At the risk of being irrevocably branded as Feminist...

The same is true of a guy that's getting a bit older. Can a 50-year-old guy work as hard as a 25-year-old? Not often. That's where working smarter and determination come in. A decent front-end loader and do the work of about six people.

And I'm not sure I would demean women who choose to fight for this country, especially when there's a lack of qualified soldiers to fill new demands.

What I find so entertaining about this is the shear lack of sense in the modern human.
Of course a woman and man can do the same tasks. But women and men are built different so they excel at different tasks. Why would a woman be the one loading a cart full of rocks, then pushing it up a hill? The man would do this much better. For the flip side. Why would a man try to plant tiny seeds. His hands are big and clumsy. Women are more adept to repetitive motions and tasks. They can go a lot longer doing such things.


So yes women and men can and do farm. Just different. Thinking they aren't different is where the modern feminist has fallen off their rocker.

Well said!

very nice!!

Why is the question asked so much? Easy. Look at the history of Western culture. Women have continually shifted into a less physical role over the centuries, overall. Obviously there are exceptions-- but then, there always are.

I find comments about the physical differences interesting-- yes, women are smaller. We have a different structure. However, take a look at the history of humans... overall women have been the farmers.

So, yeah. Short answer? It's a cultural thing.

I'm sorry but I have never seen a front-end loader being used to search a burning building for people over come by smoke. Again my point is if a woman can do the job fine but let's not lower the standards of the job just so a woman can be hired.


I'm not demeaning them. I'm just pointing out how if they want to do the job they should have to meet the same standards. At one time the minimum PT standard for males was the max for females.

How would you like to be in the middle of a firefight only to find out you don't have any ammo because the female trooper couldn't carry it? Or to realize you are going to be left behind to be captured because the two female members of your team can't carry your wounded body? Or discover your team isn't going to make the LZ before the last helo lifts off because your females can't move as fast as the rest of the unit?

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Remember, when seconds count. . .
the police are just MINUTES away!

Congress has no power to appropriate this money as an act of charity. Every member upon this floor knows it. . .Davy Crockett

Female service members are not allowed to fight on the front lines, so the point is moot.

Also, firefighters do so much more than drag bodies out of fires. Many spend their entire career without doing so.

I believe that the diversification of many positions brings more good than harm. What some women lack in pure physical strength is more than made up by some of their abilities to be compassionate and calm in moments in which others might be undergoing emotional crisis.

Thinking that all women are alike, and all men are alike, is where you've fallen off your rocker.

My husband has a bad back. Loading a cart full of rocks and pushing it up a hill probably would leave him bedridden. Me, I'm a hunky girl, I'm built to work hard and I like it!

While I'm moving those rocks, I'd be happy to let him handle the seed-planting.

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"I love all of this mud," said no one, ever.

Please stop your contrary act. It's plain to see than women and men are different. Men are physically stronger in bursts. Women can carry lighter load for much longer. If you choose not to accept your physiology then move the rocks..... Yeah, defend that burden by action.

Being a "hunky girl" you still wont get the physical work done that the average 18 year old boy could do. If you can't accept that. Get to any strength endurance sport and compete as a man. I suggest you start with Worlds Strongest Man competition.

Here is the contact info.
The main qualifying route to WSM is via the WSM Super-Series events. These are organised by World Class Events (WCE) and if you want to enter one of these events please contact athlete@super-series.com. If for any reason you are not able to enter one of these events, please contact Colin Bryce on colin@super-series.com and he will advise you further.


I'm sure since you are hunkey. You will set the world of weight lifting on fire.

Personally, I have homesteaded alone. I speak from experience. You don't have to be the clone of Jesse the Body Ventura (when he was young) nor Arnold Schwarzenegger (when he was young), to homestead. If you aren't built like a brick outhouse, you will probably need a brain. That, of course, rules out many.

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CowgirlGloria

God forbid that I should go to any Heaven in which there are no horses. ~R.B. Cunninghame Graham, letter to Theodore Roosevelt, 1917

Yes, if you look around with eyes not blindfolded by stereotypes, you will see that they are indeed different.

There are some 5'1", 120 lb men. There are some 6'1", 220 lb. women. And everything in between...

Yes, we can make generalizations about the sexes, but those tell us nothing about particular abilities and inclinations of individuals.

BTW, "hunky" is a (local?) term used to describe people of Polish or similarly Eastern European descent ... meant to imply "strong peasant type."

And I have worked in the fields, throwing hay bales with 18-year-old boys, and kept going long after some dropped out.

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"I love all of this mud," said no one, ever.

How was I stereotyping? I was talking about sense. For instance if a woman has the 6' 220 build, and a man is 6' and 220. Who is more likely to be stronger and have a greater muscle mass. Who is more likely to have a greater amount of fat? Or lets go the other way..... a 120 pound man at 5' and a 120 pound woman at 5'..... Who has more muscle? Who has more fat?


In each case the man has more muscle and less fat. It is the way we are built.


Now if you are a huge 6'-4" 240 pound woman married to a 5' 120 pound man then perhaps you and yours would be the exception. But you would be an oddity in the real world.

Your strawman has little effect on reality.

P.S. their are a lot of "hunky" men in that competition....

Probably the man. But in the case of a 6', 220 lb woman, and a 5', 120 lb man (yes, they do exist), I'd put my money on the female.

It's not a "straw man" argument -- the reality is that people come in all shapes and sizes. When you throw in disabilities and other physical limitations, along with personal preferences (I've known some men who are just plain lazy, as well as being weak!) it's pretty difficult to predict INDIVIDUAL abilities based solely on gender STEREOTYPES.

For the record, I'm all in favor of having identical standards for military men and women. But if a woman can cut the mustard, she ought to be entitled to do any job a man can!

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"I love all of this mud," said no one, ever.

"Willow_girl: For the record, I'm all in favor of having identical standards for military men and women. But if a woman can cut the mustard, she ought to be entitled to do any job a man can!"


Exactly my point. I just can't abide by the "if you are a girl you should wear pink and make muffins" mentality. Yeah, I can make muffins. But so can Emeril. And so could James Beard.

I know that the argument is that they are the exception... But aren't we all?

And I agree fully with the poster who commented that it's cultural. Yes. Very. June Cleaver didn't do any of us any favors.

I had a college student that worked for me that was 4'11", weighed maybe 102#, and could kick your donkey from one side of the farm to the other. She rode the huge 17+hh horses and VAULTED onto their backs. Aptitude and attitude, baby. Aptitude and attitude.

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Radically conservatively un-biased liberal.

http://whitepinesoapworks.com/

Let me attack this situation from a different perspective... and apologies beforehand...

Our basic human nature is one of a hunter gatherer society... the men hunt the game, wrassle grizzly bears, bring home mastodon t-bones... the women stay at home, protect the lil' ones, do some farming(gathering vegetables), and kick out the excess bones lying around the cave floor (home maintenance).

I think, in a true hunter gatherer lifestyle, the women had it rougher... and I could see some 'modern feminism' coming in to play, so that they could go out and have some of the same kind of fun, er, ah, "work" that the guys were having.

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Todays world...
My hat's off to any woman who wants to work on the farm, woohoo! the harder the better. I'd pay wimmenkind the same wages I get for working on the farm, pounding t-posts or digging ditches or clearing out weeds... nuthin... so much work on the farm provides exactly zero income... Many was the month that I'd'a loved to made anything remotely close to minimum wage... heck, I've worked for relatives all day on the farm and got nothing but a meal out of it.

My experience in life is the harder the physical labor involved, the less wages.

The better paying jobs, in the menial world, often involved heavy equipment, in a dangerous work environment... and most of the men didn't like it, but it paid better than the safer heavy equipment jobs. Woman wants to jump into the bone crusher, more power to her... means I don't have too! (As long as it's not a woman I care about! ..... bein' a gentleman, that'd be improper... as I'm supposed to stare down the saber toothed tiger)

I'd go so far as to say that VERY FEW women- OR men for that matter- can actually do a good job at farming! It is HARD work! That is not a reflection of the good people on this board... but we forget that "we" are not the norm. "The norm" has guys and girls both out there getting manicures and doing office work. They would be hard pressed to throw around even one bale of hay! Lest this sound like me judging the masses, let me just say that my husband and I were part of "the norm" for most of our lives until about ... what? 4 years ago? We have had to learn from all of you, and we have had to get sore muscles from things that would embarrass real farmers, and allow ourselves to grow stronger! We can do things now that we would not have been able to do 5 years ago. But it has been a VERY uphill climb! Dh still works the office job, but we garden too, and can our own food, and have done chickens and rabbits and ect... Put up fence, mended old sheds as shelter for critters, that sort of thing. We have yet to do large livestock, but plan to. The first year we had a garden, we thought we were going to die from just pulling weeds! The second year, I was sure that the tiller was going to kill me!
The question isn't a gender question, it is a societal question. What has convenience, and modernity, and sitting on our keisters cost us in terms of strength and health as a society? I grant that it has given us a lot of things too. I won't argue that. However, just as it is true that "there is no loss without some small gain, it is equally true that "there is no gain without some small loss", either!

JM2C,
Cindyc.

OK...I've read both sides of this argument...and I'm of the opinon that it makes a difference as to what the women wants to do...if she thinks that she can farm...then give it a go.....she will have to use her brain to figure things out that a mand would just jump in a do with his hands...but that is what machinery does...helps BOTH sexes...not just women folk..and farming is all hard work.


This is my third post...I've been watching for awhile now and had to give an opinion on this...being as I run heavy equipment for a living...and I had to ahear to the SAME set of standards the men did for my qualifications...and there was NO particality shown...just because I don't have the right plumbing. Just means we have to find a different way of doing some things.

Yeah, you're a feminist. No going back now. It's final! (Tim's tongue firmly in cheek)

If you want to farm, you go ahead. We believe in you!

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Diamondtim

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