My two cents to sort of 'sort' the arguments: First of all - yes Rand did think these rigid gender roles as part of Objectivism. She expressed them far too often in too great detail to assume she was just using them as 'personal illustrations of her characters'. But that does not keep you from doing your own evaluation. If you want to sort sexes and genders and assign relationships (no matter what sphere: physical, psychological, social, etc.), figure out a few basic facts and you'll soon see how pointless any further discussion will become - of course in our sex/gender biased world nothing is pointless when it comes to this classification :) (arguments presented only in favor of the 'deviation' from the 'not-so-fixed' rule - rule-supporting arguments are galore and don't need repeating) Even the most basic physical distinctions are not as clear-cut as we wish. Selective breeding over generations has created a broad spectrum of acceptable male and female, but few people (even doctors and scientist) bothered to look 'under the hood'. - physical: genetic and biological genetic males (xy) become biological females (with functional female reproductive organs) - hormonal changes to foetus (e.g. estrogen inundation when continuing on the pill) during first weeks of developement decides male or female development of xy foetus (week 8 or 13?) - of course the xx foetuses are stuck with female ;) => physical proof only in linear/matched combination possible -- genetic: XY, XX, XXY, XXX, plus all the xx/y xy-x derivations - many of them without identifiable influence on biological sex (see above) => no genetic proof possible -- biological: hormonal and corporeal (to avoid 'physical' again) hormonal: estrogenes (plus estriols and assorted gestagenes) and testosterone (plus other androgenes) with all possible combinations in varying degrees present in both sexes - individual circumstances decide hormonal balance or in some cases 'imbalance' --- corporeal: sexual organs identical except turned inside out with males ('they dropped a few things') - vagina, clitoris, uterus, follicles, glands all have more or less the same corporeal setup and even function - if you include intersexuals (with or without functional reproductive organs of both sexes) and neuters (no functional genitalia whatsoever) you get the picture --- secondary corporeal: breasts, hair, muscles, voice, bone-structure, etc. there's even less conclusive classification into polar sexes - some of these traits even sociologically in-bred over generations and / or varying with every individual even within his/her lifespan => no biological proof possible - individual: gender and purpose gender identification of self and other and purpose of that identification decide outcome of sexual classification => individual proof only in linear/matched combination possible (e.g. you default to the described sexual categorisation) -- gender: personal sexual identiy role - influences our perception of ourselves in the sexual spectrum and our relation to the perception of other's sexual spectrum (took me two minutes to get that our right) - not related directly or indirectly to genetic or biological sexual spectrum - gender-roles are going back as far as native societies where 'gender-mismatches' did not only occur, but were tolerated and in some societies even highly integrated (men living as women and vice-versa or non-gendered at all though those were rare) => no gender proof possible -- purpose: strongly depends on personal point of view - e.g. if indeed women are more pain-sensitive (that study did not give a valid classification of male/female to start with) it can be a biological purpose to better alert to damage to the body (both mother and child) ... or could be very personal to make a better female masochist (higher sensitivity to the infliction of pain as an erotic turn-on - not the social/emotional war going on everywhere) - of course males might fare better here if your purpose is to inflict higher damage without overstepping the slaves pain-threshhold - after all: pain is 'only' a warning to iminent or inflicted damage to your body - and reaction to pain and pain-threshhold can be 'learned' ... => intention defines purpose - no sexual/gender classification possible - evolution: one possible explanation why this whole mess got started in the first place to vary mutations through genetic intermixing of DNA when externally triggered mutations (radiation, volcanic, etc.) were declining due to thickening atmosphere and stabilizing biosphere (among other factors) - females still able to reproduce single-celled - double DNA helix already present in some unfertilized female eggs - only need trigger to start splitting (see parthogenesis - virgin births) => an experiment by nature that left non-sexed reproduction fully intact - just added a few bits - social: endless field - all interpretations possible - don't even get me started :) => always remember that you are relating any sex/gender classification to an arbitrary social component that may be quite recent in personal developement or can be 'in-bred' over generations - make sure you clearly delineate which classification of sex and / or gender you are using before linking it to any social phenomena ... VSD PS: sorry for not following Ed's great example of providing further references for the examples cited above - if you absolutely need more material let me know and I'll try digging through my archives
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