If I may be allowed to reply to E-male's 'Don't pigeon-hole women' (Nov 3) and clarify, like most "chauvinistic" men who also have mothers, sisters, lovers, wives and daughters, let me assure the writer that it is the last of our intentions to keep women in their "unequal" place. The objective is to keep the discourse on gender conflict balanced and in perspective.

I have made clear in my earlier letter that for equality to prevail, it is not necessary or realistic for equality to be evinced in all areas of human endeavour. It suffices if it applies in some areas of life whilst in spaces remaining, it depends on the relative strengths or weaknesses of the respective genders, and their circumstances to determine who shall play the dominant role.

This is the wider view of equality necessitated by the sexes having "different biological, emotional and psychological make-up and different socialisation experiences". How can equality of sexes be referenced by sameness without account or acknowledgment of their differences?

The writer repudiated the existence of any material differences between sexes, which might be used by "chauvinists" to justify inequality measured against his benchmark of "sameness" of human endeavour.

He asked, "Where is this list of things either sex can do better than the other? Apart from some biological functions such as giving birth (and with reproductive technology this will change too), in a modern world there are fewer and fewer tasks that separate men from women be it in the business world, technical fields or even in the military."

Unwittingly, the examples provided by writer supported rather than contradicted the thrust of my contentions.

In the first place, I have already stated in my earlier letter than in endeavours requiring intellectual skills, which include business, technical and military fields, there is no question that the sexes are equal in capabilities and deserving of equal opportunities as referenced by the writer's "sameness" test.

The most material difference to account and explain why women cannot, as measured against the writer's sameness criterion, be equal as men, in other areas was already pointed out by the writer himself - the biological and reproductive function - though he didn't attribute it the importance it deserved.

From this basic biological difference, all other unequal consequences flow, and cannot be 'equalised' as they stem from an unrectifiable biological fact. The illustrations I gave in my earlier letter of how women could not be equal with men in various contexts have their root in this difference of biological function.

1) First, the age-old protest against "double standards" - why can't women be allowed, as men do, to be less discerning and profligate in sexual affairs and have multiple choice of sexual partners, without being viewed scarlet and promiscuous?

The answers are: because whatever the methods of contraceptives, there is still the risk, no matter how slight, that a woman may get pregnant and carries that responsibility visible for all to see, of which burden men do not carry, and could afford to display, sometimes to their undoing, a relatively lackadaisical attitude to matters concerning sex!

If women are married, their infidelity is taboo because of the husbands' apprehension of being made cuckold to invest paternal energies on an offspring of doubtful paternity.

Because of this reproductive function of carrying the baby to term for nine months, and the emotional responsibilities of nurturing, as mommy, the infant for many years thereafter, sex to women is more procreation than recreation, and qualitative rather than quantitative aspects of the relationship are the more important, in contrast with how sex is to men.

2) Is the pressure to marry exerted on single women of 35 years of age the same as that exerted on single men of same age? Where men could be fertile and sire children at the age of 60, can women do likewise?

Answers: No, because a woman, after 35 faces greater prospect of having babies with Down Syndrome and can hear the louder ticking of the biological clock before its stops at menopause (whilst men can blissfully still produce the requisite "seed" at the age of 60) explains the pressure to marry being exerted more on women to which she has to use her wiles, to realise her biological destiny within a socially and legally acceptable framework, if need be, before it's too late.

3) Can women afford to neglect their figure and looks as men can? Can single women at the age of 40 or more find long-term partners, mates and husbands as easily as men of similar age or more? Where men could sire children and maintain more than one family with different women (a wife and one or two mistresses) can women conversely do likewise?

Answers: No, and there is no equality here because being the gender that carries the baby in her body, a woman's reproductive function is valued and so is her youth (mysteriously associated with reproductive fertility or vitality and defined by physical attributes) that explains why so many older men seek young women or re-marry younger women in abandonment of the older wives or companions. From the other side's angle, older men may have financial resources, and maturity to develop these, that younger women are surely not adverse against considering that they enhance their standard of living and provide for childcare.

The writer is obviously a male not because of his pseudonym "E-Male" but his lack of grasp on what it takes to be born and feel like a woman and her burden of carrying the reproductive function with its attendant implications that would not allow equality to be carried forward in the aspects affected, and above discussed.

In blindly supporting women to do exactly as men do under the banner of equality a la the West without factoring in this biological difference and its consequences, is, no matter how politically correct a statement, hardly doing women in general any favour but merely confusing them and creating more conflicts to add to their problems - not to mention societal problems of rising divorce rates, broken families, delinquent children that, in western experience and experience of developed nations, bear proportionally to the degree to which women exercise their independence unthinkingly to equalise with men without regard to the biological reproductive differences and the unequalness that must inevitably emanate from these differences.

As the motionless spider, the female of the species needs only to find the Ying-Yang equilibrium of how to equalise the power relations with the fly in a way that leads to fewer conflicts, more harmony, and attainment of her vital interests. So let it be.