Understanding American Society through Feminism
How my curiosity in American Feminism took me deeper
I believe in feminism, but I also believe in biology. While feminism is about empowerment, biology is about understanding our whole self. One’s empowerment cannot happen without understanding one’s whole self.
I don’t believe in increasing more women in tech or certain male-dominated professions, because their empowerment caused many of them to choose jobs other than tech-related ones. I respect their choices. Find more in this study comparing girl’s choice of subjects between welfare countries and developing countries.
I don’t believe in increasing more women in higher-paying positions or the board room, because their empowerment caused many of them to take a career break for raising young children. I respect their choices. Find more in this study in Scandinavian countries where fathers are given options for long parental leave.
I support feminism for the rampant discrimination toward women.
Women in Male-dominated Professions
The reason women face difficulties in male-dominated professions is minority bias. Minority groups tend to be considered as less than, so are women in male-dominated professions. “There aren’t enough women in engineering, because it’s difficult for women to achieve the same level of engineering skills as men. Your skills must be borderline.”
This cognitive bias stands on two logical fallacies. First: minority groups usually don’t survive as well as the the majority group does, so you as minority won’t survive. Second: male-dominated professions are of higher qualifications, so not doing one means that you’re less of a human.
To eliminate the first bias: the environment has been supporting the survival of the majority because facilities have been determined by the majority group. To have the environment safe for everyone, we need to work consciously and thoroughly together. Eliminating the second bias is easier: the perception toward professions is caused by society’s value on high-status jobs, which is also related to economic demand that correlates with different salary levels. We need to have a new mindset: choosing different professions isn’t a matter of what is better/best, but what is more relevant to our calling (irrelevant to gender).
The reason it’s difficult for women to advance their careers is cultural bias leading to lack of opportunities. The bias: women are viewed as subservient, just because they’re less likely to do self-promotion. The lack of opportunities: women are less likely to get offered job stretch opportunities leading to promotion, and women are less likely to get mentoring.
To eliminate the bias: create a fair game. If opportunities are given based on proven performance, no-one would need to self-promote (which leads to sugarcoating) to prove themselves. This isn’t easy.
Grown-up Men, or Healthy Men?
Surprisingly, there are cognitive biases made up as excuses by men, like:
- Women are good note-takers, so please take note for us
- Women are good babysitters, so please babysit for my child while I’m in the meeting
- If we get minority women in our room / trip, we’re afraid we will get sued for sexual harassment
- A breast-pump is a weird device to men, so it deserves a “moo!”
It seems like all men agreeing to the excuses #1 & #2 above actually admire women for note-taking and babysitting skills. They don’t want to perform a job they find difficult, lest they’re found to be poorly performing.
It seems like all men agreeing to the excuse #3 above actually have problems defining sexual harassment. They might not even know how to deal with women, as if their mothers are the only woman they know. They deal with women like they deal with either their mothers or sexual objects in the media. Sexual differences don’t apply in professional situations, but they cannot see women as equally human. They need to practice unseeing sexual traits in professional collaborations.
It seems like all men agreeing to the excuse #4 above actually haven’t grown up. It really reminds me of the boy pranks in middle school, or the catcalling from loitering young men on the streets. Never in my life I encountered catcalling from professional men in my job (outside USA), even as a minority.
That is why I’d like to address all the men who don’t support the four excuses above. While the feminists are attacking the men who have mental problems (insecurity or immaturity), you healthy men are included in the enemy list. I understood why some men started finding that these “attacks from women” are getting too far. Please read the next sections where I explain why feminism may only be addressing symptoms not disease.
References for the above sections: Ellen Pao (author of Reset), Emily Chang (author of Brotopia), Maureen Sherry (author of Opening Belle), Janice Fraser (talk at Leading Design), and Sheryl Sandberg (author of Lean In).
Gender Discrimination by Feudalism
The only cause of gender discrimination I knew in my life before I started living in the USA is feudalism. We can find this in Javanese culture where I was raised, or in Japan that is more widely known to Americans. Feudalism in Europe only lived during the medieval era (during which organized religions were founded), but in Japan and Javanese culture it is still alive until today.
In feudalism, hierarchy is the basis of respect. Everyone has a role to play, including those commonly attributed to certain genders, like going to war for men and home-making for women. Feminism in feudal culture has a different issue to tackle, which is to get people out of the boxes created by feudalism. The campaign is mainly about getting roles dissociated from certain genders. Roles that don’t require biological functions should be free from gender association.
I disagree with the idea that capitalism created New Feudalism. Capitalism alone doesn’t cause feudalism. The rigid boxes of feudalism don’t exist in America, where freedom triumphs everything. This country has a relatively excessive liberalism on public speech and capitalistic endeavor, enabling everyone to participate in say-whatever or capitalize-whatever.
If there are no boxes, what caused the various forms (gender, racial, social class) of discrimination in America? It’s the twisted understanding of freedom. People forget the very basic idea about freedom that a free man is one who can do anything without having the need to hurt others. Capitalism and twisted freedom practiced together produces new hierarchical boxes a.k.a. New Feudalism.
The Heart of Feminism is Empowerment
True freedom means operating on a higher perspective, by having the ability to see higher, speak higher, behave higher than everyone else. True freedom isn’t “I need to save my ass, so let me do whatever that helps me get saved”. That’s powerlessness. True freedom is obtained by discovering your greatness, so you will never have to doubt your own power and seek to establish power over others.
The display of superiority over others in order to feel great is a trait of unhealthy ego we can see everywhere in this world. However, in American society it’s very noticeable and especially apparent within those who are already in powerful positions. Therefore, American feminists can highlight the need for healing the psyche of those who utilize freedom of speech and capitalistic behavior in order to save their ass because they doubt their own power (regardless of gender!).
On a country level, Americans have long been perceived as overly paranoid about other countries beating them. The government invests a lot in military efforts, unaware that they’re actually more powerful than other countries due to their global influence in pop culture and internet technology.
True power comes from within. A country’s power comes from its citizens. In developing countries, power may come from increasing income or education level. In the USA, it may come from removing the New Feudal rules that have created an impression that the government is disempowering its citizens. However, I believe Americans can do much more than that. It’s a wealthy country with wealthy citizens, isn’t it?
Together, Americans can create an environment where individuals don’t need to be busy saving their ass from each other. A good example recently set by Starbucks that decided to open its bathrooms to everyone, where its chairman said, “we don’t want anyone at Starbucks to feel as if we are not giving access to you to the bathroom because you are less than. We want you to be more than”.
The writer is an intense introvert and a world nomad. She lived in two Asian countries and two Western countries before moving to USA and had a culture shock.
Post-writing findings:
- An article about the cause of immaturity and insecurity in American men (2015) — Written by an elderly white man
- A book about insecurity as the dominant culture of Americans resulting in government’s growing fortress mentality to provide security (2009) — Why isn’t this book popular?
- And this is what an American woman felt after living in Europe only for 2.5 years!
