Sunday 15 July 2018

Could I be a Feminist?

Could I be a Feminist?
My daughter, a mother of three, doesn’t like Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. The main reason is that he is prancing around saying “I am a Feminist.” Generations of women before her fought a hard battle to get the right to vote and she is basing her vote on not liking a politician for not being masculine enough for her taste. Her confusion is based on mixing up feminist with being feminine. She also is upset that he showed concern for the environment. Living in oil-rich Alberta, she thinks that his “weakness” can cost us jobs. She wants a government that caters to oil interest not to environmentalists.
I watched the feminist movement fight and win some measure of equality for women in my younger days. When I started my working career, it was legal to exclude females from professional advancement, and women were often paid less for work of equal value. It has changed and now it is forgotten.
When I was barely out of my teen years, it was common to employ women for a fraction of men’s wages (often 40% less) assuming that they were only working for pocket money while men were the providers. Often the women worked harder and longer than men, but were barred from high paying jobs. This was corrected by the fight of Feminists, but there is more left to do. Now a declared feminist politician is not welcomed in large portions of the country where rugged individualism is the norm. People hate him without asking why he is the way he is.
A study was done by the University of Iowa asking the question of “How women react to benevolent sexism.”  They found that women enjoy guys who land them his coat when they are cold, open doors for them and protects them from aggressors. Girls didn’t enjoy people saying that they wouldn’t work for a woman supervisor or trust a female CEO. Some, real “strong men” get satisfaction from physically and emotionally beating women, a few call it love. Tough love it is.
I am a “lefty” by many people’s assessment. I would pay a woman who is shoveling dirt the same wage as I would pay a guy, even if he shovels twice as much dirt. I would pay people who work, enough so they can pay rent, eat and feed their kids regardless of their gender. I wasn’t always like this.
I was a moral person all my life, but I learned a way to overrule moral decisions. My boss took me aside one time and told me. You are in a position financed by taxpayers who expect you to save them money and provide the best service possible. You can live your life as you wish, but make business decisions based on business rules. Your loyalty is to your investors, and they demand that you make business decisions based on finance, not on feelings.
There was a time that I scheduled people for short shifts at work, so they will not become full-time employees and be owed benefits. I had a budget, and I saved by taking advantage of workers to make the budget stretch further. I laid people off so they will not become “permanent employees.”  I hired private companies who didn’t follow safety regulations to do jobs that our regulated union workers couldn’t do for the same price.
One day a young single mother whose car just broke down said to me, “I would do anything to get more hours.” She had tears in her eyes… I found more work for her, and I changed my politics. Business crossed the line! I was helping business and business was becoming abusive towards good people. I guess I am a weak lefty feminist after all. Perhaps I shouldn’t live in a place where rugged males rule letting the economy dictate the rules based on profits for the company, government, municipality or whoever else is employing people only for gains, not for social concerns. Thank God I am now retired and no longer must say, business is business.
At this stage of my life, I have time to reflect on why the world is the way it is and do I like it to continue this way. I have my vote and my pen, or computer in this case. I can tell people why I think the way I do and listen to why they chose another way. Mostly they choose not to talk about it.
My daughter may not vote for a feminist Liberal or for female Democrat. I would not want the responsibility of telling her who to vote for anyway. I just hope that she takes in consideration who may be hurt if she votes for rugged business type individuals. I hope that she considers who really the tough leader is working for and see if it is going to help or worsen the lives of most people around her. If they are young professionals like her, I will hope she will consider where they would have all been if it wasn’t for the progressive movements like feminism that her elders fought for. I am not a feminist by definition but I am old, and I remember. I care, a lot, about those who are placed in impossible situations while others play tough, sometimes for just to show strength.
I am a family man, a Christian, a patriot, in that order. To me the “feminin” is as important as the “masculine”.

The Associated Press, Ottawa citizen news. One woman is standing up to a rugged, strong male in the G7 meeting, June 2018 in Canada. Feminists came a long way in my lifetime.
This is a link to my blog: https://thesimpleravenspost.blogspot.ca/  Feel free to check other articles and comment.

2 comments:

  1. Avner, I have to take you to task over your comment regarding women's advancement and equal pay for work of equal value. You state "it has changed and is now forgotten". Really? Tell that to the millions of women around the world who are paid less than men for the same job. Canada has the 5th highest gender wage gap among 22 OECD countries. According to Statistics Canada, women continue to earn 70% of what men earn on average annually. Canadian women who work full-time still earn 73.5 cents for every dollar men make. These numbers are even lower for Indigenous and women of colour.
    As for advancement, women represent just 11% of board members on companies listed on the S&P/TSX composite index. Canada ranked 9th among major industrialized nations for female board membership in 2011. Only 3% of the top 100 CEOs in Canada are women.
    Over & forgotten? Not by a long shot! Sorry to say Avner, but only for old white males.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I see that we need the feminist movement more urgently than I knew. Your note should be written as a letter to the editor to solicit more public input.
      Avner

      Delete

A new Human.

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