Men discriminated against from cradle to grave according to Dominic Raab MP

[JustineMumsnet]

Writing in an article on Politics Home, Dominic Raab MP for Esher and Walton has written:

"It is almost taboo for a man to question the assertion that the rapidly dwindling pay gap is the result of discrimination, rather than genuine choice. The debate has been consumed by the prejudice it seeks to purge."

"While we have some of the toughest anti-discrimination laws in the world, we are blind to some of the most flagrant discrimination ? against men. From the cradle to the grave, men are getting a raw deal. Men work longer hours, die earlier, but retire later than women. "

Then there is the more subtle sexism. Men caused the banking crisis. Men earn more because they are more assertive in pay negotiations. One FT commentator recently complained that: ?High-flying women are programmed to go for high-flying men. Most men aren?t attracted to women who are more successful than they are.? Can you imagine the outrage if such trite generalisations were made about women, or other minorities? Feminists are now amongst the most obnoxious bigots."

"You can?t have it both ways. Either you believe in equality or you don?t. If you buy into the whole Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus theory of gender difference ? with all its pseudo science - you can?t then complain about inequalities of outcome that flow both ways from those essentially sexist distinctions."

What do you think MNetters?

God, I really hate those 'poor little me, I may be a white, middle class non-disabled male in a position of power and earning shedloads but I'm a victim too, I am' types.

How pathetic to be jealous of people who face hurdles you are fortunate enough to be spared.

Exactly edam. Utterly, utterly pathetic

Jesus.

I'm only going to try and even address one element of this bollocks: women earn less through choice and better negotiation.

1. Women are still paid less than men for the same job.

1. Women's jobs are paid less than men's jobs. Famous equal pay cases on physios and speech therapists show that the 'male' jobs have more prestige and higher pay.

1. The pay in 'male' jobs actually declines when that job becomes predominately 'female'. Thus the salaries of secretaries and HR professionals both fell as more women moved into those roles.

1. Flexible working, and work which accomadates childcare responsibilities, is hard to come by, and often lower paid. That is a choice of sorts, but a forced choice. Women do these jobs because the burden of family life falls predominately on them and because they have to find something that works around that. If men took an equal burden, the world wouldn't be able to run on those principles, workplaces would have to become more flexible and women wouldn't have to 'choose' the poor paying job.

1. Studies show that women who negotiate hard are perceived negatively and as ball breakers. They are penalised for that stance. Thus women don't negotiate because they rightly assess the risks of doing so, not because they're too stupid to negotiate.

And breathe....

quite, Ribena.

LadyB, I always think all this whingeing is very unmanly. Don't men who buy into stereotypes think crying is for girls?

Oh god, privileged white man whinges about how bigoted it is to want half the human race to have half the power, half the work, half the leisure, half the joy and half the resources of the world.

What a prick. Oh is he a Tory? Oh, what a surprise. Same old same old.

Elephants sums it up nicely

Although I would like to question this assumption that there is a "rapidly closing pay gap"

Where would this be?

Do you think this might just be in the House of Commons, when the gurls earn the same as the men?

He talks as if feminists are running the country.

I hadn't noticed all the feminists in Gordon Brown's cabinet. And there was one high profile woman wasn't there, out of ... um...how many men?

They just can't stand it when their cosy little boys world is invaded by horrid women, can they?

And hello, Venus and Mars? What on earth has that got to do with feminism?

He is embarrassingly ignorant. I wonder if he has actually read one real feminist text. If he thinks men are from mars etc. is feminist, he's obviously got a very hazy idea of what feminism is. But he's allowed to bruit his ignorance around the airwaves and no-one will question why he has such privileged access to talk woefully uninformed rubbish in public.

Absolutely. He's just another Backlash mouthpiece.

And another thing - that comment about aggression on MN - what he means is, women talking straight, is aggressive.

Exactly why women who negotiate assertively on wages, are seen as aggressive by their (usually male) bosses and not granted the pay awards because their non-submissive attitude is disliked. And when they're not assertive (aka aggressive) you can then blame them for not negotiating hard enough.

So either way, employers win and women lose. And then we can blame it all on women, rather than sexist attitudes.

It is astounding that men are from mars is being touted as a feminist text. I thought I had heard it all, but clearly not.

Also, this thing about 'longer working hours' by men should read 'longer paid working hours',as opposed to 'unpaid skivvy work' and if being really accurate it should say, men work 'longer paid hours at a higher rate to women doing an equivalent job'.

people just talk such incredible crap about what feminism is and there is never any chance to reply.

Yes quite often men are doing longer working hours because it's more fun to stay in the office with your mates chatting, networking, socialising and doing a little bit of work, than it is to go home and do some of the unpaid shitwork that your wife is doing.

Funny how when women are underpaid, it's because they're choosing to be underpaid, but when men are working longer hours, it's because of oppressive sexism forcing them to. Because I expect it's all those oppressive female company directors forcing the menz to stay in the office.... oh, wait... what percentage of company directors are nasty feminist women?

And if men are so unhappy about working long hours, why aren't they demanding from political parties at election time, a workplace which enables them to function as husbands and fathers as well as as employees? Is this Dominic Raab bloke calling for a 32 hour week? Is he demanding the right of ALL workers to have flexi-time, part time work, time off for sick children etc.? Is he demanding that they be allowed to go home at 5.30PM so that they can spend time with their children and do their fair share of housework?

'Dom' doesn't have any comments on his blog yet

Oh and one last question before bedtime - are 1 in 4 men being sexually assaulted or raped with a 6% conviction rate for reported rape but with most going unreported because they know there's absolutely no chance of justice? And are 1 in 3 boys of secondary school age, being subjected to sexual bullying at school, as 1 in 3 girls are?

Thought not.

Cradle to grave my arse.

Oh god, did I just read that feminists apparently support the Mars/Venus view of men and women? Say it ain't so.

My first impression was that this guy is one of the type who when in a discussion on domestic violence will pipe up ''but men are victims too' for absolutely no good reason other then to muddy the waters of discussion. My second and third impressions were pretty similar.

He's took a couple of examples where men apparently have got hold of the shitty end of the stick and this supposedly means that men are discriminated against. When two or more individuals are competing against each other for a resource, somebody is always going to be the loser. To Dominic Raab, when the loser happens to be a man this means that men are being discriminated against and that feminists are bigots and this equality madness must be stopped. When women are the loser its tough luck or they chose to not compete hard enough and that means they deserve to be in the position that they are in.

I was amused by his view that the differences between maternity and paternity leave are down to anti-male discrimination. He seems rather desperate to pin any perceived unfairness on those rascally feminists. I wonder if he actually looked at the debates on maternity and paternity leave before he spouted off. Somehow I doubt it.

''And if men are so unhappy about working long hours, why aren't they demanding from political parties at election time, a workplace which enables them to function as husbands and fathers as well as as employees? Is this Dominic Raab bloke calling for a 32 hour week? Is he demanding the right of ALL workers to have flexi-time, part time work, time off for sick children etc.? Is he demanding that they be allowed to go home at 5.30PM so that they can spend time with their children and do their fair share of housework?''

Exactly. This Raab guy isn't interesting in actually making things 'fairer' for men. He just wants to fling shit at feminists and paint them as evil forces at work in what would otherwise be a fairy utopia with men and women living happily together in perfect equal harmony.

LadyBB a few here though

Why is this not showing up in active convos btw?

Why is there a little grey box with an "M" in it against this thread when you go to the Feminism topic?

that's funny, I can't even see this thread in the feminism topic.

it'll be something to do with it having been sticky-ed earlier and when they unstickyed it they did something wrong or forgot to do something.

Ah, the little grey box = stickied thread then?

ElephantsAndMiasmas link to study showing that women who act in a traditionally 'masculine' way at work are less sucessful:

here