Sexism...is bad.

I'm a lifelong liberal. I believe in total equality between genders. Under no conceivable circumstances should women be deprived of any rights or freedoms beyond anyone else, and the world should strive to eliminate any notions to the contrary. But the fact of the matter is that we're the product of hundreds of thousands of years of evolution that, throughout most of it, favored a society where men were in charge and women were not. In no way does this mean that society should continue this way, but it's the reason why it remains a constant topic. It's so ingrained in our psyches that it'll take generations to progress past it. One day, once the hunter-gatherer instincts have been fully weeded out of the human mentality, we will no longer have genetics that compel some men to desire to subjugate women. But we're simply not there yet. We've not filled out that progress bar.

Anyone who thinks that women are worth as much as men has a duty to move that progress bar in the right direction. They have a duty to treat women well, to acknowledge that their historically subservient role is a relic of the past, and that there can be no room for a difference in rights or privileges between the genders. Anyone who does not think so should be called out as a prehistoric moron who lacks the mental acumen to adapt to modern life. But whether you're one or the other, you also have to accept that we're living in the one thousandth of a percentile of human history where that has been the case. I would love it if women were not subjected to all this bullshit, because they truly don't deserve it. It's very much time that we make that a thing of the past. But it's also just... the way of the world, to put it bluntly.

Because for hundreds of thousands of years, it was. You see it everywhere in the animal kingdom. In some species, the female is the dominant sex. In others, it's the male. We happen to belong to the latter. You should absolutely acknowledge that humanity has moved far beyond the grasp of the traditional course of nature, but in doing so, you must also acknowledge that we're amending literally hundreds of thousands of years of evolution. There was once a time when tribes were more likely to survive if the men were in charge while the women bore the children, and since those were the ones whose genes were passed along, that instinct is prominent in the human psyche. It's no longer relevant to our modern world, but it has not yet been processed to the point of expulsion. One day it will, and we've made incredible leaps and strides in just the last fifty years.

I don't want to get into the whole notion of "feminism." That word has been infused with a bad taste by those who have not understood any of the above. Overreactions exist on both sides, and given the course of history, of course there's going to be women who fight so fervently for their case that it can be a bit much. But that's how progress is made. The very same thing can be applied to anything from the Lutheran reformers to the civil rights movement. We have, right now, and for the last fifty years, had the very same thing in modern western society as regards the rights of women, and things are very much moving in the right direction. They're moving in the right direction when women are free to voice their concerns and grievances (as were Lutherans, and African Americans) and expect them to be heard. This is how change is made. Keep it up, but accept that it takes time. We're working against evolution.

I'm not sure that the ArmageddonMUD forums are a particularly useful platform for it, but it really doesn't hurt me if it's a place where some wish to take up the debate. I don't visit the GDB often enough to keep up with what goes on there, and given the history of some members of the game's community (Shalooonsh, am I right?), it may even be useful there. But I have my doubts that it's an issue that pertains specifically to ArmageddonMUD. It's more an issue with humanity, and while the following sentence is not meant in any way to discourage further discussion or progress, it is one of many things - alongside topics like sexuality and religious freedom - that, despite the advent of a global internet making contrarian voices more audible, continue to get better and better. That's not to say that women's rights are not worth discussing, or that anyone speaking up about it is in any way deserving of reproach, but we're seeing discussions such as these precisely because things are getting better. There was a time when it would never have been heard.

As far as Arm goes, well, Shalooonsh is still on staff, isn't he? Pick a different platform. If they kept him, they don't care. You wouldn't have had much luck fighting for civil rights in 1960s rural Alabama. Would've loved it if that was not the case, but it is, and everything must be tempered against reality. Same goes for women's rights.