Women's Liberation and War

I was wondering the other day about women and war. It seems natural for men - especially young men - to want to fight. For many centuries men went to war on a regular basis and more recently we had national service. I wonder whether this spell of competition and warring met a male need, which is now played out in gang warfare, general fighting and bullying. Perhaps in the past women felt that they needed men to protect them.

In my lifetime national service was stopped and there have been no world wars. Over the same period women have (arguably) nearly accomplished their liberation (of course it will never be complete). Is this because we don't need men to fight for us anymore? As the physically weaker sex (on average) - this seems to make sense to me. How would things change if our men were sent to war? Would women have to be conscripted like the men, now that there is legalised sexual equality?

One of my first jobs was at Sainsbury's as a shelf stacker and till operator and if I remember correctly I was paid about £1 a day less than a boy of the same age (15 or 16). I didn't think this was particularly wrong since I could see that Sainsbury's were getting more brawn for their money! However, if the job had been based purely on intellect I might have been a bit miffed!

My feelings on sexual equality are summed up in that well known expression "vive la difference" - I want men to be different from women and I enjoy the differences, mostly. However, I absolutely believe that women are intellectually equal to men.

I have rarely been subjected to sex discrimination in the workplace and I think this is because I was mostly brought up by my father with some input from my brother and my mother, to a lesser extent, as she was an invalid (but who wasn't frightened of saying what she thought - as a typical Sagitarrian!). So, not being a very girly girl, I tended to be treated like the men. I think it is a bit like the victim theory - if you walk with your head held high down a backstreet of London at night you are much less likely to be mugged than if you seem weak and vulnerable.