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highlyeccentricWomen's Honi successfully reminded me of why I avoid activists in general and feminists in particular.
ed for the uninitiated: Honi Soit is the Sydney Uni SRC paper.
1.
2.
3.
Here Endeth The Rant. [/rant]
ed for the uninitiated: Honi Soit is the Sydney Uni SRC paper.
1.
I admit it. I'm one of those terrible people who think a 'Women's Edition' is daft. Not because i think it's unessecary to discuss 'women's issues'. But I have a problem with
-the fact that these issues are presented as 'women's issues'. This gives the impression that they only concern women. Like the only reason a man should care about high rates of violence about women is because women are jumping up and down about it. Violence against anyone should be everyone's concern, and if particular sectors of society are vulnerable then it should be everyone's 'issue'.
these 'women's issues' are just as demeaning to men, really. If a man only gets a job because he's a man (as opposed to female candidates), what does that say about his skills? If a culture accepts violence agaisnt women, it is also a culture in which it's accepted that men can only express themselves through violence; all this business about men thinking of nothing but sex, men sorting out problems (with each other or with women) through violence just because that's what men do is as much part of what i've heard called a 'repressive cult of masculinity' as it is part of the culture of denegration of women.
-while it is argued that we still need 'women's editions' and the like because these problems are still prevalent in society, we've been having that sort of thing for a while now. Isn't progress about moving forward? Honi has the report of the women's officers every week, but why are these diatribes about rape, women in the workplace, etc, saved up for the women's edition? Are they so unimportant to the general populace that we need a whole edition to get people to care? If that is so, that's a sad state of affairs. Not that removing the women's edition would necessarily be a step forward; but if ever have a feminist rant I'm sending it to the regular Honi first.
-the fact that these issues are presented as 'women's issues'. This gives the impression that they only concern women. Like the only reason a man should care about high rates of violence about women is because women are jumping up and down about it. Violence against anyone should be everyone's concern, and if particular sectors of society are vulnerable then it should be everyone's 'issue'.
these 'women's issues' are just as demeaning to men, really. If a man only gets a job because he's a man (as opposed to female candidates), what does that say about his skills? If a culture accepts violence agaisnt women, it is also a culture in which it's accepted that men can only express themselves through violence; all this business about men thinking of nothing but sex, men sorting out problems (with each other or with women) through violence just because that's what men do is as much part of what i've heard called a 'repressive cult of masculinity' as it is part of the culture of denegration of women.
-while it is argued that we still need 'women's editions' and the like because these problems are still prevalent in society, we've been having that sort of thing for a while now. Isn't progress about moving forward? Honi has the report of the women's officers every week, but why are these diatribes about rape, women in the workplace, etc, saved up for the women's edition? Are they so unimportant to the general populace that we need a whole edition to get people to care? If that is so, that's a sad state of affairs. Not that removing the women's edition would necessarily be a step forward; but if ever have a feminist rant I'm sending it to the regular Honi first.
2.
The assumption touted by femists everywhere is that work = liberation and home life/ motherhood = patriarchy. This really annoys me.
There was a Radar article a while back on the growth of religious piety amongst today's youth. A Barnies congregation member told the interviewer that, when she'd explain in a tute that she had a deep desire to be a mother, a Rabid Feminist stood up and told her to get out of the room and that she was not fit to be at university.
I myself have had to fight not to be horrified by high school girls who seem to have no career aims beyond marriage and motherhood. These girls aren't just the product of religious brainwashing, though. Of the two greatest examples of this type I know, one is a fervent pentecostal christian. She has aims aside from motherhood- she wants to become a worship leader and a Christian recording artist. Are these goals less admirable because she wants to be a mother first? The other such woman I knew was an avowed atheist; she wanted to, and I believe she did, marry her boyfriend, work on her family property and sell handmade furniture she and her boyfriend made. It's not that Beth and Tash have no aims in life; it simply doesn't mean tertiary training and a 9-5 job, and motherhood was top on their agenda. (And isn't that a better environment for kids than being rushed to and from childcare for the first years of life?)
Sass' article in Honi this week complained that the government was 'paying women to get out of the workplace and back into the maternity ward'.
Now, I've read Marion Maddox. I'm not silly enough to think that the Howard Government isn't favouring male-income families. If you're in a low income bracket it's actually financially beneficial for mum to stay at home and breed like a rabbit. I believe you're even assessed for tax by dividing the husband's income in two- an excellent way to go down a tax bracket. Certainly, this is a problem that needs to be addressed.
But what I object to is the idea that a woman should not stay at home with her children. My mother indoctrinated me well (she probably began this during the decade or so she stayed at home to raise my brother and I). One of the most important reasons children are not high on my list of goals is that I firmly believe children should be raised in the home until school age, and I suspect I'd go mad. Of course in todays world a man should be able to stay home, and should feel as much obliged to do so as women. But logistically speaking, in any future I envisage I have either no career, or something very flexible, ergo it would make sense for that to fall on me. Anyway, I digress.
Why can a woman not chose to make motherhood her career? Is raising children somehow less worthy of her time than corporate bastardry?
If it's disgraceful that the government is bribing women out of the workforce, isn't it just as disgraceful that many mothers, particularly single mothers, are forced into the workforce as soon as their youngest child reaches a given age, and that that age is getting lower by the day? If a mother opts out of paid employment because government subsidies and tax cuts make unemployment a better option, does that mean that another women who choses to leave the workforce in order to become a mother should not recieve income support to allow her to carry out this choice? Perhaps we ought to look at the low pay rates which make the first woman's employment impractical, or at the lack of support for struggling two-income families. But in supporting a woman's right to make her own choices, ALL options need to be included.
Until it is acceptable for anyone, mother or father, to stay at home to care for children, until the day a human being is no longer defined by his or her choices in paid employment, equality is only equal rights to the rat race. The roots of this cause lie both in the established order of things and in the attitudes of those who are pushing for change.
There was a Radar article a while back on the growth of religious piety amongst today's youth. A Barnies congregation member told the interviewer that, when she'd explain in a tute that she had a deep desire to be a mother, a Rabid Feminist stood up and told her to get out of the room and that she was not fit to be at university.
I myself have had to fight not to be horrified by high school girls who seem to have no career aims beyond marriage and motherhood. These girls aren't just the product of religious brainwashing, though. Of the two greatest examples of this type I know, one is a fervent pentecostal christian. She has aims aside from motherhood- she wants to become a worship leader and a Christian recording artist. Are these goals less admirable because she wants to be a mother first? The other such woman I knew was an avowed atheist; she wanted to, and I believe she did, marry her boyfriend, work on her family property and sell handmade furniture she and her boyfriend made. It's not that Beth and Tash have no aims in life; it simply doesn't mean tertiary training and a 9-5 job, and motherhood was top on their agenda. (And isn't that a better environment for kids than being rushed to and from childcare for the first years of life?)
Sass' article in Honi this week complained that the government was 'paying women to get out of the workplace and back into the maternity ward'.
Now, I've read Marion Maddox. I'm not silly enough to think that the Howard Government isn't favouring male-income families. If you're in a low income bracket it's actually financially beneficial for mum to stay at home and breed like a rabbit. I believe you're even assessed for tax by dividing the husband's income in two- an excellent way to go down a tax bracket. Certainly, this is a problem that needs to be addressed.
But what I object to is the idea that a woman should not stay at home with her children. My mother indoctrinated me well (she probably began this during the decade or so she stayed at home to raise my brother and I). One of the most important reasons children are not high on my list of goals is that I firmly believe children should be raised in the home until school age, and I suspect I'd go mad. Of course in todays world a man should be able to stay home, and should feel as much obliged to do so as women. But logistically speaking, in any future I envisage I have either no career, or something very flexible, ergo it would make sense for that to fall on me. Anyway, I digress.
Why can a woman not chose to make motherhood her career? Is raising children somehow less worthy of her time than corporate bastardry?
If it's disgraceful that the government is bribing women out of the workforce, isn't it just as disgraceful that many mothers, particularly single mothers, are forced into the workforce as soon as their youngest child reaches a given age, and that that age is getting lower by the day? If a mother opts out of paid employment because government subsidies and tax cuts make unemployment a better option, does that mean that another women who choses to leave the workforce in order to become a mother should not recieve income support to allow her to carry out this choice? Perhaps we ought to look at the low pay rates which make the first woman's employment impractical, or at the lack of support for struggling two-income families. But in supporting a woman's right to make her own choices, ALL options need to be included.
Until it is acceptable for anyone, mother or father, to stay at home to care for children, until the day a human being is no longer defined by his or her choices in paid employment, equality is only equal rights to the rat race. The roots of this cause lie both in the established order of things and in the attitudes of those who are pushing for change.
3.
The idea that rape is something that only happens to women is preposterous. Yes, women do make up a majority. But as long as the discussion on rape is limited to the way men treat women, there is a neglected group of men who are suffering- not to mention victims of domestic violence in lesbian relationships, on whom there was an article in UR last year.
The idea that only women have body image problems is likewise blinkered; again, women are a majority, but while we dominate discourse on the issue, the numbers of men with eating disorders and the like is growing.
Yes, there needs to be discussion on these issues, yes women as a majority of sufferers deserve special attention. But as long as these problems are percived as problems only for women, we're propagating a discourse of vitimised women and masochistic men. Significant minorities get attention in all other aspects of society- why not here?
The idea that only women have body image problems is likewise blinkered; again, women are a majority, but while we dominate discourse on the issue, the numbers of men with eating disorders and the like is growing.
Yes, there needs to be discussion on these issues, yes women as a majority of sufferers deserve special attention. But as long as these problems are percived as problems only for women, we're propagating a discourse of vitimised women and masochistic men. Significant minorities get attention in all other aspects of society- why not here?
Here Endeth The Rant. [/rant]
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no subject
Date: 2006-04-27 01:01 pm (UTC)I'm very keen to have several children as well as a career - I'm glad there are definite role models in my field who have juggled the demands of both!
...she said while on a break from alternating knitting and dissertation work. Living the dream, baby.
(I'm guessing Honi is a newspaper or something? Because yeah, I agree on that too - I think in the majority of cases, partitioning anything gender-related in that way tends to belittle it rather than give it prominence, as well as implying that the rest of public discourse is for men only.)
no subject
Date: 2006-04-27 01:12 pm (UTC)good on you for wanting kids and career :) Personally I suspect I'm going to want at least one of the creatures eventually... But i'll deal with then when it happens.
As a student at women's college, we get a lot of speakers talking about how they juggle their high flying careers with being supermum. We had one who said she'd opted out of motherhood because she didn't feel she could do children justice. I'd like to hear from someone who was 'just a mum' sometime too. There's an ethic that says to be a great feminist you have to be able to juggle both- if you're only a mum you're submitting to patriarchy, if you don't have kids you're cheating yourself. *shrugs* i think that all three and everything in between need to be both acceptable and supported.
no subject
Date: 2006-04-28 07:22 am (UTC)and what're you knitting?
i tried knitting once. i'm even less a knitter than a sewer... and that's saying something.
no subject
Date: 2006-04-28 10:25 pm (UTC)I'm knitting a shoulder bag, it's big and plain and dark red... it's the first real thing I've knitted, so I wanted to start on something simple.
no subject
Date: 2006-04-28 11:47 pm (UTC)erm... the whole lack of draft thing is going to be fun for you :)
Me, I'm doing a BA majoring in French (useful, but kinda dull) and Medieval Studies (useless but fascinating).
that's going to be a very cuddly shoulder bag, being red wool and all... :)
no subject
Date: 2006-05-03 04:22 pm (UTC)That sounds like an interesting degree. Languages and history are both very cool.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-03 10:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-03 10:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-03 10:52 pm (UTC)hah, true, i've vaacuumed my room all of three times this semester. so possibly there's something in the forcible-tidying-up theory
no subject
Date: 2006-05-03 11:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-03 11:03 pm (UTC)