The Female Mythtique

At the university where I work, they teach this class entitled "Psychology of Women." The course description reads as follows:

"An examination of women from various perspectives, such as biological, anthropological, mythological, religious, historical, legal, sociological, and psychoanalytical points of view. Discussions of ways in which these various perspectives influence the psychological development of contemporary women."

My question is: "HUH?" I checked all of the psychology class listings and guess what, folks? They do not offer a "Psychology of Men." Does that surprise you? Before anyone comments on the apparent feminism of this post, let me assure you that I am not what you would call a real feminist. I believe that each person, regardless of gender, holds a place in the world, in nature, in society and so things always even out.

You may be thinking: What does she mean by that? And I would answer: If you are a woman and are a genius, there is NO WAY that our society can keep you down. They may pay us 75 cents to a man's dollar, but in the end if you are intelligent, persistent, a hard worker (at least at first), and you know what you are doing, you will rise like the cream in milk. Can't keep good people down, that is my belief.

However, why don't they teach a "Psychology of Men?" What is up with that? So does that mean that regular Psychology classes are based only on male psychology and this one class will explain the female? Ridiculous.

It bothers me that there should be a class dedicated to explaining the female psyche, as varied and as complex and as different as women are. This class would explain exactly what? That we were the gatherers whereas men were the hunters? Then, jumping a few thousand years, women were the homemakers and men the breadwinners? I just don't understand it. Why do we merit a special class to explain our psychology and isn't that a crazy thing to try to do? The way I see it, you cannot lump people together. You cannot catalog people by gender or by ethnicity or by nationality or by sexual orientation or anything. It is enough to make a stupid statement like "Women are maternal" to be shown examples of women who abandoned their kids, or neglected them, or in extreme cases even murdered them.

A few days back a coworker told me a story about being in line at a clothing store and a hispanic female tried to butt in the line and my coworker told her off in English (she is white), and the woman acted like she didn't understand English. My coworker said to her that that's the reason hispanics should not be allowed into this country. Now, my coworker knows that I'm also "hispanic" (a label which I dislike and is totally inaccurate anyway, but that's another post). When she finished, I blinked my eyes a few times. Then I said to her: "You know that that was an asshole problem, not a hispanic problem." And she replied, "Yes you're right." Sigh. Moral: Please don't generalize.

If they offered, for example, a class called "Cuban Psychology." What would that be like? Or another example: "Psychology of Bible-Belt America." Or "Gay Psychology." I don't think any of those would be approved, so why "Psychology of Women?" If I was the professor I'd show up the first day of class and say "OK, people, the difference is that women have two X chromosomes and men have an X and a Y. Discuss among yourselves. Everyone gets a Pass grade. You are dismissed. Yeah, dismissed for the whole semester, go home. Or go wherever you like, just don't stay here."

Makes me mad. (I didn't want to say "It pisses me off.")