daenerys comments on LW Women- Minimizing the Inferential Distance - Less Wrong

58 [deleted] 25 November 2012 11:33PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (1254)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: moridinamael 24 November 2012 04:01:38AM 26 points [-]

I'm a male LWer with an infant daughter. I'd like to request some specific advice on avoiding the common failure modes.

Comment author: [deleted] 24 November 2012 05:07:01AM 14 points [-]

This isn't a how-to, but I thought you might find these articles cute:

Linky- Story of how parents of toddler boys keep their kids from playing rought with the author's toddler girl, because "you have to be gentle with girls".

Linky- Dad tired all video game heroes are male. Reprograms Zelda to make Link a female for little daughter.

Linky- Video- A What Would You Do? episode, where you see how people in a costume store react when a little boy (actor) wants to dress as a princess, and a little girl (actress) wants to dress as Spiderman for Halloween

Comment author: woodside 26 November 2012 06:54:33AM 18 points [-]

I can see the point the author is trying to make in the story about having to be gentle with girls, but I think I'd be conflicted about it if I had a son. Later in life there are severe social and legal consequences for a man that is too rough with women and I'd hate to set my kid up for failure.

I realize there is a difference between "playing rough" and abuse but there can be grey areas at the border. There are many situations were I would physically subdue a man (both playful and serious) but not a woman, partly for fear of causing harm but mainly because of the social blowback and potential for getting arrested.

I might be overly sensitive to this line of thinking because I have a military background, but I think teaching a son that he should behave as if girls and boys are the same physically is sub-optimal (in terms of setting him up for success and long-term hapiness).

Comment author: sketerpot 26 November 2012 04:25:17AM 1 point [-]

Dad tired all video game heroes are male. Reprograms Zelda to make Link a female for little daughter.

It's actually kind of remarkable how gender-neutral Link is in The Wind Waker, the game he reprogrammed. The storyline, the dialogue, even Link's sound effects work equally well for all major genders.