An aspect of the Sustainability Revolution I have rarely seen, except for the idea that we are becoming more androgenous is the notion of femininity. Today’s discussion will be one that all women will recognize completely and that most men will have been unaware, except when hearing complaints from their female relatives and girlfriends. We live in a world that not only has been male paternalistic (men making all decisions, or being responsible for women, so that they cannot or do not have to make their own decisions) for so long we have forgotten how it shapes everything within that frame through male eyes and needs.
This is not a criticism per se, just an observation of how men, for many centuries, made decisions based on their needs and perspectives and then extrapolated those needs to women with only minor modifications for gender differences. We talk about equity for all people as a part of the change coming, but interestingly, when it comes to women, it speaks of social, economic, and political equity, but what about true physical equity? After all, women make up half of the human population, so calling women’s issues as minority issues is a complete misnomer and even dereliction of understanding about basic human rights. Whenever studies are done for almost anything, it always has a male perspective. And most data has a massive gender gap in that female perspectives or data about women within society are rare or simply missing. Women are not just differently shaped males. They are biochemically, hormonally, psychologically, and not just physiologically different.
Let’s take one example I think with which we can all identify. If you have ever gone to a show that has an intermission. Note how the women’s line for the toilets is long and well beyond the entrance to the toilets. Men may have a short line, if any, but it moves fast. The reason I hope is obvious, women take a little longer for a toilet visit than men need to. For women, that has a lot to do with complexity of clothing, what time of the month it is, etc., while men just need to unzip (or unbutton) the fly on their pants. Ok, the men’s room may have three stalls for those needing to crap, with maybe five urinals. The women’s room may have 6 stalls as an accommodation for women’s needs. That design was thought of by a male architect who probably had good consideration when he planned the toilets of the showhouse, but he made the decision for the toilets based on his perceptions and almost certainly without talking to women or using any data about toilet use! Architects using data that includes women’s toilet needs are now designing auditoriums with three times as many stalls as men’s stalls and urinals. Guess what? No more women’s lines and both sexes get to relieve themselves without undue discomfort.
I hope you see what I am doing here. Women will know straight away, yet still be surprised at just how entrenched this has always been. But for the edification of my male readers, I want to discuss how we live in a world with absolute data bias in how everything works in favor of men and systematically ignores half the worlds population. An excellent resource for this is Caroline Criado Perez.
I have talked about the feminine aspect throughout this blog, but never as a separate topic. The reason I talk about this is that equity means listening to everyone. For too long we have largely ignored half of the humans on this planet. And it is important to understand just how knowing the feminine perspective will help us in reaching a sustainable world more quickly. And this post isn’t a slam at males, for what I say here are broad generalizations. And it isn’t about how women have been subjugated for millennia. I know many women who think like men and many men who think like women without even having to pigeon hole anyone with gender identification or gender role. But for how the data are nearly always biased in favor of men’s perspectives permeates our whole socio-cultural-psychological system, and has done for thousands of years.
Men tend to be more prone to aggression than women, and also be predominantly left-brain thinkers (tendency to be more quantitative and analytical, paying more attention to details and ruled by logic) because of the way our paternalistic system is set up. Everyone uses both sides of their brains in work and life, but often have a preference to use one side more as their individual makeup determines. Women have a tendency to be more right-brained tending to be more creative, emotional, intuitive, imaginative and innovative thinkers and are often drawn to fields where they can express themselves freely and help others. Whole brainers (of both sexes) are people who seamlessly use both sides of their brains, such as being analytical and intuitive at the same time (see my recent post about this).
I recently discussed how we will be a more androgenous society when we move past the Sustainability Revolution (see link). And that will mean we have to address the Invisible woman problem sooner or later, preferably starting now. And it isn’t just pubic toilets that need addressing. Equity for Women will mean we address so many other issues of human rights for everyone. Because of a male designed world, women have suffered, and continue to suffer, highly disproportionately to every problem in the world. Much of that has been because of the invisible woman syndrome, and that includes all the things that women do that is never included in work assessments, especially within the home arena.
To emphasize just how critical and highly under acknowledged a woman’s role within the home and society is, on a unique Friday, October 24, 1975, the women of Iceland had a one day strike – called the ‘Long Friday’ by the Icelandic men who quickly came to appreciate what women do every day that they took for granted. Globally, 75% of unpaid work is done by women, but that is differentiated from working women as something different. As Perez states, “There is no such thing as a woman who doesn’t work. There is only the woman who isn’t paid for her work.” While that incudes cooking, cleaning, and child care, women are also primarily responsible for elder and community care. Yet the social structures and services that help women are often designed by men who make assumptions about what the women need.
This invisibility is also expressed in how gender roles are framed through historical perspectives. Even gender roles in hunter-gatherer societies are genderized with women as the gatherers while men do the more physical hunting. While that may be a generality, when I am told this, I always say, “Unless you are Daisy Jacks.” When I visited my in-laws in Nome, Alaska in 1987, my father-in-law was supervising the building of the Community center, while my Mother-in-Law worked with the Inuit women. As a consequence during my visit, I got to meet and interact with many of the Inuit for my time there.
One day my mother-in-law said we had been invited to an Inuit home to talk with ‘Daisy Jacks’ a locally famous Inuit woman. While at her home, Daisy showed me many of her ongoing projects (like wolves head gloves, Reindeer mukluks, and a beautiful coat made from Squirrel hides), as she told me stories of her life as an Inuit. As she grew up in a village on St Lawrence Island, her prowess as a hunter was recognized by her tribe, so she hunted alongside the men. When she married, her husband stayed home with the many children while she hunted. It was completely natural for each member of the tribe to do what best served themselves ad the village with no stigma attached.
This is just a single example, but rather than isolated women doing unusual things, when we look at the full reported history of men and women, all too often the role of women has been always been downgraded as support while the men were primary providers. The truth is that indigenous women were as much within the authoritative realm as those of men. In empire history, men were seen as warriors and Emperors, with the rare women who couldn’t be ignored (e.g., Boudica, Cleopatra, Hatshepsut, Seondeok, and Wu Zetian). But even in the supposedly enlightened ancient Greek culture, women were relegated to subservient roles, and this defined women for much of our recorded history. To understand the changes needed, we need to explore more just how this male-designed world contributes more significantly to it problems.
To Be Continued ……………
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