Posted                         

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Also the idea that feminism has only happened because men have allowed it is so fucking offensive I don't know how to even respond to it.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Also the idea that feminism has only happened because men have allowed it is so **** offensive I don't know how to even respond to it.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by Boogie:
The thing I wish we all had is choice in the matter, but there's very little of that around, sadly.

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The whole point of permitting feminist ideas to spread through society is to get women into the workforce. If women had a real choice not to enter the workforce it would negate that point.

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Posted                       

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Also the idea that feminism has only happened because men have allowed it is so **** offensive I don't know how to even respond to it.

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Not men in general (men in general have no power over such things) just the rich and powerful.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Also the idea that feminism has only happened because men have allowed it is so **** offensive I don't know how to even respond to it.

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Not men in general (men in general have no power over such things) just the rich and powerful.

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Men by and large ARE the rich and powerful.

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Posted                       

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Also the idea that feminism has only happened because men have allowed it is so **** offensive I don't know how to even respond to it.

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Not men in general (men in general have no power over such things) just the rich and powerful.

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Men by and large ARE the rich and powerful.

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The rich and powerful are disproportionately male. However the vast majority of men are neither rich nor powerful. Those men who are rich and powerful are, of course, not part of the workforce rather they are the people who employ the workforce. Therefore they obviously benefit from having a greatly expanded workforce.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Men as a gender are also in a position of power, ie the patriarchy. The patriarchy's existence is a fairly basic aspect of feminism - if you do not believe in the patriarchy then it is rather pointless (and pretty offensive) to talk about why feminism has happened.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
Men 'as a gender' though do not have power.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by no prophet:
To become as feminist as a man might, having daughters motivates. Though if you don't love them, perhaps it is avoidable.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Firenze:
Even in our wonderful, enlightened Western world I, or any woman, could give you a history of discouragement, restriction and harassment that says: Not for you. You don't own this.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by Firenze:
Even in our wonderful, enlightened Western world I, or any woman, could give you a history of discouragement, restriction and harassment that says: Not for you. You don't own this.

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If you are not one of the wealthy elite then you 'don't own this'. That's true whether you are male or female.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Firenze:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by Firenze:
Even in our wonderful, enlightened Western world I, or any woman, could give you a history of discouragement, restriction and harassment that says: Not for you. You don't own this.

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If you are not one of the wealthy elite then you 'don't own this'. That's true whether you are male or female.

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I was carrying on from my previous paragraph - about public (as in outside the home) life and public space. If, for example, you've not had a lifetime of feigning deep interest in the other side of the street every time you pass two or more members of the opposite sex - and even so, receiving derogatory or obscene remarks - then you aren't aware of gender privilege.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by orfeo:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
However the great majority of people would quit their jobs if freed from financial necessity.

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And then, in about 6 months, they would slowly realise that they are getting bored out of their bloody minds.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
Firstly if you are receiving those kind of remarks every time (or even much of the time) that you go out then you are living in a bad neighbourhood.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Firenze:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
Firstly if you are receiving those kind of remarks every time (or even much of the time) that you go out then you are living in a bad neighbourhood.

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All and every kind of neighbourhood including leafy suburb. Until I achieved the invisibility of old age.

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Posted                          

quote:

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Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:

quote:

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Originally posted by orfeo:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
However the great majority of people would quit their jobs if freed from financial necessity.

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And then, in about 6 months, they would slowly realise that they are getting bored out of their bloody minds.

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False. My Dad retired a decade ago, hasn't worked a single second since, and as far as I can tell is less bored with his life than he was when he was turning up at the office every day.

I can't understand the view that being able to do the things you want to do rather than the things your boss wants you to do would be boring.

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Posted                       

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
I should ask on average how frequently would you hear such obscene remarks when living in leafy suburbs?

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Posted                       

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
A couple of points to make. Firstly if you are receiving those kind of remarks every time (or even much of the time) that you go out then you are living in a bad neighbourhood.

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Posted                       

quote:

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Originally posted by Firenze:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
Firstly if you are receiving those kind of remarks every time (or even much of the time) that you go out then you are living in a bad neighbourhood.

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All and every kind of neighbourhood including leafy suburb. Until I achieved the invisibility of old age.

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Posted                          

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by no prophet:
To become as feminist as a man might, having daughters motivates. Though if you don't love them, perhaps it is avoidable.

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I think that there is more to feminism than that. Jade Constable is saying, and I would tend to agree, that in order to be a feminist one has to believe that 'the patriarchy' exists. Your statement implies that if someone disagrees with feminism then they are agreeing that the patriarchy exists and they are defending it. That simply does not follow.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by North East Quine:

quote:

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Originally posted by Firenze:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
Firstly if you are receiving those kind of remarks every time (or even much of the time) that you go out then you are living in a bad neighbourhood.

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All and every kind of neighbourhood including leafy suburb. Until I achieved the invisibility of old age.

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Just before Christmas I was in a busy and affluent shopping mall. One of the Army charities - not Help for Heroes - had been allowed to set up a stall selling some sort of fundraising item. Two young men in Army uniform were on the stall and presumably thought they were trying to attract custom by "banter" - even I, fat, frumpy and nearly 50, merited an "Oi! darlin' OI! DARLIN'!" Woman after woman was doing that stiffening up, hunching shoulders, taking great interest in the floor thing. The men were completely oblivious to the repeated signs of discomfort and unease they were generating. Completely oblivious to the fact that no-one was coming near their stall, and women were changing direction to avoid them.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

Its got nothing to do with 'patriarchy', its simply the way that such unpleasant people display their unpleasant personalities differently to either sex.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Tommy1, reread what you just wrote. The men you speak of would be behaving obnoxiously to other men--IN A TOTALLY DIFFERENT ENVIRONMENT. I have yet to see a man cat-called in a shopping mall, or propositioned on the street of the leafy suburbs.

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quote:

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I have never in all my working career heard a man on management level described as "too aggressive," no matter what his management style, though it's a rare woman on management level who doesn't get this on a regular basis.

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quote:

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I have never seen a man called "sweetie" and "darling" at a car repair shop, while simultaneously being told that the engine will have to be yanked at a cost of at least $500 dollars--and warned of dire consequences to life and limb when he insists on getting a second opinion--only to take it across the street to a decent fellow who points to an ill-fitting hose and says, "See that? you could fix it yourself, no problem."

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quote:

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A few years ago I had the privilege of explaining to my nephew just what goes through the mind of a woman every time she leaves a well-lit building to walk to her car far out in the parking lot. It's a litany: Stand up straight and look confident; is anybody in the shadows over there? Walk quickly but don't look afraid; hold your keys in your fist so the sharp bit faces outward, in case you need to slash someone; and always check the backseat before you get in the freakin' car.

My nephew flat out refused to believe me, even though all the other women present confirmed what I told him. But for us, it's so automatic we don't even feel the fear anymore. Fear has become business as usual.

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Posted                       

quote:

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Originally posted by Belle Ringer:
About (white) men being "rich and powerful" - most aren't, most never were. But back when (in USA) job ads were segregated by men only or women only (or occasionally both) and I wanted a "management trainee" type of job, the people in charge of hiring - all of them men but not rich or powerful by any measure except being in charge of hiring - explained to me they won't hire a woman because "she'll get married and quit the job."

The ideal is a new worker who will stick around for many years, the worse case is the worker you throw a lot of training into and just when they are finally useful they quit, you've wasted all that investment.

In an era when wives (of a certain economic class) were socially pressured to stay home even if they didn't have children, hiring a woman seemed a waste of corporate resources. The low level hiring guy would have to explain to his boss, who would have to report to his rich and powerful big boss - why the unusual hire was good for the company. For the little guy the risk of damaging his own career by bucking the social system was too big.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by M.:
I don't recall encountering the type of behaviour many women are discussing here, so please don't believe all women feel the same.

M.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:
I still would find it dull and tedious and wouldn't want to do it. Why is that unacceptable?

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Its perfectly acceptable. What needs to be remembered is that for the huge majority of both men and women their paid employment is dull and tedious and they don't want to do it. I'm sorry to have to labour this point but its crucial for understanding the whole issue.

Why has feminism been permitted to flourish in the years since the Second World War? Its because employers want there to be as many women as possible in the workforce. What was initially presented as choice has for most now become a necessity.

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Posted                       

quote:

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Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:
There should be much better (and more affordable) childcare provision,

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You can have good or cheap - pick one.

Let's look at some numbers. For under fives, you want one competent adult per 4 or 5 children. Let's say 5.

Then if you want childcare, you have to pay for 20% of a person's salary per child. But there are overheads - even if the full cost of childcare is tax-deductible, so you can pay for it out of your gross income, you still have to pay employers' NI, an allowance for replacement staff to cover vacation, maternity and sick leave, insurance premiums, heat, light and rent for the childcare facility, legal and secretarial costs, advertising and so on. A factor of 2.5 for total overheads seems to be in reasonably common use, so you're actually going to have to pay 50% of a person's salary per child in childcare.

Right there, we see that if you have two young children, and your earning potential is similar to that of the kind of person you'd like to look after your children, it makes absolutely no financial sense for you to pay for childcare. Equally, it makes no financial sense for the state to subsidize your childcare.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Erroneous Monk:
That's where, if you expect your earning capacity to increase in the future, you take the pain of working now, even though, after childcare, you don't have a lot of money left. Then when you no longer need the most expensive kind of childcare, you're still on the career ladder with the earning power to start actually paying your debts.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Uh, hello? who mentioned sex crimes? A woman walking alone in a parking lot is not primarily concerned with rape. She is concerned with violence period--of any form. Really not sure why you dturned the conversation to rape.

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quote:

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As for my first point, I'm afraid you missed it again. I am saying that men who behave obnoxiously will do so MORE OFTEN in MORE SETS OF CIRCUMSTANCES to women than they will to men.

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quote:

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You seem to think that bad behavior to men in the pub balances bad behavior to women in the shopping mall. It does not. The same men who treat other men badly in the pub are also treating the women in the pub badly. Get it? The decent men get the shaft maybe half the time--at the pub, but not in the shopping mall. The women get it ALL the time. Because no matter where we go, we are "fair game."

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Posted                      

quote:

---

Originally posted by ken:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

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Originally posted by Jade Constable:
I still would find it dull and tedious and wouldn't want to do it. Why is that unacceptable?

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Its perfectly acceptable. What needs to be remembered is that for the huge majority of both men and women their paid employment is dull and tedious and they don't want to do it. I'm sorry to have to labour this point but its crucial for understanding the whole issue.

Why has feminism been permitted to flourish in the years since the Second World War? Its because employers want there to be as many women as possible in the workforce. What was initially presented as choice has for most now become a necessity.

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Ahh. You made a perfectly sensible point in your first paragraph and then you went and spoiled it all with some elitist misogynistic Tory drivel.

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Posted                      

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Belle Ringer:
About (white) men being "rich and powerful" - most aren't, most never were. But back when (in USA) job ads were segregated by men only or women only (or occasionally both) and I wanted a "management trainee" type of job, the people in charge of hiring - all of them men but not rich or powerful by any measure except being in charge of hiring - explained to me they won't hire a woman because "she'll get married and quit the job."

The ideal is a new worker who will stick around for many years, the worse case is the worker you throw a lot of training into and just when they are finally useful they quit, you've wasted all that investment.

In an era when wives (of a certain economic class) were socially pressured to stay home even if they didn't have children, hiring a woman seemed a waste of corporate resources. The low level hiring guy would have to explain to his boss, who would have to report to his rich and powerful big boss - why the unusual hire was good for the company. For the little guy the risk of damaging his own career by bucking the social system was too big.

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By men being powerful I meant men as a gender forming the patriarchy, not individual men being in power.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
without seeing statistics it would be difficult to verify that.

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Posted                       

quote:

---

Originally posted by Tommy1:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:

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Originally posted by Belle Ringer:
About (white) men being "rich and powerful" - most aren't, most never were. But back when (in USA) job ads were segregated by men only or women only (or occasionally both) and I wanted a "management trainee" type of job, the people in charge of hiring - all of them men but not rich or powerful by any measure except being in charge of hiring - explained to me they won't hire a woman because "she'll get married and quit the job."

The ideal is a new worker who will stick around for many years, the worse case is the worker you throw a lot of training into and just when they are finally useful they quit, you've wasted all that investment.

In an era when wives (of a certain economic class) were socially pressured to stay home even if they didn't have children, hiring a woman seemed a waste of corporate resources. The low level hiring guy would have to explain to his boss, who would have to report to his rich and powerful big boss - why the unusual hire was good for the company. For the little guy the risk of damaging his own career by bucking the social system was too big.

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By men being powerful I meant men as a gender forming the patriarchy, not individual men being in power.

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Men 'as a gender' don't form anything. How do men form 'the patriarchy'?

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Posted                          

quote:

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Originally posted by Desert Daughter:
I am at risk of making many an enemy with this post... but here goes: women who think they are entitled to a great career while having children at the same time have got it wrong. Their children will invariably pay the price. One cannot "have it all".

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quote:

---

Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:

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Originally posted by Anglican't:
We seem to have a society now - in some quarters at least - where the idea of being in work is seen as somehow better and more rewarding than staying at home and looking after children. Perhaps we should work towards de-stigmatising stay-at-home mothers and support them? I suspect we have something to learn from the Germans here.

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That's because working and interacting with adults generally is better and more rewarding than watching Cbeebies and singing nursery rhymes.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by goperryrevs:

I hate the idea of people having to 'choose' between their kids and their work, and I think it's inaccurate. I personally don't see how any parent could choose work over their kids. I mean, I love my job, but love for my own child dwarfs that to insignificance. However, of course, that doesn't mean that parents shouldn't work and shouldn't also gain meaning and joy from a career; that career is also what is helping them provide for their children.

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A good, balanced point well made.

Having my career made me a better person for my children to be with. I'm useless at home - now that I'm semi-retired still I don't do home making. Mr Boogs does all the cooking etc. It simply isn't me. But my love for my boys is a lasting, enduring love - there is no career that I could love more than them. I just happen to think my love for them didn't preclude having a career too.

My SIL had the kids then the career. She went to the same university as her daughter and became a midwife. She then had many happy years working and retired aged 65. But she had her children very young. I couldn't do that as we struggled for ten years to conceive. But, just because I dearly wanted to have babies doesn't mean I wanted to be with them 24/7! Some women are simply not cut out for it. Now give me a puppy ...

(My friend had five children, then when they were all at school got a puppy. She said "If I'd have got the puppy first I'd never have had the kids - much more rewarding. Pups want to please you, children want to please themselves! )

[ 13. January 2014, 15:55: Message edited by: Boogie ]

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Garden. Room. Walk

Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
Please explain why you think my second paragraph is elitist or misogynist or Tory? It is none of those things.

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Posted                      

quote:

---

Originally posted by ken:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
Please explain why you think my second paragraph is elitist or misogynist or Tory? It is none of those things.

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There's no conservative as conservative as one who doesn't even notice they are.

Anyway, just look at the reaction the women posting here have to what you are saying. Really.

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quote:

---

Why has feminism been permitted to flourish in the years since the Second World War? Its because employers want there to be as many women as possible in the workforce. What was initially presented as choice has for most now become a necessity.

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Posted                      

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
Men 'as a gender' don't form anything. How do men form 'the patriarchy'?

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By society being structured to benefit men and disadvantage women.

The patriarchy's existence is entry-level feminism, you might like to Google this next time.

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Posted                      

quote:

---

Originally posted by Firenze:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Tommy1:
without seeing statistics it would be difficult to verify that.

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Talking of statistics, have you formulated your response to the one I quoted some time ago - 'Women perform 66 % of the world's work, produce 50% of the food, but earn 10% of the income and own 1% of the property'. (UN Women)?

Or do you find it easier to repeat variations on (essentially) Huh! Sez you!

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
As I said before its difficult for me to comment on this. Most societies are outside the West and have very difference social structures, economic structures and political structures from ourselves and from one another. If you gave some stats from a particular country I could have a look at that and comment. Perhaps you could give some stats from the West that might help the discussion.

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Posted                      

quote:

---

Originally posted by Firenze:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Tommy1:
As I said before its difficult for me to comment on this. Most societies are outside the West and have very difference social structures, economic structures and political structures from ourselves and from one another. If you gave some stats from a particular country I could have a look at that and comment. Perhaps you could give some stats from the West that might help the discussion.

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You have been disputing the reality of gender privilege: I have given you a planet-sized instance of it.

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quote:

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When I or other posters speak from first hand on the lived experience of that, your response has been to reject the validity of our testimony.

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quote:

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We were untypical or unlucky or we had no worse than anyone else.

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quote:

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I see no reason to assume that you would give any more credence to some statistical representation.

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Posted                      

quote:

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Originally posted by Tommy1:
We don't live in a planet sized society.

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