Some say that...OH BOY! (merged with lealaurielle)

seribulan

Japan's Princess Kiko has boy
POSTED: 5:50 a.m. EDT, September 6, 2006

TOKYO, Japan (CNN) -- Japan's Princess Kiko has given birth to a son, likely postponing a long-running debate over whether Japanese law should be changed to allow women to succeed to the throne, the imperial palace announced Wednesday.

The boy is third in line to the throne, after Crown Prince Naruhito and Kiko's husband, Prince Akishino.

The Imperial Household Agency gave few details about the birth, which came by Caesarean section following pregnancy complications, and did not release the boy's name. (Watch Japan welcome a new royal -- 2:56)

The agency said only that the baby was healthy and that he weighed about 2,558 grams (5.6 pounds).

Naruhito is the eldest son of Emperor Akihito.

Naruhito and his wife, Crown Princess Masako, earlier had a daughter, Princess Aiko, sparking the succession debate.

Many in Japan have thought that the birth of a boy to Kiko, who has two daughters, would take some of the pressure off Masako, who has struggled with depression -- and, at 42, is thought to have a slim chance of bearing more children.

Others, however, maintained that the succession law should be changed to allow Aiko to inherit the throne.

Change proposed
When the government previously proposed changing the law, polls showed that an estimated 70 percent of Japanese approved. Once Kiko's pregnancy was announced, however, public opinion switched, with Japanese saying it would be easier for Kiko to bear a son and resolve the succession issue for now.

The birth was cause for rejoicing in Japan, and media outlets broadcast continuing coverage about the event.

Kiko was hospitalized on August 16 after showing symptoms of partial placenta previa, in which part of the placenta drops too low in the uterus, The Associated Press reported.

The gender of the baby had been a closely guarded palace secret, though Japanese tabloids speculated the child would be a boy.

The last potential male heir born was Akishino himself, in 1965.

Reigning empresses have been rare in Japan, usually serving as stand-ins for a few years until a suitable male could be installed. The last reigning empress was Gosakuramachi, who assumed the throne in 1763, according to AP.

Debate over the succession law was divisive and emotional. Some conservatives proposed a revival of concubines to produce imperial heirs, and others argued that allowing a woman on the throne would destroy a precious Japanese tradition.

CNN's Atika Shubert contributed to this report

Copyright 2006 CNN. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report.

:hmm:We sure r living in a patriarchal world...:hmm:

[ Last edited by  seribulan at 11-12-2006 08:36 AM ]

seribulan

can't seem to find the article that said Man have better brain than Woman...


will paste it if manage to find it...from this week's paper...

seribulan

They just can't help it

What kind of brain do you have? There really are big differences between the male and female brain, says Simon Baron-Cohen. And they could help explain conditions such as autism
Do you have a male or female brain? Take the test http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/news/page/0,12983,937443,00.html


Thursday April 17, 2003
The Guardian



Are there essential differences between the male and female brain? My theory is that the female brain is predominantly hard-wired for empathy, and that the male brain is predominantly hard-wired for understanding and building systems. I call it the empathising-systemising (E-S) theory.
Empathising is the drive to identify another person's emotions and thoughts, and to respond to these with an appropriate emotion. The empathiser intuitively figures out how people are feeling, and how to treat people with care and sensitivity. Systemising is the drive to analyse and explore a system, to extract underlying rules that govern the behaviour of a system; and the drive to construct systems. The systemiser intuitively figures out how things work, or what the underlying rules are controlling a system. Systems can be as varied as a pond, a vehicle, a computer, a maths equation, or even an army unit. They all operate on inputs and deliver outputs, using rules.

According to this theory, a person (whether male or female) has a particular "brain type". There are three common brain types: for some individuals, empathising is stronger than systemising. This is called the female brain, or a brain of type E. For other individuals, systemising is stronger than empathising. This is called the male brain, or a brain of type S. Yet other individuals are equally strong in their systemising and empathising. This is called the "balanced brain", or a brain of type B. There are now tests you can take to see which type (E, S, or B) you are. Not which type you'd like to be, but which you actually are.

A key feature of this theory is that your sex cannot tell you which type of brain you have. Not all men have the male brain, and not all women have the female brain. The central claim of this new theory is only that on average, more males than females have a brain of type S, and more females than males have a brain of type E.

So are females better at empathising? This theory rings true at an anecdotal level. For example, we've always known that people choose different things to read in the newsagent on the railway platform or in the airport departure lounge. Women are more likely to go to the magazine rack featuring fashion, romance, beauty, intimacy, emotional problems and agony-aunts, counselling, relationship advice, and parenting. Men are more likely to go to a magazine rack featuring computers, cars, boats, photogra phy, DIY, sport, hi-fi, action, guns, tools, and the outdoors.

And we all have anecdotal impressions about typical hobbies for men and women. Men are more likely to spend hours happily engaged in car or motorbike maintenance, light aircraft piloting, sailing, bird- or trainspotting, mathematics, tweaking their sound systems, computer games and programming. Women are more likely to spend hours happily engaged in coffee mornings or pot-luck suppers, advising friends on relationship problems, or caring for friends, neighbours, or pets.

But the E-S theory goes beyond such anecdotal evidence to pull together the scientific evidence, and investigate the origins of these differences.

The evidence for a female advantage in empathising comes from many different directions. For example, studies show that when children play together with a little movie player that has only one eye-piece, boys tend to get more of their fair share of looking down the eye piece. They just shoulder the girls out of the way. Less empathy, more self-centred. Or if you leave out a bunch of those big plastic cars that kids can ride on, what you see is that more little boys play the "ramming" game. They deliberately drive the vehicle into another child. The little girls ride around more carefully, avoiding the other children more often. This suggests the girls are being more sensitive to others.

Baby girls, as young as 12 months old, respond more empathically to the distress of other people, showing greater concern through more sad looks, sympathetic vocalisations and comforting. This echoes what you find in adulthood: more women report frequently sharing the emotional distress of their friends. Women also spend more time comforting people.

When asked to judge when someone might have said something potentially hurtful, girls score higher from at least seven years old. Women are also more sensitive to facial expressions. They are better at decoding non-verbal communication, picking up subtle nuances from tone of voice or facial expression, or judging a person's character.

There is also a sex difference in aggression. Males tend to show far more "direct" aggression such as pushing, hitting and punching. Females tend to show more "indirect" (or "relational", covert) aggression. This includes gossip, exclusion, and bitchy remarks. It could be said that to punch someone in the face or to wound them physically requires an even lower level of empathy than a verbal snipe.

Two other ways to reveal a person's empathising skill are to see how they (as a newcomer) join a group of strangers, and to see how they (as a host) react to a new person joining their group. This has been cleverly investigated in children by introducing a new boy or girl to a group who are already playing together. If the newcomer is female, she is more likely to stand and watch for a while, to check out what's going on, and then try to fit in with the ongoing activity. This usually leads to the newcomer being readily accepted into the group. If the newcomer is a boy, he is more likely to hijack the game by trying to change it, directing everyone's attention on to him. And even by the age of six, girls are better at being a host. They are more attentive to the newcomer. Boys often just ignore the newcomer's attempt to join in. They are more likely to carry on with what they were already doing.

How early are such sex differences in empathy evident? Certainly, by 12 months , girls make more eye contact than boys. But a new study carried out in my lab at Cambridge University shows that at birth, girls look longer at a face, and boys look longer at a suspended mechanical mobile. Furthermore, the Cambridge team found that how much eye contact children make is in part determined by a biological factor: prenatal testosterone. This has been demonstrated by measuring this hormone in amniotic fluid.

All this adds up to a large amount of evidence for a female advantage in empathising, with at least some biological determinants. What about the claimed male advantage in systemising?

Boys, from toddlerhood onwards, are more interested in cars, trucks, planes, guns and swords, building blocks, constructional toys, and mechanical toys - systems. They seem to love putting things together, to build toy towers or towns or vehicles. Boys also enjoy playing with toys that have clear functions, buttons to press, things that will light up, or devices that will cause another object to move.

You see the same sort of pattern in the adult workplace. Some occupations are almost entirely male. Think of metal-working, weapon-making, crafting musical instruments, or the construction industries, such as boat-building. The focus of these occupations is on constructing systems. Professions such as maths, physics, and engineering, which require high sys temising, are also largely male-chosen disciplines.

Some psychological tests also show the male advantage in systemising. For example, in the mental rotation test, you're shown two shapes, and asked if one is a rotation or a mirror image of the other. Males are quicker and more accurate on this test. Reading maps has been used as another test of systemising. Men can learn a route in fewer trials, just from looking at a map, correctly recalling more details about direction and distance. If you ask boys to make a map of an area that they have only visited once, their maps have a more accurate layout of the features in the environment, eg, showing which landmark is south-east of another.

If you ask people to put together a 3D mechanical apparatus in an assembly task, on average, men score higher. Boys are also better at constructing block buildings from 2D blueprints. These are constructional systems. And in Nick Hornby's novel, High Fidelity, the male protagonist is obsessed with his record collection, and works in a second-hand record shop catering for (almost all male) customers searching for that one missing item in their collections of music. Collections (of albums, or anything else) are often highly systematic in nature.

The male preference for focusing on systems again is evident very early. Our Cambridge study found that at one year old, little boys showed a stronger preference to watch a film of cars (mechanical systems), than a film of a person's face (with a lot of emotional expression). Little girls showed the opposite preference. And at one day old, little boys look for longer at a mechanical mobile.

We, of course, know that with time, culture and socialisation do play a role in determining a male brain (stronger interest in systems) or female brain (stronger interest in empathy). But these studies strongly suggest that biology also partly determines this.

Some of the most convincing evidence for biological causes comes from studies of the effects of hormones. There was a time when women were prescribed a synthetic female hormone (diethylstilbestrol), in an attempt to prevent repeated spontaneous miscarriages. Boys born to such women are likely to show more female-typical, empathising behaviours, such as caring for dolls. And if a female rat is injected at birth with testosterone, she shows faster, more accurate maze learning, compared with a female rat who has not been given such an injection.

Some important lessons have been learnt from studies of clinical conditions. Male babies born with IHH (idiopathic hypogonadotrophic hypogonadism) have very small testes (and therefore low levels of testosterone) and they are worse at spatial aspects of systemising, relative to normal males. Other male babies born with androgen insensitivity (AI) syndrome (testosterone is an androgen) are also worse at systemising. Compare these with female babies born with CAH (congenital adrenal hyperplasia), who have high levels of androgens and who have enhanced spatial systemising.

But even if you leave aside these clin ical conditions, there is evidence for the effects of hormones on the mind in the typical child: our own study found that toddlers who had lower foetal testosterone had higher levels of eye contact. Presumably eye contact may have something to do with sociability and empathising. And a group of Canadian researchers found that the higher your prenatal testosterone the better you do on the mental rotation (systemising) test.

Should a theory like this be a cause of concern? Some people may worry that this is suggesting one sex is better than the other, but a moment's reflection should allay this fear. The theory is saying that, on average, males and females differ in what they are drawn to and what they find easy, but that both sexes have their strengths and their weaknesses. Neither sex is superior overall.

Others may worry that a theory like this stereotypes the sexes. But we need to distinguish stereotyping from the study of sex differences. The study simply looks at males and females as two groups, and asks why on average, differences are seen. There is no harm in that, and even some important scientific advances that can come out of it. Stereotyping, on the other hand, is when a characteristic of a group is assumed to apply to an individual, and this is potentially discriminating and harmful. The E-S theory does not stereotype. Rather, it seeks to explain why individuals are typical or atypical for their sex.

What are the potential new insights from a theory like this? It may help us understand the childhood neurological conditions of autism and Asperger syndrome, which appear to be an extreme of the male brain. Such individuals may have impairments in empathising alongside normal or even talented systemising. The theory also predicts the existence of the mirror-image of autism or Asperger syndrome, namely, the extreme female brain. Science has not even begun to investigate what such people are like, but we know they must have impairments in systemising, alongside normal or even talented empathising. Finally, the theory delineates two key dimensions of individual differences - empathising and systemising - that exist among any group of children, so that parents and educators can become more tolerant of difference.

seribulan

brain break...

mysara

kenapa semua bangsa lebih mengharapkan lelaki sebagai pewaris? :hmm:

lealaurielle

Some say that it's a man's world; what do YOU think?

As the topic starter, I think its only fair that I give out my humble opinion to this matter.

Personally I think that it's a combination of both, even though I'm sure most women would wanna say, it's a woman's world once in a while. But actually, the women of today, are making big statements for themselves; they are more confident, determined to go out, and, make it a woman's world as well as a man's world. I believe that women these days are very much capable of doing the things men do best, and prove to the world, that a woman has the courage and the ability to stand up for she believes in; and I think, that alone, should be enough to show the fact that women are pretty much determined to be part of the men's dominating world too...

DISCLAIMER: I by far had no intentions what so ever to side either the men or the women - its basically a general question in which I would like everyone to take a minute and think about it. That's technically - nothing more, nothing less! :D

seribulan

from The Sun...

UNICEF: Male bias still widespread

PARIS: Gender equality is "pivotal to human progress", yet male bias remains widespread to the detriment of many countries, Unicef said on sunday in a new report on the state of the world's children.

Empowering women creates a positive impact on children, both in their development and their expectations, and some advances have been made, the UN children's agency said.

But inequities remain, it added, pointing to the many hours of unpaid work women put into their households, which limits them from taking up remunerated employment.

And when they do have jobs, they often earn less than men.

"Available evidence shows that, across regions, women's nomeinal wages are roughly 20% lower than men's," the report said.

Women are increasingly represented in parliaments around the world, but at a level stil far below parity. In South Asia, the use of quotas has increased the participation of women in local politics, however.

"Overall, of the 20 countries in the world with the most women in parliament, 18 are using some form of quota.system," Unicef noted.

The report provided breakdowns for the major regions in the world, covering data on survival, health, education, economic indicators, HIV/AIDS, child protection and on women. - AFP

lealaurielle

So technically speaking, men are still dominating la ek?

seribulan

Utusan...

Imam wanita dilantik di China

WUZHONG 17 Dis - Sebuah wilayah Islam di barat China, Ningxia meneruskan tradisi turun-temurun utk melantik imam wanita bg mengetuai wanita Islam lain dlm solat n amalan keagamaan yg lain....
Shouying slh seorg wanita Islam China yg memelihara tradisi sejak berabad-abad lalu memberikan peranan utama kpd kaum wanita...
Beliau merupakan seorg imam @ ahong wanita, gelaran yg terbit drp perkataan Parsi 'akhund' bermaksud 'org berilmu'...
"Imam wanita plg sesuai utk melakukan tugas melatih n mendidik kaum wanita bagaimana menjadi Muslimah yg baik...kerana lebih memahami keadaan wanita berbanding lelaki" kata shouying...
Agama diharamkan semasa Revolusi Budaya dibawa oleh Mao Zedong ttp bangkit semula pada 1980an meningkatkan bilangan penganut agama Islam, Buddha, Tao dan Kristian.
Kempen kerjaaan komunis menggalakkan sama rata antara lelaki n wanita membantu meluaskan peranan wanita Islam...Imam wanita China bgm tidak setaraf imam lelaki n tidak menjadi imam solat lima waktu.

lealaurielle

Bukan kes Imam wanita nih dah jadik issue ke dulu satu masa hari tu?