the spontaneity and sense of comradeship that workplaces used to offer men is pretty much gone, and I think that's what Paul and Tom were getting at. As a consequence, men may be less likely to just throw around "crazy" ideas abt how to do things or what to invent because the spontaneity that used to be there has been placed on hold in an effort to avoid saying anything someone may find annoying or offensive. In other words, by turning workplaces into strictly prescribed behavior venues, with good or bad effects for some individuals, it has "cooled" the flame of creativity a lot. As Paul pointed out, look at all the stuff everyone uses all the time: civilization itself -- and notice more than 99% of it (rhetorically speaking) comes not just from men's ingenuity but was incubated in environments "dominated" by men. "Domination" may not be so bad after all if you're ready to accept a new definition of it and actually look at what it produces.

This isn't to say it's bad for women to be in the workplace in large numbers. It is to say that it comes with a price. But the other issue is the 2x-standard; office services offering women-only space, hotels offering women-only floors, etc., all seem to be okie-dokie to feminists who, if I recall, *used to* insist that gender apartheid was inherently bad. But it seems as long as women want it and it's not mandated/desired by the gov't or men, it's fine. Men-only work or hotel spaces however always seem to be a no-no. Funny, that.

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Submitted by Matt on Tue, 2014-11-18 16:18