If anyone had told the young woman I was in the 70s what very little.......

[seeker]

.......actual progress would have been made in changing attitudes to women in society by 2012, I think I would have jumped off the Forth Bridge.

And page 3 is STILL around????

"my eyes are permanently set to roll."

YY! Sometimes I feel like my eyes will get stuck at the back of my head the amount of eye-rolling I do!!

"And page 3 is STILL around????"

Yeah, but Nonno, it's all about choice doncha know?

Same old crap, just different arguments....

I've never had a problem witn page 3. More that too many women don't force their men to do more at home and more men don't do more at home. The day jmen aren't aroused by breasts the world will die out (unless we've stocked up on frozen sperm I suppose - in theory we only need a handful of men on the planet and could exterminate the rest if we were so inclined).

Don't tempt me, Xenia...

More seriously, the most depressing thing is how many women still collude with it all; how nervous they are about changing things. Reading MN can be very depressing at times.

I quite agree and I don't think you really realise what an issue it is until you have children. I didn't anyway.

All of my friends have taken massive hits to their careers. I have friends who are SAHMs who will spend the minimum possible as they see the money coming in as their DH's. It really depresses me.

I feel that attitudes to whether women work or not is only one part of the issue. And I do think that men are doing more to help women at home now, and happy for them to work outside the home. I have many stong willed friends who don't have careers and are married to well paid men. I guess they are dependent on the man for money and he is dependent on them to run the house and look after the children. If the marriage breaks down then they will obviously have problems financially, but with education and degrees I am sure they would be ok, even if not wealthy.

For me the main issue is how women are still portrayed as sexual beings, only there for their looks. And violence against women is still rife. So many so called role models for girls, like Tulisa and Rhianna, have been in abusive relationships. We still see an older man in a suit presenting TV programmes standing next to a young thin girl with big boobs and in skimpy clothes. pornography is everywhere on the internet, and will change the way teenagers view women. Most men think that prostitutes and women in porn are willing participants, but don't realise that these women are not different to the abused young girls from the news, just a bit older.

It's more fundamental than that though isn't it - there's still a lot of "a person walks into the room" and "a woman walks into the room"

I really notice that reading my dc's story books, if there is an animal/toy/some other creature at the centre of the story it will nearly always be male, because that is the default characteristic of someone/something doing something interesting.

on the 8th June 1913 a horse ran over Emily Davison. Nearly 100 year slater, horses still cant vote, what an absolute travesty

on the 8th June 1913 a horse ran over Emily Davison. Nearly 100 year slater, horses still cant vote, what an absolute travesty

I agree that the development and growth of the porn industry has been a huge setback for feminism, and for women generally.

I think we have greater maternity rights and rights at work, which is good.

We're being very western-centric though. Globally, the plight of women remains largely unchanged. :(

I think things are much worse for women especially girls/young women than in the late 80s 90s and early 00s.

There doesnt seem to be any hope of a better way

Rihanna was involved in a violent relationship, which is bad. But she also gives sexualized musical performances, and that's bad too. In fact domestic violence has always been around, and at least now it's talked about and there's general disapproval of it, so that's progress. But stuff that some female artistes (meaning those who claim to be serious, not strippers) do on stage has got much, much worse. And the protest from the public isn't exactly deafening.

Kim in some respects I think the 70s was external, but in other ways it was more equal in 'all the little things' too. Kids wore bright coloured (or brown) cord dungarees, and played with lego. There were no disney 'girls are princesses who need saving!' or pixar 'boys are buddies and heroes!' films, and their associated branded clothing, toys, bedding, wallpaper, cups, plates, blah blah to infinity and beyond. There was "Free To Be You And Me" and people made an effort to produce 'right on!' stuff for children about equality.

I think I was raised (in my cousins' 70s hand-me-downs) in a much more unisex wardrobe than the clothes available for most children today. And we all know that the clothing you wear affects what you can do - running in heels or strappy sandals and climbing in skirts or frocks is much, much harder than in dungarees and trainers, for example.

TeiTetua Sexualisation doesn't bother me, as long as it's not the only way for female singers to express themselves (which sadly it seems to be at the moment) and if males do it too (which they don't.)

blackcurrants I agree entirely - I remember that most of my clothes (with the exception of 'best' or 'party' outfits - were practical and comfortable. And I barely wore pink.

Most of my dds' clothes are practical and comfortable. Neither of them wear a lot of pink either, although dd2(age 2.5) seems to want to wear pink a fair bit while also choosing boys clothes for other times because they've got dinosaurs on.

I think I may be raising feminists, which is a very good thing. Dd1 has never ever bought into the whole 'pink is for girls' thing and resisted very strongly the peer pressure to like Bratz, High School Musical, Glee, Disney Princesses, ballet, horses, etc. She also has very high aspirations for her later life, she's debating between wanting to be a doctor, scientist or author - she's never felt limited in her career choices in the slightest. Then again, neither did I, it wasn't my gender that stopped me being a high flier, it was my innate laziness.

I do think people are right about it being internalised pressures that are most prevalent now. I desperately want to stay at home with my babies even though I have a decent career, and dp doesn't want to stay at home with them even though we would be better off financially if he did. Those are the internalised pressures coming into play in my household as we do seem to have been conditioned to want our gender-stereotyped roles. Not housework though, I don't do much, he does far more housework than I do because I am happy living as a slob

I could describe every one of my dresses from when I was about 3. Because there were only two or three a year, and they were for best qnd parties. And I remember one pink one!

So do I seeker. My clothes were mostly hand-me-downs from my brother though. My dds don't have that issue as their clothes are mostly hand-me-downs from their female cousins. I do give away the dresses to friends because my girls prefer comfort, give them leggings, tracksuits or jeans and they're happy.

frankie4 - I do think that men are doing more to help women at home now, and happy for them to work outside the home - I don't think you meant this to come across as it does to me, which is that men are doing women a favour by 'helping' them with their housework and graciously allowing them to work. Men don't control what we do. Housework is not our job.

I agree with Xenia's position that we should all be the chairman of ICI (we'd need a big chair) only insofar as you see on MN far, far too frequently women trapped in bad or abusive relationships because they have no money of their own in order to escape. I would guess elsewhere on the internet you could read more frequently of the reverse, men trapped in bad relationships because the other partner controls all the cash. We need a better solution to this problem, a genuine way of supporting choice. And this must be for both women and men. It is socially more acceptable for Yahoo to hire a pregnant CEO than it would be for a male CEO to take 2 years off to look after a child.

But the main battle I think we face now is to get the fact that there even is a battle recognised. I'm sure there are many who think the fact there are a few Flash adverts with men wiping up in them is evidence enough that this battle is won.

I have noticed that girls today almost always have long hair or at least shoulder length. If I think back to my group of female friends at secondary school I would have said it was 50/50 short hair/long hair. There seems a lot more emphasis nowadays in girls looking "feminine".

I can only remember having 3 dresses growing up, seeker, and they were for parties/best. However, I did go to a school where I had to wear a skirt so being able to wear trousers is a definite improvement.

I agree with all the frustrating things, particulary the growth of the porn industry etc BUT

Don't underestimate the huge pogress in attitudes that have happened in the last 40 years. Women earning enough to stay single if they choose too, women organising varied and interesting social lives (don't forget women in the 70s DID NOT go into pubs on their own!), women sharing domestic duties (my father nearly fell apart laughing in 1975 when my mother asked if he wouldn't mind running the hoover round - needless to say he dined out on that story for years and still, to this day, has no idea how to plug the thing in), domestic violence taken seriously (well, at least more seriously - remember all those 70s actors like Sean Connery and Denis Waterman who thought the odd slap was necessary to keep the wife in line), the phrase THE WIFE - how I hated my dad using that phrase, I genuinely don't hear it so often these days, women taking on proper roles in all the careers they choose to go into eg women in the police doing all the jobs rather than desk jobs, women firefighters, the change in terminology from WPC to police officer or headmaster/mistress to headteacher etc, women on the news (OK they are not allowed grey hairs but at least they are there, they weren't in 1970), women choosing when to have families, women breasfeeding in public..........

it's not perfect but it's certainly progress!