Women's freedom? Yes, if you care to shake your booty
Thursday November 09 2006
Yes, there's inequality and, no, it's not the fault of men - so let's stop blaming them for everything from global warming to the fact we sometimes get passed over for promotion. When it comes to equality, we slaughtered and cooked the golden goose ourselves.
This week's report from a recruitment company (although you could produce a similar one in any given week) shows how women earn only two-thirds the salaries of their male counterparts in the financial sector. Cue another "Why, oh, why do men continue to deny us equality?" As Emmeline Pankhurst put it, why do they discriminate against "the mother half of the human family?"
I'll tell you why: we've ruined it for ourselves. The mother half of the human family has turned slut, or at least many in the limelight have - claiming it's an expression of girl power and that the more they strip the more empowered they become. Mrs Pankhurst would be aghast at how we've reinvented ourselves, less than 100 years after members of her suffragette movement were jailed and force-fed on hunger strike in their efforts to secure emancipation. They won us freedom, all right - the freedom to look and behave like a cross between a pole dancer and a centrefold pin-up.
Blow-up doll Jordan or vapid Chantelle, who says she sees nothing wrong with her stint at topless modelling, form the nucleus of this new genre. Men haven't foisted these Plastic Fantastics on us - we've accepted them willingly. Under the circumstances, I'm not surprised men are trouncing us in the workplace. The only surprise is there are any women left who can still be bothered going into an office when the insistent message from all directions is that shaking your booty propels you faster along the high road to money and success.
Think I'm exaggerating? Google any video of the Pussycat Dolls, the US all-girl troupe with their roots in burlesque. It's like watching a blue movie. They writhe and squirm provocatively, the camera homing in on cleavage and butt, and little girls admire them - want to be them. Listen to the words of their hit, 'I Don't Need A Man': "I don't need a man to make me feel good, I get off doing my thing. You know I got my own life, And I bought everything that's in it."
Way to go, girls. Except look at the sexually-charged video to accompany it: these women who don't need men are touching themselves provocatively and posing in sexually available stances. Who are they doing it for if not men? Who are they seeking to attract if not men? Who are they trying to please if not men? The language says one thing and the actions say another.
But it's not men buying their suggestive music, absorbing their raunchy image. It's little girls. And this isn't an isolated example. Christina Aguilera, Destiny's Child, any number of female performers are reinforcing the dogma that selling yourself equals fame and status. Overt sexuality leads to men desiring you, which puts you in the driver's seat.
My generation has been told men and women are equal, so repeatedly we tend to believe it. But by and large we're blase about equality, although we've contributed precious little to achieving it.
Previous generations did all the work for us in terms of gaining the vote, abolishing the marriage bar and pressing for equal pay.
Rather than build on their achievements, we're guilty of a grave error which negates the efforts of those previous generations of women. We've mistaken girls being laddish for a show of strength - flexing our equality muscles. We've convinced ourselves drinking pints into oblivion after work is a way of proving we're as good as the fellow at the next computer screen along from us. We've confused pornography with confident sexuality. Worse, we're training the next generation to imitate hookers with their Porn Star teeshirts stretched taut across the baby fat of their chests.
And now we're told these little girls can expect to live to be 100 - but I bet they'll still be paid less than the baby boy next door, even if they work harder, have better qualifications and are more talented.
Another century is unlikely to make a significant difference in gender politics because we've thrown in our lot with the bump-and-grind Barbie dolls.
Women have a responsibility towards each other and we've forgotten that, maybe because we've had it so easy compared with those who preceded us. Allowing ourselves to be portrayed as sex objects to sell anything from music to clothing lines, or buying the products of those who acquiesce to it, is a mistake - but don't expect men to call a halt.
That's our job. And we're shirking it.
