On Vox: Le Femme Violente
So listening to my morning radio show, "the Monsters in the Morning", I hear them talking about a girl fight in which a girl was beaten up by a group of cheerleaders for 30 minutes for posting some bullshit on the internet. They were talking about how violence among women has increased significantly over the past few generations and how girl fights are far more brutal than guy fights. They even cited formal boxing matches they would watch. While male boxers would tend to talk a little trash, fight, and then shake hands and show honor and respect, women boxers would take the match personally and fight far more brutally then men do. Is this a cultural trend due to an entertainment media that glorifies violence, or is this a biologically programmed response to something deeper?
Some people want to blame TV and video games for the increase in violence that we see in today's society, but I think this is too quick of a conclusion. Violence and entertainment has long been a part of our culture. "Loony Toons" and "Tom and Jerry" were well known in the 40s and were cartoons that glorified violence. For decades kids would watch these shows, from the theater in the 30s and 40s to the TV screen as it made its way into every middle class household in the country. Yet, even this violence marketed to such a young audience and the news programs showing the atrocities of the Vietnam War watched by there parents seemed to create violence on the magnitude of modern society, and certainly didn't add much violence to the female sex. This problem seems rooted deeper.
Men have always been more violent than women. To understand why women are becoming more violent we need to take a look at why this is. In many animals male violence has a lot to do with territory or social ranking. This is true of human males as well. Perhaps this has something to do with hormones, but I think in a lot of ways this is a psychological process, where the male brain develops neuro-pathways differently than females based more on a differing environmental stimulus.
So what is the differing environmental stimulus? I believe it to be the mother. The primary care giver in a vast majority of species where care is given is the female. One of the biggest contributors to maleness has a lot to do with the misunderstandings between the mother and her son. As a woman has no experience growing up as a boy she has somewhat more of a disconnect between herself and her male children. As a result, men tend to grow up being a bit more individualistic. The result of this individualism is a brain wired to compete. This understanding of competition and social heirarchy is only complemented when multiple male siblings, also wired for individualism and the dominance heirarchy, learn to compete with one another.
Mothers, however, have a greater connection and understanding of their daughters. This will often develop the female brain for a greater understanding of empathy, social interaction, bonding, and emotional awareness, as these are more easily shared between mother and daughter. This difference probably has a lot to do with why males have a tendency to take more risk than women. It may also explain why the individualist male is more likely to be Republican and the social and empathetic females tend to lean more Democrat.
So where does violence fit in here? Unnecessary violence really seems to come from a childish lack of understanding how to restrain oneself. In essence, it is a tantrum. The adult/adolescent who was insufficiently taught to control him/herself at a younger age will be more likely to cause these violent acts. Since boys don't develop as strong of a connection to the primary care giver, the result is that the boy has a greater chance of developing violent behavioral traits.
With the number of duel income families rising, both boys and girls are given less attention by both parents. This, I believe, is what has lead to an overall increase in violence in schools, and the now closing gap in violence between males and females.
But why are females so much more violent in fights? This is likely genetic. While men have evolved over millions of years with a smaller connection to their primary care giver, this is a newer phenomenon for females. The result of this evolution has been a male understanding of the line between when fighting is genetically advantageous as a means of social dominance and when fighting isn't worth the energy. Females have had far less evolutionary influence to understanding this concept. So when females fight, they fight rough, without mercy, and without an understanding of when it is advantageous to stop wasting energy on the fight.
That's enough said on this topic. Later!
Originally posted on incredibleplum.vox.com