# Resolved: Woman is the Nigger of the World (Thank you, John Lennon) **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 16, 2009, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154 "2009-02-16T20:30:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/61 "2009-02-17T21:01:39Z")
Quoth **Shayna** : > [@](#): > > If I didn’t know better, I’d wonder if you’d been paying attention to the world lately. You’ve never heard of Lilly Ledbetter? It literally took an act of CONGRESS and the President of the United States of America to give women more of the opportunity they deserve, to even challenge their employer when clear pay disparity exists. You honestly think that you can’t challenge your employer over pay disparity? Any employee in the country can go to their employer and say that they should be paid more for any reason whatsoever. I could go to my boss, and say that I deserve to be paid more because I have type A blood, if I wanted to (and so could any of my female co-workers). That doesn’t mean that my boss is necessarily going to give us the raise we ask for, but we could absolutely ask for it. Back to more recent posts, statistics on some professions (including firefighter and construction worker) will be misleading, because those jobs require some degree of physical strength, and I don’t think it’s controvertial that men, overall, tend to be more physically strong than women. If one of the job requirements is “Must be able to lift 200 pounds over your head”, or the like, then it shouldn’t be a surprise if a smaller proportion of women applicants get the job than men, because fewer women than men can lift 200 pounds over their heads. If you want to look for discrimination in those jobs, you have to look at the proportion of women who pass the strength requirements who get the job, versus the proportion of men who pass the strength requirements who get it. ---
**Author:** ![alexandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e68b1a/32.png) [@alexandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alexandra)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/62 "2009-02-17T21:14:46Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > It’s conveniently forgotten by the Feminist movement that women are a massive contributor to the oppression of women. 40 years after the Sexual Revolution it’s women clucking in their sewing circles about the revealing clothes worn by that skank across the road. I’m sure no women voted for Proposition 8, I’m sure no women picket abortion clinics. > > I hardly think I need a cite to state that women are the more socially predisposed of the two genders. If that’s true why don’t they at least deserve some of the blame for the way they are treated socially. > > Got no time for gray area, it’s so much easier if **penis =oppressor**. Feminists criticise misogyny, not men, much of the time. Cite that all feminists ignore misogyny in women? :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/63 "2009-02-17T22:03:08Z")
> [@lee](#): > > I don’t understand how saying that because women participate in some practices which oppress women it some how makes such practices ok Totally agreed. The sex of the perpetrator of an atrocity has nothing to do with whether it’s an atrocity. > [@](#): > > It think the phrasing in the OP is odious, but in support of that premise is how rape has been used in [Kenya](http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE3D81730F936A25754C0A967958260) and other places to punish women. Is there any corresponding attacks of groups of women on men and boys? Er…huh? Does the sex of the perpetrator of an atrocity have anything to do with whether it’s an atrocity? There’s a danger that, in focusing on atrocities against women as if they’re much worse than atrocities against men, we’ll downplay the atrocities against men. That’s a terrible thing to do. Yes, women getting raped in war is horrifying. So is men getting conscripted to be slaughtered (or to commit slaughter) in war. We need to end both. Both military conscription and military rape are sex-based, of course–but trying to figure out which is worse is not really helpful. And if it were helpful, I’d argue that conscription is frequently much worse. But it’s not helpful. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/64 "2009-02-17T22:43:31Z")
> [@Jimmy Joe Meager](#): > > However… the primary reason women are under-represented in dangerous jobs is that simply fewer of them apply to work there. Let’s see your cite for that. You have repeatedly merely asserted this, and I expect to see you back it up before I go to the bother of finding more cites for you. Namely, you claim that > [@Jimmy Joe Meager](#): > > Women (the majority of women) are in no hurry to take jobs like this. That’s why they’re underrepresented in these professions. Documentary evidence, please, for the claim that women’s **preferences** not to work such jobs constitute the **primary** reason that they’re underrepresented in them. Also, let’s make sure we are recognizing the distinction between women not **applying** for dangerous jobs and women not **wanting** to work dangerous jobs. If women are discouraged from applying for “men’s jobs” because of discrimination and hostility on the part of the men they’d be working with, that’s not the same thing as women not applying for “men’s jobs” just because the job doesn’t appeal to them. Don’t move the goal posts by trying to conflate these two reactions. ---
**Author:** ![truthpizza](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/439d5e/32.png) [@truthpizza](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/truthpizza)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2009, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/65 "2009-02-17T23:58:24Z")
What is the point of this thread? Why do we care if women are/were treated as badly as blacks were some years ago? The whole point seems to be that we should feel sorry for women as a group. Let’s all pity them. Having been raised in the pre-feminist 50’s, it seems to me that women were not particularly miserable, while blacks had terrible problems. Adult women were primarily housewives who had a quality of life pretty much the same as their husbands. They ate good food, had decent housing, and wore nice clothes. They were typically denied the “glamorous” careers that men had but by and large were happy with their role raising children and keeping house. In terms of overall life satisfaction I wouldn’t be surprised if most were more fulfilled than their husbands in the dog eat dog job market. A few were no doubt abused by their husbands, but from what I can see, then and now, most of the time women have been quite capable of manipulating men to get what they want (what women lack in physical strength they often make up in psychological skill). Women were well respected as long as the lived up to social expectations, the same as men. The situation with blacks would have been far worse. Neither gender could get decent jobs and I suspect many lived in relative squalor. They were looked down on by almost everybody. The comparison of women to “niggers” is totally inappropriate. Let’s face it. Virtually everybody here agrees on what is important. Women should have all the same rights as men and we should do away with traditions and stereotypes that push people into certain roles based on their sex. That is what real feminism is about and I’m all for it. I think we all agree that burkas and female genital mutilation and bride burning are totally abominable. So what is the issue? The OP seems to want to support the idea that there is a type of class warfare going on with misogynistic males oppressing women for their own benefit. This is utterly wrong. No doubt misogynists exist but I can’t say I’ve ever met one. Nor have I ever met a man that envied the men in highly sexist societies like many Muslim cultures. Men don’t cheer on rapists and wife beaters. Men do engage in a lot more violence than women, but the majority of it is directed at other men. If they hate women, apparently they hate men more. In reality most men like women a lot and will fall all over themselves trying to please them. Let me present an alternative view. Instead of a culture battle of men against women, the reality is a battle between traditional sexist stereotypes and enlightened support of gender equality and fairness. There are both men and women who support and perpetuate sexist stereotypes and there are both men and women who take the enlightened view. The ones who support the sexist views do so not because they dislike women, but because they genuinely (and stupidly) believe this is natural or what God intended. Feminism is a far better philosophy when it is looking for justice than when it is looking for anger and pity. ---
**Author:** ![j666](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de0a6/32.png) [@j666](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/j666)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/66 "2009-02-18T00:35:06Z")
> [@Jimmy\_Joe\_Meager](#): > > (emphasis mine) Yes, you make a valid point. _ **Dangerous jobs do tend to pay more** _. Men overwhelming perform the most dangerous (i.e. life-endangering) jobs in the world. Men are killed \*by their jobs \*far more frequently than women are killed _by their jobs_. This is one reason men, overall, tend to earn more – they’re doing the more dangerous jobs. > (1) Neither are they reserved for men. > > (2) The number of CEOs in the world is fantastically, overwhelmingly miniscule compared to the number of actual workers. It’s like comparing “professional NBA player” to “eveyone who has ever played basketball”. It’s like comparing “professional supermodel” to “every woman in the world”. In reality, most of us, the vast, stunning, overwhelming majority of us, will never be a pro b-ball player, a supermodel, or a CEO. My point is… including them in the mix is an irrelevant comparison. > > As has already been pointed out, some women do encourage their children to go to war (currently, in certain societies, some mothers encourage their children to become “martyrs” for their cause). > > DO. NOT. GO. THERE. > > If women \*weren’t \*allowed to join the military, women like you would be crying discrimination. But now that women have the choice (remember… joining the U.S. military is still voluntary), the \*choice \*to join up, and do join up, and, as expected, get deployed, you use that as an example of discrimination against women??? You make some valid points. I don’t agree about mothers encouraging their children to be ‘martyrs’ is the same as women sending their menfolk out to war, but that’s not worth arguing about. Yes, women to choose to join up; they don’t just send their menfolk off, they join up. Yes, men traditionally have done the dangerous, high paying jobs; yes, men still get killed more in war than do women (… except I don’t have a cite; we can stipulated that?) Yes, life can suck for men in ways it doesn’t suck for women; life can suck for men of color in ways it doesn’t suck for women (example: I have never been pulled out of the car for a moving violation, or arrested for picking up my daughter). But nowhere did I blame ‘men’ for my lower (but quite nice) pay. It’s just institutionalized. There is a very detailed salary survey available in my field; salaries are broken down by every reasonable criterion. ‘Female’ skews the average \*more than every other criterion **including geographic** \*[within a single country.] Either my gender can affect my salary more than would living in a state with half the cost of living, or 90% of the men in the survey are lying about their salaries. I doubt that every female, or even the average female, in my field is less competent or less qualified. I also doubt that every male of color in most fields is less competent or less qualified. But I do think that it is equally unfair for both me and my brothers of color. ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/67 "2009-02-18T00:57:04Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > It’s conveniently forgotten by the Feminist movement that women are a massive contributor to the oppression of women. 40 years after the Sexual Revolution it’s women clucking in their sewing circles about the revealing clothes worn by that skank across the road. I’m sure no women voted for Proposition 8, I’m sure no women picket abortion clinics. > > I hardly think I need a cite to state that women are the more socially predisposed of the two genders. If that’s true why don’t they at least deserve some of the blame for the way they are treated socially. > > Got no time for gray area, it’s so much easier if **penis =oppressor**. Here’s an interesting factoid for you and others to chew on: nowhere in my OP did I point the finger at men. Men and women both contribute to the torture, oppression, and suffering of women. That’s a plain fact, for sure. And it doesn’t change the fact that women suffer the vast majority of the pain and suffering of humanity as a whole, while doing the vast majority of the most important work necessary to the species. The two facts are not in any way mutually exclusive, nor does the fact that women contribute to the suffering of women excuse or mitigate the burden of suffering that women bear. In fact, it kinda makes it worse. As a species, it is our moral duty, no matter what our sex, to be aware of the ongoing injustice that women endure. If we are contributing, whether we are men or women, we must stop. (Having said that, are you familiar with the _Sonderkommando_?) ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/68 "2009-02-18T01:18:05Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > And it doesn’t change the fact that women suffer the vast majority of the pain and suffering of humanity as a whole, while doing the vast majority of the most important work necessary to the species. Today I was working with my second graders on writing biographies, and one of them asked a perceptive question. “Can we have opinions in our biographies?” she asked. “Absolutely,” I answered. Then I remembered a misunderstanding from earlier in the year when we studied facts and opinions. “But remember: an opinion isn’t something like, ‘Tiger Woods is a rhinoceros.’ An opinion is something like, ‘Tiger Woods is the best golfer ever.’ If you say he’s a rhinoceros, that’s…” I hesitated, looking for the right explanation. She supplied it. “That’s a FACT,” she laughed, “only it’s not a true fact!” I suspect your quote above is a fact only in the sense that “Tiger Woods is a rhinoceros” is a fact. The analogy would be more apt were I a rhinoceros myself and making the claim sincerely. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/69 "2009-02-18T01:31:28Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > I suspect your quote above is a fact only in the sense that “Tiger Woods is a rhinoceros” is a fact. The analogy would be more apt were I a rhinoceros myself and making the claim sincerely. Because…? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/70 "2009-02-18T01:44:18Z")
Because I suspect that it is not the case that women suffer the vast majority of the pain and suffering of humanity as a whole, while doing the vast majority of the most important work necessary to the species. ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/71 "2009-02-18T02:23:46Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Because I suspect that it is not the case that women suffer the vast majority of the pain and suffering of humanity as a whole, while doing the vast majority of the most important work necessary to the species. Based on what? Do you have a reason for your suspicion? ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Fight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90ced4/32.png) [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/72 "2009-02-18T02:52:13Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Today I was working with my second graders on writing biographies, and one of them asked a perceptive question. “Can we have opinions in our biographies?” she asked. You teach girls, then? Can I assume you’re not in Turkey, Pakistan, Nepal, Chad… (I could go on with about 67 more countries here)? [Here](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/schools-still-out-for-girls-505582.html) is an interesting piece on educating girls. > [@](#): > > In areas of natural as well as man-made disasters, discrimination against females has a highly damaging effect on the community. While giving out aid in Niger, Unicef and other charities found that often what little food was left in a community was locked away by men from their wives and children, while they went off for weeks to look for work or money elsewhere. The belief among the men appeared to be that the aid agencies would provide for the family. > > Unicef also discovered that giving aid directly to women offered much more of a guarantee that it would get to the rest of the family, especially the children, while the men would sometimes sell it on the black market or pass it on to other males in the clan. > > Women in the areas of acute food shortage complained bitterly about the discrimination and saw little hope of things changing. Khalida Ibrahim, 19, a mother of two, said at her home in a village near Zinder. “The men control everything here, including the food. If we had been allowed to go to schools then we could have got jobs and brought food to our families. Among the children, if anyone gets to go to school it is the boys, not the girls.” Many of us live in countries where women weren’t considered human in our grandparents’ lifetimes. Spousal rape was still legal in most states into the 1990s. Even if you are under the impression that you’re lucky enough to life in a place and time where women are afforded equal opportunity and respect (okay Swedes, you may be right), you’ve at least got to acknowledge that we live in a multicultural, globalized world, and that you are more the exception than the rule. There tends to be a bit of a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation – feminists who decry misogynist acts in other countries are accused of being culturally insensitive, or of looking abroad when there are plenty of problems at home. Those who concentrate on pay gaps and language are accused of nitpicking and not looking at ‘the bigger picture.’ And, of course, it is difficult to point out real-life victims without being accused of painting all women as victims. I’m not sure it’s really up for debate that women are the world’s (and certainly world’s religions’) most ubiquitous scapegoat. Other aspects, sure, but the original statement? Not so much. (Though it is odd to note that by comparing women and ‘niggers,’ the assumption is that the slur is against men. I’m not sure that’s an example of sparing women so much as an assumption that male is the default gender). ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Fight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90ced4/32.png) [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/73 "2009-02-18T02:59:39Z")
\*er, live, not life. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/74 "2009-02-18T02:59:39Z")
> [@](#): > > And it doesn’t change the fact that women suffer the vast majority of the pain and suffering of humanity as a whole, while doing the vast majority of the most important work necessary to the species. The most important work necessary to the species requires an essential contribution from each sex. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/75 "2009-02-18T03:03:50Z")
> [@](#): > > **Shayna** said: > Approach? Women’s salaries approach 98% of men’s. Well hallelujah women, we’re there! I can’t remember where I read this (trying to find it) tidbit that said one of the reasons for discrepancy in pay was due to men negotiating harder. They were less likely to accept an initial offer without presenting a higher counter. As it happens, that is exactly what I did with this job. They gave me a number, I came back with a higher one, and they said done. But they wouldn’t have been upset if I’d accepted the first offer. > [@](#): > > Because that’s what’s expected, and again because we aren’t valued as much in the workforce. And men are expected to work well over 40 hours a week, every week, and are definitely not valued as much in the home considering the constant stream of jokes about them being unable to accomplish even basic home and child care tasks. You ever stop to think there are people on both sides of that fence who wish they were on the other? > [@](#): > > **Stoid** said: > When a different individual woman stays with her career, she should be paid and advance identically to a man in her position. If she’s got the ability, the desire, and the experience, then by all means. It’s what I did. Thing is, when you add up all these ‘individual’ women, you tend to get exactly the kind of satistics you seem to have a problem with. Y’know, the ones that say ‘in general women are paid less due to these factors.’ > [@](#): > > **Jimmy Joe Meager** said: > (1) Neither are they reserved for men. There are actually quite a few female CEOs. If you bring in the bucks for the board of directors and the investors, I don’t really think they give a shit which bathroom you use. > [@](#): > > **Kimstu** said: > Cite for women’s personal job preferences being the main reason why they’re underrepresented in more dangerous/higher-paid professions? When I was in engineering school, we had all kind of emphasis on getting women in the programs. There was a Society of Women Engineers and a bunch of other stuff geared at getting female college students to consider engineering. What endedup happening was that almost a third of the freshman class of electrical and computer engineers was female. By graduation, it was about one in nine. I graduated with a class of about 30 computer engineers. There were only two other females. The rest had quit along the way, with a huge number of the men. Why did they quit or flunk out before graduation? Why is it that when my company advertises a software engineer position, and resumes start coming in, almost all of them are male names? ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/76 "2009-02-18T03:04:50Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > Based on what? Do you have a reason for your suspicion? You’re essentializing women. Basically you’re saying that all women throughout history have the same things in common regardless of race, class, religion, and any other factor you can think of. Women should not be treated as a monolithic group just as men shouldn’t be treated as a monolithic group. In the Ottoman Empire the women of the Sultan’s harem wielded quite a bit of political power (though it was behind the scenes) and I doubt they had a whole heck of a lot in common with poor women in the empire. 1st wave feminist in 19th century England were mostly made up of middle class (white of course) women. How could they campaign for their pet issues and care for their families at the same time? The middle class women hired working class women to clean their houses and take care of their children while they went out and campaigned for things like the vote, better education, etc. The 1st wave feminist of England couldn’t understand that the working class women wanted little to do with their causes because they didn’t see their interest as being the same. Likewise a lot of women in third world countries aren’t really interested in a western brand of feminism. I think you could make an argument that the burqa is less oppressive than the bikini. Third wave feminist of today tend to essentialize men and women a whole lot less than they did in the past. Just because you’re a woman doesn’t mean you have the same interest or problems as every other woman. Odesio ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/77 "2009-02-18T03:48:05Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Right, and female genital mutilation is done by the father, brother, and uncle, not by the mother, sister, and aunt. Get real. I’m not an expert on this subject by any means, but I’ve done a little reading about it and I had a Kenyan classmate in college who spoke publicly about her experience with FGM. In her case a woman (not a relative) was the one who actually held the knife, but it was my classmate’s father who was behind it. I don’t think this is atypical. The reason dad wanted her “circumcised” was because she couldn’t get married otherwise, and he’d long since betrothed her to the son of a friend. My future classmate put it off as long as possible, not because she was afraid of being mutilated (she didn’t fully understand what was going to happen), but because she didn’t want to get married yet. But her father insisted, and the best she was able to do was get him to agree to let her finish her education before getting married. She underwent the circumcision ritual at age 15. Her mother didn’t _object_ to FGM or try to prevent it from happening to her daughter, but it was the father who forced the issue – all for the sake of making her an acceptable bride. FGM is not just something that women do to women for their own mysterious womanly reasons. ---
**Author:** ![lee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lee/32/7455_2.png) [@lee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lee)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/78 "2009-02-18T06:38:50Z")
> [@Jimmy\_Joe\_Meager](#): > > Cite? My argument was made based on my memory of past events. It took a while to find all the cites of the main points. [This article](http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE1DC163EF937A25752C0A961948260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all) serves as a cite that AT&T women were removed from clean room work. The excuse was a small study which showed higher miscarriage rates in those doing the clean room work. [This link](http://books.google.com/books?id=sa_cnttyB3wC&pg=PA114&lpg=PA114&dq=AT%26T+semiconductors+women&source=web&ots=7rdSBfFbs8&sig=hRauDiy5Jg_ZjLJLw8fJ912f8fg&hl=en&ei=e6ObSZeBLZzgM-C2pI0F&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=10&ct=result) shows a page from _Reproductive Hazards in the Workplace_ by Regina Kenen, which calls the study AT&T used as the basis for removing the women from the work “poorly designed and badly flawed.” It also serves as a cite for the fact that the clean room work was making non-pregnant workers ill as well. The Journal of Health Law has [an article](http://www.faculty.mcneese.edu/wyman/FetalProtectionLaw.htm) which sums up the issue rather well. One of the points it makes is that that there were other ways far less drastic than banning all women to deal with the issue. Also when a pesticide was found to be making male workers infertile, the pesticide was banned rather than the men removed from jobs using that. Not from this source, but again from my memory: In other situations where a job involves exposure that is harmful to health, typically strategies to reduce exposure generally, or test for exposure and temporarily rotate off those with too high of exposure levels. The way radiation exposure is handled is an example of this. The Supreme court made a ruling in a similar exposure case in [UAW v Johnson Controls](http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=499&invol=187) was sex discrimination, specifically capacity for pregnancy discrimination, and not acceptable under current law. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 6:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/79 "2009-02-18T06:48:41Z")
> [@Honesty](#): > > What? It’s just looking at reality. Stuff like [this](http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090216/us_nm/us_bridgestv_murder) would never happen to a man. Ever. And, if it did, it’d be [sensationalized](http://www.digitas.harvard.edu/~perspy/old/issues/2000/retro/lorena_bobbitt.html) to the point of [absurdity](http://www.game-port.com/sale88.jpg) [last link should not be viewed from your work computer]. > > - Honesty If my daughter were raped and murdered, who would suffer more, me or my wife? ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154/80 "2009-02-18T08:45:14Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > That’s the best you could do? > > By the way, the thread title is not: Women in the US are the niggers of the world. Ok. I’ll note in the West that males are victims of murder far more often than women. > [@](#): > > And if you wanna talk war, how about the war in the Congo, which is being waged almost entirely via rape? Seriously…maurauding bands of fighters blow into an area, rape all the women they can lay hands on, and leave. That’s the way they “wage war”. The Congo is pretty unpleasant. As in other instances, the male death rate exceeds the female death rate. Admittedly I’m not sure why, as less than 2% of the deaths are directly due to violence. Under 5 death rates are higher than that of adults, by a factor of 2+. > **[The IRC](https://www.rescue.org/)** > > The International Rescue Committee (IRC) responds to the world’s worst humanitarian crises and helps people to survive and rebuild their lives. Find out how you can help the IRC offer lifesaving care and life-changing assistance to refugees forced to... !doc file!: [International Rescue Committee | International Rescue Committee (IRC)](http://www.theirc.org/resources/DRCMortality0106Tables.doc) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-woman-is-the-nigger-of-the-world-thank-you-john-lennon/486154.md?page=5)