It's being done... To a much better effect:

Not better, not even the same. :rolleyes:
Youse guys suck, this is how it should be done.

No heroes in that discussion... One side jumps to throat slitting, and the other equates "male heterosexuality" to catcalls and ogling.

They're such extreme positions though. Someone finding me attractive isn't an imposition. Never had a problem with men looking at me.

If a woman I did not know, had never met, and had no social context for interaction with, initiated a conversation with me, out of the blue, by telling me I was too skinny - I'd find that an imposition. Quite a few random blokes, over the years, have felt quite comfortable in telling me, a total stranger, how much they like a particular body part, how much better I'd look if wore a short skirt, or that I should get some meat on my bones (actual phrasing).

A total stranger shouting things at you in the street isn't nice. The lads, and indeed grown men, who engage in that kind of nonsense need a lesson in manners - and who the fuck knows, maybe even empathy. And I get that sometimes it may be hard to know what signals (if any) are being put out - that not everyone is equally adept at reading social cues - but headphones on, collar up, head down and eyes on the pavement is not easily misread as interested in interaction. That's what I mean by imposing - often quite literally. That doesn't mean any social interaction from anybody at that point is an imposition - but it is really not the time to make a romantic approach and certainly not a time I'm likely to give a flying fuck what a total stranger thinks of my tits.

Of course they're extreme, stupid extreme, but not uncommon on the net. They're also highly counter productive because they drive non-teeth gnashing people away from the subject entirely. Anyone taking a moderate stance is risking snipers and hooligans from both sides.

I did think this was funny, however.

Separate schooling for young boys and girls ?
...Maybe OK

Separate academic locations for men and woman ?
...No, this knight is not going forward

Women Respond to Nobel Laureate’s ‘Trouble With Girls’
NY Times - DAN BILEFSKY - JUNE 11, 2015

He's quite right of course.
Ban gay scientists too.

The argument for choosing to attend all women colleges is not so different from what this caveman is saying. But of course, how you say something is sometimes more important than what you say.

What you say, too often has no bearing on what they hear.

Funny how that works. ;)

That was awesome. Nice find.It's so true I think - we all, as individuals experience gender (or the absence of a sense of the same) in our own way. At so many different levels as well. I have a strong sense of myself as female - but my sense of what it is to be female is not necessarily in line with what a lot of other people think being female means.

Certain elements of gender can, I think, be separated out as probably more cultural than biological - if for no other reason than a wealth of evidence to suggest not just a range of gender conception, but paradigm shifts depending on historical circumstance. Different cultures have different degrees of fluidity in gender conceptions - and allow for smaller or greater ranges of gender expression. But there are also elements that seem far more biological - and then you have complexity within that as the divisions don't always break down comfortably between male and female.

However contingent on particular cultures and social structures, those elements of gender as experienced by the individual are no less real or profound.

Unfortunately our sense of what is to be male, or female is so wrapped up in what our culture understands as male or female, that it becomes almost impossible to separate self-conception from social-conception of gender. Hence another person not adhering to the same sense of gender can threaten the bounds within which that sense of gender is set.

Watched a really sweet film last weekend - Ready? Ok!, a little independant coming of age comedy about a kid growing up with gender issues; or more accurately a kid growing up with a perfectly sound sense of self whilst some of the adults in his life have gender issues on his behalf. Which I just thought was such a lovely twist on the usual way of looking at it.

I found it via my watch everything Michael Emerson's been in mission :p It's a nice little film - it's not perfect - there are couple of odd moments that didn't quite work for me, but it has heart and was made on pennies and goodwill. And there are some excellent performances.






Sidenote: Michael Emerson is playing the gay neighbour who ends up as a kind of mentor to the kid - his wife, Carrie Preston is playing the boy's single mother. How many guys, if they were actors, would be comfortable playing a gay man in scenes with their wife?

Which goes to show how wrong Summers was.

What breaks his mold more than a transgendered person?

Does Jenner get the male aptitude or the female aptitude?

Burkett seems to think so, and fumes about this rally 'round the trans is feminism backsliding.

After a couple of months of getting into gender politics and more or less discovering I have a near equal dislike for both the MRA and feminist movement, and choosing to resign the issue of gender politics until a movement that is neither innately incompetent or stupidifyingly counter productive can emerge... I think I finally found something I am more or less ok with: http://www.equalityagnostic.com/

A tiny gender egalitarian movement that attempts to bridge positions on gender inequality issues from both sides of isle without adhering to one particular narrative over the other... Technically right now it's tiny, but given the 67% who believe in gender equality but wouldn't consider themselves feminists, and given how little traction the male movement has, I would say this - or something like it - has the largest audience to grow on. I don't agree with quite everything the blogs of these sort have to say, but it's the right position to examine things from IMO (Except for not actually understanding what the word "agnostic" means... But you can't have everything *sigh*).

I'm always uncomfortable with the idea of the, or a feminist movement. There are feminist movements I'd say - or if there is a movement it is a very disparate one.

The problem with comparing feminism with MRA is that generally speaking there is no soft wing, so to speak. To self-identify as MRA at all requires a degree of intensity that isn't necessarily needed to self-identify as feminist - in part because of the ways in which those two movements arose. Lots of people casually identify with feminism in general terms but aren't particularly part of any movement or activism - it's like classing yourself as liberal, or conservative - a secular kind of feminism. I'd venture to suggest that most people who self-identify as feminist do so at that casual level. It is understood, mostly, I think, as a statement of a desire for equality and a recognition that some of the ways we organise ourselves as a society are a little screwy.

Hardcore feminism, like any hardcore philosophy, is a sometimes necessary (this near-equality we appear to have achieved in our society was never uncontested) and sometimes counter-productive mess. A little like liberalism or conservatism, feminism is much broader than an individual party. Like those philosophies, or viewpoints, it is embedded in our political and philosophical landscape as part of an ongoing discourse stretching back almost 200 years.

MRA is a fairly recent and usually very specific reaction to feminism - it is reactionary in every sense. It hasn't yet acquired those embedded roots or broader meanings.

They aren't going too, precisely because they are reactionary.

They all unite under anti-feminism but can't collect around any actual agenda, because they anti feminism includes everything from the most progressive gender egalitarians to the most traditionalists to actual movement of individualist feminism who have gotten thrown out of the sidelines of the movement during the 80s and 90s to MGTOWs who are pretty much an ironic answer to lesbian separatism mixed with PUA.

Take one simple issue: Father's rights in divorce law. All of the above groups can use this rhetorically as an example for unfairness. But Will they act on it if the progressives who want equal parenting rights need to get together with the traditionalists who want things to look like american 50s movies and thus outright want fathers to be the providers so that mothers can be the caregivers?

To actually get anywhere they need a movement that stands together on what they are for, not just what they are against. For men that doesn't currently exists.

Do you?

I am asking because in larger scale discussions I have constantly seen how "not all feminists" used as a deflection tactics, the feminists who disagree with those "Extremists" don't actually show any actual disagreement with them publicly but will indirectly defend them from criticism through the defending the label for what it means for them, and yet there is no actual reference to the "extremist" other then that label or a full way to describe it.

Look at it from the other side: How do you criticize feminist movement within literature, feminist dogma in academia, feminist political organizations, feminist lobby groups, feminist campus activism, feminist blogosphere and so on, if you are not allowed to use the word feminism because it includes people who might not quite agree with it? And if the "casual feminists" do have disagreements the "hardcore feminists", why is saying there are not one of them more important then actually expressing your disagreements with them?

The reality is that if you simply believe in equal rights for women, well - so do 85% of americans (and an even larger portion of brits if I recall)... yet only 18% of them identify as feminists, not because 67% don't know how to read the dictionary, but because feminist academia and has grown to include a lot more then that, often at the expense of meeting the dictionary definition.
After getting downsized to 18%, the chances that if you are still identify as one of them you are closer to being among the "hard core" group then you'd think is pretty high, even if you think the criticism only applies to the even more extremists.
Most of the criticism does not require lesbian separatists in order to count, if you believe in the patriarchy as a reasonable interpretation of social exchange the chances are the criticism applies to you too.

But maybe all of this truly doesn't apply to you and you genuinely both disagree with those the criticism is applicable too - in that case why not just accept the meaning of the word and their meaning they acquire in the context used by the people saying them and allow a critical discussion of people you - according to the very sentiment of "not all feminists" - disagree with? Take a step back and look at what role your position can take within the exchange, and whether you truly want to act as a smoke screen for extremists you disagree with.

Well - I've had some fairly vocal disagreements with hard-core feminists in my day.

Not all feminists - not all men - not your shield. These are snappy slogans doled out in forum wars. They get used so much they lose meaning - just another set of weapons in the arsenal.

I know lots of people who consider themselves feminists - because of the historical meaning of that term - but whose feminism assumes the necessity and desirability of equality for men too. I suspect the surveys under-represent those who see feminism as a positive thing, but don't necessarily hold it at an identity level.

Feminism in academia is, I think, an over-played card. Probably more valid 10 or 15 years ago before the big shift in gender studies started to bring men and masculinities to the forefront. Feminist academic approaches have followed, or are following, a similar path to marxist academic approaches, and post-modernist approaches. That isn't to say that there is not a field of feminist study of various kinds - but the conceptual stranglehold that took hold around certain subjects has fallen away for the most part. This happens in academia - a revolution of thinking that invigorates several fields, gets a little too omnipresent, and then the next generation of scholars coming through start to overturn it.

I think it's probably on a slightly different path in the States than in Britain and Europe - there's always been something of a tonal difference between British and American feminism, particularly in academic approaches. You can see it really clearly in the historiography of feminism and the early women's movement. The American scholarship has a much more optimistic tone to it - so, the apparent social construct, in the nineteenth century, of 'separate spheres' with men leading public and women domestic lives, in the American analysis operates to foster sisterhood and shared female experience (though also limiting agency in many ways) - the British analysis is much more pessimistic in terms of the emotional payoff of separate spheres. You don't get the same reading of sisterhood when you include a larger class component.

That's a gross generalisation on my part - the scholarship went through different iterations on both sides of the pond and at various times converged with or informed each other. But - I think there was always a slightly more political edge to the American feminist analysis - or rather that feminist analysis in American academia was more tied in with the political mission of feminism. We were slower onto that here, and then we didn't stay with it as long because the world moved on.

I have a few other thoughts - yes I know it's already fairly rambling :p I'll be back later.

[eta] quick point about patriarchy: I don't 'believe' in the patriarchy as something that exists. I sometimes find it a useful conceptual framework through which to examine some power relations and social structures. It is not the only conceptual framework - nor is it the most useful. As a historian I find it next to useless. Like most of those large-scale, total solution frameworks. Interesting to have in your head when you look at stuff (along with a bunch of different academic lenses).

Agreed.

Can you expand on that?

:thepain:

Wrote a really long and detailed response and then windows crashed before I pressed submit.

I'll come back to it at some point :p

When you do, I am also curious about these:

I'll have to come back to the emergence of masculinities as a field of study - having just smoked something very pleasant, i'm not sure I could give a coherent account ;p

As far as disagreements with radical feminists? God, where to start. I'm semi plugged in to the local activist scene - not as much as I used to be - in terms of party political campaigning and the like - and also some ties to the cooperative movement, women graduates assoc, and the women's assoc. Mostly left-leaning, some centrist, and in the women's organisations more of a spread across the left-right divide. I know a lot of women in those scenes who are feminist - most of them, as far as I can tell, have an eye-roll response to radical feminists.

For myself, I have several fairly fundamental problems with their approach. Most recently, I was pretty disgusted with the way many radical feminists responded to the issue of trans women in women-only spaces.

I don't like some of the attitudes I've seen from that branch of feminism towards masculinity. Aside from being deeply unpleasant, those attitudes suggest a very confused ideology. To whatever extent gender is constructed, it is constructed for both genders (and indeed all variations). It is also as complex for each. And - if we are going to throw off those essentialist chains - well, then we can't also have women as the natural civilising force for brutish men, can we? If women are not contained within a narrow gender definition, then how is it that women's presence in the boardroom is going to bring about greater harmony and a more caring attitude, purely because they are women?

Most of the problems I have with the way our society thinks about gender boil down to a belief that, whilst there are some differences in how our brains work, we are far more united by our shared experience of humanness than we are divided by our disparate experiences of gender. We focus so much attention on differences that are slight, or highly contextual and ignore the massive overlap.

Alongside that is the idea that we all have our own conception of gender - of what it means to us to be our gender. And if that is ok at one end of the spectrum of masculinity then it is also ok at the other. Masculinity is not a problem for feminists to solve.

Jelly on the smoke.

So this is interesting... I don't know if it's a different degree or a different perspective to construct the spectrum from to began with. I don't know about the british ones, but I have followed the american equivilents and I certainly consider them to be fanatic extremists on my spectrum (Or rather, I believe that their leadership is the result of politics, so representing feminism as an ideology gradually got replaced with representing women as a demographic), yet none of the particular beliefs you describe come across as particularly radical.

Help me get an idea of how you construct your spectrum here - You are an activist from the sound of it, at least to some degree, so what do you agree with in the feminist movement? What differentiates you from the more extremists? What differentiates you from those less?

Sorry, I wasn't really clear there. I have been at various times a political and/or community activist - so, I was an active member of the Labour party for years and a local politician - and I've been involved in anti-racism activism and some local issue stuff. The two women's groups I mentioned aren't really groups for feminist activism. A lot of the people i know or am connected to in these groups are feminists and there is a baseline of gender consciousness, but there's also a baseline of class consciousness for most as well. As interested as I am in gender issues, I am not in any way an activist in the feminist movement.

That said - I have on occasion supported causes which come under the umbrella of feminist issues - but they've tended to be quite specific, such as supporting the campaign to stop funding cuts for a domestic violence support unit.

I don't mean to diss the whole movement there - I've known some wonderful people who have worked with passion and commitment to try and make our society a fairer one, or even just a more accepting one. Several of my personal heroes are women who have been active in the women's movement - but they're also active in the labour and trades union movement. One was the MP for my town up until 2005 -Alice - now in her late 70s I think. To be a female Labour MP for a northern town in the 80s/90s; man, that's a tough gig :P

One problem with radical feminism - aside fom the echo chamber effect of social media - is that feminism is not a total solution. It is not sufficient - but is treated as if it is all there is - eclipsing other, equally pressing, sometimes more pressing concerns. With the best will in the world, human beings are messy creatures - whilst i think it is useful and desirable to challenge the status quo and try to understand and tackle systemic inequality, the challenge is pointless if it is not relevant to people's lived lives.

As to the spectrum - I think the whole thing's been sent out of whack by the twittersphere.

I watched a show last night (sort of. It was on TV and I couldn't be bothered turning it off till I got up from the computer) called Blinging up Baby. It was a British show about women who are totally obsessed with buying fancy clothes and putting make up on their baby/toddler/little girls.

One of the women was talking to her little girl of about 6 about wearing make up and how all women look better with 'a bit of make up on', and the child was agreeing and going along with it.

When we live in a society where grown women think like this, and actively encourage the next generation to believe it, is it any wonder that we're all confused about gender roles and equality? According to the woman on that show, a woman who doesn't wear make up isn't even a real woman anyway!

... until she's riding a bronc or driving a pick up.

http://cellar.org/2015/women.jpg

Fair enough, they are all famous enough to have a lot written about them, but a quick WIKI check gives a rough sketch...

Maria Mitchell (August 1, 1818 – June 28, 1889) was an American astronomer who, in 1847, by using a telescope, discovered a comet which as a result became known as "Miss Mitchell's Comet".
She won a gold medal prize for her discovery which was presented to her by King Frederick VI of Denmark - this was remarkable for a woman. On the medal was inscribed "Non Frustra Signorum Obitus Speculamur et Ortus" in Latin (taken from Georgics by Virgil (Book I, line 257) (English: “Not in vain do we watch the setting and rising of the stars”). Mitchell was the first American woman to work as a professional astronomer.

Emmy Noether we talked about before.

Dame (Susan) Jocelyn Bell Burnell, DBE, FRS, PRSE FRAS (born 15 July 1943) is a Northern Irish astrophysicist. As a postgraduate student, she discovered the first radio pulsars while studying and advised by her thesis supervisor Antony Hewish, for which Hewish shared the Nobel Prize in Physics with Martin Ryle, while Bell Burnell was excluded, despite having been the first to observe and precisely analyse the pulsars.
The paper announcing the discovery of pulsars had five authors. Hewish's name was listed first, Bell's second. Hewish was awarded the Nobel Prize, along with Martin Ryle, without the inclusion of Bell as a co-recipient. Many prominent astronomers expressed outrage at this omission, including Sir Fred Hoyle.

Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova; IPA: (born 6 March 1937) is the first woman to have flown in space, having been selected from more than four hundred applicants and five finalists to pilot Vostok 6 on 16 June 1963. In order to join the Cosmonaut Corps, Tereshkova was only honorarily inducted into the Soviet Air Force and thus she also became the first civilian to fly in space.
Before her recruitment as a cosmonaut, Tereshkova was a textile-factory assembly worker and an amateur skydiver. After the dissolution of the first group of female cosmonauts in 1969, she became a prominent member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, holding various political offices. She remained politically active following the collapse of the Soviet Union and is still regarded as a hero in post-Soviet Russia.

Cecilia Helena Payne-Gaposchkin (May 10, 1900 – December 7, 1979) was a British–American astronomer and astrophysicist who, in 1925, proposed in her Ph.D. thesis an explanation for the composition of stars in terms of the relative abundances of hydrogen and helium.
According to G. Kass-Simon and Patricia Farnes, Payne's career marked a turning point at Harvard College Observatory. Under the direction of Harlow Shapley and Dr E. J. Sheridan (whom Payne-Gaposchkin described as a mentor), the observatory had already offered more opportunities in astronomy to women than did other institutions, and notable achievements had been made earlier in the century by Williamina Fleming, Antonia Maury, Annie Jump Cannon, and Henrietta Swan Leavitt. However, with Payne-Gaposchkin's Ph.D., women entered the 'mainstream'.

The trail she blazed into the largely male-dominated scientific community was an inspiration to many. For example, she became a role model for noted astrophysicist Joan Feynman. Feynman's mother and grandmother had dissuaded her from pursuing science, since they believed women were not physically capable of understanding scientific concepts. But Feynman was later inspired by Payne-Gaposchkin when she came across some of her work in an astronomy textbook. Seeing Payne-Gaposhkin's research published in this way convinced Feynman that she could, in fact, follow her scientific passions.

Lise Meitner (7 November 1878 – 27 October 1968) was an Austrian physicist who worked on radioactivity and nuclear physics. Meitner was part of the Hahn-Meitner-Strassmann-team that worked on "transuranium-elements" since 1935, which led to the radiochemical discovery of the nuclear fission of uranium and thorium in December 1938, an achievement for which her colleague Otto Hahn was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1944. Meitner is often mentioned as one of the most glaring examples of women's scientific achievement overlooked by the Nobel committee.
A 1997 Physics Today study concluded that Meitner's omission was "a rare instance in which personal negative opinions apparently led to the exclusion of a deserving scientist" from the Nobel. Element 109, meitnerium, is named in her honour.

Caroline Lucretia Herschel (16 March 1750 – 9 January 1848) was a German British astronomer and the sister of astronomer Sir William Herschel with whom she worked throughout both of their careers. Her most significant contributions to astronomy were the discoveries of several comets and in particular the periodic comet 35P/Herschel-Rigollet, which bears her name.
She was the first woman to be paid for her contribution to science, to be awarded a Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society (1828), and to be named an Honorary Member of the Royal Astronomical Society (1835, with Mary Somerville). She was also named an honorary member of the Royal Irish Academy (1838). The King of Prussia presented her with a Gold Medal for Science, on the occasion of her 96th birthday (1846).

Rita Levi-Montalcini; 22 April 1909 – 30 December 2012) was an Italian Nobel Laureate honored for her work in neurobiology. She was awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine jointly with colleague Stanley Cohen for the discovery of nerve growth factor (NGF). From 2001 until her death, she also served in the Italian Senate as a Senator for Life.
Rita Levi-Montalcini had been the oldest living Nobel laureate and was the first ever to reach a 100th birthday. On 22 April 2009, she was feted with a 100th birthday party at Rome's city hall.

Seems to me most of these women got screwed over for recognition. But they were lucky to make the big time, by being related to or friends with someone influential in the scientific community, or occasional shit luck. For the vast majority with neither, think of the brains and ability that's been wasted. :(

This, right here, is one of the tragedies of gender inequality. And it works both ways. When we corale, with the full force of society and culture, each gender into a narrow path - how many potentially great scientists are stifled? And, on the other side of that equation, how many potentially wonderful nurses and teachers?

This is what makes the whole gender / sexism issue so complicated and difficult. We all make this culture. Sexism isn't something men apply to women - it's something we as a society build in to our culture. We inculcate our young into whatever gender conceptions we have. Right up to the extremes - it isn't men who carry out FGM on young girls, it is grandmothers and female elders of the community.

We exist within our gendered world - it is impossible to fully step outside it, even if we want to. For those who don't even question it - it is as simple and immutable a fact of life as the air we breathe.

It's weird how attitudes can shift and change in such a short space of time though.

For example the idea that "Every little girl wants to be a Princess." When I was a little girl, there were plenty of stories of Princesses desperate to escape palace life, who ran away and lived poor, who loved their horses and grooms more than dresses, who would never kiss a frog just in case it became a Prince, but knew how to shoot an arrow or splint a broken wing...

And yet it's presumably my generation of women who are raising little girls believing they are obsessed with pink, hate getting muddy and really only want to attend State Functions where they talk to elderly statesmen until they become brood mares.

My heroines were Florence Nightingale, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Grace Darling, Zola Budd.
Maybe I let the side down by not passing this on to daughters of my own.

I agree, which is why I think a return to gender traditionalism would be economically and culturally devastating in so many ways, not to mention individually (IMO it was a rotten deal all around).

And yet this is also the reason why the solution needs to be in the realms of equal opportunities, not strong arming institutions into equal results, because in many ways we are turning the wheel backwards, for the 18 girls who didn't get to study what they wanted within the sciences because the 60 student course teaching it didn't reach the required gender quota (Or you know, for the 42 boys).

As outdated and foolish as Hunt's comments were - I do think the UCL forcing him to resign was a step too far. I don't think it helps at all that this man's career is now in the wind. He had apologised for what he said - an attempt at humour that went awry.

I get why UCL take it seriously - with all the historical and current barriers to full participation in scientific fields, and the great efforts academic institutions are putting into finding a better balance - his comments were very unhelpful - coming from such a leading voice in academia. But - I don't like that he's been forced out over it.

Show of hands, who here has ever cried at work, whether in front of people, or in the bathroom or parking lot but at least one coworker caught you?

I have.

Ironically might do a better job at pushing women away then he did, by missing the joke and reinforcing the stereotype that scientists tend to live lower along the autistic spectrum (One of my closer friends is a quantum biologist outright diagnosed with autism and he was able to get the social tone and humor.... Just sayin').

I generally don't cry. But I get choked up a bit, or get teary-eyed, and in my 24 years here, that's happened on a few occasions at work.

Most memorable was when a homeless guy committed suicide at our workplace by gaining access to our roof and jumping into the alleyway. So many people rushed to the offices on that side of the building to gape at the body during the police investigation. It was just so SAD to me. The suicide, sure, but mostly my cow orkers' reactions to it. I didn't look, BTW. It still bothers me today, years later. What's wrong with people?

I have, more than once. But as far as I can remember, only for personal reasons. My sister made me cry more times at work (not all caught) than any other reason put together.

I think partly in ignorance, as after the age of 21 she's only ever worked part-time and never had an accessible work landline. She seemed to think she could be as mean and disapproving as she wanted while I was sat at a desk I couldn't get away from for a good few hours... But then I never smoked at work, so if you add up the paltry minutes lost to my tearful episodes, my employers would have benefited more from refusing to employ smokers.

I have.

Women are tricksy! I was reading this interesting article by Sarah Laskow on the hundreds of products in our grocery basket which have been modified by atomic radiation.

Suddenly, without warning, I was subjected to this:
A woman scientist?!? What a preposterous notion, I damn near dropped my monocle. http://cellar.org/2012/bwekk.gif

Yes, though technically I wasn't caught crying so much as had a waitress mentioning there's wet spots on a sandwich she was about to bring to the customer (I was working in the kitchen at the time).

I cried in my bosses office when I was asking for time off when I split from the boys father. He was understanding and never judged me for it. He was an old softy though. I miss him actually. He was always good to me too. Continued to promote me afterwards too.

I have dealt with numerous crying women in office situations though, both as an equal and as a boss. Occassionally as an underling. I think (believe it or not) people irl see me as someone to be relied on to offer good advice, and who can be trusted with sensitive information.

Actually even now I have women crying into their teacups at my kitchen table at least once a week. Often more often. I think locals know I work from home and the kettle is always hot, and there's usually a cookie around too, so the just drop in. It's nice. I like the company, and no one minds if I keep working while we talk. :)

If'n it got me into your kitchen, I'd be walking down your street rubbing oniony fingers into my eyes every week...
Then again, I'm semi-professional at crying these days, so I wouldn't even need to do that.

It would be a real treat to have you in my kitchen sundae, even if you were crying. X

.

*shakes head*

http://www.theguardian.com/football/...ners-daughters

Seriously. Wtf were they thinking?


And just to show that they really, fundamentally don't get why this is problematic :

So - reflective of the 'many personal stories' of the women's team players, were the roles of mother, partner and daughter. Not teacher, fitness coach and accountant - mother, partner and daughter.

Well that's where they belong, having babies and supporting obeying their man. Next thing you know they'll be wanting to work on trucks in the Army, like that Elizabeth chick. :lol2:

I complained to Channel 4 a few years back, after they mentioned an Israeli politician, new to the position, was a mother-of-two. Interesting information for anyone who wants to set up a play date I suppose, but hardly appropriate on an international news broadcast about her appointment. My question was whether a male politician would be similarly credited with now many children he had in a similar piece. No, only if it were specifically relevant ie he was meeting with Fathers For Justice and speaking on the reform of the Family Court system or suchlike.

On a side note, I wonder if the players really weren't mothers, partners or daughters while they were away...

"fathers, partners and sons” ... still offensive to you? not to me.

No - because the cultural context is entirely different. If we were coming off the back of two centuries of struggle for men to be taken seriously in the workplace, where no matter what their successes they are routinely denied the identity of worker - with even top executives and politicians judged and identified primarily on their roles as childbearers and husbands - then it would be an equivalent.

Reversing it only works if you can actually reverse all of it.

Bit like with racism :P

"Today, these firemen go back to being fathers, partners, and sons... but now they are also heroes."

You really think anything like would ever be said, by any newscaster or PR person, ever? It's not about the fact that the women have personal lives, of course they do. It's the implication that the personal is their primary job, that this is what they really are on a day-to-day basis, and their status as good soccer players is surprising, plucky, and practically adorable. The whole comment is a verbal pat on the head. It's not malicious, it's just patronizing as all fuck.

Thankyou Clodfobble - that's the explanation I was reaching for and failing to find :P

Yes I do, when it's amateurs athletes. After the US hockey team's "miracle on ice", the press and public got tired of rehashing the game, so they got into what the individual players are were doing next. Most of those stories emphasized the life they were returning to as fathers, husbands and sons. I think Dana's right about "mothers, partners and daughters", is the result of a pretty narrow view of women's role in society, but I think the intention was to indicate they were amateurs returning to normal lives.

Is this team not a professional, full-time one? I don't follow the sport at all.

Well - all women's football in this country used to be entirely amateur. Since 2009, there have been contracts for the main squad - giving salaries of £16k p/a. Some of the squad also have part-time jobs or their own businesses - in order to receive the salary they are not alowed to work more than part-time hours outside of the team.

Claire Rafferty is an analyst with Deutsche Bank in the City
Jo Potter is an FA skills coach
Jade Moore owns her own Sports Therapy business
Eniola Aluko recently qualified as a sports and entertainment lawyer (she's waiting til she retires from the team to work in that field).

Bruce is absolutely right abotu the purpose of that press release. It was about them returning to 'normal' life - and it clearly wasn't intended as anything negative - but damn was it clumsy. Particularly given the issues around acceptance of women in sport, and in particular football - women's sports get a fraction of the attention that men's sports do (in this country anyway), female athletes get paid a fraction of what male athletes get paid - and the prizes and accolades are similarly tiny in comparison to those showered on the men.

Basically, there has been, for a very long time, a cultural attitude towards women's sports that suggests they are a novelty and somewhat frivolous and unnecesary - unlike the serious and hero-making business of men's sports.

The ban on women playing on FA grounds was lifted the year I was born - 42 years later and women's football is only just starting to get anything like the recognition it deserves - can you imagine offering a male footballer a salary of 16k a year?

42 years and the FA are still putting their collective foot in it when it comes to women's football.

Case in point: bikini-clad Olympic "beach volleyball"

You don't see a spedo-clad male counter-part to this farce.



(The spedo's are reserved for men's swimming where they are for "function")

I don't think they're pros because they don't fall down and writhe in pain when someone comes within three feet of them, like the pros do. ;)

Now that's entertainment!

:p

Oh - I think I was mistaken about all women's football being amateur - I think some of the clubs have professional women's teams on the books.


That said - it really is a pittance compared to the men's game.


So - the captain of the England team - arguably representative of the cream of women's football earns a little less than the average annual wage.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/ampp3d/...better-4684810

And yet ... they've been doing far better than the men's national team.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/row-ze...womens-4672335