Unnecessary Feminism

To start with, I received some good news this week. I only have 2 subjects to complete before I graduate one of my degrees. The bad thing was, one of them was unavailable as "after hours" study. It was looking as though I would have to return next year to do it, which I didn't want to do. I emailed the uni and they have agreed to substitute that subject for another one. Which is great. But the subject they're allowing me to do is in an area I hate and am not good at because it involves creativity. So that sucks. And it's on Friday nights from 6 to 9. So that sucks too. But I suppose at least I will be able to graduate at the end of the semester.

In other news, I am having an argument on a forum I read. The feminists have come out of the woodwork and once again suggested women in the workforce are discriminated against in terms of pay and what not. I just simply do not agree with this. They've tried to quote studies showing the average woman's salary is lower than the average man's. I countered with the fact that women traditionally choose lower paying occupations than men (teacher/clerical over skilled tradesmen, etc). They then said that women within the same occupation as men are being paid less. I just don't believe it. There are so many different variables when dealing with employment, and I think it's far too simple for women to reduce it to a gender dispute and say the reason they're not being paid the same is because they're a woman.

What if the man doing the same job as them is simply doing a better job? What if he's putting in more productive hours? What if his work ethic and quality of work are higher? What if he has better qualifications/better experience? Why should anyone (man or woman) who is not up to the same level be paid the same amount just because the two people share the same job description? I don't think that's fair to the employer.

Also, I believe women choose to work for employers who pay less salary, but offer more "fringe benefits", such as access to childcare, or flex time, or maternity leave, or other sorts of things. The employer offers a "package", but the salary by itself might be lower than that offered by another firm who is not so flexible, simply because it would be stupid financially for the flexible employer to offer both a stellar salary as well as all of the added benefits. Therefore, the woman is going to be earning less than a man who is not interested in such benefits.

The feminists on the forum were also going on about how it's the right of a woman to have children and it's not a choice, and the workforce should recognise this. WTF?! It IS a choice, and it's a privilege, not a right! Just because you've got the equipment doesn't mean you have to use it! It's because of all the women out there who don't view having children as a privilege that we have so many abused and neglected children in the world. Just because you CAN have children doesn't mean you SHOULD! And it IS a choice to have children. No one is forcing you to have them. You do not HAVE to procreate. If you DECIDE to procreate, you should also realise that your choice may have an impact on other areas of your life, and you should take that into consideration. It might not be "fair", but women are traditionally the primary caregivers. If you decide to have children, you have to take into account that maybe you won't be able to put in as many hours at the office, and that might adversely affect your career.

The feminists were shouting that men have been able to have children and a career, so why shouldn't women. They can. If their husband is the primary caregiver. I really don't see that you can have both. You can't be a primary caregiver as well as focus on your career. One of them has to give. It's a choice you have to make. And sticking your kids in child care/after school care for hours so you can stay at work means you are no longer the primary caregiver in my opinion.

I just don't see why feminists are still arguing about this in this day and age. There are so many more factors involved. It's far too easy for women to cry foul and suggest the discrepancies are due to the fact they don't have a penis. It's far too easy for them to suggest it's all the employer's fault, and ignore the fact that perhaps they just didn't *deserve* the same rate of pay as another male employed in the same role (or another woman for that matter, but they never make that suggestion, do they?). No two employees are ever going to be exactly the same, and the combination of experience/qualifications/work ethic one has compared with another is always going to be more valuable to different employers. Therefore, the two employees should not be paid the same in my opinion.

Then they started bringing out the "my sister/friend/mother/cousin was told she wouldn't be employed because she said she wanted to have children within 3 years in the interview! That's so unfair!" statements. Well of course an employer isn't going to hire a woman who wants to have children over a candidate that's going to stay on long term! It doesn't make sense financially! If I were an employer, I certainly wouldn't hire someone who said they were going to leave within 3 years either. Why should I waste time, money and resources on training them up when I'm only going to have to do the same thing again in 3 years' time? Or worse - be forced to pay maternity leave AND have to hire a replacement for the person while they're gone - that's double the cost! It simply doesn't make sense from a financial point of view.

I am sick to death of women wanting to have their cake and eat it too. You can't have everything. Yes, it might suck and it might be unfair, but stop getting emotionally involved and look at the situation realistically!

The "I can't believe a young woman is making these comments" outcry has just begun now. Apparently I should be burning my bras *just* because I'm a young woman. I don't think so. I think feminists in Australia today are full of crap and are unnecessary. I think the early work done by the women's movement was very brave and has gotten us to where we are today. I am grateful for those women and I admire them. But I don't think it's necessary in Australia any longer. I think the feminists just want to have something to whinge about. They should go to a country like Moldova where women are bought and sold, trafficked to work in forced prostitution, with insufficient government attention to protect their rights and punish the traffickers and then see how lucky they are to be living in this country with, in my opinion, no discrimination whatsoever. They should stop trying to manipulate statistics to try to create issues that aren't there. I really believe any discrepancies in pay between men and women can be easily explained by any number of realistic viewpoints.

Thoughts?