To get annoyed when other women say "I'm not a feminist"

[Nickabilla]

As if it's a dirty word and a shameful thing to be? I hear it every now and then and always question it. Someone said it today and I'm annoyed again.

Do some women not realise that women didn't used to be allowed to go to university, get divorced, own property or vote?

Rant over.

'Menial' i.e. the lowest paid jobs are overwhelmingly done by women.

Women could do better paid menial work farm workers, sewage workers, mine workers, potato picking, construction, street cleaning the list of non-exotic dull jobs are endless, and not all of them pay a pittance. I have never seen a female construction worker EVER. No a single woman holding those stop/go roadwork signs, no road workers, bridge painters, refuse workers, river dredgers..not one woman ever.

Feminists only want women to work in nice air-conditioned buildings, earning a shitload of money apparently. And the government wants to see more women in the top jobs so feminists stop moaning at them. So when you see a female MP looking out of her depth she probably wasn't there on merit.

'But sigmund - who says men have to earn the most? Why can't women have the top earning jobs as well?'

Not me. Women can have the top earning jobs AFAIC (on merit). They just don't seem to want them.

So women don't want the menial jobs. But they don't want the top-earning jobs either. So what do women want Sigmund? Chilling out and fleecing their DP's for maintenance? I'm not buying that tbh.

I'm quite shocked at some of the things I'm reading here tbh. It's one thing to say you think feminism isn't needed because things are equal but another altogether to say that men have it bad because of load of sexist patriarchal bullshit some imagined advantages women have.

If women's work is so valued, why are so few men interested in entering the poorly paid jobs that are typically seen as women's jobs? Nursing, primary school teaching, cleaners, school lunch ladies people, school lunchtime supervisors, nursery nurses and so on and so forth. As for women not wanting to do "men's work" I suggest that women and girls are pushed away from certain jobs from infancy. They are told that girls don't get dirty, girls don't do that, that's not safe for girls, you wouldn't like it, you wouldn't be strong enough etc etc etc. The dirty, menial work my dad does is better paid than the nursing job I used to have and I wanted to do his job as a teen, but he talked me out of it because he was worried I'd be bullied by men who didn't think women could or should do an outdoor, manual labouring job. He was probably right, my friend was bullied out of an engineering job shortly before her apprenticeship ended.

'But does anyone need to earn 'the most'? My point is, it's childcare that means men's earnings outstrip women. If childcare becomes more equal, so will earnings.'

What? I'm not qualified to do DH's job, and DH would be crazy to do my job for 'equal earnings'. It's going to take some bizarre logistics for two people to end up earning the same for different jobs (unless they do the same job!). I'm not really following you here. If DH did an equal amount of childcare to me (if his employers allowed him to work part time), he would still earn shedloads more that me.

I saw two women in a white van today. They have a building business, complete with pink livery etc.

My mum employed female plumbers in the 1980's.

Did anybody see the docuseries last year about Smithfields meat market? An overwhelmingly male, macho atmosphere. One woman was featured, but the abuse and hostility she got from the men there forced her to quit eventually.

Do you think road crews would generally make female colleagues feel welcome?

You do have to take into account the psychological and actual barriers to entry of traditional, physical male dominated jobs though - jobs that were not open to women for generations because women are delicate, weak, pretty and need to be looked after.

There are women construction workers, but I wonder how many of them struggle to be taken seriously in such a male environment?

Tbh, women have historically had many employment avenues in male dominated workplaces automatically blocked off, simply because they are women. They are then blamed for not doing these jobs in equal numbers to men.

Really Sigmund, never? Gee, could it be because women and men are conditioned to think that those are men's jobs, and discouraged from applying even if they want to, and that even if they do apply they are rejected because the men reading their application and conducting the interview are worried that she might break a nail while pushing a wheel barrow and end up cocking the job up for all the blokes who were doing just fine dammit until that frayed woman came along, with her hormones and her hair flipping?

Interesting thread this. Just to point out to yams that physiologically men are generally stronger than women, few would dispute that. Which is why, sigmund, the dv thing often find women on the receiving end. Not always, sometimes it's men on the receiving end of domestic abuse, I'm sure we can agree that there are nasty people of both genders.
To me it's about being treated equally. Not to be confused with being the same. That would be boring, as I tell my boys :)
I read an interesting book detailing the work to allow women higher education, and apparently it was debated with great intensity whether or not our wombs would not just shrivel up and fall out. All the blood being diverted from the abdomen to the brain. That tickled me. Both men and women held this view.
I want my boys to be treated equally in terms of education and work, personal views etc as long as they don't want to withhold that from others. For my daughter I would wish the same. FOr any of them to work if they wish and are able or to stay at home to raise their family. After all, the economy would crash pretty quickly if there weren't any people to make it go round.

'Oh yes, because women are lazy, just want to chill at home and spend their dh's hard earned cash.'

Are you saying that these women don't exist?

'You do not appear to like women very much. Is that what you intend to come across as?'

I do like women, I know strong, successful (on their own merit)women. Success, btw, isn't something that I measure by how much they earn.

Frayed should be dratted. I have fat fingers and autocorrect.

PromQueen, I salute your work on this thread. You're saying very eloquently what I'm thinking.

Can't believe some of what I'm reading.

But why are there not women firms who do sewerage work, clean drains, women construction firm partnerships, women diving firm parnerships, women chimney sweep firms. I am sure women would employ them to clean their drains, sweep their chimneys etc. It could so easily be done. What is stopping that happening?
Answer, because the vast majority of women in this country do not want to do those jobs.

sigmund - lazy people exist. It's not a woman thing

Personally I think people should be able to just not give a shit

Rather lazy and ungrateful, yes?

but sigmund, your situation is not the only one in the world. Generally women were paid less even to do the very same job as a male counterpart. Same hours, same level, same skill etc. the same. But paid less because they were...wait for it...female.
That is the most pressing issue. Then we can discuss the nessecity or lack thereof for the massive paygaps across the work force, in another thread.

So the million dollar question. How did we end up with the current status quo?

It is true to say that, excluding the extremes, women are as strong as men. It's also true to say that women are as intelligent as men too. In fact in almost every area, women are equally good at stuff as men.

So how did we end up with women as the oppressed class since the dawn of time till now?

'So what do women want Sigmund?'

I suspect most women would want to be respected for being the individuals that we are. If I shave my legs and wear a T-shirt with the logo 'I wore this tight t-shirt to look alluring to men', if that's my choice, I don't want to be judged. If I want to clean people's arse's for a living, if that's my choice, I don't want to be pitied. If I don't want to align myself with feminism, that's my choice, I don't want to be belittled. Thanks.

Sigmund, believe it or not, I'm not posting about you. I'm posting about general principles. Such as, if a man and a woman who are similarly qualified start out on broadly similar career paths, their earnings will generally stay around the same. Until the woman has a child. Then it all goes tits up.

But anyway. We don't agree. And given some of the posts on this thread where feminists have been accused of being harpies, cult members, bullies and brainwashed/brainwashes I'm reluctant to be your next anecdote so I'm out. Nice talking to you. Bed calls.