Damned if You Do and Damned if You Don't
Elementary school teachers in Iceland were on strike for a total of eight (8) weeks. On saturday the Althingi passed a law effectually making the strike illegal, thereby forcing the teachers back to work. Without a new deal.
A teacher who has taught for thirty years makes less than a meter maid.
Yet the media has been quite negative in their portrayal of the teachers' ordeal, leaving them to defend themselves constantly. Many seem to think that what we have here is some sort of club of overpriviledged ladies arguing over the size of crumpets who should stop whining and focus on the value of their jobs. Children are the future and their education is of the utmost importance. Again, the inconsistency of this argument seems to bother no-one.
I'd venture to say that at the core of this problem is the fact that about 80% of teachers are women. Angry women, be it feminists, teachers or wives, seem to provoke people quite a bit. Although I rarely buy into freudian theories, perhaps there is some sort of mother complex going on here? A need to punish the authoritarian mother figure? A need to put her in her place?
When trying to figure out what is at the bottom of the gender based pay gap some have pointed out that women are less skilled at negotiating higher salaries for themselves. What if we turn it around? What if we say that people in charge react less favorably when women ask for what is rightfully theirs? And this in turn creates an environment where women are less likely to stick to their demands.
Unless, of course, parliament steps in and makes their salary and benefit negotiations illegal.
I say, lets get rid of the pesky teachers altogether and send in the meter maids. They have to know the basic math, spelling and reading. In stead of vasting valuable money teaching the little critters Phys.Ed. we can use the kids to hand out parking violations. I'm sure fewer people would argue with a cute eight year old than a meter maid and eventually we could run schools with profit.
A teacher who has taught for thirty years makes less than a meter maid.
Yet the media has been quite negative in their portrayal of the teachers' ordeal, leaving them to defend themselves constantly. Many seem to think that what we have here is some sort of club of overpriviledged ladies arguing over the size of crumpets who should stop whining and focus on the value of their jobs. Children are the future and their education is of the utmost importance. Again, the inconsistency of this argument seems to bother no-one.
I'd venture to say that at the core of this problem is the fact that about 80% of teachers are women. Angry women, be it feminists, teachers or wives, seem to provoke people quite a bit. Although I rarely buy into freudian theories, perhaps there is some sort of mother complex going on here? A need to punish the authoritarian mother figure? A need to put her in her place?
When trying to figure out what is at the bottom of the gender based pay gap some have pointed out that women are less skilled at negotiating higher salaries for themselves. What if we turn it around? What if we say that people in charge react less favorably when women ask for what is rightfully theirs? And this in turn creates an environment where women are less likely to stick to their demands.
Unless, of course, parliament steps in and makes their salary and benefit negotiations illegal.
I say, lets get rid of the pesky teachers altogether and send in the meter maids. They have to know the basic math, spelling and reading. In stead of vasting valuable money teaching the little critters Phys.Ed. we can use the kids to hand out parking violations. I'm sure fewer people would argue with a cute eight year old than a meter maid and eventually we could run schools with profit.
posted by disinterpreter at 11:16 AM
3 Comments:
It is ironic that whilst women's communication skills are constantly lauded as exceeding those of men's that we are forced to put up with illegal pay differentials. Assertive women have always been denigrated (think of labels such as harridan or battle-axe) and ridiculed. Once again, this constitutes a crude (but sadly effective) marginalisation tactic. From birth we are encouraged to be less demanding, to put our ambitions on hold in accordance with the image of the nurturing mother sacrificing herself for the sake of her husband/offspring. Social attitudes lag severely behind social change - a widespread perception that women's income is somehow subsidiary to that of her husband/partner's (which, in itself assumes that she is a mere appendage to some protecting male, that she cannot exist outside such a relationship, that unattached women are somehow defective/abnormal in spite of the contemporary prevalence of single person households), ignoring the fact that in most families the female wage contribution is indispensable to survival (and always has been for all but the most privileged segments of society). It makes my blood boil! The sad fact (as I have commented elsewhere) is that female-dominated professions are not taken seriously. From hairdressers and flight attendants to conference interpreters and nurses, from carers in old people's homes to the primary school teachers you mention, women's toil is chronically undervalued. We are the first to be forced into working part time for starvation wages, the first to be made redundant. Not to mention the unpaid and unappreciated chores we perform in the home - I would welcome a piece on this subject. The caring role is not appreciated although the economy would collapse without it - we wipe away the shit from baby's bottoms and the dribbles from the trembling chins of the elderly with the tender affection of loving hands. Even if we do rise through the ranks at the workplace our heads sooner or later bump against the glass ceiling...
Too true Chameleon!
Certainly the politics of economy are very male oriented. Lately, I have been thinking that in addition to bursting out of the gender based trappings of the domestic workspace, we must indeed learn to put a higher monetary value on those services generally seen as female.
Too long have we been told that domestic services are duties to be performed for free. While what used to be more male dominated duties such as providing the food by hunting and catching it, slaughtering and so forth the same does not go food preparation and so forth.
Um, yeah that thought was supposed to lead somewhere. Was up painting til 4 am last night.
Anyway. The "male domestic chores" such as building the shelter, hunting & killing and whatnot have been morphed into businesses. Rarely do we look down on a man for not having slaughtered our dinner, but the woman who refuses to make dinner is somehow not feminine?
Why should the traditionally female duties not be marketable and valued in money/assets?
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