Cougar Allen
Buccaneer (ret.)
- Joined
- Oct 9, 1998
- Messages
- 75,748
I think social conditioning keeps people from admitting their likings much more effectively than it controls their likings. People don't mind telling me these things because they know I'm not judgemental.... A large percentage of the women who know me well enough to tell me such things love knives. I know a number of men who do needlepoint, too.
Somebody mentioned the tobacco industry already -- I think it's a good analogy. Maybe some people believed -- a few decades ago -- that women were biologically disposed to dislike the taste of cigarettes, or socially conditioned to dislike it. Now we know social controls only succeeded in affecting their behavior (and even then, often only in public....) It is difficult to control what a person likes or dislikes, much harder than controlling their public behavior. Many of the women who say they hate knives have no such feelings; they only feel obliged to say they do....
-Cougar Allen :{)
Somebody mentioned the tobacco industry already -- I think it's a good analogy. Maybe some people believed -- a few decades ago -- that women were biologically disposed to dislike the taste of cigarettes, or socially conditioned to dislike it. Now we know social controls only succeeded in affecting their behavior (and even then, often only in public....) It is difficult to control what a person likes or dislikes, much harder than controlling their public behavior. Many of the women who say they hate knives have no such feelings; they only feel obliged to say they do....
-Cougar Allen :{)
