5 ms·

Gender seems different than race. With race the inequality is passed on through the generations. You inherit the discrimination against your ancestors. Gender i

by Buge 9y ago

Gender seems different than race. With race the inequality is passed on through the generations. You inherit the discrimination against your ancestors. Gender inequality is not really passed on, because whether someone is rich or poor, male or female, they have a 50% chance of having a son or daughter.

DoreenMichele 9y ago
I am a woman and was one of the top 3 students of my graduating high school class. I never got the two career couple lifestyle I grew up believing would happen. A friend of the family once asked me why the hell I failed to be a self made millionaire by age 30. The ugly history of people of color outlined in one of the links in this discussion has some things in common with the outcomes women have. But I don't really feel like arguing it. This is an overwhelmingly male forum. I increasingly feel it is pointless to try to give a female point of view here. It will be downvoted, dismissed and attacked. If The resist, I will be accused of behaving badly while the insults to me are treated like reasonable statements that I am simply overreacting to. So, suffice it say, I don't agree with you. If you were correct, then women should have economic parity with men. They don't. The exact details may vary a bit, but the feminization of poverty is a phrase in our lexicon for a reason. When people talk like it isn't real, I never know quite what to think of that. I have a really hard time accepting that people sincerely don't see something so obvious for which there is overwhelming evidence. Yet I also realize it is obvious to me because I happen to be female. There are lots of details about the Black experience that I am inadequately aware of. So that gives me pause when it comes to trying to assess why men say such things. But I feel pretty worn down and hopeless of late.
- erohead 9y ago
  I believe you. I'm sorry you feel like your opinion isn't valued on HN. I certainly do appreciate it.
- SomeStupidPoint 9y ago
  > If you were correct, then women should have economic parity with men. They don't. Every statistic I've seen seems to indicate that modulo life choices that seem correlated with gender (ie, on average women prefer different things to men, though individuals vary greatly), there is economic parity between men and women (in most developed nations, but I'm most familiar with the US). There are some very real issues with the direction that women are steered by society, but there are also some real issues that men face (eg, school, legal system, etc). However, there's also a non-trivial number of women (in places like the US) who blame sexism for the consequences of choices they've had to make in life between things that they want, and seem to treat it as an affront to their gender that they're not treated as catered princesses by the world -- getting to have every want. And then hide that behind talking about "economic parity". > The exact details may vary a bit, but the feminization of poverty is a phrase in our lexicon for a reason. Doesn't this mostly have to do with poor women being forced to carry the economic burden of many children in developing nations? It's also definitely not a common term to use -- which makes me think that you likely have a biased view from hanging out in a very polarized, niche crowd. > But I feel pretty worn down and hopeless of late. As a fellow human, are you sure you're not inventing a narrative that's worse than the truth, and then stressing yourself out battling phantoms? (This is something I do all the time, on issues small to large.) There are real issues in the world -- quite serious ones, at that. But modern charities and other social purpose organizations deploy weaponized psychology meant to send you into an emotional state in order to boost their funding (or membership, but really power), and the consequence of everyone doing this "for the right reasons" is a completely toxic society, polarized in righteous anger over every issue to the point its emotionally burnt out and fragmented. This habit has even been exploited by foreign states to attack the nation. (True for virtually every country, and definitely all of the European and "Western" ones.) This is quite possibly the best of times on any of those issues, so instead of worrying about how you're going to feed every woman in Africa with too many kids (hint: you won't), just try to focus on what's the next small step that you can take to fix one of the issue a little. Then do that. That's something you can actually do right now, won't exhaust you even if you have to do it for the rest of your life, and would completely fix the problem if everyone would just stop panicking and do that.
- belorn 9y ago
  Every person is allowed their opinion. Male, female, everyone should get the same respect and same rights. > top 3 students of my graduating high school class ... > I failed to be a self made millionaire by age 30 Each year in the US there is around 900,000 students that will graduate in the top 3 of their high school class. Assuming that no other person in the nation would become millionaire, that is still way more than the number of new millionaires each year. Becoming a millionaire at some point in your life time after graduate in the top 3 is still a very rare event, and extremely rare if the target is to achieve it before the age of 30. > feminization of poverty is a phrase in our lexicon for a reason. I have a really hard time accepting that people sincerely don't see something so obvious for which there is overwhelming evidence. As evidence go, the the wast majority of the homeless are men. The bottom 1%, those that earn least and have least power and wealth in society are mostly men. Maybe those evidences are obvious to me because I happen to be male, but it would not be how I would phrase it. I don't think my gender give me any special insight to interpreting statistics or that there is a male point of view to it.
  - DoreenMichele 9y ago
    As evidence go, the the wast majority of the homeless are men. http://sandiegohomelesssurvivalguide.blogspot.com/2017/07/gender-and-homelessness.html http://sandiegohomelesssurvivalguide.blogspot.com/2017/07/ge...
    - belorn 9y ago
      As effective evidence goes, a blog is exactly the same as a HN comment but with no voting system. It is a single person opinion, some which I would agree to and some which I disagree with. To counter some of the arguments in there. Men in general has smaller social network. Where the blog argues that friends and relatives are much more concerned about a woman being out on the street because women tend to have a much harder time on the street, the fact found from medical research and statistics is that those friends and relatives simply are not available to the same extent for men. Men at the bottom of society don't generally have a social support network where they can ask for help. The blog claims that women tend to make less money than men when homeless. No they don't. Data on begging finds that society is the most generous when it comes to young women, and among people who beg in the street they are the highest earners. "able bodied men", refer to the abusive tactics of exploiting desperate people into dangerous low paying temporary jobs, sometimes illegal, and can be about as healthy as selling sex on the street. Its a common tactic heard from paperless which are bounced between illegal construction sites, sometimes sold like cattle. The blogs claims that men choose to become homeless and women do not. That is victim blaming. No one choose to be at the bottom of the social ladder. The blog briefly touch on the subject that society sometimes welcome women, even homeless and without any wealth or status to their name. As the blog points out this is mostly to do with sex, but what it miss is that comes from the cultural values in dating. Women are not primarily judged based on how much money they have, so homelessness is not as dooming factor as it is for men. Cultural values make it so that fewer women would ever consider dating a homeless man compared to the number of men who would consider dating a homeless woman.
- diN0bot 9y ago
  i’ve been wanting a feminist hacker news for some time. somewhere where ignorant loud space-takers dont wave thoughtless opinions around like dicks in a workplace. somewhere where i can talk about news without worrying if my experiences will be believed, or my value undermined. somewhere where “feminine” communication and support is a norm. does this exist anywhere? let’s make this happen. anyone interested? email me and we’ll figure out next steps all together.
- will4274 9y ago
  > women should have economic parity with men. They don't. Depends on how you measure it. Women have about 80% of the income of men, but they also have about 70% of total purchasing power (in the United States for both numbers). Women's disproportionate purchasing power comes from their tendency to make "family" purchases (in the majority of household, women do more errands than men) and to outlive men. This fact is well known in the advertising industry..
- Buge 9y ago
  I am a white male. I'm not going to downvote, dismiss or attack you, just as I'm not going to downvote, dismiss or attack black people. My point was not that society is fair to women, and I'm sorry if it sounded like that. My point was that gender injustices are different from racial injustices because racial injustices are inherited while gender injustices are not. Once we get to a point where society is 100% fair racially and genderally, gender inequality will die out with the old generations, while racial inequality will live on due to its inherited nature. Racial inequality is caused by current societal problems as well as past societal problems. But gender inequality is just caused by current societal problems.
  - DoreenMichele 9y ago
    I have studied the problem and thought quite a lot about it. I think sexism will tend to persist because there are biological differences that have substantial impacts. The fact that women can get pregnant but men cannot has a huge raft load of implications that influence the attitudes and choices of both men and women. Women I have known who thought they could live their life like a man did fine until they had a baby, at which point their assumptions of independence and self determination had an unpleasant wake up call. There may be things society can do to mitigate that reality, but most discussions I see of gender equality make zero effort to mitigate it. Instead, most people seem oblivious to its existence. This does not bode well for the possibility of creating policies that genuinely help level the playing field. I believe there are inherent challenges in creating good policies in this area, so it likely won't happen by serendipity. The current result seems to be a growing divide between the quality of life for empowered women and disempowered women. That divide seems to be strongly influenced by reproductive choices in ways that are not obvious or straight forward.
    - loopdedoo 9y ago
      The implication that women can get pregnant but that men cannot is deeply harmful and transphobic. Please reconsider your assertion.
      - 9y ago

by Buge 9y ago

DoreenMichele 9y ago

I am a woman and was one of the top 3 students of my graduating high school class. I never got the two career couple lifestyle I grew up believing would happen. A friend of the family once asked me why the hell I failed to be a self made millionaire by age 30. The ugly history of people of color outlined in one of the links in this discussion has some things in common with the outcomes women have. But I don't really feel like arguing it. This is an overwhelmingly male forum. I increasingly feel it is pointless to try to give a female point of view here. It will be downvoted, dismissed and attacked. If The resist, I will be accused of behaving badly while the insults to me are treated like reasonable statements that I am simply overreacting to. So, suffice it say, I don't agree with you. If you were correct, then women should have economic parity with men. They don't. The exact details may vary a bit, but the feminization of poverty is a phrase in our lexicon for a reason. When people talk like it isn't real, I never know quite what to think of that. I have a really hard time accepting that people sincerely don't see something so obvious for which there is overwhelming evidence. Yet I also realize it is obvious to me because I happen to be female. There are lots of details about the Black experience that I am inadequately aware of. So that gives me pause when it comes to trying to assess why men say such things. But I feel pretty worn down and hopeless of late.

erohead 9y ago
I believe you. I'm sorry you feel like your opinion isn't valued on HN. I certainly do appreciate it.
SomeStupidPoint 9y ago
> If you were correct, then women should have economic parity with men. They don't. Every statistic I've seen seems to indicate that modulo life choices that seem correlated with gender (ie, on average women prefer different things to men, though individuals vary greatly), there is economic parity between men and women (in most developed nations, but I'm most familiar with the US). There are some very real issues with the direction that women are steered by society, but there are also some real issues that men face (eg, school, legal system, etc). However, there's also a non-trivial number of women (in places like the US) who blame sexism for the consequences of choices they've had to make in life between things that they want, and seem to treat it as an affront to their gender that they're not treated as catered princesses by the world -- getting to have every want. And then hide that behind talking about "economic parity". > The exact details may vary a bit, but the feminization of poverty is a phrase in our lexicon for a reason. Doesn't this mostly have to do with poor women being forced to carry the economic burden of many children in developing nations? It's also definitely not a common term to use -- which makes me think that you likely have a biased view from hanging out in a very polarized, niche crowd. > But I feel pretty worn down and hopeless of late. As a fellow human, are you sure you're not inventing a narrative that's worse than the truth, and then stressing yourself out battling phantoms? (This is something I do all the time, on issues small to large.) There are real issues in the world -- quite serious ones, at that. But modern charities and other social purpose organizations deploy weaponized psychology meant to send you into an emotional state in order to boost their funding (or membership, but really power), and the consequence of everyone doing this "for the right reasons" is a completely toxic society, polarized in righteous anger over every issue to the point its emotionally burnt out and fragmented. This habit has even been exploited by foreign states to attack the nation. (True for virtually every country, and definitely all of the European and "Western" ones.) This is quite possibly the best of times on any of those issues, so instead of worrying about how you're going to feed every woman in Africa with too many kids (hint: you won't), just try to focus on what's the next small step that you can take to fix one of the issue a little. Then do that. That's something you can actually do right now, won't exhaust you even if you have to do it for the rest of your life, and would completely fix the problem if everyone would just stop panicking and do that.
belorn 9y ago
Every person is allowed their opinion. Male, female, everyone should get the same respect and same rights. > top 3 students of my graduating high school class ... > I failed to be a self made millionaire by age 30 Each year in the US there is around 900,000 students that will graduate in the top 3 of their high school class. Assuming that no other person in the nation would become millionaire, that is still way more than the number of new millionaires each year. Becoming a millionaire at some point in your life time after graduate in the top 3 is still a very rare event, and extremely rare if the target is to achieve it before the age of 30. > feminization of poverty is a phrase in our lexicon for a reason. I have a really hard time accepting that people sincerely don't see something so obvious for which there is overwhelming evidence. As evidence go, the the wast majority of the homeless are men. The bottom 1%, those that earn least and have least power and wealth in society are mostly men. Maybe those evidences are obvious to me because I happen to be male, but it would not be how I would phrase it. I don't think my gender give me any special insight to interpreting statistics or that there is a male point of view to it.
- DoreenMichele 9y ago
  As evidence go, the the wast majority of the homeless are men. http://sandiegohomelesssurvivalguide.blogspot.com/2017/07/gender-and-homelessness.html http://sandiegohomelesssurvivalguide.blogspot.com/2017/07/ge...
  - belorn 9y ago
    As effective evidence goes, a blog is exactly the same as a HN comment but with no voting system. It is a single person opinion, some which I would agree to and some which I disagree with. To counter some of the arguments in there. Men in general has smaller social network. Where the blog argues that friends and relatives are much more concerned about a woman being out on the street because women tend to have a much harder time on the street, the fact found from medical research and statistics is that those friends and relatives simply are not available to the same extent for men. Men at the bottom of society don't generally have a social support network where they can ask for help. The blog claims that women tend to make less money than men when homeless. No they don't. Data on begging finds that society is the most generous when it comes to young women, and among people who beg in the street they are the highest earners. "able bodied men", refer to the abusive tactics of exploiting desperate people into dangerous low paying temporary jobs, sometimes illegal, and can be about as healthy as selling sex on the street. Its a common tactic heard from paperless which are bounced between illegal construction sites, sometimes sold like cattle. The blogs claims that men choose to become homeless and women do not. That is victim blaming. No one choose to be at the bottom of the social ladder. The blog briefly touch on the subject that society sometimes welcome women, even homeless and without any wealth or status to their name. As the blog points out this is mostly to do with sex, but what it miss is that comes from the cultural values in dating. Women are not primarily judged based on how much money they have, so homelessness is not as dooming factor as it is for men. Cultural values make it so that fewer women would ever consider dating a homeless man compared to the number of men who would consider dating a homeless woman.
diN0bot 9y ago
i’ve been wanting a feminist hacker news for some time. somewhere where ignorant loud space-takers dont wave thoughtless opinions around like dicks in a workplace. somewhere where i can talk about news without worrying if my experiences will be believed, or my value undermined. somewhere where “feminine” communication and support is a norm. does this exist anywhere? let’s make this happen. anyone interested? email me and we’ll figure out next steps all together.
will4274 9y ago
> women should have economic parity with men. They don't. Depends on how you measure it. Women have about 80% of the income of men, but they also have about 70% of total purchasing power (in the United States for both numbers). Women's disproportionate purchasing power comes from their tendency to make "family" purchases (in the majority of household, women do more errands than men) and to outlive men. This fact is well known in the advertising industry..
Buge 9y ago
I am a white male. I'm not going to downvote, dismiss or attack you, just as I'm not going to downvote, dismiss or attack black people. My point was not that society is fair to women, and I'm sorry if it sounded like that. My point was that gender injustices are different from racial injustices because racial injustices are inherited while gender injustices are not. Once we get to a point where society is 100% fair racially and genderally, gender inequality will die out with the old generations, while racial inequality will live on due to its inherited nature. Racial inequality is caused by current societal problems as well as past societal problems. But gender inequality is just caused by current societal problems.
- DoreenMichele 9y ago
  I have studied the problem and thought quite a lot about it. I think sexism will tend to persist because there are biological differences that have substantial impacts. The fact that women can get pregnant but men cannot has a huge raft load of implications that influence the attitudes and choices of both men and women. Women I have known who thought they could live their life like a man did fine until they had a baby, at which point their assumptions of independence and self determination had an unpleasant wake up call. There may be things society can do to mitigate that reality, but most discussions I see of gender equality make zero effort to mitigate it. Instead, most people seem oblivious to its existence. This does not bode well for the possibility of creating policies that genuinely help level the playing field. I believe there are inherent challenges in creating good policies in this area, so it likely won't happen by serendipity. The current result seems to be a growing divide between the quality of life for empowered women and disempowered women. That divide seems to be strongly influenced by reproductive choices in ways that are not obvious or straight forward.
  - loopdedoo 9y ago
    The implication that women can get pregnant but that men cannot is deeply harmful and transphobic. Please reconsider your assertion.
    - 9y ago