Like Breathing Nitrogen

I honestly have no idea how my mind works, but on the way from the gym today, I was thinking about how the world really wants us to believe that men and women are the same.  We want women to do the same exact things as men and now, we want men to do the same things as women.  Some people embrace gender-neutral parenting, believing that a male and female infant aren't different from each other and that gender roles are assigned by society.  Where there are some things that anthropology shows us both genders are capable of, there are other things that are consistently performed by the same gender.  And there are other cultures who have short life-spans because of a reversal in those functions.

What I don't understand is that this is scientifically accepted.  Men and Women aren't THAT different, are they?  And yet the scientific community would quite emphatically agree that breathing in Nitrogen is significantly different from breathing in Oxygen.  Well why that example?  Nitrogen and Oxygen are ALMOST EXACTLY ALIKE.  They differ in ONE Proton.  But breathing in Nitrogen will kill you while Oxygen gives us life.  Well, men and women have different chromosomes.  Men are XY and women are XX.  They are different on a chromosomal level.  Those different chromosomes tell the brain what hormones to produce and those hormones effect the very development of the child's brain and body before they are even born.  For instance, estrogen encourages storage of fat while testosterone encourages the development of muscles.  A female child will be born with more fat than a male child will be.  It isn't just physiological though.  It's psychological as well.  Estrogen promotes the region of the brain associated with social interaction while Testosterone promotes the region of the brain associated with objects.  Baby boys are more tactile than girls and girls are more interested in their loved ones' faces than boys are.  And those innate tendencies have a dramatic effect on how little boys and girls play as they grow older. 

Where our society has come a long way in making our children more versatile as they grow, we have lost sight of the fact that male and female really are different.  Its in our wiring.  And instead of disowning our differences, we should be embracing them.  Our differences do not make one better than the other, it completes the us.  Male and Female together.  And that is good.