There will always be tensions in feminism, and in fact any movement for change, between those who think we should concentrate on change from within the system and those who think change should come from outside the system to dismantle the system. I definitely lean more towards the former of those options but then, hey, I’m an economist.
Here’s Jessica Valenti in the Washington Post also arguing for the former. In this case she is defending Sheryl Sandberg, COO for Facebook:
The detractors underestimate how radical Sandberg’s messages are for a mainstream audience. When was the last time you heard someone with a platform as big as hers argue that women should insist that their partners do an equal share of domestic work and child care?
The view that Sandberg is too rich and powerful to advise working women is shortsighted; it assumes that any sort of success is antithetical to feminism. The truth is, feminism could use a powerful ally. Here’s a nationally known woman calling herself a feminist, writing what will be a wildly popular book with feminist ideas, encouraging other women to be feminists. And we’re worried she has too much influence? That she’s too . . . ambitious?
For those interested, Jill Filopovic also has a piece in The Guardian in defence of Sandberg’s new book.
As pragmatic as I am, and I’m frequently accused of being too pragmatic, I am also quick to say when I think feminism has missed the mark.. and I try to be open to that same kind of criticism, myself. That criticism is important, let’s never be shy about self-reflection but I also want to acknowledge something here that I have been meaning to say for a while now. And that is that all women calling themselves feminists are taking some heat. By and large, if you care enough about feminism to publicly identify as feminist and spread the word on feminism then you are contributing something valuable to the movement, and I want to properly recognise that. I’ve criticised a couple of Australian feminists recently, most notably, Jane Caro, Mia Freedman and Lauren Rosewarne, and for reasons I stand by, but I also want to note that each of these women are public feminists. They all clearly care about and promote the movement – that’s hard work at times, and that’s something to support.
Re supporting powerful women who declare as feminists: yes I agree. Re Sandberg – I cannot get past that she is CFO of a site that promotes rape jokes, misogyny and pornography – and despite the reporting mechanisms these do not seem to contravene FB’s terms and conditions. Until I see her addressing this, I cannot take her seriously.
Thanks for writing this. I have been watching the treatment Sandberg’s been getting and thinking to myself: “And people wonder why Marissa Mayer refuses to call herself a feminist?” Neither Sandberg nor Mayer is a perfect person. But none of us are. Would any of our lives stand up to the scrutiny that these two women get? Personally, I find Sandberg much more inspirational than Mayer, but that does not mean Mayer deserves the treatment she is getting from people.
Take the furor over the recent Yahoo decision to require all their employees to work from the office- a lot of other companies, even in high tech, have similar policies. Google doesn’t have the policy, but has a culture that strongly encourages long hours in the office. And yet it is Mayer is the only CEO who is getting excoriated about it. I don’t agree with her move, because I think it is short-sighted and unlikely to solve the problem she is trying to solve. But so much of the discussion of it is so obviously sexist against Mayer that I have mostly tuned it out, even though productivity and changing our workplace cultures to promote a healthier work-life arrangement for everyone is something I am passionate about.
This is not to say that I don’t think there are fair criticisms to be leveled at Mayer, just that I think we are holding her to a standard we don’t hold male CEOs to. We won’t defeat sexism until we demand change from male leaders, not just female ones.
Similarly, there are fair criticisms to be leveled at Sandberg, but it is unfair to expect her to tackle all feminist concerns. No one can be an activist on all the problems we face at once. She admits that she is only addressing one part of the problem. Personally, I’m glad that she has made time and energy to work on the problems she does address. I am nowhere near as powerful as she is at work, and I don’t often have the energy after dealing with my own concerns to go out and advocate to fix the larger problems. In fact, I just wrote on my blog this week that the flak I get when I write about being a working mother even on my little blog has made me steer clear of the subject. I admire Sandberg for being willing to stand up to the judgement and criticism and keep speaking out.
@JLO- Sandberg is the Chief Operating Officer of Facebook. Their policies about what is inappropriate comment are not under her direct control. I strongly suspect she has a seat on the committee that does control them, and I hope that she speaks up for better policies, but it is unfair to think she could just decide they need to be fixed and fix them. She could decide she cannot tolerate working at a company with those policies and quit, but I’m not sure what that would accomplish.
Wow, I clearly should have finished my morning tea before writing that comment. Sorry for all the typos!
Very well said. I have blogged about this as well: http://empressnasigoreng.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/spotted.jpg I think the point about women expecting Mayer to behave differently because she is a woman is an important one and really smacks of double standards to me.
Partly, Marissa Mayer is getting criticism for changing existing policy, not just for having family-unfriendly policies. Those big, sweeping changes often seem ideological instead of pragmatic, at least from the bottom end of the org chart.
I’ve been at two different companies that suddenly and sweepingly changed policies about work from home, part time vs. full time, vacation time, and workplace flexibility. The changes are always wrenching – not just at home but at work. They undo careful compromises made between managers and employees, and between different departments and teams. The changes are always phrased in terms of careful consideration of business needs, yet they seem to follow general business culture trends more than anything else.
I left my last part time job because we were being pressured to go full time, mostly at the whim of a new director (it certainly wasn’t cost, since the benefits for part time were much less than full time).
Similarly, I have a friend at Yahoo who is going to have to relocate to keep her job – there is no local Yahoo office where she lives. But the relocation won’t make her “local” to her team – the team is spread all over the world, and some members are on more than one project team, similarly dispersed. The team will still function using varied hours and remote communication, just from Yahoo offices instead of home offices. It’s not at all clear how this serves a business purpose. Possibly it does, but the rationale hasn’t been spelled out to employees who are experiencing significant disruption.
“The view that Sandberg is too rich and powerful to advise working women is shortsighted” <– I agree. To discount someone just because of their privileged position is shortsighted. It is possible (indeed, necessary) for women with power and means to peak out for those who lack that power. However, to do so effectively requires care and consideration, to make sure to explore what those struggles and challenges are for those women and people who are more marginalized, and speak along with them rather than "for" them (or even worse, to ignore them altogether).
I am pleased to see women in powerful positions saying things like that it's not ridiculous for men to chip in with housework and childrearing. I think that's a message we all need to hear and say way more often, so it can pervade our culture and change it.
I was impressed by Sandberg’s comment too that the most important step that you can take to be a successful woman in all of your roles is to choose your partner wisely. There is a lot to criticize in what Sandberg is advocating — particularly, her assumption of class privilege — but it’s refreshing to see one of the most powerful women in corporate American say that both parents must be full participants.
Is it feminist to strongly oppose a woman’s right to bodily autonomy? I just can’t get my head around Mia Freedman as an actual feminist, given her views on women’s rights in pregnancy and birth. To me, defending a woman’s right to bodily autonomy (in ANY circumstance) is a fundamental tenet of feminism, because without control over our bodies we are too easily controlled in other ways.
@Cloud: yes I realise that Sandberg is probably peripheral to the terms and conditions of FB, but she has a better chance of affecting these than any of us and she should take it. Otherwise what is the point of a woman being part of the team if she buys into the misogyny? FB allows appalling anti-woman pages and posts on its platform and consistently resists taking action about it, whilst at the same time banning pictures of breastfeeding mothers as ‘obscene’. Whilst it is good to see women getting to the top – if they do not promote women-friendly policies, then they are perpetuating the system. So yes, I do think it is fair to expect her to tackle feminist concerns, otherwise as I say, what is the point? As it stands, she is just another corporate drone making lots of money and therefore not worthy of comment.
Do you know that she ISN’T advocating for better policies internally?
Look, I’m not saying she is above reproach. But she is doing a delicate balancing act- all women leaders are. (If you aren’t familiar with some of the terms of this balancing act, I highly recommend this article from Harvard Business Review: http://citt.hccfl.edu/Newsletters/NewsletterID1.pdf)
It is completely unfair of us to expect women to solve these problems just by virtue of having finally gotten a seat at the leadership table. We should hold ALL leaders accountable. When we single out women leaders on these topics, we just add another weight to the things they are balancing. So by all means- advocate for changes to Facebook’s policies. But don’t hold Sandberg more accountable for them than Zuckerberg (who is the CEO and therefore really COULD change them whenever he wants).
In my opinion, the point of having women in leadership positions is that it allows them to pursue the things that fulfill them, just like men in leadership do. It is that excluding them is unfair. They are no more responsible for fixing our sexist system than the men- who, after all benefit from that system- are.
I know that this opinion places me far outside the mainstream of most feminists. But if find it deeply unfair that women who manage to succeed in a system that is seriously weighted against them are then yelled at for not having the ability to dismantle the system when we don’t also yell at the men who most benefit from the system. Women are being held to a double standard, and that is wrong whether that double standard is set up by sexists or feminists.
As a woman who had spent my whole life in a balancing act between being a single parent and working to achieve a career, I am well aware of the problems that this brings.
And yes I have held the owners of Facebook to account via a sustained campaign in 2011 about the misogynistic, violent and appalling content on the platform, so by questioning the point of Sandberg’s role at Facebook as a woman I am not holding her to a double standard, I am hoping that as a woman that she will address the problem that Facebook has with women. If she does not, then I will hold her to the same standard as the men she works with – that they are all corporate drones making money without a conscience.
As I said before, if she is just going to be one of the guys, then her appointment is not worthy of comment.
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