Sexism you have personally experienced or have heard of? *READ POST 1*

The Corinthian

Sleepy wrote: »

No doubt it's a hangover from the "breadwinner" role of men but as a gender we tend towards expecting higher rewards for jobs that require qualification.

It's not a 'hangover' - it's alive and well. While attitudes are slowly changing, men are still typically expected to pay; from the first date, through to long after the divorce. We can't afford not to seek more money.

Grayson

tsiehta wrote: »

You also have Meg on Family Guy, who's entire point on the show is to be constantly verbally and physically abused.

have you seen family guy? Like the simpsons, most of the major male characters are portrayed as being stupid. Peter, and chris in family guy and Homer and bart in the simpsons are idiots

Feathers

Sleepy wrote: »

Even here in TGC, I'll probably get slated for this but anyway...

A family member has numerous qualifications related to early childhood development and childcare and worked in creches for a few years. Frankly, unless you happen to own the creche, the money is so poor (even at supervisory levels) that few who aren't in some way subsidised by a parent (e.g. still living at home) or partner could support themselves on it.

While some men are happy enough to work in low-paid positions, I've rarely met one prepared to do the level of certification expected for a position that pays so poorly (typically around minimum wage). No doubt it's a hangover from the "breadwinner" role of men but as a gender we tend towards expecting higher rewards for jobs that require qualification.

To be fair, few of the women I've known that worked in creches stayed past their late teens / early twenties, progressing into careers with more prospects and those that remained tended to do so as it suited their primary role of caregiver to their own children.

You could easily switch 'work in a creche' to 'primary school teacher', and the point still stands. Primary school teacher is a solid paying career, which has opportunity for career development (could go into a principalship, or a move to the inspectorate, etc.)

Leaving aside the low numbers of male primary school teachers overall, how many of the men in schools are teaching infant classes?

Panthro

maybe

I don't know either party personally, but it looks like a sexism situation.
I can't see a whole lot of difference between the two cases below, bar the punishment that is.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2359404/Revealed-The-dirty-text-messages-sent-teacher-24-pupil-16-week-affair-tattooed-body.html
She "whisked him away for a romantic weekend break"..is that not abduction? She was spared jail while this guy:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2351611/Abducted-girls-love-letter-jailed-teacher-Jeremy-Forrest-seized-barred-visiting-him.html

Well he gets 5 and a half years jail time.

Seems a bit odd I think.

Sleepy

Feathers wrote: »

You could easily switch 'work in a creche' to 'primary school teacher', and the point still stands. Primary school teacher is a solid paying career, which has opportunity for career development (could go into a principalship, or a move to the inspectorate, etc.)

Leaving aside the low numbers of male primary school teachers overall, how many of the men in schools are teaching infant classes?

Honestly, I don't think the two are all that comparable: one pays a good salary with fantastic working hours and pension whilst the other pays minimum wage. I'd know a handful of men who work as Primary School teachers but have never met a man involved in running a creche (other than one who did the books etc. for his wife's business).

Feathers

Sleepy wrote: »

Honestly, I don't think the two are all that comparable: one pays a good salary with fantastic working hours and pension whilst the other pays minimum wage. I'd know a handful of men who work as Primary School teachers but have never met a man involved in running a creche (other than one who did the books etc. for his wife's business).

No, they're not comparable at all, which is what I was saying - the point was made that the low numbers of men in creches could be down to the low wage or the status of the job.

The same couldn't be said of teaching infants in primary school, but there's near zero men in these roles.

Frogeye

clairefontaine wrote: »

Also it's such a low status job they aren't going to push for men to be able to access, unlike physics and engineering, mentioned earlier. I can't think of any traditionally high status jobs dominated by women.
.

I can think of a few:

Journalists
Nursing
Teaching
Town Planning
and soon to include Doctors!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2009/jun/03/gender

clairefontaine

Frogeye wrote: »

I can think of a few:

Journalists
Nursing
Teaching
Town Planning
and soon to include Doctors!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2009/jun/03/gender

You'd consider those high status?

Rev Hellfire

clairefontaine wrote: »

You'd consider those high status?

Doctors, absolutely.
Teachers, they certainly used to be, but still have a high standing in the community.

The others are by no means low status jobs, and are certainly a long way away from being unskilled labor.

MOC88

Frogeye wrote: »

I can think of a few:

Journalists
Nursing
Teaching
Town Planning
and soon to include Doctors!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2009/jun/03/gender

Add pharmacists to that as well

DamoKen

Just saw this today http://www.ics.ie/index.php?option=com_eventbooking&task=view_event&event_id=413&Itemid=241 .

Not sure what to make of it. On the one hand think it's great for children to know what their Mam's do in work. On the other it blatantly ignores the fact the majority of IT engineers are male, ergo the majority of children with a parent working in IT will miss out simply cos their parent is the wrong sex.

Why not just leave it up to the child to shout "my Mom/Dad is an engineer" on the day depending on individual circumstance? At least it would mean children whose parent in IT is not a woman would be included?

I understand females are underrepresented in IT, I should know, worked in the field for the last 15 years and almost regretted my choice in college when on the first day I found just 3 of my classmates were girls out of a class of 25+. But surely that was a personal choice in career? How does holding an exclusive event for those already in IT in any way address career choices for those at college level?

Just doesn't sit well with me. I'm in IT, think an open day at google for kids is a great idea, but although I've worked in IT for years neither I nor my children can go because I'm not a woman. Why? Do children have no interest in what their fathers do? Is an apitude for Computer Science not present in children if it's only the father in IT?

Makes no sense to me to have such a blantantly exclusive event. Would have thought the very point of a childrens day would be to be inclusive for family. Last I checked fathers are part of that.

py2006

ongarboy wrote: »

I kind of equate this double standard to the whole element of how differently male and female sexualisation is treated in the media. e.g. Male strippers are considered a source of humour or giggles for the girls even as they ogle the men yet female strippers being ogled by men is viewed as seedy and sordid.
.

Yea I always found that one strange. I remember several years ago the Chipendales came to Ireland and it was advertised everywhere (including billboards) as a fun night out for the ladies!

While the reverse is a seedy, perverted, degrading act that horrible sexist men do on the sly.

py2006

In my experience, especially in the workplace, women are just as sexist as men. Probably even more so nowadays because men are afraid of their lives in case they make the wrong comment and they loose their jobs.

I've seen groups of women openly ogle a large picture of semi naked man posing suggestively with an exaggerated bulge. I had remarks made about my ass and on another occasion when a remark was made about my jeans, one woman shouted "its whats in your jeans" much to the hysterics of the other ladies in a group. All I could do was be embarrassed and laugh. It was only afterwards that I realised that I would have been a serious amount of trouble if I had done the same.

Recently, while being the only man at a meeting I had to listen to them giving out about men and how sexist they are but the irony was that they were being very sexist and offensive.

py2006

Zulu wrote: »

On the sexism I've experienced, it's the refusal to entertain the topic that bothers me the most. Discussing sexism faced my men or mens rights, inevitably, at some stage, will have certain people attempt to shut down the conversation/topic. Be it thread derailment, or petty "women have it worse" type belittlement.

This really bugs me. It has happened to me on a few occasions. If I bring up anything relating to men it means that I am a) belittling the situations women find themselves in or b) I hate women.

I kid you not.

ibstar

1)Any guy working/worked in retail will always work and have to do more things than their female counterparts (while both parties being paid the same)
2)Night clubs charging males more than females, or not charging females at all.( happens a lot abroad)
3)Women expecting you to give up your seat (used to give up when I was single ). Will only give up my seat for an Elderly person (Ageism anyone?) or a pregnant woman.

Amirani

ibstar wrote: »

1)Any guy working/worked in retail will always work and have to do more things than their female counterparts (while both parties being paid the same)
2)Night clubs charging males more than females, or not charging females at all.( happens a lot abroad)
3)Women expecting you to give up your seat (used to give up when I was single ). Will only give up my seat for an Elderly person (Ageism anyone?) or a pregnant woman.

I'm not sure I agree with number 1.

Number 2 I do find particularly annoying.

Number 3 is completely bonkers.

Woodward

No

NiallSparky wrote: »

I'm not sure I agree with number 1.

Number 2 I do find particularly annoying.

Number 3 is completely bonkers.

#1 is true in my experience. On top of all the other duties the guys are expected to do most of the lifting even when the girls would be perfectly capable

Rev Hellfire

ibstar wrote: »

1)Any guy working/worked in retail will always work and have to do more things than their female counterparts (while both parties being paid the same)

Any time I've been involved in office moves the expectation from the majority of the female staff has been for the males to carry the pc, monitor and other moderately heavy equipment. All of which they where physically capable of holding but frequently played the men are stronger card.

ibstar wrote: »

3)Women expecting you to give up your seat (used to give up when I was single ). Will only give up my seat for an Elderly person (Ageism anyone?) or a pregnant woman.

It amazing how blind other women become in my experience when they've got seats and there is a pregnant women standing beside them. This is especially so if there is a male seated.

My favourite was once seeing a male eventually getting up to give a seat and overhearing one women say to another that it took him long enough.

Pity I didn't have the balls to say something.

Fukuyama

Just on the retail point - anyone saying that's not true has their eyes wide shut.

I've often found myself doing ridiculous tasks in retail simply because I was the only male around. Cleaning up feces, heavy lifting, dealing with anti-social/aggressive customers etc...

Also in my last job it was an unwritten rule that female members of staff wouldn't do the locking up shift (petrol station). It was assumed that the lads wouldn't mind the added danger of having an armed robbery. :rolleyes:

When we actually did have one I was quietly very pissed off at that rule. You could argue that the girls were also being discriminated against in that they could only do morning, afternoon and evening shift. Yet I never heard a complaint about it, particularly after the robbery happened. Interesting.

I enjoyed the night shift anyway so wasn't going to kick up a fuss. However, after the attempted robbery there were obviously conversations among the male staff about the obvious elephant in the room.

the_syco

maybe

ibstar wrote: »

1)Any guy working/worked in retail will always work and have to do more things than their female counterparts (while both parties being paid the same)
2)Night clubs charging males more than females, or not charging females at all.( happens a lot abroad)
3)Women expecting you to give up your seat (used to give up when I was single ). Will only give up my seat for an Elderly person (Ageism anyone?) or a pregnant woman.

The retail thing I can attest to; always had to carry the heavier boxes, and/or most of the manual tasks. Shop, pub, cinema; all jobs require heavy lifting by males. And thank f**k; a few of the part-time jobs that I had gotten I think I got because I was a tall male that they assumed could lift stuff. Most other males in the jobs were strong, and the women (mainly) weak and pretty. I suppose that brush swings both ways.

As for the third point, I only give my seat up to the elderly. I wouldn't want to offend any fat ladies.

astonaidan

Went for a group interview with my sister for a sales job,now granted I was terrible at it there was 3 guys who were easily in the top 4 people and turned out only the four girls there hired 2 of which did worse than me.

RED PASSION

psinno wrote: »

That is because it is deemed acceptable for woman to escalate verbal offence to physical violence. It is perfectly acceptable for a women on tv to hit a man for something he said but you would never see it portrayed as ok for a man to hit a woman for something she said.

if the man hit the girl the programme would end with a domestic violence number and vice versa nothing happens

RED PASSION

Playboy wrote: »

I think it is partially down to what a multi cultural city London is. You have people from all cultures and walks of life working and living in the city and some cultures still have a more old fashioned approach to things that harks back to a bygone era. Not a day has passed in about 6 months where I have not seen a man offer a seat to a healthy woman. I have never seen a woman offer a man a seat. While the sighs and dirty looks are not as common a behaviour I still see it very regularly. Also when a pregnant woman gets on the tube it is nearly always a man that offers his seat and rarely a woman. I think there are a lot of people out there whilst believing in equality still think some of this old fashioned chivalric behaviour is a essential component of good manners.

Women feel they have a god given right to your seat, or you are a second class citizen compared to them.

banquo

maybe

ibstar wrote: »

1)Any guy working/worked in retail will always work and have to do more things than their female counterparts (while both parties being paid the same)
2)Night clubs charging males more than females, or not charging females at all.( happens a lot abroad)
3)Women expecting you to give up your seat (used to give up when I was single ). Will only give up my seat for an Elderly person (Ageism anyone?) or a pregnant woman.

Hrmm,

1) I don't agree with, and I worked in retail full time for 3 years and part-time for two, over four different outlets! Guys are automatically expected to do the heavy lifting, which is perceived as being unfair because it's more dangerous and we face higher risks.

But I've done the other side too: half the labels on the bottles in the cleaning press are rotted off except for the skull and crossbones, that **** is lethal! Also, if you're at the till all day dealing with customers... you know. God, never again.

2) That's because they want women to go, because men go where the women are and once inside they buy them drinks! Sexist? Probably, yeah, but that's the free market.

3) No women except a girlfriend have ever expected me to give up a seat for them, and even then it wouldn't be 'expected', you'd just do it out of affection.

So while I think there's institutional sexism on both sides, these ain't them for me!

banquo

maybe

Also (this really bothered me) someone being interviewed on Sky News about the Twitter nonsense earlier today said, and I quote:

"We have to take threats of violence very seriously, especially violence against women."

Like, dafuq? Interviewer didn't even pick them up on it.

Edit: can't find the interview, I know it's here somewhere...

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

what's to pick up on, men are basically disposable. *shrug*

RED PASSION

DamoKen wrote: »

Just saw this today http://www.ics.ie/index.php?option=com_eventbooking&task=view_event&event_id=413&Itemid=241 .

Not sure what to make of it. On the one hand think it's great for children to know what their Mam's do in work. On the other it blatantly ignores the fact the majority of IT engineers are male, ergo the majority of children with a parent working in IT will miss out simply cos their parent is the wrong sex.

Why not just leave it up to the child to shout "my Mom/Dad is an engineer" on the day depending on individual circumstance? At least it would mean children whose parent in IT is not a woman would be included?

I understand females are underrepresented in IT, I should know, worked in the field for the last 15 years and almost regretted my choice in college when on the first day I found just 3 of my classmates were girls out of a class of 25+. But surely that was a personal choice in career? How does holding an exclusive event for those already in IT in any way address career choices for those at college level?

Just doesn't sit well with me. I'm in IT, think an open day at google for kids is a great idea, but although I've worked in IT for years neither I nor my children can go because I'm not a woman. Why? Do children have no interest in what their fathers do? Is an apitude for Computer Science not present in children if it's only the father in IT?

Makes no sense to me to have such a blantantly exclusive event. Would have thought the very point of a childrens day would be to be inclusive for family. Last I checked fathers are part of that.

sounds like take your daughter to work day in America ..........




your son leave him at home

beano345

No

py2006 wrote: »

Yea I always found that one strange. I remember several years ago the Chipendales came to Ireland and it was advertised everywhere (including billboards) as a fun night out for the ladies!

While the reverse is a seedy, perverted, degrading act that horrible sexist men do on the sly.

Have to agree with this.have you ever seen the way women act at these things its like a zebra getting disemboweled by lions in the Serengeti! As for the giving up your seat I remember being on a subway in Sydney and a woman got on looked at me like I should offer my seat then turned to the Lady beside here and said obviously he hasn't been house trained yet. To which I replied surely to god your not that helpless!

GalwayGuy2

The above reminded me of something.

I'm watched a new Tv show back in June, I think, called Orange is the New Black.* It's a great show, but it does something that a lot of shows do.

Only one guy talks rather explicitly about a women's body parts and it's portrayed as misogynistic, and aggressive, as a precursor to assault. And the guy in this Tv Show is a bastard.

Yet, one of the women said to her friends how much "meat" a black man had in his trousers, and it was portrayed as cute and slightly embarrassed. Hmmm, maybe it's just individual differences between the two characters, but the next example would definitely be shot differently if it was an all male prison.

One of the female characters threatens to go down on a woman in her sleep. And, yes, she says a threat. But, strangely, it's shot as a joke, and as if the problem is with the woman being threatened, as she is homophobic and right-wing christian.

Sorry, but whether you're a man or woman, going down on someone who is unwilling while they are sleeping, is assault.

* I'd hasten to add that this really is quite a good show, and everybody should watch it.

Galwayguy35

I worked in a factory a few years ago, it was a mix of men and women working there but certain jobs were only left for the lads to do and the women were never asked to do them.

When we brought this up at a staff meeting we were told by the Dept. Manager (female) "we can't expect the ladies to do those jobs".

Seems only equal when it suits.

ibstar

Finally found the video related to this topic. Imagine what the comments and reactions would be like if a male did this to a female.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrxZEhItBec

Galwayguy35

ibstar wrote: »

Finally found the video related to this topic. Imagine what the comments and reactions would be like if a male did this to a female.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrxZEhItBec

Probably a slap to the face and sexual assault charges.

beano345

No

Galwayguy35 wrote: »

Probably a slap to the face and sexual assault charges.

reminds me of this. how would people react out of curiousity?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4akMaeZ0-k

Legs.Eleven

RED PASSION wrote: »

Women feel they have a god given right to your seat, or you are a second class citizen compared to them.

No we don't.

RED PASSION

Legs.Eleven wrote: »

No we don't.

I am basing this on my experience from college, i did a 4 year female dominated course, approx. 20 of us andfrom interacting with females this is my take home message, sitting in a coffee shop some of my female classmates arrive and no seats free and constant digs about someone should offer a seat to them hint hint the lads, I have other examples but not trying to tar all women with the same brush, just my recent experience.

Legs.Eleven

RED PASSION wrote: »

I am basing this on my experience from college, i did a 4 year female dominated course, approx. 20 of us andfrom interacting with females this is my take home message, sitting in a coffee shop some of my female classmates arrive and no seats free and constant digs about someone should offer a seat to them hint hint the lads, I have other examples but not trying to tar all women with the same brush, just my recent experience.

Your original comment was certainly tarring us with the same brush and that's what I was replying to.

NegativeCreep

Recently had a female friend suggest to me, in all seriousness, that I should sell my dog as the dog I have is not a very "manly" breed of dog. :rolleyes: As if certain genders can only have certain dogs!

Also, have to agree with women on buses, especially women in their 40's/50's feeling entitled to a man's seat. I had one woman stand right beside me and throw daggers at me because she felt like she had a right to my seat. I asked her what her problem was and she just said "I guess chivalry is dead." told her to feck off and popped my iPod on.
Have had women try to guilt me into giving them my seat lots of times.

A lot of them seem to feel like they should be let onto the bus first too. Piss off!


Btw, I'm not talking about all women. Just a few I've had the misfortune of dealing with.

Daveysil15

ongarboy wrote: »

I kind of equate this double standard to the whole element of how differently male and female sexualisation is treated in the media. e.g. Male strippers are considered a source of humour or giggles for the girls even as they ogle the men yet female strippers being ogled by men is viewed as seedy and sordid.

This is a very good point actually. Peter stringfellow tried to set up a strip club in Ireland a few years ago which didn't last too long. There were women and religious groups protesting outside it. They had to shut it down.

py2006

NegativeCreep wrote: »

Also, have to agree with women on buses, especially women in their 40's/50's feeling entitled to a man's seat. I had one woman stand right beside me and throw daggers at me because she felt like she had a right to my seat. I asked her what her problem was and she just said "I guess chivalry is dead." told her to feck off and popped my iPod on.
.

That age group seem to be the worst for that kind of thing. I have actually been assaulted by women on two separate occasions. One such lady thought it ok to push me aside on a bus queue. I was literally pushed onto the road. I was having none of it so I made sure I got on bus before her and got my seat. She gave me the evil eyes and said something along the lines of, "you bring shame to your gender". If it wasn't a packed bus I would have shouted her down.

Yellow121

I once held a door open for a woman, she was walking faster than me. We came to another door and she never held it open for me. I was outraged.

kiffer

No

Daveysil15 wrote: »

This is a very good point actually. Peter stringfellow tried to set up a strip club in Ireland a few years ago which didn't last too long. There were women and religious groups protesting outside it. They had to shut it down.

The weird part of that Stringfellow's lap dancing club situation was that there had been a lap dancing club on that spot for a few years under two other names...

NegativeCreep

Yellow121 wrote: »

I once held a door open for a woman, she was walking faster than me. We came to another door and she never held it open for me. I was outraged.

Wouldn't even say that's sexism, she's just a dick! She wouldn't hold the door open for a woman either.

iptba

Yellow121 wrote: »

Do you not think it's an over reaction to be outraged by something so small as that?
Just like the majority of things on this thread.

So you are saying when you said "I was outraged", you were lying? I was wondering but you've now basically admitted it. Great to have people lying on the thread, presumably trying to sabotage it. Some people don't feel comfortable when possible sexism against men is discussed.

Yellow121

iptba wrote: »

So you are saying when you said "I was outraged", you were lying? I was wondering but you've now basically admitted it. Great to have people lying on the thread, presumably trying to sabotage it. Some people don't feel comfortable when possible sexism against men is discussed.

Well I thought it would be obvious that I was lying. Why would you be outraged by something like that?
Just like the rest of the things people are saying. Outraged cause a woman threw daggers at you with her eyes. Get out of it.
It's real petty stuff, not sexism.

NegativeCreep

Yellow121 wrote: »

Do you not think it's an over reaction to be outraged by something so small as that?
Just like the majority of things on this thread.

Well I wouldn't be outraged but it just wouldn't be very nice :L

iptba

Yellow121 wrote: »

Outraged cause a woman threw daggers at you with her eyes.

The point about a woman threw daggers at somebody is relevant for the specific point about whether specific women expected somebody to give up the seat. And people can be influenced by people's emotions.

Yellow121 wrote: »

It's real petty stuff, not sexism.

It might be interesting to know whether you have said this to women on boards discussing the issue in specific threads devoted to the topic. Some people appear to take a sexist approach to discussions of sexism i.e. are more tolerant of women discussing it than men / more tolerant of discussions about possible examples of sexism against women than possible sexism against men. Indeed, this could be said to be an issue in academia (sociology, gender studies, etc.).

alphamule

I keep getting asked to carry heavy things by women...

What about my back!!

Randy Shafter

maybe

What was the story with video a few pages back with the guy getting slapped by the woman and then slapping her back? Was that some sort of show?!

beano345

No

Randy Shafter wrote: »

What was the story with video a few pages back with the guy getting slapped by the woman and then slapping her back? Was that some sort of show?!

some indian game show,its interesting to watch the reaction of the other men while the woman shrinks into the backround.he ended up suing the show and won.

Randy Shafter

maybe

beano345 wrote: »

some indian game show,its interesting to watch the reaction of the other men while the woman shrinks into the backround.he ended up suing the show and won.

What sort of game show is about belittling people? At least he sued them.