Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5 6

Original poster

To think that women are treated like shit by society?

147 replies

superstarheartbreaker · 13/03/2014 18:47

Especially single mothers. I have been discriminated against several times about my lack of marital status.
I'm fed up with the whole way that society treats women and I'm worried about my dd.
I do love men and they make good friends but society gives out this message that it is important to be married and/ or in a relationship. Single women are seen as a threat and / or failures.
Women in relationships are often repressed. The media promotes this 'perfect' body image and porn.
I mean I know it's been done to death but why do we put up with it?
What is worse it that we are our own worse enemy. Women see each other as threats too.

OP posts:

Grennie · 13/03/2014 22:40

I agree with you OP. I read yesterday that 43% of women experience violence from a male partner. About 20 - 25% of women are raped, either as children or adults, or both. Sexual harassment such as cat calling on the street, is so common. I am older and I think things have got worse for women.

Grennie · 13/03/2014 22:43

cumberbatch - According to the UN's rank of sex equality in different countries, the UK is not doing that well. For a relatively well off country, we should be doing much better. Rwanda is much better than the UK on many measures of sex equality.

FudgefaceMcZ · 13/03/2014 22:43

YANBU at all and the people saying you are are oblivious misogynists. You only have to have looked at a newspaper in the last year to know that single mothers are considered acceptable targets for hate speech (which would be illegal against most other categories) in the mainstream press.

mrscumberbatch · 13/03/2014 22:49

Really Grennie?! That's depressing.

Like really depressing and quite embarrassing.

Eurgh. And people say that they don't see the problem?

Oy vey

Mitchy1nge · 13/03/2014 22:51

I don't think it's misogynous to be oblivious to sexism, it's probably lots of other, protective, things like genuine oblivion.

Anyway it's important to keep pointing these things out, whether they are the extremes most people agree on or the smaller incidences that you become inured to or genuinely don't see.

fideline · 13/03/2014 23:07

There's a enthusiastic participant in 'steak and blowjob day' posting happily in AIBU atm, if anyone wants an example of everyday misogyny.

Its like the surrendered strippers club over there.

mrscumberbatch · 13/03/2014 23:17

What kind of fucked up Hallmark holiday is Steak and Blowjob day?

caruthers · 13/03/2014 23:21

To be fair it does sound a bit filling

cashewfrenzy · 13/03/2014 23:24

I was thinking about this today. Lots of professions are less respected now than they used to be - plenty reasons for this including media, the internet etc - but I wonder how big a factor the increasing presence of women in such roles as doctors, dentists, lawyers and teachers is in this loss of respect?

I can't help but suspect that the fact that society seems to view women as inherently less worthy of respect is playing a part.

fideline · 13/03/2014 23:25

I have a notion that it was invented by an australian but don't quote me.

Apparently it is quite fashionable for women to embrace the notion. Presumably to demonstrate how free thinking and sexually confident they are

Do wish people would stop boasting about it all over the web though.

fideline · 13/03/2014 23:26

Oh and it is apparently an 'antidote' to Valentines day. Which is for 'girls'.

My head hurts.

FreudiansSlipper · 13/03/2014 23:29

why does anyone need to inform others that they are going to engage in oral sex the next evening

fideline · 13/03/2014 23:33

Got me there slipper

mrscumberbatch · 13/03/2014 23:34

Caruthers

Jeezo. I know that everyone talks about the liberation women in the last 20 years and about how 'we have taken control of our bodies and our sexualities and dressing for ourselves' blah blah blah.

I don't want to shame people for their choices but there comes a point where you are not being liberated by being able to leave the house in stripper heels and hot pants.

I love feeling attractive or whatever but some things are not for outdoors.

Tiny shorts with bums hanging out are about as acceptable as gimp masks in public for me.

Excuse the mild rant but the sunshine made a rare appearance in the last few days here and I've seen more bums than Id like to admit.

caruthers · 13/03/2014 23:52

If I went out with my arse hanging out i'd be arrested.

uselessidiot · 14/03/2014 07:04

YANBU. IME and from observation women seem to be held to higher standards than men. Either that or they're assumed to be stupid, I.e. "you won't understand that, you're a woman".

I know someone who's xh decided to stop paying maintenance and refused to discuss it. When she contacted the CSA she was told she should act responsibly and ask him. She was told she had a responsibility to support her children and should do so. She is, single handedly because he walked out. Yet at no point did anyone suggest he was irresponsible.

I know of someone else who was accused of being a bad mother in court. The reason; she worked full time to support her child. Can you a imagine a father being accused of being a bad father on the basis of working full time? I can't.

ApocalypseThen · 14/03/2014 07:37

It's interesting that the OP initiated a thread about sexism towards women in society and possibly 1/3 if it is posts about how brilliant men are. Why might that be? Is it possible that we're used to discussing men but are not so comfortable focusing on women?

feelingvunerable · 14/03/2014 08:15

Op, you are spot on.

I really don't think you can comment unless you have been a single parent about whether single mother's are discriminated against. Of course they are. I have geared lots of negative comments using the phrase "un married mothers" yet the same people don't mention "un married fathers".

The whole miss/mrs/ms is sure proof that sexism is alive. I never offer my title when giving out my details I simply give my full name, a man is a man regardless of marital status. To say you can choose not to become mrs is irrelevant, the distinction is still there, on every single application form. Why not just ms or mr?

There are so many examples.rape for instance, where else does a victim have to prove there worthiness?

whattheholyfeck · 14/03/2014 10:37

I'm really sorry, I know you have some valid points, however I get very annoyed about this subject.

Try being a Muslim woman. I have copied and pasted this from Wikipedia:

"Islamic laws and cultural customs impact various stages of a Muslim women's life, including her education, employment opportunities, rights to inheritance, female circumcision, dress, age of marriage, freedom to consent to marriage, marriage contract, mahr, permissibility of birth control, divorce, sex outside or before marriage, her ability to receive justice in case of sex crimes, property rights independent of her husband, and when salat (prayers) are mandatory for her. Polygyny is allowed to men under Islam, but not widespread; in some Islamic countries, such as Iran, a woman's husband may enter into temporary marriages in addition to permanent marriage. Islam forbids Muslim women from marrying a non-Muslim.There is debate and controversy on gender roles according to Islam."

Women in these countries are treated as second class citizens. I know this first hand, as my father is Muslim.

Also, I was brought up with a single mother (as as British woman she could not cope with the way my Muslim father treated her and my sisters) and so I know first hand they can be discriminated against.

But the problems women face in this country pale into insignificance when you consider how women in other cultures have to live.

Stop moaning.

Sorry. I am really not trying to start an argument but I just had to say something.

fideline · 14/03/2014 10:43

Apocolypse It's a morbid fear of being thought 'feminist'

" I lurvvvve men, some of my best friends are men and I adore high heels, a LOT of my best friends are high heels....."

Mitchy1nge · 14/03/2014 10:47

I completely wholeheartedly reject the idea that people should tolerate unfairness in a 'mustn't grumble' style just because there are ever more grotesque unfairnesses elsewhere in the world

it's all part of the same thing, it is possible to acknowledge that it is wrong for women to be paid less than men for the same job without in any way detracting from the horrors of the more extreme inequalities elsewhere in the world

GarthsUncle · 14/03/2014 10:53

I completely wholeheartedly reject the idea that people should tolerate unfairness in a 'mustn't grumble' style just because there are ever more grotesque unfairnesses elsewhere in the world

Seconded.

Mitchy1nge · 14/03/2014 10:53

so I won't 'stop moaning'

it's one of my great interests in life :)

whattheholyfeck · 14/03/2014 10:55

Three words: first world problems

GarthsUncle · 14/03/2014 10:56

Do you say that to your mother, what?

Flip

1 2 3 4 5 6