After considering female infanticide in China, I ask that we think about the United States' male-only military draft which suggests the relative disposability of our own adult men. As we discuss the genital mutilation of girls in the Middle East, let's remember the infant boys who are routinely, brutally circumcised without anesthetic in America.
Goodman quotes UN Ambassador Madeleine Albright in referring to the importance of "dealing with a woman as an actor in her own life...having the education she wants and marrying whom she wants and planning her family and her work." Who among us is so out of touch with reality as to think that the typical man gets the education he wants and the wife he truly desires? In this scientifically advanced age do we yet have a birth control pill for men so that they can plan their families? How many of the world's 50 year-old male day laborers and store clerks do we think "planned" their occupations?
The bottom 95 percent of the world's men are not powerful actors in their own lives. Their days are filled with the challenge of putting food on their tables and keeping roofs over their heads. They're concerned with satisfying basic needs and have little time to dream of catering to anyone's wants and desires. If they don't hear Ellen Goodman's cries to share what they have, perhaps it's because her demands have been drowned out by those of their wives, children, employers and governments.
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