Women on boards: Do they only exist in stock photos?

So the glossy, smiley, Photoshopped, flawless world of stock photography seems to have a thing for corporate shots involving women participating next to men in meetings.
Sadly, it seems to be the only place where women are represented equally on boards. Currently, women only make up 8.3% of directors of the top 200 companies listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, and there’s growing support for enforced quotas that would see more board positions occupied by women.

The idea of forcing a company to promote a certain number of women to a senior management level seems like an easy solution, but I think it will raise more problems than it solves. Here’s why.

In mixed-gender PE classes, the teacher will sometimes instigate a rule during ball sports that means a team can’t score a goal without the ball first being handled by at least two girls. Sounds like a great way of getting everyone into the game, but instead what happens is that the boys will stop playing as they were, and with a dramatic roll of the eyes pass the football/basketball/puck to the nearest girl, only to have it immediately returned. Do the girls get to touch the ball? Yes. Do they feel valued, appreciated, and like they’ve made a worthy contribution to the team? No. They feel patronised and stupid, made to perform as part of a token gesture.

I’m not saying that women don’t belong on boards, or that if they were forcibly elected that they wouldn’t do a damn fine job. I just think that having a quota is going to inspire resentment in the males who should have been more respectful in the first place and potentially self-doubt in women who may feel as though they’ve only been included to avoid a spanking From Higher Up.

Other ways to include women in companies could be:

• Encouraging women to apply for management positions so they feel as though they have a chance of achieving the role
• A policy that sees all resumes handed in contain no gender-identifying features such as a first name or title
• Catered meetings during lunchtime instead of having them after-hours when women may be occupied with their family
• Maternity and paternity leave to encourage a men to take on domestic responsibilities as well as their partners
• Fostering a culture of acceptance instead of enforcing rigid gender roles

Then again, progress is slow. In the 1992 government report ‘Half Way to Equal’, the recommendation for ‘action strategies’ to redress gender imbalances in senior positions was supported. It’s almost 20 years later, and I can’t see much evidence of things changing.

Maybe people will only see that women are capable of playing the game if they have to pass them the ball. Maybe it’s just going to take a much longer time than we were hoping for. Either way, if women and men could get on board with this, we could all kick a lot more goals.

Breasts

Of all the prejudices that make living in this society just a little bit harder, the shit that breastfeeding mothers cop is right up there with Things That Make My Blood Boil (along with shouting men on carpet advertisements and Bratz dolls).

I can’t think of a harder job than being a new mother. You’ve just had a fresh human ripped from your insides, you’re sleep-deprived, wading through domestic chores and don’t get a moment to yourself. Then you step outside for a glimpse at your old, baby-free life, and WHAM.

Some dick complains about you breastfeeding your child.

The "disgusting" act of breastfeeding

Seriously? People can’t take a pair of breasts out in public? When it’d be fine if they were advertising perfume. Or pumped up with silicone and on the front of a men’s magazine, or on display attached to a sunbathing beauty.

These breasts? Fine. Breasts actually doing their job? No way.

Try this on for size: Feeding infants is what breasts are FOR. It’s what they’re designed to do. The amount of whinging about this astounds me – women can even be charged with indecent exposure for breastfeeding in America.

Women being asked to leave restaurants for nourishing a child is especially insulting. It’s a restaurant! You’re eating! I’ve seen fully-grown adults dine in public areas that make far more indecent viewing than a quietly feeding baby. And what’s more, if you don’t breastfeed an infant, it won’t take that quietly – and I’d much rather share public space with a feeding baby than a screaming one.

...but not welcome anywhere else

To combat this sort of stigma, some health care associations and other companies have put up signs reading: ‘Breastfeeding welcome here’. Their intentions may be good, but all this implies is that it’s not welcome anywhere else, that women need a designated area to breastfeed. As though it were something to be ashamed of doing in public, like urinating or smoking, instead of feeding a child.

A lot can go wrong if a baby isn’t fed – they can suffer from lack of energy and nutrients, miss out on important bonding with a parent and get fatigued. All the people walking by have to put up with is a glimpse of a breast.

Ridiculous

In 1959, a nine-year-old boy went to a library to borrow books to quench his thirst for knowledge. And he was refused. Because he was badly-behaved? No. Because there wasn’t an adult with him? No.

It was because the library didn’t lend books to black people.

Fast-forward about twenty years and Dr Ronald E McNair held a PhD in physics from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and was a specialist in laser physics. The idea of refusing him books at a library because of his race seems, to us in Australia in 2011, ridiculous. Who cares if someone’s black? Or a child? Or religious, or a woman, or gay? Shouldn’t they be allowed the same privileges as the rest of their society?

The sense of injustice I felt when learning about the refusal of books is very similar to the way I feel about the current legislation against gay marriage. I don’t see being gay as a disadvantage, or a handicap, or as a problem. Human rights should apply to all humans. And I don’t understand why a rational government would prohibit gay people from marrying each other and being allowed the same rights as people who, through no conscious decision of their own, happen to be heterosexual.

Apart from an unsatisfying move by Centrelink that accepts de facto relationships into their system (purely because it means they can pay people less if their partner earns a certain amount), the changes to gay marriage have been slow despite the fact that 60 per cent of Australians support it.

The shifts are coming. Gay marriage is on the political agenda now, with Penny Wong openly in favour of it. Hasn’t convinced J-Gil yet, but it must be tough being in politics and trying to keep everyone happy.

I’m glad that things are changing, however slow. I hope not only that change will come, but that when we look back in another fifty years, that the idea of not letting two people get married just because they’re gay will seem just as ridiculous as not letting someone borrow a book just because they’re black.

Liking the abuse

I was furious the first time I heard ‘Love the Way You Lie’ by Eminem and Rhianna. Coming out not long after the pop star was violently abused by then partner Chris Brown, I couldn’t believe that she was prettily singing, “Just gonna stand there and watch me burn, well that’s alright because I like the way it hurts”.

It’s not alright, I seethed. That Rhianna, supporting domestic abuse again. First she doesn’t leave Brown after he beats her up, and now she’s glamourising it? What a terrible role model!

Rihanna after being assaulted by Chris Brown

Psychiatrist Dr Michael J. Gerson agreed with my first reaction when he said, “It chills me to think that young people could easily embrace this song as a model for love and desire. I see abused children, spouses, partners and students carry the emotional scars that punctuate their life stories and define their self-concepts”. Right on!

Just recently though, I caught myself happily singing along to ‘Self-Esteem’ by the Offspring, with its chorus of “I know I’m being used, but that’s okay because I like the abuse”.

I love this song, I thought. It’s hilarious. Then I realised I’d put myself in a very hypocritical position. Why am I so outraged about Rhianna appearing to condone abuse, but I find it amusing when Dexter Holland says exactly the same thing?

The messages behind the songs are very similar – both artists here are commenting on the nature of an abusive relationship by seemingly glorifying it. Holland in ‘Self-Esteem’ is really just as provocative as Rihanna on the issue, singing, “the more you suffer, the more it shows you really care – right?”

When I listen to Rihanna singing that chorus, I hear her saying domestic abuse is okay. When Holland sings ‘Self-Esteem’, I hear a satire of the issue. Then again, I could take Holland more seriously. He had a close friend who was sexually abused when he was in high school, and given that most violence against men goes unreported it could be that Holland is using his position as a celebrity to draw attention to the issue. And who am I to say that Rihanna isn’t doing just the same thing?

Still from the 'Love the Way You Lie' video clip

Maybe both Rihanna and Holland are speaking out against domestic violence. Maybe neither of them are because they’re manufactured celebrities who would just say anything as long as it sells. Rihanna is releasing a sequel to the song in November, and maybe I’ll change my mind again when it comes out.

But as someone who likes to say she believes in equality for men and women, I’m starting to think I shouldn’t have two sets of judgements for the same message.

No

There’s another story about a prominent footballer being involved in a sexual assault case doing the rounds today.

Nothing has been proven yet, but it’s certainly not the first time a footballer has been accused of sexual misconduct.

Spida Everitt has thrown in his own comments by tweeting “Girls!! When will you learn! At 3am when you are blind drunk & you decide to go home with a guy ITS NOT FOR A CUP OF MILO! Allegedly……” It’s this sort of blatant disrespect for women that really makes me angry. For a woman to interpret a man’s flirtatious behaviour in a romantic way and assume he wants a committed relationship with her is seen as inappropriate, so why do some men seem to think being sexually suggestive entitles them to sex?

I think this ad, from a current UK campaign against rape, hits the point home – it shows a woman out shopping for a skirt, trying to decide which one she’ll buy. When the saleswoman asks if she needs any help, she says, “Yeah, I’m going out tonight, and I want to get raped. I need a skirt that will encourage a guy to have sex with me against my will”. The idea that dressing or behaving in a certain manner obliges women to follow through with sexual activity is just ridiculous.

Okay, sometimes circumstances must get confusing for footballers. Yes, they’re young, male and revered as celebrities in Melbourne. Yes, they would regularly have admiring women throw themselves at them. But this is no excuse for forcing women into sexual acts that they’re not comfortable with. Sports clubs – and I’d argue, the rest of the community as well – clearly need more guidance and more respect.

The AFL does have a Respect and Responsibility program that advocates the use of ‘education programs’ across the entire organisation, and a statement from CEO Andrew Demetriou claiming, “we find any form of violence towards women abhorrent… creating safe and supportive environments for women is a shared responsibility”. Trouble is, the policy seems to have been last updated in 2005. Since then there have been numerous allegations that football players have acted inappropriately towards women. Some incidents have reached the media – I’d be willing to bet that a number of them have been hushed up.

I didn’t find anything in the AFL’s report that spoke of a zero-tolerance approach to sexual harassment of women, which I think would send a much clearer message to players, employees and the wider community.

In a recent blog about violence against women by Sam deBrito, he refused to excuse harassment on any level, writing: “We all choose our actions, no matter how drunk, stoned, depressed or angry we are and to assert otherwise provides abusers with a dangerous escape clause.”

No means no. There isn’t any other excuse.

Slasher

When you watch a slasher film, you know what you’re going to get. While it’s true that every genre of movie has a certain formula, in a slasher you can put the following elements together like a recipe:

• The killer is a white male with his identity concealed
• The victims are attractive young people, mostly females, who are killed one by one
• The murder weapon is handheld, usually a knife
• The film contains a past event that has traumatised the killer, with the main action set in the present where an event reignites the killer’s vengeful drive
• The sole survivor is a girl

Slight variations in character and setting provide a different flavour to the cake that is a slasher film, but it is a recipe, whether the end result is Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween, Prom Night, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Scream or Psycho. That much is a given. What’s not always obvious at first is who the hero is.

While it’s true that the ‘final girl’ could be seen as the hero of the slasher film, as she alone escapes from the killer, the school of thought I agree with says that in fact, the girl in the slasher film can’t be the main character, because it’s the killer that makes all the action happen. She just reacts.

This theory comes from Laura Mulvey, who argued that when you watch any film, you watch it through a man’s eyes. Her idea of having a “male gaze” meant that whenever you have a female character in a film, she is essentially passive, and males are the active, powerful ones in the story.

In Halloween, the final girl, Laurie, does not move the narrative forward in any significant way. She might end up attacking the killer, but only because she is reacting to the events that he has set in motion by escaping from a mental asylum and murdering her friends. There are several shots that are even filmed from Michael’s direct viewpoint, reinforcing that throughout the film, Michael holds the power. Instead of being substantial characters, the females in the film play passive roles. They are often sexy, meaning they are there to be looked at rather than do anything important.

So who cares if we’re watching a movie through a man’s eyes rather than a woman’s? If films reflect the culture that they’re from, then the danger of always seeing men as active and women as passive in movies might mean that people expect men and women to act like that in real life. That’s not to say that men are suddenly supposed to go around disguising themselves and hacking teenagers to death, but that essentially, men are the important ones while women are mostly there just to be looked at. And I love slasher films – I’d just like to think that as a woman, I can play a bigger part.

Replacements

I found an online recipe for chocolate-peanut dipped banana pops today, tagged with ‘boyfriendreplacement’.

Now, I’m going to ignore the obvious Freudian references to penises here and ask: do people seriously think they can replace partners with chocolate?

There’s a whole website called Boyfriend Replacement that sells ‘fresh, whimsical gifts to cheer up your girlfriends or yourself’. It sells chocolate, t-shirts with slogans like ‘you don’t deserve me’ on them, journals and bubble bath. These things are supposed to ‘replace’ your boyfriend, not help you get over him. Now, it’s been widely reported that chocolate contains endorphins which boost your mood, but I don’t quite see it compensating for an entire relationship.

And it’s not just girls who are looking for someone special without the actual someone. There’s a virtual girlfriend projection that a lonely dude invented to feel less alone in bed – she responds to movement, so it’s supposed to feel like there’s someone lying next to you.

This idea of replacing people is so ridiculous, and it’s not just because of the simple fact that nothing, not chocolate, books, bubble baths or even stupid boy-shaped pillows can replace a real person, even with all the clever marketing and fake sleeves in the world.

It’s mostly ridiculous because having a ‘boyfriend/girlfriend replacement’ puts the focus right back on what the person’s missing – a partner. It’s like when people say, “don’t think of big black hairy spiders,” and then ask you what you’re thinking about. Of course it’s going to be spiders. It’s not going to help anyone feel less alone if all they have surrounding them is reminders of how lonely they are.

Those frozen bananas dipped in chocolate and peanut butter look awesome – I’m going to have a try at making some later on. And when I do, it will be because I think they’ll be delicious, not to replace a person.