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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
Analysing 2500-year-old teeth has thrown open a window onto life and gender inequality during Bronze Age China.
The University of Otago-led research has cast light on breastfeeding, weaning, evolving diets and the difference between what girls and boys were eating, lead researcher Dr. Melanie Miller, a postdoctoral fellow in the University of Otago's Department of Anatomy, says.
The teeth come from the Central Plains of China and date from the Eastern Zhou Dynasty, between 771 and 221 BC. Despite their extreme antiquity (they are as old as Athens' Parthenon and the Old Testament sacking of Jerusalem's First Temple) the teeth's dentin—the bony tissue forming the bulk of our teeth's structure—was full of information.
Using stable isotope analysis, researchers were able to show the types and amounts of various elements in the dentin, including carbon and nitrogen, unlocking information about the individuals' life and diet. That enabled a picture to be drawn of a changing society, Dr. Miller says.
[...] The analysis of 23 individuals from two different archaeological sites shows children were breastfed until they were between 2.5 and four years old, with weaning onto solids—consisting mostly of wheat and soybean—occurring slightly earlier in females than in males.
"For the two communities we studied, food was an integral aspect of identity, and it was a medium of differentiation between females and males. We found dietary differences between the sexes began in early childhood and continued over the lifetime.
[...] Males continued to eat more of the traditional crop, millet, while females consumed more of the "new" foods such as wheat and soy, Dr. Miller says. That wheat and soy foods were important components of childhood diets suggests they were incorporated into local culinary practices as weaning foods.
The Eastern Zhou Dynasty is a very important period of Chinese history and Chinese cultural change; it is the time of Confucius and other notable intellectuals, Dr. Miller says.
More information: Melanie J. Miller et al. Raising girls and boys in early China: Stable isotope data reveal sex differences in weaning and childhood diets during the eastern Zhou era, American Journal of Physical Anthropology (2020). DOI: 10.1002/ajpa.24033
Journal information: American Journal of Physical Anthropology
(Score: 2) by Bot on Friday March 20 2020, @12:13AM (6 children)
Maybe they had read (using TCP over time machine, which has been developed sometimes in the future) studies like Endocrine disruption by dietary phyto-oestrogens: impact on dimorphic sexual systems and behaviours [google.com], so they ruled out soy for males.
Which means gender inequality, in this particular case, is instead "being actually observant". Sorry if this disrupt the down with patriarchy narrative but you have plenty of examples of actual discrimination to decry. This is probably not one. Better luck next time, Winston.
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(Score: 4, Interesting) by dwilson on Friday March 20 2020, @02:40AM (5 children)
I'll admit to skipping the story and only reading the summery, and agree the title summoned up all kinds of "oh jesus, what kind of bullshit are they looking to prove now" feelings in me, but the quoted summery doesn't really support the whole "down with patriarchy" narrative you're bitching about. Females continued to consume more of the good stuff, ergo males were discriminated against. Dating puts it at least 2200 years ago so I don't really give a fuck regardless.
- D
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Bot on Friday March 20 2020, @12:12PM (4 children)
Don't submit to newspeak, for that is a slippery slope. If I say "gender inequality" I imply gender is a thing and equality is to be desired. Sex based differentiation is instead correct (unless you have data about the culture in bronze age families, which I doubt).
If you can't say heil hitler and wear a svastika without being implied a threat to society you can't get away with this choice of terms. (reductio ad hitlerum: completed)
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(Score: 1, Troll) by crafoo on Friday March 20 2020, @01:43PM (1 child)
The whole idea of egalitarianism is bullshit. The modern push for it by the post-modernist crew is one of the greatest tragedies of our time.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Friday March 20 2020, @02:04PM
Egalitarianism should be the last resort when you cannot achieve justice.
Instead we have e.g. social justice, whose inherent coarseness makes it already an oxymoron.
For example, if all shipping of African slaves to the US were perchance made by jewish people, should jews be considered accomplices or even initiators of the practice? If social justice were at least consistently unjust the answer would be "yay".
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(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Friday March 20 2020, @04:49PM (1 child)
Dude, this story is ABOUT cultural data from the bronze age.
But you probably missed reading the summary in the rush to post about your persecution complex.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Friday March 20 2020, @05:50PM
I think you didn't get what I intended to be the context of the phrase, if you are able to discern how many genders existed according to those people, then you have enough data. Else nope.
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