I was listening to an audio interview of Harvey Mansfield, author of Manliness, in which he argues that our society is becoming feminized and there should be a return to manliness in men. The radio show interviewing him had on some other guests which disagreed, saying that manliness was hurtful, that it was sexist to say what he was saying, that women were equal and just as courageous, etc. Now, I could easily post on this subject of manliness, but the point of my post today is that it occurred to me that the arguments really dealt with zero-sum competition. Those who were opposed to Dr. Mansfield, were attempting to argue that by saying men should become more manly, this somehow took away from women. They are treating it like a zero-sum game where giving to one party automatically means taking from another. Any lower level economics course will teach you that we do not live in a zero-sum economy. One nation gaining riches does not mean another nation must be poorer. Apparently a lot of people still don't understand that. Attributing qualities to men and allowing them more responsibility in some situations does not, in any way, take away from the importance of women. This is not a zero-sum competition. Building up women does not mean degrading men. We can build up one sex or gender and not be hurting the other. We see these zero-sum arguments in many areas. This is an argument many have used against the LDS church. We believe that God, the Father and God, the Son are two separate physical persons. We also believe in eternal progression of man. Many believe that these two beliefs of ours somehow take power away from God the Father. Somehow, they think, it makes Him less of a God when He shares His power with His children or builds up His children to become more like Him. They think that God operates in a zero-sum world of power and authority. But like Paul said, "Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God..." (Phil 2:5-6). Why do we have so much trouble understanding the concept of non-zero-sum? What is about our society that teaches zero-sum so that it is almost ingrained in us? It seems like most of these beliefs surround power. Giving men power takes away from women. Giving man power takes away from God. Maybe we just don't understand power because so many examples use power in the wrong way, exercising unrighteous dominion, which treats power as zero-sum. If we can learn to live non-zero-sum with power, perhaps we will begin to see the changes in many other areas of our lives. Any comments are appreciated.

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