Gender Equity – Anywhere BUT here…
March 11, 2010
by Amy Siskind
|There are some major events this week surrounding international women’s right.
Yesterday, The New Agenda’s Vice President, Betty Cotton, attended Vital Voices Global Leadership Awards event in Washington DC. Betty reports from the conference: “Gender equity is THE major issue of this century.”
This weekend, I’ll be representing The New Agenda at The Daily’s Beast Women in the World summit. Tina Brown has put together an incredible rooster of women activists from around the world. Tina write today at her website: “The rights of women are to the 21st century what civil rights were to the 20th.”
So with all the attention being paid to women around the world, how about gender equity here at home? I wrote a piece yesterday for the Huffington Post Why I Still Stand With Blanche Lincoln. It was quite disappointing to see that with all the attention given to gender equity internationally, folks are at best antagonistic to that notion here at home. You can go over to Huffpost and read the comments, but suffice it to that the comments felt like a time warp back to 2008 and Hillary. We think our country — or in this case Democrats — would have moved forward, but apparently not.
I want to share a sampling – many of which could just as easily have been written if the title of the article were “Why I Stand With Hillary Clinton for President” in 2008:
Sure, we need more women in office –we’d all be better for it. But supporting someone because of the nature of their genitals is the definition of sexism.
I don’t think we should sacrifice the quality of our representatives purely to have a more diverse government.
Reverse racism/sexism is no better than racism/sexism.
I have absolutely no problem voting for a women, but I do have a problem voting for people I don’t agree with or think are unqualified.
I agree that we want women – but not any women – we want the right women.
We’ve come a long way baby?
I would like to ask the Huffpo commenters how it is possible that 83 percent of the time the right vote means voting for a man? I would also like to ask the Huffpo commenters if they would throw the same fits when the African American community bands together to vote in African American candidates. Is that wrong of them? Would that be the definition of racism? Rather, many give the African American community credit (myself included) for having the smarts to unify for better representation. Women (and men who support women) need to follow this model.
“The
rights of women are to the 21st century what civil rights were to the
20th.”
Because all black people are male and even when it comes to equality, women are still fucking last in line. And this is perfectly normal, even to them.
I’m not attacking her, just saying what her words made me think first.
Wait your turn fir this, wait your turn for that, wait your fucking turn for equality. And of course your turn comes after everyone else. Does the irony sting yet? Even a little?
I don’t know Janis – I’m pleased that spokespeople like Tina are marking THIS time for gender equality. It’s also an admission that it’s an issue needing to be dealt with – that has not achieved. Unlike many who seem to think that women have all that we need so stop complaining.
21st century sounds to me like NOW. gender equity is our issue. can we listen into that summit on the web?
Not sure about listening – but there is a twitter account – details here:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/n.....-the-world
It amazes me that women are even still fighting for equality! We’re over half the population and still we allow men to define us so much so that far too many women still look for the slightest flaw in another woman running for office, while simultaneously willing to vote for a man who is less qualified. It boggles the mind!
Conditioning controlled by the patriarchy in how young girls are raised, as opposed to how young boys are raised, plays a major role in why women haven’t recognied their own power yet. In fact, the biggest fear the patriarchy has is when women do realize that together, we can achieve true equality with men. Despite this fear, I feel confident that women will not use this new found power to do to men what they have done to women since the beginning of time. Taking the best for ourselves and letting them fight over what’s left.
Maybe with more women in the power structure of society, those men who continue to believe women are inferior to them, will find out there are things in life that are much more valuable than money and power and control. It’s time for men to learn that “real power” is when you no longer have a need to believe you are superior to anyone in defining who you are and that women are not the enemy.
Great artice at the HuffPo Amy, still not sure why you write there, you are always abused. The left just doesnt get it…waiting for the so called right woman will never happen..time to vote gender period- no agendas no side issues.Sarah Blanche etc
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