I'm celebrating my "New, Improved" TU status by writing my first diary. Whatever shall I write about? It should be something that I'm impassioned about, right? Let's make a list:
* Torture
* The Hate Amendment
* The Anti-Choice Thang
* The War
* The Screwing of the Middle Class
* The Katrina Disaster
* The Subtle (or not so subtle) Erosion of Women's Equality
* Global Warming/The Environment
* The Outsourcing of our Government
* The Failure of the 4th Estate
Let's spin the Wheel O' Outrage and see where we land...
The Subtle (or not so subtle) Erosion of Women's Equality is a subject near and dear to my heart. For one thing, I am a woman, so I have some experience. For another, I've been on the planet for 52 years, and have seen many things change. I'll have to work up to those other topics.
In the United States we live in a patriarchal society, where male members of a society tend to predominate in positions of power; with the more powerful the position, the more likely it is that a male will hold that position. Wikipedia
Looking at our country from this viewpoint, most political positions are held by men, therefore most decisions affecting our lives (all of us, male or female) are made by men. There have been many diaries here about abortion, and other larger issues, but I'm going to focus on the small, everyday stuff.
I have a 14 year-old daughter who happens to play basketball. She's been on AAU teams for a couple or three years now. I was assistant coach for a two of those years. Suffice it to say that we've bought a fair amount of basketball equipment over the past few years.
Shoes have almost always been an issue. They don't really make many girls/ladies basketball shoes. I'm not saying there aren't any, but it's always been difficult to find any kind of variety in her size. Boys have many more choices in b-ball shoes, in fact, they always have a whole wall full of shoes for them. They actually don't ever seem to carry many women's basketball shoes. Who supplies the women in the WNBA? I always wonder. Our Nike outlet doesn't have them. Neither does Sports Authority, or Big 5. The last pair of shoes we found for her (and she now wears Women's size 7 ½ or 8) was at Famous Footwear in the "Junior" section. That's Boys Juniors. Why are we left out? I must know of a couple of hundred of young women who play basketball. They all wear shoes.
And here's my favorite: Spalding came out recently with the "Never Flat" basketball. It's guaranteed to stay fully inflated for a full year. Sounds great, right? And yes, they make it in a 28.5 size (Women's). We went to a Big 5 near us to get one, and they only had the 29.5. The manager of the store didn't seem to care at all that they didn't have it. Later that day we went to our local Sports Authority. They carry a larger inventory, and had a ton of the Never Flat. But not in a 28.5. I told them how disappointed I was, and still no offer to order it for us or make it right. I went on a mini-tirade about it, and my daughter told me it was no big deal. No big deal?! I let her know in no uncertain terms that it was a big deal, and did she want to be a second class citizen for the rest of her life?
We ended up not talking about it for a while. She was annoyed with me for making a scene, and I was bothered by the fact that she didn't "get it".
Spalding, Big 5 and Sports Authority are on my list of entities to write to about their lack of customer service, and the fact that they're ignoring an important segment of the population. As I get older, I find I'm getting crankier about things like this. They will be hearing from me, and so will anyone else who doesn't cater to their women customers.