Chapter 8 Summary and Analysis

The limitations imposed on us due to our sexes are another one of Viorst's "necessary losses." Parents have different responses to boys and girls. Freud felt women see themselves as defective boys and as such, tend toward low self-esteem and character defects, while modern science says that mammals start out female. Although there are many unanswered questions about the innate differences between the sexes, four have been established. "That girls have greater verbal ability. That boys have greater math ability. That boys excel in visual-spatial ability. And that verbally and physically, boys are more aggressive." Of these, only male aggression and visual spatial ability have any basis in scientific fact, and some even question that.

Viorst goes into great detail about the Cinderella Complex, coined by Collette Dowling, which says that women are programmed for dependency and boys are trained for...