Feminism chat for right wingers

[LeslieKnopefan]

Wondered if anyone else who is on the right like myself (see myself as centre right) wanted to chat about feminism.

I noticed there was a chat going for those in the Labour Party and thought it might be nice for anyone else like myself who is on the right but see them self as a feminist.

To introduce myself to begin... I’m in my mid 30s and always been right wing for as long as I can remember and am an active member of the Tory Party. I didn’t until recently see myself as a feminist because I always had negative connotations about the word and felt it wasn’t an issue that effected me.

But now that I’m older I’ve realised that feminism is a broad church and it is an issue that I’m not only interested in but actually there has been times in my life where being a woman has held me back or where I have been judged in a way that a man wouldn’t have been judged.

The areas that I’m currently most interested in are trans issues and how the Conservative party will deal with the many grey areas that trans rights brings with it.

I’m also concerned about the way we raise girls (and boys!!) such as the seperation of toys and the pinkness of everything for girls that we didn’t see when I was growing up. I know myself that I will say to little girls how pretty they look but wouldn’t say that to a boy, I am trying to stop myself saying such things but I realise how ingrained this is.

Finally, an issue that hasn’t really changed since I was growing up is the idea that men that have many sexual partners are great whilst women are sluts or slags. Again, I can’t say I’ve always been innocent of this especially at school where it seemed to be the norm to talk badly of girls who had lost their virginity but not boys.

Anyway that’s enough from me right now. If there is anyone else on the right here who wishes to join in please do :)

If it's a matter of improving wages and female earning power, then what are the Tories doing to make sure male and female earnings are the same for the same jobs?

Equal opportunity is often a fallacy. It's difficult to have equal opportunities when women are criticised for having similar behaviours to men. Or when they get pregnant, while men can't.

How are equal opportunities measured? By equal outcome, even if there are differences in different fields, they should cancel each other out.
So, while there is no equal outcome, you can't say there are equal opportunities. You may have been able to push forward as a woman and get quite far, but you should also ask youself why not enough other women aren't doing the same.

Modern Capitalist nations are some of the least patriarchal nations you can find

There are no pure money economies. They are always embedded to some degree in social obligations and social relations.

Yes.

Which nations are those?

Scandinavian countries are not that capitalist. They have huge social support by comparison.

The US is much more capitalist by comparison and I wouldn't say they are doing much better for women. On the contrary.

@CritEqual I hadn't thought about it in that way before. You have a point.

By that I mean, women's dependence on men being replaced by dependence on the state

If it's a matter of improving wages and female earning power, then what are the Tories doing to make sure male and female earnings are the same for the same jobs?

This is already law. It is literally illegal to pay people differently based on their sex.

And whilst I can already hear people starting to type replies of a "how naive" nature, there's a lot of misinformation spread around wage gaps. If you have an actual example of unequal pay for the same work based on sex you can bring this to court. And that happens.

Two laws that say the same thing brings no advantage.

Or you could look at it as dependant children being reliant on the mother who is present and not the father who is absent.

It depends how you frame things.

Let's look at who the all-important children can and do rely on. And how the absent parents get away with it. What would we say these ambient parents tend to have in common? You know, just take a stab.

The wage gap issue is more than having laws requiring equal pay for the same work.

For a start, salaries are often not publicly known in private companies. Then there's the problem of the definition of equal work.
Then there's how different professions are valued. And why it's women who tend to work part time and have career gaps.

So, yes, naive.

Interestingly, Equal Pay Act 1970, passed under Labour Government.
Superceded by Equality Act 2010, passed again under Labour Government.

Curiously, both not long before general elections won by Conservatives.

Scandinavian countries are not that capitalist. They have huge social support by comparison.

In Scandinavian countries the means of production is overwhelmingly privately owned rather than the State. The so-called "Nordic model" IS free-market capitalism. High vs. low taxes is a different axis to privately owned vs. publicly owned. In some ways Sweden is even more capitalist than countries like the UK. For example private for-profit schools that parents can use state education vouchers to pay fees with. If you consider Capitalism to be an opposite spectrum end to Socialism (which is reasonable) then Scandinavian countries are more capitalist than socialist.

Besides, the contention was that it was hard to imagine anything more patriarchal than free-market capitalism. I listed four systems that exist in the world today that are massively more patriarchal than any capitalist nation so the point is proved.

Also we shouldn't oversimplify and compare say Norway and the USA when there massive social and cultural and historical differences between the two. It's not comparing like for like to attribute sexual equality differences to "capitalism".

Finally, Sweden has seen a massive influx of Islamic immigration in recent years with areas like Husby where women have to be very careful about how they dress, where they can go etc. so the countries have become a great deal more patriarchal than you might be aware of.

For a start, salaries are often not publicly known in private companies. Then there's the problem of the definition of equal work.
Then there's how different professions are valued. And why it's women who tend to work part time and have career gaps.

Well if you're arguing that it's wrong for different professions to be differently valued, you might as well be a paid up member of the Communist party. Arguing that career gaps and part time work shouldn't make a difference is contradicting your own statements that it's equal work and starting to argue something quite different which is that unequal work should be paid the same. Again, I refer you to your local communist cell.

The problem of definition of equal work is a case by case basis for the courts. It is not possible to usefully enshrine definitions of work in law to a level that would resolve this.

Finally, you're demanding that all salaries must be public. That brings a number of problems and is also unnecessary. Under the Equality Act of 2010 any employee may approach their employer on the basis of suspected inequality and the employer is required to respond. If the response is not to the employee's satisfaction they can file a grievance or apply directly to an employment tribunal. There are also provisions for triggering an Equal Pay audit.

Now, I believe you've received a good answer so I'm going to bed. Goodnight, all! .

It's not a good answer, actually.

I wasn't arguing that different professions should be paid the same.
I was pointing out that whereas men and women may be paid the same in the same profession, professions with female majorities tend to be paid less (be less valued) than male majority professions.

I wasn't arguing either that career gaps or part time should be considered as equal to continued or full time work. But, overall, they contribute towards the pay gap between men and women, even if strictly, there is equal pay for equal jobs.

BTW, I know a few excellent people who are paying members of the Communist Party. Even politically active. There are much worse things to be.

The rest is naive.

Employers can easily argue cases for "different jobs", and it's fairly easy to support men over women in some jobs. Think of the networking and bonding at the pub, not to mention strip clubs, in some professions. It's still not easy for women to participate in those. Women still find it more difficult to put on the extra hours that some jobs require.

Then how many employees find it easy to get to court, or even question their employer about salaries?

As you said, it has to be case by case, in court, so it's incredibly difficult to enforce simply by law.

Equal pay for the same work by law certainly does not translate into no pay gap.
And equal opportunities on paper doesn't translate either on equal outcome. And I mean overall.

And if you think a different outcome is ok, I'd ask why? Don't you think that the population should be fairly represented in Parliament? Why is there a male majority when half the population is female? Do you think men are good representatives of women?

One way I was fortunate growing up was having parents that told me I could do and be whatever I wanted. If I had told them I wanted to be a car mechanic they would have been as happy as if I had told them I wanted to be a grid girl.

I believe we need to do more work in ensuring all girls grow up knowing that there aren’t men or women’s jobs but just jobs and with ambition they can reach their goals.

I really believe a female PM helps that, also in Scotland at one point all the leaders of the major parties were women. That is inspiring to me.

Someways my opinions may differ from the left is that I wasn’t against gridgirls - in fact I would like to see grid men too!

I also have friends that work for Hooters and love it and I choose to eat and drink there on a regular basis.

Feminism to me, means giving women the chance to choose to do what they want including these jobs.

Someways my opinions may differ from the left is that I wasn’t against gridgirls - in fact I would like to see grid men too!

I wasn't aware that the existence of gridgirls was a political issue. Was it in the Labour manifesto?

And if you'd like to see grid men too, isn't that an equality proposition? And one that feminists may well agree to? How is that a right wing position?

Scandinavian countries have social democracy. Which is not all out capitalism. Nor all out socialism.

A free market works well for the society because it's cushioned off by high taxes and good social support.

What we are seeing with current western capitalism is increased salary gaps between the top and the bottom jobs. Such inequality is likely to drive social instability. But the top earners have been able to find scapegoats. Mostly immigrants. Instead of greed (see last economic crisis).

Mylovelyhorse is right.
If women are left holding the baby, this less able to avail themselves of the opportunities capitalism affords, surely that is due to the way men behave. The answer is to change that, not shrug our shoulders and say it will never change and the position that women are inevitably more dependent on state support is fixed in stone.

Ps you might want to look a bit at the actual history of communism before concluding that being a member of the communist party is perfectly ok.
Even for mumsnet, that’s a pretty out there statement.

surely that is due to the way men behave. The answer is to change that, not shrug our shoulders

Who's shrugging shoulders?

Yes, therein lies the problem. Hence feminism. :)

But here comes the question again. What has the right done to change men's behaviour?

I wouldn't be a member of the communist party, but I do know people who are and they're good people. Not demons. We just have different ideas about what's best for society.

For me communism is on the same level as pure capitalism. Some interesting ideas, hopefully never in power.

I prefer the middle. Somewhat leaning left.

And what are we to do while men's behaviour doesn't change? Let single women with children starve?

(Ups, sorry, not all of us single women with children need state help. Or any man's help, for that matter )

Oh, and care for the elderly. Guess who tends to fall on? What marvellous caring for the elderly has the right put in place?

Wrt caring for the elderly, TM did propose a pretty progressive idea in the manifesto for those who require nursing homes but was undermined by the left of all things - and inflammatory headlines that misrepresented the proposal.

To be fair though, the poor interpretation was TM's fault as it wasn't briefed at all to her party & when it was briefed it was done in a muddled way.

To be honest I would take communist party membership to be as objectionable as nazi party membership. Communism killed off far more in the 20th century than fascism, and in fact the far right and the far left are essentially the same thing: Namely totalitarian regimes that are collectivist in nature and inflict unimaginable horrors on their own populations in the name of some greater good.

TM did propose a pretty progressive idea in the manifesto for those who require nursing homes but was undermined by the left

I was under the impression she had parliamentary majority.
What was so great about her proposal?

No, I wouldn't consider communism the same as national socialism. Even though communist regimes have been brutal and damaging in many ways, the ideology itself is not comparable. And having experience of a communist party in local government and enabling a left wing government, I really wouldn't compare the far right with the far left.
But thank God they were never able to be in power here.

Just as an aside - I've heard it argued that Thatcher's decimation of the mining industry and other assaults on the working classes meant that a significant number of women went out to work because the men couldn't get jobs. So it subverted the traditional model and women started becoming the financial providers.