Sunday, December 13, 2015

Who discriminates against women?

Military historian and author of Equality: The Impossible Project, Martin van Creveld, considers where all this discrimination against women is coming from:
As per grades, first at school and now at the universities as well, women are increasingly outperforming men. To some that fact, allegedly coming after millennia of subjugation and oppression, is a blessing. Others see it as a danger-sign that points to the feminization of society which, on pain of losing the competition with other, more virile, nations must be avoided at all cost. But is the claim true? Fifty-two years after Betty Friedan first raised the standard of revolt, only about 5 percent of heads of state are female; out of Forbes’ ten best-paid American business executives, not a single one is. Further down the list, the situation is hardly any different. The gap in earnings remains almost as large as it was in ancient Rome where, everything else being equal, female slaves were valued at about two thirds of male ones. Similar facts could be cited almost indefinitely. They show that, now as ever, the higher on the greasy pole one climbs the fewer women one encounters. By one calculation, should present trends continue, it will take another 150 years for the gap in earnings to close. If, which I personally doubt very much, it ever does.

How to explain these facts? The standard interpretation, put forward by countless feminists the world over, is discrimination. This idea has the advantage that it enables women to occupy the high moral ground. Often it also enables them to harass and even bully men in- and out of court; few things are harder to refute, and more likely to damage a man’s career, than being accused of discriminating against a female employee.

The difficulty with this argument is that, in every developed country, women now form a majority of the population. Their share in the workforce is also very close to that of men. How, in a democracy, a majority can discriminate against a minority is easy to see; parts of the US Constitution were expressly designed to prevent just that. But the opposite is not true. This fact makes the explanation appear unlikely. Unless—and as we shall see in a moment, there are some reasons to think so—a number of those who do the discriminating are themselves women.
Van Creveld has one of the most formidable historical minds on the planet, and it's unusual to see him take on a relatively light topic like this one, so you'll definitely want to read the whole thing.

8 comments:

Sokrates said...

http://freedompowerandwealth.com

„Discrimination“ is a game, not reality. As long as we don’t face the facts we will be drawn into other peoples plans and “scripts”.

michael savell said...

Everybody is discriminated against in one way or another.Anybody,given the means,
could pursue the ideology that they and their like are hard done by and possibly form a new group.The question arises of logic and logic is not a strong point of Feminism whereas feelings are by far more important because it is not everyone who can "put it over"like the erudites of academia.Logic does not appear to work solely
because we are where we are using logic, and that place does not appear to favour
those who would affect immense change especially the ones along the lines of changing the power relationship between male and female.Women want the natural power
of men as well as their own and would reduce men to the surfs they think they are.
To this end,men with no power at all will regress to slaves eventually and those with power will ally themselves with the transgressors since it is far easier to bully the weak than side with them.

1sexistpig2another said...

We need more discrimination, not less.

Dalrock said...

The problem with the assumption of discrimination is it assumes the discriminating party is willing to work against their own best interest. More realistically, it assumes that entire groups are colluding against their own best interest. The gap in slaves at 2/3 is telling, because paying less for a female slave doesn't "hold back" the female slaves, nor does it help the male slaves.

A while back I pulled the feminist's own numbers to see what happened in the US after the much vaunted Equal Pay Act took effect in 1964. Prior to the act it was fully legal to discriminate against women, and some might argue socially encouraged to pay them less. What was so telling was that after the act passed the ratio of men's and women's wages didn't change for a full 17 years. The law had no effect, because employers were simply paying women what their labor was worth. Only in the mid 1980s did the "wage gap" start to shrink, and this was likely some combination of legally enforced discrimination (affirmative action), and a shift in women's preferences away from marriage and children.

Here is the chart: https://dalrock.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/equal_pay_act_effect.png

Megamerc said...

Here's an article that discusses similar concepts, mostly relating to female performance compared to male performance.

https://thechildlikeauthor.wordpress.com/2015/04/06/female-insecurity/

Anonymous said...

Another reality hidden in plain sight. The amount of money that will be wasted on studies and programs to re-state the obvious and attempt to overturn the truth - women are wired to desire children and protection - is maddening.

Dark Herald said...

Women hate other women.

No middle aged woman who is successful is going to take a young, smart, beautiful girl under her wing and act as a mentor to her. She couldn't bare the competition, the resentment of her is hardwired.

Anonymous said...

CS - in addition, an older woman may "mentor" a young protege, but she (we older women) will expect homage no young woman can, should, nor would ever pay. My "nurturing" ego is a bitch. We're women are hard-wired to one degree or another to manage/micromanage others. As relates to our offspring, this natural bent is, well, um, natural. When our own nurture nature is not sufficiently nourished, expressed, and managed by a leader-male/mate, it metastasizes. Woe be unto whomever it lands.

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