Why don’t women speak out more against sexism in the workplace and demand to be treated the same as men? Because when women do speak out they will likely be accused of the following..
You are just playing the ‘gender card’:
“The day will come when you can no longer call the gender card or the victim card, and by pretending to be a victim the prime minister has demeaned every woman in this parliament”.
You are looking for special treatment:
“We don’t wish to be treated as somehow less able or a victim of somebody’s spiteful words.”You aren’t tough enough for the job:
“The fact of the matter is if you take leadership you must exercise leadership and if you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen”.
You are undermining the sisterhood:“We didn’t come here to be told that we could not do the job and needed to be treated differently”.
From Liberal MP Bronwyn Bishop in response to Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s speech on the sexism and misogyny being used against Gillard in politics, quoted in The Sydney Morning Herald.
“You are undermining the sisterhood:
“We didn’t come here to be told that we could not do the job and needed to be treated differently”.”
Er, I believe Gillard’s point was that she *was* being treated differently. The wrong differently. No doy.
It’s disgusting (though predictable) the way the Liberal party is using its female MPs to be the face of the there’s-no-sexism-and-we-should-all-shut-up-about-it line. Their reward is that they get to be seen as the ‘good’ women in power: the ones who won’t ask anyone to change, the ones who have proved they’re tough enough to take it. Bishop of all people should have twigged by now that she can only every buy herself associate membership of the club this way.
It is just so disappointingly shitty
I’m not saying I’m a victim. I’m saying your behaviour is shitful. Difference.
The entire message seems to be: You told the truth about outrageous things men (and some women!) say and do to you because you are a woman. They are vile, reprehensible comments and actions. WHY ARE YOU SUCH A BIG BABY?
I am so, so, so, so tired of this predictable dynamic. And SO GLAD the PM spoke out. Imagine saying: “I was OFFENDED BY … ” because so often, we’re told to “rise above it” and “just ignore it.” Well, gee, that’s worked well.
Gah. Even some of the responses I hear round and about generally are disappointingly predictable. I have had one acquaintance imply that the Prime Minister is a hippocrite because she called out sexism in our parliament but still ‘does business with’ countries that oppress women – the old ‘only worried about sexism when it suits her’ line.
So by their logic if a woman wants to defend herself against sexism then she must defend the whole world against it, else she is a hippocrite. And since this is impossible then really wouldn’t it be better if us women just kept quiet and accepted how good we have it compared with, say, Pakistan. (I really hope the sarcasm came through here).
Sorry if this isn’t quite on topic – while I am buoyed by many of the positive reactions to Julia Gillard’s speech, comments like Bronwyn Bishop’s and the one above make me so angry I can barely see straight.
[...] More on that fabulous speech by Julia Gillard. Blue Milk has an excellent round-up of responses to the speech, but not so many from the mainstream media, who seem to think that Gillard was wrong wrong wrong to ever mention misogyny and it was all just a political tactic – About the Prime Minister’s speech. And she has a post about the silencing tactics being used against Gillard. [...]
[...] and not nearly as eloquently as others. There are so many great pieces being written (here, here, here and here – the last one is decidedly R Rated so don’t go there if you don’t want [...]
[...] blue milk discusses silencing women who speak out against sexism [...]
Amanda Vanstone singing from the same hymnbook on Qanda last night, and Jones so busy trying to keep everyone moving along that there was no decent response. Why is she still behaving like a party hack? And why isn’t Peter Garrett a better advocate for his boss, is it only the Libs who think that’s part of their job description?
[...] courage and the outrage to finally confront it was a powerful moment because you wanted to see that it is possible to confront sexism and survive it. So now, watching the Prime Minister be continually ridiculed and disrespected, and on such a [...]