Re: political correctness according to Hugo de Garis

Kathryn Aegis (aegis@igc.apc.org)
Sun, 5 Jan 1997 00:19:45 +0000


>While exploring Hugo de Garis's web site on brain building I came
>across this rant on political correctness. He claims that genius
>in an undeniably male trait. I would be interested if anyone has
>a reasonable argument against his views:

The general reasoned response to this type of statement is that it
does not take into account historical realities and is probably
heavily biased in Western Christian history. You could bring up
examples such as (i) that Socrates and Plato were originally the
protoges of prominent female scholars (ii) that entire libraries were
burned during Christian attacks on advanced 'pagan' civilizations so
we don't have an accurate record of who their prominent thinkers
were, (iii) that one of the greatest known ancient mathematicians of
all time, Hypatia, was murdered by monks and her library burned
simply because she was a woman, and (iv) what about Marie Curie, the
Countess of Lovelace, Sappho?

You could also point out that until very recently most women were
prohibited by law from attending school or even reading books, and that
these prohibitions were often enforced through beatings or commitment to
asylums. It is believed that many women who exhibited signs of early
genius were treated as socially rebellious or mentally anamolous.

Sin,

Kathryn Aegis

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