Feminist principle number one
The Wage Gap Myth
If you haven't heard this one, go look it up, it's a doozy. Supposedly, according to feminists, women are paid 23% less than men in today's job market. That would be 77 cents on the dollar. This would mean that the ladies I've worked with are getting paid less than I was for the same work and I, as well as they, should be truly outraged.
Except, it's not true, at least where it matters and makes sense. And it's been proven many, many times over and even by feminists.
That 23 cent differential is true. Women do make 23% less than men. Total. For all full time workers. From secretaries to engineers and professors of Women's Studies to professors of Biology. There is a gap. But, that gap isn't gender specific if you actually look at the careers. Teachers, on average, are not paid nearly as much as engineers and very few Women's Studies profs are raking in the big bucks on salary alone. These jobs don't just come out of nowhere and are, in fact, chosen by each gender rather disproportionally by the time they graduate college.
So, let's take a look at this phenomenon.
We need to look at the majors that men and women choose and what sort of revenue those majors bring in. Luckily enough, the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce has already compiled this list for us.
The top 10 most lucrative majors?
- Petroleum Engineering: 87% male
- Pharmacy Pharmaceutical Sciences and Administration: 48% male
- Mathematics and Computer Science: 67% male
- Aerospace Engineering: 88% male
- Chemical Engineering: 72% male
- Electrical Engineering: 89% male
- Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering: 97% male
- Mechanical Engineering: 90% male
- Metallurgical Engineering: 83% male
- Mining and Mineral Engineering: 90% male
The 10 least lucrative majors?
- Counseling Psychology: 74% female
- Early Childhood Education: 97% female
- Theology and Religious Vocations: 34% female
- Human Services and Community Organization: 81% female
- Social Work: 88% female
- Drama and Theater Arts: 60% female
- Studio Arts: 66% female
- Communication Disorders Sciences and Services: 94% female
- Visual and Performing Arts: 77% female
- Health and Medical Preparatory Programs: 55% female
A trend? I think so. But, let's not be hasty, as Treebeard would say, there must be some solid reason these princesses of the F bomb are so pissed off about money- other than indoctrination into a bigoted movement.
Surely, FCKH8's message isn't that teachers, social workers, and those in the theater should be making as much as engineers, right?
Well, I truly hope not, because that won't be happening anytime soon, seeing as early childhood educators and social workers (regardless of gender) are making close to $37,000 a year while petroleum engineers are making upwards of $120,000. And it shouldn't.
So, once again, why are these little cursing divas getting so upset that women are free to choose what fields they go into? Are we supposed to be forcing girls to follow career paths they don't want to be on just to make ourselves look and feel good when the headlines come out reading:
EQUALITY ABOUNDS, WOMEN MAKE UP 50% OF ALL JOBS
Applaud yourself if you wish, but that seems to be more than a little bigoted and "pro-force" than my taste. Now, I'm all for more women in STEM fields and more men teaching- granted I had quite a few going through high school, but to force girls, or boys, into careers they don't want is not going to make the world go round. In fact doing so may make the world stop spinning if competent men and women are pushed into areas they are not prepared/ have desire to be in. As many know, "choose a job you love and you'll never work a day in your life," is truer than most work related quotes.
Then there's a few other things to think about when it comes to the 23% disparity in wages:
Men take more dangerous jobs- loggers, pilots, roofers, construction laborers- than their female counterparts and thus earn more money doing that. Should your life be worth less just to make the gender wage gap disintegrate? I should hope not.
Men work, on average, 6 hours more per week than women. Should their pay be docked simply because they stay at the office longer, on average? I think most men in the work force pray that's not the case (or maybe it is and they can leave their job earlier).
Women business owners (the CEOs and self-employed) make less than their male counterparts. Why's that? Because somehow men just get more money from society and don't have to pay as many expenses? Doubtful. It's actually got more to do with women not being as motivated by money as men are, by almost 50%.
Feminist principle number two
Rape and Violence
"One out of every five women will be raped or sexually assaulted by a man in their lifetime."
Another horrid claim and another atrocity of society. If it's true. However, this claim is founded in one study done in 2007 at two large universities and a possible inflated amount of victims responding to the study rather than non-victims. The stigma of rape and violence happening strictly to women is even more detrimental to society than these misguided numbers though.
More detrimental? How's that? Women are the only ones to ever get raped or attacked at night, right?
Where'd you get that idea? Because "1 in 5" women and only 1 in 71 men are raped at some point in their lives? I'll give that to ya, it seems like a very, very large gap and makes rape appear to be a very gender-based crime rather than a person on person crime, until you realize two things:
1. The FBI's UCR program specifically says that men cannot be raped and thus any reported male rapes are put under the umbrella of assault.
2. And, until recently, the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) said that a man could not be raped by another man.
Now, I don't believe that this closes the gap exponentially but it does give some perspective to the gender-gap in rape statistics and makes this not a gender issue but a human issue, as egalitarians everywhere would like the world to understand.
If we look at it the numbers a whole, approximately 20% of the population (men and women) will experience rape at some point in their life-- and that's going off of the old system that says men cannot be raped by other men (or cannot be raped in general). That is a vast number of people- 63.8 million in fact- who are affected, directly, by rape.
And yet we are still fighting to make this a women vs men crime and making men, as a whole, out to be the bad guys. This often ends up leaving male victims out because they cannot or will not come forward due to the stigma that a man cannot be raped because "you must have wanted it, you had an erection!"- a quote I myself have heard when a friend was told about a male acquaintance's rape.
Rape and violence in general is not a gendered problem and the answer is not "teach boys not to rape." We already teach them not to rape; more than we teach women to be self aware- slut shamers that we are. Rape, is not, has not, and will never be an okay thing. Just as most anyone with morals can tell you that murder or theft or arson are criminal and immoral acts, rape is viewed with an even bigger stigma than those crimes and will forever be viewed as more heinous.
FCKH8 has attempted to do something in today's social media driven culture, but beyond making cash off the hot button issues of the world- a beautiful business idea I must say- I don't see what it is. Their videos use children in provocative emotional appeals to take down the patriarchy or white privilege. That's nothing more than blatant indoctrination into a society that hates the mere idea of equality, because when equality comes about, what happens to these people? They have to invent new inequalities to fight "for."
So, once again, why are these little cursing divas getting so upset that women are free to choose what fields they go into? Are we supposed to be forcing girls to follow career paths they don't want to be on just to make ourselves look and feel good when the headlines come out reading:
EQUALITY ABOUNDS, WOMEN MAKE UP 50% OF ALL JOBS
Applaud yourself if you wish, but that seems to be more than a little bigoted and "pro-force" than my taste. Now, I'm all for more women in STEM fields and more men teaching- granted I had quite a few going through high school, but to force girls, or boys, into careers they don't want is not going to make the world go round. In fact doing so may make the world stop spinning if competent men and women are pushed into areas they are not prepared/ have desire to be in. As many know, "choose a job you love and you'll never work a day in your life," is truer than most work related quotes.
Then there's a few other things to think about when it comes to the 23% disparity in wages:
Men take more dangerous jobs- loggers, pilots, roofers, construction laborers- than their female counterparts and thus earn more money doing that. Should your life be worth less just to make the gender wage gap disintegrate? I should hope not.
Men work, on average, 6 hours more per week than women. Should their pay be docked simply because they stay at the office longer, on average? I think most men in the work force pray that's not the case (or maybe it is and they can leave their job earlier).
Women business owners (the CEOs and self-employed) make less than their male counterparts. Why's that? Because somehow men just get more money from society and don't have to pay as many expenses? Doubtful. It's actually got more to do with women not being as motivated by money as men are, by almost 50%.
Feminist principle number two
Rape and Violence
"One out of every five women will be raped or sexually assaulted by a man in their lifetime."
Another horrid claim and another atrocity of society. If it's true. However, this claim is founded in one study done in 2007 at two large universities and a possible inflated amount of victims responding to the study rather than non-victims. The stigma of rape and violence happening strictly to women is even more detrimental to society than these misguided numbers though.
More detrimental? How's that? Women are the only ones to ever get raped or attacked at night, right?
Where'd you get that idea? Because "1 in 5" women and only 1 in 71 men are raped at some point in their lives? I'll give that to ya, it seems like a very, very large gap and makes rape appear to be a very gender-based crime rather than a person on person crime, until you realize two things:
1. The FBI's UCR program specifically says that men cannot be raped and thus any reported male rapes are put under the umbrella of assault.
2. And, until recently, the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) said that a man could not be raped by another man.
Now, I don't believe that this closes the gap exponentially but it does give some perspective to the gender-gap in rape statistics and makes this not a gender issue but a human issue, as egalitarians everywhere would like the world to understand.
If we look at it the numbers a whole, approximately 20% of the population (men and women) will experience rape at some point in their life-- and that's going off of the old system that says men cannot be raped by other men (or cannot be raped in general). That is a vast number of people- 63.8 million in fact- who are affected, directly, by rape.
And yet we are still fighting to make this a women vs men crime and making men, as a whole, out to be the bad guys. This often ends up leaving male victims out because they cannot or will not come forward due to the stigma that a man cannot be raped because "you must have wanted it, you had an erection!"- a quote I myself have heard when a friend was told about a male acquaintance's rape.
Rape and violence in general is not a gendered problem and the answer is not "teach boys not to rape." We already teach them not to rape; more than we teach women to be self aware- slut shamers that we are. Rape, is not, has not, and will never be an okay thing. Just as most anyone with morals can tell you that murder or theft or arson are criminal and immoral acts, rape is viewed with an even bigger stigma than those crimes and will forever be viewed as more heinous.
FCKH8 has attempted to do something in today's social media driven culture, but beyond making cash off the hot button issues of the world- a beautiful business idea I must say- I don't see what it is. Their videos use children in provocative emotional appeals to take down the patriarchy or white privilege. That's nothing more than blatant indoctrination into a society that hates the mere idea of equality, because when equality comes about, what happens to these people? They have to invent new inequalities to fight "for."
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