So what's it like to be a woman?

905 wrote:

In January 1960, a reporter for the London Standard approached Churchill at a reception.
"Sir Winston, what is your comment on the prediction made the other day that in the year 2000, women will rule the world?"

"They still will, will they?" was Churchill’s grunted response

it's funny cos it's true

I don't know.

If they rule the world they don't rule it very well. Like men.

johnfás wrote:

I only tried it once, was pretty good.

I tried it one and had a terrible time of it. I almost broke an ankle and one of my boobs burst. 

cookiemonster wrote:

johnfás wrote:

I only tried it once, was pretty good.

I tried it one and had a terrible time of it. I almost broke an ankle and one of my boobs burst.

I knew that was you I saw in the george. You had that drunken accountant look about ya.

riadach wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

johnfás wrote:

I only tried it once, was pretty good.

I tried it one and had a terrible time of it. I almost broke an ankle and one of my boobs burst.

I knew that was you I saw in the george. You had that drunken accountant look about ya.

Yeah. The double entry of the toilets was a dead give-away.

riadach wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

johnfás wrote:

I only tried it once, was pretty good.

I tried it one and had a terrible time of it. I almost broke an ankle and one of my boobs burst.

I knew that was you I saw in the george. You had that drunken accountant look about ya.

Last time I was in the George it was with me newly out gay best friend (how I didn't cop that I'll never know) and that was in the clubby bit, which I didn't think would be your scene. The last time in was in jurassic was while wearing a Tux, blind drunk on champagne and inadventently being chatted up by some lefty bloke from Trinity. It's a very odd place that. 

Is that the pub on Parliament St. or the on at the bottom of Sth. Great Georges St ? They're both gay bars, or were in the '80s, I forget the names now.

cactus flower wrote:

Squire wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

They have a lot less power than men.

Oh I don't know about that. Much of the power most men enjoy is illusionary.

Would you elaborate on that Squire?

What power do men most men really have? They get up, go to work and come home, perhaps have some inane hobby like making flies for fishing or train spotting. In most families who really makes most of the decisions? Who chooses the pink curtains or decides young Theo should learn the piano? The man? I doubt it. It is the matriarchs that hold society together.

At work men breeze about, wear suits and feel very important but how many have any real power? And when it comes to relationships a hint of thigh and they melt. Men are generally paper tigers with a tendency to escape form reality.

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

Is that the pub on Parliament St. or the on at the bottom of Sth. Great Georges St ? They're both gay bars, or were in the '80s, I forget the names now.

The George is on South Great Georges street. I know the name of the one on parliament street but the name escapes me now!

cookiemonster wrote:

riadach wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

johnfás wrote:

I only tried it once, was pretty good.

I tried it one and had a terrible time of it. I almost broke an ankle and one of my boobs burst.

I knew that was you I saw in the george. You had that drunken accountant look about ya.

Last time I was in the George it was with me newly out gay best friend (how I didn't cop that I'll never know) and that was in the clubby bit, which I didn't think would be your scene. The last time in was in jurassic was while wearing a Tux, blind drunk on champagne and inadventently being chatted up by some lefty bloke from Trinity. It's a very odd place that.

What makes you think the clubby bit wouldn't be my scene? I am offended. You're not implying for a second that I would mingle with the near-deads in jurassic, are you?

cookiemonster wrote:

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

Is that the pub on Parliament St. or the on at the bottom of Sth. Great Georges St ? They're both gay bars, or were in the '80s, I forget the names now.

The George is on South Great Georges street. I know the name of the one on parliament street but the name escapes me now!

The one on parliament street you're referring to is Front Lounge. However, the guy I'm seeing, his neighbour who was a fag hag in the eighties, has informed us that it used be called the parliament. Apparently, the George and Front Lounge are the oldest surviving gay pubs in dublin. Before decriminalisation there used also be gay nights in the Baggot Inn (I need not mention the pun made on that name, as it is obvious to all) where I believe Mr Pussy made his name, and Bartley Dunne's on lower Stephen's Street. There is an awful lot of underground history there that may yet be written.

riadach wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

riadach wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

johnfás wrote:

I only tried it once, was pretty good.

I tried it one and had a terrible time of it. I almost broke an ankle and one of my boobs burst.

I knew that was you I saw in the george. You had that drunken accountant look about ya.

Last time I was in the George it was with me newly out gay best friend (how I didn't cop that I'll never know) and that was in the clubby bit, which I didn't think would be your scene. The last time in was in jurassic was while wearing a Tux, blind drunk on champagne and inadventently being chatted up by some lefty bloke from Trinity. It's a very odd place that.

What makes you think the clubby bit wouldn't be my scene? I am offended. You're not implying for a second that I would mingle with the near-deads in jurassic, are you?

I though they might like your beard. 

One of the things that make me suspicious about discussions on women on Internet forums is that "women" are always understood as a coherent category. But social differences between women are seldom evoked.

Here we hear many women interviewed on the radio, who produce a typical women emancipation discourse, like "I wanted to do that so I did it", or "you just have to want it", "I fought for realizing this", etc. That includes travelling, writing a book, setting up a business...

But back at home I hear "my" women talking about those interviews, saying they feel guilty at first not to be able to achieve the same wonderful results, but that after reflection they realize that those interviewed are always upper middle case women, and that they only "had the nerve" to do things because they had the money to do things.

Taking a full year for instance to travel in India and write a wonderful photographs book is not only "willpower", it's totally unrealistic for women who need to work for the next month's income.

Furthermore, upper middle class women don't live in a world of women only. They have fathers, husbands, sons, friends... who help them find a super job, a publisher, contacts abroad and such whenever necessary. So they never have to say "I had to wait for six months unemployed before I could do it", or "I didn't have a car to go to this interesting meeting". So I call that the "emancipation of women with important men around". This is true in the business world, in the artistic world...

Furthermore, women who achieve a great carreer do so by hiring other women to care about the children and the household, so that for those lower classes women it becomes clearly impossible to achieve any bright carreer. There is a systemic class divide here.

Recently I heard a woman, running her own paramedical small business but daughter of a very rich family (with real estate and such), who regularly tells her female clients "Oh but children must be autonomous as soon as possible and I would never stand my son staying at home at his age". But when you think a bit you realize she actually PAYS a flat for her son who's making studies abroad. That way she can be very affirmative about "you must be more energetic than that".

905 wrote:

In January 1960, a reporter for the London Standard approached Churchill at a reception.
"Sir Winston, what is your comment on the prediction made the other day that in the year 2000, women will rule the world?"

"They still will, will they?" was Churchill’s grunted response

Wasn't his mother very unhappily married off, for money, to a title?

Mmm. I'm not a bit taken in by all that. I'm sure you all know that men make 95% of the big decisions (going to war, buying a car, moving house) and women the little ones. Men also have most of the wealth.

On the other hand, as I mentioned, they die sooner and are less happy in their old age. Perhaps the Jan Morris solution of a mid-life sex change is the optimum solution.

The thread is about what its like to be a woman. As cookiemonster is the only person to have made a serious attempt at answering, I'll try.

The answer of course is full of contradictions.
Firstly, there is very little difference between men's and women's thought processes. I've never known any poster get that TheBear was a girl unless told so - the reaction is usually total shock. On P.ie I was assumed to be male by a lot of posters. There are other posters whose genders turned out to be a shock to me - I still can't see NotDevsSon as other than a rather scary female Civil Servant. I've been wrong about other posters too.

How it feels to be a woman is hormonal. Maternity is a powerful physical sensation like a drug - read Penelope Mortimer's the Pumpkin Eater. One's brain is awash with happy chemicals at various stages. One can also become a raging force of destructive nature (the goddess Kali) at others.

I think for anyone who really wants to know, reading poetry - (Plath, Dickinson, Rossetti, or some of the Irish women poets would do it) is the only way you are going to get an insider view.

cactus flower wrote:

I think for anyone who really wants to know, reading poetry - (Plath, Dickinson, Rossetti, or some of the Irish women poets would do it) is the only way you are going to get an insider view.

So, all those years I spent dutifully listening to the (ex-)girlfriends, I was wasting my time? I was learning nothing?

Mind you, it was partly for self-preservation. When the woman was telling me what's what, laying down the law, giving me a piece of her mind, it was easier to stand and listen than risk the slings & arrows of an (admittedly) inferior throwing arm as I left the room. Not to mention the inevitable fall-out.

Really, I tried. I listened, and even when it didn't make much sense, I tried to make sense of it. I must have learned something.

It couldn't hurt to go back to Emily Dickinson, I suppose.

On the other hand, if we men keep on eating more and more soya foods (with their oestrogen-mimicking elements), won't we end up with a female mentality? See, for example: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/jul/24/foodtech.medicalresearch

cactus flower wrote:

Firstly, there is very little difference between men's and women's thought processes. I've never known any poster get that TheBear was a girl unless told so - the reaction is usually total shock. On P.ie I was assumed to be male by a lot of posters. There are other posters whose genders turned out to be a shock to me - I still can't see NotDevsSon as other than a rather scary female Civil Servant. I've been wrong about other posters too.

soubresauts wrote:

On the other hand, if we men keep on eating more and more soya foods (with their oestrogen-mimicking elements), won't we end up with a female mentality? See, for example: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/jul/24/foodtech.medicalresearch

Thought processes, hormones, writing style - are we getting down to it now to know what it's like to be a woman (or a man) ?

Forums online must be pretty good places to test the perceived character of a person's writing style in terms of gender as cactus has suggested but is that character independent of the body which is often afflicted with hormonalism both in men and women ?

Madonna can tell you what it feels like ...



Listening is always good Soubresaut

Not convinced.

Quote :

So, all those years I spent dutifully listening to the (ex-)girlfriends, I was wasting my time? I was learning nothing?

Mind you, it was partly for self-preservation. When the woman was telling me what's what, laying down the law, giving me a piece of her mind, it was easier to stand and listen than risk the slings & arrows of an (admittedly) inferior throwing arm as I left the room. Not to mention the inevitable fall-out.

Really, I tried. I listened, and even when it didn't make much sense, I tried to make sense of it. I must have learned something.

Maybe you should have been listening to what they weren't saying, soubresauts..?

What are you not convinced of, arnaudherve?

Why did I think soubresauts was a girl?

riadach wrote:

Why did I think soubresauts was a girl?

I thought so too.

Only a woman could say that a man thinks like a woman. That is the reason that only a complete fool would discuss his past sexual history. Unless of course he only had 15 or 20 notches on the old Jolly Roger.
But now the tables are being reversed with ladies on the hunt for mickie. I have read reports of young men being intimidated by these aggressive approachs. After all they would not be skilled swordsmen. The result of this unsavory development is that some sportsmen are relying more on alcohol to level the field. This leads to a dulling of the blade let us say so to counter this they have taken to consuming large doses of viagra. One well known effect of viagra is a diminishing of your eyesight. So the appealing but aggressive ladies are ignored and the less appealing reap the benefit. Everyone is happy

Sounds like you want ravaged Youngdan.