gender equity – Susan X Jane

Loads of Love

Recently this Ariel laundry soap ad, titled #sharetheload , from India crossed my desk (thanks, D!) and brought a little tear to my eye.

The touching story of a father who learns–not too late–the importance of balancing the second shift at home is more than just bubbly suds. When women entered the workforce, the talk was all about being able to bring home the bacon AND fry it up in a pan AND of course cater to your mates masculinity. After years of all y’all trying to have it all, it’s time to concede: work-life balance is a struggle if the partnership follows the plotline of Leave it to Beaver or today’s patch of modern sitcoms with dope dads and super moms.

The Don Draper uber-masculine scotch drinking dad of yesteryear is dead. Cold distant dads are out. Today with a wide variety of family structures and work commitments, the old school gender-role driven division of labor is giving way to more balanced homes. What’s more, sharing chores with your mate is good for more than clean laundry. Here sociologist Michael Kimmel talks about the many benefits shared home-work.

So don’t wait till you’re a silver fox to pitch in at home. Who knows, dinner might not be the only thing you get cooking!

Digits Women’s History Month Edition: We’re Number 28!

From the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2015

And cause, you know, we love to be number one, here’s some March madness rankings of our gender gap compared with 100+ of our nearest neighbors. Spoiler alert, Iceland won global rankings of gender equity.

Here, Ladies, Don’t Spend It All on Shoes

I came across this super cute ad from Australia’s ANZ Bank where little girls detail a world that seems weighted on their failure. The depressing facts are spoken in sweetly by girls in some fantasy room, drenched with sunbeams and piled with books. To top it off, there’s one tough little grasshopper who wants youth know how strong these girls can be.

Nice, right? The ad is a part of a campaign by ANZ Bank to address the gender wage gap. In addition to the ad, their announced they will be adding and extra $500 to the annuity funds of each of their 12,700 Australian female employees. That’s 6.3 million dollars for the ladies: bonus!

Now I love free money as much as the next, and the bank is clearly articulating that they know the wage gap exists-soooo with you! As a woman that earns a wage, I’d rather be paid fairly–every year–than receive a lady-boys to make up for it. That seems like a booby prize to me. I wager I’m not the only woman who wants wage equity, not a handout.

The Lavender Aisle

This week mega-retailer Target announced that it will be doing away with gender signage in the children toy,entertainment, and home goods department. The move comes after parents complained about the pink aisle, a pink fluffy princess zone full of all things sugar and spice and everything nice. How do you grow up to love math, or science, or reading, or adventure if the only toys and goodies you see are focused on looking pretty and dressing up? You can’t.

I grew up with three brothers and I never wanted to be left behind because I was a girl. Seeing my older brothers as role models meant I saw worlds of possibility blocked from the view of the pink isle. Now all girls, with brothers or not will see a world of play more like the real world that they will grow into. Boys likewise will be freed from early training in hyper masculinity and have new opportunities for play and imagination–like this sweet easy bake oven.

Let’s hope target is just the first of many stores that open up the traditionally binding boundaries of gender in boys and girls play and products. Here’s to more lavender!

Princess and The Pant

Artist Claire Hummel has a fantastic set of illustrations of your favorite Disney princesses–with a twist. She has taken all of your favorite Disney princesses and given them historically accurate costumes.

Surprisingly, some of these accurate costumes are not far off from Disney’s own.

What I want to know is, why have we not created a female heroin since women started wearing pants? Hummel’s drawing point out that the Princess is outdated–none of them exist in our own modern era. None of them are young enough to wear pants. So why does the toy isle for girls look like this?

Happy International Women’s Day: You Are Like Bacon!

Happy International Women’s Day! Today the world pauses to celebrate 50% of the world’s population–women. Now you might be thinking: ‘Since women make up more than 50% of the world population why should they get their own month and when will men get a Men’s Day and Men’s History Month? This is so unfair!’ Hold up.

Even though women make up 50% of the world population, they don’t have an equal share of financial wealth or political power. Globally, women do 60% of the labor, but own less than 1% of the world’s property. That’s right–women in the U.S. included–women hold only 1% f the world’s wealth.

When it comes to politics, women still don’t have equal representation in government. Even when in office, women continue to combat stereotypical commentary on their looks and family roles. Again, don’t comfort yourself by thinking this is only the situation in the developing world. The United States has not had a female at the helm in the history of the presidency. If Hilary takes the office in the upcoming 2016 election, that’s still 1 in 44.

Even the most unscientific research–Google Auto correct– reveals the uphill battle women face in the fight for equity. How do we think of who women are? What can they do? What should they do?

Okay, so we’re like bacon, shouldn’t vote or work, and can’t have it all. It may not be scientific, but these ideas are popular–that’s why they rank high in the search terms. I’m sure you’ve heard all these ideas about women before–except maybe the bacon thing….or maybe…

Interstingly, our not so scientific study has one more finding. When I entered “women deserve”, Google had nothing to offer…

So even as Google and the rest of the world celebrate women in today’s doodle, the wider discourse about women continues age old patterns of inequality. Raise your glass to amazing women today, but even as we celebrate Women’s History Month, let’s plot to break out of March and claim our 50%.