[balabaster]

Unfortunately, that's the world we live in at this moment where too many people need to find validation by belonging to some virtue group or another because they care what other people think. In hindsight, I'm not sure why I even cared enough to defend my position. Perhaps I'm not so different as I'd like to hope.

[Baeocystin]

Letting people know your honest thoughts in a straightforward manner is important. I know plenty of folks who hold opinions along the same line as the person you replied to. They are usually various degrees of shocked when I give them civil yet straightforward pushback, and more often then one may think, when done in person, it leads to real discussion, and ideas outside of normal worldview enter both our minds. It is a good thing.

[andromedavision]

That Kipling poem is flawless. Injecting virtue signalling dilutes its beauty. They don't even go together.

This is personal for me because it is the most profound thing I've ever read. For someone to come and refer to it as sexist is demeaning.

Savor it and quit being so wound up is all I'm saying. There's a place for everything and this was ill-placed.

[mfoy_]

I think it's very possible to read the last few lines in a non-gendered light. You have to want it to be misogynistic in order to interpret it as such.

[gowld]

I'm not sure I agree, madam.

There is a gulf between "misogynistic" and "being part of a culture that largely ignores women". It strains credulity to claim that the words "son" and "man" don't draw males closer and push females away. Any one poem is a "micro", but it adds up across the culture.

[mfoy_]

I'll play the historical context card here. At the time the poem was written, that language perfectly evoked the image the author was going for.

[andromedavision]

Absolutely. It's incredibly innocuous.

[balabaster]

I agree wholeheartedly. I've always loved this poem. I think a lot of the values it presents are sadly lost in today's culture - we're in a post-chivalric era alas. But these are the values I grew up with and as a result form the man I am today. This is what happens when your childhood heroes and role models come from the pages of Robin Hood, Les Miserables and The Three Musketeers.

As with all though, you either evolve or you're doomed to irrelevance. This should be a familiar concept to any programmer in the past 20 years :P

[andromedavision]

> ...sadly lost in today's culture - we're in a post-chivalric era alas. But these are the values I grew up with

Exactly this. It can be tough but you pick up your load and move valiantly forward.

[andromedavision]

No, you're alright.