The Alternative Sex

Abstract

Feminist logic operates according to its own special rules, which allow its practitioners to condemn in others methods of argument used by themselves. Mr and Mrs Belsey and Marcia Yudkin take me to task for using stereotypes, but seem very ready to use stereotypes themselves, and, since I reject the doctrines of female egalitarianism, cast me in the role of male chauvinist pig.' But these are not exhaustive alternatives. To poke fun at the follies of feminism is not to commend a brutal machismo. Indeed, it is one of my complaints against feminist logic that its crude either-or approach encourages those who can see that women are not in all respects the same as men to conclude that they are therefore inferior, and to be treated as sex-objects rather than persons. The age of chivalry may be dead but it is still at least logically possible to think of women as persons, sharing a common humanity with men although different from them in certain, often important, respects. Mr and Mrs Belsey find it 'quite unclear whether' I suppose that the distinction between the two stereotypes of the peer-group and the pairgroup is exhaustive.2 Of course I do not. In another paper in this journal I explore others relevant to the general issue of egalitarianism.3 The reasons for concentrating on the peer-group and pair-group are that they are pure cases and we can understand their logic better. The family, the neighbourhood and the institution embody differences of age, authority power or position which may appear adventitious and obscure the logic of the situation. Feminists are fond of attributing features of actual societies to outmoded patriarchal practices of male dominance and female subordination. It is very much in point, therefore, to argue that even if we were not born of women, were never politically or economically dependent on others, and never found ourselves under pressure to conform to the established mores of an already existing neighbourhood, we should still have reason to form peer-groups and pair-groups which are based, respectively, on the principles of sameness and of difference. Trudy Govier allows that pair-grouping leads to differentiation within roles, but protests