Responding to 'Sexism' . . .

Although I agreed with some of what Nicholas Gunther wrote in his article Men, Women and Sexism (February 9), much of what he said disturbed me deeply. There is less discussion among both men and women of our generation about sexism than there was a few years ago, when feminism was a 'new' issue. With this decreased discussion I feel there has been a growing confusion about the issues involved and their implications.

The womens' movement, as it evolved in the late '60s and early '70s, brought into full view a whole slew of problems and injustices, of which both men and women are the victims. Some seem relatively straight-forward, such as job discrimination; some were enormously complex, such as the various issues revolving around human sexuality. Unfortunately, as Gunther's article suggests, the latter type is being milked for all it is worth in the commercial world.

But Gunther's piece also illustrates how easy it is to confuse the ackowledgement that a problem exists, and the problem's resolution. And to go a step further, his article represents reaction against what he sees as excessive reform, when in fact much reform has not occured in the first place.

According to Gunther, the new literature about human sexuality--largely generated, if indirectly, by the women's movement--paints an unfairly grim picture of men as savage, self-centered sexual beings.

I would argue that what is written in the Hite Report or The Joy of Lesbian Sex is of relatively little importance. What is important is that the feminists' desire for sexual equality has cleared the way for a great deal of open discussion about human sexuality, which can only be a healthy development.

Gunther goes on to complain about what might be called reverse sexism. "What is about women is interesting, what is about men is dull...women playwrights and authors, even of dubious quality, are hoisted into the national spotlight. We are expected to listen to women not because they are brilliant musicians but because they are women."

This attitude is odious. It reflects an unsophisticated, even warped sense of reality. There is a much larger number of male authors, musicians and artists of other sorts who enjoy commercial success and critical praise than there are female artists.

If Gunther is correct that some women artists get attention because they are women, maybe it is because women' experiences are very different from those of men. Thus their art reflects a unique and interesting perception of the world. Furthermore, few self-respecting artists of either gender seek or appreciate the kind of patronizing attention that Gunther thinks is so pervasive.

I would like to aks what fields Gunther has in mind when he says that "in many fields it is three times as easy for a woman to get a job than for a man." Can affirmative action be dismissed in so facile a manner?

There is a huge disparity between the number of women one would expect to hold lucrative and interesting jobs on the basis of the proportion of women in the work force, and the number that actually hold such positions. This disparity might encourage Gunther and others like him to consider the multitude of factors--both subtle and obvious--that discourage women from aspiring towards lofty goals. That those few women who overcome these factors are given some advantage over equally well-qualified men in some fields can only be just.

Reality shows us that these sorts of reforms have not transformed ours into a world in which women have an unfair advantage over men. How many tenured faculty members at Harvard are women? What percentage of doctors, lawyers, or political leaders are women?

Gunther complains that women are taking jobs, not because they are "interested" in them, but because they expect "better chances...and better salaries than their competition, mostly being male." Why, I would ask, have women traditionally been "interested" in teaching in elementary school and not in universities?

Why are they "interested" in being nurses and not doctors? Secretaries, not executives? The prospect of entering a field in which only a minute number of women attain success would be enough to dampen any woman's interest.

Gunther concludes that "we are all of the same stuff, and we should try like hell not to hurt each other." In order not to hurt each other we have to understand each other. While in some ways we may be "of the same stuff," we must strive to remember that our experiences and struggles differ.

If we dismiss our differences as superficial or unimportant, we are in danger of abdicating our responsibility to seek a fair world for humans of both sexes.