Let’s Talk Opinion | Lunchtime Edition

I am rather fond of opinion pieces. Opinions offer no certainty. They are more likely to engender a multitude of questions rather than the opposite, and yet there is an intrinsic freedom to these flighty expressions of views and feelings. We all have them, and in exploring uncertainty, armed with some degree of experience and oftentimes incomplete knowledge, we find the courage to draw the veil and let others sift through our treasure trove of conclusions in the hope of finding kindred spirits or perhaps in order to test the strength of our convictions.

Since opinions always fall short of absolute conviction, they also allow space for communication. There will be those who will agree and those who will challenge our views. And yet by the very virtue of open dialogue, all parties are enriched, if only by glimpsing a world of possibility hitherto unknown.

“We may have our private opinions but why should they be a bar to the meeting of hearts?” – Mahatma Gandhi

I initiated the Let’s Talk Opinion series several months ago as a means of engaging with issues that are important to other bloggers and in doing so I hoped that we may journey together to discover – if not answers – at least new ways of questioning the world.

The first post of the series, titled You Will Be Offended asked you to consider “where do we draw the line between opinion, self-censorship and free speech in the blogosphere?” as well as establishing what I hope to achieve with these posts and what I do not. Whether you have been keeping up with the series or are new to ShardsOfSilence, I hope you will enjoy taking a peek at the articles that have faired best so far. Here they come!

 #1 Drunk Sex / RAPED This November piece, in conversation with Sifting Reality, made it to the top of the list. Does regret in hind-sight play a role in reporting intoxication-related sexual assaults? This author begs to differ. 

 

#2 You Are Not White Enough! “There’s no man in this world who will reject you because of your unbleached Bermuda Triangle.” This anti-fairness advocacy piece is a humorous rant against the racist vagina police. In conversation with Jezebel.

 

#3 Men vs Women | Crossing the Divide adds another doze of humour to the question of gender difference. By all accounts, having failed to fit nicely into what OM, my interlocutor for this piece, describes as “typical” female behaviour, and afraid that I may well be facing an identity crisis as a result, I relied on that oh-so-British love of subtext to fashion a tongue-in-cheek reply.

 

#4 Get Naked. Be Art. I am certain that this will not be the first, nor the last article that questions the intent behind nudity in the music industry and beyond. luna luna asked the reader to consider the divide between art and marketing ploys: between instances when nudity is empowering and disarming, and when it is just a gimmick, aimed at increasing sales. This article, although by no means definitive, is my attempt at an answer.

 

#5 BABY ON BOARD | Discrimination This post considered the issue of discrimination in the workplace in reply to Quinn, who claimed that offering any special consideration to working parents constitutes “blatant discrimination – “family” vs. “individual””. Gloves were off for this one!

 

I hope you enjoy revisiting these posts. If they are new to you, then I hope you won’t shy away from sharing your opinion. I am certain that at least one of the above topics will be to your liking. Nonetheless, should you be left searching for just the right topic for you, tune in tomorrow for the next set of Let’s Talk Opinion favourites.

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Let’sTalk Opinion posts engage with issues that are important to other bloggers, connecting with others on matters close to their heart. If you like a topic and would like to contribute, please feel free to add to the comment box, reblog, share, email or message me on Twitter @shardsofsilence.

Or if you happen to be a fellow Hogwartsian send me a letter by owl. 

BABY ON BOARD | Senators and CEOs

Let’s Talk Opinion in conversation with genderneutrallanguage

This is the 2nd part of BABY ON BOARD | Discrimination

“Something was really lost taking this post out of context.  That context really addresses most of your points. What we where discussing was if women deserve special treatments in the work place because many women prioritize family over income, and that results in very few women CEO’s and Senators. The question was not if there should be any considerations given to people that prioritize family, but should people that prioritize family over work be promoted over people that prioritize work over family.

We most decidedly live in a society, and this is a good and important thing.  It is not exclusively about the individual, but we do need to balance the individual good against the social good.  It would be a great “Social good” to pay each mother $50,000/year per child for the job of raising children.  The kind of taxes, taking money from other individuals, needed to support this would be enough to break the economy.

I choose to not have children, but I really need to subsidize your children in some ways.  I need to support society.  The only question is extent.  I pay my taxes that fund your children schools.  I pay my taxes that provide school lunches.  I pay my taxes that fund food stamps.  I pay my taxes that will now be used to subsidize your health insurance.  I think many of these programs should be expanded and improved.  We need better schools, and a single payer health care system.  Paying my fair share to be part of a moral society is important.

Where I draw a solid line is when having children is a workplace benefit.  Extra paid time off *because kids* when I’m already paying my taxes to subsidize your choices is just to far.  When we start talking about paying women the same dollar amount for 36 hours of work that men get for 44, we have a real problem.  When we start talking about creating special, lower, standards for women to become CEO or a Senator, we have a real problem.  We need the best candidates as CEO’s and Senators regardless or race, gender, orientation, religion (laundry list of irrelevant things).  When there are mandates to include women, regardless of merit, we have major problems.” genderneutrallanguage

I do agree with your argument. You are right in the points that you make, I find little to quibble in the issues you raise, and yet… I am uncomfortable with the outcome of such an attitude when implemented and applied in practice.

I would fully support it if it were the case that it applied equally to men and women. The comment does mention that it does, yet in reality it is more of an “it ought to”, as unfortunately we do not live in egalitarian societies, and therefore this affects women disproportionately more than men.

Men also choose to have children, yet their careers seldom suffer as a result. All these examples you mention, when people get time off work with pay because they have a baby – well, as a matter of biology, it does affect women more than men.

When children are sick, the primary carer is more often than not the woman, and it is her who has to find a way of getting time away from work. The same goes for taking time away from work when the child’s school calls, when day care closes unexpectedly, when the babysitter doesn’t show up.

The brunt of the responsibility for raising children falls on the woman.

I am aware that there are exceptions, but these are exactly that: exceptions. So, until men and women take a 50/50 approach to sharing the responsibility of raring children, I do believe that it is women who will suffer most, and it is their opportunities and careers that would be curtailed as a result.

And all these things you mention are not workplace benefits. This is the life of a jobbing parent, who try as they may, cannot stop their child from being sick sometimes, or prevent a baby-sitter from not showing up.
I am sure they don’t see it as a benefit, and they’d much rather not have their work interrupted by domestic emergencies either.

Since we reached the topic of benefits; there are many benefits that others have and that I have to pay for that I would rather not – but at the end of the day, I’d rather pay my share and live in a compassionate society, where those who need help and assistance get it, rather than a society that punishes people who fall on hard times.

As for the corporate ladder climbing: somehow I struggle to believe that the childless those who work hard and put in the hours are constantly overlooked in favour of their mothering counterparts who somehow have fallen short of doing their job.

Is it possible that these career mothers have simply been more effective and efficient, taken work home and put in extra “invisible” hours precisely because they know that having a child can work against them and they did everything they could to outbalance that particular potential drawback for their careers?
Is it possible that they actually deserved the raise, the bigger pay-packet or making partners?

I do not know how useful it is to talk in terms of hours worked when it comes to getting the job done either. Some people may need longer for the same project than others. It doesn’t necessarily make them more hardworking. It could be a matter of lesser talent=more hours needed.

Perhaps this is a matter to be raised with the employers themselves. They would not discriminate against mothers, but I am sure they would equally not discriminate against talent either.

Incidentally, I assume the “you” in your reply refers to the “you, woman who chose to have children”, rather than “you, woman who wrote the comment.” I know I did not mention it, but perhaps I ought to just in case: I do not have children.

You say: “When we start talking about creating special, lower, standards for women to become CEO or a Senator, we have a real problem.”

The problem I think lies in those who think it necessary to create lower standards in order to get female CEOs and Senators. Being a mother does not automatically make someone incapable of successfully discharging their duties in a job. It may require flexibility, but I do not see why that would in any way equate with lowering standards.

Women should not be made to feel like it’s an either or. They should be empowered to do both.

There is also altogether an ambiguity regarding what this lowering of standards entails.
Women do not need to be men in order to have high standards, a good work ethic and the capability to do high powered jobs. They can choose not to have children, but that ought never be a choice made based on career progression.

If a career demands of a human being to give up everything else in their lives in order to follow it, then the problem is the culture of that career and it is the demands of that career that are substandard, not the people attempting to make a go of it – parents or not.

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Let’sTalk Opinion posts engage with issues that are important to other bloggers, connecting with others on matters close to their heart. If you like a topic and would like to contribute, please feel free to add to the comment box, reblog, share, email or message me on Twitter @shardsofsilence.

Or if you happen to be a fellow Hogwartsian send me a letter by owl.