This week's SheKos is a little bit of everything, from Fair Pay to wives making more than husbands to kids not learning leadership if they don't have dads (WTF???). Also, Facebook sexism disguised as a compliment!
Let's get this party started!
Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act: Just the Half of It
by LeanneB, SheKos editor
Any list of President Obama's accomplishments from his first year in office will inevitably lead off with the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, and rightly so. It was not just the first piece of legislation to receive his presidential autograph, but it was a cause he had expressly championed as a presidential candidate and a co-sponsor of the bill, unlike rival John McCain, who fought its passage.
Indeed, the signing was given full ceremonial treatment, with Ledbetter herself standing behind the president as his left hand applied the ink that made the act a law.
"It is fitting that with the very first bill I sign — the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act — we are upholding one of this nation’s first principles: that we are all created equal and each deserve a chance to pursue our own version of happiness," the president said.
He said was signing the bill not only in honor of Ms. Ledbetter — who stood behind him, shaking her head and clasping her hands in seeming disbelief — but in honor of his own grandmother, "who worked in a bank all her life, and even after she hit that glass ceiling, kept getting up again" and for his daughters, "because I want them to grow up in a nation that values their contributions, where there are no limits to their dreams."
But while we should not scoff at this achievement and its undeniable importance to women's rights, it is critically important to understand that the passage of the Fair Pay Act did not represent a step forward. Rather, it was merely a restoration of rights that women were already presumed to have before the controversial SCOTUS decision in Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. (2007).
In that decision, five SCOTUS Justices redefined the statute of limitations of employment compensation discrimination. The Fair Pay Act was necessary to amend the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and restore civil legal protections to workers against employers practicing discriminatory compensation.
So while it was certainly just and heartening that - despite Republican obstruction (I know, I was shocked, too) - the Senate did finally pass the Fair Pay Act, all this did was bring us back to the status quo of 2007. What would have produced real progress was passage of the Paycheck Fairness Act, which passed the House in 2007 as a companion to the Ledbetter bill but has (gasp!) languished in the Senate.
The Paycheck Fairness Act amends the Equal Pay Act of 1963, which established that men and women should be payed equally for jobs that involve essentially the same kind and amount of work. Since women are still paid on average under eighty cents on the dollar to men, that law has clearly not worked quite as designed. The Paycheck Fairness Act is intended to close loopholes in the earlier law and, it is hoped, to close the gender-based wage gap.
So Ledbetter Act was great, but it was just one-half of the tag team. In the words of NOW:
Passing both bills is critical to the overall goal of achieving pay equity for all. The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act amended Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and righted the wrongs done by the Supreme Court, regaining ground we recently lost. The Ledbetter Act is a narrow fix that simply restores legal practices and EEOC policies to what they were the day before the Supreme Court's Ledbetter decision was issued in 2007 -- nothing more, nothing less.
The Paycheck Fairness Act is a much-needed update of the 45-year-old Equal Pay Act, closing longstanding loopholes and strengthening incentives to prevent pay discrimination. Together, these bills can help to create a climate where wage discrimination is not tolerated, where fair employers can have a healthy workplace, and where the administration has the enforcement tools it needs to make real progress on ending wage discrimination.
Our work, then, as feminists, is clearly laid out before us on this issue. We need to pressure the Senate to bring Paycheck Fairness out of mothballs. We need to call our women's advocacy groups and find out what they are doing to fight for this bill to get to the Senate floor.
We need to let our Senators know that they can't throw us a flashlight with no batteries and tell us we need glasses if we still can't see.
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EAR ON CULTURE: Emily Mitchell, A Novelist to Know
by earicicle, SheKos editor
Historical fiction, as a genre, has a cheesy rap: bodice-ripping adventures, gaining a veneer of class from being set in Ye Olde Days of Yore. Playing fast and loose with the facts of the past? Meh...but the fight scene on page 437 is awesome!
The actual historical record, however, is frustrating for many of history's most fascinating people. Diaries, journals, letters, interviews--these first-person, revealing narratives don't exist for many famous figures whom we'd love to understand more intimately. In the right hands, fiction can be a remarkable technique for giving life and shape to a skeletal narrative of facts. One of the best novels I've read in years does just that: Emily Mitchell's The Last Summer of the World (2007). Mitchell, 34, is a native of London, who attended college and grad school in the United States. Last Summer, her book-length debut, made a host of "Best of 2007" lists.
The luminescent novel reimagines the early life of American photographer Edward Steichen (1879-1973). Set primarily in France, it centers on the summer of 1918 and the waning months of World War I. Mitchell weaves in chapters set before the war; each of these interludes is constructed around the description of a real Steichen photo. The restless young Steichen keeps heady company among prewar Paris' artists. Their avant-garde aesthetic also extends to the unconventional way many of them live their personal lives.
Mitchell shows compellingly how these early 20th century men and women share the same urges for freedom, personally and artistically, but not the same avenues. Society's constraints are particularly cruel for the women. Even the most progressive among them face the assumption that marriage and childbearing will end their creative pursuits. But when the women suffer, there is fallout for the men, too. Steichen's wife, Clara, reflects on the disconnect between the polish of her husband’s work and rough edges of their life together:
The real world is far messier and more confusing than these photographs betray. As many dreams are denied as fulfilled; as many loves fail as endure.
Mitchell’s prose flows effortlessly, with edges as smooth and clear as Steichen’s sharpest portraits. And her insight into character--the vivid way she brings people to life--makes her a novelist to know.
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THIS WEEK IN WOMEN'S HISTORY: Potpourri
by joedemocrat
- This week in 1836, Betsy Ross passed away. She is credited with making the first American flag.
- This week in 1933, Corazon Aquino was born. She was the first female elected president in the Philippines.
- This week in 1944, civil rights activist, feminist, professor, and former Black Panther Angela Davis was born.
- This week in 1966, folk singer Joan Baez wins three gold records for albums. She was very active in the civil rights movement, GLBT rights, anti-poverty movement, and opposing the Iraq war.
- This week in 1972, Shirley Chisolm became the first woman to announce her candidacy for president of the United States.
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WOMEN IN THE WORKPLACE: The Rise of Wives
by pat of butter in a sea of grits
Equal pay may be a dream of the future, but inferior wifely earning power is becoming a relic of the past. A new Pew Research Center study came out this week focusing on the increasing earning power of women relative to their husbands. The Pew study used Census data to look at education and income among U.S.-born married couples ages 30 to 44 in 1970 and 2007. Results showed that couples are increasingly depending on the education and earning power of wives.
In 1970, only 4 percent of husbands had a wife who earned more than they did. By 2007, that number had risen to 22 percent. Not surprisingly, given the greater potential for two earner households, married couples have a higher median income than single adults, and the gap is larger for women than for men. Married women have a median household income of $74,642, while single women have a median household income of only $48,738 and single men's median income is $65,849.
In both 1970 and 2007, just over half of married couples had the same level of education. However, among those couples where education level didn't match, husbands were more often better-educated than their wives in 1970, while the reverse was true in 2007. Women are now the majority of college graduates (college graduates were 53.5% female in 2007, compared with only 36% in 1970 - again, among 30-44 year olds).
Married women who did not graduate from high school did not see the same gains that more educated married women did. Only three-quarters of these less educated married women had a partner in the workforce, compared with 92 percent in 1970. This decline reflects the decreasing employment opportunities for less-educated men in the United States.
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RECOMMENDED READING
by dirkster42
For this week, we'll turn to two seventeenth-century feminists from Venice. The first, Lucrezia Marinella (1571-1653), published a number of works in her own name, including The Nobility and Excellence of Women and the Defects and Vices of Men in 1600.
Money quote:
I say that compared to women all men are ugly. They would not be loved by women were it not for our courteous and benign natures, to which it seems discourteous not to love our male admirers a little.
The second book, by the Venetian nun Arcangela Tarabotti (1604-1652), Paternal Tyranny is a denunciation of the practice of forced monachization - a practice wherein Venetian families would force daughters into convents in order to avoid paying large doweries. The visibility of Tarabotti's critique in her day gives the lie to the assertion that "we can't judge the past" because people didn't have a wider view of the common practices of their time. Tarabotti's uncompromising criticism definitely saw the light of day, and was part of the public conversation of her world.
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GLBT NEWS THE KAT DRAGGED IN: And Now, For The Defense
by KentuckyKat
Well, we are now into week three of the Perry v. Schwarzenneggar trial and the Defense has finally stepped up to the plate. Their witness list is much smaller than that of the Plaintiffs and the Defense will likely rest this week. To say the Defense witnesses have made some interesting comments would be an understatement.
For example, Ron Prentice (Executive Director of ProtectMarriage.com) was shown in a video claiming that
[Just before 10:23 update] Dads have instinctual differences from Moms. When do kids learn to be leaders without Dad?
So, I guess we women are incapable of leading? I thought this trial was going to be about homophobia but it turns out misogyny will be out in full force.
Also, Defense expert witness Kenneth Miller apparently believes we (GLBTs) have tons of political power.
[under 1:40 update] It is true that LGBT movement has lost twice: Prop. 22 [earlier version of Prop. 8] and Prop. 8. They were unsuccessfully [sic] in direct democracy. California voters have not used initiative process to revoke other rights granted by the voters. It cannot be said that those were stripped away by voters in election process.
The last sentence there really gets me. How is removing rights found to be in the state constitution not having rights stripped away by voters in election process?
Hands down, my favorite part was the following. (For ease of understanding, B= Plaintiff attorney David Boies and M=Miller.
B: Any examples of discrimination against gays and lesbians in modern period?
M: Military.
B: Any others?
M: Private situations about which I cannot opine, but only official discrimination of which I can think is DADT.
B: Is that your definition, official discrimination, that is legally enforced by the state?
M: Yes.
B: Are you aware of any official discrimination against gays and lesbians in this country today other than DADT policy?
M: (Thinking) I’m trying to think of other laws that are official...policies that discriminate on that basis. One thing you are looking at would be DOMA policy.
B: There you go!
M: That’s what you are getting at. The DOMA policy is a differentiation of the treatment between gays and lesbians.
Same link, right above the 3:22 update. If you aren't keeping up with the trial, please consider reading the daily summaries at www.prop8trialtracker.com. And, if you get a chance, read some of the comments. They describe in hundreds of voices why this trial, the word marriage and designation of sexual orientation as a suspect classification (or even quasi-suspect classification such as that given to gender and legitimacy) is so important.
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THE LITTLE THINGS: Casual Sexism
by Elise, SheKos editor
Every evening I take a look at the latest Facebook status updates from my friends. Now and then I find an update that causes me to cheer. Then there are moments like tonight where I go from laughing at my friend Jen who avoided a telemarketer by saying her parents weren't home (she's 30 and on kid #2), to having smoke come out of my ears.
My friend's status update:
If you are a woman that has a wonderful boyfriend (husband) that works so hard and would give up anything for you, then repost this to your wall status today...because great men are few and far between, and by the grace of God, I have one.
That's a nice status update. I have a wonderful husband who would give up anything for me (he lives with my cats despite being allergic to them - thank goodness for Singulair), so I understand that feeling. And before I met my husband, the great men certainly did seem to be few and far between. I'm reading along and thinking to myself, "sure" - and then I read the comment someone else left on her status update.
It says:
Andrea its refreshing to see a woman recognize all that us men do to give you ladies the dream lives you lead!
I wish there was a "strongly dislike this sexist comment" button I could click. How refreshing, indeed, that Andrea sees that her husband "gives" to her "the dream life" she leads. The dream life that includes her working 40-50 hours a week, raising two daughters and being pregnant with the third child, and having a few dogs that she bathes, feeds, and walks because her husband is too busy with his friends for that kind of thing. How lucky Andrea is that her husband "gives" her all of those things. This is the kind of thing my father or father-in-law would say as a joke, knowing it would push my buttons, but this was genuine. Genuine everyday sexism, and it isn’t going to go away until we confront it.