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I read a great article in The Atlantic today: http://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/archive/2013/03/the-problem-with-mostly-male-and-mostly-female-workplaces/274208/ I work in a very gender-integrated business field, and I’ve never worked in a gender-dominated field (e.g. IT, nursing, truck driving), so going to church is really the only situation I’m in that is gender-segregated, and it is frankly really weird sometimes. I suspect it’s behind the way we talk about modesty (from a male perspective – women are temptations), and the way men talk to women (or often don’t, prefering to talk to the husband). However, I have also found that men at church who work in more gender-integrated fields behave much differently than the men who work in a gender-segregated field. I don’t feel invisible to those who are used to talking to women, and the behavior of the other ones is just laughable to me at times. Here are a few good quotes from the article:
Quote:Like the friends of the Steubenville victim who turned on her, and the other women who allegedly threatened her after the verdict, the culture forces people to choose sides.
I have seen this one a LOT in the church – not in such a dire situation as rape obviously – but that there are many women who want to squelch discontent among other women and stand up for the patriarchy. To me, that’s like the Alice Walker quote: “I have seen the axe, and the handle is one of us.” The worst insults toward LDS feminists come from other LDS women.
Quote:This separation seems to help make possible many men’s simple assumption that women don’t really exist as people. That silent assumption is very different—and harder to change—than looking a real person in the eye and saying, “I don’t like you because you’re a woman, so I’m going to hire someone else.” The power of segregation is people usually don’t have to do that.
This reminds me of the women praying in church thing. Men didn’t notice that women weren’t being asked to pray in Gen Conf. Women were largely invisible.
Quote:This partly explains why sexual harassment is so common in male-dominated workplaces: The women there are perceived as outsiders who threaten the normal routine
When women “agitate” for change, men feel threatened. What will happen [to men, who benefit from the status quo] if women do [insert thing women would like to have the option to do]?
Quote:workplace culture spills over into family life, as men in male-dominated jobs (such as police officers) or female-dominated jobs (where their masculinity is threatened) perpetrate violence at home.
Again, this goes with my observation that separation in the church environment alone is insufficient to create this kind of mentality, but for those who ALSO have a gender-segregated work life, they are NOT good to run into in the church setting. Yikes.
Quote:What we see is that jobs are devalued when women hold them
This is the other side of the wage gap. When you compare like to like jobs, the pay gap is narrower. But that’s because jobs held by women are often undervalued. And does this also explain (partly) why budgets for YW are so much lower than for YM. I realize that it’s partly because scouts is expensive to run (camps, awards, licenses), but shouldn’t we be doing something of comparable value for our young women? No?
Thoughts?
Thanks for sharing hawkgrrrl…I live your stuff. I’d you ever get to Oregon let me buy you lunch so we can chat cuz I love your brain. I agree with most of the article. I work in high tech so we are very gender integrated. I am frequently shocked at some of the gender bias in church. I remember being called to a calling and saying that my wife had a calling that took her away in the evenings a bit so I couldn’t take the calling cuz I had to watch the kids. The guy actually said “just have your wife spend less time inn her calling”. I said ..sorry but no.
One thing the article missed its the psych of women playing a part in their own devaluation.
Rutgers did a study on the pay difference between men and women and find men are willing to refuse jobs as part of negotiating salary where women had a tendency to accept the first offer. This plays a big part in the gender past gap…especially since men tend to assume weakness and low ball women…unless they are salesmen then they high ball women, again knowing the woman is less likely to haggle
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Quote:One thing the article missed its the psych of women playing a part in their own devaluation.
This is a huge problem in the church. Women who don’t finish their education (despite rhetoric that finishing it is important – it can be tough to do if women marry young and start having kids) are an example of this. Or women who just get a degree that has no economic value but is a softer discipline. Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In initiative is great. I wish we did more of that in the church – encouraging girls to be active leaders, not just passive recipients. Even the new YW manuals are written passively for the girls, but the YM manuals talk about them taking the lead. Subtle sexism.
hawkgrrrl wrote:Quote:One thing the article missed its the psych of women playing a part in their own devaluation.
This is a huge problem in the church. Women who don’t finish their education (despite rhetoric that finishing it is important – it can be tough to do if women marry young and start having kids) are an example of this. Or women who just get a degree that has no economic value but is a softer discipline. Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In initiative is great. I wish we did more of that in the church – encouraging girls to be active leaders, not just passive recipients. Even the new YW manuals are written passively for the girls, but the YM manuals talk about them taking the lead. Subtle sexism.
In an article about “Lean in” it was discussed how women will sometimes/often “Lean out” long befopre they need to. An example of this is in determining career, education, decision not to push for that big promotion – all with the mentallity of doing things that will someday mesh with being a wife and mother. Can’t have demanding/successful career when my ultimate goal is to be a mother. The point was that if you want to step out of the work world to be a mother – Good for you – but don’t sabotague your career arc from the beggining in anticipation. I remember shortly after our marriage, DW wondering before a big job interview if she should tell them that we would soon begin
tryingto conceive a baby. I convinced her that it was none of their business and she got the job. There was also a statistic that some 60% of women who take a break from employment (I’m assuming that this is more than just FMLA maternity leave) never go back to full time work.
If a brillant young woman “leans out” in the early years, then takes a break for raising the kids, how can she possibly jump back in after the kids are grown in any capacity near her potential?
Contrary to what people think, gender inequality is not all one way. In some areas women have the whip hand over men. It is far harder for men to go into traditionally feminine industries than vice versa. If a woman becomes a pilot, she’s a pioneer, if a man becomes a flight assistant, he’s called, and assumed to be a “faggot”. If a woman becomes a national leader, she’s lauded, if a man works in a kindergarten, it’s assumed he’s got pedophile tendencies.
In the church, there are certain inequalities men have women don’t, men have to serve missions, wear suits and white shirts, get the Melchizedek priesthood etc. Women don’t have to serve missions, have huge leeway in what they wear etc.
“Men didn’t notice that women weren’t being asked to pray in Gen Conf.”
Some didn’t.
Quote:“Men didn’t notice that women weren’t being asked to pray in Gen Conf.”
Some didn’t.
Some women didn’t notice either.
I can’t count the number of times that women have asked my wife questions when they are clearly intended for me – even if I’m right there. I’ve been to mormon wedding receptions where the woman will only hug women and the man will only hug men. Many women at church call me “brother” but they’ll call my wife by her first name. Funny things like that result. The Proclamation on the Family perpetuates some of the traditional gender roles and I remember growing up and hearing talks about how the woman’s job is to be mom in the home, although I don’t hear that from the pulpit much now.
Another interesting thing is how gender segregation is closely tied to morality (yes, I’m thinking of our earlier conversation about moral reasoning here). Many folks think that if men and women work closely together there is no alternative but for them to become sexually intimate eventually, but sometimes that reasoning only applies to church. For example I travel with women because of work fairly occasionally and it doesn’t bother my wife. But if I were to drive a member of the RS presidency somewhere I think it would bother my wife and other women in the ward.
It seems the church is moving in the right direction, though, which is encouraging.
hawkgrrrl wrote:And does this also explain (partly) why budgets for YW are so much lower than for YM. I realize that it’s partly because scouts is expensive to run (camps, awards, licenses), but shouldn’t we be doing something of comparable value for our young women? No?
Writing a separate response here because when this happens it really gripes me. Activity Day Girls and Cub Scouts should have the same per capita budget. YM and YW should have the same per capita budget. I think it’s the responsibility of not only the bishopric, but also YW leaders and Primary leaders (led by women) to point out the inequities. Sometimes the bishopric is just clueless and simply copies the previous year’s budget and doesn’t compare YM to YW. In the case of my ward someone pointed out the inequality of the budgets and the bishop changed it the next budget cycle – and it was completely painless. Of course, this varies by ward and by bishop…
hawkgrrrl wrote:Quote:“Men didn’t notice that women weren’t being asked to pray in Gen Conf.”
Some didn’t.
Some women didn’t notice either.
That’s true.
Anyway, some men do support a different, improved role for women in the church. I actually think some women have the priesthood already, but that’s another matter. It’s a matter of recognition.
Roadrunner wrote:hawkgrrrl wrote:And does this also explain (partly) why budgets for YW are so much lower than for YM. I realize that it’s partly because scouts is expensive to run (camps, awards, licenses), but shouldn’t we be doing something of comparable value for our young women? No?
Writing a separate response here because when this happens it really gripes me. Activity Day Girls and Cub Scouts should have the same per capita budget. YM and YW should have the same per capita budget. I think it’s the responsibility of not only the bishopric, but also YW leaders and Primary leaders (led by women) to point out the inequities. Sometimes the bishopric is just clueless and simply copies the previous year’s budget and doesn’t compare YM to YW. In the case of my ward someone pointed out the inequality of the budgets and the bishop changed it the next budget cycle – and it was completely painless. Of course, this varies by ward and by bishop…
Not being sexist but as long as scouts are in the picture the boys need more money. Our 10 kid troop had to spend 200-300 a year on scout badges and books…that was over half the budget…
johnh – Yes, I know scouts drives the difference. But when I was a YW, I would have absolutely loved going white water rafting, kayaking or any of the other expensive scouting type activities the boys got to do! You know I would have probably turned my nose up at basic sewing and cookery lessons but they would have been of great practical use to me over the years. At the risk of turning this into a Scout thread: If Scouting in the Church was run like Scouting outside the Church there wouldn’t be as much as an issue. Scout units outside the Church are supposed to pay heir own way. But then Scouting in the Church is all but mandatory.
When I was a cub master I calculated how much awards would cost if each Cub advanced at a reasonable rate. There was no way the budget could support it.
If I recall correctly from the days when I was the clerk the budget money for youth activities was not divided between male and female organizations when it came down from Salt Lake. The bishop/branch president decided how it would be divided. We didn’t sponsor any Scout units either so Scouting wasn’t a consideration.
SamBee wrote:You know I would have probably turned my nose up at basic sewing and cookery lessons but they would have been of great practical use to me over the years.
And changing a tire and learning to use a drill would also be very helpful for all women to learn. When I was in YW we didn’t learn cooking or sewing anyway though.Sure but I mention these things because they’re “feminine” yet useful to men like me. I have had to teach myself rudimentary sewing, but still take more complex jobs to a female friend! (To my shame.) Sewing, cooking, changing tires, fixing wires in plugs etc might all be connected with certain genders but are useful to all. BTW LDS scouting is non-existent in most stakes outside the USA.
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