Letters to the Editor
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Anecdotal evidence...
It seems interesting to me that the anecdotal evidence supporting either position is often class based.
The anecdotes on one side always seem to read: [hugely successful woman] leaves [high powered, high paid] career to care for children. Therefore the gender gap is not real; it's women choosing lifestyle over career.
The anecdotes on the other side always seem to read: [box store employee] earns $6 an hour while her male counterparts earn $6.33 an hour. She keeps losing her job because when her children are sick her no-good dead-beat boyfriend won't help out. Gender inequality is therefore alive a ticking in our patriarchal society.
Is is possible we're all just talking past each other on this one?
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it's "sexual conquest!"
This is not devotion to the family -- the man is creating his own future, which he can take with him if he decides to dump the family when he wants to move on to some other sexual conquest.
A person who is devoted to the family cares about more than just money. They care about actually being there.
The time you spend with your family isn't something you can invest in securing your next sexual conquest.
Most divorces are initiated by women.
Also
I told my boss that I would like him to pay me 40 hours for 30 hours of work, but he told me to jump in a lake.
Then I told my landlord that he needed to reduce the rent because I was only working 30 hours of work each week, and he told me to jump in a lake.
Then I told my wife that we needed to move to a smaller apartment because I was only working 30 hours of work each week, and she told me to jump in a lake.
Then Tracy Clark-Flory told me that I was an angry white male misogynist.
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Sooo,...
You'd be happy in the rat race full time if you're husband wanted to work part-time? Would you have been attracted to him in the first place if that were the case?
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Not to wrestle with turds...
but do those "70% of women initiate divorce" statistics include the women who are cheated on and abused? If so, then you should probably not banty that about as proof of how much women suck.
And for the record it IS a class issue. The mid and lower class women of the world are stuck working because they have to, in lower paying jobs while still doing all the domestic work. That sounds like a problem worth discussing.
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I'm all for discussing it...
And for the record it IS a class issue. The mid and lower class women of the world are stuck working because they have to, in lower paying jobs while still doing all the domestic work. That sounds like a problem worth discussing.
My problem, and the problem of the chick at the Post is let's not waste time and energy LEGISLATING 'it' when we haven't really come to any sort of agreement on what 'it' is beyond "it's a social problem" or "it's a class problem" or "it's a sexist probm" or "it's an injustice". All of these are true statements, but none of them are qualified specifically enough to addresss.
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Women that initiate divorce NEVER cheat on their husbands! And they never abuse their husbands either!
Not to wrestle with turds...
but do those "70% of women initiate divorce" statistics include the women who are cheated on and abused? If so, then you should probably not banty that about as proof of how much women suck.
And for the record it IS a class issue. The mid and lower class women of the world are stuck working because they have to, in lower paying jobs while still doing all the domestic work. That sounds like a problem worth discussing.
Yes, because we know that women never cheat on their husbands, which is why their are no books on Amazon on how to cheat, and why women cheat.
And we know that the statistic that 38% of domestic violence occurs TO men, is just that, another lying statistic.
(P.S. It's "bandy" not "banty". It's "panty" not "pandy.")
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Not everyone has the luxury of a choice...
"And for the record it IS a class issue. The mid and lower class women of the world are stuck working because they have to, in lower paying jobs while still doing all the domestic work. That sounds like a problem worth discussing."
Yes, I agree, and I think one of the big problems with Feminism today is that all the talking and writing are focused on the upper and mid-upper class. It's the women who can't afford to make "choices" who could most benefit from feminist ideals, and they aren't even involved in the conversation.
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Thereis certainly a wage gap,
but it does not come about from discrimination based on sex. (Doubtless there is some sex discrimination, but it cannot account for any but a tiny percentage of the wage difference.)It also has nothing to do with inherent differences in the sexes. The wage gap reflects the fact that women work less than men do (at paid work). The BLS stats show this. That women do less paid work than men reflects the fact that societal messages encourage women more to be mothers and men more to be wage earners. That's the way it is in current day US. It's not discrimination; it's how we view the sexes.
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The fact that women work less shouldn't affect the wage PER HOUR
Right, Robert Franklin?
Maybe there's a wage gap in the median income yearly because women work less (although if these are salaried employees, again, the number of hours worked shouldn't matter). There is a wage gap in the median income annually for FULL-TIME employees. Comparable workers who have full-time jobs who don't get paid by the hour. Why is that?
Moreover, the wage PER HOUR for workers being paid per HOUR shouldn't be different between men and women, right? But it is.
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On blowhard authors
I just love this comment:
"Does some book author du jour or newspaper columnist have to live in my shoes, with my husband and kids? No. That's for me... so it's also for me to work out for myself what is an acceptable balance between home, money, career challenge, personal happiness, and how big the laundry pile is. For any of these blowhard book authors to assume that they have the answer for me and my life (or for anyone else's life) is incredibly presumptuous."
Hear, hear.
These blowhard authors, in addition to being cocooned in an ivory, Ivy League tower (nothing like mixed metaphors!) are, I think, exploiting a particular market niche -- the scold-today's-women-no-matter-what-they-do niche. Women don't chase the dollar hard enough and opt instead to spend time with kids? Scold them. Women work outside the home and don't stay home with their kids all the time? Scold them. Women divide their time between paying jobs and family duties but still scramble to make ends meet and save for retirement and emergencies? Scold them. It seems like anytime anyone writes something that scolds women -- or scolds parents, for that matter -- there's always somebody to buy what's written.