Today we’re talking about the differences between men and women, focusing primarily on women, by virtue of two great books of philosophy: Human, All Too Human and Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche.
Trigger warning: Nietzsche has been charged with being a complete misogynist.
I took a risk with offending my prime audience with this one (three quarters of my listener and readership is young women), but I surmised from personal correspondence with many of you that everyone is intelligent, thinks with nuance, and is open-minded. Plus, I try to address all sides.
We’re talking about:
- Are there no good men anymore?
- The best time to start a family
- Are women better than men?
- The war on traditional values
- The good things about being a man
- Mansplaining and catcalling
- The good things about being a woman
- Ballsy talk about identity politics
- How men think vs how women think
- Is everything motivated by sex?
- A man’s prime vs a woman’s prime
- “Toxic masculinity”, anger, and jealousy
- What I think about Tomi Lahren’s rant about men
- Equality of opportunity vs equality of outcome
- And much much more.
If you enjoy relatively controversial discussion on male-female relationship dynamics and would like more, please let me know.
We can certainly keep deep-diving into this sort of thing. I’m thinking we look at Jane Austen to balance out the hyper-masculine Nietzsche. Emily Brontë would also be a fine choice.
Update on the book poll: The votes are in, and I’d like to thank you very much for helping me choose the next podcast. There were a lot of votes! The overwhelming winner was Animal Farm by George Orwell (~80% of the votes). The short stories of Borges were a runner up, as was King Lear. And thank you to everyone who emailed me with their great book recommendations. I’ve got a lot of exciting new reading cut out for me.
The Differences Between Men and Women (Nietzsche Podcast)