Seeds of Wisdom: "Perceived truth is more powerful than truth itself." -- Unkown
I started to respond to Shelley's (BurningBird) latest blurb in her comments, but I saw that I was going to ramble on for too long, so I'm responding here instead.
daveski(@adelphia.net) wrote:
"Women constitute about 51% of the adult population in this country. Are they 51% of the federal legislature? Are they 51% of the working IS population? NO! Are there conscious efforts made to keep the status quo in certain spheres? CERTAINLY"
Not to mention that men generally get paid more than women do for the same type of job. I don't have the stats handy, but concrete evidence exists to substantiate this statement.
Let me tell you some tales of male bias - men who firmly believe that women are not up to the task and so should be kept barefoot and pregnant ...
Early in my working life, one of my bosses came to me and asked me to type a letter for him. Being not secure enough at the time to tell him, "go jump in a lake. Typing is not in my job description," I told him, "Okay, but I hope you don't need it in a hurry."
He asked why.
I told him, "Because I can operate a typewriter, but I can't type." He looked aghast. "What do you mean you can't type?" he asked. "All women can type."
I smiled sweetly in an attempt to mask the grinding of my teeth, and replied, "No, only the ones who took typing in school. I didn't."
He stalked off in search of a more "normal" woman who could type, grumbling in his wake that there ought to be a law requiring schools to teach women to type.
I had another boss who insisted that the women working for him all take turns making him coffee. I refused, and the only reason I got away with it is because he was at least smart enough to realize that I was very good at my job. A job - btw - that required considerable math - something he wasn't very good at <g>
Further along, I worked for a time in the heating and a/c business. Basically, I did customer service and order entry (still can't type, but I'm a whiz on a keyboard <g>).
Being the curious kat that I am, and somewhat mechanically inclined, I learned a lot about the products and how they worked. I could easily answer many of the technical questions as long as they didn't have to do with electrical wiring - my mind can't deal with the concept of electricity for some reason.
One customer called in with a simple question about how the system operated. He listened patiently, then said, "Thanks honey, but I'd rather speak to one of the men."
Furious, I transferred him over to one of the guys who told him the exact same thing I had said. Only then did he accepted the explanation as valid.
Same company. The owner took all the women out for lunch on Secretaries Day, despite the fact that we didn't have a secretary in the company. He also said he wouldn't hire a woman (or promote one of several qualified women from within the company) to customer service manager because "women don't have the balls to do the job."
If I had a dollar for each time I have told computer tech support people or auto repair people about a problem, only to have them discount what I've said, I'd be rich. My husband calls - tells them the same thing, and they trip over themselves trying to help him.
And guys ... dress up in a wig and a dress, and then try to buy a car. See how you get treated. Car salesmen are among the worst!
Some social stuff ...
My sister lived in Maryland for awhile - a transplant from NJ where the men hide their chauvinism for the most part
The men would get together and go "pillaging" - basically going to bars, hanging out and getting drunk. Why they called it "pillaging" I have no idea. Guess they thought it sounded "manly," or more exciting than it was. The women were expected to stay home cooking or cleaning or something ::batting eyelashes:: feminine.
My sister quickly tired of this and enlisted some of her women friends to have a girls' night of "pillaging" as well. Her friends asked, "but what will we do?" She told them that it didn't make any difference what they did, so long as they gave the guys a taste of their own medicine.
Her husband and the husbands of her friends spent the whole night trying to find out where they were and what they were doing. Convinced that the women were all just hiding out in one of their houses, they went from house to house in search of their wives. Needless to say, they didn't find them.
Drove them nuts that none of the wives would tell them where they had been or what they had done. But that was the first and only time the women got to go "pillaging."
Another time, my husband and I were down visiting her. We - my sister, my husband and I - had been out antiquing with one of her friends. When we dropped her friend off at her home, we saw that my sister's husband was there. Her friend invited us in.
Inside, we found the friend's husband sitting in a big old chair with his feet up, chatting with my sister's husband. We said, "hello," and found ourselves seats.
The friend's husband grunted, "Git us some beers." No hello. No please.
The friend obediently got up and headed for the kitchen. When she returned, she handed her husband, my husband and my sister's husband each a beer. She then turned to us and said, "I'm sorry girls, I'm all out of soda."
Kind of puzzled by that statement, I said, "That's okay. I'll have a beer."
She looked at me astounded. I checked to see if I'd grown another head or something. Then she said, "The beer is for the men."
Boggled my mind.
In all fairness, men are at fault for planting these seeds in the first place, but too many women perpetuate the myth. Maybe they find it easier, I don't know.
Mostly I consider myself a feminist with a sense of humor. I don't get all riled up because those things in the road are called "man-hole covers," and the like. But I do get riled up when I'm treated like a second class citizen or I'm paid less for the same job or same type of job. And I really get riled up when I'm treated as less intelligent because of my gender.
I see far too many women who find it convenient or easier to appear helpless.
At one job - a mail order house - we had gotten in the new edition of our catalog. Each employee was given one as a reference and also because we could order at a discount. I'd handed out all of the ones I'd been given, but I was short of what I needed. I went over to the store room and found the cartons of catalogs. I moved one to see how heavy it was, and determined that I could lift it. As I came down the hall, one of my female co-workers said, "You shouldn't be carrying that. Get one of the men to do it."
I said, "It's not that heavy. I can handle it." She scowled at me and said, "But you're making it bad for the rest of us." I quite felt like throwing the carton at her, but I resisted.
When I first started working for that particular company, they were about to move their offices to another location. The VP of our areas paired up all the managers and directed us to tag all the furniture with the department name so that the movers would know where it belonged. All the tags had to go in the upper right hand corner, so it frequently meant we had to move the furniture around. I was partnered with one of the guys and we set out on our task.
At the end of a long hard day, we were sitting around one of the offices having a much needed break. My male partner - remember, I was new so he didn't know me very well - said, "I'd like to say something by I don't want you to take it the wrong way."
I laughed and said, "Okay."
Clearly nervous, he said, "It's really a complement. I want you to know that."
Again I laughed. I said, "Just say it already!"
He said, "You work like a man."
I had to laugh and I did take it as a complement.
He went on to explain that he thought when he saw that he'd been paired with a woman that he thought he'd have to do all the hard work like moving the furniture around so we could slap the labels on the upper right corners. Never occurred to me to stand around helpless while he did all the work. I simply pitched in and moved furniture right along with him.
Women like the one in the anecdote above, are just as much to blame for furthering the notion that women can't handle what needs to be done - mentally and physically. So those of you who are sitting around pretending to be helpless, get off your butts and do your share.
Men and women are different. There's no doubt about that. But not all men can fix a car. Not all men are good at sports. And not all men refuse to ask for directions. <g> And not all men are chauvinist "pigs."
Just as all women are not incapable of lifting heavy objects or doing the math or hooking up the computer. We're not all helpless and we're not all bra-burning feminists either. We all need to shuck the stereotypes we seem to cling to so ardently and so unreasonably.
As far as Blogsisters, I agree with Meryl Yourish when she writes, "Blogsisters is sexist. Is it hypocritical? No, because its theme isn't sexism. It may touch upon it, but it wasn't started as any kind of reaction to sexism in the blogging world."
I also agree with her idea that Blogsisters is, "A more public version of 'Girls' night out.'" When we're lounging around and letting our hair down, it's girls only - sorry guys <g> I also understand that there are times when you feel the same.
Though I was inclined to join my sister bloggers, I didn't for the same Meryl gave. - I simply don't have the time to do justice to two blogs. I see no harm in it. though. Women need to commune with their own gender in the same manner that men do.
The harm comes when either gender is excluded so that the included gender can maintain some hold on the power structure. That may not be the original intention of "men's clubs." or the "old boy network," but too often that becomes an important function - consciously or sub-consciously - nonetheless.
Dave Winer wrote, "If you want to be treated with respect, start by giving it." That goes for both sides of the equation.
Happy St. Patrick's Day All!
Posted by Cyberkat at March 17, 2002 11:16 AM | TrackBack