On today's Debate...
I'm sorry, it's me again, the bee with the really bad itch (but you know you love me for the opinionated and mildly obssessive thang that I am...) but just a few quibbles and agreements that came to me during the debate.
*I'm sorry, but was I taking crazy pills or was I the only one actually listening to the preposition? To quote, their position was that the stereotyped, breadwinner figure of the father was no longer necessary and you know what was really odd? All the cute and humorous (touching?) stories that we girls had to tell of our special relationships with our fathers precisely proved what Lucia's team was arguing for, though it seemed everyone was too chocked up with emotion as we all revelled in our moment of electra-complex induced happiness, to realise this. None of the father-daughter relationships described by the floor gave us a father who remotely resembled the fatherly stereotype. That was the point. If those girls who spoke of dads playing with them and taking them around had grown up with the stereotype, they'd have been voting the other way, believe me. As it was, it was actually the preposition that won and we didn't even seem to realise it. Damn embarrassing that was.
*It's hard (and yes, I know I'm standing on thin ground here, so you can slap me tomorrow or something) to accept tales of fatherless girls becoming teenage mums from a middle-class caucasian female, who has never had it better. Social status has far more to do with anything - just go ask a social worker (as I have - ooh, lucky me, I know, but you get my point) who works in Lambeth or Brixton rather than Islington or Chelsea...
*And maybe it's the scientist in me (imagining that she was about to set up an experiment with a control group etc. etc. It's not a bad way to think, you know...) but there was something rather creepy about the way we lapped up the personal experiences of those with divorced parents, going on about how they missed their Dad. Not so much because I am just generally disdainful of that sort of argument (far too crude) but because, well.... HELLO! These girls missed their Dads because they already knew their Dads. Of course they look forward to visiting them! They've grown up for some of their childhoods with this figure in their lives and a few rows later, *poof!*, he's gone! I'd miss my Dad if that happened. But that proves very little in the way of saying that fathers are necessary. What it says though, is that stability in a child's life is necessary.
*As for father's offering some sort of balance from the stress of the mother, the fact that lesbian couples are so adept at raising decent kids, shows (as I tried to explain) that it is not neccessarily a father that is needed, but merely another parent/person who can offer another perspective. A child is not raised by the parents, we Igbos are fond of saying, but by the village. That was all that the various floor speakers proved to me, not, again, that fathers are neessary.
It sucks having learnt rhetoric. You get to rip apart people's arguments, but they're usually too silly to realise it, *sighs*
*Athene's point was good *claps*. That's what I'm talking about!
*Olivia's point as to genetic diversity was good, but cast into an irrelevant light when one considers how the preposition had stated their cause. As for cloning, well, I am fed up of the old 'sci-fi horror' scenario we all seem to insist on carrying around with us like a nasty case of head-lice. Cloning is far more complicated than we think. If I were to be cloned, I can bet that even with all of my precise genes, the person will end up with slightly different coloured eyes, perhaps darker skin and on average be slightly taller. That is how complicated our genetic heritage is. Stop pissing about, please.
*As for Dolly... look, she lived for six years because she was overfed and unhealthy. A spoilt, lonely, mildly depressed, obese sheep. That's what she was. For goodness' sake, she lived in a separate barn for security reasons when as a sheep, years of evolution and human breeding have resulted in a species that is mainly docile and can live in groups (yeah, you know; flocks...). If you want an example of an unhealthy lifestyle, look at Dolly. If you want an example of the dangers of cloning, just get a pair of ordinary twins of the species homo sapiens for god's sake...
*Oh yes, and considering I'm a know-it-all Physicist (man, you biologists should be ashamed, lol...), who gets way too riled when people say stupid things about science for her own good, I find it amusing that it's me who often has to reveal this fact to my fellow students who study biology...
...Nature itself has 'decided' that the Y-chromosome male is no longer necessary. Let me explain...
*The Y chromosome is actually a degraded X chromosome and in fact (theoretical mainly) biologists generally agree that this process is an ongoing one. That's right, Y is on the way out. In a million years or so, we may well end up with three sexes, XX, XY and XV.
*Boys need Fathers to set a good role model... To be perfectly frank, this argument is one of my pet hates because it is illogical, flawed and oh so true. Damn human nature!
*Historically speaking, our attitudes on the parents role in upbringing a child are very recent. Up until some 100-80 years ago, it didn't matter if either parent was there or not. Good blood would out: who cares if there was a series of nannies/governesses who looked after your girls or you sent your son to some Dickensian prison of a public boarding school in the North. Good blood, good family, was all one needed. Noble family, noble heart seemed to be the pervasive attitude. A slightly more spohisticated version of eugenics, to be honest.
So, that's my rant done. My personal view on the debate was that it was invalid, and thus I abstained. It simply asked the wrong question.
*I'm sorry, but was I taking crazy pills or was I the only one actually listening to the preposition? To quote, their position was that the stereotyped, breadwinner figure of the father was no longer necessary and you know what was really odd? All the cute and humorous (touching?) stories that we girls had to tell of our special relationships with our fathers precisely proved what Lucia's team was arguing for, though it seemed everyone was too chocked up with emotion as we all revelled in our moment of electra-complex induced happiness, to realise this. None of the father-daughter relationships described by the floor gave us a father who remotely resembled the fatherly stereotype. That was the point. If those girls who spoke of dads playing with them and taking them around had grown up with the stereotype, they'd have been voting the other way, believe me. As it was, it was actually the preposition that won and we didn't even seem to realise it. Damn embarrassing that was.
*It's hard (and yes, I know I'm standing on thin ground here, so you can slap me tomorrow or something) to accept tales of fatherless girls becoming teenage mums from a middle-class caucasian female, who has never had it better. Social status has far more to do with anything - just go ask a social worker (as I have - ooh, lucky me, I know, but you get my point) who works in Lambeth or Brixton rather than Islington or Chelsea...
*And maybe it's the scientist in me (imagining that she was about to set up an experiment with a control group etc. etc. It's not a bad way to think, you know...) but there was something rather creepy about the way we lapped up the personal experiences of those with divorced parents, going on about how they missed their Dad. Not so much because I am just generally disdainful of that sort of argument (far too crude) but because, well.... HELLO! These girls missed their Dads because they already knew their Dads. Of course they look forward to visiting them! They've grown up for some of their childhoods with this figure in their lives and a few rows later, *poof!*, he's gone! I'd miss my Dad if that happened. But that proves very little in the way of saying that fathers are necessary. What it says though, is that stability in a child's life is necessary.
*As for father's offering some sort of balance from the stress of the mother, the fact that lesbian couples are so adept at raising decent kids, shows (as I tried to explain) that it is not neccessarily a father that is needed, but merely another parent/person who can offer another perspective. A child is not raised by the parents, we Igbos are fond of saying, but by the village. That was all that the various floor speakers proved to me, not, again, that fathers are neessary.
It sucks having learnt rhetoric. You get to rip apart people's arguments, but they're usually too silly to realise it, *sighs*
*Athene's point was good *claps*. That's what I'm talking about!
*Olivia's point as to genetic diversity was good, but cast into an irrelevant light when one considers how the preposition had stated their cause. As for cloning, well, I am fed up of the old 'sci-fi horror' scenario we all seem to insist on carrying around with us like a nasty case of head-lice. Cloning is far more complicated than we think. If I were to be cloned, I can bet that even with all of my precise genes, the person will end up with slightly different coloured eyes, perhaps darker skin and on average be slightly taller. That is how complicated our genetic heritage is. Stop pissing about, please.
*As for Dolly... look, she lived for six years because she was overfed and unhealthy. A spoilt, lonely, mildly depressed, obese sheep. That's what she was. For goodness' sake, she lived in a separate barn for security reasons when as a sheep, years of evolution and human breeding have resulted in a species that is mainly docile and can live in groups (yeah, you know; flocks...). If you want an example of an unhealthy lifestyle, look at Dolly. If you want an example of the dangers of cloning, just get a pair of ordinary twins of the species homo sapiens for god's sake...
*Oh yes, and considering I'm a know-it-all Physicist (man, you biologists should be ashamed, lol...), who gets way too riled when people say stupid things about science for her own good, I find it amusing that it's me who often has to reveal this fact to my fellow students who study biology...
...Nature itself has 'decided' that the Y-chromosome male is no longer necessary. Let me explain...
*The Y chromosome is actually a degraded X chromosome and in fact (theoretical mainly) biologists generally agree that this process is an ongoing one. That's right, Y is on the way out. In a million years or so, we may well end up with three sexes, XX, XY and XV.
*Boys need Fathers to set a good role model... To be perfectly frank, this argument is one of my pet hates because it is illogical, flawed and oh so true. Damn human nature!
*Historically speaking, our attitudes on the parents role in upbringing a child are very recent. Up until some 100-80 years ago, it didn't matter if either parent was there or not. Good blood would out: who cares if there was a series of nannies/governesses who looked after your girls or you sent your son to some Dickensian prison of a public boarding school in the North. Good blood, good family, was all one needed. Noble family, noble heart seemed to be the pervasive attitude. A slightly more spohisticated version of eugenics, to be honest.
So, that's my rant done. My personal view on the debate was that it was invalid, and thus I abstained. It simply asked the wrong question.