>There is _no symmetry_ between women and men. That men do not have access
>to women's knowledge most emphatically does not mean that its
>opposite--women do not have access to men's understanding of themselves--is
>true. (This is a Hegelian insight of the master-slave relationship.)
I can imagine that, assuming we all live under patriarchy (and assuming a couple of old-fashioned essentialisms), it is sensible to assume men might not know women - 'womanness' would not be currency in the mainstream, and projections of 'manness' would be everywhere.
I think that it does not follow that women under patriarchy would have much of a clue about 'womanness' either. I also think it enormously arrogant, indeed dangerously so, to assume all of 'manness' circulates in the mainstream. Patriarchy doesn't equal men's being per se, rather it is a hegemony of projected ideals, often redolent of other times/classes/struggles etc.
I know you don't know me, you see. That's probably all I know about you, but there it is.
And we're not just born into cultures (read patriarchy) or ideologies (read patriarchy) either. We're born into bodies, too. And here there just might be a dimension of incommensurability. I dunno. Nobody seems to be talking about it these days, anyway. Too dangerous, perhaps ...
All the best, Rob.