Gender or Sex?

When Harvard President Lawrence Summers suggested that biology might be partially responsible for the relative rarity of female science and mathematics professors, he stuck a finger in the eye of the women’s studies movement. The essence of women’s studies is the concept of “gender,” that differences between men and women are not biological but are cultural artifacts, imposed by the oppressive patriarchal society.

Nancy Chodorow, a women’s studies pioneer, believes that sexual differences “derive from the contingent circumstance that women happen to be the primary caretakers of children. The special, ‘feminine’ empathy required for rearing children becomes indelibly associated in our minds with people who just physically happen to be female.”

Chodorow believes that the emotional closeness of mothers and daughters perpetuates the conventional female sexual role. “If we could just break the association between gender and child care, then we might vanquish gender” … and establish an androgynous society.

Happy days!

Meanwhile, in Nairobi, Kenya, a nursing dog foraging for food retrieved an abandoned baby girl in the Ngong forest and carried the infant to its litter of puppies. Neighbors discovered the baby, unharmed, and cuddling with the puppies. According to doctors, the stray mama dog saved the baby girl’s life.

Gender? No way!