The argument has been made that gender is fully a social construct, with no biological merit. I want to argue against this point. First, I do acknowledge the fact that there are obvious cultural artifices in constructing how the two sexes behave. Pink is often associated with girls, while blue is typically linked to boys. Ashley is a girl’s name, and John is a boy’s name. These are all examples of gender norms established by society. But there is also a certain predisposition that is fully biologically based. Point one, men and women have varying degrees of hormonal differences. Men, on average, have far higher levels of testosterone than women, and women, on average, have far higher levels of estrogen. Our emotions and behaviors are heavily influenced by the chemicals in our brains. For example, higher levels of testosterone lead to a higher instance of aggression, assertiveness, and violence. Estrogen makes individuals more empathetic. The unequal distribution of these two chemicals among the sexes leads to differences in biological dispositions and behavior.
Many point out how Gender roles are socially based. But I want to argue that gender roles are a part of human evolution. Humans are a sexually dimorphic species, meaning there is a physiological difference between the sexes. Men are on average 3 inches taller and weigh 25% more than women. Nature doesn’t just make species sexual dimorphic unless there are some sexual survival benefits from it. Case in point, a book written by Leonard Shlain “Sex, Time, and Power”(A must read) Shlain( a surgeon) theorizes that because women on general suffer from Iron deficiency(due to the fact they lose blood every month from menstrual cycles, as well as their red blood cells produce less Iron), and the fact women have to go through eight months gestation and six years weaning a newborn child. Women needed men to help them attain Iron by providing them with meat; in return, the men got copulation.
For those (particularly feminists) who are skeptical about this. Imagine 150,000 years ago, living in the Savannah of East Africa, being a pregnant mother (let’s imagine 6 months), trying to go hunting. You would put yourself and your child at great risk. Sure, you would be able to go forging, but subsisting on local vegetation alone will not be enough for you and your gestating child. Men would have to go out and hunt while the women remained in the village. This arrangement would have existed for all of humanity until the emergence of civilization around 10,000 years ago.
With the beginning of civilization, humans transitioned from relying solely on wild game and vegetation to domesticating both crops and animals. Many of the roles that women had previously held remained largely unchanged, as women still became pregnant and had to care for their young children. Men now had to participate in the field or face starvation. We see the emergence of patriarchy in this time period. Men, having a physical advantage over women, took responsibility for keeping society safe from outsiders as well as undertaking all the intense labor required for agriculture.
Feminism as we know it wouldn’t become a serious ideology in Human affairs until the Industrial Revolution, for good reason. Humanity (at least in the West) wasn’t reliant on muscle power, but on stem and steel to grow its food. Women could go out to work. This new era of technological advancement is the only reason feminism was able to emerge!
Da Joanis Project 