to think that all the people who have a problem with people using "girls" instead of "women"

[CartwrightMiss]

Should say "womanfriend" instead of "girlfriend"?

[gron]

I suppose Freya, it need not necessarily be true.
But if for example, there are 17 million male full time workers, and 11 female full time workers, there are going to be many many industries that are undermanned by women, so more men at the top, n'est pas?

ILTB, I think the word you used was 'definition' not 'necessarily.' It isn't by definition true.

That matters because it has to apply in the real world, and take into account unpaid work and different roles. There are lots of different ways of making the world more equal between different groups.

Garlic

If everyone has this patriarchal view then why would women even aspire to roles that were having their status erroded by other women? Do you think prospective undergraduates will look at medicine and still aspire to become doctors if society thought it was a lower status job since women started flooding in? Of course not. Society doesn't have one unified view on job roles that is controlled by a single entity. This would assume we were all drones with an inability to think for ourselves. Yes, some people will be influenced by people high up but some won't because not all of us are driven by what others think or by what the supposed 'societal norm' is.

This is the contradiction that you and Freya have presented thus far i.e. the claim that:

a) more women in a role = greater influence over the public
b) more women in a role = lowering of perceived status by the public

How can you possibly have greater influence over people if you are simmultaneously seen to have lower status/credibilty than your male peers?

Anyway, enough of the contradictions. IMHO societal views aren't dictated by powerful people or those in high places with influence and this is where I believe the focus is misplaced. Societal views are much more complex and do not simply pyramid down. If so how would you suggest a 50% feminist government/board of directors or other institution would go about changing the male view that it's ok to call women 'girls'? What influence can be exerted from the top down so that society only uses the term 'girl' in a manner that is acceptable for all women? Are you suggesting that getting into power would enable you to legislate against the use of terms that have been deemed derrogatory?

Ilikethebreeze

Thanks BTW

I don't think it is a contradiction. I've justified that by talking about intrinsic power. Any role is made up of intrinsic sources of power (a doctor's physical ability and skills to save lives or harm people) and extrinsic sources of power (how much faith society has in doctors, how much autonomy it grants them, what resources, equipment it allows them access to).

If women are doctors, and their extrinsic sources of power are reduced, they still have more intrinsic power than if there were no women doctors at all.

As for societal influences, some are top down and some are bottom up. I don't think it can be just one or the other.

TT, in terms of legislation, in the work place I think (personally) that the legislation already put in place is okay for dealing with this. You could bring a sex discrimination case, with being called a girl repeatedly as part of the case, as long as it was in a context of other discriminatory behaviour. It would be all the different things that happened altogether, not just one individual part.

All manner of flirting and informality goes on in work places. You can't ban it all. I don't think anybody would want to! It would be a number of things together that would make it a problem for a person and would make a case.

Techno. The freedoms, equalities and protections we now enjoy were instigated by law and are enforced by law. Listen to a business federation arguing for the removal of health & safety regulations, equality legislation and employment rights. There cannot be any doubt in your mind that, without legislative enforcement, equalities, protections and rights for employees would not exist.

Laws are created by governments. Governments listen to the electorate's representatives, not the electorate itself. Thus it is important for feminists that there should be feminist representatives and feminist law-makers.

The thing you presented as a contradiction, isn't. The public adopts what the law says it shall adopt. If the laws were passed by Noddy and Big Ears, the public would still normalise them with practice.

Dont agree with that garlic.
If Noddy and Big Ears made laws, and if you think of certain countries were dubious laws are made, the people rise up and rebel, and mostly succeed, or succeed eventually.
That is the trouble with top down laws.
To get equality with men, you need respect from men [which could come with women doing those man jobs].

I like - do you feel disrespected by men?

I don't. I suspect I am not alone.

I don't involve men, who see women as second class, in my life.

No I dont,far from it.
That is part of the reason I cant see why women cannot work with men.

"To get equality with men, you need respect from men [which could come with women doing those man jobs]."

What about men "doing those woman jobs"?

"
I don't involve men, who see women as second class, in my life."

You can hardly avoid it when they are in positions of power!

Feminism want equality.
Feminists think they are hard done by.
So they need to take some of what men have.
As someone poss LRD said upthread, she does not expect men to come down, therefore women have to go up.

seeker - yes, I meant personally.

I don't understand ilike's relationship with men.

I like them, I appreciate them, I respect them.

all of them?

Well, obviously it is going to be hard to quantify quite how many of them!

Are you married or have a partner?
Do you have sons?

yes and no.

I like a lot of men.

"I like them, I appreciate them, I respect them."

What all men?

What about women?

How do you feel about women, I meant to say.

Some can be bitchy.
Some can be introverted.
But on the whole I like them.

It is not that I dont like introverted women, but even if I talk to them, they can stay shut up emotionally.
Introverted men I can normally still get to open up emotionally.

Dont have a clue why I am being asked this, but you can ask away.

As for societal influences, some are top down and some are bottom up. I don't think it can be just one or the other.

This is what I have been saying and what makes the 'patriarchal' view such a generalistic one. It's impossible to make the kinds of sweeping statements that have been made thus far as human behaviour is way too complex.

Hence my claim that the heavy focus on FTSE100 companies etc. is misplaced and simply serves to cast question over the 'cause'. Feminism has often been criticised for focussing only on the middle class and this really does nothing to assuge this.

If, like you say, societal influences come from all over (which is a bit of a u-turn from earlier) then it is an imbalanced approach to focus on the cream of the workforce. I accept that influence/change does pyramid down but that there are millions of pyramids of various sizes throughout society. Leaders do influence but the workforce has many diverse leaders in companies of all sizes. Each organisation has its own culture irrespective of whether there are 10 or 10,000 members of staff.

Obviously there are many solutions to everyday sexism but possibly none better than increasing the numbers of women in the workplace. Again I agree with Ilikethebreeze as unfortunately women need to gain respect of men to be 'seen' as equals. Obviously the same needs to happen for men entering female dominated fields but this is of slightly less importance as it is opression/sexism we are trying to eliminate isn't it?

In this respect I've no doubt car mechanics would benefit from more women in the workplace and wolf whistling would probably reduce if there were more female builders etc. These are generalisms as I'm sure there are many non-sexist builders/mechanics but I'm sure you get my point. None of these industries typically fall under the FTSE100 umbrella so there is insufficient discussion about initiatives to get women into these fields.

As some above have said there for me is no issue as long as the male equivalent is boy, the issue is when men are referred to as men and women are referred to as girls in the same context - that is plain rude, intentionally or not.

TT, I never said there should only be a focus on the cream of the workforce. For most of this thread I've been posting about the bottom of the global workforce - smallholders, women who deal with sewage, the poor. I'm not sure getting more women into positions of power in most companies helps those women because many companies are predatory and woman at the top of those companies would probably have to work against the interests of most women. But I do think more women in charities, law, medicine and politics helps poorer women.

I think feminism has a range of different main areas of interest which I would say are - reproductive rights, violence against women, poverty, environment, employment roles, social representation and political representation. If you are particularly interested in employment roles, you may well see a lot of stuff about FTSE 100, and that will be your perception of feminism. I mainly get involved with stuff about reproductive rights (maternity care for all women), poverty (so unpaid and poorly paid women) and environmental issues like damage to women's land, dumping of unsafe waste that women then have to process etc. So I don't notice the FTSE stuff because it's not an area I'm interested in or know a lot about.

If you've identified a gap in women's access to certain employment roles, there may be too few feminists involved in resolving that, and I'm sure they'd value your help and the help of any feminists (male or female) who work in those fields. But feminists are stretched pretty thin across a whole range of human rights issues for women (and often individually contribute to other social movements too). I'm not convinced that if lot of us become builders and bin men, more men collectively will see women as equal and resolve those other women's rights issues.

So in short, go for it. Lots of girls currently at school will benefit. There's no reason for us all to focus on the same stuff.