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| META TOPICPARENT | name="WebPreferences" |
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| | | Cooperation v Competition | |
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< | Books with titles such as “Woman to Woman: From Sabotage to Support” try to encourage women to stop competing in the workplace, and a TIME magazine article in 2001 chronicled female lawyers and the struggle that they encountered working with other women in law firms. According to the article, female supervisors are often hostile to younger women entering the field (an experience I can attest to having interned at a law firm and faced one of these women myself), while female associates often accused their female supervisors of becoming “one of them” –a reference to the patriarchal power structure. TIME. While certainly the power struggle against male norms is a primary reason for women not rising to the top, women contribute to the cycle as well. Hostile competition between women contributes to forcing females out because not only are women fighting patriarchy, but they are also battling each other. Without allies women often do not get to the top because there is nobody supporting the climb. Maybe women compete against each other because of biology or because the women at the top have “become one of them,” part of the male hierarchy they do not want to threaten. Maybe it is that women who have struggled think that other women need to struggle as well. Whatever the explanation, part of the reason nobody can find the “disappearing women” is because many of the people who should be starting the search are actually an impediment to finding the solution. Who is supposed to look for the women who are disappearing and why should men worry about advancing more women in the workplace, when many women will not help each other’s advancement? | >
> | Books with titles such as “Woman to Woman: From Sabotage to Support” try to encourage women to stop competing in the workplace, and a TIME magazine article in 2001 chronicled female lawyers and the struggle that they encountered working with other women in law firms. According to the article, female supervisors are often hostile to younger women entering the field (an experience I can attest to having interned at a law firm and faced one of these women myself), while female associates often accused their female supervisors of becoming “one of them” –a reference to the patriarchal power structure. TIME. While certainly the power struggle against male norms is a primary reason for women not rising to the top, women contribute to the cycle as well. Hostile competition between women contributes to forcing females out because not only are women fighting patriarchy, but they are also battling each other. Without allies women often do not get to the top because there is nobody supporting the climb. Maybe women compete against each other because of biology or because the women at the top have “become one of them,” part of the male hierarchy they do not want to threaten. Maybe it is that women who have struggled think that other women need to struggle as well. Whatever the explanation, part of the reason nobody can find the “disappearing women” is because many of the people who should be starting the search are actually an impediment to finding the solution. Nobody expects all competition to fade. Men compete with other men all the time after all, and women should compete as well, with both men and women. But women should compete with other women without cutting each other down because even if the men at the top support the female quest for equality, women will never get it without treating each other as equals first. | | | "The Mommy Wars" | | | Women for Hillary! (But Against Other Women) | |
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< | With Hillary Clinton running for President what should be a moment for women to take advantage of their visibility in the political process has become another example of women marginalizing each other. I have been told, sometimes by women whose only reason for voting for Clinton is her womanhood, that not voting for her is a betrayal to my gender. NOW has perpetuated this view by criticizing young female supporters of Obama for not feeling the obligation that they should to vote for Clinton. This method of “support” for Clinton is contributing to women’s invisibility. When women vote for Clinton because she is a woman, are they not diminishing her work and her values? In a political process that should be about leadership and views, to vote for someone because of their gender only serves to reinforce gender lines, not break them down. This lack of recognition of Clinton's views diminishes her as an individual and as an accomplished person. | >
> | With Hillary Clinton running for President what should be a moment for women to take advantage of their visibility in the political process has become another example of women marginalizing each other. I have been told, sometimes by women whose only reason for voting for Clinton is her womanhood, that not voting for her is a betrayal to my gender. NOW has perpetuated this view by criticizing young female supporters of Obama for not feeling the obligation that they should to vote for Clinton. The call for women to support each other does not mean that all women need to blindly support someone solely because she is a woman. This method of support contributes to women’s invisibility. When women vote for Clinton because she is a woman, are they not diminishing her work and her values? In a political process that should be about leadership and views, to vote for someone because of their gender only serves to reinforce gender lines, not break them down. This lack of recognition of Clinton's views diminishes her as an individual and as an accomplished person. | | | But more importantly, women are demeaning each other. To assert that a woman is betraying her gender by not voting for Clinton minimizes women as individuals. It lumps women into one entity, whose defining characteristic is gender, not values. Further, it demeans women whose own experiences do not match up with Clinton’s by implying that because Clinton is a woman, she is the best representative for all women. What about women whose experiences differ from Clinton’s? These women’s values and views are discounted in favor of gender “obligations”. Even when women are supporting another powerful woman, they somehow manage to also demean other women, making them invisible in society by discounting their individuality.
Conclusion | |
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< | If “disappearing” women are to be found at work, they must first be visible in society, an important element of which is the political process. For this visibility to happen, the light has to be shown on the way women are marginalizing themselves. Whereas women should be leading the search for other women, instead, it seems they compete with and critique each other, perpetuating invisibility, while expecting the power structure to see them. If women want to become recognized at work and in society, women first have to look to themselves. They must stop dividing themselves by first and foremost recognizing each other as people of substance and as deserving of respect for the choices that stem from the autonomy women fought to have. | >
> | If “disappearing” women are to be found at work, they must first be visible in society, an important element of which is the political process. Women must stop marginalizing each other, and instead, recognize each woman’s value as a person, whose choices should be respected. Just as with any other group fighting for equality, it is nearly impossible to solve the problem when the problem is being perpetuated within. | | |
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