erinja:It's one thing to say you have trouble understanding men (women, Esperanto speakers, whatever); this is your personal problem. It's another thing to say "I have trouble understanding [whoever] because they are not logical". That becomes an insult.

This is the thing though, people aren't logical, and neither gender can properly understand each other according to their own ideas of logic (at least not without great difficulty). It's not a personal problem, it's something that's always existed, and as long as we remain beings with free choice that don't just run off their instincts and sensations, it always will.

There's nothing personal* about calling someone illogical, and as soon as someone is offended by that they have gone and proven it. If there was even something personal* and wrong about calling someone illogical, as a logical being, they would realise it is a waste of time to feel such feelings as offense.

Otherwise, why are we having this very conversation? Is this not illogical?

*EDIT: Ah, sorry, my confusion - there is something personal about calling someone illogical because it's addressing the person, thus the "personal" (duh, man I'm stupid today). But just as I am not offended to be called "white" or "having brown hair", well, you get the idea.

@ Daniel: As for virismo/virinismo, why not just have "egalismo", or "seksegalismo" if someone really wants equality between sexes but doesn't want to be a racial egalitarian for some reason? Perhaps that is ignorant of things that are sexual traits or encoded as such in human culture, that feminists and machists/masculinists (?) want to preserve?

I like "seksegalismo" (the word and the concept), and so we could leave "virismo" and "virinismo" for those who want to have advantages over the opposite sex.

As for the other question, in general, those who seek equality between sexes are not denying its real differences. For example, scarcely anyone would deny that a woman needs some pause in her work for breastfeeding a baby, while a man does not need it. In general, we oppose differences who have no root in reality.

Let me borrow an example from maths. We know that 2 + 2 = 4 is true. That means that 2 + 2 is equal to 4, but not that 2 + 2 is identical to 4.

Same way, women and men are not identical, but they are (or should be) equal, with regard to human dignity, rights, respect, etc.

Giving a woman a pause to breastfeed a baby, and not giving the same pause to a man, does not preclude equality. It's simply treating in the same way those who are in the same circumstances.

Allowing a man to choose his wife, but not allowing a woman to choose her husband, does attack equality, because you are not treating in the same way those who are in the same circumstances.

In my mind, I see it crystal clear. But I'm not sure if I have succeeded in conveying my ideas with the appropiate wording. Just in case, if there are two ways of understanding something I wrote, and one of them is derogatory to women (or to men), I meant the other.

Regards,

Daniel

ceigered:

@ Daniel: As for virismo/virinismo, why not just have "egalismo", or "seksegalismo" if someone really wants equality between sexes but doesn't want to be a racial egalitarian for some reason? Perhaps that is ignorant of things that are sexual traits or encoded as such in human culture, that feminists and machists/masculinists (?) want to preserve?