What's your definition of a strong female character?

[timewaster]

Originally Posted by maestrowork

What is "strongly written"?

Are you confusing "memorable/3-dimensional/well-developed" with "strong"? To me, there is a difference. You can have memorable characters who are not strong, and you can have strong characters who are not memorable. And of course, you can have weak characters who are not memorable, and strong characters who are memorable.

I don't think I am conflating those things.
By 'Strongly written' I merely mean written in such a way that the reader has a strong sense of a fully formed personality - even if the personality is flawed. Hamlet is not 'strong' according to most of the definitions bandied around here but he is to my mind 'strongly written' so that his weakness is compelling.
In fiction weak characters can be as interesting as strong ones and I get irritated by the need for all characters to be proactive.

[timewaster]

Originally Posted by IWannaWrite

It means that they are ball-busters.

Sadly, as I tend to write warrior women types - this is not entirely untrue : )

[Rachel Udin]

Originally Posted by MAP

kcallender, I believe you are an intelligent person, and you've made many eloquent post both here and in other threads. You have said many times to others that they need to educate themselves, and now I implore the same for you.

I believe Iwannawrite is correct. You clearly do not understand the scientific method.

I'm sure you have studied science and psychology, but are you sure that your interpretation of them wasn't influenced by your own social construct. I find that many people have a misconception about scientists and the scientific method that you are very much demonstrating here.

You mention psychology a lot, and I don't have any experience in psychology research so I can't to defend it, but Iwannawrite is talking about biology not psychology. There is a very real difference between how research is done in social science vs. hard science.

Hard science deal with facts, observable facts that isn't published until it goes through serious peer review. Scientific papers have to explain exactly how the research was done so other scienstist can reproduce their results. And you better believe that other scientists do.

So I am confused at how you think the observable differences between men and woman, specifically the number of hormonal receptors, is skewed by misogynist scientists. This is an observable fact. Our scientific techniques are at the level that we can literally count the number of hormonal receptors on a cell. If men cells on average have more testosterone receptors than female cells, how can you argue with that? It is a fact.

The fastest man in the world is faster than the fastest woman. The strongest man in the world is stronger than the strongest woman. Do you really think the women aren't training as hard as the men?

There are biological differences between men and woman. What is wrong with that? It only becomes sexist if one believes those differences make one sex better than the other.

1. I believe that Psychology has kind of a skew towards Western Ideals.
2. *Some* science does often try to prove what are oscial constructs as "superior" to others. Which, you know isn't very scientific and is a load of crock.
3. My mother is a neuroscientist, so I'm pretty well aware of the scientific method and even some of the articles printed in the magazines she gets she questions the method and prejudice of the scientists approaching the study. Scientists, as she often said to me, are not 100% objective. Even a grade school class will tell you that often if you believe something to be true before the experiment, then you are more likely to find it true and this is entered as a margin for error. The problem with most modern articles is that they don't enter this margin of error, which makes it hard for me to assess their so-called findings, especially studies v. real experiments.

You seem to say that Scientists have no margin for error? Or that social construction *can't* influence science? It can and it does. It doesn't mean everything in science is crock--hell no. It just means that you have to admit that some studies will have prejudice in them and questioning it is part of the scientific method, or have I really not understood my mom lecturing about optic nerves and how to do a science report properly all the time she's been talking to me about synapses?

I *do* wish the error for margin was printed more clearly in these articles, including Scientific American, which I read a lot of.

Originally Posted by Mara

Masculinity and femininity are social constructs wrapped around a few biological traits which are exagerrated by socialized perceptions. The existance of social constructs does not disprove the existance of biology.

And nobody ever addressed my question about how constructionism--belief in socially constructed gender with almost no biological basis--explains transgender people.

I'll take this on.

Sex is biological.

Gender is sociological.

Where those intersect is another question that I don't think can be solved. Done.

Why is gender sociological? Have you heard of a sixth gender before? I have. Biologically they might be intersexed, but they might identify gender-wise a different way. Your issue is that you are trying to define self v. the world through these two gender roles where you must be X or Y.

Female and male are sex.

Feminine and masculine are gender roles.

It's not a definite answer, but I don't think that's what you're searching for.

Originally Posted by James D. Macdonald

My definition of a strong female character is the same as my definition of a strong character in general:

A strong character is active rather than reactive.

Disagree. Rosa Parks. Sat on the bus and didn't do anything. Still got harassed.

Originally Posted by MAP

Mathematics is the language of the universe. It describes the patterns that we see in nature and in the universe. It is beyond us, and our social concepts. We of course have to interpret it with our human language (1, 2, 3, 4.....etc), but it is not tainted by that language. It is pure.

I have five fingers. It doesn't matter if I call them fingers or something else. It doesn't matter if I use the word five, or no language at all for that matter (but it is hard to make my point ). It doesn't matter if all the humans are dead, and ants are crawling on my hand. The number is still five. It will always be five. It is a universal truth. Mathematics is beyond language, beyond social constructs.

Does that make sense? I am not talking about language, but the actual number five. The number exists whether or not we name it or describe it or whether we exist at all.

Anything that is quantifiable is pure. In the hard sciences, we use this as data. In science, every theory must be backed up by solid data. If it is not, you get reamed. The data is fact and cannot be tainted by our social constructs
....
I am not saying that scientists are perfect or free from prejudices because that is not true. And I am not saying that there aren't immoral scientists out there that misrepresent data because unfortunately there are, but not as many as people believe.

But the scientific method is pure, and if followed correctly is not tainted by the social constructs of the scientists. And the scientific community does a good job at regulating itself. We are not a collective that agrees on everything. There is enough competition, egos, and even allrusitc scientists (that truly want to find the truth) to catch those who misrepresent data to support their own beliefs.

BS. 1+1 =11 1+1=2 1+1= 0

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Numbers are mutable, ite depends on the context. Science does not happen in a vaccuum. Scientists are not robots. They are human. And even robots are mutable by human beings. Errors occur which are called bugs and miscalculations.

Science is fallible by the pure fact the humans are fallible. It may be that the facts didn't really change, but how we see them differs. And this is where your argument falls apart. Does that mean it's a definable line of 25.999% of Nature v. nurture? No. I don't think so. Why bother defining the line at all?

And I wouldn't bother with the "You don't know Science" routine on me. As I said, I had a scientist for a mother. I've been listening to this stuff since I was 5 years old.

Originally Posted by maestrowork

201 posts later, we come back to this point.

Really, that's it.

Characters are individuals, not society, if you wish to reconstruct society and gender roles, go ahead and do it.

As for strength.... coming from me, whose been through a lot of unbelievable crap the last few years of my life I, personally define it as this:

Getting kicked when you're down, and still being able to get up and open yourself to new experiences in the world.

That works physically and psychologically.

And if anyone wants the whole nature v. nurture thing. God, I've had enough of that crap as an adoptee, a person of color and a woman. Bring it on. I'll argue you into the gray fast.

[Mr Flibble]

Rosa Parks. Sat on the bus and didn't do anything. S

And displayed massive strength of character to do so. Cos I woulda dinged someone....and that I feel I can is down to her and those like her. Ghandi made a career out of non-violent protest -



non-violent does NOT mean not strong.

[maestrowork]

Originally Posted by timewaster

I don't think I am conflating those things.
By 'Strongly written' I merely mean written in such a way that the reader has a strong sense of a fully formed personality - even if the personality is flawed. Hamlet is not 'strong' according to most of the definitions bandied around here but he is to my mind 'strongly written' so that his weakness is compelling.
In fiction weak characters can be as interesting as strong ones and I get irritated by the need for all characters to be proactive.

It's a great character, not necessarily a "strong character." You may have written it strongly, but the character itself isn't necessarily strong. I don't equate "strong" with "proactive" either; but one who won't back down in the face of adversity is strong, for example.

[Rachel Udin]

One more thing to throw out there.

I watched *a lot* of Discovery channel out there and this is what Discovery channel said to me over an over about human men v. women.

Women are better at endurance and men are better at the sprint.

Of course, I can wrap this into a joke.

Women are meant for endurance because they give birth to children. That's a marathon there.

Men are meant for sprints because of *how* the woman gets pregnant. *grins*

I always liked that one. Though, I think since the science shows really do take mostly one race/segment of society there is a certain amount of prejudice, but I won't weigh it too much and not define or delineate nor state I believe or disbelieve.

But I would say physically that's a kind of strength too. I'm not quite sure why physical strength was only defined as "kicking butt" but isn't the strength to endure something to also look at?

I, personally, admire the centurian who after 100+ years still relishes life up til their death. My 103 year old grandmother woke up from a coma before she died to eat supper. That's something to be admired.

Physical strength also has many realms as well. And that's something to consider. How are you, in your story, defining strength? How are the characters around your main character defining strength?

And I'll leave this little tidbit: The only universal between the SEXES (not genders, 'cause, as I said, I know one society with 6.) across cultures is that women, i.e. females take care of the children. That's it.

If we are going into strength of character: Ah, I like to bring in the old POV stick and hit some rocks with it. It depends on the society and those around them. If you have 20 strong women going around throwing stuff like 100lbs of boulders, and that's what you saw. And the main character only can pick up 5lbs max. The reader is likely to think that character is weak. Now that character meets a bunch of characters that can only pick up 2.5 lbs, then that character is strong. It's really relative to the surroundings of the character. (Because this is where we should have been headed in the first place).

If the writer sets up enough background around the character then the definition of strength will change for the reader accordingly, but this takes skill.

Because, really, personality is merely a perception of the same traits. How that character acts in a social setting might not change at all, but if the setting changes and the character does not adapt they can be percieved differently. Speak loud in a library v. a rock concert, for example.

Given this kind of thing, I think if you just boil it down to individual v. society and then feed it into event+character+conflict you can get a perception of strength that's appropriate to your story.

Because, really, I won't be putting many Xenas and Buffys in a Medieval European setting. However, I might have a woman kick butt in modern times and you wouldn't blink.

Shouldn't this be where we should be headed? Rather than the biology v. nurture stuff, because that, too, I've been dealing with since I was 5 years old and then it always ends up in the gray area of the chicken or the egg--which came first, at which point I really don't care and I'm not sure why you're assaulting a 5 year old on your beliefs about this so adamantly that you feel obligated to tell me who I love and by how much to prove this stupid point in the first place. So let's let it be gray until someone feels like giving us an answer that will be shot down and debated anyway.

Back the individual v. society + conflict stuff, because that's where the story is really born and that's how you'll get any character, human or not to define their strength.

One last addition:
I have no idea why people think that working in a kitchen doesn't take a lot of mental and physical strength. Has anyone really *seen* an active kitchen.

[MAP]

Wow, this really is a massive derail, so I will be brief.

Originally Posted by Rachel Udin

1. I believe that Psychology has kind of a skew towards Western Ideals.

I am so not going to argue psychology. It is much different than the hard sciences, and I am talking about hard science.

2. *Some* science does often try to prove what are oscial constructs as "superior" to others. Which, you know isn't very scientific and is a load of crock.

I am talking about science published in respectable scientific journals in the hard sciences (chemsitry, physics, biology). There is a lot of bad science being done, but it is not respected by the scientific community at large. If you can find an example of one of these studies in a respectable scientific journal (not in psychology or any of the soft sciences), I'd be interested to see it.

3. My mother is a neuroscientist, so I'm pretty well aware of the scientific method and even some of the articles printed in the magazines she gets she questions the method and prejudice of the scientists approaching the study. Scientists, as she often said to me, are not 100% objective. Even a grade school class will tell you that often if you believe something to be true before the experiment, then you are more likely to find it true and this is entered as a margin for error. The problem with most modern articles is that they don't enter this margin of error, which makes it hard for me to assess their so-called findings, especially studies v. real experiments.

The data is pure of social constructs. The interpretation of the data is not. I clearly stated this in my previous posts. You can argue the interpretation; you can't argue with the numbers.

You seem to say that Scientists have no margin for error? Or that social construction *can't* influence science? It can and it does. It doesn't mean everything in science is crock--hell no. It just means that you have to admit that some studies will have prejudice in them and questioning it is part of the scientific method, or have I really not understood my mom lecturing about optic nerves and how to do a science report properly all the time she's been talking to me about synapses?

Scientist do have a margin for error. Scientists do have preconceptions and social constructs. I'm sorry if I was unclear. But to publish a finding in a respectable scientific journal your work goes through extensive peer review. Other researchers who are doing the same thing you are will most likely try to reproduce your results. Other researches will be more than happy to point out where you misconstrued your data, and they do. Scientists are very conservative (and I don't mean this in a political way ) about their interpretation of data. Remember that science is not a cultural thing, it is global. Researchers all over the world review the same information with different social constructs.

The data is free from social constructs (but not free from laboratory error there is always some margin of error). But of course the interpretation is a little affected by social constructs, but from my experience, that is effect is miniscule for the science reported in respectable journals.

BS. 1+1 =11 1+1=2 1+1= 0

glyph+glyph=something.

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Numbers are mutable, ite depends on the context. Science does not happen in a vaccuum. Scientists are not robots. They are human. And even robots are mutable by human beings. Errors occur which are called bugs and miscalculations.

You don't understand my point. You are stuck on the language and the symbols we use to describe numbers which is necessary for communications. But the numbers exist whether we define them or not. They are patterns in the Universe.

If you wish to discuss this further, you can PM me, but as someone pointed out before, this is a massive derailing of the original OP.

Sorry everyone.

[timewaster]

Originally Posted by maestrowork

It's a great character, not necessarily a "strong character." You may have written it strongly, but the character itself isn't necessarily strong. I don't equate "strong" with "proactive" either; but one who won't back down in the face of adversity is strong, for example.

I don't doubt that one can make a case for the difference I'm merely saying that readers don't necessarily make that distinction and that, if this thread is anything to go by, neither do all writers.
I'm not sure such an ambiguous term is much practical use: it might be better to focus on writing a character well than on writing a 'strong' character.

[aruna]

Originally Posted by IdiotsRUs

And displayed massive strength of character to do so. Cos I woulda dinged someone....and that I feel I can is down to her and those like her. Ghandi Gandhi made a career out of non-violent protest -



non-violent does NOT mean not strong.

Fixed it for ya! (sorry, the "Ghandi" thing is a pet peeve of mine and I correct it wherever I see it so it doesn't get too prevalent!)

Rosa Parks and Gandhi are good examples. Strength is not necessarily pro-active or dominant; a strong character is not necessarily in a position of power. As Ray said: it's inner strength that counts, whether you are male or female. Call it confidence, call it faith, call it courage, call it endurance: it comes from deep inside and I love it best when such people are underestimated because they seem so mild...
There's a German expression that sums it up:
Klein aber Oho = Small but Oho.

[Mr Flibble]

Originally Posted by aruna

Fixed it for ya! (sorry, the "Ghandi" thing is a pet peeve of mine and I correct it wherever I see it so it doesn't get too prevalent!)

Oops! Apologies.

Rosa Parks and Gandhi are good examples. Strength is not necessarily pro-active or dominant; a strong character is not necessarily in a position of power. As Ray said: it's inner strength that counts, whether you are male or female. Call it confidence, call it faith, call it courage, call it endurance: it comes from deep inside and I love it best when such people are underestimated because they seem so mild...
There's a German expression that sums it up:
Klein aber Oho = Small but Oho.

Thing is Rosa and Gandhi were proactive - it's just they acted in a non-violent way. If they had been reactive they would not have protested at all, but just gone along with the injustice as presented to them. They said (probably not actually, but in essence) 'screw that'. They just chose not to be violent about it. Because violence was the easy answer, but not necessarily the right one. It was action, not reaction.

[aruna]

Originally Posted by IdiotsRUs

Oops! Apologies.




Thing is Rosa and Gandhi were proactive - it's just they acted in a non-violent way. .

Exactly. Too many posters here, too many books and movies equate strength with kicking butt. But real strength, real proactiveness comes in many forms and is not necessarily loud or obvious to the eye.

[yoghurtelf]

Originally Posted by kcallender

Dude. Raphael kicks serious ass. He was my original crush before I turned to the Gundam Wing boys. Not even ashamed to admit it..

Hehehehe, he was my crush too!! LOL.

To answer the earlier question put to me, I guess I don't see a need for there to be a difference in strong male/female characters. I guess they DO all seem the same to me - as in, people who know their own minds and don't feel the need to conform. So...yeah. Maybe there's no such thing as my idea of a strong female character, because it's all just about being strong characters.

Still, I get frustrated by reading "wimpy" female characters, chicks I just can't relate to because their mission in life is to simper and sigh and be taken care of.

Of course, there are plenty of whiny guys to go around too Not a huge fan of them either.

[milly]

strong females are characters who "deal with it," whatever crap comes their way, and they do so without placing blame or whining

this doesn't mean they won't fall apart a time or two, make mistakes because of it...but they deal with it...they *own* their drama if that makes any sense

[RJK]

Strong characters, whether they be male or female, are those who face their fears and continue on to achieve their goal. There isn't a hero in existence who didn't feel paralyzing fear before he acted, but he pushed past that fear and did what was necessary. Strong characters come to these decision points, and chose the difficult path, the one filled with fearful consequences. Why, because that's the path to their goal.

[backslashbaby]

Originally Posted by MAP

Wow, this really is a massive derail, so I will be brief.

I am so not going to argue psychology. It is much different than the hard sciences, and I am talking about hard science.

[. . .]

If you are talking about behavior, you are arguing psychology. Unless you are discussing things that don't perceive or have cognition, of course.

[IWannaWrite]

Originally Posted by Rachel Udin

3. My mother is a neuroscientist, so I'm pretty well aware of the scientific method and even some of the articles printed in the magazines she gets she questions the method and prejudice of the scientists approaching the study.

This reminds me of so many of the non-physician children of physicians who think they know how to diagnose medical conditions because they picked up some of the medical lingo from being around their parent.

To those of us with advanced degrees in the sciences, your claim is laughable. If all one had to do to understand the processes of science was to pick up a few concepts from Mom while she drove you back and forth to dance class, then why the hell did the rest of us have to spend 5 more years after 4 years of college to get our PhDs? And then another 2 year post-doc before we became tenure track assistant profs? And don't even get me started on all the grant proposal writing.

But you're right. Listening to mom as she cooked dinner is probably good enough to fully understand the intricacies of scientific data collection and analysis.

BTW - it is routine to analyze the methods of a study. All studies have limitations. Scientists are well aware of the limitations of their work and usually always discuss those in the Discussion section of their papers. And in some journals, the NEJM comes to mind, the lead study is always accompanied by an editorial written by a peer researcher or group of researchers who critique the methods of the lead study. That is in addition to the critique of the methods presented by the author(s) of the lead study themselves that is found in the Discussion section of the paper.

You are presenting this as if your mom critiquing the methods of a scientific study is unique. That is called Science for PhDs 101. Run. Of. The. Mill. We all analyze our work within the context of the limitations of our methods and welcome it when our peers enlighten us to any limitations that we ourselves had not considered.

Here is an example from this week's NEJM:

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe1009121
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1007174

Note how the journal even asks for comments from other NEJM subscribers so that the work may be even further critiqued by other researchers.

You are coming across as very naive on this topic. Perhaps a chat with mom might help to clarify things for you.

[IWannaWrite]

Originally Posted by Rachel Udin

3. My mother is a neuroscientist, . . . Scientists, as she often said to me, are not 100% objective.

Sounds like your mom doesn't understand the difference between data and conclusions. Or that you misunderstood her.

What are mom's credentials BTW?

[Rachel Udin]

Originally Posted by MAP

Wow, this really is a massive derail, so I will be brief.



I am so not going to argue psychology. It is much different than the hard sciences, and I am talking about hard science.



I am talking about science published in respectable scientific journals in the hard sciences (chemsitry, physics, biology). There is a lot of bad science being done, but it is not respected by the scientific community at large. If you can find an example of one of these studies in a respectable scientific journal (not in psychology or any of the soft sciences), I'd be interested to see it.



The data is pure of social constructs. The interpretation of the data is not. I clearly stated this in my previous posts. You can argue the interpretation; you can't argue with the numbers.



Scientist do have a margin for error. Scientists do have preconceptions and social constructs. I'm sorry if I was unclear. But to publish a finding in a respectable scientific journal your work goes through extensive peer review. Other researchers who are doing the same thing you are will most likely try to reproduce your results. Other researches will be more than happy to point out where you misconstrued your data, and they do. Scientists are very conservative (and I don't mean this in a political way ) about their interpretation of data. Remember that science is not a cultural thing, it is global. Researchers all over the world review the same information with different social constructs.

The data is free from social constructs (but not free from laboratory error there is always some margin of error). But of course the interpretation is a little affected by social constructs, but from my experience, that is effect is miniscule for the science reported in respectable journals.











You don't understand my point. You are stuck on the language and the symbols we use to describe numbers which is necessary for communications. But the numbers exist whether we define them or not. They are patterns in the Universe.

If you wish to discuss this further, you can PM me, but as someone pointed out before, this is a massive derailing of the original OP.

Sorry everyone.

My point was that the actual numbers may not vary, but the way they can be played with and construed can be fidgeted with. Classic old experiment:

A man got a skull of an African American and a White American. He subconsciously skewed the data by saying that the volume of the White American had more brain capacity by "stuffing more into the foramen magnum." At the time (late 1800's, which will make you scoff, but let me get to it.) this was widely "tested" (though you and I would throw this out) and found to be "true." Showing that the prejudices of the society influenced the INTERPRETATION of the data.

I believe this is what the original poster was talking about. It wasn't that they were talking about "they intentionally knew that the data was skewed." It was that the scientists might not be aware of the *interpretation* of the data might be off. Without a sample size, and releasing of what type of subjects they used it's hard to assess in an abstract if the data was skewed or not.

I've found that Scientific American often releases experiments before going through thorough peer review (Yes, this is highly simplified... but I don't feel like going through the whole thing--I do think some of their articles are insufficient in the presentation of their data). It usually talks about one group of scientists at one university found X. It's the studies that do the multiple reviews, but that's further interpretation of data, which may be done by a singular country/group.

So I don't think we vary. Data doesn't change, but the context and the interpretation of the data may change. And I believe that's what was being driven at in the original "Social Constructionist" posts. That the way the data is presented often is fallible. Because how we interpret the data is a behavior, if we like it or not and how we present it must be through words, which, I believe, you called a "soft science."

Scientists try very, very hard to vet out the "soft science" factor, but it's not infallible because we are only human and the way we interpret things is soft science.

Originally Posted by IWannaWrite

BTW - it is routine to analyze the methods of a study. All studies have limitations. Scientists are well aware of the limitations of their work and usually always discuss those in the Discussion section of their papers. And in some journals, the NEJM comes to mind, the lead study is always accompanied by an editorial written by a peer researcher or group of researchers who critique the methods of the lead study. That is in addition to the critique of the methods presented by the author(s) of the lead study that is found in the Discussion section of the paper.

You are presenting this as if your mom critiquing the methods of a scientific study is unique. That is called Science for PhDs 101. Run. Of. The. Mill. We all analyze our work within the context of the limitations of our methods and welcome it when our peers enlighten us to any limitations that we ourselves had not considered.

Unique--hardly. Where did I physically say that. I'm saying YOU forgot that data has to be interpreted in the context of science. You presented that data had "hard infallible" nature without need for interpretation, and thus the articles you presented were "perfect" in their facts. I'm pointing out the error for margin. And as the above poster mentioned, there is a margin of error in the interpretation of the facts, which may be filtered through the "soft sciences" as you both put it.

I'm not saying that Science doesn't try to vet out this occurrence, but if you see that often science has to be reported through the social constructs in which we live, i.e. our language and using our brains and make it appropriate to our surroundings, you'll find that while the data might have not changed, the say, limited word count in which to report the data might have skewed things. Humans are, by their nature, from both the hard science and soft science, very fallible.

BTW, my mom was a hippies chick that went to MIT. While she kind of dislikes some of the soft sciences, is rather inflexible in some areas, she does realize that soft science does have it's place. She'd place the nature v. nurture ratio at 50% and 50%, but you may scoff at her that this is because she works with nerves which adapt and die depending on use. (Yes, I'm aware this is highly simplified). She has tenure at her current university.

I should also point out that this penchant to separate soft science from a hard science POV (sociology and cultural Anthropology) has only been an advent of the 1920's forward, probably due to industrialism. But I don't think one should pit one against the other. They *do* fabulously work together.

And if you are arguing "gender" sorry, but that's a soft science. If you are arguing "sex" that's a hard science. Where they meet, you need both hard and soft science to sort them out. But from soft science, culture is merely a way to sort out the gray and give it interpretation of limitations. Can you really define what is "orange" from a color spectrum v. that of yellow v. red. Where does the physical interpretation stop and start and you start to change the words? That's culture and hard science.

That's where that discussion should have gone. Admitting that the data might not be different, but the interpretation, while played with, often goes through "soft science" and thus can be highly fallible. (Not is, but has the possibility of being).

I don't understand why we can't live with more grays. Or greys. Or gris. Or whatever you want to call it.


BTW, posting abstracts without the full article and the margin of error including the background of the scientists, which peer review boards and what data they might have "thrown out" or ignored by accident or without other findings is kinda skewed, even for a scientist. I would think you'd want to post cross findings that disputed the findings and then left the interpretation of the data to us rather than posting one article that proved your point. But from *this* Cultural Anthropology POV, that's so much like the dominant American White Middle Class. (Somewhat British too).

At least one thing I did get from my parents was question everything. So I think if you want to continue down that path of "this is infallible" and "numbers can't be played with" you need to act a little bit more like a scientist and post more data from other experiments with the board of review and the people on those boards listed.

I want to know who they sampled, what their sample size was, from what body weights did they survey, from which countries and backgrounds did they sample, which board of reviews took it, who did the interpretation of the facts, what was the demographic of the people sampled, what social backgrounds was it? And did they account for builds, body weights and people of different races? I would also need to know things like the ethnic background of the scientists, what social backgrounds they have, and that of the peer review Are they all American White Scientists that never set foot outside of that demographic?

How many experiments were done and from which labs? Was it only one team in one town, or was it a bunch? Is this a study or an experiment. Who funded this experiment? Was it a pharmaceutical company or was it the US government, was it British government?

Did they take blood samples from, say Inuits? Or from the Kaluli? How did they define "control"?

A mere abstract can't give me this type of data. I'd need a bunch more. By arguing that you think it's gone through enough peer review without posting the peer review and the background info, kinda is poor show of data. Are there people who refute it? Who does? Why? If you say Scientists are thorough, which I know they are, then show me. You said you were a damned good scientist. Show me. 'Cause I read all your posts and you really only showed one article, which was an abstract. And that's really poor show of data.

Even my mom, who you questioned, said, well this article said, this, this and this, but this article said, that, that and that, and based on these group of articles I read before and the margin for error, I'm more inclined to believe X. Shouldn't you do the same?

Originally Posted by aruna

Exactly. Too many posters here, too many books and movies equate strength with kicking butt. But real strength, real proactiveness comes in many forms and is not necessarily loud or obvious to the eye.

Exactly. I pointed this out after reading all of those posts. Two factors were missing. That was that the strength was defined as "kicking butt" and also that the "endurance" factor was missing. The whole confrontation and having to go Xena... I don't get. There's types. And a good story should be able to define from a societal POV, what those types within the society are. (doesn't matter on the genre).

A good writer should be able to define strength for the character within the context of the story.

And as for separation of male and female and masculine and feminine roles--depends on how the author sets up the story. You can try to make such distinctions, but I really wish people would play with gender more, which is a soft science.

Pushing out a baby is a kind of strength too... I don't see many men doing that. So why are people saying that men are more physically strong than women? They have different types. I think hard science kinda settled that a long time ago. What differs is what society puts a value to and at what limits those values are set.

One last note: Sexuality and gender are different in the social sciences. Gender may be defined around sexuality (as in the Berdache, or Two-spirit model, though this is not strictly that), or even with interesex, but it's not Dependant on it. The idea that one is dependent on the other (for example, gay men have to act super female) is something from the US and British cultural background. Classic example: John Barrowman was called not "gay" enough when he auditioned to be a gay man. Or the co-worker who said that he feels he has to act more "gay" in public. Or where acting like a girl is called "gay." Or where being intersex is often said to be "gay" (though they are separate), or a crossdresser is called "gay" (though this, too, is separate.) So don't mix the two. I saw a trend towards it. There are straight men that take care of children at home, too. Separate them.

[IWannaWrite]

Originally Posted by Rachel Udin

She has tenure at her current university.

That's meaningless. I asked for credentials. I am going to have to cut you off though because you are rambling on about things you know very little of except through your conversations with your mom. And it shows.

[IWannaWrite]

Originally Posted by Rachel Udin

BTW, posting abstracts without the full article and the margin of error

We don't call it margin of error in the biological sciences. We call it the p-value. You can google it since you don't seem to know what it is called. Or ask your mom. She should know.

You don't seem to understand another basic point either - most of the respected peer-reviewed bio and medical journals are not freebies. In fact, I can't think of any that are freebies off the top of my head, but there could be some. You might get some full text articles posted online for free, like the 2 NEJM articles I linked to in my earlier post.

So you see, I can't post the full article for you. If I have a subscription to the journal or my institution does, I can get a copy for myself. But I can't post it online without violating their copyright. So if you want the full article, go to your local medical library and read it. Or buy yourself a copy. Or ask your mom to buy it for you.

Anyone who has even a modicum of understanding of the biological sciences knows these basic things. I am talking undergrad level knowledge. Clearly, you don't have it.

[Selah March]

Originally Posted by IWannaWrite

That's meaningless. I asked for credentials. I am going to have to cut you off though because you are rambling on about things you know very little of except through your conversations with your mom. And it shows.

And I'm going to have to have to ask a mod to cut you off for being rude, dismissive, and exhibiting a lack of respect for your fellow AWer.

[IWannaWrite]

Originally Posted by Selah March

And I'm going to have to have to ask a mod to cut you off for being rude, dismissive, and exhibiting a lack of respect for your fellow AWer.

Hey, you got that last part right. I don't respect her at all. She is writing about things that are way over her head.

[Mr Flibble]

Originally Posted by IWannaWrite

Hey, you got that last part right. I don't respect her at all. She is writing about things that are way over her head.

You've read the Newbie Guide, right?

And you know what Respect Your Fellow Writer actually means, right?



If you haven't/don't, you too could be over your head. Way over.

ETA: Just to note I was going to be incredibly sarcastic here. But that too would have been over the line. So I was good for once....

[Birol]

Thread closed for review.

[Birol]

Geez. I'm only on page three and I'm already wondering why it took people so long to report posts. This thread started to spiral out of control on page one.

Look, here's the thing, there's a bunch of people who obviously deserve to be slapped on the wrist for disrespecting their fellow writer in this thread and for not working on inclusion. Rather than putting everyone in a three day timeout, which would be a valid option at this point, I'm taking the entire thread to the Landfill.

If I hear ANY whispers of the disagreements that have occurred in this thread being carried ANYWHERE else -- PM, rep point, wherever -- I will immediately and without question put the offending parties in a seven day time out. This is not up for discussion.