Gender Discrimination 1

Weaknesses of the solutions proposed by Feminist Majority Foundation Organization: Gender Discrimination Kyaw Lin Han ESL 115 M May 8, 2012

Gender Discrimination 2 Strengths and weakness of Feminist Majority Foundations solutions Gender Discrimination British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) (2011) reported that a group of six women accused Walmart, the world largest supermarket chain, for paying less salary than men and skipping them about promotions and discounts. Those women are aware of their rights and those women rights do not come with mild evolution. Women rights evolved gradually from ancient Greece to Todays world on the cost of many lives and sacrifices. From no legal personhood, no right to property and no political rights, it came all the way to access to political rights, birth control and reproductive rights, property rights, education rights and so on. Although there are many years of hard work in fight for women rights, gender discrimination is still happening around the globe. (See chart below.) According to publicola (2010), an average salary of a woman is 77 cents for every dollar a man earns. (para. 2). Not only in pay gap, woman get second class treatment in politics, employment benefits, work environment, work load and being traded as a commodity (Abrejo, Shaikh & Rizvi, 2009, p. 15). In order to solve the problem, many governments and organizations come up with solutions to gender discrimination. One of the well-known organizations is Feminist Majority Foundation (FMF). The mission of the organization is to empower women economically, socially, and politically. With many years of researches and experiences, although it provides several solutions to solve the problem, some solutions might have flaws. Therefore this paper discusses the weaknesses of several solutions provided by FMF to solve gender discrimination around the world, including working with government and stopping gender discrimination in campuses, and offers several improvements for each. Additionally, FMF should consider a new solution, stopping sex-selective abortion.

Gender Discrimination 3

Work with male dominated government FMF had put in effort to work with government to fight for gender discrimination. The organizations current battle for equality is to post laws that favor feminism. According to FMF (n.d), these actions include asking US leaders to stop Abstinence Only Programs and Telling the President to reverse the HHS (Health and Human Services) decision on switching Plan B, drug to prevent pregnancy after unprotected sex or birth control failure (planbonestep.com, n.d.), to behind-the-counter status (CNN, n.d.) . They have also urged public to sign many petitions to President and Congress to stop gender discrimination. Government is the most powerful institution and laws are effective and forceful to solve the problem. Through public policy development, FMF steps towards its aim of stopping gender discrimination. Although FMF works hard to push government to pass feminism policies, there are still many problems with this solution. One main problem is that most government positions are filled with men and they might not be feminists. According to Center for American Women and

Gender Discrimination 4 Politics (2012), women hold far less percentage in government positions not only in present day but also in the past. The current feminism opportunities and gender equalities regulations are the result of years long fighting and campaigning. However, the growth rate of female positions in government is disappointing with compare to the rate of campaigning. Even with the current

equality rules in place, without drastic change to the political systems, men will continue to dominate. Only women will have the motivation to make these changes. Singapore government leaders are traditional thinkers. Even policies are in place, women cannot join politics easily because of two significant reasons which are culture and degree of political democracy. Lyons (2005) supports that in Singapore, PAP (People Action Party) support for traditional sex roles and continued gender discrimination in policy making (p. 249). PAP deploys the traditional thoughts about women into people around the political system. For example, thoughts such as women are not suitable for politic, women are not tough to lead large population of people and so on. According to Lyons (2005), PAP members think suitable women in politics are simply cant be found and emphasizing that a better skills and qualifications are

Gender Discrimination 5 not a focus for a political position. Therefore government leaders themselves are the reflections of traditional thinker and they did not even try to accept gender equality and they blamed the society tradition and culture (Lyons, 2005). Secondly, the degree of political democracy also keeps women away from political systems. Hussin Mutalib (2000) claims that Singapores model of inclusionary corporatism by which he means that the PAP plays an interventionist, centrally coordinated and paternalistic role in many sectors of society (as cited in Lyons, 2005, p. 237). It means that PAP is like a parent of its own citizens and they are centrally organized to protect the citizens and control society thinking. As the opposition party to PAP is weak, no strong opposition is going to argue for gender equality. PAP has control over all political activities including local council governance and cadre training, appointing executives and technical managers within the bureaucracy and non-government fields (Lyons, 2005). Even though women are given voting rights, the final decision is depended on only the ruling party. Therefore the chances of women entering politics also depend on the degree of democracy of a country. Now policies for women to join politics are in place and women can join Japan government. Only women know and understand about women and only women government can help feminism effectively. According to Takao (2005), in 1999 the government passed the Basic Law of a Gender Equal Society for the first time. The law is an exemplar of gender equal society and is the government support to promote equal gender opportunity and treatment in society (p. 149). Although womans right to vote and participate in public events are achieved, their political representation is substantially low. If women want to bring some change, they have to participate in the process of making it. Takao (2005) states that few countries have made changes to their electoral systems in order to increase the womens representation in government. Therefore, the right move for the organization is that urging women to take government positions

Gender Discrimination 6 instead of asking the public to sign the partition to change the current policy. If the government is a traditional thinker, women can change the culture of the government or the party by only joining the government. According to Lyons (2005), the increasing representation of women in Singapore parliament will not only change social attitudes about women MPs (Member of Parliaments) but also encourage other women to join political system (p.246). It will both benefit the feminist society and encourage more women to join politics. Therefore FMF should campaign and encourage women to join politics instead of writing partitions to the government to change the current policy. Indirect gender discrimination Gender discrimination starts from school so FMF claims that they should start by raising awareness in schools by educating girls about women right and gender discrimination. Women were ban from school in earlier days. Women became to realize their potential to impact the country, they fought for their opportunities and then Title IX, that allowed women to get education, is legalized. No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance. Because of Title IX, women had a chance to get higher education. Now women graduating rate is higher than men. According to National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES, 2000), between 1979 and 2005, the percentage of masters degrees earned by women increased from 49% to 59%; during the same time period, the percentage of doctoral degrees awarded rose

Gender Discrimination 7 from 30% to 49% (as cited in Easterly and Ricard, 2011, p. 63). Therefore the situation of gender discrimination in education is improved as compared to early days. Although law is established to protect females, there are still some unconscious gender discriminations happening in campus. The flaw of the organizations solution is that the campus itself still has gender discrimination. MIT noted in 1999 that the campus was slow to recognize other, more subtle forms of discrimination; it did not look like what we thought discrimination looked like (as cited in Easterly and Ricard, 2011, p.64). Easterly and Ricard (2011) argue that recommendation letters written for women contain two times doubt raisers than those for men. Recommendation letters for women are likely to focus on personal life and teaching but not on research and skills. Therefore, women are ended up being assigned more teaching hours than men. Women are usually lack of time to do research which is vital for publication and building their reputation. According to NCES, in 1997 16% of female faculty at degree-granting institutions had attained the rank of professor, a number that by 2005 had decreased to 15% (as cited in Easterly and Ricard, 2011, p.63). Although more women are getting higher degrees, women professors or faculty leave institutions because of those reasons (indirect gender discrimination) given above. Title IX is not well suited for current society as It was created in 1972. Therefore, today, some of its policies are outdated. According to Walters and McNeely (2010), those areas include compensation, pregnancy and care of dependents, sexual harassment and the work environment (p 323-324). Women tend to get less pay for more teaching hours than their male counterpart. (Walters and McNeely, 2010) Although there are policies for pregnant women such as tenure clock, it is not easy to apply for one. Actually there are not many schools that allow pregnant women to take maternal leave without being penalized. Carr, Szalacha, Barnett, Caswell, and

Gender Discrimination 8 Inui (n.d.) state that in one study, for example, 70 percent of female faculty in academic medicine reported gender-based discrimination and sexual harassment (as cited in Walters & McNeely, 2010, p. 324). Women faculty have limited lab access, equipment, fund, office space, more teaching hours and mentoring hours, etc. These situations clearly states current Title IX has room for improvement. Title IX is mainly describing situations between student and student or student and staff. These situations are merely not enough for current society so Title IX is needed to be adjusted. Updating the current law is the most desire solution for gender discrimination. Gender inequalities in schools are still in existence. More and more female are highly educated. It is a lost that universities could not keep them. Law enforcements are required for female faculty to get confidence in joining higher education. Walters and McNeely (2010) claim that creating gender equality atmosphere in academic work place should be the goal of enforcing Title IX (p. 329). With laws that are properly adjusted in compliance with current society, women will get equal chances to present their talents in schools and get equal benefits. If more female faculty and admin are hired, they will protect feminism and make campus female friendly. They will effectively reduce indirectly or directly discrimination against female in campus. Stop sex-selective abortion The root of gender discrimination exists at birth of a child which is called gendercide or sex-selective abortion. FMF should pay attention to the issue as it is also gender discrimination and it leads to many severe consequences. In some countries, cultures, policies and tradition make people want male infant than female. Nowadays, people take advantage of technology in such a way that they can know the sex of the unborn child. Abrejo, Shaikh and Rizvi (2009) report that if these babies are identified as female, the lives of these unborn girls end in abortion.

Gender Discrimination 9 (Introduction, para. 1). The Economist (2010) reports that in China the imbalance between the sexes was 108 boys to 100 girls for the generation born in the late 1980s; for the generation of the early 2000s, it was 124 to 100. In some Chinese provinces the ratio is an unprecedented 130 to 100 (The dearth and death of little sisters section, para. 1). Therefore, the gender discrimination is practiced even at birth so the organization should look into it. Gender imbalance creates many problems and most of them are connected to gender discrimination. Abrejo, Shaikh and Rizvi (2009) agree that This endangered sex or missing girls phenomenon is one of the worst forms of gender inequality affecting certain societies (p. 10). The lack of women population is the main reason behind sex trafficking. Human trafficking is not easy to solve as it relates to large numbers of people, resources, countries and corporations. Hvistendahl (2010) agrees that human trafficking was changing the society of unbalanced sex population countries (Suining county, China section, para. 4). It created a black market that trade bride for money. The U.S. Department of State lists the lack of women in Asia is one of the main causes of sex trafficking in Asia. Some of those trafficked women are sold for marriage. Others become prostitutes (Hvistendahl, 2010, Suining county, China section, para. 4). In conclusion, sex-selective abortion causes complex problem so the organization should consider how to stop gendercide. Another serious problem is that crime rate become higher in places with higher male population. One line of speculation centers on testosterone, which occurs in high levels among young unmarried men. While testosterone does not directly cause violence in a young man, it can elevate existing aggressive tendencies, serving as a "facilitative effect" that predicts whether he will resort to violence. (Hvistendahl, 2010, Suining county, China section, para. 5). Single male is highly likely to become violent. For example, in China with millions of male unmarried, there

Gender Discrimination 10 are many crimes caused by unmarried male because of the biology reason and the enormous population of unmarried. (Hvistendahl, 2010, Suining county, China section, para. 5). Therefore sex-selective abortion not only just kills female infants but also results in serious problems other than gender discrimination. The organization should add stopping gendercide to its solutions. Ways to stopping gendercide has many solutions. The gendercide is caused by policy (one child policy of China and lack of proper abortion law, male only inheritance law), tradition (Dowry system in India), gender inequality (less benefits for females in all aspects) and early revealing of unborn sex using medical technology. The most effective solution will be posting proper abortion law. According to Abrejo, Shaikh, & Rizvi, (2009) the solutions is not only passing proper laws that label sex-selective abortion as an extreme, serious offence, and to sue those asking it as well as providers. (p. 15). Taking legal actions against those who are responsible for gendercide not only will make mothers to rethink their decisions but also will make hospitals and companies to contribute to the society and less advertisement for abortion and ultrasound. Another way of stopping gendercide will be raising awareness of public about sex-selective abortion. If more people aware of gendercide consequences, people will stop practicing it. For example, parents of a mother will stop a mother from sex-selective abortion. Society will help in prosecuting people who involves in gendercide. One organization called Population Research Institute (n.d.) practice these solutions to fight gendercide. Therefore FMF should consider them too. Conclusion As stated above, this paper has discussed the weaknesses and improvements of several solutions provided by FMF to solve gender discrimination around the world, including working with government and stopping gender discrimination in campuses. Furthermore, FMF should add

Gender Discrimination 11 a new solution that is stopping sex-selective abortion. Many serious problems are found to be associated with gender discrimination. These include unequal employment treatment (salary, benefit, etc.), unequal social status, sex selective abortion, gender population unbalances, human trafficking and higher crime rate. Gender discrimination has gone underground and it has become unconscious in many cases in today. With the rising gender discrimination, it will affect the society of both women and men. Women will never have equal social status as men in terms of salary, employment benefits, etc. If the sex selective abortion is uncontrolled and become overly unbalance, the society pattern will change and there will be news about women trafficking every day around the world. All the females will not have free and easy daily lives and they will be fear of being kidnapped all time. Males wont find a life partner and the reproduction of human will become less and less and finally it will lead to the end of human world. A public approach is to educate people around about gender discrimination, discriminative actions and how serious the problem is. Therefore everyone is responsible for fighting gender discrimination.

Gender Discrimination 12 References Abrejo, F., Shaikh, B., & Rizvi, N. (2009). And they kill me, only because I am a girl. a review of sex-selective abortions in South Asia. European Journal Of Contraception & Reproductive Health Care, 14(1), 10-16. doi:10.1080/13625180802518231 Barnett, E. (2012), On equal pay day, women still make 77 cents to mens dollar, Retrieved from
http://publicola.com/2012/04/17/on-equal-pay-day-women-still-make-77-cents-to-mensdollar/

Catalyst (2011). Womens earnings and income. Retrieved from http://www.catalyst.org/publication/217/womens-earnings-and-income Center for American Women and Politics (2012). Women in elective office 2012. Retrieved from http://www.cawp.rutgers.edu/fast_facts/levels_of_office/documents/elective.pdf The Economist. (2010). The war on baby girls gendercide. Retrieved from http://www.economist.com/node/15606229 Easterly, D. M., & Ricard, C. S. (2011). Conscious efforts to end unconscious bias: why women leave academic research. Journal Of Research Administration, 42(1), 61-73. Feminist Majority Foundation (n.d.) Retrieved from
http://feminist.org/

Hvistendahl, M. (2011). Unnatural selection. Psychology Today, 44(4), 80-87. Lyons, L. (2005). A politics of accommodation. International Feminist Journal Of Politics, 7(2), 233-257. doi:10.1080/14616740500065139 Population Research Institute. (n.d.). Our answer. Retrieved from http://www.pop.org/projects/stop-sex-selective-abortion Plan B One-Step (n.d.) What plan b one-step is. Retrieved from
http://planbonestep.com/what-is-plan-b.aspx

Gender Discrimination 13 Smith, A. (2007). Plan B paves the way for new drug class. Retrieved from
http://money.cnn.com/2007/11/12/news/companies/behind_the_counter/index.htm

Takao, Y. (2007). Japanese women in grassroots politics: building a gender-equal society from the bottom up. Pacific Review, 20(2), 147-172. doi:10.1080/09512740701306790 Vaidyanathan, R. (2011). The women accusing Walmart of sex discrimination. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-12601177 Walters, J., & McNeely, C. L. (2010). Recasting Title IX: addressing gender equity in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics professoriate. Review Of Policy Research, 27(3), 317-332. doi:10.1111/j.1541-1338.2010.00444.x