Original post by Sapphire321I am a 21 year old woman and I would describe myself as a feminist going by the actual definition of feminism which is: the advocacy of women's rights on the grounds of equality of the sexes. I am a feminist because I believe that men and women should be equal in society and that neither men nor women should be forced to conform to traditional gender roles NOT because I think that women should be superior to or have more privileges or better rights than men or because I think all men are sexist. I would also say, before people stereotype me, that I am straight, I do not hate men, I do take care of my appearance and I am not in any way the type of radical, extreme feminist that so many people now seem to think that all women who want equal rights are.
Anyway, to get to why I started this thread, I used to believe that men and women were fairly equal in modern society in the UK. However, as I’ve got older I’ve realised more and more that this is just not the case. In the workplace, there is still a 9.4% pay gap on average between men and women for full-time employment and when part-time employment is also included the gap extends to 19.2%. In the private sector specifically the pay gap for even for full-time employees was 17.2%! The TUC analysis of the ONS statistics showed that looking at the highest earners that gap widens even more reaching 54.9% for the top 2% of earners. The “glass ceiling” is even now nowhere near broken. There are many more men than women in top level jobs in politics, law, science, technology, engineering, academia, business… Just looking at politics alone, there is currently a lot in the media about how the next Prime Minister now has to be either Theresa May or Andrea Leadsom therefore it has to be (how shocking!) a woman. I know it’s only the second time in history so that’s a point of interest and it’s obviously great that there was no gender discrimination in this case that prevented us from getting another female Prime Minister but it still shouldn’t be portrayed by the media as such a novel and unusual idea. Even after the 2015 General Election, only 29% of MPs and a third of cabinet ministers are women. Women in politics seem to be judged by the media and society in general as much for how they look as for their policies and often face sexism from both the media and male colleagues. So, if we can’t get proper gender equality in politics which is both very public and obviously instrumental in trying to create equal rights then what hope is there for other professions.
It’s not just in the workplace that women aren’t treated equally either. Everyday sexism is present in schools, universities and in wider society. Worryingly, there is evidence that our generation, if anything, is getting worse. The rise of “Lad Culture” and “Rape Culture” which are particularly prevalent at universities is becoming a serious problem. Women are routinely objectified. Some men (I am definitely not saying all men) and even some women make sexist jokes and comments on a regular basis including joking about rape. Sexist posts and memes (again including jokes about rape) are often shared on social media… Why is it still seen as acceptable to joke that women should “get back to the kitchen” or worse?
As I said, I used to believe that men and women were now equal in the UK when I was still at school but scarily, knowing what I know now looking back on things that happened when I was at school, sexism was obvious there too. I had one male teacher in sixth form who used to patronisingly call all the girls “young lady” but never the boys “young man”. I had a female teacher who said women who worked and had children were irresponsible because they couldn’t be fully committed to their careers. Boys in my class joked that “all women should be prostitutes” but “*name of girl* wouldn’t get any customers”. In my year, boys and even occasionally girls made jokes that were either sexist or involved rape or both. Also, seeing some of the threads on TSR where (some) guys make sexist and misogynistic comments and then call girls “feminazis” if they dispute what’s been said makes me think that sexism certainly hasn’t gone, it hasn’t even decreased by all that much in some ways, it has just adapted into a modern version.
So, why is it that in 2016 women are still not treated as equal to men? And why do people say that feminism is now irrelevant when there is still so much inequality? In a country where women got the vote almost a century ago shouldn’t we have better equality in modern society than this?