The Second Sexism

1

This is not to say that men have not sometimes utilized anti-discrimination legislation and sought relief from the courts for discrimination against them. However, anti-discrimination legislation was not enacted to target this form of discrimination. Moreover, there are those who seem to begrudge men this relief and make exaggerated claims about how much men have benefited. See, for example, Catharine A. MacKinnon, Feminism Unmodified, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987, p. 35.

2

Although men and boys are not the only males, when I use “males” in this book I am referring only to human males. Moreover, by “males” I mean those humans who are of the male sex rather than the male gender — that is to say, those who are anatomically rather than socially or psychologically male — in cases where sex and gender do not coincide. (For more on this, see note 7 below.)

3

As far as I know this term is my own. In a response to my earlier article by this name, Tom Digby disputes this. He writes: “By the way, the epigraph to [Christina Hoff] Sommers’ article, ‘The War against Boys’ [Atlantic Monthly, May 2000, pp. 59–74], presumably not written by the author, proclaims ‘it is boys who are the second sex’. So credit for that nasty inversion of Beauvoir’s expression may actually go to an anonymous editor at “The Atlantic” (Tom Digby, “Male trouble: are men victims of sexism?” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, p. 247, n. 3). Referring to boys as the second sex (which I encountered only after formulating my title) is an inversion or negation of the Beauvoirian phrase. My expression is a derivation from it. It says that even if females are the second sex, males are the victims of the second sexism. Professor Digby seems not to have distinguished between (a) a disagreement about whether boys or girls are the second sex, and (b) a claim that boys and men are the victims of a second sexism.

4

Blood-letting was once a standard medical treatment for dozens of conditions. Haemochromatosis is one of only a few conditions for which it is actually a suitable treatment.

5

While older woman do not menstruate, the onset of iron accumulation in those with haemochromatosis tends to begin sufficiently late in their life that they either die of something else first or only suffer the symptoms very late.

6

Fans of Monty Python’s Life of Brian will remember that a man’s lack of a uterus is “nobody’s fault, not even the Romans’.”

7

As implied in note 2 above, I am interested in sex discrimination rather than gender discrimination. Although there are different ways of drawing the distinction, a common one is between the biological or anatomical condition of being male or female — a person’s sex — and attributes that are socially designated as being masculine or feminine — a person’s gender. Thus a person who is anatomically male might be feminine and a person who is masculine might be anatomically female. I am fundamentally interested in sex discrimination because I am interested in discrimination against people who are anatomically male (or who are perceived as such). This is the complement to concern about discrimination against people who are anatomically female. Of course, sex discrimination and gender discrimination are related. Sexists tend to assume that males should be masculine and females should be feminine, but the expectation is that people’s gender matches their sex. Masculine women do not escape discrimination against females, and feminine men do not escape discrimination against males.

8

I am not the only one to think this. For example, Sophia Moreau (“What is discrimination?” Philosophy and Public Affairs, 38(2), 2010) says that her view of discrimination “does not offer a single reductive explanation of the wrong of discrimination — that is, an explanation that traces the wrong of discrimination to some further single kind of normative fact that is operative in all cases” (p. 157). That it cannot be so reduced, she says, “reflects the complex nature of the type of injustice that we are trying to explain” (p. 157). She says that we can only address such questions “on a case-by-case basis” (p. 159). And she says that this is no more problematic for her “account than for any other account of discrimination” (p. 160). Iris Marion Young makes a similar claim about oppression. She says that “it is not possible to give one essential definition of oppression” (Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990, p. 42).

9

Some people use the term “sexual discrimination” but I prefer to avoid it as it is ambiguous between discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation or activity and discrimination on the grounds of a person’s sex.

10

Janet Radcliffe Richards, The Sceptical Feminist, London: Penguin Books, 1994, p. 37. Martha Nussbaum shares this view. Although she does not explicitly define sexism, she says that liberal feminism (which obviously stands in opposition to sexism) takes sex to be a morally irrelevant characteristic in determining how people should be treated. (Sex and Social Justice, New York: Oxford University Press, 1999, p. 10.)

11

Mary Anne Warren, Gendercide, Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Allanheld, 1985, p. 83.

12

Ibid., pp. 83–84.

13

See, for example, Marilyn Frye, The Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory, Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press, 1983, p. 38; Iris Marion Young,Justice and the Politics of Difference, especially pp. 39–65.

14

Richard Wasserstrom, “On racism and sexism,” in Carol Gould (ed.), Gender, Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1997, pp. 337–358, at p. 347.

15

Ibid.

16

The “systemic” requirement is not sufficient. Discrimination against males may well be systemic. Those who deny the existence of a second sexism thus also require the condition that the system favors those who hold overall power. (This assumes that males hold overall power. I shall return to this assumption later.)

17

Marilyn Frye,The Politics of Reality, p. 19.

18

Ibid., p. 38. The precise wording of Professors Frye’s and Wasserstrom’s definition allows the possibility that males could be victims of sexism if discrimination against them were part of a system that concentrates power and advantage in the hands of (other?) males. However, it does not seem that either of them intended this loophole in their definitions.

19

Marilyn Frye, The Politics of Reality, p. 18.

20

Richard Wasserstrom, “On racism and sexism,” p. 347.

21

Ibid.

22

Peter Singer, Animal Liberation, 2nd edn, New York: New York Review of Books, 1990, pp. 18–19.

23

Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference, pp. 40–41. I shall discuss these issues further in the final chapter.

24

And if anybody objects to that term, we might simply say that they are the victims of injustice, or simply that they are wrongly treated.

25

Some might suggest that if females are the greater victims of sex discrimination than males that we are, on that basis, justified in focusing on anti-female sex discrimination. I reject that argument in the “Distraction” section of Chapter 5.

26

For example, Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique, New York: Dell, 1974; Carole Pateman, The Sexual Contract, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1988; Deborah L. Rhode,Speaking of Sex: The Denial of Gender Inequality, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997.

27

Perhaps in extraordinary circumstances — to avoid some catastrophe, for example — a sexist act might be morally justified. Some might wish to say, under such circumstances, that the discrimination still wronged the person who was harmed by it, but that the wrong was justifiably inflicted. In this book I focus on ordinary rather than extraordinary circumstances.

28

Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference, pp. 41, 150; Nijole V. Benokraitis, Subtle Sexism: Current Practices and Prospects for Change, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1997.

29

John Stuart Mill, “The subjection of women,” in On Liberty and Other Essays, ed. J. Gray, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991, p. 486–487, 493–495; Martha C. Nussbaum, Sex and Social Justice, pp. 11, 13, 130–153.

30

Frontiero v. Richardson, 411 US 677 (1973).

31

I am grateful to Don Hubin for drawing my attention to this case and for suggesting the observations I have made in this paragraph.

32

There are some criticisms that do not presuppose either of the views I shall now outline. There are not many of these and I shall consider them too in due course.

33

Michael Levin would deny that egalitarian feminism really is feminism. This is because one of his conditions for a view to count as feminist is that it not be a “platitude which no reasonable person would dispute.” He then says that views like “opposition to sexism” fall foul of this condition. (Feminism and Freedom, New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books, 1987, p. 16.) The problem with his view, however, is that opposition to sexism has been, and still is, widely rejected. Even when people say that they are opposed to sexism their words often do not match their commitments. Thus it is not unreasonable to understand egalitarian feminism as a genuine commitment to equality of the sexes.

34

This distinction is not quite the same as Christina Hoff Sommers’ distinction between equity feminism and gender feminism, even though there are similarities. (See Who Stole Feminism? New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994, p. 22.)

35

Janet Radcliffe Richards notes that there are partisan feminists (The Sceptical Feminist, p. 29), but judges such a view not to be true to feminism. She says, for example, that feminism “is not concerned with a group of people it wants to benefit, but with a type of injustice it wants to eliminate” (pp. 25–26). It is, she says, “far more reasonable to ask people to support a movement against injustice than a movement for women” (p. 26).

36

For example, the (no longer existent) “New York Radical Women” in a statement of principles said:

We take the woman’s side in everything. We ask not if something is “reformist”, “radical”, “revolutionary”, or “moral.” We ask: is it good for women or bad for women?

Robin Morgan (ed.), Sisterhood is Powerful: An Anthology of Writings from the Women’s Liberation Movement, New York: Vintage Books, 1970, p. 520.)

37

I shall discuss this further in Chapter 3.

38

Indeed, when I first published an article on the second sexism, all four of the responses, invited by the journal editors, were feminist responses. Conservatives were not even invited to comment. This, I think, is very likely indicative of the current tendencies in social philosophy and of academia more generally.

39

Tom Digby (“Male trouble,” p. 248) complains that I leave the nature of the threat unspecified. This is because its nature will depend on the particularities of any given reader’s view.

40

I refer here to orthodoxies in general.

41

Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Benatar’s alleged second sexism,”Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, p. 211.

42

I have since discovered that many of them were mentioned well before the 1970s. See Ernest Belfort Bax, “The Legal Subjection of Men” (1908). Available at: http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Legal_Subjection_of_Men (accessed July 1, 2010). Since this work claims that it is men rather than women who are (or, at the time of writing, were) subjugated, I do not endorse the conclusions of this broadside.

43

See, for example, Tom Digby, “Male trouble,” p. 247. He says “antifeminism is a common theme in angry man discourse.” He then says that this is my “approximate vantage point.”

44

We should also reject, as an ad hominem fallacy, the possible accusation that male feminists hate men — or at least those men who do not agree with their particular feminist views.

45

It is ironic, indeed, that Professor Digby, who accuses others of being angry men, has previously objected to making the allegation that feminists hate men. See his “Do feminists hate men? Feminism, antifeminism and gender oppositionality,” Journal of Social Philosophy, 29(2), Fall 1998, pp. 15–31.

46

Tom Digby tries a similar move when he taints, by association with racists and people who are insensitive to racism, those who disapprove of affirmative action (Tom Digby, “Male trouble,” p. 258). I agree that those who oppose affirmative action (for blacks) include racists and those insensitive to racism, but there is another strand of opposition to affirmative action that is based on liberal, anti-racist premises.

47

My views have already evolved. In some cases, I previously thought that it was an open question whether a given disadvantage of being male was the product of discrimination, but subsequent reading suggested that it is.

1

Will Ellsworth-Jones, We Will Not Fight: The Untold Story of the First World War’s Conscientious Objectors, London: Aurum, 2008.

2

At the time of writing these appear to include: Albania, Algeria, Angola, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Benin (selective), Bhutan (selective), Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Burundi (selective), Cape Verde, Central African Republic (selective), Chad (selective), Chile, China (selective), Colombia, Cuba, Cyprus, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Denmark, Ecuador, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Estonia, Finland, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Indonesia (selective), Iran, Iraq, Israel, Ivory Coast, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Lebanon, Libya, Lithuania, Madagascar, Mali (selective), Mexico, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar, Niger (selective), North Korea, Norway, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Russia, Senegal (selective), Serbia, Singapore, South Korea, Sudan, Switzerland, Syria, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo (selective), Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Vietnam and Yemen. It is very difficult to get reliable, comprehensive, up-to-date information on which countries still conscript. The above list is drawn from a few different sources and involves a measure of verification (or falsification) between them and independently. The full list of sources is too long to include here, but the initial, general sources were: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/mil_con-military-conscription; http://www.wri-irg.org/programmes/world_survey; and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription.

3

Will Ellsworth-Jones, We Will Not Fight, especially chapter 4.

4

For more on adolescent soldiers in the First World War, see Richard van Emden, Boy Soldiers of the Great War, London: Headline, 2005.

5

Quoted in Will Ellsworth-Jones, We Will Not Fight, p. 47. Ironically, the feminist icon Virginia Woolf claimed — falsely, the evidence shows — that relatively few white feathers had been handed out and that “it was more a product of male hysteria than actual practice” (ibid., p. 46).

6

Originally women were conscripted for 24 months and men for 30 months. However, the period of women’s service was reduced to less than 21 months and men’s was increased to 36 months. Dafna N. Izraeli, “Gendering military service in the Israel Defense Force,” Israel Social Science Research, 12(1), 1997, p. 139.

7

Ibid., p. 138.

8

Ibid., and Nira Yuval-Davis, “Front and rear: the sexual division of labor in the Israeli Army,” Feminist Studies, 11(3), Fall 1985, pp. 666–668.

9

Women did serve (voluntarily) in combat in Israel’s War of Independence, and women are now admitted to combat units, but only voluntarily.

10

Judith Wagner DeCew, “Women, equality, and the military,” in Dana E. Bushnell (ed.), Nagging Questions: Feminist Ethics in Everyday Life, Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1995, p. 131.

11

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat: The New Evidence That Women Shouldn’t Fight the Nation’s Wars, New York: Sentinel, 2007, p. 72. Mary Wechsler Segal makes a similar point. She distinguishes military jobs by the degree to which they “involve offensive or defensive combat potential.” “The arguments for female combatants,” in Nancy Loring Goldman (ed.), Female Soldiers: Combatants or Noncombatants? Historical and Contemporary Perspectives, Westport: Greenwood Press, 1982, p. 267.

12

John Keegan, The Face of Battle, New York: Penguin Books, 1978, p. 89.

13

John Keegan and Richard Holmes, Soldiers: A History of Men in Battle, London: Hamish Hamilton, 1985, p. 261.

14

At least they begin on a larger scale. Casualties also occur in training, well before combat begins.

15

Joanna Bourke, Dismembering the Male: Men’s Bodies, Britain and the Great War, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996, p. 228.

16

Not all drown at sea. At the Battle of Agincourt, for example, when “the heavily armored French men-at-arms fell wounded, many could not get up and simply drowned in the mud as other men stumbled over them.” James Glanz, “Historians Reassess Battle of Agincourt,” New York Times, 25 October 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/25/world/europe/25agincourt.html?pagewanted=all (accessed October 25, 2009).

17

For harrowing images of injuries suffered by twenty-first-century soldiers see Shawn Christian Nessen, Dave Edmond Lounsbury and Stephen P. Hetz (eds), War Surgery in Afghanistan and Iraq, Falls Church, VA: Office of the Surgeon General, United States Army, and Washington, DC: Borden Institute, Walter Reed Army Medical Center, 2008.

18

Joanna Bourke, An Intimate History of Killing: Face-to-Face Killing in Twentieth-Century Warfare, New York: Basic Books, 1999, pp. 235–236.

19

Scott Claver, Under the Lash: A History of Corporal Punishment in the British Armed Forces, London: Torchstream Books, 1954, p. 67; James E. Valle, Rocks and Shoals: Order and Discipline in the Old Navy, 1800–1861, Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1980, p. 38.

20

Joanna Bourke, Dismembering the Male, pp. 94ff.

21

David Sharp, “Shocked, shot, and pardoned,” The Lancet, 368, September 26, 2006, pp. 975–976. Although earlier terms such as “shell shock,” “neurasthenia” and “Vietnam War syndrome” referred to some similar symptoms, it is only more recently that the condition has been understood more fully and (relatively more) sympathetically.

22

Jeffrey Gettleman, “Soldier Accused as Coward Says He Is Guilty Only of Panic Attack,” New York Times, November 6, 2003.

23

Ibid.

24

Ibid.

25

“Army drops all legal action against SSG Georg-Andreas Pogany.” Statement by Anderson & Travis, PC, July 16, 2004.

26

Joanna Bourke, Dismembering the Male, pp. 38, 83ff.

27

Ibid., p. 77.

28

Ibid., p. 31, 70.

29

Joanna Bourke, An Intimate History of Killing, pp. 339ff.

30

Ibid., p. 350.

31

Dave Grossman, On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society, Boston: Back Bay Books, 1995, p. 277.

32

Joanna Bourke, An Intimate History of Killing, pp. 67–68. See also James E. Valle, Rocks and Shoals, p. 76.

33

Steven Lee Myers, “Hazing Trial Bares Dark Side of Russia’s Military,” New York Times, August 13, 2006.

34

Ibid.

35

Ibid.

36

Saying that men are more likely to be the victims of aggression and violence is not to say that they are always over-represented among such victims. Nazi genocide of Jews and others, for example, eventually targeted men and women equally.

37

As distinct from parent–child or sibling violence.

38

For a comprehensive list of studies see Martin S. Fiebert, “References examining assaults by women on their spouses or male partners: an annotated bibliography,” available at http://www.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm (accessed March 5, 2010). Here are a few examples: Murray Straus, “Victims and aggressors in marital violence,” American Behavioral Scientist, 23(5), May/ June 1980, pp. 681–704; Murray A. Straus and Richard J. Gelles, “Societal change and change in family violence from 1975 to 1985 as revealed by two national surveys,” Journal of Marriage and the Family, 48, August 1986, pp. 465–479. For similar findings in Canada see Merlin B. Brinkeroff and Eugen Lupri, “Interspousal violence,” Canadian Journal of Sociology, 13(4), 1988, pp. 407–430.

39

This, of course, heightens one’s confidence in the findings. They are clearly not the product of preconceived notions or ideological bias.

40

Murray Straus, “Victims and aggressors in marital violence,” p. 683.

41

Ibid., p. 684.

42

Jan E. Stets and Murray A. Straus, “The marriage license as a hitting license: a comparison of assaults in dating, cohabiting, and married couples,” Journal of Family Violence, 4(2), 1989, p. 163. Jean Malone, Andrea Tyree and K. Daniel O’Leary (“Generalization and containment: different effects of past aggression for wives and husbands,” Journal of Marriage and the Family, 51, 1989, p. 690) found that women are more likely to throw an object, slap, kick, bite, hit with a fist and hit with an object. For a survey of other findings to this effect, see Donald Dutton and Tonia Nicholls, “The gender paradigm in domestic violence research and theory. Part 1: the conflict of theory and data,” Aggression and Violent Behavior, 10, 2005, pp. 680–714 (especially pp. 687–689).

43

K. Daniel O’Leary, Julian Barling, Ileana Arias et al., “Prevalence and stability of physical aggression between spouses: a longitudinal analysis,” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 57(2), 1989, pp. 264–266.

44

David B. Sugarman and Gerald T. Hotaling, “Dating violence: a review of contextual and risk factors,” in Barrie Levy (ed.), Dating Violence: Young Women in Danger, Seattle: Seal Press, 1991, p. 104.

45

See, for example, Jan E. Stets and Murray A. Straus, “Gender differences in reporting marital violence and its medical and psychological consequences,” in Murray A. Straus and Richard J. Gelles (eds), Physical Violence in American Families, New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1990, pp. 151–165; Michele Cascardi, Jennifer Langhinrischen and Dina Vivian, “Marital aggression: impact, injury, and health correlates for husbands and wives,” Archives of Internal Medicine, 152, 1992, pp. 1178–1184; Daniel J. Whitaker, Tadesse Halleyesus, Monica Swahn and Linda S. Saltzman, “Differences in frequency of violence and reported injury between relationships with reciprocal and nonreciprocal intimate partner violence,” American Journal of Public Health, 97(5), 2007, pp. 941–947.

46

Murray Straus, “Victims and aggressors in marital violence,” p. 681; Murray A. Straus and Richard J. Gelles, “Societal change and change in family violence,” p. 468; K. Daniel O’Leary Julian Barling, Ileana Arias et al., “Prevalence and stability of physical aggression,” p. 267.

47

See, for example, Maureen McLeod, “Women against men: an examination of domestic violence based on an analysis of official data and national victimization data,” Justice Quarterly, 1, 1984, pp. 171–193; Donald Vasquez and Robert E. Falcone, “Cross-gender violence,” Annals of Emergency Medicine, 29(3), 1997, pp. 427–428.

48

See, for example, K. Daniel O’Leary, Amy M. Smith Slep, Sarah Avery-Leaf and Michele Cascardi, “Gender differences in dating aggression among multiethnic high school students,” Journal of Adolescent Health, 42, 2008, pp. 473–479; David M. Fergusson, L. John Horwood and Elizabeth M. Ridder, “Partner violence and mental health outcomes in a New Zealand birth cohort,” Journal of Marriage and the Family, 67, 2005, pp. 1103–1119.

49

Ann Frodi, Jacqueline Macaulay and Pauline Ropert Thome, “Are women always less aggressive than men? A review of the experimental literature,” Psychological Bulletin, 1977, 84(4), p. 642; Alice H. Eagly and Valerie J. Steffen, “Gender and aggressive behavior: a meta-analytic review of social psychological literature,” Psychological Bulletin, 100(3), 1986, pp. 321–322.

50

Diane Craven, “Sex Differences in Violent Victimization, 1994.” Bureau of Justice Statistics Special Report, September 1997.

51

Home Office, Crime in England and Wales 2008/9: A Summary of the Main Findings, London: HMSO, 2009, p. 8.

52

Adam Hochschild, King Leopold’s Ghost, Boston: Mariner Books, 1999, p. 232.

53

Robert Conquest, The Great Terror: Stalin’s Purge of the Thirties, Toronto: Macmillan, 1968, pp. 533–535. He explains why the differential is not (significantly) attributable to combat deaths in the First World War.

54

Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa, Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report, Cape Town: Truth and Reconciliation Commission, 1998, vol. 1, p. 171; vol. 4, pp. 259–266.

55

Ibid., vol. 1, p. 171.

56

Ibid., p. 169.

57

Ibid., vol. 4, Chapter 10.

58

Paul. B. Spiegel and Peter Salama, “War and mortality in Kosovo, 1988–9: an epidemiological testimony,” The Lancet, 355, June 24, 2000, pp. 2205–2206.

59

Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, Kosovo: As Seen, As Told: An Analysis of the Human Rights Findings of the OSCE Kosovo Verification Missions, October 1998 to June 1999, Warsaw: OSCE, Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, 1999, p. 196.

60

Adam Jones has written at length about ways in which males have been targeted in genocide and mass-killing. See, for example, the following collection of his essays: Adam Jones, Gender Inclusive: Essays on Violence, Men, and Feminist International Relations, New York: Routledge, 2009.

61

For argument against sex discrimination in the infliction of corporal punishment see David Benatar, “The child, the rod and the law,” Acta Juridica, 1996, pp. 197–214; David Benatar, “Corporal punishment,” Social Theory and Practice, 24(2), Summer 1998, pp. 237–260.

62

James E. Valle, Rocks and Shoals, p. 79.

63

Ibid., p. 81.

64

Ibid., p. 38.

65

Prince Peter Alekseevich Kropotkin, “Discipline in the Russian Army,” New York Times, October 16, 1898. Online at nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf (accessed October 7, 2009).

66

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_in_Singapore#Military_Caning (accessed October 12, 2009).

67

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_corporal_punishment (accessed October 12, 2009).

68

Here are two examples: South Africa: J. Sloth-Nielsen, “Legal violence: corporal and capital punishment,” in Brian McKendrick and Wilma Hoffmann (eds), People and Violence in South Africa, Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1990, p. 77; United Kingdom: Section 56(1) of the (UK) Petty Sessions and Summary Jurisdiction Act 1927 (as amended by s. 8 of the Summary Jurisdiction Act 1960), quoted in Tyrer v. United Kingdom, European Human Rights Reports, 1978, p. 4.

69

http://www.corpun.com/singfeat.htm (accessed October 12, 2009).

70

Ibid.

71

Singapore Criminal Procedure Code 2010, Part XVI, Division 2, 325(1)(a). This replaced the (now repealed) Singapore Criminal Procedure Code, Chapter 25, 231(a), which also explicitly forbade caning of women.

72

See, for example, Singapore’s Regulation No. 88 under the Schools Regulation Act 1957. Quoted at http://corpun.com/sgscr1.htm (accessed February 18, 2002.)

73

http://www.corpun.com/rules2.htm#singsch (accessed October 13, 2009).

74

T.L. Holdstock, “Violence in schools: discipline,” in Brian McKendrick and Wilma Hoffman (eds), People and Violence in South Africa, p. 349.

75

Revealingly, the person who recounted this case wrote that the girlfriend “was compelled to witness the caning in the principal’s office” (ibid.) In presenting the fact this way rather than by noting that not only was the boy caned but that he was subjected to the further indignity of being caned in the presence of his girlfriend, the focus is placed on the unpleasantness for the girl instead of on the greater unpleasantness for the boy.

76

“Cuts” is a term for strikes with a cane.

77

“Ploddy,” the author of this account explains elsewhere, was the nickname the pupils gave the headmaster.

78

Robert Kirby, “Spoil the Rod, Spare the Child,” Mail & Guardian (Johannesburg), December 22, 2000–January 4, 2001, p. 41. For other accounts see, for example: “Eton beating,” in Michael Rosen (ed.), The Penguin Book of Childhood, London: Penguin Books, 1995, pp. 102–103; Roald Dahl, Boy: Tales of Childhood, London: Puffin Books, 1984, pp. 46–51, 119–121, 141, 145–146; Edward Said, Out of Place, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2000, pp. 41–42, 183, 187.

79

Steven R. Shaw and Jeffrey P. Braden, “Race and gender bias in the administration of corporal punishment,” School Psychology Review, 19(3), 1990, pp. 378–383; Irwin A. Hyman, Reading, Writing, and the Hickory Stick, Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 1990, p. 65; John R. Slate, Emilio Perez, Phillip B. Waldrop and Joseph E. Justen III, “Corporal punishment: used in discriminatory manner?” Clearing House, 64, July/August 1991, pp. 362–364.

80

T.L. Holdstock, “Violence in schools: discipline,” p. 349.

81

Ibid.

82

F. Spender, An Inspector’s Testament, London: English Universities Press, 1938, cited in Jacob Middleton, “The experience of corporal punishment in schools, 1890–1940,” History of Education, 37(2), March 2008, p. 264.

83

Joseph Mercurio, Caning: Educational Rite and Tradition, Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1972, p. 50.

84

Roald Dahl, Boy, p. 141.

85

Colin McGinn, The Making of a Philosopher, New York: Perennial, 2003, p. 4.

86

For example, at Eton College, boys had to remove their pants and underwear for beatings until as late as 1970. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eton_College#Corporal_punishment (accessed December 24, 2010).

87

See, for example, Rick Lyman, “In Many Public Schools, the Paddle Is No Relic,” New York Times, September 30, 2006. Online at http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/30/education/30punish.html (accessed October 3, 2006).

88

Håkan Stattin, Harald Janson, Ingrid Klackenberg-Larsson and David Magnusson, “Corporal punishment in everyday life: an intergenerational perspective,” in Joan McCord (ed.), Coercion and Punishment in Long-Term Perspectives, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. 321–323; Murray A. Straus, Beating the Devil Out of Them: Corporal Punishment in American Families, New York: Lexington Books, 1994, pp. 29–30.

89

Ronald E. Smith, Charles J. Pine and Mark E. Hawley, “Social cognitions about adult male victims of female sexual assault,” Journal of Sex Research, 24, 1988, pp. 101–112.

90

Ibid., p. 104.

91

Ibid., p. 107.

92

Ibid., p. 109.

93

Ibid.

94

Ibid., p. 107.

95

A later study of college students (Cindy Struckman-Johnson and David Struckman-Johnson, “Acceptance of male rape myths among college men and women,” Sex Roles, 27(3/4), 1992, pp. 85–100), revealed somewhat less disturbing results. In this study subjects rejected most (but not all) myths about the rape of males, albeit to varying degrees. However, because the subjects were asked explicitly to endorse or reject statements, the responses might not be as revealing as the study of Ronald Smith and colleagues, which was more likely to determine latent rather than explicit attitudes. Cindy Struckman-Johnson and David Struckman-Johnson had another methodological concern about their study in retrospect (p. 96). Even their study, however, found that “male rape myths do operate more strongly when the perpetrator is described as a woman” (p. 97). For example 40% of male subjects thought that a man raped by a woman “was to blame for being careless or for not escaping” (p. 97). Moreover, 35% of men and 22% of women agreed that a man would not be upset about being raped by a woman (p. 97). See also, H. Douglas Smith, Mary Ellen Fromouth and C. Craig Morris, “Effects of gender on perceptions of child sexual abuse,” Journal of Child Sexual Abuse, 6(4), 1997, pp. 51–62.

96

Guy Holmes and Liz Offen, “Clinicians’ hypothesis regarding clients’ problems: are they less likely to hypothesize sexual abuse in male compared to female clients?” Child Abuse & Neglect, 20(6), 1996, pp. 493–501.

97

Ibid., p. 493.

98

Ibid., p. 498.

99

Almost every scholar working in the area makes this claim. They cannot all be listed, but here are some examples: William C. Holmes and Gail B. Slap, “Sexual abuse of boys: definition, prevalence, correlates, sequelae, and management,” Journal of the American Medical Association, 280(21), December 2, 1998, pp. 1855–1862; Bill Watkins and Arnon Bentovim, “Male children and adolescents as victims: a review of current knowledge,” in Gillian C. Mezey and Michael B. King (eds), Male Victims of Sexual Assault, 2nd edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000, pp. 40–42; Matthew Parynik Mendel, The Male Survivor: The Impact of Sexual Abuse, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1995, pp. 40–51.

100

An outline of some of the discrepant data is provided by Bill Watkins and Arnon Bentovim, “Male children and adolescents as victims,” p. 38. See also Matthew Parynik Mendel, The Male Survivor, pp. 48–51.

101

Nathan W. Pino and Robert F. Meier, “Gender differences in rape reporting,” Sex Roles, 40(11/12), 1999, pp. 979–990; see also Gillian C. Mezey and Michael B. King (eds), Male Victims of Sexual Assault.

102

Arthur Kaufman, Peter Divasto, Rebecca Jackson et al., “Male rape victims: noninstitutionalized assault,” American Journal of Psychiatry, 137(2), February 1980, pp. 221–223.

103

Nicholas Groth and Wolbert Burgess, “Male rape: offenders and victims,” American Journal of Psychiatry, 137(7), July 1980, p. 808; Cindy Struckman-Johnson and David Struckman-Johnson, “Men pressured and forced into sexual experience,” Archives of Sexual Behavior, 23(1), 1994, p. 112.

104

Cindy Struckman-Johnson and David Struckman-Johnson, “Men pressured and forced into sexual experience,” and Philip M. Sarrel and William H. Masters, “Sexual molestation of men by women,” Archives of Sexual Behavior, 11(2), 1982, p. 121.

105

For a summary of findings about female abuse of boys see Bill Watkins and Arnon Bentovim, “Male children and adolescents as victims,” pp. 43–45. See also Michael King, Adrian Coxell and Gill Mezey, “The prevalence and characteristics of male sexual assault,” in Gillian C. Mezey and Michael B. King (eds), Male Victims of Sexual Assault, p. 12.

106

See, for example, Mary Spencer and Patricia Dunklee, “Sexual abuse of boys,” Pediatrics, 78(1), July 1986, pp. 133–137.

107

Gregory S. Fritz, Kim Stoll and Nathaniel N. Wagner, “A comparison of males and females who were sexually molested as children,” Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy, 7(1), Spring 1981, pp. 54–59.

108

For an overview of data from a range of studies see Matthew Parynik Mendel, The Male Survivor, pp. 62–63.

109

For a discussion of various possible explanations of why women are not recognized as perpetrators of sexual abuse see Craig M. Allen, “Women as perpetrators of child sexual abuse: recognition barriers,” in Anne L. Horton, Barry L. Johnson, Lynn M. Roundy and Doran Williams (eds), The Incest Perpetrator: A Family Member No One Wants to Treat, Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications, 1990, pp. 108–125.

110

The explanation for this may differ in the two sexes. For details on the phenomenon in the female see Meredith Chivers and J. Michael Bailey, “A sex difference in features that elicit genital response,” Biological Psychology, 70(2), October 2005, pp. 115–120. For details of the non-sexual stimuli to physiological arousal in pre-adolescent and early adolescent males see Glenn V. Ramsey, “The sexual development of boys,” American Journal of Psychology, 56(2), April 1943, pp. 217–233. For case studies of physiological arousal in men sexually molested by women, see Philip M. Sarrel and William H. Masters, “Sexual molestation of men by women.”

111

Meredith Chivers and J. Michael Bailey, “A sex difference in features that elicit genital response.”

112

Cindy Struckman-Johnson, David Struckman-Johnson, Lila Rucker et al., “Sexual coercion reported by men and women in prison,” Journal of Sex Research, 33(1), 1996, pp. 67–76. The male rate was consistent with that found in another study that looked only at sexual coercion rates in male prisons. (Cindy Struckman-Johnson and David Struckman-Johnson, “Sexual coercion rates in seven prison facilities for men,” Prison Journal, 80(4), December 2000, pp. 379–389.) This study found that 21% of inmates “had experienced at least one episode of pressured or forced sexual contact since incarcerated in their state.”

113

M. Peel, A. Mahtani, G. Hinshelwood and D. Forrest, “The sexual abuse of men in detention in Sri Lanka,” The Lancet, 355, June 10, 2000, pp. 2069–2070; Michael Slackman, “Reformer in Iran Publishes Account of a Prison Rape,” New York Times, August 25, 2009.

114

Criminal Law of the People’s Republic of China, enacted by the National People’s Congress on July 1, 1979, as amended. Online at http://www.cecc.gov/pages/newLaws/criminalLawENG.php (accessed December 1, 2009).

115

Compare Articles 177 and 176 of the Penal Code of Japan (Act No.45 of 1907, as amended). Online at http://www.cas.go.jp/jp/seisaku/hourei/data/PC_2.pdf (accessed December 1, 2009).

116

1974 amendment of Section 750.520 of the Michigan Penal Code Act 328 of 1931. Online at http://www.legislature.mi.gov/(S(24i0ub45icnmus55zkfdd32r))/documents/mcl/pdf/mcl-750-520a.pdf (accessed December 2, 2009). See also Maria Bevacqua, Rape on the Public Agenda: Feminism and the Politics of Sexual Assault, Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2000, pp. 99–100.

117

Criminal Law (Sexual Offences and Related Matters) Amendment Act 32 of 2007. Online at http://www.justice.gov.za/legislation/acts/2007-032.pdf (accessed December 1, 2009).

118

Sexual Offences (Scotland) Act 2009 (asp 9). Online at http://www.opsi.gov.uk/legislation/scotland/acts2009/pdf/asp_20090009_en.pdf (accessed December 1, 2009).

119

According to Section 1 of the Sexual Offences Act of 2003:

(1) A person (A) commits an offence if –

(a) he intentionally penetrates the vagina, anus or mouth of another person (B) with his penis,

(b) B does not consent to the penetration, and

(c) A does not reasonably believe that B consents.

Online at http://www.opsi.gov.uk/Acts/acts2003/ukpga_20030042_en_2#pt1-pb1-l1g1 (accessed October 19, 2009).

120

Ibid. She could be charged under Section 4, “Causing a person to engage in sexual activity without consent” and under Section 3, “Sexual assault,” which criminalizes non-consensual “sexual touching.” Both of these offenses lead “to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 10 years,” whereas a conviction for rape would lead “to imprisonment for life.”

121

Howard League Working Party, Unlawful Sex, London: Waterlow Publishers, 1985, p. 27.

122

Philip M. Sarrel and William H. Masters, “Sexual molestation of men by women,” p. 122.

123

Michael Benatar and David Benatar, “Between prophylaxis and child abuse: the ethics of neonatal circumcision,” American Journal of Bioethics, 3(2), Spring 2003, pp. 35–48. See also David Benatar and Michael Benatar, “How not to argue about circumcision,” American Journal of Bioethics, 3(2), Spring 2003, online edition: http://www.bioethics.net/journal/pdf/3_2_LT_w01_Benetar.pdf (accessed August 29, 2011).

124

Whether it is permissible depends, in part, on the relative therapeutic success of lumpectomy versus full mastectomy.

125

See, for example: Bertran Auvert, Dirk Taljaard, Emmanuel Lagarde et al., “Randomized, controlled intervention trial of male circumcision for reduction of HIV infection risk: the ANRS 1265 trial,” PLoS Medicine, 2(11), 2005, pp. 1112–1122; Robert C. Bailey, Stephen Moses, Corrette B. Parker et al., “Male circumcision for HIV prevention in young men in Kisumu, Kenya: a randomised controlled trial,” The Lancet, 369, February 24, 2007, pp. 643–656; Ronald H. Gray, Godfrey Kigozi, David Serwadda et al., “Male circumcision for HIV prevention in men in Rakai, Uganda: a randomised trial,” The Lancet, 369, February 24, 2007, pp. 657–666.

126

For a survey of the evidence see David Benatar and Michael Benatar, “A pain in the fetus: toward ending confusion about fetal pain,” Bioethics, 15(1), 2001, pp. 57–76.

127

For more on the data about circumcision anesthetic see Michael Benatar and David Benatar, “Between prophylaxis and child abuse,” pp. 37–38.

128

Doriane Lambelet Coleman, “The Seattle compromise: multicultural sensitivity and Americanization,” Duke Law Journal, 47, 1998, pp. 717–783.

129

Ibid., pp. 749ff. However, even if her claim is correct, that would only show that the double standard to which I shall refer is one that is enshrined in law.

130

Ibid., p. 748.

131

Ibid., p. 749.

132

American Academy of Pediatrics, Committee on Bioethics, “Policy Statement — Ritual Genital Cutting of Female Minors,” Pediatrics, published online April 26, 2010. DOI: 10.1542/peds.2010-0187.

133

Ibid., p. 1092.

134

American Academy of Pediatrics, “American Academy of Pediatrics Withdraws Policy Statement on Female Genital Cutting,” May 27, 2010. Online at www.aap.org/advocacy/releases/fgc-may27-2010.htm (accessed July 4, 2010)

135

Ibid.

136

“Not Anyone’s Daughter,” New York Times Online, June 30, 2010. Online at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/01/opinion/01thu4.html?scp=1&sq=not%20anyone’s%20daughter&st=cse (accessed July 1, 2010).

137

“Circumcisions Have Claimed 102 Lives since 1996,” Cape Times, Thursday, October 5, 2006, p. 6.

138

For one survivor’s harrowing account of evading detection, see Emanuel Tanay, Passport to Life, Ann Arbor, MI: Forensic Press, 2004. See also Solomon Perel, Europa Europa, New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1997.

139

American Association of University Women, Shortchanging Girls, Shortchanging America, Washington, DC: American Association of University Women, 1991.

140

American Association of University Women, The AAUW Report: How Schools Shortchange Girls, Washington, DC: American Association of University Women, 1992.

141

Ibid., p. 22.

142

Christina Hoff Sommers, The War against Boys: How Misguided Feminism is Harming Our Young Men, New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000; and “The War against Boys,” Atlantic Monthly, May 2000, pp. 59–74.

143

American Association of University Women, Beyond the “Gender Wars”: A Conversation about Girls, Boys, and Education, Washington, DC: American Association of University Women, 2001.

144

Ibid., p. 4.

145

Myra and David Sadker, Failing at Fairness: How America’s Schools Cheat Girls, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1994.

146

Digest of Educational Statistics, 2008, “Table 109: Percentage of high school dropouts among persons 16 through 24 years old (status dropout rate), by sex and race/ethnicity: Selected years, 1960 through 2007.” Online at http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d08/tables/dt08_109.asp (accessed October 25, 2009).

147

G. Bowlby, “Provincial drop-out rates: trends and consequences,” http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/81-004-x/2005004/8984-eng.htm (accessed December 2, 2009).

148

OECD, Education at a Glance 2008: OECD Indicators, Paris: OECD. Online at http://www.oecd.org/document/9/0,3343,en_2649_39263238_41266761_1_1_1_1,00.html (accessed June 16, 2011). See also Indicator A2, in OECD, Education at a Glance 2009: OECD Indicators, Paris: OECD, p. 56.

149

In 2006, Iceland was the one exception.

150

Digest of Educational Statistics, 2008, “Table 403: Average mathematics literacy, reading literacy, and science literacy scores of 15-year-olds, by sex and country: 2006.” Online at http://nces.ed.gov/programms/digest/d08/tables/dt08_403.asp (accessed October 25, 2009).

151

Ibid. In 2006, there were no exceptions to this trend, although data for the US are not listed.

152

There are some data that suggest that males do better and some data that suggest no significant difference between the sexes, but the bulk of the data support the conclusion that females do better. See Lee Ellis, Scott Herschberger, Evelyn Field et al., Sex Differences: Summarizing More Than a Century of Scientific Research, New York: Psychology Press, 2008, pp. 278–279.

153

Digest of Educational Statistics, 2007, “Table 191: College enrolment and enrolment rates of recent high school completers, by sex: 1950 through 2006.” Online at http://nces.ed.gov/programms/digest/d07/tables/dt07_191.asp (accessed October 25, 2009).

154

The following statistics are drawn from US Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics, “Fast facts: what is the percentage of degrees conferred by sex and race?” Online at http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=72 (accessed October 25, 2009).

155

American Association of University Women, The AAUW Report, p. 68.

156

American Association of University Women, Shortchanging Girls, Shortchanging America, pp. 7ff.

157

These are statistics from a 1995 report, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Monthly Vital Statistics Report, 43(9), Supplement, March 22, 1995, pp. 24–25. As far as I can tell the CDC no longer collects or publishes data on the proportions of maternal and paternal custody of children following divorce and thus I cannot cite more recent data from this source. The US Census has more recent data, but because the percentages listed in the Census reports total 100%, there is reason to think that unlike the earlier CDC reports, they are also factoring in joint custody. Thus the report for 2007 says that 82.6% of custodial parents were mothers, and 17.4% were fathers. (Timothy S. Grall, “Custodial Mothers and Fathers and Their Child Support: 2007,” Washington, DC: US Census Bureau, November 2009, p. 2). Even if fathers now account for a slightly greater proportion of (sole residential) custody parents than in the early 1990s, they are still a small minority of such parents.

158

This comes from a ministerial answer to a parliamentary question in New Zealand. Question available at http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Business/QWA/0/f/d/QWA_09643_2006-9643-2006-Judy-Turner-to-the-Minister-for-Courts.htm (accessed April 5, 2011). The answer links from that page. I am grateful to Stuart Birks for directing me to this source.

159

There has been some fluctuation: 73% in 1970, rising to 79% in 1976 and then dropping to 72% in 1986. See Department of Justice, Evaluation of the Divorce Act. Phase II: Monitoring and Evaluation, Ottawa: Department of Justice Canada, Bureau of Review, May 1990, p. 99.

160

Ibid., p. 103.

161

Eleanor E. Maccoby and Robert H. Mnookin, Dividing the Child: Social and Legal Dilemmas of Custody, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992, p. 103.

162

Ibid.

163

Ibid., p. 105.

164

See, for example, Bernard L. Bloom, Shirley J. Asher and Stephen W. White, “Marital disruption as a stressor: a review and analysis,” Psychological Bulletin, 85(4), 1978, pp. 867–894.

165

Augustine J. Kposowa, “Marital status and suicide in the National Longitudinal Mortality Study,” Journal of Epidemiological Community Health, 54, 2000, pp. 254–261.

166

For a number of suggestions see Sanford L. Braver, Divorced Dads: Shattering the Myths, New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 1998, pp. 112–121.

167

Ibid., pp. 87–107.

168

Cited by Ross D. Parke, Fathers, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1981, pp. 81–82.

169

Ibid.

170

Emmy E. Werner and Ruth S. Smith, Vulnerable but Invincible: A Longitudinal Study of Resilient Children and Youth, New York: Adams Bannister Cox, 1982, p. 80.

171

Ibid., pp. 94–95.

172

Paul R. Amato and Bruce Keith, “Parental divorce and adult well-being: a meta-analysis,” Journal of Marriage and the Family, 53, February 1991, pp. 43–58.

173

K. Alison Clarke-Steward and Craig Hayward, “Advantages of father custody and contact for the psychological well-being of school-age children,” Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 17, 1996, pp. 239–270.

174

For example, who is the mother of a child that is formed from the ovum of one woman but gestated in the womb of another?

175

When women adopt, then, they obviously know that their children are not their genetic offspring, but the same is true of men.

176

The precise rate of non-paternity is very difficult to calculate. Studies have shown considerable variation. See, for example, Kermyt G. Anderson, “How well does paternity confidence match actual paternity?” Current Anthropology, 47(3), June 2006, pp. 513–520.

177

Tuan Anh Nguyen v. I.N.S, 121 S.Ct 2053 (2001). I am grateful to Alex Guerrero for drawing my attention to this case.

178

Men technically also have castration, but then we can add hysterectomy and oophorectomy for women.

179

For a detailed (and relatively up-to-date) tabulation of parental leave benefits by country, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parental_leave (accessed January 3, 2011).

180

Dan Smith, The State of the World Atlas, Brighton: Earthscan, 2003, pp. 62–63.

181

Kath O’Donnell, “Lesbian and gay families,” in Gill Jagger and Caroline Wright (eds), Changing Family Values, London: Routledge, 1999, p. 90.

182

D.J. West, “Homophobia: covert and overt,” in Gillian C. Mezey and Michael B. King, Male Victims of Sexual Assault, p. 29.

183

FBI, “Hate Crime Statistics, 2008.” Online at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/hc2008/documents/incidentsandoffenses.pdf (accessed December 21, 2009). (The sum of these is not 100% because some crimes were motivated by bias against homosexuals in general, some were motivated by bias against bisexuals and a small proportion were motivated by bias against heterosexuals.)

184

For surveys, see Rebecca Jurado, “The essence of her womanhood: defining the privacy rights of women prisoners and the employment rights of women guards,” Journal of Gender, Social Policy and the Law, 7(1), 1998/1999, pp. 1–53; and Brenda V. Smith, “Watching you, watching me,” Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, 15, 2003, pp. 225–288.

185

Smith v. Fairman, 678 F.2d 52 (7th Cir. 1982).

186

Jordan v. Gardner, 986 F.2d 1521 (9th Cir. 1993).

187

Robino v. Iranon, 145 F.3d 1109 (9th Cir. 1998), at p. 1110.

188

Bagley v. Watson, 579 F. Supp 1099 (D.C.Or., 1983).

189

See, for example, Forts v. Ward, 621 F.2d 1210 (2nd Cir. 1980); and Torres v. Wisconsin Department of Health & Social Services, 838 F. 2d 944 (7th Cir. 1988).

190

Carlin v. Manu, 72 F.Supp.2d 1177 (D.Or., 1999).

191

See, for example, Timm v. Gunter, 917 F.2d 1093 (8th Cir. 1990).

192

Canada is another, but male prisoners have been similarly disadvantaged there. See Weatherall v. Canada (Attorney General), [1993] 2 S.C.R. 872.

193

“Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners,” adopted by the First United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders, held in Geneva in 1955, and approved by the Economic and Social Council by its resolutions 663 C (XXIV) of July 31, 1957 and 2076 (LXII) of May 13, 1977. Online at http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/pdf/treatmentprisoners.pdf (accessed January 6, 2010).

194

Martin van Creveld, Men, Women and War, London: Cassell & Co., 2001, p. 216 (citing a personal communication from Lt.-Col. Ian Wing, Australian Army).

195

In ancient Rome, all functions were performed in full view of others using the toilets.

196

The Economist, Pocket World in Figures, 2007 Edition, London: Profile Books, 2006, pp. 170, 212, 240.

197

Ibid., pp. 186, 190.

198

Ibid., p. 202.

199

Ibid., p. 168.

200

George Stolnitz, “A century of international mortality trends: I,” Population Studies, 9(1), 1955, pp. 24–55; George Stolnitz, “A century of international mortality trends: II,” Population Studies, 10(1), 1956, pp. 17–42.

201

All the foregoing statistics in this paragraph are from the Human Mortality Database, University of California, Berkeley (USA) and Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (Germany). Available at www.mortality.org (accessed January 28, 2010).

202

George Stolnitz, “A century of international mortality trends: II,” pp. 23ff.

203

Ibid. It was also true that male survival rates were higher than those of females at specific ages (even when female longevity was overall greater than that of males). However, over time female survival rates at those ages outstripped that of males. Ibid. See also, George Stolnitz, “A century of international mortality trends: I,” pp. 44–45.

204

US Bureau of the Census, Historical Statistics of the United States, 1789–1945, Washington, DC, 1949, p. 45.

205

Ibid.

206

Ibid.

207

Colin Pritchard, Suicide — The Ultimate Rejection? A Psycho-Social Study, Buckingham: Open University Press, 1995, p. 59.

208

Ibid. See tables on pp. 61, 64–67.

209

Ibid., pp. 114–115.

210

US Department of Labor, “Fatal occupational injuries, total hours, and rates of fatal occupational injuries by selected worker characteristics, occupations, and industries, civilian workers, 2008,” p. 1. Online at: http://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/cfoi_rates_2008hb.pdf (accessed January 17, 2010).

211

US Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Current Population Survey, and Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries, 2009,” p. 8. Online at www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/cfch0007.pdf (accessed January 17, 2010).

212

Andrew Sharpe and Jill Hardt, “Five Deaths a Day: Workplace Fatalities in Canada, 1993–2005,” Ottawa: Centre for the Study of Living Standards, 2006. See Table 4a.

213

Yen-Hui Lin, Chih-Yong Chen and Jin-Lan Luo, “Gender and age distribution of occupational fatalities in Taiwan,” Accident Analysis and Prevention, 40, 2008, p. 1606.

214

Roy Walmsley, “World Prison Population List,” 4th edn, London: Home Office, 2003, p. 1.

215

Ibid. I say “possibly” because the data show that the USA has about 1.96 million prisoners including pre-trial prisoners and that China has about 1.43 million excluding pre-trial prisoners. It is possible that if the pre-trial detainees were added to the China figures, they would exceed those of the USA.

216

There is obviously some fluctuation. Roy Walmsley, “World Female Imprisonment List,” London: International Centre for Prison Studies, 2006, p. 3 (lists the female proportion as 8.6%, based on information available at the end of April 2006). US Department of Justice, “Prison Inmates at Midyear 2007,” Washington, DC, June 2008, p. 1 (lists the female proportion as 7.2% based on information available at the end of June 2007).

217

UK Office of National Statistics, “Prison Population, 2003,” March 22, 2005. Online at http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=1101 (accessed February 3, 2010).

218

Roy Walmsley, “World Female Imprisonment List,” p. 1.

219

Ibid.

220

Ibid.

221

Victor L. Streib, “Rare and inconsistent: the death penalty for women,” Fordham Urban Law Journal, 33, 2006, pp. 609–636, at p. 621. Some of Professor Streib’s data are drawn from his “Death penalty for female offenders,” University of Cincinnati Law Review, 58, 1990, pp. 845–880.

222

Victor L. Streib, “Rare and inconsistent,” p. 622.

223

Ibid.

224

I say “known” because China, which carries out many executions, is notoriously secretive about the precise numbers.

225

See http://www.capitalpunishmentuk.org/women.html (accessed February 24, 2010). The author of this site, Richard Clark, advises me that his claim of less than 1% is made in the light of his “detailed analysis of executions worldwide published every month.” His figures exclude China because “there are no definitive numbers for that country for either sex.” He also indicates that his “site lists the names of all verifiable and reported executions in the 21st century” (personal communication, February 23, 2010).

226

Roger Hood and Carolyn Hoyle, The Death Penalty: A Worldwide Perspective, 4th edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008, p. 54.

227

Ibid., p. 196.

228

Ibid., p. 195.

229

Not all do deserve it, as it has not been unknown for wrongfully convicted people to be sentenced to death.

1

See, for example, Martha Nussbaum, Sex and Social Justice, New York: Oxford University Press, 1999, p. 29.

2

Quoted by Judith Wagner DeCew, “The combat exclusion and the role of women in the military,” Hypatia, 10(1), Winter 1995, p. 62.

3

Hannah Fischer, “United States Military Casualty Statistics: Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom,” Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, March 25, 2009, p. 2.

4

US Department of Commerce, US Census Bureau News, “Women’s History Month, 2010,” Washington, DC, January 5, 2010. Online at http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/pdf/cb10ff-03_womenshistory.pdf (accessed March 21,2010).

5

This suggestion was first made to me on one of the occasions on which I spoke about this topic. It also appears in Tom Digby, “Male trouble: are men victims of sexism?” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), 2003, p. 256.

6

See David Bevan, Drums of the Birkenhead, Cape Town: Purnell & Sons, 1972; Mark Giroud, The Return to Camelot: Chivalry and the English Gentleman, London: Yale University Press, 1981. Sex and age are not the only relevant variables. Class is another. For statistics on the percentages of surviving men, women and children in each of the three classes on the Titanic, see Ian Jack, “Leonardo’s grave,” Granta, 67, Autumn, 1999, p. 32.

7

Adam Jones has made this point repeatedly. See, for example, “Gender and genocide in Rwanda,” in Adam Jones (ed.), Gendercide and Genocide, Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2004, pp. 126–127; Adam Jones, Gender Inclusive, London: Routledge, 2009, pp. 255 and 257. In the next three paragraphs, I provide some of his examples by following his citations to their source.

8

Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust, New York: Vintage Books, 1997, p. 149.

9

Christopher Browning, Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland, New York: HarperCollins, 1992, p. 13.

10

Ibid., p. 14.

11

Ibid.

12

Christopher Browning, Nazi Policy, Jewish Workers, German Killers, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000, p. 30.

13

Leo Kuper, Genocide: Its Political Use in the Twentieth Century, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981, p. 204.

14

Maura Reynolds, “War Has No Rules for Russian Forces Fighting in Chechnya,” Los Angeles Times, September 17, 2000.

15

The following are a few of hundreds, if not thousands, of possible examples. (1) In a report about South Koreans kidnapped by Afghan militants, it was said that “authorities believed that 22, including 18 women, were still being held” (Choe Sang-Hun, “Spirits Sag in South Korea at Death of Hostage,” New York Times, July 27, 2007). (2) The caption to a photograph in another New York Times article read: “Children related to five people, including three women, who died Feb. 12 in a night raid near Gardez in Paktia Province, Afghanistan, stood at their graves last week” (R. Oppel and R. Nordland, “U.S. Is Reining In Special Forces in Afghanistan,” New York Times, March 16, 2010). (3) A newspaper infographic about the Khmer Rouge, referring to the Tuoi Sleng Prison, read: “At least 14 000 people passed through, fewer than 10 are thought to have survived… Women, children and babies were among those killed” (Reuters, “Khmer Rouge Prison Chief Sentenced,” Cape Times, July 27, 2010, p. 2). (4) The headline of a front-page article about all the victims of the space shuttle Challenger explosion read “Two Women among Victims” (Cape Times, January 23, 1986, p. 1). (5) The Iraqi human rights minister is quoted as saying that authorities had found “a mass grave with the bodies of more than 800 people, including women and children” (“Mass Grave Contains 800 Saddam Victims,” Cape Times, April 15, 2011, p. 2).

16

Judy Dempsey, “East German Shoot-to-Kill Order Is Found,” New York Times, August 13, 2007. Online at http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/13/world/europe/13germany.html (accessed August 13, 2007).

17

Adam Jones, Gender Inclusive, pp. 100–101.

18

Adam Jones, “The Globe and males,” in Gender Inclusive, pp. 3–24.

19

Ibid., p. 5.

20

Good evolutionary reason is not the same as good moral reason. I shall say more about this later.

21

Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Are men oppressed?” in Larry May, Robert Strikwerda and Patrick D. Hopkins (eds), Rethinking Masculinity: Philosophical Explorations in the Light of Feminism, 2nd edn, Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1996, p. 301.

22

Ibid.

23

Ibid.

24

Susan Estrich, Real Rape, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987.

25

See, for example, Ileana Arias and Patti Johnson, “Evaluations of physical aggression among intimate dyads,” Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 4(3), September 1989, pp. 298–307; Cathy Stein Greenblat, “A hit is a hit is a hit… or is it? Approval and tolerance of the use of physical force by spouses,” in David Finkelhor, Richard J. Gelles, Gerald T. Hotaling and Murray A. Straus (eds), The Dark Side of Families: Current Family Violence Research, Beverly Hills: Sage Publications, 1983, pp. 235–260.

26

Richard B. Felson, “The normative protection of women from violence,” Sociological Forum, 15(1), 2000, p. 95.

27

Stuart P. Taylor and Seymour Epstein, “Aggression as a function of the interaction of the sex of the aggressor and the sex of the victim,” Journal of Personality, 35, 1967, p. 481.

28

Ibid.

29

To clarify, the claim that male lives are not less valuable is different from the descriptive claim that male lives are not less valued. I have shown that people do value male lives less. I am now arguing that they are wrong to do so.

30

In rejecting the view that they should have these attributes, I am not arguing that they should not have them.

31

David Benatar, Better Never to Have Been, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006.

32

Males are conceived at substantially higher rates. Some studies put the primary sex ratio at 160 males to every 100 females. Since the secondary sex ratio — the ratio of male to females at birth is around 105 : 100, it is evident that many more males succumb during gestation. (See Lee Ellis, Scott Herschberger, Evelyn Field et al., Sex Differences: Summarizing More Than a Century of Scientific Research, New York: Psychology Press, 2008, pp. 1–2.

33

D.J. Albert, M.L. Walsh and R.H. Jonik, “Aggression in humans: what is its biological foundation?” Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, 17, 1993, p. 417; Ann Frodi et al. say that “[c]ommonly held hypotheses that men are almost always more physically aggressive than women and that women display more indirect or displaced aggression were not supported.” Ann Frodi, Jacqueline Macaulay and Pauline Ropert Thome, “Are women always less aggressive than men? A review of the experimental literature,” Psychological Bulletin, 1977, 84(4), p. 634.

34

African Rights, Rwanda: Not So Innocent — When Women Become Killers, London: African Rights, 1995.

35

Patricia Pearson, When She Was Bad: Violent Women and the Myth of Innocence, New York: Viking, 1997.

36

“Biological determinism” is not synonymous with “genetic determinism.” However, genetic determinism is an example or component of biological determinism.

37

It is a separate question whether such gender role reinforcement is desirable. Michael Levin is one who thinks that it is desirable because it encourages boys and girls to do what they will find most fulfilling. (See Feminism and Freedom, New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books, 1987, pp. 59–60.) My response is as follows: traits can be possessed to varying extents. (One can be more or less generous, courageous, patient, etc.) The degree of a trait that is found fulfilling will vary. That is to say, some people will find having trait Z to degree X fulfilling, while others might find having trait Z to degree Y fulfilling. Even if such variation will occur between the sexes it will also occur within the sexes. Thus imposing certain traits on those people who are atypical for their sex will threaten rather than foster their fulfillment.

38

Anne Fausto-Sterling, Myths of Gender: Biological Theories about Men and Women, rev. edn, New York: Basic Books, 1985, p. 14.

39

Ibid., p. 36.

40

See, for example, Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat: The New Evidence That Women Shouldn’t Fight the Nation’s Wars, New York: Sentinel, 2007, pp. 43–46.

41

The elevated prenatal androgen levels in boys do not drop immediately at birth, but taper off in the months after birth. Thus the androgens generated in utero may continue to influence development postnatally for a few months.

42

Robert T. Rubin, “The neuroendocrinology and neurochemistry of antisocial behavior,” in Sarnoff A. Mednick, Terrie A. Moffit and Susan A. Stack (eds), The Causes of Crime: New Biological Approaches, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987, p. 248.

43

D.J. Albert, M.L. Walsh and R.H. Jonik, “Aggression in humans,” pp. 407–410.

44

Robert T. Rubin, “The neuroendocrinology and neurochemistry of antisocial behavior,” says “there remains a definite controversy concerning the role of androgenic hormones in human aggressive and violent behaviors” (p. 248) and “the data on the neuroendocrine correlates of aggression and violence, with particular reference to the most thoroughly studied relation, that of testosterone in men, are sparse and conflicting” (p. 250). D.J. Albert, M.L. Walsh and R.H. Jonik, “Aggression in humans,” say that “[a]ttempts to demonstrate a correlation between testosterone and aggression in humans have been in progress for almost 30 years. Yet, a clear relation remains to be established” (p. 406). Leslie Brody, Gender, Emotion, and the Family, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999, says “there is very little basis to the widely accepted idea that there is a causal relationship between testosterone levels and human aggression” (p. 107).

45

D.J. Albert, M.L. Walsh and R.H. Jonik, “Aggression in humans,” p. 417.

46

Leslie Brody, Gender, Emotion, and the Family, p. 111. Ruth Bleier, Science and Gender: A Critique of Biology and Its Theories on Women, New York: Pergamon Press, 1984, p. 97.

47

Sheri A. Berenbaum and Susan M. Resnick, “Early androgen effects on aggression in children and adults with congenital adrenal hyperplasia,” Psychoneuroendochrinology, 22(7), 1997, pp. 505–515; Vickie Pasterski, Peter Hindmarch, Mitchell Geffner et al., “Increased aggression and activity level in 3- to 11-year-old girls with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH),” Hormones and Behavior, 52, 2007, pp. 368–374.

48

Anke A. Ehrhardt and Susan W. Baker, “Fetal androgens, human central nervous system differentiation, and behavior sex differences,” in Richard C. Friedman, Ralph M. Richart and Raymond L. Vande Wiele (eds), Sex Differences in Behavior, Huntington, NY: Robert E. Krieger Publishing Co., 1978, p. 41.

49

John Money and Anke A. Ehrhardt, Man and Woman, Boy and Girl, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1972, p. 99. John Money and Mark Schwartz, “Fetal androgens in early treated adrenogenital syndrome of 46XX hermaphroditism: influence on assertive and aggressive types of behavior,” Aggressive Behavior, 2, 1976, pp. 19–30 (esp. pp. 22–23). Melissa Hines and Francine R. Kaufman, “Androgen and the development of human sex-typical behavior: rough-and-tumble play and sex of preferred playmates in children with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH),” Child Development, 65, 1994, pp. 1042–1053.

50

D.J. Albert, M.L. Walsh and R.H. Jonik, “Aggression in humans.”

51

Ibid., p. 414.

52

There are many behaviors that are characteristic of one sex across many and unrelated species. For example, both territoriality and courtship display are usually male, while mate choice is usually female. There are exceptions, however, and thus the point about evolutionary discontinuity is not that if some specific behavior is characteristically male in most species we should expect the same behavior to be characteristic of human males. Instead the point is that if at least some behaviors are distributed unequally between the sexes in other species, it would be strange if no behaviors were distributed unequally between human males and females.

53

See, for example, Peter Singer, A Darwinian Left: Politics, Evolution and Cooperation, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999.

54

Adam Jones, “Gender and Genocide in Rwanda,” p. 127.

55

By this, I do no#t mean an arbitrary height requirement, but rather a height requirement that is materially connected to the nature of the job.

1

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat: The New Evidence That Women Shouldn’t Fight the Nation’s Wars, New York: Sentinel, 2007.

2

While this argument is worthy of detailed consideration, another argument is so weak that it is worthy of mention in this footnote only because it has actually been advanced. Tom Digby has denied that males are unfairly disadvantaged by “the warrior role and all that follows from it” because “the overall pattern of men being assigned to combat was advantageous to most societies, in many cases even crucial to their survival” (Tom Digby, “Male trouble: are men victims of sexism?” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), 2003, p. 259). The upshot of this, he claims, is that men too have benefited from the warrior role, by living in societies that have benefited from it. This argument is a stunning rationalization. Following this line of reasoning, women are not discriminated against when, for example, they are excluded from the military, so long as some benefit from this exclusion could be ascribed to them. Professor Digby thinks that males have other benefits, too. He says that “the power that has accrued to men by virtue of their ability to manifest the qualities of the warrior has given men control over important institutions like government and religion, and control over resources in general” (p. 260). Two points may be made in response to this. First, men can manifest the qualities of warrior without actually being a warrior and thus it is not clear why being forced to be a warrior is a benefit. Second, and more importantly, Professor Digby fails to distinguish between those men who pay the cost of being a soldier, and especially the highest cost (namely death), and those (other) men who gain access to power. In other words, he sees only men and women as groups, rather than individual men. One man’s benefit does not negate the harm suffered by another man.

3

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat, pp. 19–37.

4

Ibid., pp. 97–99.

5

Ibid., pp. 113–126. “Why men love war” is the title of the relevant chapter. The chapter itself makes a more modest claim — that some men find rewards in war.

6

Ibid., pp. 38–47.

7

Ibid., pp. 48–53.

8

Ibid., pp. 60–63.

9

Ibid., implicitly; and pp. 66, 70, 295.

10

Ibid., pp. 75–78.

11

Ibid., p. 65.

12

Ibid.

13

Ibid., p. 63.

14

Ibid. p. 11.

15

This parallels claims that many feminists have made about upstream discrimination against females. For example, it has been suggested that if girls are socialized to be less competitive than boys and this (partially) explains why fewer women are to be found in leadership positions, the socialization constitutes unfair discrimination even if those making the appointments to senior positions are not discriminating against women because there are fewer competitive women from whom to choose.

16

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat, pp. 97–99.

17

Ibid., pp. 113ff.

18

The evidence he cites is of masculinizing effects more generally. See ibid., pp. 44–45.

19

Ibid., p. 45.

20

Ibid.

21

Ibid.

22

Ibid., p. 11.

23

Ibid., p. 94. He correctly notes that the presence of women need not always have this effect.

24

Ibid., p. 94.

25

Professor Browne recognizes this benefit, but he underestimates its importance.

26

As it happens, even purportedly risk-taking men know when the risks are excessive, and under such conditions the fear of cowardice is not sufficient to keep many of them from undertaking those risks. That is why military leaders have not infrequently motivated soldiers by imposing the fear of a still greater likelihood of death if they fled the battle. Professor Browne himself recognizes this when he notes that during the Second World War, “Soviet officers were authorized to shoot their men on the spot” if they retreated. He also cites reports from Iraqi soldiers who feared the death squads of the Baath Party behind them more than the coalition forces ahead of them (ibid., p. 134).

27

Ibid., pp. 186–189.

28

Ibid., pp. 189–193.

29

I refer here specifically to his and my primary foci, because both of us consider the other case.

30

Within such a volunteer force, one might find that a disproportionate number of men are attracted to combat positions (whether for biological or social reasons). Nevertheless, the presence of significant numbers of women even in the support positions might preclude the need for males to be conscripted into those positions. Currently 15% of the US military is female. It is conceivable that this proportion will increase at least somewhat — say to 20 or 25% — in the coming decades. Absent those volunteers it might have been necessary to conscript some males, at least to serve in the support positions that many female soldiers occupy.

31

Writing under the pseudonym “Scalpel,” “The Female Medical Pupil,” Daily Evening Transcript, January 3, 1851, p. 2.

32

Bradwell v. The State (Illinois), 83 US 16 Wall, p. 141.

33

Almroth E. Wright, The Unexpurgated Case against Woman Suffrage, New York: Paul Hoeber, 1913, p. 88.

34

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat, p. 288.

35

Ibid., p. 290.

36

Ibid. The appeal to fear is another common technique used to support conservative conclusions.

37

Ibid., p. 93.

38

See, for example: Lizette Alvarez, “G.I. Jane Breaks the Combat Barrier as War Evolves,” New York Times, August 16, 2009; Steven Lee Myers, “Living and Fighting alongside Men, and Fitting In,” New York Times, August 17, 2009.

39

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat, pp. 1–2.

40

Both Iddo Landau and Don Hubin have reminded me that members of the US military have spoken out, in opposition to some of their civilian bosses, against the inclusion of openly gay people in the military. This suggests that at least some military leaders do have the courage to speak their minds.

41

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat, p. 111.

42

Chris Bateman, “Blood service adjusts after ‘racist’ claims,” South African Medical Journal, 95, 2005, pp. 728–730.

43

Ibid., p. 88.

44

Ibid., pp. 135–146. Michael Levin says that the “brawling, drinking, athletic, rough-house, vulgarity, and sexual braggadocio of young men in groups incomprehensible to most women, are the rituals that cement the male bond” (Feminism and Freedom, New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books, 1988, p. 244). What Professor Levin does not recognize is how many men find that sort of behavior incomprehensible.

45

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat, pp. 136–137, 164–169.

46

Ibid., pp. 169–175.

47

Ibid., p. 150–160, esp. p. 153.

48

Ibid., p. 154.

49

Ibid., pp. 154–155.

50

Ibid., pp. 279–280.

51

Ibid., p. 279.

52

Ibid., pp. 199–200.

53

Ibid., pp. 235–241.

54

Ibid., pp. 243ff.

55

Ibid., p. 239.

56

See, for example, Joanna Bourke, Rape: A History from 1860 to the Present Day, London: Virago, 2007, p. 362.

57

There is also plenty of evidence of sexual assault on males in other conflict situations. See, for example: Pauline Oosterhoff, Prisca Zwanikken and Evert Ketting, “Sexual torture of men in Croatia and other conflict situations: an open secret,” Reproductive Health Matters, 12, 2004, pp. 68–77; Eric Stener Carlson, “The hidden prevalence of male sexual assault during war,” British Journal of Criminology, 46, 2006, pp. 16–25; Kirsten Johnson, Jana Asher, Stephanie Rosborough et al., “Association of combatant status and sexual violence with health and mental health outcomes in postconflict Liberia,” Journal of the American Medical Association, 300(6), August 13, 2008, pp. 676–690.

58

Presidential Commission on the Assignment of Women in the Armed Forces, Women in Combat: Report to the President, McLean, VA: Brassey’s (US), 1992, p. 20.

59

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat, p. 254.

60

After I wrote this, a US general in Iraq issued a policy that would make pregnancy an offense for which a female battlefield soldier and the male soldier who impregnated her could be court-martialled (“Pregnant G.I.s Could Be Punished,” New York Times, December 20, 2009). Curiously he subsequently said that “he would never actually seek to jail someone over pregnancy” (“U.S. General Backs Off Pregnancy Policy,” New York Times, December 23, 2009). Just days later, his superior, the top US commander in Iraq, indicated that he would rescind the policy (“Commander to Rescind a Provision on Pregnancy,” New York Times, December 26, 2009). This lends some support to Professor Browne’s claims about double standards, but the fitting response to such double standards, as I indicated before, is not to accept them but rather to eliminate them.

61

Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat, pp. 208–220.

62

See, for example, Fiona Leach and Sara Humphreys, “Gender violence in schools: taking the ‘girls-as-victims’ discourse forward,” in Geraldine Terry with Joanna Hoare (eds), Gender-Based Violence, Oxford: Oxfam, 2007, p. 108.

63

Adam Jones makes a similar point: Adam Jones, “Gendercide and genocide,” Journal of Genocide Research, 2(2), 2000, pp. 205–206.

64

Consider, for example, the massacre of old men along with younger men in Srebrenica. See David Rohde, Endgame: The Betrayal and Fall of Srebrenica, Europe’s Worst Massacre Since World War II, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997, and esp. pp. 207, 216 and 229.

65

Ibid., and esp. pp. 205 and 230; African Rights, Rwanda: Not So Innocent — When Women Become Killers, London: African Rights, 1995, pp. 58 and 59.

66

African Rights, Rwanda: Death, Despair and Defiance, rev. edn, London: African Rights, 1995, p. 815.

67

Ibid. See also, African Rights, Rwanda: Not So Innocent, p. 81.

68

Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, Kosovo: As Seen, As Told: An Analysis of the Human Rights Findings of the OSCE Kosovo Verification Missions, October 1998 to June 1999, Warsaw: OSCE, Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, 1999, p. 196.

69

R.J. Rummel, Death by Government, New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books, 1994, p. 329.

70

Adam Jones, “Gendercide and genocide,” p. 207, n. 13.

71

My own view is that although most instances of corporal punishment are wrong, physical punishment may sometimes be permissible — or at least that the arguments that it is always wrong fail to establish that conclusion. (See David Benatar, “Corporal punishment,” Social Theory and Practice, 24(2), Summer 1998, pp. 237–260.)

72

Among those who claim this are Myra and David Sadker, Failing at Fairness: How America’s Schools Cheat Girls, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1994. They say: “In most cases when boys get tougher discipline, however, it is because they deserve it” (p. 201).

73

Madeline H. Meier, Wendy S. Slutske, Andrew C. Heath and Nicholas G. Martin, “The role of harsh discipline in explaining sex differences in conduct disorder: a study of opposite-sex twin pairs,” Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 37, 2009, pp. 653–664.

74

See, for example, Anna Maria Aloisi and Marco Bonifazi, “Sex hormones, central nervous system and pain,” Hormones and Behavior, 50, 2006, pp. 1–7; and Roger Fillingim, “Sex-related influences on pain: a review of mechanisms and clinical implications,” Rehabilitation Psychology, 48(3), 2003, pp. 165–174.

75

Anna Maria Aloisi and Marco Bonifazi, “Sex hormones, central nervous system and pain,” p. 1; Roger Fillingim, “Sex-related influences on pain,” p. 169.

76

Roger Fillingim, “Sex-related influences on pain,” p. 166.

77

Rebecca M. Craft, Jeffrey S. Mogil and Anna Maria Aloisi, “Sex differences in pain and analgesia: the role of gonadal hormones,” European Journal of Pain, 8, 2004, p. 407.

78

See, for example: Scott Claver, Under the Lash: A History of Corporal Punishment in the British Armed Forces, London: Torchstream Books, 1954, p. 63; Joseph A. Mercurio, Caning: Educational Rite and Tradition, Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Division of Special Education and Rehabilitation and the Center on Human Policy, 1972, p. 90.

79

Almost nobody, that is, other than perpetrators.

80

Some Jewish authorities have made precisely this claim in defense of circumcision. See Moses Maimonides, The Guide for the Perplexed, 2nd edn, trans. M. Friedländer, New York: Dover Publications, 1956, p. 378.

81

Helena Cronin, “Mind the (Gender) Gap: It’s More Than Cultural,” Cape Times, August 29, 2008, p. 11. See also: http://www.edge.org/q2008/q08_10.html (accessed January 11, 2010).

82

Christina Hoff Sommers, Who Stole Feminism?, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994, pp. 162–163.

83

Christina Hoff Sommers, “The War against Boys,” Atlantic Monthly, May 2000, pp. 59–74, at p. 61.

84

Here is one possible example. We saw earlier that feminists note that girls receive less teacher attention than do boys. They assume that this indicates discrimination. However, there is at least some evidence that the rate at which teachers call on boys is not disproportionate to the rate at which boys volunteer to be called on. See Ellen Rydell Altermatt, Jasna Jovanovic and Michelle Perry, “Bias or responsivity? Sex and achievement-level effects on teachers’ classroom questioning practices,” Journal of Educational Psychology, 90(3), 1998, pp. 516–527.

85

Donald Hubin correctly notes that the “phrase ‘award custody’ constitutes a strange twisting of reality in the context of divorce, dissolution and most other conflicts over custody between natural and adoptive parents.” This, he says, is because “such parents typically appear before the court at the outset each with full parental rights. No one is awarded rights; one parent is deprived of rights” (Donald C. Hubin, “Parental rights and due process,” Journal of Law and Family Studies, 1(2), 1999, pp. 123–150, at p. 136.

86

Interestingly, one study found that both mothers and fathers perceived the legal system (in Arizona) to be slanted towards mothers rather than fathers, even though they did not agree on the extent of that slant. See Sanford L. Braver, Divorced Dads: Shattering the Myths, New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 1998, p. 104.

87

See Robert H. Mnookin and Lewis Kornhauser, “Bargaining in the shadow of the law: the case of divorce,” Yale Law Journal, 88(5), April 1979, pp. 950–997.

88

See Paul Millar and Sheldon Goldenberg, “Explaining child custody determinations in Canada,” Canadian Journal of Law and Society, 13, 1998, pp. 209–225, esp. p. 215; Paul Millar, The Best Interests of Children: An Evidence-Based Approach, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009.

89

For a defense of this view see Steven D. Hales, “Abortion and fathers’ rights,” and “More on fathers’ rights,” in James M. Humber and Robert F. Almeder (eds), Reproduction, Technology, and Rights, Totowa, NJ: Humana Press, 1996, pp. 5–26 and pp. 43–49; Elizabeth Brake, “Fatherhood and child support: do men have a right to choose?” Journal of Applied Philosophy, 22(1), 2005, pp. 55–73.

90

The following circumstances are discussed by Donald C. Hubin, “Daddy dilemmas: untangling the puzzles of paternity,” Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy, 13, pp. 29–80.

91

See, for example: Mercer County Dept. of Social Services on Behalf of Imogene T. v. Alf M., 155 Misc.2d 703, 589 N.Y.S.2d 288; State of Kansas ex rel. Hermesmann v. Seyer, 252 Kan. 646, 847 P.2d 1273; Jevning v. Cichos, 499 N.W.2d 515; County of San Luis Obispo v. Nathaniel J., 50 Cal.App.4th 842, 57 Cal.Rptr.2d 843.

92

Donald C. Hubin, “Daddy dilemmas.”

93

S.F. v. State ex rel. T.M., 695 So.2d 1186.

94

Louisiana and Rojas v. Frisard, 694 So.2d 1032, 96-368 (La.App. 5th Cir. 4/29/97).

95

S.F. v. State ex rel. T.M., at p. 1191.

96

This could be more than half.

97

In some places, such as various states in the US, as well as in Germany and Japan, successful adoption is not even necessary. So-called “Safe Haven Laws” enable women to deposit babies at designated places without legal penalty. If the babies are not adopted they will be wards of the state.

98

Jordan v. Gardner, 986 F.2d 1521 (9th Cir. 1993), p. 1525.

99

Somers v. Thurman, 109 F.3d 614 (9th Cir. 1997), at p. 623, citing that court’s earlier decision in Grummett v. Rushen, 779 F.2d 491 (9th Cir. 1985), p. 493.

100

Griffin v. Michigan Dept. of Corrections, 654 F.Supp. 690 (E.D.Mich.1982), p. 701.

101

Michenfelder v. Sumner, 860 F.2d 328 (9th Cir. 1988).

102

Smith v. Fairman, 678 F.2d 52 (7th Cir. 1982).

103

Timm v. Gunter, 917 F.2d 1093 (8th Cir. 1990); Grummett v. Rushen.

104

Jordan v. Gardner.

105

Torres v. Wisconsin Department of Health & Social Services, 838 F.2d 944 (7th Cir. 1988).

106

Ibid.

107

Grummett v. Rushen; Michenfelder v. Sumner.

108

Forts v. Ward, 621 F.2d 1210 (2nd Cir. 1980), Robino v. Iranon, 145 F.3d 1109 (9th Cir. 1998).

109

Oliver v. Scott, 276 F.3d 736 (5th Cir. 2002); Somers v. Thurman.

110

Timm v. Gunter; Griffin v. Michigan Dept. of Corrections; Grummett v. Rushen.

111

Jordan v. Gardner.

112

Somers v. Thurman.

113

Ibid., p. 617. Note that the question was construed in gender-specific terms. Thus, at the outset, the Court assumed that male inmates might not enjoy such rights even if female inmates do.

114

For example, the Court claimed that women are more likely to be more adversely affected by cross-gender searches.

115

Oliver v. Scott; Michenfelder v. Sumner.

116

Jordan v. Gardner included minimum, medium and maximum security female prisoners, but the judgment in that case made no reference to the different levels in determining whether the fully clothed searches by male guards were reasonable.

117

Johnson v. Phelan, 69 F.3d 144 (7th Cir. 1995). Judge Posner, in his dissenting opinion, noted that the Court does not even know with what crime Albert Johnson was charged. “It would be nice,” he wrote, “to know a little more about the facts before making a judgment that condones barbarism” (p. 156).

118

See Forts v. Ward.

119

Bagley v. Watson, 579 F.Supp. 1099 (D.Or.1983), p. 1104.

120

Timm v. Gunter, p.1102.

121

Griffin v. Michigan Dept. of Corrections, p. 701.

122

This distinction is important because physiological arousal is possible in the absence of psychological arousal (as we saw in Chapter 2), and vice versa. Yet either might be thought to be relevant.

123

There might also be less reason to be concerned about bodily exposure to homosexual members of the opposite sex than to homosexual members of the same sex as oneself.

124

For more on this see, David Benatar, “Same-sex marriage and sex discrimination,” in American Philosophical Association Newsletter on Philosophy and Law, 97 (1), Fall 1997, pp. 71–74. There I suggest that the solution to the problem of single-sex toilets (and change rooms) would be unisex ones in which every individual has a high level of privacy from every other individual — much as one has in the toilets people have in their homes.

125

There are possible mechanisms for considering not only a potential guard’s sex but also his or her sexual orientation in determining how extensive an invasion he or she would pose to prisoner privacy, but I shall not discuss them here.

126

See Johnson v. Phelan and Robino v. Iranon, as contrasted with Griffin v. Michigan Dept. of Corrections.

127

Ace Allen, “Women’s health,” New England Journal of Medicine, 329 (9) December 1993, p. 1816.

128

Ibid.

129

See, for example, Nanette K. Wenger, Leon Speroff and Barbara Packard, “Cardiovascular health and disease in women,” New England Journal of Medicine, 329, July 22, 1993, pp. 247–256; Ruth B. Merkatz, Robert Temple, Solomon Sobel et al., “Women in clinical trials of new drugs: a change in Food and Drug Administration policy,” New England Journal of Medicine, 329, July 22, 1993, pp. 292–296; Marcia Angell, “Caring for women’s health: what is the problem?” New England Journal of Medicine, 329, July 22, 1993, pp. 271–272.

130

Curtis L. Meinert, Adele Kaplan Gilpin, Aynur Unalp and Christopher Dawson, “Gender representation in trials,” Controlled Clinical Trials, 21, 2000, pp. 462–475.

131

See, for example, Yen-Hui Lin, Chih-Yong Chen and Jin-Lan Luo, “Gender and age distribution of occupational fatalities in Taiwan,” Accident Analysis and Prevention, 40, 2008, pp. 1604, 1607.

132

Imogene. L. Moyer, “Demeanor, sex, and race in police processing,” Journal of Criminal Justice, 9, 1981, pp. 235–246; and Debra A. Curan, “Judicial discretion and defendant’s sex,” Criminology, 21(1), February 1983, pp. 41–58. It should be noted, however, that while the author of the latter study claims that her study shows that investigations show no sex effect, this is only partly true. The results were somewhat mixed. In her paper, she notes that at “the sentencing stage… results using the total sample showed that females were treated more leniently than males. When the data were analyzed for each of the three time periods this finding of leniency was shown to be specific to the two most recent periods” covered in the study (p. 54). It was in “negotiations, prosecution and conviction” that no sex effect was found.

133

I shall discuss some of this literature below, but for a broader review and the claim that most studies show that the offender’s sex makes a difference, see Darrell Steffensmeier, John Kramer and Cathy Streifel, “Gender and imprisonment decisions,” Criminology, 31(3), 1993, pp. 411–446.

134

Lisa Stolzenberg and Stewart J. D’Alessio, “Sex differences in the likelihood of arrest,” Journal of Criminal Justice, 32, 2004, pp. 443–454.

135

However, the authors of the study say that the last-mentioned “relationship was relatively weak given the large sample size.” Ibid., p. 449. (A weak correlation in a large sample size constitutes weak evidence.)

136

Stephen Demuth and Darrell Steffensmeier, “The impact of gender and race-ethnicity in the pretrial release process,” Social Problems, 51(2), 2004, pp. 222–242, at p. 233.

137

Ibid.

138

Ibid.

139

See, for example, Kathleen Daly, “Discrimination in criminal courts: family, gender, and the problem of equal treatment,” Social Forces, 66(1), 1987, pp. 152–175.

140

See, for example, Patricia Godeke Tjaden and Claus D. Tjaden, “Differential treatment of the female felon: myth or reality?” in M.Q. Warren (ed.), Comparing Female and Male Offenders, London: Sage Publications, 1981, pp. 73–88; Kathleen Daly, “Discrimination in criminal courts”; Gayle S. Bickle and Ruth D. Peterson, “The impact of gender-based family roles on criminal sentencing,” Social Problems, 38(3), 1991, pp. 372–394; Carol Hedderman and Mike Hough, “Does the Criminal Justice System Treat Men and Women Differently?” Research Findings 10, Home Office Research and Statistics Department, May 1994; Darrel Steffensmeier, Jeffrey Ulmer and John Kramer, “The interaction of race, gender and age in criminal sentencing: the punishment cost of being young, black and male,” Criminology, 36(4), 1998, pp. 763–798; Cassia Spohn and Dawn Beichner, “Is preferential treatment of female offenders a thing of the past? A multisite study of gender, race, and imprisonment,” Criminal Justice Policy Review, 11(2), 2000, pp. 149–184.

141

Lisa Stolzenberg and Stewart J. D’Alessio, “Sex differences in the likelihood of arrest,” pp. 449–450.

142

Darrel Steffensmeier, Jeffrey Ulmer and John Kramer, “The interaction of race, gender and age in criminal sentencing”; Stephen Demuth and Darrell Steffensmeier, “The impact of gender and race-ethnicity.” There is also some support in Lisa Stolzenberg and Stewart J. D’Alessio, “Sex differences in the likelihood of arrest.”

143

See, for example, Christy A. Visher, “Gender, police arrest decisions, and notions of chivalry,” Criminology, 21(1), February 1983, pp. 5–28.

144

Kathleen Daly, “Discrimination in the criminal courts.”

145

Nor can it be argued that although it is unfair to treat female offenders more leniently than male ones, it is nonetheless justifiable to be more reluctant to sentence child-caring mothers to prison on account of the secondary effects that imprisonment would have on their children. Sentencing breadwinning fathers to prison could also have secondary effects on the children and it is not clear that these are typically worse for the child. A child whose mother is imprisoned will likely be placed in the care of others. While less than ideal, it is not clearly worse than staying in the care of a mother who is less able to provide for the child’s material needs.

146

Kathleen Daly and Michael Tonry, “Gender, race and sentencing,” Crime and Justice, 22, 1997, pp. 201–252, at p. 231.

147

Ibid., p. 230.

148

President of the Republic of South Africa v. Hugo, 1997 (4) SA 1 (CC).

149

The other two categories were all children under the age of 18 and all disabled prisoners who were in prison on May 10, 1994.

150

Affidavit of President Nelson Mandela, quoted by Richard Goldstone in President of the Republic of South Africa v. Hugo, p. 38.

151

Ibid., p. 26.

152

Some might argue that women are breadwinners in many single-parent families. Even if this is true, imagine a scenario in which it were not, because it seems unlikely that even then the Court would have reasoned in a way parallel to the way it reasoned in Hugo.

153

President of the Republic of South Africa v. Hugo, p. 38.

154

Ibid., p. 25.

155

Here it is relevant that neither the Presidential Act nor the Court’s opinion was concerned with the severity of the crimes committed. That, rather than the sex of the prisoners, may well be relevant.

156

Roger Hood and Carolyn Hoyle refer to a case of a woman in Vietnam who in 2000 was spared after she became pregnant in prison, while the others in her gang were all executed. See their book, The Death Penalty: A Worldwide Perspective, 4th edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008, p. 195.

157

Quoted by Subhash C. Gupta, Capital Punishment in India, New Dehli: Deep & Deep Publications, 1986, p. 151.

158

Ibid.

159

G. Scott, The History of Capital Punishment, London: Torchstream Books, 1950. David C. Baldus, George Woodworth and Charles A. Pulaski, Jr., Equal Justice and the Death Penalty: A Legal and Empirical Analysis, Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1990, p. 159.

160

Victor L. Streib, “Gendering the death penalty: countering sex bias in a masculine sanctuary,” Ohio State Law Journal, 63, p. 441.

161

Ibid.

162

Ibid., p. 448.

163

Ibid., p. 449.

1

I add the qualification “very,” because some do seem to want us to step back from some of the most recent developments, but even they do not recommend a return to the arrangements of a century ago.

2

Kenneth Clatterbaugh erroneously attributes to me the claim that the inversion argument is rarely used (“Benatar’s alleged second sexism,” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, p. 212) when, in fact, what I am saying is that such an argument is rarely explicitly presented. The practice of inversion is common, however.

3

Cynthia Enloe, “Some of the best soldiers wear lipstick,” in Alison M. Jaggar (ed.), Living with Contradictions: Controversies in Feminist Social Ethics, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1994, p. 603; my emphasis.

4

Ibid.

5

I made the distinction explicitly in “The second sexism,” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, pp. 177–210. Yet my respondents ignored the distinction in order to advance an inversion argument. For example, James Sterba notes how and why women are excluded from combat (where there is an all-volunteer force) and then asks how this could possibly be a form of discrimination against men. (James Sterba, “The wolf again in sheep’s clothing,” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, p. 222.) Carol Quinn and Rosemarie Tong also suggest that the “first sexism” explains the exclusion of women from combat. (Carol Quinn and Rosemarie Tong, “The consequences of taking the second sexism seriously,” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, pp. 238, 241.)

6

Professor Sterba unfairly attempts to undermine my genital excision analogy by comparing it not with conscription but with voluntary military service — involuntary excisions are compared with voluntary enlistment. Professor Sterba also suggests that the analogy breaks down because female genital excision, where it is practiced, is strongly supported by men and this explains why there is female support for it. (“The wolf again in sheep’s clothing,” pp. 224–225.) These kinds of claims are hard to verify. Those women who support the practice point to many reasons other than being marriageable — including affirmation of the girl herself and her initiation into the (adult) community. I am not suggesting that we take these claims at face value. I am suggesting only that we be as cautious in our judgments of allegedly male-affirming claims that support male-only conscription and combat. Male support for male-only conscription and combat may be explained (at least in part) by female endorsement of that conception of masculinity that underpins male-only conscription and combat. For more about cultural biases in judgments about female genital cutting, see Michael Benatar and David Benatar, “Between prophylaxis and child abuse: the ethics of neonatal circumcision,” American Journal of Bioethics, 3(2), Spring 2003, pp. 35–48.

7

James Sterba, “The wolf again in sheep’s clothing,” p. 223, n. 10. The latter condition, presumably, is to exclude those countries, such as Switzerland, which conscript males but which are unlikely to enter a war.

8

Ibid., p. 223.

9

Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Benatar’s alleged second sexism,” pp. 215–216.

10

For further details about which countries still conscript, please see Chapter 2.

11

For example, Carol Quinn and Rosemarie Tong say: “We speculate that, in the same way that many U.S. women, continue to choose to be wives and mothers (full or part-time) despite the fact that they are free to live their lives entirely in the public world… many men would continue to enlist in the military and fight voluntarily even if they were not required to do so.” (Carol Quinn and Rosemarie Tong, “The consequences of taking the second sexism seriously,” p. 241.)

12

Ibid.

13

Conscription is itself evidence of unwillingness to enlist and fight. If most men would join the military voluntarily, conscription would not be necessary. Men are conscripted because without being forced to join the military, relatively few would. Joshua Goldstein makes this and a related point. (Joshua Goldstein, War and Gender, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001, p. 253.)

14

Judith Hicks Stiehm, “The protected, the protector, the defender,” in Alison M. Jaggar (ed.), Living with Contradictions, p. 585.

15

Ibid.

16

Ibid.

17

Ibid, p. 583.

18

Adam Jones, Gender Inclusive, London: Routledge, 2009, pp. 115–116.

19

Ibid., p. 116.

20

Ibid., p. 117.

21

Ibid., p. 271.

22

Ibid. For more on Amnesty International’s gender bias, see also ibid., p. 274; and David Buchanan, “Gendercide and human rights,” in Adam Jones (ed.), Gendercide and Genocide, Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2004, pp. 145–146, 149.

23

Adam Jones, “Gender and genocide in Rwanda,” in Adam Jones (ed.), Gendercide and Genocide, p. 112.

24

Ronit Lentin (ed.), Gender and Catastrophe, London: Zed Books, 1997, p. 4.

25

Quoted by R. Charli Carpenter, “‘Women, children and other vulnerable groups’: gender, strategic frames and the protection of civilians as a transnational issue,” International Studies Quarterly, 49, 2005, pp. 295–334, at p. 323.

26

Ibid., p. 325.

27

Deborah L. Rhode, Speaking of Sex: The Denial of Gender Inequality, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997, p. 109.

28

Ibid.

29

Ibid.

30

The irony here is that she accuses those who list examples of discrimination against males as being “highly selective.” (Ibid., p. 230.)

31

Denise A. Hines, Jan Brown and Edward Dunning, “Characteristics of callers to the domestic abuse helpline for men,” Journal of Family Violence, 22, 2007, pp. 63–72. They report that 29.1% of men who were asked responded that they had been stalked by their wives. This study was published a decade after Professor Rhode’s book and thus the objection is not that she ignored it, but that she offered untested claims and engaged in rationalizations.

32

Professor Rhode herself later says of sexual violence against and harassment of women that because “only a small number of abuses result in civil or criminal charges” we need in addition to legal proceedings also other strategies. Deborah L. Rhode, Speaking of Sex, p. 243.

33

Nadine Brozan, “Religious Circumcision in a Changing World,” New York Times, October 19, 1998.

34

The ceremony for boys is called brit mila (the covenant of circumcision). Among the names given to the female ceremony are brit bat (the covenant of a daughter) and hachnasat bat l’brit (the entering of a daughter into the covenant). See, for example, “Berit Mila Program of Reform Judaism: Ceremonies for Girls,” http://beritmila.org/Ceremonies%20for%20girls.html (accessed August 10, 2005).

35

See, for example, ibid.

36

For more on this see David Benatar, “Why do Jewish egalitarians not circumcise their daughters?” Jewish Affairs, 63(3), Chanuka 2008, pp. 21–23.

37

Michael Benatar and I argue that the failure to use an anesthetic is the biggest problem with neonatal circumcision. See our “Between prophylaxis and child abuse.”

38

Although there is biblical, talmudic and halachic (that is, Jewish legal) foundation for allowing a woman to perform circumcision, tradition has dictated that ritual circumcisers are men.

39

Mike Weiss, “A Woman’s Touch: Lillian Schapiro Is Charting New Territory as an Atlanta Mohelet,” Atlanta Jewish Times, June 8, 2001. Online at http://atlanta.jewish.com/archives/2001/060801cs.htm (accessed August 15, 2005).

40

Ibid.

41

American Association of University Women, Beyond the “Gender Wars”: A Conversation about Girls, Boys, and Education, Washington, DC: American Association of University Women, 2001, p. 4.

42

Ibid.

43

US Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics, “Fast Facts: What Is the Percentage of Degrees Conferred by Sex and Race?” Online at http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=72 (accessed October 25, 2009).

44

American Association of University Women, The AAUW Report: How Schools Shortchange Girls, Washington, DC: American Association of University Women, 1992, pp. 19–20.

45

Paul Nichols and Ta-Chuan Chen, Minimal Brain Dysfunction: A Prospective Study, Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1981.

46

Jacqueline Liederman, Lore Kantrowitz and Kathleen Flannery, “Male vulnerability to reading disability is not likely to be a myth: a call for new data,” Journal of Learning Disabilities, 38(2), 2005, pp. 109–129.

47

Brenda V. Smith, “Watching me, watching you,” Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, 15, 2003, p. 230, n. 22.

48

Ibid.

49

Nijole V. Benokraitis and Joe R. Feagin, Modern Sexism: Blatant, Subtle and Covert Discrimination, 2nd edn, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1995, p. 40.

50

Notice, however, that outside the cinematic context, men are typically required to remove their shirts more often than women are. While the level of exposure is less for males, bodily modest males might feel a greater invasion than bodily immodest females. The asymmetrical expectations about when to uncover will disadvantage some men, just as the asymmetrical expectations to remain covered will disadvantage some females.

51

Jack Matthews, “A system rated NC-17,” Newsday (Long Island, NY), November 22, 1992, p. 5.

52

Joel Feinberg, Offense to Others, New York: Oxford University Press, 1985, p. 134.

53

Ibid.

54

Some might suggest that one sense in which naked women are more exposed is that they are more likely to be raped. Nudity thereby poses a special vulnerability. But that is certainly not true on screen. A woman who is naked on the screen is not vulnerable to rape during her nudity (unless the on-set security is inadequate).

55

For a compelling demonstration of this see Sanford Braver, Divorced Dads: Shattering the Myths, New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 1998.

56

Ibid., pp. 28–33.

57

Sanford Braver relates that a well-known demographer, commenting on his research, had said that “if the mother tells you one thing and the father tells you something else, then the father is a God-damned liar.” (Ibid., p. 35.)

58

Ibid., pp. 33–34.

59

Ibid., pp. 42–45.

60

Ibid., pp. 45–53.

61

Lenore Weitzman, The Divorce Revolution: The Unexpected Social and Economic Consequences for Women and Children in America, New York: The Free Press, 1985, p. 323.

62

For an account of this, see Sanford Braver, Divorced Dads, pp. 59–62.

63

Ibid.

64

Ibid., p. 61.

65

Ibid., pp. 62–86.

66

Jean Drèze and Amartya Sen, Hunger and Public Action, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989, pp. 50–59; Amartya Sen, “More Than 100 Million Women Are Missing,” New York Review of Books, December 20, 1990, pp. 61–66. The idea has been used by, amongst others, Martha Nussbaum and Jonathan Glover in their edited volume Women, Culture and Development, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995, pp. 3, 33.

67

Amartya Sen, “More Than 100 Million Women Are Missing,” p. 61.

68

Ibid.

69

John Rawls, A Theory of Justice, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1973, p. 74.

70

Ronald Dworkin, “What is equality? Part 2: equality of resources,” Philosophy and Public Affairs, 10(4), 1981, p. 314. Neither Professor Dworkin nor Professor Rawls is talking about inequalities in health or longevity, but their claims apply equally to these.

71

Cameron A. Mustard, Patricia Kaufert, Anita Kozyrskyj and Teresa Mayer, “Sex differences in the use of health care services,” New England Journal of Medicine, 338, June 4, 1998, p. 1678.

72

Ibid.

73

Jennifer Haas, “The cost of being a woman,” New England Journal of Medicine, 338, June 4, 1998, pp. 1694–1695.

74

Ibid., p. 1694.

75

Ibid., p. 1695.

76

James Sterba, “The wolf again in sheep’s clothing,” p. 231.

77

Ibid.; my emphasis.

78

Carol Quinn and Rosemarie Tong, “The consequences of taking the second sexism seriously,” p. 242; their emphasis.

79

Professors Quinn and Tong do also consider evidence about ways in which women are neglected in healthcare.

80

Carol Quinn and Rosemarie Tong, “The consequences of taking the second sexism seriously,” pp. 242–243

81

This statistic is contained in the source provided by Professors Quinn and Tong: www.cancer.gov/cancerinfo/pdq/treatment/malebreast/patient. Unfortunately, this page no longer exists. However, the same statistic can be found here: National Cancer Institute, “Male Breast Cancer Treatment: Incidence and Mortality,” http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/pdq/treatment/malebreast/HealthProfessional (accessed June 15, 2011).

82

Professor Sterba claims that if “more females were dying off in societies that clearly were not discriminating against women” he would be as unperturbed as he is about the current female–male ratio in those countries where it is 1.05 : 1. But this begs the question. He assumes that in these countries the higher male mortality rate is clearly not the result of some kind of discrimination against males. But this is the very point of contention. I have argued that there is (indirect and unintentional) discrimination. He recognizes discrimination in sex ratios when the victims are female but not when they are male. Therefore, I am not “flailing against an imaginary opponent” (James Sterba, “The wolf again in sheep’s clothing,” p. 232).

83

This view is mentioned, even if not endorsed, by Gayle S. Bickle and Ruth D. Peterson, “The impact of gender-based family roles on criminal sentencing,” Social Problems, 38(3), 1991, pp. 372–394, at p. 373.

84

Ibid.

85

While, in the United States, white women are less likely to be incarcerated than black women, white is not equivalent to “empowered” and it is poor and disempowered whites who are more likely to become entangled with the criminal justice system.

86

Paralleling the little boy who cried “wolf,” this is a case of what we might call the little girl who cried “wolf-whistle.” (Being under the threat of a wolf is a bad thing, but so is saying one is under such threat when one is not. Being subjected to sexual harassment, exemplified here by the wolf-whistle, is a bad thing, but so is falsely saying that one is or was subjected to such harassment.)

87

This view is taken by Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Are men oppressed?” in Larry May, Robert Strikwerda and Patrick D. Hopkins (eds), Rethinking Masculinity: Philosophical Explorations in the Light of Feminism, 2nd edn, Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1996, pp. 289–305, esp. pp. 299–300.

88

Ibid., p. 300.

89

James Sterba, “The wolf again in sheep’s clothing,” p. 229.

90

Tom Digby also makes this claim. See Tom Digby, “Male trouble: are men victims of sexism?” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), 2003, pp. 247–273.

91

This is the claim for which Steven Goldberg argues. See his Why Men Rule: A Theory of Male Dominance, Chicago: Open Court, 1993, esp. p. 14.

92

Kenneth Clatterbaugh has raised this objection. See his “Benatar’s alleged second sexism,” pp. 215–217.

93

Ibid., p. 215.

94

An anonymous reviewer (of an earlier article on this topic) has kindly pointed out that this sort of argument might be applied against a view, mentioned earlier, that more healthcare resources should be directed to women in order to improve the quality of the extra years of life they have over men. Since the disadvantage (a lower quality of life in the extra years) is a cost of the advantage (the extra years of life) there is no ground for complaint according to this argument. More generally, insofar as disadvantages of being female are costs of their being protected against the disadvantages of being male, defenders of the costs-of-dominance argument might be forced to accept a comparable costs-of-protection argument. The obvious response is that many women might not want the protection if it comes at that cost, but the same can be said of many men who might want the purported dominance if it carries the costs it is said to carry. This is why the condition of voluntariness is crucial.

95

It is not always viewed as dirty work. Sometimes it is valorized and glorified, but one suspects that this may be a means to encouraging people to participate. Moreover, there is a division of labor within the military. In some contexts the officers have been drawn from higher social strata, but it is then the enlisted men rather than the officers who are assigned the worst tasks.

96

Some advocates of this view think that the burden of proof lies with those who would deny such connections. (See Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Are men oppressed?” p. 300.) My own view is that when it comes to unequal and discriminatory treatment, the burden of proof lies with those who seek to defend or condone such treatment.

97

Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Benatar’s alleged second sexism,” p. 218.

98

I shall argue for this in Chapter 7.

99

It will not suffice to say that because patriarchy is not an intentional plan, male dominance can have unintended side-effects. This is because, as I have shown, such purported side-effects, if unidentified, could be countered.

100

Tom Digby, “Male trouble,” p. 265.

101

Ibid.

102

Lest it be suggested otherwise, there are at least some places where racial discrimination is worse than sex discrimination. Apartheid-era South Africa was one particularly obvious example. The legacy of racial discrimination is much worse than that of sex discrimination, both in contemporary South Africa and many other countries, including, the United States. On average, blacks in both places have shorter lives, less education and greater poverty than (non-black) women.

103

Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa, Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report, Cape Town: Truth and Reconciliation Commission, 1998, vol. 4, pp. 289–290.

104

See Anne M. Coughlin, “Excusing women,” California Law Review, 82(1), January 1994, pp 1–93.

105

Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Benatar’s alleged second sexism,” p. 211.

106

Tom Digby, “Male trouble,” p. 257. Contrast what he says here with his claim that to “the extent that evolution of the male gender role has taken place on a biological level, the odds that male disadvantage can be ameliorated are greatly reduced (although it becomes all the more clear that the disadvantage is not unfair)” (p. 266). Would he say the same of the female gender role and female disadvantage?

107

He explains, for example, that men “have generally been advantaged relative to other men by being able to suspend their concern for the feelings, health, and lives of those men, but the consequences has been disadvantage for men as a group” (ibid., p. 258). But if we accepted this, then we could provide a similar account of how women have been advantaged relative to other women. By adopting the features of the traditional female role, perhaps thereby making themselves more attractive to males, some women have been advantaged relative to others, even though the consequences have been disadvantage for women as a group. Thus I cannot see how the evolutionary context helps us judge male disadvantage not to be the product of sexism if we continue to think that female disadvantage is the result of sexism.

108

Quoted by Tom Digby, “Male trouble,” p. 259.

109

Ibid., p. 260. The distinction between cognitive and political discrimination is similar to but not identical with the distinction I drew in Chapter 1 between discrimination and unfair or wrongful discrimination — that is, between discrimination in the non-pejorative sense of differentiating, and the pejorative sense of treating or viewing them unfairly.

110

Ibid., p. 259.

111

This suggests that cognitive discrimination — a veridical discernment between properties — is not incompatible with political discrimination.

112

Tom Digby, “Male trouble,” p. 260.

113

Professor Digby might deny that these features are deemed morally inferior by those who value the male gender role. However, at least some who value this role do not regard it as morally better. Those of them who romanticize the female role may actually regard women as morally better — and therefore in need of protection by those who bear the moral risks and get their hands dirty.

114

To then suggest that valorizing rather than valuing is crucial is to make an ad hoc move to rule out some kinds of disadvantage as discrimination.

115

Tom Digby, “Male trouble,” p. 260.

116

Laurence Thomas, in a personal communication, has noted that victims of racism (for example) may even be empowered in some ways by racism. The example he provides is that of a black man who inspires fear in a white woman. This power would be unwanted by many black men but, he says, some black men may revel in it.

1

Even if women do not experience the same degree of preference in all affirmative action policies, they do in some.

2

I have discussed race-based affirmative action in David Benatar, “Justice, diversity and racial preference: a critique of affirmative action,” South African Law Journal, 125(2), 2008, pp. 274–306.

3

Although there may be some disagreement, there is also a limit to reasonable disagreement about what the criteria are.

4

Women and Work Commission, “Shaping a Fairer Future,” London: UK Commission for Employment and Skills, 2006, p. 4.

5

Equal opportunity affirmative action would rule out favoring the children of alumni in admissions decisions. Curiously, some defenders of the controversial form of affirmative action — what I shall call preference affirmative action — like to note that children of alumni enjoy greater preference than beneficiaries of preference affirmative action. (See Deborah L. Rhode, Speaking of Sex: The Denial of Gender Inequality, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997, p. 166.) However, the practice of favoring the children of alumni is not an axiom justifying preference for other groups. Instead, it is a form of preference to be eliminated.

6

The same is true, mutatis mutandis, in many cases of race-based affirmative action.

7

Rarely is it noted that stereotypically masculine environments, as well as inflexible hours, may also be hostile to some (even if not as many) men.

8

Kingsley Browne, “Sex and temperament in modern society: a Darwinian view of the glass ceiling and the gender gap,” Arizona Law Review, 37(4), Winter 1995, pp. 971–1106, at pp. 1017–1028.

9

Ibid., pp. 1028–1033.

10

Ibid., pp. 1033–1037.

11

Ibid., p. 984.

12

For more on the political power and insatiability of such people, see the next section, “Lessons from ‘Summers School’.”

13

At one time, the salaries for men and women performing the same job were explicitly different — women’s lower than men’s. This is no longer the case, at least in the developed world.

14

In the United Kingdom, single women “earn as much on average as single men” and “women in the middle age groups who remain single earn more than middle-aged single males.” (J.R. Shackleton, Should We Mind the Gap? Gender Pay Differentials and Public Policy, London: Institute of Economic Affairs, 2008, pp. 29–30.)

15

Ibid., esp. pp. 45–66.

16

Carl Hoffmann and John Reed, “When is imbalance not discrimination?” in W.E. Block and M.A. Walker (eds), Discrimination, Affirmative Action, and Equal Opportunity: An Economic and Social Perspective, Vancouver: The Fraser Institute, 1982.

17

Ibid., p. 193.

18

Ibid.

19

Ibid., p. 198.

20

A.D. Irvine, “Jack and Jill and employment equity,” Dialogue, 35(2), 1996, pp. 255–291.

21

Ibid., p. 259. The author says that during “the time that today’s full professors were first being hired, the percentage of applicants who were women is estimated to have been 8.6%. At the same time, the percentage of job recipients who were women was only 7.6%.”

22

Ibid., p. 260.

23

Ibid.

24

Steven Pinker makes the same point. See The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature, New York: Penguin Books, 2002, p. 355.

25

I say “generally” because there are exceptions. For a discussion of this see the section below on the “legitimate-sex-preference” argument.

26

The few possible exceptions to this are discussed in the discussion of the “legitimate-sex-preference” argument below.

27

Lawrence H. Summers, “Remarks at NBER conference on diversifying the science and engineering workforce,” January 14, 2005. A transcript of the speech is available at http://www.president.harvard.edu/speeches/summers_2005/nber.php (accessed February 15, 2010).

28

Lisa Wogan, “Summersgate,” Ms, Summer 2005, pp. 57–59, at p. 57.

29

Sam Dillon and Sara Rimer, “No Break in the Storm over Harvard President’s Words,” New York Times, January 19, 2005.

30

Ibid.; my emphasis.

31

Sara Rimer and Patrick D. Healy, “Furor Lingers as Harvard Chief Gives Details of Talk on Women,” New York Times, February 18, 2005.

32

Lawrence H. Summers, “Letter from President Summers on women and science,” January 19, 2005. Online at http://www.harvard.edu/president/speeches/summers_2005/womensci.php (accessed August 30, 2011).

33

Sara Rimer, “Professors at Harvard Confront Its President,” New York Times, February 16, 2005.

34

Alan Finder, Patrick D. Healy and Kate Zernike, “President of Harvard Resigns, Ending Stormy 5-Year Tenure,” New York Times, February 22, 2006. Professor Summers had had previous clashes with some members of the Harvard faculty and those earlier issues likely also factored into the no confidence vote. However, his remarks about women in science and engineering played a very significant part.

35

Ibid.

36

My discussion of the diversity arguments is drawn from my “Diversity limited,” in Laurence M. Thomas (ed.), Contemporary Debates in Social Philosophy, Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2008, pp. 212–225.

37

John Stuart Mill, On Liberty, in On Liberty and Other Essays, ed. J. Gray, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991, p. 21.

38

See, for example, Stanley Rothman, S. Robert Lichter and Neil Nevitte, “Politics and professional advancement among college faculty,” The Forum, 3(1), 2005, online at http://www.bepress.com/forum/vol3/iss1/art2/; John F. Zipp and Rudy Fenwick, “Is the academy a liberal hegemony?” Public Opinion Quarterly, 70(3), Fall 2006, pp. 304–326.

39

David Wasserman, “Diversity and stereotyping,” Report from the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, 17(1/2), Winter / Spring 1997, pp. 32–36, at p. 32.

40

Lewis S. Feuer, “The stages of the social history of Jewish professors in American Colleges and Universities,” American Jewish History, 71(4), June 1982, p. 432. This author, citing earlier sources, says that “by the mid-[nineteen-]twenties there were still probably less than one hundred Jews among the college and university professors in the liberal arts and sciences faculties in the United States… As late as April, 1930, the institution which had the largest Jewish student body in the world had not a single Jewish professor.” That institution was the Washington Square College of New York University, where 93% of the students were Jews (p. 455).

41

The role-model argument for preferring “blacks” fails for more complex reasons.

42

See, for example, Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Benatar’s alleged second sexism,” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, p. 218.

43

The argument is implicit in my discussion, in Chapter 4, of whether it is worse to be seen naked by (non-intimate) members of the opposite sex than by people of the same sex. In suggesting that it is reasonable for a woman to have a preference for a (heterosexual) female gynecologist, I am not suggesting that having no preference for the sex of one’s gynecologist is unreasonable. That too might be reasonable.

44

Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously, London: Duckworth, 1987, p. 232.

45

In 1910, for example, Jews constituted 8.6% of the Viennese population, but accounted for between 39.2% and 43.9% of academics at the University of Vienna. Jews were, however, more highly represented in some faculties than in others. In the faculty of medicine, for example, they accounted for between 51.2% and 59.4% of academics. In the faculty of philosophy, they accounted for “only” 21.6% of academics. (Steven Beller, Vienna and the Jews: 1867–1938, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989, pp. 36, 44.) Advocates of the proportionality view would have to insist that Jews should have been proportionately represented in each of the relevant faculties.

46

According to the Indian Census of 1920/1921 and 1921/1922, the Parsees constituted only 0.03% of the Indian population, yet they held 6.8% of engineering degrees, 4.7% of degrees in medical fields and 1.7% of the degrees in science. (Robert E. Kennedy, Jr., “The Protestant ethic and the Parsis,” American Journal of Sociology, 68(1), July 1962, p. 19.)

47

Nathan Glazer and Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Beyond the Melting Pot: The Negroes, Puerto Ricans, Jews, Italians, and Irish of New York City, 2nd edn, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1970, pp. 204–205.

48

In 1973, for example, 70% of all doctors were women. See Maria D. Piradova, “The role of women in the public health care system in the USSR,” in Proceedings of the International Conference on Women in Health, Washington, DC: Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, 1975, p. 23.

49

Jonathan Kaufman, “How Cambodians Came to Control California Doughnuts,” Wall Street Journal, February 22, 1995, p. A1. Would a more just California be one where immigrants from Korea or Mexico or Europe were more equitably represented among doughnut-shop owners? Although I followed this example to its source, I first learned of it in Thomas Sowell’s Barbarians inside the Gates, Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1999, p. 168.

50

“African-born U.S. residents are the most highly educated group in American society,” Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, 13, Autumn 1996, pp. 33–34; “African immigrants in the United States are the nation’s most highly educated group,” Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, 26, Winter 1999/2000, pp. 60–61.

51

Jeff Z. Klein, “It’s Not Political, but More Canadians Are Lefties,” New York Times, February 16, 2010.

52

Sometimes sexist discrimination excludes only one sex, while still imposing qualification requirements on members of the other sex. However, in some cases, those qualification requirements are set very low. Thus, in conscripting males, for example, the burden of proof is on males (of the targeted age) to show that they do not meet the minimum requirements rather than on the state to prove that they do meet them.

1

See, for example, Warren Farrell and James P. Sterba, Does Feminism Discriminate against Men? A Debate, New York: Oxford University Press, 2008.

2

The National Organization for Women (NOW) in the United States seems to have gone further than this in suggesting that even when conscription is not justified, women should not be exempt if men are being conscripted. In January 1980, NOW resolved as follows:

Be it resolved, that NOW opposes the reinstatement of registration and draft for both men and women. NOW’s primary focus on this issue is on opposition to registration and draft. However, if we cannot stop the return to registration and draft, we also cannot choose between sisters and brothers. We oppose any registration or draft that excludes women as an unconstitutional denial of rights to both young men and women. And we continue to oppose all sex discrimination by the volunteer armed services.

National Organization for Women, “Opposition to Draft and Registration.” Online at http://www.now.org/issues/military/policies/draft2.html (accessed December 23, 2010).

It is unclear from this resolution whether NOW thinks that conscription could ever be justified. However it is clear that it was of the view that irrespective of whether conscription is justified it would be wrong to conscript only males.

The 1980 resolution was preceded by another, in 1971, in which the “sexist basis for compulsory military service” was condemned. Online at http://www.now.org/issues/military/policies/war.html (accessed December 23, 2010).

3

It is obviously difficult to know what proportion of sexual harassment accusations are false. Part of the difficulty is determining when an action is sexual harassment. There are broader and narrower definitions. It is even difficult to determine the extent of false rape accusations. One study, operating with an unambiguous definition of rape, tracked the proportion of false rape accusations in a small metropolitan community over a nine-year period. Accusations were deemed false when the accuser recanted. This study found that 41% of rape accusations were false. (See Eugene J. Kanin, “False rape allegations,” Archives of Sexual Behavior, 23(1), 1994, pp. 81–92.) The author explicitly cautions against generalizing from this sample. He concludes that “false rape accusations are not uncommon” (p. 90). At the very least we can conclude that this possibility cannot be excluded.

4

Myra and David Sadker, Failing at Fairness: How America’s Schools Cheat Girls, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1994, p. 205. See pp. 205–209 of the Sadkers’ book for further examples of how robust the male gender role still is.

5

I am not claiming that males are oppressed because they have not entered historically female professions in great numbers, but I do think that their failure to enter those professions indicates the greater resilience of the male gender role.

6

Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Are men oppressed?” in Larry May, Robert Strikwerda and Patrick D. Hopkins (eds), Rethinking Masculinity: Philosophical Explorations in the Light of Feminism, Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1996, p. 299.

7

Linda A. Bell, “Gallantry: what it is and why it should not survive,” Southern Journal of Philosophy, 22, 1984, pp. 165–173.

8

I do not claim that all feminists take offense or express it. Instead I refer to those– that subset of — feminists who do.

9

The lecture took place at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University on February 4, 2010.

10

Linda A. Bell, “Gallantry,” p. 172.

11

For dozens more, see Paul Nathanson and Katherine K. Young, Spreading Misandry, Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2001.

12

David Benatar, “Sexist language: alternatives to the alternatives,” Public Affairs Quarterly, 19(1), January 2005, pp. 1–9. Curiously, departures from the zealous advocacy of gender-inclusive language are employed when this better serves the script of male perpetrators and female victims. See, for example, Sharon Lamb, “Note on terminology,” in The Trouble with Blame: Victims, Perpetrators, and Responsibility, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1996, p. viii; and an interview with Mark Hess, quoted by Philip W. Cook, Abused Men: The Hidden Side of Domestic Violence, 2nd edn, Westport, CT: Praeger, 2009, p. 143.

13

Here is one ironic example: A call for papers for a conference entitled “Under-represented Groups in Philosophy” (Cardiff University, November 26, 2010) makes reference to the strategy of “[a]lerting conference organisers as to the problems of homogenous speaker programs and encouraging them to consider speakers from a more diverse pool.” The two advertised keynote speakers for this conference were both women. That is not gender diverse and thus it seems that the organizers of this conference did not heed their own advice.

14

For many examples, see Patricia Pearson, When She Was Bad: Violent Women and the Myth of Innocence, New York: Viking, 1997 (for example, pp. 52, 61).

15

Jean Bethke Elshtain (Women and War, Brighton: Harvester Press, 1987, p. 235) attributes this sort of view to Virginia Woolf (in her Three Guineas) and Jane Addams (in her The Long Road to Woman’s Memory, Peace and Bread in Time of War and Newer Ideals of Peace).

16

See, for example, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Women and War, pp. 167–169,181, 196. See also, “Women as perpetrators,” in Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa, Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report, Cape Town: Truth and Reconciliation Commission, 1998, vol. 4, pp. 313–314; and African Rights, Rwanda: Not So Innocent — When Women Become Killers, London: African Rights, 1995.

17

Wini Breines and Linda Gordon, “The new scholarship on family violence,” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 1983, 8(3), p. 495.

18

Many feminists ignore the question of drafting females. However, feminists were challenged to comment on the matter when the United States Supreme Court considered a sex-discrimination challenge to the males-only draft. The National Organization for Women expressed support for drafting females. Other feminist groups, however, opposed drafting females. (See Judith Wagner DeCew, “The combat exclusion and the role of women in the military,” Hypatia, 10(1), Winter 1995, p. 72.)

19

Philip W. Cook, Abused Men, pp. 114–117.

20

Although I have stated this explicitly before, it has not stopped some critics from attributing to me the claim that feminism is responsible for the second sexism. See Carol Quinn and Rosemarie Tong, “The consequences of taking the second sexism seriously,” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, p. 245; and Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Benatar’s alleged second sexism,” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, p. 213.

21

Some have suggested that I am denying this. See, for example, Tom Digby, “Male trouble: are men victims of sexism?” Social Theory and Practice, 29(2), April 2003, pp. 252–253; and Carol Quinn and Rosemarie Tong, “The consequences of taking the second sexism seriously,” p. 244.

22

Tom Digby, “Male trouble,” p. 253.

23

Ibid., p. 252.

24

Some may seek to claim that girls are benefited by the procedure because without it they would be ostracized. It is true that in societies in which the practice is widespread, individuals who are not cut may be ostracized. It is a further question whether the benefit of not being ostracized outweighs the harm of being cut. However, whatever the answer to this, the feminist critique is most plausibly understood as a critique of the general practice rather than of individual instances of it in the context of a general practice.

25

As I said in the Introduction, even if this does not count as sexism, it would still be wrong.

26

Marilyn Frye, The Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory, Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press, 1983, p. 1. Others use slightly different language. Allison Jaggar says that feminism is “dedicated to ending the subordination of women” (my emphasis). (Alison Jaggar (ed.), Living with Contradictions: Controversies in Feminist Social Ethics, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1994, p. 2.)

27

Kenneth Clatterbaugh, “Are men oppressed?” p. 289.

28

Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990, pp. 40–41.

29

Ibid., p. 41.

30

Ibid.

31

Ibid.

32

Marilyn Frye, The Politics of Reality, pp. 10–11, cited by Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference, p. 41.

33

Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference, p. 64.

34

Ibid., p. 49.

35

Ibid., p. 53.

36

Ibid., p. 56.

37

Ibid.

38

Ibid., p. 57.

39

Ibid., p. 59.

40

Ibid., pp. 58–59.

41

Ibid., p. 61.

42

Ibid.

43

Ibid., p. 53.

44

Ibid., p. 50.

45

Ibid.

46

Ibid.

47

Ibid.

48

How many such men and women there are depends on what one means by “women working for them at home.” If one means women with whom they are partnered or married, then the number is much larger than if one includes hired (usually female) domestic labor. But the problem with interpreting the phrase in the broader way to include hired labor is that those “who enjoy freedom, power, status and self-realization” are reliant not only on (paid) domestic labor but also on much other paid labor — the labor of those who grow their food, remove their refuse and fix their cars, for example. Since much of this work is done by men, those “who enjoy freedom, power, status and self-realization” could not enjoy those things without the work of both men and women.

49

Carole Pateman, The Sexual Contract, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1988, p. 158.

50

It should go without saying that in determining the current de jure situation, it will not suffice to cite historical evidence. Professor Pateman’s focus in The Sexual Contract is almost exclusively historical. She writes at great length about the relationship of men and women, husbands and wives, in the past. When she refers to the present, it is almost always an unsubstantiated sweeping statement. For example, she says that in “modern civil society all men are deemed good enough to be women’s masters” (p. 219). She refers, in a few sentences, to contemporary female disadvantage in the developed world (on p. 228, for example), but the examples are selective and even some of those (for example, the claim that “women’s economic circumstances still place them at a disadvantage in the termination of the marriage contract”) are contested. (See the section on “Custody” in Chapter 5, above.)

51

To rectify this, Susan Moller Okin has suggested that both partners to a marriage should have “equal legal entitlement to all earnings coming into the household” (Justice, Gender, and the Family, New York: Basic Books, 1989, pp. 181–183).

52

Iris Marion Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference, p. 56.

53

Ibid., p. 59.

54

Ibid.

55

Jessica Valenti, “For Women in America, Equality Is Still an Illusion,” Washington Post, February 21, 2010, p. B02.

56

Janet Radcliffe Richards, “Separate spheres,” in Peter Singer (ed.), Applied Ethics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986, p. 198.

57

Ibid.

58

I say “generally,” because there are some men who have wanted to change places with women, and not because of a so-called “gender-identity disorder.” Men’s dressing in women’s clothing in order to secure places on lifeboats is one example.

59

This is not to say that these female feminist philosophers think that they are worse off than women in more traditional societies. They do not think this. However, it is the case that they are more dissatisfied with their own situation than some of the more restricted women in more traditional societies are dissatisfied with theirs.

60

Feminists need to take a stand — as the National Organization for Women did (see note 2 above) — on whether women should be exempt under such conditions.

61

Pacifists think this, and some feminists are pacifists. It is presumably an implication of at least some forms of pacifism that a woman may not use (deadly) violence to defend herself against a man attempting to rape her, even if that is the only way she can prevent the assault.

62

In his letter to the New York Times about the mistreatment of female recruits at the Citadel in South Carolina, USA, Dan Patterson writes “It is indeed a sad state of affairs when it takes the abuse of female cadets to make the Citadel’s ‘deviant conduct’ newsworthy. Where was this indignation during the scores of years that male cadets suffered abuse?” “Citadel’s Culture Abused Men before Women,” New York Times, January 17, 1997. I do not deny that a lone female recruit may be singled out for a special kind of harsh treatment, but this has also been true of male recruits who have been different in some way.

63

For some examples see Kingsley Browne, Co-Ed Combat: The New Evidence That Women Shouldn’t Fight the Nation’s Wars, New York: Sentinel, 2007, pp. 208–229.

64

Some might suggest an alternative strategy — that continuing to tell boys this would be acceptable if one also told girls that “big girls don’t cry.” The problem with this strategy is that the effect of the admonition to girls is unlikely, at least for now, to have the same effect on girls that the comparable admonition would on boys and thus the same treatment would have a disparate impact.

65

If the phrase “taking it like a woman” ever came to mean the same as “taking it like a man,” then the meaning of both phrases will have changed.

66

Or, more accurately, to end violence against those, including men, who do not deserve it.

67

Federal Glass Ceiling Commission, Good for Business: Making Full Use of the Nation’s Human Capital, Washington, DC: Federal Glass Ceiling Commission, 1995.

68

Women and Work Commission, “Shaping a Fairer Future,” London: UK Commission for Employment and Skills, 2006, p. xii.

69

Victor L. Streib, “Gendering the death penalty: countering sex bias in a masculine sanctuary,” Ohio State Law Journal, 63, pp. 464–465, quoting 18 U.S.C §3593(f) 1997.

70

For evidence that these sorts of ethical reminders can impact on behavior, see Dan Ariely, Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions, rev. and expanded edn, New York: Harper, 2009, pp. 207–214.

71

Deborah Rhode objects that the “American public gets endless accounts of what is wrong with the women’s movement” but “rarely do we hear about what is wrong with the men’s movement” (Speaking of Sex: The Denial of Gender Inequality, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997, p. 217). One good reason for the asymmetrical attention, however, is that the men’s movement is much smaller and less influential than the women’s movement. Many people do not take it seriously, but they have a much more difficult time dismissing the women’s movement. The focus on (some parts of) the women’s movement is thus understandable, even if many of the same flaws characterize (some parts of) the men’s movement.