When asked about the wage gap and why we don’t see women equally represented in society how often is one bombarded with comments like: “Women prefer lower paying jobs”, or even better, ‘there is no such thing as the wage gap”. Steaming monkey muffins to that bollocks is my usual reply. Before we go on, one should not forget the neural-sexist angle, “females are just better at doing certain (lower paying, lower esteemed) jobs than others”.
*Gah* with hearty helping of *fml*
Gerda Lerner chooses a historical perspective to analyse the performance gap between women and men in society and in doing so creates an accurate set of insights into why dudes be achieving the way they do.
“For many centuries the talents of women were directed not towards self-development but towards realizing themselves through the development of a man. Women, conditioned for millennia to accept the patriarchal definition of their role, have sexually and emotionally serviced men and nurtured them in a way that allowed men of talent a fuller development and a more intensive degree of specialization than women have ever had. The sexual division of labor which has allotted to women the major responsibility for the domestic services and the nurturance of children has freed men from the cumbersome details of daily survival activities, while it disproportionately has burdened women with them. Women have had less spare time and above all less uninterrupted time in which to reflect, to think, and to write. The psychological support from intimacy and love has been far more readily available to talented men than to talented women. Had there been a man behind each brilliant woman, there would have been women of achievement in history equal to the numbers of men of achievement.”
>— The Creation of Feminist Consciousness: from the Middle Ages to Eighteen-seventy, Gerda Lerner
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
3 comments
December 16, 2015 at 6:35 am
makagutu
That was well said
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December 16, 2015 at 6:57 am
roughseasinthemed
As well as ‘women are better at …’ one should add, ‘women aren’t really designed for, (insert whatever), because they dont have the right sort of brains. It’s a man’s job, don’t you know?’
And especially, ‘men are better at being in charge/running things/organising things/managing money etc etc’.
However, while the emphasis on the domestic childcare thing may be a convenient scapegoat, it still doesn’t negate the sheer prejudice against women (read, misogyny) that has gone on down the centuries. And. Continues. It’s the insidious sexism that destroys us.
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December 16, 2015 at 9:38 am
robert browning
I have long believed that more people w feminist values in positions of authority would bring an end to inequalities throughout societies. Achieving that will certainly be a long process. The most practical action, along w elevating awareness, might be to take a page from the Koch brother’s book and start w school boards, city councils and local governments to build a base of satisfied (customers)
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