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Real Beauty... If You're White
Unilever tells Western women they're beautiful as is. In India, it's a different story.
Indian actress Ileana D'Cruz got start in Fair & Lovely ad.
[Editor's Note: Last week The Tyee ran an article on Dove's Real Women ad campaign. That piece led Munisha Tumato, a writer at Vancouver's Mehfil magazine, to pen this response.]
It's a scene straight out of vile Bollywood.
A pretty young Indian girl approaches a fair-skinned, business-suited woman sitting behind a desk and offers a prayer for the business. "Pooja?" the woman replies, horrified. This is a modern beauty company!" As the mortified girl turns to leave, the receptionist comments snidely on the difficulties of making "these kinds of girls" beautiful.
Flash forward to the next scene: the girl walks back into the same office, but this time everyone stands in amazement. The receptionist wears a look of pure amazement and one man catches his breath and utters, "What a face...."
What is it that propelled this backward young woman into the supermodel that she is today? Simple. Before the girl wore a salwar kameez and was brown-skinned. Now she wears western clothes and has a pale face.
How did she get so white? Simple again. The girl went home after being humiliated and applied a healthy dose of "Fair and Lovely," the single most popular skin whitening cream in India today.
Real [Western] women
Who is behind this product and this advertising campaign that tells Indian women not to be brown -- or to be brown and suffer the humiliating consequences? Skin care giant, Unilever, that's who.
Yes, that's right, Unilever. The same company responsible for Dove and Dove's "Real Women" campaign, an advertising venture that has garnered international attention and kudos for using women with curvy parts and wrinkly parts and saggy parts in its ads.
"Real women, real curves!" shouts Dove. Go ahead, Western women! You have our permission to be yourselves!
But for Indian women, it's a different story. Unilever runs its skin-whitening ad campaigns in India like state-issued propaganda. The Fair and Lovely brand is as prevalent in the Indian female psyche as Coke ads are in the average North American teenage mental wasteland.
"They advertise skin lightening so much that it's just there in the back of your mind," says Neetu, 32. "You see so much Fair and Lovely out there, so you sort of just pick it up with the other things [you're buying] and you don't even think about it." Neetu is a mother of three, who emigrated from India and now lives in the Lower Mainland. She used Fair and Lovely whitening products for about four years.
What's more is that by claiming that a whitening cream can increase your chances of being happily married and financially successful, Fair and Lovely appeals to the most vulnerable (and usually the darkest) segment of the India population: poor and often uneducated women for whom a leg up, by any means necessary, is a highly desirable proposition.
'Colonial Hangover'
For Indian woman, fairness is next to godliness. Indian girls are taught from a young age that fair and lovely go hand in hand; a complexion a couple shades lighter could mean the difference between a successful marriage and career, and a lifetime of dismal failure.
Darker Indian girls are continually berated for their darkness and compared to lighter-skinned kin. Call it a sort of colonial hangover -- a psychological effect collectively affecting a group of people conquered throughout their history by fairer folk from Europe and the Middle East.
"I don't think Unilever invented this sexist bias in society but they are certainly exploiting it," says Aneel Karnani, professor at the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business. Karnani has been vocal about his distaste for Unilever's India ad campaign in his research and writing.
"A few years ago, the dominant message of these ads was that, as a woman, you had to be fair in order to get a husband, and that's pretty bad in itself," he says. But these days, more and more the message is that you have to be fair to get a job. That, I think, is much worse. Romance you can claim is based on looks, but why would a job be based on your looks?"
'No more than a sun block'
The real piss of it though is that there is no readily available proof that Fair and Lovely actually works. Most dermatologists will tell you that making your skin lighter than its natural tone is impossible without the help of harsh chemicals like mercury and hydroquinone. Those same experts agree that Fair and Lovely -- which does not contain harsh chemicals -- acts as no more than a sun block.
But Unilever can afford to be hypocritical. Skin lightening products are by far the most popular product in India's $318 million skin care market. Fair and Lovely, meanwhile, commands over half of that.
The skin whitening business is so lucrative that several skin care companies have launched new whitening products targeted at Indian men. The most popular? Fair and Handsome, produced by Emami and advertised like Fair and Lovely: by telling brown men that fair women will only love them if they are fair themselves.
'Fair skin is like education'
Unilever (and subsidiary Hindustan Lever) make a big deal about being a "socially responsible" company. The company claims that 90 per cent of Indian women want to use Fair and Lovely because it is "aspirational... fair skin is like education, regarded as a social and economic step up."
When Karnani questioned a representative of the company about their social responsibility, he was told that Unilever was simply giving Indian women what they want. A very capitalist argument, says Karnani, for a company that pats itself on the back for its social responsibility to the "real women" in the West.
Skin whitening cannot be equated with tanning or thinness either, says Karnani, because both are achievable, to a certain extent, without causing major harm (and there are reams of information and support for women who do cross the line.) On the other hand, to successfully de-pigment the skin is a highly dangerous procedure that no sane dermatologist would ever recommend, let alone endorse.
Empowerment: Not for sale
In India, apparently, it is still acceptable to flaunt the reeking-of-colonialism argument that when it comes to beauty, white is right. And as a brown woman, I'm tired of this self-loathing trussed up as "empowerment" and sold hand over fist by corporations out to make a buck.
"Empowerment" is not an ethical marketing tool anymore than shame is. White and brown alike, how we ever allowed ourselves to be convinced that beauty had to be bought in a tube or bar is beyond me. The truth is that empowerment is nothing a corporation can sell you. Empowerment comes from knowing that beauty is confidence and acceptance of self. Beauty is age and wisdom. Beauty is pride.
Related Tyee stories:
- How I Became a Dove Girl
I'm no cover model, but this ad campaign I joined. - Have You Been Infected?
By viral marketing, that is. - Wal-Mart's 'Good Works'
Donations are lean from the box store giant. The hype is generous.
![[Tyee]](http://thetyee.cachefly.net/ui/img/ico_fishie.png){kind=small}
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41
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IAMC
4 years ago
I am not a racist
I resent the point of this article, which seems to me as an attempt to point out that racism is rampant, and that these poor Indo Canadian women, feel that they have to lighten their skin, in order to be accepted.
Nothing is further from the truth.
From a pure hedonistic point of view, people find others attractive, regardless of the color of their skin.
They kike their appearance, simple as that.
No racism here.
Give it up, find another reason to hate.
Betty
4 years ago
Can we please stop...
...talking about women's bodies and looks now, Tyee? Please?
marta
4 years ago
Not quite accurate
The elevation of fair skinned women in India predates colonialism.
dorothy
4 years ago
but,but...?
I am not rying to put this back 'in the face' of people in India. But is it correct to ascribe this to 'colonialism'? Was there not, prior to colonial times, a social stratification present in India, which was based on skin tone? I understand even now, the government there is doing a battle for egalitarian principles and practices in the presence of the very stubborn remnants of this old caste system.
Please, whoever has the knowledge, enlighten me and others on this, as I believe it is fundamental for putting this debate into the correct context.
Whatever its origin, I can certainly understand the quest for 'fairness' (is that linguisitc similarity not intriguing?). I have time and again encountered the phenomenon here and now, that it certainly doesn't hurt one's progress to be fair-haired and blue-eyed. Someone should do stats on how many villains and how many heroes have been fair-and dark-hued down through filmic history. It would be interesting, if we could ever be completely objective about this, to try to trace its prehistoric roots, as there must once have been an evolutionary rationale for the bias, which seems to crop up so persistently down through our history.
Betty
4 years ago
Word choice
Is it being racist to ask someone to 'enlighten' them?
rangergord
4 years ago
unilever sucks but peoples preferences rule
No love lost for Unilever but racial preferences are a societal force. Having spent a number of months working on development projects in India, I am well aware of how desirable the mimicking of so called western ways are to the populations of developing countries. India is a rapidly maturing democracy that can chart its own path forward. Perhaps Indian women should learn that many western white men such as myself, find dark skin much more appealing than white skin. The darker the better, give me that hot cocoa! Interracial attraction is nothing new and it is not surprising that Indians would view white skin as more attractive. On the other hand maybe India should renationalize and kick out Unilever for good this time.
Sarah L
4 years ago
Excellent article
Thanks so much for this. There was always something about the Dove campaign that made me a little queasy and your last paragraph made it click for me. And of course the marketing in India is sickening. I am going to pass on this article to all the nice people who sent me that Dove video that was so "empowering."
from a chunky short Jewish girl with stretch marks who does not use Dove and is therefore woefully unempowered
Betty
4 years ago
Thin and white and still unempowered...
...but it's all because, I really believe, I don't curry favour with The Man. (Or, these days, The Woman.)As I said (unkindly, admittedly) to a friend of mine complained 24/7 that her appearance stopped her from getting dates and jobs: "Did you ever think it's not your looks that are to blame, but your own attitude?" After she got over the shock, she went to a doctor. Since she's been on anti-depressants, she's got a fabulous job, bought a 4-story townhouse, and got engaged to a man she adores. I might be wrong, but I have a hunch that when people fail to achieve something, they themselves are the ones to quickly look in the mirror and (possibly incorrectly) identify what part of their 'looks' caused them to fail. Usually, this 'part' is the very thing that they, not others, is sensitive about and doesn't like. For example, when one of my friends failed at something, she always blamed her weight. When I fail, I blame the circles under my eyes. When my other friend fails at anything, she blames her age. Incidentally, those of my acquaintaince who are single and unhappily employed happen to be the slim ones who are considered attractive by North American standards. Those who are happily married, own their own homes, drive new vehicles and pull in at least $65,000 a year are, believe it, the allegedly overweight 'Dove' girls with terrible self-esteem. Make of that what you will. It confuses the hell out of me.
dorothy
4 years ago
I will effect a Bengal light on this (maybe)
"Is it being racist to ask someone to 'enlighten' them?"
Assuming that you are asking in good faith and not trying to 'make light' of a serious subject, I will clarify, if not enlighten: You may question the metaphor, of course, but it remains a proven fact, that light enables you to see better, so illuminating a subject for someone or enlightening them on the matter has solidly legitimate and practical roots.
You may wish to deepen your understandingof this by reading
Robert A. Johnson's book 'She', in which he suggests that Psyche from the greek mythology can be taken as a metaphor for all women, and the moment where she chooses between the lantern and the knife is very important, in that lighting up the dark places in life is better than hacking and slashing your way through life.
I do not think we can escape this linguistic similarity, inasmuch as it rests on physical reality, but we can at least avoind laying dumb bait out for each other by getting too facetious, which may be a bit on the 'knifey' side.
southdeltawalker
4 years ago
Unilever/Dove-The New Cynicism
The Dove "Real Women" campaign has always sickened me.
A year ago i was emailed a Dove "Real Women" ad. This e-mail was sent to hundreds of women.
When i replied that all we were doing was free advertising for a multinational- some women got mad and stated that i was negative and didn't see the positive.
All they want is our money. So Unilever/Dove will pretend to be "feminist" in North America while selling "skin whiteners" to women of colour in India.
A more apt slogan for the Unlilever/Dove campaign is not "The Real Women" but "The Real Cynicism".
BTW..this is my first comment in month's. i took a break from "The Tyee" for most of the summer.
I find "The Tyee" very male. Sure enough in yesterdays' column "My suburban summer' both the writer and the one commentator found a way to work in the size of women's breasts.
Also some of the comments on the initial story "How I became a Dove Girl" were misogynist especially by one commentator who finally got censored {once}.
watcher_t
4 years ago
Marketing
It seems that everyone misses the point here, nothing to do with racism at all. It has all to do with corporate marketing.
Dark skin women are supposed to get ahead with light skin.
In our society white women are encourage to get brown for a healthy look.
These companies will tell you anything to make a buck and most will fall for it.
James Burns
4 years ago
Colonialism, science, culture and skin 1
There are a few things I think that need to clarified due to earlier commenters misinterpretations. First, IAMC I don't recall this article being directed specifically at you, it's about Unilever. As for racism being rampant, it most certainly is, it's just rarely as blatant as the Fair and Lovely campaign. Unilever is exploiting racism to sell their product.
As for skin shade bias being present in India before colonialism, the mistake some of the commenters have made was thinking the only colonialism Ms. Tumato was referring to was British colonialism. Much of India has had many different colonialists over it's very long history. For example, Alexander the Great was one of the earliest "western" conquerors of the region that we know of, but civilization on the Indian subcontinent existed for thousands of years prior to that.
I should also point out the caste system, is far more complicated than skin shade. Wikipedia has some good information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_caste_system
Historically the British preference for lighter skin wasn't "official" policy. But in the same way a restaurant like the Cactus Club doesn't "officially" hire young attractive female servers, in practice that is exactly what they do. (cont'd)
James Burns
4 years ago
Colonialism, science, culture and skin 2
(cont'd) Now, where evolution is concerned, I've heard a number of evolutionary psychologists speculate that lighter skin may have a slight selection pressure in its favor, because it may be easier to tell how healthy someone is who has lighter skin. I've also heard them suggest that blond hair attracts more attention, in the same way bright colors attract our attention, and thus it also has a favorable selection pressure. But as far as I've been able to find, there is absolutely no scientific evidence for any of this speculation. I'm highly dubious of it as well, primarily because lighter skin would be a definite biological disadvantage in certain parts of the world. What the science unequivocally demonstrates about skin shade and hair color is that they are primarily adaptations that are a balance between sun protection and letting enough light into the skin for it to produce vitamin D. Notions of what is considered attractive in the case of color seems to have less to do with evolutionary drives, and far more to do with culture, and developmental experience (e.g., the first person you were sexually attracted to often sets a template for who you will be attracted to in the future).
As far as my personal experience goes, I've been involved with a number of darker skinned women of different ethnic backgrounds, and I have to say I don't really understand preference for lighter skin. Personally I find darker skin at least as attractive as light or white skin. What attracts me has far more to do with personality, and yes physical attributes like symmetry, and other indicators of health. I find it no harder to see the visible signs of health in someone dark as opposed to someone light. But I'm well aware that within pretty much every non-white ethnic community I've been exposed to, there seems to be a preference for lighter shades, which I find extremely frustrating. I've seen the emotional toll it can take on women who worry about being too dark.
I'm sorry to say that, in my experience, the Indian community seems to be the worst for having a lighter skin bias. While it happens in the black community as well, it is at least far more politicized, and people seem to be more aware of the negative implications. It's also there in most Asian ethnic groups, although it seems far less common among Asians born and raised here, as opposed to immigrants.
Stump
4 years ago
Unwitting prejudice?
Wow. And here's me thinking that it's the person and their personality, not their skin colour, I'm supposed to be attracted to.
Anyway, watcher t nailed it. The Beauty Machine wants to sell you whatever you ain't.
nightbloom
4 years ago
Interesting comments, JB. I
Interesting comments, JB. I believe you'll find an ingrained antipathy to arguments grounded in bio-social data in the whole race/class/gender debate. It's the quickest way to make yourself persona non grata in liberal-left policy enclaves. Such data tend to undercut the political agenda by undermining the structuralist assumptions upon which it's based. Fascinating material though - as I've said so often, to rehabilitate its relevance the Social Sciences (or large swathes of it at least) must doff its cap, genuflect reverently and invite science and scientific method back into the curriculum on penitentially bended knee, and then observe a vow of silence and study for the next generation or two.
Just a point: aren't we forgetting where all Europeans came from to begin with? Notwithstanding gradients in skin colour, the inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent are the original seed stock of all "Indo-European" Caucasians, are the not? Alexander was just going home.
jjb
4 years ago
Can we stop talking about this?
I can't decide which one makes me want to go back to bed more:
—the original Dove ads, which deeply and genuinely touched many of the women I know;
—or this strident, racism-alleging take on the original Dove ads, which deeply and genuinely touched many of the women I know.
They're ads, for God's sake. They can only sell you what you're not. You don't blame a tiger for eating an impala—that's what it does. Unplug.
James Burns
4 years ago
Human origins
Well humanity started in Africa, specifically the eastern horn. That's where the original seed stock seems to have come from. At least that's what most biological anthropologists say is most likely given the current evidence in the fossil record. Migration started there and spread to all corners of the world. The actual direction of migration is contentious. And really what seems to be the case is that migration was really a lot of back and forth rather than in just one direction. But remember we're talking something like at least 150,000 years ago for the first appearance of Homo sapiens sapiensis (us). Civilization has only been around for about 10,000 years or so. But even 150K years is a blip next the massive time frames of most of fossil record, and forget even trying to conceive geological or cosmological time frames.
But to partially get back to the topic, humanity almost certainly started out quite dark skinned given that where we likely first appeared was both quite close to the equator, and in savanna.
Yammer
4 years ago
Empowerment, it's so western
Hey.
When we're jumping up and down railing against neoconservatism's attempt to remake the Arabic world into a pluralistic, capitalist, common-law, market-oriented semi-democracy like ours, don't we do so on the basis that "those" people have the right to be, well, backward?
Maybe we should be praising Unilever for helping maintain the cultural traditions of India!
Betty
4 years ago
Please respect one another
Kindly stop talking down to me, Dorothy. My question was serious and a lecture was not called for.
James Burns
4 years ago
Quote:When we're jumping up
No, I think it has more to do with outrage over all the people the Americans are murdering in the name of pluralistic, capitalist, common-law, market-oriented, imperialist, so-called democracies.
nightbloom
4 years ago
JB - Aren't scientists now
JB - Aren't scientists now seriously theorizing that there was a parallel evolutionary track in Asia - that most Asians emerged from an independent branch of homo habilis or Australopithecus afarensis?
nightbloom
4 years ago
A tangentially related
A tangentially related article, of possible interest to some participants here:
Prospect online: India's Middle Class Failurehttp://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=9776
"India's 200m-strong middle class is the most economically dynamic group on the planet, but is largely uninterested in politics or social reform. Until it begins to engage politically, India will suffer from a lop-sided modernisation..."
nightbloom
4 years ago
Oops - that link
Oops - that link again:
http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=9776
G West
4 years ago
Yep, lots more problems in India
Problems that the self-absorbed 'middle class' couldn't care less about:
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/wideangle/shows/vidarbha/index.html
So, what else is new? Once the bourgeoisie, always the bourgeoisie. Is it any different here in Canada?
Here's a little more:
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/12/13/1451229&mode=thread&tid=25
And, if you're still interested in getting beyond the vanity level...well, let me know.
dorothy
4 years ago
uh,oh
"Kindly stop talking down to me, Dorothy."
I did certainly not see myself in the position to do so, as I don't know you. For the same reason, I cannot be sure just exactly what in my reply you took exception to. I admitted that the term 'enlightenment' could remotely be taken and run with by those who cowtow to the fair-haired and blue-eyed supposed elite, but as I don't belong to said elite on either count, naturally I use the word without any hidden connotations.
I have gained great inspiration from Robert johnson's books myself, and would certainly never recommend them to anyone, the mental acuity of whom I had doubts about.
Let us say it makes me a bit tired sometimes, when people, as in these comlumns, step out in the public domain and exchanges opinion, sometimes very strongly opposing opinion, and then we must go through three paragraphs about how we didn't mean to step on anyone's face, before we get to the meat of the matter. I do not know if my ending remark was what bothered you, but I do not do this for entertainment or attention-getting, or trying to feel superior, but because matters are being discussed, which I care about and wish to learn more about. Did you really think, that 'enlightenment' is a loaded word, or were you being just a tad facetious? I would and could not put it beyond realistic possibility in a city, where we will soon have to call 'winter' 'the cold time of the year', because a bunch of grubbers think they can monopolise the W-word.
James Burns
4 years ago
Quote:JB - Aren't scientists
Not exactly. There is the multi-regional hypothesis, where regional branches of Homo erectus (not the earlier Homo habilis or the even earlier Australopithecus) evolved into regional versions of modern humans. But the multi-regional hypothesis is by far the minority opinion. And even the multi-regional hypothesis asserts there was continual intermixing among human populations.
puppyg
4 years ago
Fair and Lovely
Where is it? I've been struggling just now to find a travel memento from my two years spent teaching in Bhutan in the late 80's.
Alas, it has been salted away too deeply, my "Foul and Lovely" series.
This collection consists of ten or so 'Fair and Lovely' knock-offs that I found in shops across Bhutan on India's northern frontier.
These little white tubes of skin-whitening cream came in near-identical purple boxes picturing a light-skinned Indian lady and sporting hilarious names like "Dare and Lovely" and "Cherry Lively".
Of course, the game was to trick rural Nepali and Indian girls into thinking they were buying the real deal, soon to be scorching their skins with the good stuff.
(Colgate toothpaste, too, had a knock-off series of which my favourite was "Clogged").
I was both amused and repulsed during the gathering of my collection.
In particular, I was creeped out by what it implied for young women trying to forge an enhanced sense of worth in the marriage markets of South Asia.
One day, I'll stumble upon my collection in a drawer or in a cupboard. I envision it assembled and mounted as a mobile, a sixties-style statement of dangling purple art.
nightbloom
4 years ago
Ah...freedom from marriage
Ah...freedom from marriage markets....nothwithstanding all the ball-busting boardroom bluster, it's still something that pampered well-fed Western white girls only dream of...
Stump
4 years ago
Winter
Don't worry about the word. At the rate we're wrecking the planet, it will soon be an outdated word with no real relevance to reality, filed in the same folder as democracy, press freedom, and human rights.
nightbloom
4 years ago
In keeping with the casual
In keeping with the casual and opportunistic accusations of "misogyny" which pepper some of these threads, here's a short exercise in deprogramming for some of the more trenchant feminists out there...
Is There Anything Good About Men?
http://denisdutton.com/baumeister.htm
G West
4 years ago
Interesting - if unpersuasive
The last 4 paragraphs being a bit of a stretch...culturally speaking
thanks nightbloom - Summers should have talked to Baumeister first I guess...might have kept him out of trouble.
nightbloom
4 years ago
He's actually presenting a
He's actually presenting a condensed, simplified, paint-by-numbers summary of solid, long-standing and highly convincing research that has been systematically pushed out of the ideology-driven Social Sciences over the past four decades. It's not opposed to (or in competition with) feminist principles at all. But it helps to highlight where feminist ideology risks becoming just another mechanism for testing and selecting men (at least in those areas where feminism concerns relations between the genders). What feminism and feminists have to start believing and advocating is that there's 'liberation' enough to go around. Men won't do that for themselves - it's totally contrary to their traditional gender role. Unfortunately, we're stuck in a rut selling young women an exagerated and one-sided sense of grievance in order to further consolidate a key constituency, while we further entrench the traditional male gender role of "strong silence" and and passive consent to his own expendability. Where's the universal liberation in that...?
The Tyee needs to broaden its "gender critique" a little. The real world is moving on.
G West
4 years ago
In your opinion
I hasten to politely add and remind you, as before, that that construction is an important part of civil discourse.
Sadly, whatever's discussed in academia is frequently not all that significant relative to the real-world experiences of the girls and boys down on the 'farm'...that's where the gender wars are still being fought out and, Baumeister to the contrary, the boys are still on the winning side more than 50% of the time. With the exception of certain 'public' service and academic environments - it is still very much a man's world. Not very many young men in the business and commercial world actually feel thwarted and threatened by women very much of the time: In a rules-based consensus environment like academia - absolutely; but the rest of the time in the rest of the world - not so much.
nightbloom
4 years ago
I think you missed the point
I think you missed the point - there are no "sides"...we're all on the same "side". Inequalities manifest themselves in many different ways, whether you measure them in board directorships or body bags. Quote me your stats on the paucity of women PhDs and I'll give you stats on the surfeit of boy child-soldiers. There's no legitimate counter-argument to either reality, so don't superimpose an oppositional mentality. Your putative "gender war" is manufactured, and is no longer constructive to furthering and expanding the debate. No one but the well-off of either gender can genuinely be "multi-option" women & men today - poor women don't "have it all" and are still the wards of the social welfare sector just as poor men don't "have it all" and are still the wards of the correctional system. So let's retire the misandrist "Andrea Dworkin" routine once and for all and get on with it.
Broad Feminist objectives (freedom from prescribed roles, miximization of lifelong options/choices) are now the rational mainstream objectives. What people like myself are saying is simply that the discourse needs to be opened up for everyone - males of all ages included. Get off the victim pity-party, stop the neurotic navel-gazing and get everyone in the tent and on board.
silvia
4 years ago
Not surprising. I've seen
Not surprising. I've seen whitening products in Asia before and wondered what the hell was up with that. While in Canada everyone wants to tan and acquire a "healthy glow" in other parts of the world you are told white is the thing.
The point is to get you to buy things you don't need with money you don't have.
G West
4 years ago
Nope don't agree
There are sides - and men still have it all over women and they still take advantage of it unfairly in all kinds of ways. I agree with your objective but, until we've reached some kind of functional parity the disequilibrium still has to be addressed.
I'm not into child soldiers nightbloom - the one thing I do know is that most of the monsters who use them are men. And that's where the problem lies - not at the size or sex of the instrument.
dorothy
4 years ago
Please explain that to me...
"...men still have it all over women and they still take advantage of it unfairly in all kinds of ways."
I'm trying hard, but this claim I cannot relate to. What is it men have, and how do they take advantage? Are you sure we are not simply living in only partially overlapping universes, and the difference is much more profound than anyone is willing to recognize? I cannot see anything that men have, and which I cannot/could not have, if I cared to, simply because I am a woman, and I do not see men laughing all the way on their way to anywhere.
I have been able to relate to men in all kinds of capacities: I had a father, a brother, an extended family with granddads,uncles, great-uncles, cousins and so on. I am married for many years and am the mother of two sons. I do not see where 'they' are so on top of it all and we are so down in the muck.
Please elaborate on how you get to see things that way...
nightbloom
4 years ago
Quote:...and men still have
Those are crude blanket generalizations which don't correspond to the reality people of both genders are living today. And you dismiss child soldiers simply because of their gender?? Now that's ideological brainwashing. You need to rethink that one big time and stop trying to prop up the wornout one-sided Oppression Narrative the liberal-left and its on-campus satellites in the the Womyn's Studies departments keep flogging. It doesn't reflect the totality of the gender reality, and it never has.
G West
4 years ago
hardly
What I said, nightbloom, was meant to not evaluate child soldiers as being of either gender because to me that's unimportant.
What I focused on was the 'gender' of the monsters who use them for their own selfish and evil purposes.
I'll copy and paste once again:
You may have thought the initial phrase was dismissive - it was not intended to be so - which I thought was quite clear from the statement's last sentence.
Your jumping to ideological conclusions without taking the time to actually parse the sentence a trifle more carefully is kind of interesting though.
dorothy,
I've never had any difficulty relating to women - or men for that matter - although, I find women (at least the ones I care about) to be far less impressed with superficialities than most men; far less inclined to show off and far more friendly and open than my men friends.
They are, as a rule, much more capable of self-criticism than ANY group of men I've ever known.
The other point, and this is based more on my view of professional office politics than my own personal beliefs, is that there is almost always a special set of rules and hoops through which every woman has to go to get the same kind of pay and recognition that most men simply receive as rightful.
I'm sure there are exceptions (or even reciprocal evidence in female-dominated professions such as nursing) but in the main, my experience is that a woman must be at least 50% better than her male colleagues if she is to survive and thrive.
Does that make my position clear?
nightbloom
4 years ago
I like Dorothy's answer to
I like Dorothy's answer to you, Gwest.
I can only repeat the point that the perspectives we’re both expressing are not mutually contradictory. They’re part of the same thing. Your "either / or" proposition is a total misnomer, which has been promoted by the campus branch-plants of the liberal-left in the Social Sciences (like the Women’s Studies and Social Work departments) as part of their constituency consolidation & mobilization efforts. It's not the reality. Some of your other commentary about gender relations is totally outdated. Your garden variety professional middle-class professional white woman is doing just fine, notwithstanding now being confronted with the challenges men have always faced with regard to the work-life balance: family life, absentee parenthood, surrogate childcare, increasing stress-related illness like heart disease, etc. We’re all in the same fix now, chasing bigger salaries that always seem to buy less & less.
One thing is interesting: you’re manifesting the archetypal male gender role by fending off what you *perceive* as male encroachment on the communal attention-giving mechanism and abdication of male expendability. Believe it or not, it actually belongs to the same set of behaviours as male chauvinism and homophobia (against gay men as "failed men"). Not accusing you of either; just pointing out a structural connection. You stand before the hearth, handing out your white feathers to the rest of us. But the women have stopped clapping for you. They can guard their own thresholds now – it’s what they’ve been clamouring for. You need to stand-down, put your club away, and listen to Dorothy and the other young women around you. They get it.
dorothy
4 years ago
Gee, thanks...
"listen to Dorothy and the other young women around you"
I take that as a genuine compliment to my flexible and fun-loving mind. For it must be clear from much I have written here, that I wouldn't qualify as 'young' in the demographic sense the way it is commonly used.
Now to the gender 'stuff':
Than you for the replies. There is still much to be discovered and figured out in the gender difference field. I read with interest the piece by Roy Baumeister. Some of his stats and his attempts to conclude from it are truly fascinating. One question it nevertheless leaves me with is: What cultural blind alley did people like the Taliban get themselves into, with their obsessive need to control and their vicious hatred of women? This cannot be anything other than counterproductive.
Thanks for being out there and bothering, there is some great stuff going on right here!