What is Work?

A couple weeks ago there was a big to-do about women and what constitutes work. Mitt Romney's  team got all riled up when someone associated with Obama suggested that staying at home and taking care of children is not work, in reference to Ann Romney. I think the outrage was mostly fake and ginned-up, but that's how campaigns work. But fine, we all agree that women (and men) staying home to take care of children is work.

Except Mitt Romney doesn't actually agree with that himself if you look at past statements. When talking about low income women, Mitt Romney actually thinks staying at home is not work, and that these same women should be forced to "work" in order to get welfare and to teach good "work" habits to their children.

Mitt Romney is a bad candidate. His positions are not at all consistent, even when not considering all the positions he has changed. But this actually points out a Republican inconsistency. Republicans want the woman's role in the home recognized and appreciated. Just not when it comes to low income women.

It is a shame that the press is more interested in fake controversies than in actually getting at fundamental issues like whether being at home is work and how that affects major policies like welfare reform. If pressed, Republicans cannot maintain this position and be consistent. If taking care of kids is work, than single low income mothers should be paid to stay home if they want to (welfare). If not, Republicans have to say that staying home is not work.

But our press corps won't push this. Instead, they'll cover every silly fake controversy and miss all the important issues. And Republicans (and sometimes Democrats) will continue to be allowed to be inconsistent. And policy and our debate will suffer.

Book Report: Gail Collins - When Everything Changed

This is Gail Collins' second book on the history of feminism. I didn't read the first one because at the moment I am much more interested in the post-suffrage movement - the movement for fair pay and equal roles in the workforce.

The book relies heavily on anecdotes, though it has statistics where they exist and are relevant. This approach makes the book move fast, but makes it a little less trustworthy as a book explaining a vast movement. It still works, but at times it does make me wonder if the one story we are being told is representative.

What is great about the book is how it shows people trying to create new systems and new customs. Over the course of the book, women are trying to figure out where they fit in society. They know they don't like the current set-up, but no one knows exactly what the set-up should be. So throughout the movement, everyone is debating and trying alternate systems to see which is ideal.

The starting point is what they know they don't like. They know that they shouldn't be denied jobs or paid less than men just because they are women. And they know they shouldn't have to stay in the home and raise the family if they don't want to. But how should the system really be? It wasn't clear at the time, and I think we take that for granted.

For example, if some women found being a house wife constraining, should we encourage all women away from that? Or if women are sometimes chosen just on their sexuality / attractiveness and not for their skills, should all women avoid showing sexuality? If family life is unfulfilling, does that mean women shouldn't be in families? Are men and families unnecessary? Are communes or multiple couples raising one child together better?

I would argue that we have mostly concluded that women should have the opportunity to work in all jobs and to receive pay equal to what men earn (which we still haven't fully achieved). And that women shouldn't have to stay at home but should be free to a professional career. However, women should also not feel ashamed to stay at home - and nor should men. I would argue that we basically know where we want to be, but we still have some work to do. As I said, women still don't make as much as men, and women are still underrepresented in many jobs - sometimes due to discrimination.

Where I think we have failed to make progress is for low income women. They still face significant barriers because they cannot afford to stay home if they want to but child care funding is insufficient, where it exists.What is heartbreaking, and was surprising to me, was how close we came to having national childcare support. A bill was passed but Richard Nixon vetoed it. We haven't seen or heard that issue again. Truly sad.

Women - Stereotypes Need Apply

The recent news about Congressman Weiner has lead to discussions about why this happens to men and not women. Of course many of these discussions rely on generalizations and stereotypes - and this NY Times article is no different. When I see articles like this (or in a Political Science class I took in college studying leadership in politics), I often wonder how helpful and accurate the generalizations are. A statement like this seems way too comprehensive and therefore not accurate:

"There are certain men that the more visible they get, the more bulletproof they feel," Ms. Myers said. "You just don’t see women doing that; they don’t get reckless when they’re empowered."

Really? No women get reckless? But it is the quote that I find actually harmful:

"The shorthand of it is that women run for office to do something, and men run for office to be somebody," said Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. "Women run because there is some public issue that they care about, some change they want to make, some issue that is a priority for them, and men tend to run for office because they see this as a career path."

The problem with generalizations is that they lead to stereotypes which then puts people into a box. Soon, we think all people in a category are a certain way or should be a certain way.

I realize that at first, this quote sounds good: women are the workhorses and men are the show-horses; women are about substance and men about style and ego. But actually it is pigeon-holing women. When you say women run for office to do something, men to becomes someone, you are essentially saying women shouldn't have ambition or ego.

And as this drives our expectations, when women do want to become someone, we bristle at that because she is acting unladylike. And as much as I didn't support Hillary Clinton's campaign (more on that in the future), I think she suffered from this.

And in fact, the reckless line creates the expectation that women won't do that and likely would make the backlash worse. And when I think back to my class on leadership, one of the articles identified differences in leadership styles between men and women where men are more commanding and women more about consensus. Again, this boxes women in.

The bottom line is that we should be very careful with generalizations and creating expectations about how people should act because of the group they are in. This way, they can be free to be who they are - women can be more interested in becoming someone or can be reckless and have only as much backlash as men get. Or they can continue to be the workhorses of government.

Charlie Sheen / The Disposable Woman

This column in the NY Times is pretty powerful. It points out the difference between how Chris Brown was treated when he assaulted Rhianna (his girlfriend at the time) and how Charlie Sheen has been treated after assaulting his various wives and girlfriends.

The author suggests that the difference is in how society sees the women. Rhianna of course is a talented musician. In Sheen's case, his women are less sympathetic and therefore almost deserving of the abuse.

But there’s something else at work here: the seeming imperfection of Mr. Sheen’s numerous accusers. The women are of a type, which is to say, highly unsympathetic. Some are sex workers — pornographic film stars and escorts — whose compliance with churlish conduct is assumed to be part of the deal. (For the record: It is not.)

Others, namely Ms. Richards and Ms. Mueller, are less-famous starlets or former “nobodies” whose relationships with Mr. Sheen have been disparaged as purely sexual and transactional. The women reside on a continuum in which injuries are assumed and insults are expected.

[Edit]

It’s these sorts of explicit and implicit value judgments that underscore our contempt for women who are assumed to be trading on their sexuality. A woman’s active embrace of the fame monster or participation in the sex industry, we seem to say, means that she compromises her right not to be assaulted, let alone humiliated, insulted or degraded; it’s part of the deal. The promise of a modern Cinderella ending — attention, fame, the love and savings account of a rich man — is always the assumed goal.

The only other reason for the difference in treatment is just as appalling: the difference in race between him and Chris Brown.

Either way, we should be focusing much more on his behavior towards women - as we should have all along - and less on his absurd rants and drinks of tiger juice.

NY Times: Op-Ed at 40

The Times has an amazing feature today in recognition of their 40 years of Op-Eds. The feature includes some of the most notable Op-Eds (good and bad) over that time. The highlights include:

A piece by Gloria Steinem on Clinton's impeachment. For the record, I completely disagree with it. Of course yes means yes and no means no. However, it is difficult to think that a supervise has the power to say no to a supervisor - that he or she can actually consent to anything. It seems to me that there was a lot of tortured logic on both sides during the Clinton impeachment trial (one of the few clear voices was Marjorie Williams) and this strikes me as one of them.

A great piece by Harvard theologian Peter J. Gomes. I would give you a quote, but really you need to read the whole thing. It is titled A Bible for All and it is near perfect.

A piece by Henry Louis Gates (of break-in fame) about the poison of bias.

Those are the three that stuck out to me so far. If I notice more, I'll update the post.

Navy I Wear to Work

A while ago I read The Woman at the Washington Zoo, which is a collection of columns by Marjorie Williams, a Washington Post columnist that died of cancer in 2005 three days after her 47th birthday. The title of the book refers to a poem by Randall Jarrell about women hiding part of their true selves to remain under the radar, and thereby achieve some success, in the professional world.

Williams wrote political columns as well as some excellent political profiles, including Jeb Bush, the Clinton and Gore White House, and Barbara Bush. Some of my favorite columns from the book are about politics and modern feminism. The columns are nuanced and very intelligent. Her writing was objective, and sometimes stood against the liberal opinions at the time. The strongest example of this is her writings during the Clinton sex scandal; she seemed to be one of the few who was criticizing Clinton by describing how this was a set back for feminism and sexual harassment in the workplace.

Williams' obvious talents are sorely missed, especially when comparing her to current columnists. Maureen Dowd for example also writes about feminism. But Dowd rarely seems as objective, thoughtful, or capable of nuance. Gail Collins and Judith Warner are both pretty good, but there is something missing in their columns as well.

By the end of the book you are heartbroken, not only because you wish she was still alive and writing, but because of what she went through. You feel for her family, husband and two children, who miss her far more than her readers ever can. And you feel for her because of how much of her rich life she will miss. So that politics is never ignored, she makes sure to show readers how medicine can do wonders, as well as where it falls short. Her treatment was so great because of her connections, and she reminds her readers that most people wouldn't get treatment half as good. So while we marvel at how much extra time she managed, we see that more needs to be done for those without her resources.

Read this book for her sharp writing and deep insights. Read it because you might not find a better columnist or political profile journalist for a long time. And read it because of how close you feel to her before it ends. I miss her and I didn't even know about her while she was alive.