Discrimination against guys / children

Long story short: British Airways apparently has a policy that adult males sitting alone cannot be next to a solo child traveler. Guy who switched seats with his wife was forced to move, successfully sued.

Blatantly discriminatory.

One of the things I've known about myself for a long time is that I love kids. Even when I was enormously more shy and awkward, all traces of embarrassment disappeared around youngsters: I would wag my tongue, make faces, and do just about anything to get a smile. Every 6 months, when seeing my young cousins, I delighted in gaining their trust and tossing them up, down, and around, solely to give them joy. I'm sure it has a lot to do with all of the moves my dad used to use with me; he would lift my stomach up with his feet and I would be "flying." One of my proudest accomplishments is the invention of a throwing move for ages 3-6 that is completely fast & safe, without the potential to cause dizziness.

This is why I am so easily distracted by kids at Williams - I miss them. Anyhow, the idea that my love of laughter and providing joy might be seen as something else is frankly frightening. I've never been stereotyped like the man from the article, but I now worry about it. I suppose it might be a little like DWB, or getting unwanted catcalls on the street; the fear makes me feel my maleness as a burden.

But wait, my wonderful friends might cry, women have it so much worse! Biologically, I have to agree - guys don't have to be pregnant, we can stand up in the bathroom, and we don't have a "time of the month." Sociologically, I'm as sure: women are getting butt in the college admissions game, which would suggest that there are lots of under-performing guys out there in my generation.

But let's not discount the awful choices in picking outfits that my friend CF told me about - for each body part uncovered, something else must be put on. Or what about walking the line between prudedom and promiscuity? I was amazed to find out how much of an issue catcalls still are these days, and flat opinions that sexism still undercuts women who lead seemingly "progressive" institutions. Then again, I also didn't expect to know of a real-life racist in my community.

The most frustrating part of all this is the polarity between "men have it worse" and "women have it worse." The bottom line is that there are issues facing people of every gender and sex. Furthermore, the specific problems and solutions will vary according to cultural contexts that vary between states, blocks, and even between members of the same household. No doubt that the power structure of history favored males, and that that structure remains today, but I'd predict that 20 years from now, the US will look very different as a result of effects on the generations not yet in charge. But the ultimate balance between men and women on who is the biggest victim misses the entire point; instead of trying to get a bigger slice of the sexism card pie, we should really focus on making sexism of all sorts socially unacceptable.

And while I'm issuing platitudes: men and women are qualitatively different. We don't understand all of those differences, but the Surpreme Court's statement on the loss of women in a jury still rings true.