kathyw
09-04-2005, 09:56 PM
Interesting article thought I would share found in the Times Online, a UK Newspaper
September 05, 2005
A message for Earthlings: men aren't Martians and women aren't Venusians
Tim Hames
I HAVE NEVER been keen on the “men are from Mars, women are from Venus” thesis, born of John Gray’s bestseller. For a start, you would hope that both hail from Planet Earth. Yet the claim that differences based on gender are at the root of most divisions has become a new orthodoxy. With Karl Marx discredited, it is as if somebody and something had to take his place and Andrea Dworkin, the feminist writer, emerged as the candidate. The survey of attitudes towards love and relationships analysed in The Times today should prompt second thoughts about whether chromosomes have superseded class. For it reveals that men and women are not worlds apart, but within the same orbit.
Reaching that conclusion would have been impossible, of course, if 2,000 people of the appropriate demographic blend had not completed the confidential questionnaire. I admire their courage. Even under the cloak of anonymity, had I been through a marital split I am not sure that I would want to confront the inquiry: “What best describes the reason for your divorce?”, nor would I much like the thought of my other half pondering whether “I still find my partner/husband/wife attractive”, let alone the teaser: “How would you define having regular sex?” (defining “irregular sex” might be more straightforward). Yet the answers in these areas and many more are here.
And they are credible. Polls of this kind (as much else) should only be taken seriously when they involve consenting adults. I never cease to be amazed that such attention is lavished on, for example, wholly unscientific surveys of teenagers in which some vast implausible percentage “admit” to consuming the contents of a small off-licence daily, the output of the average Amsterdam cannabis cafe as a weekly routine, while maintaining an extensive collection of flick knives, probably the odd firearm and occasionally the blueprint for a nuclear weapon, stashed alongside their PlayStation.
The broader picture of our shared ambitions and frequent failings is shrewdly assessed by Bel Mooney in times2. She is rightly interested in what people want from long-term relationships and the factors that cause stress, disappointment and breakdown. What fascinates me, though, is how little difference there is between men and women in any of these areas. The “gender gap” that we are almost programmed to recognise is just not there.
That does not mean that we have become androgynous. There are some distinctions of note, and these are largely to be expected. Rather more men than women think that it is “acceptable to start having sex” on “the first date” (tragically, the male of the species was not offered the option of “before/instead of the first date”). More damning still, eight times more women who have been divorced cite the cause as “my partner had become boring to me ” than was true for their male counterparts. Men remain more likely to mention the maintenance of physical appearance as an important factor in sustaining a marriage. Women continue to point to a spouse’s obsession with work as a catalyst for separation.
These are, nonetheless, the exceptions and not the rule. Men and women were read a lengthy set of statements about relationships and asked to agree or disagree. When it came to “I think that for a successful marriage/long-term relationship, friendship is more important than sexual attraction”, 68 per cent of women and 70 per cent of men are in accord. On “Finding someone to love and who loves us is the most important thing in life”, 73 per cent of women and 71 per cent of men agree. For “It is possible to be in love with one person for life”, 71 per cent of women and 69 per cent of men say yes. Exactly the same proportion of men and women (70 per cent) think that “Most people do not work hard enough at their marriages”. Even the potentially loaded line of “It is the job of a wife to make her husband feel good about himself” produces a mere 4 per cent disagreement (50 per cent of men and 46 per cent of woman embrace the notion). Mars? Venus? More like peas, pod.
There is only one out of twenty questions in this section that reveals a significant schism between the sexes. It is whether women “are more fulfilled in their love lives than in their mother’s generation”. The dispute it reveals was not the one that may have been anticipated. Less than half of all men (46 per cent) accept this proposition, but a clear majority of women (61 per cent) believe that they are more fulfilled than women 25 years ago.
A similar level of consensus exists throughout the many other spheres of emotional life tested. Men and women are broadly as one on what is important within a marriage or a long-term relationship. They differ little, if at all, on what are reasonable grounds for leaving a marriage or why people should stay together even if their relationship has deteriorated quite spectacularly. British society has, collectively, interesting and often strikingly traditional opinions on these matters. As far as gender goes, “collectively” is precisely the appropriate phrase.
This is not because of bland homogeneity. Age, income and geographical location emerge as polarising elements in attitudes towards love and relationships,which should make us want to revisit the entire “men are from Mars, women are from Venus” cliché. There are surely aspects of life on which the sexes hold distinct views, but these are generally finer or more subtle and sophisticated than those who have made a fortune selling the assertion that we are incapable of understanding each other will acknowledge. For as this exercise shows so starkly, it is more accurate to contend that “men are from Millwall, women are from Vauxhall”. A few miles apart, not planets away.
September 05, 2005
A message for Earthlings: men aren't Martians and women aren't Venusians
Tim Hames
I HAVE NEVER been keen on the “men are from Mars, women are from Venus” thesis, born of John Gray’s bestseller. For a start, you would hope that both hail from Planet Earth. Yet the claim that differences based on gender are at the root of most divisions has become a new orthodoxy. With Karl Marx discredited, it is as if somebody and something had to take his place and Andrea Dworkin, the feminist writer, emerged as the candidate. The survey of attitudes towards love and relationships analysed in The Times today should prompt second thoughts about whether chromosomes have superseded class. For it reveals that men and women are not worlds apart, but within the same orbit.
Reaching that conclusion would have been impossible, of course, if 2,000 people of the appropriate demographic blend had not completed the confidential questionnaire. I admire their courage. Even under the cloak of anonymity, had I been through a marital split I am not sure that I would want to confront the inquiry: “What best describes the reason for your divorce?”, nor would I much like the thought of my other half pondering whether “I still find my partner/husband/wife attractive”, let alone the teaser: “How would you define having regular sex?” (defining “irregular sex” might be more straightforward). Yet the answers in these areas and many more are here.
And they are credible. Polls of this kind (as much else) should only be taken seriously when they involve consenting adults. I never cease to be amazed that such attention is lavished on, for example, wholly unscientific surveys of teenagers in which some vast implausible percentage “admit” to consuming the contents of a small off-licence daily, the output of the average Amsterdam cannabis cafe as a weekly routine, while maintaining an extensive collection of flick knives, probably the odd firearm and occasionally the blueprint for a nuclear weapon, stashed alongside their PlayStation.
The broader picture of our shared ambitions and frequent failings is shrewdly assessed by Bel Mooney in times2. She is rightly interested in what people want from long-term relationships and the factors that cause stress, disappointment and breakdown. What fascinates me, though, is how little difference there is between men and women in any of these areas. The “gender gap” that we are almost programmed to recognise is just not there.
That does not mean that we have become androgynous. There are some distinctions of note, and these are largely to be expected. Rather more men than women think that it is “acceptable to start having sex” on “the first date” (tragically, the male of the species was not offered the option of “before/instead of the first date”). More damning still, eight times more women who have been divorced cite the cause as “my partner had become boring to me ” than was true for their male counterparts. Men remain more likely to mention the maintenance of physical appearance as an important factor in sustaining a marriage. Women continue to point to a spouse’s obsession with work as a catalyst for separation.
These are, nonetheless, the exceptions and not the rule. Men and women were read a lengthy set of statements about relationships and asked to agree or disagree. When it came to “I think that for a successful marriage/long-term relationship, friendship is more important than sexual attraction”, 68 per cent of women and 70 per cent of men are in accord. On “Finding someone to love and who loves us is the most important thing in life”, 73 per cent of women and 71 per cent of men agree. For “It is possible to be in love with one person for life”, 71 per cent of women and 69 per cent of men say yes. Exactly the same proportion of men and women (70 per cent) think that “Most people do not work hard enough at their marriages”. Even the potentially loaded line of “It is the job of a wife to make her husband feel good about himself” produces a mere 4 per cent disagreement (50 per cent of men and 46 per cent of woman embrace the notion). Mars? Venus? More like peas, pod.
There is only one out of twenty questions in this section that reveals a significant schism between the sexes. It is whether women “are more fulfilled in their love lives than in their mother’s generation”. The dispute it reveals was not the one that may have been anticipated. Less than half of all men (46 per cent) accept this proposition, but a clear majority of women (61 per cent) believe that they are more fulfilled than women 25 years ago.
A similar level of consensus exists throughout the many other spheres of emotional life tested. Men and women are broadly as one on what is important within a marriage or a long-term relationship. They differ little, if at all, on what are reasonable grounds for leaving a marriage or why people should stay together even if their relationship has deteriorated quite spectacularly. British society has, collectively, interesting and often strikingly traditional opinions on these matters. As far as gender goes, “collectively” is precisely the appropriate phrase.
This is not because of bland homogeneity. Age, income and geographical location emerge as polarising elements in attitudes towards love and relationships,which should make us want to revisit the entire “men are from Mars, women are from Venus” cliché. There are surely aspects of life on which the sexes hold distinct views, but these are generally finer or more subtle and sophisticated than those who have made a fortune selling the assertion that we are incapable of understanding each other will acknowledge. For as this exercise shows so starkly, it is more accurate to contend that “men are from Millwall, women are from Vauxhall”. A few miles apart, not planets away.