‘The Alpha Effect’

From an outsiders perspective, a girl who goes to a small massage therapy school, I see both sides. I believe that if women truly demand more respect from the male population, most of the time, she would get it. Sometimes, the guy would just snuff her off so to speak and move on to someone else. Others would gravel at her feet. It really depends on the guy and what he believes/how he was raised.

As a female freshman at Dartmouth, this article is particularly interesting, especially in light of the recent gender conflicts on campus. I dispute the idea that "the girls could have a civilizing effect on the boys," especially after the outright warfare women on this campus occasionally engage in against the men. People here seem more interested in sparking conflict needlessly and creating irritating campus-wide drama.

And I forgot to mention- the hook-up culture you assuage is due in large part to the predominate social paradigm of the feminist movement. The gender feminist deconstruction of the family in particular. It would be refreshing to see people like Carol Gilligan begin to acknowledge the negative impacts and results of the core of her life work. Then again that would require humility and intellectual honesty- i.e. softer and kinder and working towards cosensus. The ultimate flaw you summed up in this sentence," they wanted the boys to become more like girls". How patently offensive and disrespectful.
-still a concerned mom of two boys

More misandry from the ivory tower. What I find offensive is that you place the blame on men. If girls were underperforming in your class you would be motivated to aid and assist them and attribute the problem to the system. But if boys are underachieving you blame them????? I am in agreement with the other posters here- this anti-male society is begetting exactly what is deserves until it acknowledges the factors that have left so many young men adrift. And yes, that is going to include challenging the gender feminist hegemony on the college campus!!!
- a concerned mother of two boys

Were girls ever really "softer and kinder"? Or are they just less inclined to physical aggression? Were they ever "more civilized"? Even when they couldn't go to college, there were millions of women scheming to make their kids and husbands come out on top. In short, the very premises of this article are highly questionable. Women have ALWAYS been "uncivilized ruffians", they just in the past expressed this in different ways from the men.

Girl's have been given permission to be smart and powerful with slogan's like "Girl Power". Our society encourages girls in a way that we no longer encourage boys. Boys are just as smart as girls. If boys aren't doing as well as girl's are it;s because our education system isn't helping them achieve "Boy Power".

Maybe one problem is we don't want to help the boys; we are not interested in making colleges 50/50, instead we applaud girls for being the majority. It's very hypocritical, since in the 1970's the boy majority was seen as a problem. We need to find out how to teach and motivate boys in high school better so they will be just as prepared for college. Instead we just assume they must be stupider or don't care as much. Boys learn diffferently and high schools do notaddress it.

Why is it great for girls that they are the majority in colleges? In the 1970's feminism say the boy majority as a problem, how hypocritical things have become! Boys learn differently (they are not simply stupider) and high schools need to address this. Boys need structured freedom; high schools and college requirements leave no room for this. It is all structure, no freedom.

Maybe one problem is we don't want to help the boys; we are not interested in making colleges 50/50, instead we applaud girls for being the majority. It's very hypocritical, since in the 1970's the boy majority was seen as a problem. We need to find out how to teach and motivate boys in high school better so they will be just as prepared for college. Instead we just assume they must be stupider or don't care as much. Boys learn diffferently and high schools do notaddress it.

As a student development professional, I have often seen a study cited which compared the affects of high achievers and roommates. (In the hopes of raising the grades of at-risk students they were placed in rooms with students with extremely high grades. At the end of the student, the students with low grades did not see an improve in their GPA, but all the students who were considered high-achievers saw their grades drop.)