Feminism versus egalitarianism?

[EldritchCleavage]

Universities David Willetts has suggested here that working class men have lost out because feminism enabled middle class women to take educational and working opportunities that the men would otherwise have got. He appears (trying to see past the Daily Hate Mail spin to what he actually said) to see this as an unfortunate effect of feminism, rather than a pernicious effect of our class system. Thoughts?

This article is in the guardian too. Their article includes a particularly repellent quote from that great supporter of women Cristina Odone. Grrr

I don't think his analysis is entirely wrong - I would agree that middle class women have benefited more than working class men over the last 40 years. And I'd agree (and rejoice to some extent) that that is to do with women's liberation enabling middle class women to be more able to do what middle class men have been able to do. He hasn't actually said that that is bad (technically he's said the opposite), he's just said it in a way that means he thinks that if that hadn't happened then more working class men would have been able to move up into the middle class opportunities that have arisen. He might be right.

I think his error is more about the implied assumptions - That playing off vulnerable sectors of society (women and working class) against each other is humane or a valid way of looking at social mobility. That a society in which only the middle class (and above) have an acceptable lifestyle (or even that class to that extent exists) is OK. Or that a rate of change that accommodates only small sectors of society at a time is acceptable rather than awful.

BUT the really awful thing in what he says, to me at least, is that his words, even when read to include an acceptance that the gains made my middle class women are good, fail to even acknowledge that working class women bear a double burden. He seems to be implying that if only working class men had made it, all the women could have "married up" and everything would have been fine.

Anyone got a source for the full text of the speech?

Of course women have benefitted - it just shows how crap it was when there was 0% women in various professions. It stands to reason that the 100% men were picked from a pool which did not include the best people as it excluded women!

Smallwhitecat - just wanted to say that you made me :o :o :o

Apparently he already has form for slagging off grammar schools which pissed off the Tories no end, so he may not be around too long.

Have spent the day emailing everyone I can think of (MP, union, women friends, Polly Toynbee, newspapers etc) urging all to call for Willetts' dismissal. What he says is a load of cock, and typical Tory blather - when joblessness rises, it suits the neolibs to push women out of the labour force ( I recall in the 1980s my sis in law was told she should be ashamed of herself for looking for work when there were 'family men' on the dole). The current rise is joblessness is a result of raids on the public sector and the decimation of industry - and women are the worst hit - not massive beneficiaries at all. And now we're supposed to feel guilty for having a job? Blimey. I'm amazed he can get away with saying what he did - it's inflammatory and divisive, and if he'd blamed any other social group for rises in joblessness, we'd be calling for his job. Can we mount a campaign to get him sacked?