ozarque: Sexism in and out of the workplace; part two; afternote....

ozarque (

ozarque) wrote,
@ 2006-08-07 16:10:00

Sexism in and out of the workplace; part two; afternote....
The comments you've made about this morning's post have been almost entirely supportive; I thank you for them, and I believe I understand what you're saying. The problem is -- as I perceive it -- that as long as women who find themselves in a situation like the one I described go on doing the kind of thing I did, situations like that will continue. I was in fact contributing to the sexist system that was putting me in that situation; I didn't have the courage to do what I knew was right and then deal with the consequences, whatever they might have been.

My weakest point is my children (and of course now my grandchildren). I think of the children who walked through that howling mob in Little Rock to desegregate its schools, and kept on going back day after day. And I know absolutely that I could have done that myself if it had been something an adult could do, but I would never have been able to muster the courage to send my children to do it. Somebody's children had to do it, and there's no reason on this earth why mine should have been exempt; but I never could have found the courage or the strength to send them.

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	artfulruin 2006-08-07 05:02 pm UTC (link)
	I think many women's children are our weakest point. The fact that we're not willing to throw them to the wolves slows down the whole expedition. Does that make us wrong? I'm honestly asking. So many times, I don't know. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	Response to artfulruin.... ozarque 2006-08-08 01:53 pm UTC (link)
	I don't know the answer to that question either; I wish I did. Maybe we ought to be able to rise above our love for our children and think instead of the greater good .... but I know I'm not able to. I have a very hard time thinking of the greater good ahead of anybody's children, much less ahead of my own. (Reply to this)(Parent)

matociquala
2006-08-07 05:31 pm UTC (link)

I'm not sure that what you did in fact contributes to a sexist system so much as exploiting it. I'm also reasonably convinced that the reason 'fighting like a girl' (by which I mean, fighting like the weaker person in the power dynamic) is stigmatized is because being weaker is stigmatized.

On the other hand, fighting like a girl is how the colonists won the American Revolutionary War. Maybe it's time we laid by these outmoded ideas of judging ourselves by a historically male standard and judged *them* by ours.

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whatifoundthere
2006-08-07 07:30 pm UTC (link)

I hear the same kind of argument made by, e.g., women who work at Hooters. "I get paid huge tips for indulging the fantasies of jocks and businessmen, so I 'exploit' the system and get paid better than I would at a different restaurant." I'm not convinced. Doing exactly what those-in-power expect you to do (in this case, by making your body into an object) does not "exploit" those people. Camille Paglia has made the claim that strippers have a lot of power in our culture because their clients are fixated on them; I appreciate her attempt to up-end the standard view of power, and it's important to understand that the system is abusive to men too -- but the fact of the matter is, in both

ozarque's case and in that of our hypothetical Hooters waitress, the men are the ones with the ability to change the situation, and the women are not.

After all, the man in

ozarque's story could prevent or permit

ozarque to pursue her career. What could she do to him? If she had confronted him, she would be out on the street. This is how exploitation works. It seems perverse to say that she was the one exploiting him just because she found a way to get that certificate out of him. I'm not saying she shouldn't have done it; I agree with the other readers of this journal who say that it was a necessary evil. But I think it's overstating the case to say that she "turned the tables" on him or somesuch. She didn't. The situation was a horrifically desperate one, and it's unfair to try and sugarcoat it.

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matociquala
2006-08-07 10:54 pm UTC (link)

I should probably inform you that I consider being compared to Camille Paglia fightin' words.

That said, there is a difference between selling yourself into indentured servitude, and using any weapon that comes to hand against the man with his boot on your throat.

When somebody is between you and the door, you go over them, and you don't sweat too much what you have to use as a handhold along the way.

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whatifoundthere
2006-08-07 11:29 pm UTC (link)

I don't think you and I disagree. I think I may just have snagged on your use of the word "exploiting" -- because to me that word leads naturally to the concept of exploitation, which just didn't seem applicable in

ozarque's case. If you meant the word more neutrally ("she just used the tools that were available to her"), then yes, I think most of the people who have commented so far are on the same page in that regard.

Unfortunately, I don't think that exploiting (in the neutral sense) a sexist system precludes contributing to it. I wish it did; I wish the fact that

ozarque was a brilliant and strong-willed woman was somehow "enough" to put a dent in the machine that her instructor was a part of. I think that's the point I was trying to make in my first comment. In my encounters with misogyny in the workplace, sometimes I just gritted my teeth and bore the abuse, because just surviving was really all I could hope for in those situations, and whistleblowing or whatever would simply have wrecked my life, full stop. I don't think I did the wrong thing, but I do fear that the system got just the teeniest-tiniest bit stronger as a result. Power feeds itself, and it's designed to eliminate threats to itself. I've seen firsthand how that works. That doesn't mean it's undefeatable, but it does mean that easy Hallmark answers ("Just stand up for yourself! Let your talents shine! Justice will prevail!") ring very hollow to me. Thankfully I haven't seen much of that in this discussion, but I've seen a lot of it elsewhere, which is one of the reasons I've become very reluctant to talk about sexism in the workplace at all.

JFTR, you don't strike me as being anything like Camille Paglia. I just brought her up because she's one of the people who's tried (unsuccessfully, IMO) to redefine concepts of power so that "exploited" women come out on top.

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	matociquala 2006-08-07 11:34 pm UTC (link)
	g I think she's an apologist lap-dog of the oppressors. But I tend to be unforgiving, I'm told. ;-) Fair enough; I certainly see your logic, and it makes sense to me. (Reply to this)(Parent)

ziactrice
2006-08-07 05:33 pm UTC (link)

I believe there is a substantial difference between: my family's very ability to survive is at stake here - if I don't get this certificate, we won't be able to eat, shelter, and clothe ourselves properly; and promoting or supporting sexism. Sometimes, you do have to play the hand you're dealt, and sometimes that is a very poor hand and you have to bluff. Other times, you can pick your battle and establish some minor gain.

There is also a very non-trivial difference between putting one's self at risk, and putting one's children or very livelihood at risk. In any conflict, keeping in mind the goal and if the sacrifices are in keeping with gaining the goal is the fundamental issue.

Situations like yours are likely to continue, yes. Standing up to one won't be guaranteed to change that - for him, or for any other man willing to wield his power oppressively. However, whether or not to stand up is not a choice made just on courage, but also on real life trade-offs we all have to face.

For what it's worth, he was rejecting you on such subjective grounds that proving it as discrimination - especially that many years ago - would have been virtually impossible, even if you were gifted with the enormous resources of time and money it would have taken to persue justice legally. I have stood up, before, but only after a careful and considered review of the cost and benefit ratio convinced me I could actually effect a change. Charging headlong into brick walls to no or little purpose has never appealed to me - or struck me as a measure of courage.

I've read some from one of those children, the little girl in the dress in the pictures. She is a remarkable person. I believe she was so before that experience, but it has certainly affected her entire outlook and life, in the balance favorably, I think.

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dichroic
2006-08-08 10:42 pm UTC (link)

I think

ozarque's comment makes it clear she also had some pretty remarkable parents, who must have had an effect too. I've read some from her, as well; it would have been interesting to read her parents' view, 30 or 40 years later. I'm sure they were proud of her. I wonder if they regretted or were glad about their difficult decision.

Though not: unlike Suzette's that decision was one that directly benefited that child, within a few years' time. That might have made it a minute bit easier.

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	dichroic 2006-08-08 10:43 pm UTC (link)
	Sigh. "not" in second paragraph should be "note". (Reply to this)(Parent)

	hilleviw 2006-08-07 05:44 pm UTC (link)
	"Morality is a private and costly luxury." - Henry Brooks Adams He's not wrong. We have to choose priorities. You chose the well being of your children over facing down sexism, and allowed yourself to be co-opted by a system you recognised and disdained. You've probably made different choices at other times. (Reply to this)

starcat_jewel
2006-08-07 05:45 pm UTC (link)

ziactrice has said a lot of what I was thinking. To what she said, I will add this: I've been told by observant-Jewish friends that survival trumps religious law. If you must do hard physical labor in the heat, you are permitted to drink even though it's a fast-day, because otherwise you are at risk of heatstroke. If you are lost in the forest in the winter and the only food available to you is the carcass of a wild boar, you can eat it even though it's pork, because you are not required to commit suicide for your religion.

This situation seems to me to be similar. Your children's survival was at stake; that (even more than if it were your own survival) trumps ideology. "Standing up for what's right and taking the consequences, no matter what they may be" is something that you can ethically do for yourself; doing it for other people is a much iffier proposition. When my money has been tight, I might go hungry for a few days -- but my cats were always fed. Going hungry was a choice I couldn't ethically make for them. How much more does that apply to a child?

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leora
2006-08-07 06:25 pm UTC (link)

Not can, must. Not permitted, required. Keeping yourself alive is generally viewed as a commandment, and there are only a few situations where you are allowed to put that aside.

But yeah, trouble risking your children, that's an incredibly common human one. I struggle with that. There are things I'd like to be open and honest about, but I also want to have children. And children have been taken away from parents for being sufficiently different in ways that do not harm the children. Children have been taken away for parents having relationships with other adults that someone deemed unacceptable. There was even a recent case of a child taken away because of a religious ceremony that a woman participated in while her children weren't there. Yes, it mocked Christianity and Jesus, but that was her personal religious belief. It's not safe to be too vocal about some differences if you care about your children.

And even in smaller ways... I like the name Jezebel. I think it's pretty and should be reclaimed. I think it's highly unfair that the name has been ruled out because of one Biblical reference that most people don't even understand. But to reclaim the name, you need to name children with it, as is being done with Lillith. And that means putting the burden onto a child who cannot consent to it, which is a much harder thing to do than taking it up yourself. I don't intend to name any daughters of mine Jezebel. But it really does sound quite pretty.

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archangelbeth
2006-08-07 08:19 pm UTC (link)

You don't actually need to name children that. People can change their own names, y'know. O:> (A friend of mine is considering adopting her nom de plume as her legal name.)

And you can hedge bets. My daughter's first name is from a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta. Her middle name -- the same as my mother's -- is not so common, but it's much more mundane than "Iolanthe." If she decides she hates her name, or is tired of dealing with it (as my grade school friend, Chi (pronounced "shy," just as Cher is "share"), did), she can always switch to the middle one.

Or she may stick with it. She seems proud enough of it now, for certs. (And I always wished I had a more unique first name amongst the three (!) that I've got. At least one of my last names is cool.)

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leora
2006-08-07 08:26 pm UTC (link)

I've already had everyone switch over to a new name for me once (the one my father wanted to give me, not the one I actually got), if you try to do that sort of thing more than once, you lose a lot of credibility. Plus, I think changing my name to Jezebel would seem somehow pretentious or aggressive, while just having it be your name seems much more okay somehow. I'm not entirely sure why, but I definitely think if I told people I changed my name to Jezebel, they would look at it very differently than if I said that was the name I was given. There's a cultural value to accepting the name you are given.

Yes, you can hedge with middle names. But going by a middle name and having it be your first name still are quite different. Every roll call from kindergarten through the end of college will expose people to your legal name, mail will, phone calls will, and you often need to be clear that what you go by isn't your first name or some people will feel lied to. It's just not as easy. Do-able, sure. Something to foist on a child who has no say in the matter? Tricky. Something I can do; I think not. Plus, I don't feel a connection to the name for myself. And retraining myself to pay attention to a third name might start to get me really confused. :) And with online names, I have enough names to last a couple lifetimes.

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archangelbeth
2006-08-08 12:32 pm UTC (link)

My maternal grandfather was "Jack" to everyone. Allegedly, on his wedding day, my maternal grandmother was most surprised to hear, "Do you, Clarence Perry..."

His mail came to "C.P. Cayce." Heck, he may have even had the legal right to sign "Jack" as it was done with no intent to defraud. I don't recall what he signed his checks with, though. I suspect he avoided putting his given name into the records whenever he could.

Other examples might be L. Sprague deCamp, or anyone else who goes by "Initial Name Lastname."

(I think anyone who feels "lied to" when given a preferred use-name -- especially one that is part of the legal names -- over a deprecated legal name... Well, I think that the issue isn't with the person who's being honest about what he or she wants to be called.)

Not that I'm not saying you should change your name -- especially if you've already changed it once. But it's not impossible for people to do.

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	Names archangelsmom 2006-08-11 06:53 pm UTC (link)
	I donated a LOT of names to Archangelbeth, partly because her father wanted a numerological balance (hence the Anne - I insisted on the 'e'), and because I knew that the 'Elizabeth' part could be morphed into literally dozens of alternatives - one of which she has basically chosen: Beth). BTW, Jezebel could also be morphed into the good ol' Southern Jessie Belle. (Reply to this)(Parent)

danaseilhan
2006-08-07 06:15 pm UTC (link)

If you want my opinion (and maybe you do), it isn't your responsibility to change a man's perception of women in general. It's HIS responsibility to open his damn eyes and see for himself that women are neither stupid nor weak. A smart man wouldn't have fallen for the simpering. A salvagable not-so-smart man would have wised up when you started doing it, interpreting it as a mocking of his myopic view of women. Shame you didn't wind up with either of those types deciding your future.

Women are expected to babysit men, even when it comes to politics. The trouble is, you can lead a jackass to the truth but you can't make him think.

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	danaseilhan 2006-08-07 06:16 pm UTC (link)
	And all that's my way of saying I don't blame you for simpering. You're not the one who set up the situation where you'd have to do it in the first place. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	Response to danaseilhan... ozarque 2006-08-08 01:56 pm UTC (link)
	I do want your opinion. For sure. And I love that jackass variation; great line! (Reply to this)(Parent)

firecat
2006-08-07 06:57 pm UTC (link)

I see why you say that you contributed to sexism, and I think it's important that you are telling the story and explaining how your behavior played in with sexism. But I think you're being too hard on yourself when you say that you "didn't have the courage." It seems to me like a case of conflicting needs. Sexism is a cultural malfunction and no one individual response is going to fix it. People are finite and people have multiple conflicting needs and have to make choices. It's impossible to behave in a perfectly anti-sexist manner at all times and also meet your other needs and the needs of people who depend on you.

Let's say that fighting sexism is like a chorus of people singing a continuous tone. If enough people sing, the tone will be continuous even though each of the singers will be stopping singing to take a breath every now and then. The way to change things is for more people to sing rather than for the same small group of people to try to sing louder and never breathe.

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	starcat_jewel 2006-08-07 09:57 pm UTC (link)
	That's an outstanding analogy! Mind if I swipe and store it for future use? (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	firecat 2006-08-07 11:08 pm UTC (link)
	definitely pass it on. i'm going to post it to my own lj at some point. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	(Anonymous) 2006-08-07 07:07 pm UTC (link)
	(Michael Farris) "I didn't have the courage to do what I knew was right and then deal with the consequences, whatever they might have been." And if you had stood up for principal then and suffered the consequences whatever they might have been how much of what you've accomplished since would have remain unaccomplished? (Reply to this)(Thread)

Response to Michael Farris....

ozarque
2006-08-08 01:59 pm UTC (link)

"And if you had stood up for principle then and suffered the consequences whatever they might have been how much of what you've accomplished since would have remain unaccomplished?"

That's a question I can't answer, and I'm very grateful that I can't. One of the blessings I most appreciate in life is the fact that I'm not clairvoyant; if I were, I'd be afraid to get out of bed in the morning.

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shakatany
2006-08-07 07:11 pm UTC (link)

It also should be taken into account that this probably happened in the early '60s just as the Second Wave of Feminism was beginning (which I date from the publishing of Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique in 1963). Were we even aware of such a thing as sexism (had the word even been created then?) and even if we were aware there was little or no recourse back then. A blindly noble act would've done great harm to your family. You had your priorities right.

Shakatany

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voxwoman
2006-08-07 08:52 pm UTC (link)

I was told by a "counselor" when I was doing poorly at college that "I was not college material." That woman was full of it. Once I got my act together and "grew up" (which meant studying instead of partying), I never got less than a "B" - and that was with electives that were graduate level physics classes instead of "Monday Night At The Movies" classes (because I was a masochist, and I still think particle physics is cool). Of course, having 6 F's drag down one's GPA meant that I will never go to grad school, but at this point, I don't want to (I'm closing in on 50, and have other priorities now).

Never let some jerk in a position of power crush your own dreams.

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msminlr
2006-08-08 02:11 am UTC (link)

Depends on the grad school, and the subject matter.
If you find something that really GRABS you, and the courses you flunked aren't genuine prerequisites for the courses you need to take, I'd bet you could talk your way in somewhere. And if they ARE prerequisites, you likely need to refresh your memory after 30-some years anyway, unless you've learned the material on-the-job since.

Back in the first half of the 1960's, females were not encouraged to take Mechanical Drawing in high school, especially if they were just looking for a random elective and didn't have impressive math course grades. I happened to be a Theater major in college, with a very large geography minor. Somewhere between scenery design and cartography, I discovered drafting, and it's what I've been doing for my day-job since January of 1975. Several places I've worked, I've been the only female employee other than the receptionist/secretary. At least one small-town engineer I worked for told me he PREFERRED to hire females to do the drafting; he didn't specify why.

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dale_in_queens
2006-08-08 03:35 am UTC (link)

I have at least one idea why. I work in a profession that's mostly female. Workplace dynamics (I've been told) are quite different when there is even one man in the office. I don't know in my profession, since I'm the less common sex. But in high school and beyond I worked in a metalshop (the kind of place that makes fences, welds, sells oxygen, builds metal sheds, and so forth). When a woman worked there, the dynamic was quite different. It was more like work and less like men goofing off. So...just a thought..

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	nancylebov 2006-08-08 05:35 am UTC (link)
	One more thought about choosing your battles--that woman didn't send her children to any old segregated school at a random time, she did it when the National Guard was backing her children up and there was a good chance of safety and victory. (Reply to this)

michaelsullivan
2006-08-08 01:36 pm UTC (link)

The problem is -- as I perceive it -- that as long as women who find themselves in a situation like the one I described go on doing the kind of thing I did, situations like that will continue. I was in fact contributing to the sexist system that was putting me in that situation; I didn't have the courage to do what I knew was right and then deal with the consequences, whatever they might have been.

The real problem is the position you and others get put in, because dealing with it "properly" is like the tragedy of the commons on steroids. The individual cost you must accept by behaving according to the categorical imperative in the absence of critical mass support is *huge*. I can't judge someone who refuses to accept that cost, particularly given the responsibility to children, even if I agree with you that the "right thing" in some sense is to bear it.

It's utterly amazing to me that this worked. I'm still trying to figure out whether it was pure sexism (he wanted you to be incompetent "like a girl"), or if you simply engaged his caretaking reflex so strongly he couldn't resist. Men can do that to women as well, but in different ways (you referred to what I mean by that in one of your earlier posts, that's very common in New England as well).

I realize the gendered caretaking reflexes all tie in to the patriarchal structure, but it wouldn't suprise me if there's a major biological component to that drive.

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	Response to Michael Sullivan... ozarque 2006-08-08 02:02 pm UTC (link)
	The most astonishing thing about the fact that my strategy worked is that I was so abominably bad at it. If the man had had two neurons to rub together he would have spotted me for a fake instantly. (Reply to this)(Parent)

Standing up for themselves

samael09
2007-02-08 01:50 am UTC (link)

SEXISM in the workplace has been prevalent ever since companies have been set up in the 20th century but it was only in the latter part of the century that a lot of women workers have come out and complained about the abuse done to them by male workers.

What made this come to pass was the increasingly patronizing attitude brought about by men in the workplace. But due to the vigilance and the campaign waged by some women groups, public awareness on the issue had been raised, though these incidents keep on coming.

Children are the weakest point of any person since they know so little of the world they are facing. One could only hope they’ve been raised to think wisely for themselves but other than that, there’s only so much one can do to enable them to speak up and make a stand for themselves.

Samael09

http://www.findmypaydayloan.com

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