>Secondly, the author doesn't make a convincing argument that the fact that the reason why men get all the risk and all the reward is because of something innate, instead of a self-perpetuating social system that actively encourages one gender to risk it all and reap the rewards, while holding back the other gender to mediocrity and risk-free existences. The possibility is raised for a few sentences, and discarded, as if it's ridiculous, and it's obvious that the reasons are inherent.

I think that the mechanism for what he is describing is the difference in neurotransmitter and hormone balances. Nobody is going to argue that men have more testosterone than women and that women have more estrogen than men. Nobody is going to argue that these things change behavior - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testosterone#Physiological_effe... Similarly, nobody is going to argue that men cannot bear children because of social conditioning. Why is it so difficult to accept that men and women are physically and psychologically built for different sets of requirements and therefore have different probabilities of performing particular actions? I'm not suggesting that it's set in stone, but there are certainly tendencies to go in a particular direction.

>the statement "the British Empire did a lot more good than harm" is a disgusting, privileged statement that really doesn't elicit much more than pitying contempt from me.

Completely agree, building roads for your slaves doesn't free them.