>>>>>Why IS it ok for men to tell women to 'Smile' all the time, yet rarely tell other men that? Is every man out there somehow the arbiter of women's attitudes?
>>>>
>>>>FWIW, we also need to stop telling our sons that "big boys don't cry." Same problem, actually.
>>>
>>>I think you're stuck in a bit of a time-warp. "Big boys" are crying all over the place.
>>>
>>>Athletes, soldiers, politicians, news anchors, Darth Vader...
>>>
>>>This society has been telling little boys that it's ok to cry for a couple decades and we're seeing the results. Grown men are publicly blubbering like babies.
>>>http://www.askmen.com/top_10/dating/top-10-shameless-male-crying-displays.html
>>
>>You still hear it. I was at the ballgame the other week. A guy behind us was there with his 3-year-old, who was behaving like a 3-year-old. Someone behind them leaned over and told him "big boys don't cry." Had it been a kid in my group, I would have immediately responded both to the kid and the adult. Since it wasn't, with difficulty, I bit my tongue.
>>
>
>I bet with extreme difficulty ;-)
>
>You are my favorite feminist with the possible exception of my daughters. And that isn't a fair comparison. They grew up in a time when equal rights went without saying. They truly don't get it that women before their time didn't have it the same way. In their world girls have the same rights, if not more.

Yep. I can astonish some of the young people I know by telling them that when I was growing up, the want ads listed jobs for women and jobs for men separately.

Tamar