[DanaC]

From Arthur Schopenhauer's essay Of Women, published in 1851.

One need only look at a woman’s shape to discover that she is not intended for either too much mental or too much physical work. She pays the debt of life not by what she does but by what she suffers—by the pains of child-bearing, care for the child, and by subjection to man, to whom she should be a patient and cheerful companion. The greatest sorrows and joys or great exhibition of strength are not assigned to her; her life should flow more quietly, more gently, and less obtrusively than man’s, without her being essentially happier or unhappier.

Women are directly adapted to act as the nurses and educators of our early childhood, for the simple reason that they themselves are childish, foolish, and short-sighted—in a word, are big children all their lives, something intermediate between the child and the man, who is a man in the strict sense of the word. Consider how a young girl will toy day after day with a child, dance with it and sing to it; and then consider what a man, with the very best intentions in the world, could do in her place.

The nobler and more perfect a thing is, the later and slower is it in reaching maturity. Man reaches the maturity of his reasoning and mental faculties scarcely before he is eight-and-twenty; woman when she is eighteen; but hers is reason of very narrow limitations. This is why women remain children all their lives, for they always see only what is near at hand, cling to the present, take the appearance of a thing for reality, and prefer trifling matters to the most important. It is by virtue of man’s reasoning powers that he does not live in the present only, like the brute, but observes and ponders over the past and future; and from this spring discretion, care, and that anxiety which we so frequently notice in people. The advantages, as well as the disadvantages, that this entails, make woman, in consequence of her weaker reasoning powers, less of a partaker in them. Moreover, she is intellectually short-sighted, for although her intuitive understanding quickly perceives what is near to her, on the other hand her circle of vision is limited and does not embrace anything that is remote; hence everything that is absent or past, or in the future, affects women in a less degree than men. This is why they have greater inclination for extravagance, which sometimes borders on madness. Women in their hearts think that men are intended to earn money so that they may spend it, if possible during their husband’s lifetime, but at any rate after his death.

As soon as he has given them his earnings on which to keep house they are strengthened in this belief. Although all this entails many disadvantages, yet it has this advantage—that a woman lives more in the present than a man, and that she enjoys it more keenly if it is at all bearable. This is the origin of that cheerfulness which is peculiar to woman and makes her fit to divert man, and in case of need, to console him when he is weighed down by cares. To consult women in matters of difficulty, as the Germans used to do in old times, is by no means a matter to be overlooked; for their way of grasping a thing is quite different from ours, chiefly because they like the shortest way to the point, and usually keep their attention fixed upon what lies nearest; while we, as a rule, see beyond it, for the simple reason that it lies under our nose; it then becomes necessary for us to be brought back to the thing in order to obtain a near and simple view. This is why women are more sober in their judgment than we, and why they see nothing more in things than is really there; while we, if our passions are roused, slightly exaggerate or add to our imagination.

It is because women’s reasoning powers are weaker that they show more sympathy for the unfortunate than men, and consequently take a kindlier interest in them. On the other hand, women are inferior to men in matters of justice, honesty, and conscientiousness. Again, because their reasoning faculty is weak, things clearly visible and real, and belonging to the present, exercise a power over them which is rarely counteracted by abstract thoughts, fixed maxims, or firm resolutions, in general, by regard for the past and future or by consideration for what is absent and remote. Accordingly they have the first and principal qualities of virtue, but they lack the secondary qualities which are often a necessary instrument in developing it. Women may be compared in this respect to an organism that has a liver but no gall-bladder.9 So that it will be found that the fundamental fault in the character of women is that they have no “sense of justice.”

This arises from their deficiency in the power of reasoning already referred to, and reflection, but is also partly due to the fact that Nature has not destined them, as the weaker sex, to be dependent on strength but on cunning; this is why they are instinctively crafty, and have an ineradicable tendency to lie. For as lions are furnished with claws and teeth, elephants with tusks, boars with fangs, bulls with horns, and the cuttlefish with its dark, inky fluid, so Nature has provided woman for her protection and defence with the faculty of dissimulation, and all the power which Nature has given to man in the form of bodily strength and reason has been conferred on woman in this form. Hence, dissimulation is innate in woman and almost as characteristic of the very stupid as of the clever.

Accordingly, it is as natural for women to dissemble at every opportunity as it is for those animals to turn to their weapons when they are attacked; and they feel in doing so that in a certain measure they are only making use of their rights. Therefore a woman who is perfectly truthful and does not dissemble is perhaps an impossibility. This is why they see through dissimulation in others so easily; therefore it is not advisable to attempt it with them. From the fundamental defect that has been stated, and all that it involves, spring falseness, faithlessness, treachery, ungratefulness, and so on. In a court of justice women are more often found guilty of perjury than men. It is indeed to be generally questioned whether they should be allowed to take an oath at all. From time to time there are repeated cases everywhere of ladies, who want for nothing, secretly pocketing and taking away things from shop counters.

This encapsulates a lot of the 'scientific' approach to gender difference during late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Similarly dodgy reasoning was used to define the races.

This mix of enlightenment ideas about biological determinism with pre-existing notions of innate female inferiority was a staple for philosophical, political and scientific discourse across Europe and America from the beginnings of the Enlightenment through to....

Well, hello, Men are From Mars; Women are from Venus.

The tenor has altered somewhat. It's no longer about proving that the female sex is the lesser sex. It's now about nailing down the dividing lines to the exact contours of the male and female brain, in order to fortify our existing assumptions that there must be an unbridgeable gulf between us. Surely there must.

And if we can tie it to our hunter gatherer past, like our forebears tied it to God's great plan, well, that works fine. Makes sense. Men read maps because they hunted. Women are communicators because they existed in a more social setting.
Except that many men are excellent communicators and many women read maps as easily as I read books.

I actually used to subscribe somewhat to that. I did. It fit my experience of the world. My brother and my father both have/had very strong spatial and mapping skills. Both at a meta level, in navigating and mapping their world, and at a smaller level, designing and using spaces. I, my mother, and my best friend all sucked at that stuff. I have no internal map or sense of direction and neither does Mum. My friend Maddy used to have to check which fingers had rings on them to tell left from right.

I knew it was something I could probably learn (reading maps) but found it very, very difficult. It made sense to me that the men in my life had better map reading skills, because you know...hunter gatherers blah, blah. It made sense that it owuld be something, not that only men could do, but that men would find easy and women harder.

Then my brother had two daughters, both of whom have exactly the same internalised sense of space and direction that their dad has. And, indeed, their mother.

So, maybe my brother wasn't so good at maps and all that spatial stuff because of his maleness, but because he got the genetic inheritance from my Dad that produced such a talent. And maybe when he met Jen, who also has that ability, between them they gave my nieces that genetic heritage. Maybe I didn't take after mum because I am female, but because of when I was born in relation to my brother.

Or maybe, because I followed Mum, as my female role model early on, I just never developed those skills. And Martin, following and watching our dad, took all that on board in a way I hadn't. And maybe his kids now have as well.

Some of the differences we assume to be because of our gender, may be because of other factors. And it so very easy to spin out a rationale that says yes, this is so because it must be so; and it must be so, because it is so.