If there are people who are competing against one another for a valuable but limited prize they will use whatever tactics are available to achieve victory over their competitors. If telling someone that she is “nice” or that she is “cute” will contribute to her defeat, then that is what her adversaries will do. Personally, I would not deploy that tactic because I do not believe that it would achieve the desired effect, but Yael Wolfe, the author of the original article, appears to believe that it would.

If women are really “disempowered” because of certain words uttered by their adversaries, then their adversaries will take advantage. Women would have to find a way to resist succumbing to that vulnerability if they wish to exert power. Appealing to their adversaries to cede power to them is futile. Power is not given; it is seized. If someone gives you power they can just as easily take it back. One who cedes power to another only gives the illusion of power. The one who has supposedly ceded power is still the true source of that power. If women want power they must seize it - they must overcome their vulnerability to a few words.

Issues involving “empowerment” or “disempowerment” of women are not among my personal priorities, so “indifference” would be an accurate term to describe my position with respect to those issues.

I agree that men and women may have different perspectives regarding fairness. There are physical differences between women and men. People decide issues of fairness based upon their personal experience. Different bodies process experiences differently - different bodies produce different experiences which produce different perspectives.