Okay, now that I have your attention. I’ve been thinking a lot about women this week. More than I usually do. Which is quite a lot :-p On Monday, I heard the phrase ‘Booth bunny’—an attractive girl who stands with company’s table at a convention or exhibition. Like corporate eye candy, this girl entices the male traffic to a business’s booth in order to potentially gain new clients or to network. Sex sells, even if you’re selling air coils, as the person who told me this does. Am I supposed to be offended? Or is it just smart marketing? I wholeheartedly believe in capitalism and I have a basic understanding of economics. In a world of supply and demand, you want the chick to be in demand.
I also followed the progress of the Paycheck Fairness Act in Senate this week. The Republicans filibustered it and consequently, it will never be brought up to a vote. Numerous news sites have confirmed to me that women still only make 70% of what men make on average. Am I outraged? Of course, but with a caveat. I believe in equal pay for everyone, but I don’t believe in paid maternity leave. There, I said it. If you want to have children, maybe you should make sure you and your company can afford to take the time off. You’re missing work and your company is lacking a service that you were contracted to do. I understand sick days but pregnancy is planned absence. If a man were to miss two months of work, he’d get fired. Some progressive companies give men an equivalent of maternity leave, which is nice, but I don’t think either maternity leave is necessary. I’m not saying that women should be fired or that if they want to get pregnant, they should quit their jobs. All I’m saying is that women shouldn’t be paid for time off that men don’t, for the most part, receive an equivalent of. Isn’t that what equal pay is all about?
If you still stuck with me and aren’t planning to flame me both online or in person, I have a couple more things to say. I received an invitation on Facebook to the nationwide event, “Kick a Misogynist in the Balls”. One of my friends decided to be a little rambunctious and posted a comment to the effect of ‘Make me a sandwich”. Needless to say, he got blasted pretty hard by the female creator of the event, even to the point where he was threatened. As my friend pointed out to me, the whole event is hypocritical. How are misogynists expected to change their ways if they’re going to get kicked in the balls? Wouldn’t that make them hate women more? What about me? I don’t have balls…where would people kick me? I actually don’t believe I’m a misogynist, despite my huge supply of women jokes. (Why couldn’t Helen Keller drive? Because she’s a woman!)
As a woman, I understand my limitations from my gender. I have no problem with there being societal constructed labels if they work. Today, I had one of my roommate fix the brake light in my car. It would have taken me over a half an hour but it took him under ten minutes. Even if I watched a Youtube clip on this, I couldn’t have done it as fast or as well as he did. Who needs a manual when you have a man?
You know what I did today? I baked a cake. And it was delicious. I’m okay with the fact I can’t fix my car and unless it’s a secret desire, I’m sure my roommate is okay that he doesn’t spontaneously bake. Women and men should understand their limitations and abilities. I’m proud that I can paint my toenails in the lines and arrange a vase of flowers. I don’t need to mow my lawn to feel empowered.
Again, my take on feminism is that people need to see that everyone has abilities. Maybe it’s not always fair. Maybe a woman should make less if she’s working less hours. Of course, I believe if a woman puts in as much work as a man, she deserves to get paid the same amount. If she works more, give her a raise. I still believe in women voting. I guess what I’m saying is that it’s okay to be a girly girl. The world needs men to fix cars and women to cook delicious dinners. If the roles switch, that’s cool too. But women are genetically different for a reason. Let’s embrace the genetic predispositions that have been at play for centuries. For once, I’m all right with the status quo.
I'm not offended, but I notice that you equate some socially constructed activities (baking and changing brake lights) with genetic predispositions. I don't think I've been genetically predisposed to paint my toenails in the lines (unless there was some kind of mixup in my gene pool!)
ReplyDeleteOn the subject of maternity leave, think of it as a socioeconomic issue. If women didn't get paid maternity leave, only the ones who could afford to live without a salary could ever take maternity leave. What about single mothers, or women whose families depend on their salary to live on? Only the wealthy could afford to procreate.
That's a valid point Emily. Even I'm not callous enough to think that babies are just extra expenses. However, I have a problem with women getting this paid time off that men don't have. I might retract what I said about women not deserving to get paid, but it still seems indulgent for me. What about people like me who don't want kids? I can't take two months off and still get paid. Its a little discriminatory.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the 'Kick a Misogynist in the Balls' day was in response to "smack a hoe day'
ReplyDeleteAnd women should get paid maternity leave, if you want the human race to continue on.
As one Republican was rebuffed when he said, "well I don't need maternity benefits so they shouldn't be covered by healthcare,"
"yea, but your mother probably used them."
My ancestors probably used slavery, but that doesn't make it right... just because my mom used maternity leave doesn't make it right either. Stupid argument.
ReplyDeleteThe problem, ASSUMING there is actually a statistical difference in the pay between men/women for equal work, is just an example of a greater problem with the American work ethic... complain about the problem and ask other people to fix your issues rather than just do something about it.
If women are soooooooooooo outraged about pay rates, then those women should start their own companies and have the exact same, hypothetical, pay discrimination as other companies have -- except reversed. There should be no excuse not to do be able to do it, unless, of course, women are actually inferior to men.
But no, instead of just starting your own company to fix your pay issues, some bright broad decided the right thing to do was bitch and bitch until the senate fixes their issues.
Yes, I am saying woman's rights advocates are taking the wrong approach, but I'm not sexist. I'm also saying that this problem is systemic in America, and applies to almost every "social" issue of our day.
I hate it when people try to make it law how much you have to pay people. Blanket laws like that just encourage laziness. Lets take this example about women and their pay. If it became law that women who hold the same title as men must be paid the same amount, and current diversity laws require companies to hire women, where is the incentive for women to earn their pay? They have a guaranteed job because of diversity laws, and then they get guaranteed pay because of this hypothetical law... there is NO incentive to work as hard as a man if the senate makes laws guaranteeing everything for women in life.
Also, yes, the whole maternity leave thing is BS, and the human race would not die off if we got rid of paid maternity leave... that argument is ridiculous for a billion reasons, so I won't even dignify it with a response.
My 0.02.
Also, one last point I failed to make... did it ever occur to these chicks spearheading this movement that pay differences may have environmental causes? For example, female adult entertainers and female models make FAR more money than their male counterparts do, but I'm not on the senate floor demanding for equal male rights in the strip clubs of America.
ReplyDeleteMen get paid more, on average, in the sports world, for example. Saying that a WNBA forward should make as much as a NBA forward is just silly, nobody cares about the WNBA, and most females would agree. Thats right, I went there.
PS: thumbs up for baking cakes and a second thumbs up for olivia wilde... if I knew there were naughty pictures I would have started reading this blog earlier.
I didn't even consider these points Asher but you really make an even more convincing argument. I like what you said about the environmental causes. I didn't want my post to be anti-women, or anti-men. I just don't always believe that things need to be equal.
ReplyDeleteIf you're going to say that the government shouldn't even be involved in this discussion, then fine. That's legitimate. But you have to separate those arguments from discussions of gender and biological differences.
ReplyDeleteIt'll be interesting to see if there's a shift in the next twenty years as the number of males going to college and earning higher degrees continues to fall. Will people advocate for equal pay and prestige for men instead?