Private Group for paid up members of Boards.ie. Join the club.
Women's rights under attack
Comments
-
-
-
-
And even stranger than that is Dublin Zoo's attempt to celebrate "mammies" using pictures of a man in drag.
Imagine using blackface to celebrate black history month. Yet women are not allowed to find womanface offensive.
3 -
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
I must admit that International Women's Day always has me a bit conflicted. On the one hand, celebrating achievements like those of Marie Curie, Amelia Earhart, etc is a terrific way to highlight role models for young women who might be hesitant to follow what might seem to be a stereotypical male path, in a "if you can't see it, you can't be it" way. On the other hand, some of the celebrations can end up having a bang of "isn't she great…for a woman" about them.
And that last phrase reminds me of a song I used to send to my female colleagues on IWD:
I'm Gonna Be An Engineer, song lyrics
When I was a little girl I wished I was a boy,
I tagged along behind the gang and wore my corduroys.
Everybody said I only did it to annoy,
But I was gonna be an engineer.Mamma said, "Why can't you be a lady?
Your duty is to make me the mother of a pearl;
Wait until you're older, dear,
And maybe you'll be glad that you're a girl.
Dainty as a Dresden statue, gentle as a Jersey cow,
Smooth as silk, gives cream and milk,
Learn to coo, learn to moo,
That's what you do to be a lady, now.When I went to school I learned to write and how to read,
History, geography and home economy,
And typing is a skill that every girl is sure to need,
To while away the extra time until the time to breed,
And then they had the nerve to ask, what would I like to be?
I says, "I'm gonna be an engineer!""No, you only need to learn to be a lady,
The duty isn't yours, for to try to run the world,
An engineer could never have a baby,
Remember, dear, that you're a girl."She's smart --- for a woman.
I wonder how she got that way?
You get no choice, you get no voice,
Just stay mum, pretend you're dumb.
That's how you come to be a lady, today.
This song was originally posted on protestsonglyrics.net
Well, I started as a typist but I studied on the sly;
Working out the day and night so I could qualify,
And every time the boss came in, he pinched me on the thigh,
Said, "I've never had an engineer!"
"You owe it to the job to be a lady,
The duty of the staff is to give the boss a whirl,
The wages that you get are crummy, maybe,
But it's all you get, 'cause you're a girl."Then Jimmy came along and we set up a conjugation,
We were busy every night with loving recreation;
I spent my days at work so he could get an education,
And now he's an engineer!He said: "I know you'll always be a lady,
The duty of my darling is to love me all her life,
Could an engineer look after or obey me?
Remember, dear, that you're my wife!"As soon a Jimmy got a job, I studied hard again,
Then busy at me turret-lathe a year or two, and then,
The morning that the twins were born, Jimmy says to them,
"Your mother was an engineer!"
"You owe it to the kids to be a lady,
Dainty as a dish-rag, faithful as a chow,
Stay at home, you got to mind the baby,
Remember you're a mother now!"Every time I turn around there's something else to do,
Cook a meal or mend a sock or sweep a floor or two,
Listening to Jimmy Young - it makes me want to spew,
I was gonna be an engineer.I only wish that I could be a lady,
I'd do the lovely things that a lady's s'posed to do,
I wouldn't even mind if only they would pay me,
Then I could be a person too.What price for a woman?
You can buy her for a ring of gold,
To love and obey, without any pay,
You get a cook and a nurse for better or worse
You don't need a purse when a lady is sold.Oh, but now the times are harder and me Jimmy's got the sack;
I went down to Vicker's, they were glad o have me back.
But I'm a third-class citizen, my wages tell me that;
But I'm a first-class engineer!The boss he says "We pay you as a lady,
You only got the job because I can't afford a man,
With you I keep the profits high as may be,
You're just a cheaper pair of hands."You got one fault, you're a woman;
You're not worth the equal pay.
A bitch or a tart, you're nothing but heart,
Shallow and vain, you've got no brain.Well, I listened to my mother and I joined a typing pool,
Listened to my lover and I put him through his school,
If I listen to the boss, I'm just a bloody fool,
And an underpaid engineer.
I been a sucker ever since I was a baby,
As a daughter, as a mother, as a lover, as a dear,
But I'll fight them as a woman, not a lady,
I'll fight them as an engineer!1 -
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
For people who think men claiming to be women has no link with (other) men abusing or stalking women, here's an example of why they're wrong:
The UK Independent has compiled a list of 50 influential women for IWD. One of these "women" is Paris Lees, a man who went to prison for a violent robbery and who has said he (as a woman) loved to be sexually objectified and treated like a ‘piece of meat’ by other men - and that this did not make him less of a feminist.
A pioneering and influential voice for transgender representation in the UK media, Paris Lees’ own story leapt onto our screens last year in the BBC’s What It Feels Like For a Girl. Adapted from Lees’ memoir of the same name, the powerful and critically acclaimed coming-of-age story was described as “urgent” by The Independent’s critic Nick Hilton and earned praise from all corners of the British media
So Lees is apparently able to unironically explain to the world "What It Feels Like For a Girl" - and that includes enjoying being catcalled and treated like a piece of meat.
And we're really supposed to think that isn't a harmful message to send out to young men? That women "like it really"? When it's actually a MAN saying that, and yet this man is put on a list of influential women and referred to as "she" in multiple fawning reviews and interviews??
Last summer I went to Ibiza, Spain, where I was catcalled, sexually objectified, and treated like a piece of meat by men the entire week. And it was absolutely awesome. It got to the point where I couldn’t even be bothered to follow any of it up. Every time some hot guy got fresh with me, I just thought, OK, I could **** you, but there might be some even hotter stud serving it up later.
Paris Lees is not the only such man aping hypersexualised women, by any means. Other trans women who've won acclaim for telling us what it's like to be a woman are Torrey Peters, with Detransition, Baby which includes a description of how it's so "validating" to be hit during sex because that's what women experience and not men. Or there's "Juno" Dawson, chosen for IWD plaudits by MP Stella Creasy. Dawso's writing includes several variants on the nugget that being a woman means "getting f¨cked, because that's what a woman is". Also claims that there are a lot of gay men for whom being gay is "a consolation prize because they couldn't be women".
And just to be clear, I'm NOT saying it's ONLY about transidentiifying men. I'm not. How ever they are part of the problem.
More generally, here's an article by the fabulous Julie Bindel that explains why the trend, mostly led by men but with the complicity of a certain section of "appeasing" women, of minimising sexual harassment of girls by pretending (among other things) that prostitution is just work, or that it's acceptable to require women in the Hooters restaurants sign a contract prior to starting work that waives their right to sue the organisation for sexual harassment incites men into harassing women. Because it's really about men's desire to consider women as mere sexual objects for them. And that takes multiple forms.
Bodies for sale - The feminist fix: Sexual harassment will never end if men can pay for it
What is the feminist fix to sexual harassment? We must, first and foremost, stop separating porn and prostitution from male violence, and recognise that a world in which commercial sexual exploitation proliferates, boys will grow up internalising the message that women and girls are there to be used and abused at the whim of men. There is no point bringing in additional laws when the current ones are not being implemented. Making misogyny a hate crime is not, as some women have claimed, the answer. All this would do is give the criminal justice system an additional excuse to not criminalise rape and domestic violence. Sexual harassment happens because women are objectified. True liberation for women can only be realised when our bodies are no longer seen as the property of men.
4 -
-
Advertisement
-
