| > They seem to completely reject the idea that there are sex-specific genetic factors that influence psychology and neurochemistry, or that gender roles and their genetic predisposition can be a self-perpetuating system. Where did I reject that? > we still need to have babies and raise them into functioning adults. If women are both gifted in this role and feel a psychological need to perform it, it makes no sense for them not to do it. That doesn't mean that women should be barred from the workplace, but it might mean that women taking less involved and prestigious roles in the workplace so that they may have more time to raise their children or look after grandchildren or what have you The child rearing role is valuable and we should support people who choose to make that their role in life, regardless of their gender. Gender does have a genetic impact on the traits that assist with child rearing. Like physical traits such as height, there is a large amount of overlap and thus there are many women who are less suited to child-rearing than the average male. I would guess that it is likely that in a world with full equality for both genders, that you would still find some gender disparity in some roles. (See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11220916) However, if you think that the current gender disparity is not primarily the result of gender inequality and disparate expectations, you need to take look at the data and talk to some of the women who have left the field. Thus this disparity is not a good thing for society and is something we should squawk about because we are missing out on optimally utilizing a large portion of our population and we are discouraging them from realizing their full potential |