Response To An Essay On Gossip

[insertwackynamehere]

[Quast]

Gossip is certainly not limited to females as you say. A good 2/3 of all conversation is devoted to it.

[Scientist]

Gossip may not be a typical female thing in the sense that it is only practiced by females; males also do it.
However, I strongly think Deborah Jones has a point when she calls it “intimate language” for women.

In my personal experience I've noticed that men and women both do gossiping but the way they do it is different.

It's kinda hard to explain but I'll try.
When i'm with only male friends there's very few gossiping going on if any. And if there's gossip it's mostly meant in a humorous (non-serious) way. Also the victim is always a person we all hate.

When you find yourself in a group of nearly only women the conversation may go a bit slow untill the gossip starts. Suddenly they're ears and eager to join the conversation.
It really doesn't matter who the victim is. It's a free for all to bash and kick; after all the victim isn't here so he/she won't notice. Gossip isn't considered harmful

Females can gossip about their friends and partners without any problem whereas I as a male would find this unacceptable; it would feel as if I'm betraying them or something.

Maybe there's a better way to explain this:
My mother tells perfect strangers the most detailed stories about what me and my brothers that happened when we were younger.

If I were to catch a cold she'd call my entire family to spread this fascinating news. But I doubt my father would even pick up the phone if I had cancer.
Well, I'm not saying my father doesn't love me or anything it's just he wouldn't be has eager to "spread the news."
Jeezs, this is hard to explain and I hope it make any sense.

I agree with Jones gossip is some "intimate language for women" but I agree to have no explanation for it.

Gossip is not limited to females but they do seem to use it differently than men.
It would be interesting to see how females would react to the topic, but hey, this is Doomworld.

[geekmarine]

Firstly, I will, on this one rare occasion, concede a difference between men and women. Both men and women gossip; however, there's something different about the way women do it. It's actually been argued that men and women are equally aggressive, but that they channel that aggression differently. Whereas men tend to use physical violence, women tend use gossip and cliques to make others feel outcast. Interestingly enough, the emotional effects of this can be as devastating, or even more so, than physical aggression. So much for sticks and stones. Also, it's an interesting double standard. A kid gets in a fight with another kid at school, he gets suspended. A girl is made an outcast by the rest of the girls in the class through gossip and the like, nothing happens.

Now that that's out of the way, it is a popular misconception that men do not gossip. There have been studies done suggesting that men do, in fact, gossip just as much as women, though they are simply less willing to admit it, being that it's not a "guy" thing to do. Very similar to other studies in which they've shown that women think about sex just as much as men, but are less willing to admit that (or something to that effect - can't remember the specifics). In both cases, it's just that each sex sees the particular subject matter to be "inappropriate" to talk about. Just goes to show some of the interesting barriers put up by society, but really, deep down, we really are alot alike.

Finally, like I said, there are some differences between men and women, but once you begin to realize how society regulates how we behave, it really makes you question how much of that difference is really innate and biological, and how much is just because that's how society expects us to behave. In the above example, the fact that girls don't generally get into fist fights as much as boys has more to do with the fact that it's not "proper" for girls to get into fights than girls being any less aggressive than boys. Therefore, they are forced to express it in a different way. I mean, as much as we like to claim to be free-thinking and independent, culture really does have a huge impact on how we live our lives, and heck, the belief that we have this freedom and independence may even be yet another form of control.

[baronofhell]

Yeah, I agree. I myself always HATED the in-crowd. People who act according to some unwritten rules. Fucking always was annoyed by people like that!!aaaahhh!!!(grabs hair with both hands, grits teeth and slams head into computer desk)