species, were it not that
the combination of the two seem to produce offspring - so little is
there in common between us. We are mentally distinct, if not
genetically. Though I hasten to add that we differ mainly because of our
upbringing, which can be changed, and not because of any genetic or
God-ordained determinism.
Yet what use is talking about sexism until we have at least determined
what it actually is to be a man, or a woman. Therefore, I will do here
what very few would dare: I will outline the major differences between
man and woman, and in the process I will hopefully impress upon you that
if things are not the same they cannot hope to be automatically equal
and demand equal rights.
Kierkegaard, the great Christian philosopher, says that "Woman is
personified egotism," but that she can never know it because of her lack
of penetrating thought. Nietzsche observes that "woman is first and
foremost an actress.", and describes an actor as "a person who is
skilled at combining falseness with a good conscience." Schopenhauer, in
his renowned essay "On Woman" states that women . . . "are their whole
life - grown-up children . . . She is an intellectual myope whose
intuitive understanding sees distinctly what is near, but has a narrow
range of vision, which does not embrace the distant." Schopenhauer finds
that her basic tools of trade are a subconscious and automatic tendency
towards "cunning and deception," and that the woman's basic failing lies
in her injustice. Others agree on this point. Freud says that "the poor
sense of justice in women is connected to the preponderance of envy in
their mental life." And Plato makes his view clearly known when he says
that "Woman's nature is inferior to that of men in capacity for virtue."
Women are singled out for special attention in the philosophic
religions. In Hinduism, women are kno
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