Feminism

[slightreturn]

Please feel free to express your views honestly re; Feninism.
What to men really think about it?

Well as to the straw feminist's it seems i will have to do some reading when i have the time.

About the image change however if placed by a group which want feminism to been viewed negatively why would they work to remove it. Unfortunately there have been many times in history where a group of people have had an image placed upon them and they must actively remove it since no one else will do it for them.

yes it is ultimately about power. Power to choose, power to live your life in the way you wish to. And the construct we experience here of capitalism ( other systems have their own dynamics of oppression) serves to direct a 'competitiveness' where power is central to your development and safety.

just read in detail a lot of the thread I had skimmed earlier - a little more fractious than I had first thought. tbh, most of the 'silly' and 'idiotic' labels were being used by the women.

Having said that, the notion of feminists having to 'redesign' the movement in order to make it more palatable to men ( and so enlist their support) is fairly derisory. This does appear as a major source of contention, male vs female, on this thread.
The obv. question, going down this derisory route, would be to have to ask "so how far do we have to compromise to make you satisfied?

Now I'm new to this very interesting thread, but not to feminism more's the pity.

I used to work in an extremely male dominated industry, where I was regularly humiliated for having different needs (such access to a toilet when I had my period etc).
I have been repeatedly told that women aren't cut out for this job, etc. And I have been sexually assaulted by men on the job.

It was shit, and but the main reason why I now don't work in that industry and indeed work for myself is that I have no pay gap now. I charge the industry standard for the work I do, and I don't have to shave off 17% because of that total because of the fact I'm a woman.

I find the feminism threads here a little frothy and aggressive, and can't really see how being so very angry is conducive to getting the job done. And so I don't post on the fem threads, although I believe that all human beings are equal - different yes, with different skills etc.. but equal.

I would love men to realise that they are equal to women, and to give themselves a break, relax about the hormones (hisnhers), but it seems the pay gap is too attractive to give up or share.

In my mind, we have to start the work of feminism in the pay packet. It makes economic sense to let women bear the brunt of their longer lives with more in their pension pot.

AFAIK all civil and public service employees by law have to have the same salary for the same job, but it is time I think to lobby that the private sector also treated working men the same as working women.

Across Europe Women get paid less then men for equal hours of similar work. How any one in their right minds can say that this is fair or clever, or something to want to preserve is beyond me. It makes no sense at all.

Have a look at the EU site for more information on how to lobby for equal pay.

As an aside I've noticed that a lot of posts on this thread are oiling the squeaky man.
I suggest we get on with the job in hand: lobbying for equal pay for men and women.

What does oiling the squeaky men mean?

(Have images of tin man from the Wizard of Oz)

Well we've had the straw man... why not the tin one??
seriously, I mean the deliberately provocative ones... squeak, squeak, oil, oil.

Let's lobby for equal pay. I think the rest will follow.

I've tried to ignore them this thread. It's too tiresome...

Remember talking about POWER to choose etc is irrelevant if pay is not equal. Money is power (as Xenia would no doubt say).
Money gives you more choices and more power.

So I think your answer Pan to
"so how far do we have to compromise to make you satisfied?"

is, 17% in the UK and more in other places. Derisory answer or not.

Organisations to lobby for equal pay in the UK, are

Government Equalities Office
www.equalities.gov.uk

Chambers of Commerce
www.britishchambers.org.uk/

Equality and Diversity Forum
www.edf.org.uk

Trade Union Congress (TUC)
www.tuc.org.uk/

Engender
www.engender.org.uk

Women's Resource Centre
www.wrc.org.uk/

NAWO - National Alliance of Women's Organisations
www.nawo.org.uk/

Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD)
www.cipd.co.uk/

UNITE
www.unitetheunion.com/

Fawcett Society
www.fawcettsociety.org.uk

Equal Day? Equal Pay!

zazen - I was thinking more broadly about how much feminism as a movement have to alter their presenatation and voice to get more men on board. It's derisory IMO as it seems to ask "whilst you are killing, battering and raping us, please let us know what we can do to make you accept us more".

Feminism is not about equality, it's about liberation

So if the pay gap is finally closed, that is not going to stop misogynistic porn from being produced, for example, or have any connection to a woman's right to be treated with respect in labour; some females absorb the misogyny too and become women-haters themselves in order not to have to confront the way women are viewed in society etc etc.

So equality, as in power and monetary equality is the tip of the iceberg although it would make a massive improvement, especially in politics.

It's a start Sakura.
You have to start somewhere, and this is an obvious place.

It's measurable and workable.

Misogyny is a behaviour built out of fear.
If men don't have to see themselves as alpha and strong because there is no reason for it - ie women are paid equally for the work done, then the alpha and strong labels disappear like snow on a spring day.

How can you be alpha if you can't find the proof of your 'superiority' in your wallet anymore?
Will you still look in your Y fronts or your fists. Is that what a man is? A piece of muscle? These are questions for the men on this thread.

Pan "- I was thinking more broadly about how much feminism as a movement have to alter their presenatation and voice to get more men on board"
I don't think we have to change at all Pan just to suit men, to make our interests more attractive to men. You'll be suggesting a brazillian wax for the movement next

With increasing urbanisation and social change associated with the increased need for co-operative non-violent society, rather I think men need to align to a more feminine (non testosterone driven) way of being.

I do think men have a lot of work to do on their own selves to remain relevant, and to contribute meaningfully in this non physical urban world we increasingly live in - where let's face it testosterone and aggression is a disadvantage, and increasingly men have less and less to do with the social bonds within society.

But that's not the job of feminists.

Our job is a lot simpler IMHO:
Let's lobby for equal pay, (and we will see how we go from there Sakura).

I do hope so too Stayfrosty...

You know, I think the men can get their own arguments together by them selves - we need to focus on what we want, not what the squeaky man might be about to say about our rights.

SAHM is a job it's true. Maybe pay the going rate for that also? Or have huge tax credits for that work when a woman returns to work f/t or p/t?

Equal pay is a massive issue of course, but I think it's a mistake to be so narrow. It's not what "feminism" as such is about, it's just one strand and of course you can have one strand of a movement which devotes itself to just that, because that's its main interest. Other strands might devote themselves to other issues such as domestic violence, or sexist language, or consciousness raising, or parenting, or rights in childbirth, or women's health or whatever.

But feminism as a whole is about more than just equal pay, it's about the whole way society is organised and how women function in it. If you just devote yourself to one issue, you get to the rather tiresome position of "well the way women are treated in Afghanistan is so bad, that we've got no right to complain about the way we're treated in the west, so we'll just focus on Afghanistan and not bother fighting the battles here, or even deny that there are any to fight". Which is a popular, if tiresome misguided view out there.

I know that feminism as a movement shouldn't change or become more 'accommodating', or rid itself of 'radical feminists' to make it more palatable - this was rather the point of that series of posts. Sorry if that wasn't crystal clear.

Many years ago I DID consider equal pay almost as a panacea though now I see things differently - it is limited for those as StayFrosty indicates for those who stay at home, and it could be undermined by other economic tides of change. IT could well be also that women are more likely to spend there income on family care matters ( esp. as women tend to be the ones who put in effort to maintain extended family releations rather than men) so simply having equal pay doesn't necessarily mean total economic equality.

btw, I NEVER squeak.

though sometimes my spelling is rubbish.

oh and meant to say that the pay gap narrows as a result of all the other battles - consciousness-raising et al. One of the reasons that the pay gap is 17% not 30%, isn't just because of equal pay legislation, it's because there is a growing awareness out there of the equal value of work - so for example the waste-disposal operators (commonly known as bin-men and mostly men) versus what was it? But anyway, mostly women workers, who were systematically paid less because the rates of pay were lower simply because the majority of workers were women. I can't remember what group it was, but they took their case to court to argue that their work was as valuable as that of bin-men and therefore their pay should be equal, and they won. Previously councils had got away with paying them less purely because they are women, because the job was not the same. But the work is of equal value and so the case raised consciousness of the fact that "women's work" is consistently undervalued and underpaid versus work that is mainly done by men - witness the drop in earnings and status, as soon as women enter a profession en masse (teachers and estate agents being a good example). Anyway, that's a round about way of saying that consciousness-raising feeds into equal pay and other issues.

HB - it was Birmingham City Council who argued if I recall correctly, that they ahd recruited over a long period and so individual contracts were drawn up which they couldn't simply rescind ( though we know employers do that each and every day). It was a pathetic positon, which ever one it was, and they lost, to the cost of millions.

Yes and it's set a legal precedent and lots of other councils up and down the country have got to abide by it and restructure all their pay grades. And of course, what they are doing is not putting up the women's pay, they are putting down the men's pay. And lots of people out there blame feminism for that, as if feminists set wage rates.

on a more frivolous note re "economic equality is more than just about what you earn, rather also about how you spend it", have you seen the cost of a decent hairdo?! When men have to pay £90 for a short back and sides then we WILL be nearer a sense of equal treatment.

Here is a really good bit of journalism from the Guardian (for once) about Cumbrian seamstresses working for the NHS who won their case when demanding equal pay compared to the equivalent (more traditionally 'male') job.
Possibly a bit out of date now.

really interesting read, and a bit disturbing re the union angle.

Back on the economic arguments, remember "The Handmaid's Tale" - Atwood. Where women were given bank account numbers, so that when control was formally taken by the men of Gilead, those accounts could be frozen.
Scarier, in the epilogue she writes thatthis, and all of the other methods of control are not fiction - they have all been practiced in history in various countries. I don't know of which country has practiced that one but scary nonetheless.
Legislation and bureacracy may be used to establish a greater equality, and good for that, but they don't have an effective or lasting impact without a change in consciousness and attitude, so that Atwood's nightmare scenarios are further distanced from being possible.

"How can you be alpha if you can't find the proof of your 'superiority' in your wallet anymore?
Will you still look in your Y fronts or your fists. Is that what a man is? A piece of muscle? These are questions for the men on this thread."

I think that's a very good question. I'm going to come back to this in more detail later as I have to pop out.

For what it's worth, though, I've never looked in my pants or to my fists to define what kind of a man I am. Indeed, the fact that I don't do those things is part of the kind of person I am.

I must finish The Handmaid's Tale. I got half way through and couldn't take it any more.

Yes, that is a good question.

Economic equality is a difficult one, and is going to be impossible under a capitalist system. That's a fact.

SOme women, such as myself, experienced a biological pull to breastfeed and nurture their newborns. WIld horses couldn'T have dragged me away from my babies. Other women don'T know who the father of their child is; yet other women are single mothers for various other reasons. I personally believe there will always be men who are more "free" and that part is biological determinism. WOmen have a greater stake in childrearing than men because of our bodies. The stakes are higher. Although I've no doubt that men can become more nurturing and less hyper-masculine.

And yet, for the revolution to be over, women need an equal share of society's resources and power in their hands.

So the only way out is some sort of revolution. Because women are just not going to be able to wrest half the power in the current patriarchal capitalist class system. They are ghettoed into low-end service work, taking hte jobs the men won't touch, because they want to spend time with their kids.
MAny become prostitutes because it makes economic sense.

On a practical level, we need to get over the ageism and male working culture. There is no reason whatsoever why middle-aged women with grown children can't become MPs for example. In fact, why don't they?