Don't look at me like that! So you look around you and think all you see are differences, and I say, vive la difference!

The point is, we are all different - individually - and also that there is no definable class of "men" or "women" that can be identified except by the modest differences in genitalia and hormone production.

My claim, and a theory I have been testing now for many, many years, is that mens and womens minds are no more different than they are alike, no more different or alike than between any people chosen by some other criteria. The prejudices that men and women hold about and against each other are to my mind the biggest and nastiest ones we have.

If you take this idea and mull it over - I don't expect you to believe it - just try it on for a while. Try swapping genders whenever you encounter or utter a statement that refers to "men" or "women," and see how it feels when inverted. Test the truth or lack of it in both versions of the statement. Try thinking of yourself as possessing every trait that you ever hear is attached to your gender - and then every trait likewise attributed to the other gender.

See what you learn about yourself and others. See if you think, regardless of the absolute truth of the statement, whether or not it is a good thing to have in your mind.

Please.

8/1/00 - 5 AM