It surprises me to recall that when I was a young teacher and the issue of equal pay arose, I was not particularly interested until it occurred to me that although I was paid less, being a woman, I was never charged less, as a woman. Free entry on one day of the year at "Ladies'Day" at the races didn't really seem to balance that.
It's easy to accept the world as it is without questioning.
(The pig is just there for colour: my one and only attempt at pottery).
However, I now feel that difficulties for women are a by product of the misuse of power, and that this is the enemy. Sometimes people are unaware of their power. Parents can misuse power, as can spouses, bullies, politicians, bosses, managers. Anyone.
People misusing power often treat those "underneath" them with contempt.
It was a very hierarchical world back then. People knew their place, (irony alert). Important people - professionals, ceos, the religious, the monied - were the authorities on everything. They were the power figures, expecting deference. Women were of course lower - "we'll look after you as long as you act like we think women should", was the sometimes explicit message. Children, by and large, were very low down in the rankings, but poor people were probably lower again. Poor children - well, we know how they were treated.
Turning points. At 21 I was sent by the Department of Education to a remote country town. It was so small that there was little for rent, so for a while I lived at the hotel. One morning at breakfast a catholic priest sat at my table and questioned me. "How old are you?" he said. "Twenty one," I replied. "How old are you?" He looked at me aghast and muttered "52" or something. I was impressed and aghast at my own boldness. He was just aghast. He left me alone after that outrage, and I felt a gleeful pride. There was no turning back.
At present in NSW, apart from the endless child abuse scandals, we have ongoing revelations of past corruption involving politicians, some of whom were enriched by tens of millions of dollars. The adult son of one, when asked how confidential mining maps, showing coal seams under land that they bought for $3 million and profited by $73 million, appeared in his office, said, "Perhaps Jesus put them there."
They need their wings clipped.
Suzanne Moore, in The Guardian, rewrites Burke: "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men kid themselves that they knew nothing and set up yet another inquiry."
Hear, hear. We've had more than enough of that. We need to either limit power, train people how to use it, or have far more open systems than we do.
And dissociate power from physical strength, as well. And that brings me back to feminism again.
What a muddled post this is.
