This might be slightly off-topic but this thread is the closest community of feminism-knowledgeable people I have at hand. I recently posted something I've been thinking about regarding gender differences, and it's one point where I seem to disagree with some feminists.
It is my intuition that actively downplaying gender differences is an artifact of the fight of feminism against a patriarchal society where "male characteristics" were seen as good and "female characteristics" as inferior; and that in an hypothetic post-patriarchal society, gender differences would be embraced and leveraged as there would be no stigma associated with them. But as this is a topic I've been mulling on for years and not really discussed with any other feminists (mainly because I know pretty much none in real life), I wanted to get some comment on it.
I fully agree with this. Excessive zeal in erasing gender differences usually results in the exaltation of "traditionally male" values and deprecation of "traditionally female" values; i.e. if you are a woman who wants to stay at home raising your children, you're "backwards". Ironically this perception doesn't apply to men who do so (they're "so progressive"), so it becomes yet another way in which women are oppressed.
What society should do is start appreciating these traditionally female values for the pillar of society they are, no matter who does them. There is no civilization if nobody takes care of the next generation, why isn't this seen as crucial work?
The other reason gender difference erasure bothers me is ignoring valuable qualities; in fact many of my views might be seen as female extremism. I mean, women are better at communicating, emphatizing and multitasking, so why are most bosses men, let alone most politicians? It would make more sense for me if women were in charge!
It is my intuition that actively downplaying gender differences is an artifact of the fight of feminism against a patriarchal society where "male characteristics" were seen as good and "female characteristics" as inferior; and that in an hypothetic post-patriarchal society, gender differences would be embraced and leveraged as there would be no stigma associated with them. But as this is a topic I've been mulling on for years and not really discussed with any other feminists (mainly because I know pretty much none in real life), I wanted to get some comment on it.