If women ruled the world ...

A little girl asked her father: "How did the human race appear?" The father answered "God made Adam and Eve; they had children; and so was all mankind made" Two days later, the girl asked her mother the same question; and the mother answered: "Many years ago there were monkeys from which the human race evolved". The confused girl returned to her father and said: "Dad, how is it possible that you told me the human race was created by God, and mom said they developed from monkeys?" The father answered:"My dear, it is simple. I told you about my side of the family, and your mother told you about hers."

Well, folks, having resolved the question of how men and women appeared on earth; let us move on to the matter of the subject.

I know how the world would be, if I ruled the world. But, since I am not going to be able to do it during this visit of mine to planet earth; I do feel that the world would be a better place to live in, if women ruled the world.

I say this despite my experience of living in this serendipitous land under two women heads of government. One, of course, was the first of her kind in the entire world - a woman prime minister - Sirimavo Bandaranaiake. The other was none other than her daughter Chandrika Kumaratunga under whom, for the first time since independence, this country had a year of negative growth. Both periods in the history of this country would be best left unspoken and forgotten for various reasons other than politics.

It's easy to argue that men haven't done such a great job.

The last century was the bloodiest in human history, and so far, this one has been a tale of war, terrorism, religious extremism, abject poverty, and disease.

Answers

I'm not saying it's all men's fault. But let's just say, they've been in charge, and it doesn't seem we're much closer to finding answers to these profound and vexing problems. On the other hand, according to former White House press secretary Dee Dee Myers, it seems that she too thinks that if women ruled the world, everything would change. Politics would be more collegial. Businesses would be more productive. And communities would be healthier.

Empowering women would make the world a better place. Blending memoir, social history and a call to action, Myers challenges us to imagine a not-too-distant future in which increasing numbers of women reach the top ranks of politics, business, science and academia. Here's an excerpt from "Why Women Should Rule the World":

"For virtually all of history, woman has played a supporting role to man's, well, leading man.

A comprehensive review of encyclopaedia entries published in the early 1900s included only 850 women, though it covered a span of nearly 2,000 years. And the Queens, politicians, mothers, wives, mistresses, beauties, religious figures, and women of "tragic fate" were notable mostly for their relationships with men.

I'm not a sociologist. I'm not a psychologist, or a biologist, or a political theoretician.

But as I began this book, I wanted to try to paint a picture, in laymen's - or should I say lay women's? - terms, of what changes when there are more women in positions of power and authority across public life. And I hoped - and let's be honest, expected - the results would make it obvious that the influence of women has been an overwhelmingly positive thing. Not because women are the same as men, but because of the many ways they are different."

God, if at all made anything, has made woman beautiful and foolish: Beautiful, so that man might love her; and foolish, that she might love him.

And, notwithstanding the fact that women are meant to be loved and not to be understood; that frailty be thy name; I tend to: be to her virtues very kind; and, be to her faults a little blind. Hence, I am a firm believer that the world would be a better place to live under the rule of women because there would be more love, compassion, and understanding.

Knowledge

I say this in spite of the fact that some women could be more vexatious than men; and also with the knowledge that if "Heaven hath no rage like love to hatred turned, Hell has no fury, like a woman scorned."

However, whether men like it or not, the evidence is overwhelming that the possibility of this occurrence is not far off. Research has predicted that by 2020 women will be outperforming men academically, socially, technologically and even biologically. Professor Steve Jones, a geneticist at University College London claims: "I'm fairly confident that in the west, the 21st century will be the century of women." By 2020 girls will be outperforming boys at every step of the educational ladder. There are three women graduating university for every two men. Under-qualified, men will be struggling to make it in the feminised workplace where traditional hierarchies, rigid working structures and hours are a thing of the past.

As traditional male dominated industries disappear, women will be better equipped to succeed in the work place of the future. Innovations in medical science have also overcome the last obstacle to women reaching the top of their professions; childbirth. Thus, "one could have a scenario where men are surplus to requirements" says Dr Susan Greenfield, a leading brain researcher.

But what would a world run by women really be like? Would our world be a better, more peaceful place if it was run by women? I suppose it would be.

Feminine qualities

It will also be less corrupt; even though women are known to be equally dishonest, fraudulent, unethical, unprincipled, and unscrupulous as their male counterpart when in power.

However, it is her inborn feminine qualities that will ultimately tilt the scales in her favour to make the world a better place than what men have made of it thus far. Her genetic traits of: gentleness, sensitivity, compassion, sympathy, tenderness, understanding, intuitiveness, communicativeness, and cooperativeness - all add weight in support of her.

What is more, a woman is more responsive, receptive, and warm, yet conservative by nature.

Hence, it is likely that under a woman, the world would see more cooperation instead of posturing; more progress rather than gridlock; more conversation as an alternative to talk; more equality and less poverty. The world could really be a more humane place to live in. I end with a quote:

"It is the long condemnation by man of feminine qualities that has gone deep into the blood and bones of women.

It is a man's conspiracy to prove him superior to women - which he is not. And to prove that the woman is weak, he has to condemn all the feminine qualities. He has to say that they are all weak, and all those qualities together make the woman weak. In fact, the woman has all the great qualities in her. And whenever a man becomes awakened, he attains to the same qualities which he has been condemning in women.

Dominated

The qualities that are thought to be weak are all the feminine qualities. And it is a strange fact that all the great qualities come into that category.

What is left is only the brutal qualities, animal qualities. Love, trust, beauty, sincerity, truthfulness, authenticity - these are all feminine qualities, and they are far greater than any qualities that man has.

But the whole past has been dominated by man and his qualities". ~ Osho, excerpted from Sermons in Stones

See you this day next week. Until then, keep thinking, keep laughing. Life is mostly about these two actions.

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