“When I was young there were beatniks. Hippies. Punks. Gangsters. Now you’re a hacktivist. Which I would probably be if I was 20. Shuttin’ down MasterCard. But there’s no look to that lifestyle! Besides just wearing a bad outfit with bad posture. Has WikiLeaks caused a look? No! I’m mad about that. If your kid comes out of the bedroom and says he just shut down the government, it seems to me he should at least have an outfit for that.”
No, I’m serious, if women all got together and went into electrical engineering or automotive repair en masse, then ten years later people would be talking about how it was a “soft field” and it would pay proportionately less than other fields.
Likewise, if men moved en masse to bedeck themselves in sparkles and make-up, then suddenly you’d get a bunch of editorials talking about how classy they look.
None of these things are inherently masculine or feminine; none of these things inherently elevate you or drag you down. But whatever women are seen to do is automatically seen as being inherently more frivolous than anything men do. And shaming women for not pigeonholing themselves into a narrow range of acceptable “masculine” behaviours is just going to result in the goalposts getting moved once again.
This is literally what happened to basically every field women have entered. The opposite happens when men enter. Computers used to be a “woman thing” until the guys who did it got really mad about how badly their job was viewed and realized they could fix it by forcing out women.
Also happened/ is happening with the fields of biology and psychology….
I honestly wonder how much of the backlash against public education in the last generation has been due to teaching becoming a woman-dominated profession.
Fashion used to be a men’s thing. Then women got involved in the late 17/1800’s, so men went the other way because it came to be seen as “frivolous” and “anti-intellectual” to care about how you looked. Add in the homophobia that arose around that time, bam, staid bland dress. Ditto leggings/tights, that are now called attention-whoring when on men they were required to show you cared about your figure and had the money to pay for such a fitted item.
People want to say misogyny doesn’t exist, that male privilege doesn’t exist. Look beyond “living memory” and you’ll find that’s what drives the “inexplicable reversals” society seems to make on many things. Hell, just look beyond your own society, and you’ll find out that what’s considered “for men” elsewhere is held in high esteem while here it’s scoffed at purely because it’s “for women”:
Skinny jeans are the height of masculinity in several east Asian societies, rather than being seen as “gay” in the USA because of their association with femininity.
Medical fields in Russia are valued like kindergarten teachers are here, because it’s women who are the doctors instead of men.
Love and romance are highly valued in eastern countries, because men are interested in it too—of course they would be, surely you want to share your life with someone? Here, it’s strictly a women’s subject.
The field of anthropology as a whole illustrates this.
Significantly higher proportions of females compared to males are currently entering the fields of archaeology and biological anthropology, and as this occurs, the prestige, funding, acceptance as valid kinds of science, etc, are fading quickly.
This has already occurred with linguistic anthropology and cultural anthropology. Cultural anthropology in particular went VERY quickly from being seen as a manly, scientific discipline (e.g., Franz Boas, Bronisław Malinowski) to being seen as a touchy-feely female thing.
Let’s examine a traditionally male-dominated role that is very well-respected, and well-paid, in many parts of the world — that of a doctor. In the UK, it is listed as one of the top ten lucrative careers, and the average annual income of a family doctor in the US is well into six figures. It also confers on you significant social status, and a common stereotype in Asian communities is of parents encouraging their children to become doctors.
One of my lecturers at university once presented us with this thought exercise: why are doctors so highly paid, and so well-respected? Our answers were predictable. Because they save lives, their skills are extremely important, and it takes years and years of education to become one. All sound, logical reasons. But these traits that doctors possess are universal. So why is it, she asked, that doctors in Russia are so lowly paid? Making less than £7,500 a year, it is one of the lowest paid professions in Russia, and poorly respected at that. Why is this?
The answer is crushingly, breathtakingly simple. In Russia, the majority of doctors are women. Here’s a quote from Carol Schmidt, a geriatric nurse practitioner who toured medical facilities in Moscow: “Their status and pay are more like our blue-collar workers, even though they require about the same amount of training as the American doctor… medical practice is stereotyped as a caring vocation ‘naturally suited‘ to women, [which puts it at] a second-class level in the Soviet psyche.”
What this illustrates perfectly is this — women are not devalued in the job market because women’s work is seen to have little value. It is the other way round. Women’s work is devalued in the job market because women are seen to have little value. This means that anything a woman does, be it childcare, teaching, or doctoring, or rocket science, will be seen to be of less value simply because it is done mainly by women. It isn’t that women choose jobs that are in lower-paid industries, it is that any industry that women dominate automatically becomes less respected and less well-paid.
Ripley has a very good grasp of the word “touch” and we often use it as a command word to get him to try to be less afraid of new things or to ask his permission to pet him. He knows if we ask him to “touch” a person or object, he’ll be praised for gently tapping his beak against it. He also knows exactly what we mean when we ask him not to touch something,
Today I yelled at him for biting the wall and he did probably the pettiest thing I’ve ever seen him do: he went around touching stuff in the room and saying “no” and staring at me to make sure I was watching him do it.
guys please observe my friend’s salty toddlersaur.
Seriously.
4 years ago, I’m cashiering at a whacky mart on a register that holds
all the smokes and alcohol. It’s 10pm and these two young men (early
20s) come up to the counter. They have three random novelty items (I
don’t remember they were), but it was strange and unusual to get odd
items this late at night. Maybe it was for some fraternity, I don’t
know. It’s a college town so I get weird stuff from frats a lot. I scan
the items and tell them their total is $22.xx.
Grinning at each other, they reach into their jackets and slam down
two gallon zip-lock bags, full of only pennies. I stare them in the eye,
but they didn’t even look back at me. Everyone else in line groan and
went to other registers. These two kids knew what they were doing, but
they didn’t know what they were in for because I prepared for this; I
knew this was going to inevitably happen. I grinned with them, because I
was gonna get paid during this. These pranksters are here for
recreation. This convo occurs between Me, Ringleader (the other guy was
silent and awkward), and a friendly coworker of mine.
Me: Is this $22.xx?
Ringleader: …
Me: Did you count it?
Ringleader: Nope.
Me: Are you going to?
Ringleader: Nope.
Me: Is it at least $22.xx?
Ringleader: Don’t know.
Me: Nice.
Coworker: Hey! You guys can use the self checkout. It can take all of your coins at once.
Me: Oh, don’t worry about it Cowor–
Ringleader: Nope, don’t trust them lady. (Partner laughs)
Coworker: What? Why!?
Ringleader: Doesn’t count all your change right.
Coworker: I’ve used them before. It really works!
Me: (to Coworker) I got this.
I unpacked the ziplocks and threw all the pennies on the counter. It
was a beautiful, massive shitstorm of a mess. And I digged in it. I was
Frank in a dumpster in ‘It’s Always Sunny’. The two, still averting my
gaze, start chuckling as if they were taking away my dignity. They
whisper to each other “Dude oh my God,” “Dude yeah,” “Dude, hilarious.”
I counted each penny, one by one. My coworker comes up to me.
Coworker: Guess I’ll help you count this.
Me: Don’t worry about it.
(She looks at me confused. Then she puts on her ‘get down to busy’ look.)
Coworker: I got your back.
Me: Oh…ok.
We worked up a system where we counted ten, put them in a pile, then
with ten stacks of ten pennies we separated them, making $1 piles. We
made progress slowly but surely. Some customers came to the line, but we
advised them to get to another line. Some of them looked at us
confused, but when they saw the counter full of pennies they understood.
Some decided to wait, but when they realized it wasn’t going to take
just a few minutes they took their leave. Another register in the liquor
department opened so it wasn’t too bad for other customers. We get to
about $12 (about 10min in) until I “knocked” over the piles.
Coworker: Neontonsil!
Me: Oops. Sorry.
(Coworker looks at my grin. I give her a wink and tilt my head, motioning her to leave)
Coworker: You know what, I think I better let you do this.
Me: Ha, alright.
(Coworker leaves. I look at the two guys. They are absolutely stunned at the fallen piles of pennies.)
Me: (To Ringleader) Yeah, I’m going to have to count all of this again.
Ringleader: ….Ok.
I started from zero. I count slower then ever, and made my way back
up. The duo is entirely silent. I get to about $7, when suddenly I say:
Me: Drats. I lost count. I better start all over again.
Ringleader: Really?
Me: Oh yeah man.
Ringleader: Why!?
Me: I lost count, sir. I could be in trouble if my register doesn’t
have the right amount of cash, and I don’t want to rip you off.
Ringleader: …
It’s about an hour later. My manager walks past, looks at me. I smile
at him, and he looks at the counter. He walks away without a word. I
eventually count all the change and surprisingly they had only $18!
Me: Hmm, I think that this is $18.
(The duo has been dead silent. They look done for the night.)
Me: I’ll recount it.
I fucking recounted it.
Me: I think this is actually $19.xx.
(Without a word, the Ringleader whips out a $5)
Me: Seriously? You had cash?
Ringleader: Needed to get rid of my change.
Me. No problem. I’ll just recount this again. I want to make
perfectly sure that this is $19, since I counted $18 the first time.
Ringleader: Are you kidding me?
(I shake my head no, completely serious)
He takes out a $20 bill straight out of his pocket and throws it at
me. My coworker gives the biggest WHAT THE FUCK face. Internally, I die
as well, because they were smart enough to have a backup plan. And the
fact that he was touching his cash in his pocket the entire time kinda
messed with me. I take the cash, do the transaction, give him his
change, thanked him and wished him a good night. The two start to put
their pennies back in the ziplock bags and I didn’t help them at all. I
watched them just as how they watched me. Lots of pennies dropped to the
floor, but they didn’t care to pick them up. It looked like their souls
were sucked out of them. It was past midnight and I clocked out way
past when I was supposed to. A lot of my coworkers gave me a thumbs up
or told me good night. Even my manager told me ‘good job,’ the only two
words he ever said to me. Went to bed at the dorms after such a great
petty penny night and crashed. Strange to say, but I’d love to count
pennies again.
TL;DR I recounted 1900 pennies like 5 times. Was it 5 times? I better count again.
Was suprised to find out this strip had been nominated for an Ignatz award this morning. I was not expecting that, and I am beyond honored to have been considered. Thankyou to Matt Bors and The Nib for commisioning it from me, and thankyou to Eleri Harris my wonderful editor.
Canadian negotiators are demanding the United States roll back so-called “right to work” laws – accused of gutting unions in some U.S. states by starving them of money – as part of the renegotiation of the North American free-trade agreement. The request is part of a push by Ottawa to get the U.S. and Mexico to adopt higher labour standards under the deal…
One group of negotiators spent all day Sunday working on the labour file, according to a schedule of the talks obtained by The Globe and Mail. One source familiar with the discussions said Canada wants the United States to pass a federal law stopping state governments from enacting right-to-work legislation; the source said the United States has not agreed to such a request. Canada believes that lower labour standards in the United States and Mexico, including right to work, give those countries an unfair advantage in attracting jobs.
Jerry Dias, the leader of Canada’s largest private-sector trade union, said Ottawa’s negotiators are: pushing Mexico on its corporate-sanctioned unions, which are accused of negotiating collective agreements unfavourable to workers; agitating for both countries to offer a year of paid family leave, as Canada does; and targeting American right-to-work laws that allow workers in unionized shops to refuse to pay dues, draining money from unions.
“I’m very pleased with the position the Canadian government is taking on labour standards,” Mr. Dias, president of Unifor, told reporters outside the talks. “Canada’s got two problems: The low wage rates in Mexico and the right-to-work states in the United States.”
We, of course, would never consider underbidding other advanced countries when it comes to upper middle class and gentry class professions. Keep in mind, Justin Trudeau is not a leftist–by a long shot. That the U.S. has become a low-wage haven among advanced nations is just an obvious reality other countries are forced to deal with.
I always did the opposite... ate the ones I hated first and saved my favorites for last (though, I had to defend the good ones with threats of bodily harm to those who came along "oh, you don't like the red ones?" -- #2 pencil through their hand)
you know that shit that happens where you eat a bag of assorted candy but theres one flavor in there you dont like and eventually, like, you get down to the point where its like a huge bag of just that flavor and you try your best to eat it anyway bc it feels weird to throw out?? sundays feel like a solid 24 hours of that feeling. idk why. this isnt like, an analogy. dont try and break down like how theres an equivalency bc theres not, im not drawing one, im saying there are a finite amount of vibes in the world, and sometimes the universe has to repurpose them, and “being alive on a sunday” and “possessing a whole bag of just the worst kind of candy” is a case of that
let your child be goofy and silly and make messes. teach them to clean up the messes without yelling at them. let your child be a child. not a mini adult who has to be perfect 24/7
A child is brought to the US by their illegal immigrant parents; they grow up knowing nothing but America, go to American schools, have American friends, are fundamentally American. And then Donald Trump decides that, because of their parentage, they are going to be thrown out of the country and sent to a different country that they might not know anything about. He wants to repeal the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which doesn’t go far enough in accommodating these kids. I think the DREAM Act, which would have allowed undocumented immigrants to earn citizenship with college attendance or military service, would be an excellent idea — we ought to recognize that there are people living here, who want to live here, who want to be part of this country, and that we ought to be welcoming them.
It is intolerably cruel to deny these young people anything short of full acceptance. They have committed no crime, yet Trump wants to make them suffer.
It is un-American to base people’s role in life on their ancestry — or at least, it is an overt rejection of the myth of American equality and opportunity. At least, the ideal that this was a place where you could advance yourself by studying and working hard, even if imaginary, was part of what we told ourselves made America great. The Republicans would rather your position in society was determined by inheritance, I guess.
These monsters must go. It’s not just an arbitrary political decision, it’s becoming a matter of defining the basic humanity of the American people…and the current regime is making all the wrong decisions.
