Happy International Men's Day!

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

Plopsu wrote: »

Ah, that'll be much like my hunch that STEM fields just appeal more to men than to women. :pac:

My science degree, started in the early ‘00s, was roughly a 50/50 gender split. Actually, I think there was slightly more women than men.

I wonder how many men started at the teacher-training colleges the year I started my degree?

Like I said, men should be encouraged to enter teaching. It doesn’t mean that there’ll be a large upswing in interest in the profession from men. It might lead to a big surge and, if so, great.

Plopsu

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

My science degree, started in the early ‘00s, was roughly a 50/50 gender split. Actually, I think there was slightly more women than men.

Hmmmm.... perhaps there should be more programs to get boys interested in STEM fields.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

Plopsu wrote: »

Hmmmm.... perhaps there should be more programs to get boys interested in STEM fields.

I think that all students, male or female, should be informed about a wide array of professions. I suspect that there will still be some that skew male and some that skew female. Engineering, I think, will always be male-heavy. And I think primary teaching will always attract more women than men, like I suspect it always has. We need more men in primary teaching and hopefully that will happen. But I doubt it will ever approach 50/50 and there’s many reasons for that.

Plopsu

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

And I think primary teaching will always attract more women than men, like I suspect it always has. We need more men in primary teaching and hopefully that will happen. But I doubt it will ever approach 50/50 and there’s many reasons for that.

Well both of us are guessing at what the gender balance in the profession was (and I doubt either of us could be ars*d trawling the internet for actual figures). As I said, my experience (ten years earlier) was very different from yours. If there were enough men interested in primary teaching then to pretty much fill a school then, then why is that no longer the case?

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

Plopsu wrote: »

Well both of us are guessing at what the gender balance in the profession was (and I doubt either of us could be ars*d trawling the internet for actual figures). As I said, my experience (ten years earlier) was very different from yours. If there were enough men interested in primary teaching then to pretty much fill a school then, then why is that no longer the case?

I think your majority male teacher primary school from back in the day sounds like an outlier but how and ever.

I put forward some possible reasons for the low uptake of male primary school teachers. You’ll never be rich doing it and the status of the job has decreased. Possibly these things matter more to men than women, especially as a man’s attractiveness can be boosted by social status. To add to that, the school day is quite short which is better if you have a family and I think women might be more enclined to take a job with shorter hours for that reason. As far as I know, many more women do part-time work than men for that reason and the hours for primary teachers almost fit that. Then the summers off are enticing if you have a family and, again, this seems more of a draw for women.

I’d encourage any campaign that highlights these benefits to young men wondering what they want to do. More male teachers would be a good thing. But if those benefits don’t result in a surge in men taking up teaching, what can you do?

givyjoe

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

I think your majority male teacher primary school from back in the day sounds like an outlier but how and ever.

I put forward some possible reasons for the low uptake of male primary school teachers. You’ll never be rich doing it and the status of the job has decreased. Possibly these things matter more to men than women, especially as a man’s attractiveness can be boosted by social status. To add to that, the school day is quite short which is better if you have a family and I think women might be more enclined to take a job with shorter hours for that reason. As far as I know, many more women do part-time work than men for that reason and the hours for primary teachers almost fit that. Then the summers off are enticing if you have a family and, again, this seems more of a draw for women.

I’d encourage any campaign that highlights these benefits to young men wondering what they want to do. More male teachers would be a good thing. But if those benefits don’t result in a surge in men taking up teaching, what can you do?

Create male only teaching posts because sexism is clearly the problem. :pac:

Deebles McBeebles

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

But if those benefits don’t result in a surge in men taking up teaching, what can you do?

Give Mary Mitchell-O'Connor a shout. If there is a genuine gender imbalance she'd be all over it, presumably.

El_Duderino 09

It never takes long for a thread about IMD to go down the Gender Wars route. Funmy thing is that a feminist started this thread to draw attention to IMD, all feminists I can recall posting in this thread supported IMD. Meanwhile men were the only ones who talk down IMD and the related issues it aims to highlight (Granted some men also supported/nothinged IMD).

The assumption that IMD is just a weapon in the gender wars becomes a self fulfilling prophecy when the men (never feminists in these threads) turn it into a gender war.

I'll continue to talk up IMD and the related men's issues because I see them as important. If someone sees the gender wars as the important thing, then that's probably what they'll focus on.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

givyjoe wrote: »

Create male only teaching posts because sexism is clearly the problem. :pac:

Deebles McBeebles wrote: »

Give Mary Mitchell-O'Connor a shout. If there is a genuine gender imbalance she'd be all over it, presumably.

I couldn’t agree less with Mitchell-O’Connor and her notions of women only posts. I’m interested in meritocracy and giving young people plenty of information about a wide array of professions. After that, it’s up to them what career they pursue.

givyjoe

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

I couldn’t agree less with Mitchell-O’Connor and her notions of women only posts. I’m interested in meritocracy and giving young people plenty of information about a wide array of professions. After that, it’s up to them what career they pursue.

I think most reasonable folks would say the same.

Deebles McBeebles

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

I couldn’t agree less with Mitchell-O’Connor and her notions of women only posts. I’m interested in meritocracy and giving young people plenty of information about a wide array of professions. After that, it’s up to them what career they pursue.

Totally agree, my post should have come with a sarcasm warning.

Deebles McBeebles

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

It never takes long for a thread about IMD to go down the Gender Wars route.

Pretty sure that happened on the first page or 2. For the majority all we want is equality. No interest in pitting genders against each other or giving preferential treatment to either.

Plopsu

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

I think your majority male teacher primary school from back in the day sounds like an outlier but how and ever.

I put forward some possible reasons for the low uptake of male primary school teachers. You’ll never be rich doing it and the status of the job has decreased. Possibly these things matter more to men than women, especially as a man’s attractiveness can be boosted by social status. To add to that, the school day is quite short which is better if you have a family and I think women might be more enclined to take a job with shorter hours for that reason. As far as I know, many more women do part-time work than men for that reason and the hours for primary teachers almost fit that. Then the summers off are enticing if you have a family and, again, this seems more of a draw for women.

I’d encourage any campaign that highlights these benefits to young men wondering what they want to do. More male teachers would be a good thing. But if those benefits don’t result in a surge in men taking up teaching, what can you do?

Yes but your thoughts on my school are based on nothing but your own preconceived notions. I could make the same statement (inverted) about your school recollections.
With regard to reasons, the conditions are the same as they always were AFIK. So that wouldn't really explain a drop in male numbers. I'm not buying the status thing. And by that I'm not saying that it mightn't be a reason for a fall in numbers. I don't believe it was a job that came with any kind of social status forty years ago.

Just editing to say that I actually went and checked. The number of men in primary school teaching was at about 40% in the 70s. So there's been about a 68% fall in their numbers. https://www.thejournal.ie/gender-imbalance-irish-teachers-3018754-Oct2016/

tritium

bluewolf wrote: »

My workplace did have imd talks which i thought was good

My workplace didn’t even mention it so I gave HR a hard time on it. Got a (fairly stock) answer that they promise to do better next year. I fully intend to hold them to that

(Role I’m doing means they can’t really tell me to **** off with myself :pac:)

El_Duderino 09

tritium wrote: »

My workplace didn’t even mention it so I gave HR a hard time on it. Got a (fairly stock) answer that they promise to do better next year. I fully intend to hold them to that

(Role I’m doing means they can’t really tell me to **** off with myself :pac:)

Great. Give them plenty of notice and links to the sites which discuss the themes of IMD 2019. You could make something happen next year.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

Plopsu wrote: »

Yes but your thoughts on my school are based on nothing but your own preconceived notions. I could make the same statement (inverted) about your school recollections.
With regard to reasons, the conditions are the same as they always were AFIK. So that wouldn't really explain a drop in male numbers. I'm not buying the status thing. And by that I'm not saying that it mightn't be a reason for a fall in numbers. I don't believe it was a job that came with any kind of social status forty years ago.

Just editing to say that I actually went and checked. The number of men in primary school teaching was at about 40% in the 70s. So there's been about a 68% fall in their numbers. https://www.thejournal.ie/gender-imbalance-irish-teachers-3018754-Oct2016/

Not buying it is your call.

It absolutely was a status job 30, 40, 50 years ago especially in rural areas. The doctor, the priest and the schoolteacher were the pillars of the community. Again, up to you whether you buy that or not. I won’t be trying to convince you.

Plopsu

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

Not buying it is your call.

It absolutely was a status job 30, 40, 50 years ago especially in rural areas. The doctor, the priest and the schoolteacher were the pillars of the community. Again, up to you whether you buy that or not. I won’t be trying to convince you.

Not my call, my recollection. Maybe it was different in one horse schools in the sticks but it sure wasn't the case in cities.
At least you've stopped with denying the drop in numbers.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

Plopsu wrote: »

Not my call, my recollection. Maybe it was different in one horse schools in the sticks but it sure wasn't the case in cities.
At least you've stopped with denying the drop in numbers.

Ireland is a country full of “one horse schools”. You use that term like they are a rarity. If you grew up in a larger urban area (and it’s easy to tell that you did), this might be hard for you to imagine but that’s how it was. There were community pillars of which the teacher was one. Dismissing it as not really a thing except in small towns is blithely ignoring that Ireland IS a country of small towns with larger urbans areas dotted around sparsely. Many schools classed as urban will actually be the one school in the small market town or tiny village where everyone knows each other. It’s probably hard for anyone used to urban anonymity to get their head around but there it is.

Plopsu

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

Ireland IS a country of small towns with larger urbans areas dotted around sparsely

And the percentage of the population living in those sparse dots? Currently, it's about 63% but I can't find a figure for 1970. I would guess at about 50% based on Dublin being about 1/3 of the country's population when I was a kid. From what both of us have said, it would appear that high numbers of male teachers were skewed towards urban areas, so it wouldn't have been a factor for most of them and certainly not enough to explain the massive drop.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

Plopsu wrote: »

And the percentage of the population living in those sparse dots? Currently, it's about 63% but I can't find a figure for 1970. I would guess at about 50% based on Dublin being about 1/3 of the country's population when I was a kid. From what both of us have said, it would appear that high numbers of male teachers were skewed towards urban areas, so it wouldn't have been a factor for most of them and certainly not enough to explain the massive drop.

You were also disputing that teaching was much more of a status job 30 years ago. Now that I know you had an urban upbringing, that really explains a lot.

I think there are less men in teaching for various reasons - loss of status, you won’t get rich doing it, FDI has brought higher numbers of lucrative jobs to the country and I think men still societally feel like they should be big earners, women are still more likely to take on part-time work than men if they have a family. Those last two are the big ones, I think.

Plopsu

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

You were also disputing that teaching was much more of a status job 30 years ago. Now that I know you had an urban upbringing, that really explains a lot.

I think there are less men in teaching for various reasons - loss of status, you won’t get rich doing it, FDI has brought higher numbers of lucrative jobs to the country and I think men still societally feel like they should be big earners, women are still more likely to take on part-time work than men if they have a family. Those last two are the big ones, I think.

Drop in status would not have been a factor for most of the male teachers (who would have been in urban areas according to both our recollections) . Lucrative jobs are also available to women. Women also won't get rich doing it. You think men feel like they need to earn big but you also thought there'd been no real change in numbers until it was shown to you. Also, you need to study specifically to be a teacher and very few would have families at that point.
And at THIS point we're just going round and round, so I'll leave it there, thanks.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

Plopsu wrote: »

Drop in status would not have been a factor for most of the male teachers (who would have been in urban areas according to both our recollections) . Lucrative jobs are also available to women. Women also won't get rich doing it. You think men feel like they need to earn big but you also thought there'd been no real change in numbers until it was shown to you. Also, you need to study specifically to be a teacher and very few would have families at that point.
And at THIS point we're just going round and round, so I'll leave it there, thanks.

Yes, so numbers of male teacher have dropped. You don’t seem to want to venture any reasons yourself as to why that might be, only dismiss ones suggested by others. Which is odd. Well, not that odd. Often on messageboards, being right (or being seen to be right at least) is more important. If one can’t say why there are fewer men entering teaching, how does one even begin to try to consider how to encourage them back to the profession?

I mean, we know that the gender pay gap isn’t really an inequality thing. When the gap arises, it’s simply because women are much more likely to take a few years out or work part-time when their children are small and naturally their earning power is stymied a bit by that. What does this have to do with teaching? Well, it’s not a stretch for me to imagine that when it comes to choosing college courses, women who know they want to be mothers cast their eyes to the future and look at jobs that will give them more free time. Believe me, many women are very focused on the future motherhood thing quite young. I feel quite confident to say it wouldn’t be as much a consideration for young men filling out their CAOs. The arising of the gap also shows us that staying in full-time work happens more for men than women. Even when families come along, men seem less interested in cutting their work hours. That’s very telling.

No doubt all I’ve written will be dismissed by yourself but, you know what, at least I’m offering possible reasons, instead of just acknowledging that numbers of male teachers have dropped without attempting any insight into why that might be.

El_Duderino 09

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

I mean, we know that the gender pay gap isn’t really an inequality thing. When the gap arises, it’s simply because women are much more likely to take a few years out or work part-time when their children are small and naturally their earning power is stymied a bit by that. What does this have to do with teaching? Well, it’s not a stretch for me to imagine that when it comes to choosing college courses, women who know they want to be mothers cast their eyes to the future and look at jobs that will give them more free time. Believe me, many women are very focused on the future motherhood thing quite young. I feel quite confident to say it wouldn’t be as much a consideration for young men filling out their CAOs. The arising of the gap also shows us that staying in full-time work happens more for men than women. Even when families come along, men seem less interested in cutting their work hours. That’s very telling.

Childcare is encouraged for women in a way that doesn't apply to men. If parental leave could be shared between parents, then men would have the freedom to think about how they will organise their family and career. As it stands, woven have that freedom because they have the maternity leave and men get a couple of weeks.

That sets the tone for the course of men and women's careers and how they organise their lives. It's set in the culture.

I see parental leave as a men's issue (sorry to bring the discussion back to men's issues). It's something I think IMD could be used to highlight instead of the usual whinging and moaning about how IMD isn't as big as women's day.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Childcare is encouraged for women in a way that doesn't apply to men. If parental leave could be shared between parents, then men would have the freedom to think about how they will organise their family and career. As it stands, woven have that freedom because they have the maternity leave and men get a couple of weeks.

That sets the tone for the course of men and women's careers and how they organise their lives. It's set in the culture.

I see parental leave as a men's issue (sorry to bring the discussion back to men's issues). It's something I think IMD could be used to highlight instead of the usual whinging and moaning about how IMD isn't as big as women's day.

Absolutely. IMD is the perfect opportunity to talk about that issue. But that’s less fun, isn’t it?

El_Duderino 09

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts wrote: »

Absolutely. IMD is the perfect opportunity to talk about that issue. But that’s less fun, isn’t it?

Best thing to do is wait until Women's Day. Then all the big brave bucks who spend all day pretending to care about men's issues as a proxy for whinging about feminism, will be out in force whining about how nobody cares about IMD. Ironic, ain't it?

givyjoe

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Best thing to do is wait until Women's Day. Then all the big brave bucks who spend all day pretending to care about men's issues as a proxy for whinging about feminism, will be out in force whining about how nobody cares about IMD. Ironic, ain't it?

Do you think you could go 5 posts without the usual, whinge bait post?:rolleyes:.

El_Duderino 09

givyjoe wrote: »

Do you think you could go 5 posts without the usual, whinge bait post?:rolleyes:.

I suppose the people who use mens rights as a proxy for whinging about feminism might be triggered by my mentioning them. Funny how you seem to regularly pick up on that.

Do you think you have anything men's rights or IMD related to contribute to the thread?

iptba

Transcript of the UK House of Commons debating International Men's Day 2018
https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2018-11-29/debates/DE4D3A7A-24BA-4C7E-834B-F6BAC2751D9D/BACKBENCHBUSINESS

I haven't read this myself yet

Video here: https://www.parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/e848ff0d-a368-4e4d-93c3-6f523567f4b5#player-tabs

El_Duderino 09

I read the opening speech. Very good. He focuses on domestic violence against men throughout but also links it to prison sentences. He goes on to discuss treatment of men in family courts, circumcision.

I think he goes too far with the President's Club comparison at the end but it's generally on the money. He's calling for men's issues to be given the same consideration as analogous women's issues. Fair play.

tritium

iptba wrote: »

Transcript of the UK House of Commons debating International Men's Day 2018
https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2018-11-29/debates/DE4D3A7A-24BA-4C7E-834B-F6BAC2751D9D/BACKBENCHBUSINESS

I haven't read this myself yet

Video here: https://www.parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/e848ff0d-a368-4e4d-93c3-6f523567f4b5#player-tabs

Pretty damning that the government wouldn’t allocate the main chamber on the actual day for this debate. Really does show how seriously it’s taken by some.