Antifeminist day at the beeb

So, I come out of my lengthy blogging break to point out two BBC articles which pissed me off this afternoon. Firstly, poor old Jeremy Paxman is being discriminated against! I know, I know, it certainly doesn't seem that way, with his comfortable Newsnight position, and lucrative interview possibilities. However, apparently this is all totally irrelevant, as, because Paxman can name 5 women prominent in broadcasting, it seems that suddenly white middle class men are being horribly discriminated against. Hmm. I seriously disliked him anyway, he is so arrogant, but I am sad to see that my worst suspicions have been proven true. He is also a pathetic misogynist who is clearly intimidated by the fact that white middle class men might be forced to actually prove their talents in future, rather than just relying on their gross overprivilege. So, get over yourself Paxman, and realise that you are not as entitled as you would like to think, and hopefully soon everybody will come to view you as an irrelevance, as I do.

Secondly, there is to be a Nun's beauty pageant held online. There is so much that is fucked up about this that I really don't know where to begin. It just goes to show what happens when you have a patriarchy. Firstly, women must be dressed 'modestly' in order to avoid inflaming the passions of men, who apparently, are incapable of self-control. Then, reproductive choice is systematically opposed, with the ultimate goal of reducing women to being walking incubators. Finally, it seems, despite all of this, women must still be sexy. I try not to put anything past the catholic church these days, however, even I was pretty surprised to read this story today. They utterly disgust me with their hypocrisy, and their shocking treatment of women.

Law exam blogging

I am in the middle of exam hell, but here is a quick link that is of interest. Another example of how the patriarchy hurts women: cars are not tested with crash dummies of an appropriate size/shape for women, only for men.

ARGH!

Apparently, "bosses weigh up pregnancy risk" prior to employing someone, and only 5% would employ someone if they knew that they were already pregnant.

At the moment, I am too angry to blog about this (although its hardly news, it still makes me mad). Hopefully later I'll have calmed down enough to write something sensible.

Idiot of the day: Silvio Berlusconi (again)

Second time in a week! This time, he has criticised the Spanish Parliament for being "too pink". The Telegraph reports that he went on to say that;

"Zapatero has formed a government that is too pink, something which we cannot do in Italy because there is a prevalence of men in politics and it isn't easy to find women who are qualified for government."

Firstly, I assume that by calling the Spanish Parliament "too pink" he actually means to refer to the fact that Zapatero has appointed equal numbers of men and women to his cabinet. A prevalence of men in politics is a problem, but I'm not sure that Berlusconi sees it that way. He appears to be using the fact that there are a lot of men in Italian politics as a reason why women are not, and can't be, represented. Not excusable Mr Berlusconi. Just because someone is difficult to find, doesn't mean that they are not there. Perhaps women in Italy who are suitably "qualified" for politics are few and far between, but as a member of a privileged majority in Parliament, you should be seeking out these women, and actively encouraging them to become part of the political life of Italy. Only when everybody feels enfranchised and represented will you enjoy genuine democracy.

One quibble with the reporting of this in the Telegraph;

Mr Zapatero has championed equality since he first rose to power in March 2004 and consolidated his position as self-confessed feminist with his choice of cabinet in his second term, saying: "I feel very proud that there are more women ministers than men."

Emphasis mine. Why is feminism something we have to "confess" to? That implies that there is something wrong with Zapatero being a feminist, which in my opinion, there certainly isn't!

via F Word

Female apprentices earn less than male

Perhaps I should stop reading the BBC News website so often, but it just provides such good fodder for blogging!

In the latest, female apprentices earned £147 compared with the £186 per week that male apprentices could expect to receive. In yet another example of brilliant investigative reporting, the beeb suggests that this is because;

The difference is mainly due to the fact that female apprentices tend to work in lower paid sectors than males.

Hairdressing apprentices earned £109 a week while apprentices in electro technical posts earned £210 weekly.

Those in early years posts earned £142 a week compared with £189 for those in engineering and manufacturing, the research commissioned by the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (Dius) said.

However, they don't take it upon themselves to investigate why it is that we seem to value - and therefore reward - traditionally male occupations so much more highly. Particularly telling of our screwed up values system is the low wage which is attached to early years care. Why is this not more highly paid? Either we do not as a society think that being able to access high-quality childcare is especially important, or we have found that we can get away with paying the (predominantly) young women who do significantly less than what they could hope to get if they chose to work in other sectors.

Actually, I think it a combination of those two factors. Firstly, patriarchy has a general impression that childcare should be free - after all, women did it for years without being paid for it. Why should the uppity bitches expect money for it now? Secondly, it does seem as though the people who actually do these jobs accept their low wage packets as part of the deal. Perhaps this is because, as with nursing (another female-dominated low wage profession), there is an element of altruism which means that the people entering the profession do so for more than financial gain. However, just because someone does something with the best of intentions does not mean that they should not be adequately compensated for their time and effort. Traditionally female jobs, such as those within the "caring" professions, should have their salaries brought in line with jobs from other sectors which have similar levels of skill required.

As a final note, I actually think that, as society could not function as it currently does without people filling these roles, and taking care of the more vulnerable members of society, their pay should reflect that. However, at the moment, I think that at least increasing it to the levels of other similar jobs will have to do!

Groundbreaking research of the day!

The BBC has discovered that boys and girls choose to play different musical instruments to each other! What I really love is that the article makes statements like

"And it's somehow easier for a girl to cross over into 'boys' territory and play a trumpet than for a boy to take up the flute."

Hmm, I wonder why this could be? Perhaps because basically the worst thing to be called/associated with/likened to in our culture is a girl. Gendered insults like "slag", "pussy" and of course, "cunt" demonstrate this. However, it is easier for women to emulate men because there is a general assumption that they are the "norm", and women are somehow deviant from this. Therefore, it actually upholds a patriarchal values system when women express a desire to engage in similar activities to men, because it maintains the assumption that what men do has inherently more worth and value to society, than what women do, which must be regularly derided, and absolutely not emulated.

What is really sad is that children as young as 6 are able to pick up on these cues, and choices which they make are guided by these prejudices.

c'mon Italy, join us in the 21st Century!

Ok, I know I had a go at Berlusconi yesterday, and I have to say that I actually love Italy, but clearly the Italians have got some work to do on women's rights. This article comes up with the shocking statistic that just 46% of Italian women have work, because women are considered to be less good candidates than men. People who say that sexism doesn't exist in the western world anymore: what more proof do you need?

"get your tits out for trafficking"

I did not come up with the title of this post unaided, it actually comes from the excellent article written by Julie Bindel highlighting the fact that more and more charities are using highly sexualised - and sexist - images of women in order to further their cause.

What really bothers me about the actions of charities like Peta is that it is never OK to subjugate the rights of one group in order to further the interests of another. I don't accept the argument that "the women volunteered/agreed" or whatever. We can all be agents of our own oppression. Just because someone has agreed to something doesn't make it not sexist.

I wish that these charities would think up some ways of appealing to the masses (which they must obviously do) which doesn't simultaneously objectify and alienate a whole group of people by likening them to animals, and perpetuating the sexist vision of women which a great deal of society sadly has anyway.

Feministe has more.

Idiot of the day: Silvio Berlusconi

Apparently, Silvio Berlusconi has really hit the left where it hurts; left-wing women are ugly! Why is it that when right-wing politicians or activists are feeling threatened, they find it appropriate to compare the relative attractiveness of their female supporters? Says a lot about the values of the right.

As an aside: Berlusconi has pledged to appoint 4 women to his cabinet if he is elected at the next election! Wow! That will be so amazing and representative! Thank you Silvio Berlusconi!