Why does prog attrack more males, not females?

I'm serious!
My son and I just got back from San Francisco having just seen Transatlantic.  The crowd was mainly middle aged men (like myself, I might add).  Please spare the SF jokes, I'm from Seattle.  Okay, please spare the Seattle jokes...   No seriously,  ever since I started going to prog concerts back in the old Genesis days, It seems that prog appeals to males more than females.  Don't flame me, just an observation.   I'm sure many of you have noticed this also.

I AM NOT SAYING THAT WOMEN DO NOT LIKE PROGRESSIVE ROCK!

Just an ongoing observation.

What is it about the music we listen to that does not appeal to women in general.  BTW, there were women in the audience, but very few and they seemed to be either spouses or girlfriends tagging along.

This is a question more puzzling to me than the origins of the universe.

Why, why, why?

I would love to hear females respond

BTW, if this is an old topic, sorry, I'm a newbie!

Everyone knows that women have terrible taste in music. Diana Krall? Avril Lavigne? Tori Amos? Lily Allen? The list goes on and on. Honestly, you could say the same thing about almost any genre of music that is considered good. I don't have data on thisother than my own experience, but I would bet that few women listen to Jazz or Classical music compared to men. On the other hand, I bet fewer women listen to Rap as well, so they score a point there.

Now to any women who are offended, don't be. We all have our strengths and weaknesses. Musical taste is just not one of your strengths.

stonebeard wrote: HTCF wrote: Because men are smart? I mean, I'm not sexist in the slightest bit  smartness has different qualifications, and that men do better than women in some of them (abstract concepts, spatial-relationships) and women better in others (language use, deciphering communication, especially nonverbal)

I disagree, I've seen absolutely zero evidence to show that women are better than men at language use.

Case in point:  every female teacher I've ever had (and most non-teaching women I've met) says "tempature," which isn't a word.  They also say things like i-urn (instead of iron).

Even the "Advanced Placement" English teachers I know have horrible grammar.

I hypothesize women are socialized to see music as a supplement to social events or statuses more than men. For some reason few women who are introverted go for prog when indie is right around the corner. My honest estimation is that they desire to be in social cliques more than men need to, and so they choose something like indie to express their independence or "uniqueness" while also wanting to be recognized for the uniqueness more than men do. That's as far as socialization goes in my mind now.

Or maybe guys just think in polyrhythms and odd times more than women. Whatever.


Edited by stonebeard - April 22 2010 at 22:41

HTCF wrote: stonebeard wrote: HTCF wrote: Because men are smart? I mean, I'm not sexist in the slightest bit  smartness has different qualifications, and that men do better than women in some of them (abstract concepts, spatial-relationships) and women better in others (language use, deciphering communication, especially nonverbal) I disagree, I've seen absolutely zero evidence to show that women are better than men at language use. Case in point:  every female teacher I've ever had (and most non-teaching women I've met) says "tempature," which isn't a word.  They also say things like i-urn (instead of iron). Even the "Advanced Placement" English teachers I know have horrible grammar.

Knowing where to place commas and spelling is not the same thing as interpersonal language usage. It's pretty irrelevant. Things like reading facial expressions, deciphering verbal and visual cues in other people, generally being focused on relationship dynamics and stuff life that all has to do with language. And prevailing opinion has always told us women are more in tune with this stuff than men, and it turns out generally it's right. Men become engineers while women become PR reps, caregivers, social workers and so on. It's a mistake to assume that because someone can crunch numbers that they're "smarter" than someone who can't, or maybe even smart at all.

stonebeard wrote: Knowing where to place commas and spelling is not the same thing as interpersonal language usage. It's pretty irrelevant. Things like reading facial expressions, deciphering verbal and visual cues in other people, generally being focused on relationship dynamics and stuff life that all has to do with language. And prevailing opinion has always told us women are more in tune with this stuff than men, and it turns out generally it's right. Men become engineers while women become PR reps, caregivers, social workers and so on. It's a mistake to assume that because someone can crunch numbers that they're "smarter" than someone who can't, or maybe even smart at all.

That all falls under "interpreting discussion" and NOT under "language use"

Just because someone can read your facial expressions doesn't mean they can effective convey a point, or even manage not to sound like a simpleton

I grew up with prog because my brother, who is ten years older than I am, listened to all that strange stuff in the 70s, and I was attracted to those strange noises coming out of his room, so I wound up being around when he and his friends gathered around by candlelight under billows of thick sweet smoke, with me, the little sister of my brother, being a kind of mascot. So sorry, I am an exception to the rule.

BaldFriede wrote: I grew up with prog because my brother, who is ten years older than I am, listened to all that strange stuff in the 70s, and I was attracted to those strange noises coming out of his room, so I wound up being around when he and his friends gathered around by candlelight under billows of thick sweet smoke, with me, the little sister of my brother, being a kind of mascot. So sorry, I am an exception to the rule.

HTCF wrote: stonebeard wrote: OK, I'll backpedal and say I don't know specifically if  "language use" is a more women-centric thing, but I'd wager my next paycheck that studies generally show women, given similar backgrounds and education as men, take greater care to spell better. But this doesn't even matter. Everyone f**ks up spelling from time to time and if no one ever does, chances are he's a horribly boring person. Grammar is beside the point in being smart, although it's a nice smoke screen for impressing people. Point is, we tend to think of smarts in terms of mathematical ability or the degree to which someone can spout of BS about literary analysis with a straight face. This isn't the whole picture. I don't know where all this discussion on spelling even came from, I was talking about pronunciation earlier.  With spellcheck-everything nobody needs to know how to spell anymore

I think he means that women understand things like the tone of your voice and non-verbal cues better than men, what you are actually saying is only a small part of what makes up a conversation.