Conference turris::womannotes-v3

    Interestingly, I have found that most (not all, by a long shot, but
    most) Feminists are Equitists.  And a lot more women than men are
    Equitists.  Just as, I suppose, more whites advocate "color-blindness"
    than blacks (in my limited experience.)
    
    It makes sense, I guess, that oppressed peoples would more likely to be
    Equitists...I think they are more likely to see the inequity that
    exists already.
    
    D!

    D!,
    
    You've done a good job stating a confusing difference between two
    mind sets, both of whom are trying to be "fair."  I believe, as you
    do, that equity is more fair.  As Jean-Luc Picard of the Starship
    Enterprise once said, "There can be no justice as long as laws are
    absolute.  Life itself is an exercise in exceptions."
    
    I think men are more likely to be equalists because, in general, they
    are less comfortable with emotion.  In a given situation, men either
    fail to see the emotional context or fail to see why it should be given
    any value.
    
                   Sue
    
    
    

    Taken at a systemic level, your arguments are valid, but at a personal
    level, such activities will inevitably cause backlash.  For instance,
    it is valid to say that the people who have the most power in this
    society are white men.  But it is not valid to say that all white men
    have power.  It is valid to say that some men benefit from sexism, but
    it is not valid to say that all men benefit from sexism.  So, if a
    white man who, (rightly or wrongly) _feels_ just as dis-enfranchised as
    he believes the rest of society is, and he gets caught up in a
    situation where "equity" rules against him, as in an Affirmative Action
    sort of decision, he is going to feel hurt and abused and is going to
    feel like lashing back in some way.  He may feel that past wrongs
    aren't his fault, and he may feel that it isn't fair for him to pay for
    transgressions committed by others.  And his feelings are going to be
    quite valid.  

    Not that this is an excuse for breaking the law, mind, nor is it a
    reason for society to ignore past wrongs or try to correct those
    wrongs, but it is a reason why it is difficult for many men to accept
    the premise that they should offer themselves and their families up for
    sacrifice because someone else has treated people unequally.  It is a
    reason why many people are resistant to an "equity" type solution,
    especially since so many people on the political side of things spend
    so much time talking about "equality", when what they really mean is
    "equity".

    Just a point of view that I thought deserved mentioning, and not meant
    to create any hard feelings, or be the basis for ignoring just redress
    of wrongdoing.
    
    Mike

Basically what I hear you saying, Mike, is that many people belong
to groups which are "in power" are resistent to the Equity argument because
it takes away some of their power.  I agree entirely, which is exactly what
I said in the "Do men benefit from sexism" note - men (and other groups
in power) are going to resist to the best of their ability equalizing 
the power distribution.  I don't see that as a reason not to do it, 
though.

>He may feel that past wrongs
>    aren't his fault, and he may feel that it isn't fair for him to pay for
>    transgressions committed by others.  And his feelings are going to be
>    quite valid.  

No, I don't think his feelings are "quite valid."  The past wrongs may
not be his fault, but he has still benefitted from them.  He didn't
institute or enforce the bucket-on-the-foot rule, perhaps, but he is
still running bucket-free in a race in which half the people have buckets
on their feet.  And so he may be angry that he has to stop running while
the bucket-people catch up, but his anger doesn't make it less right.

>It is a
>    reason why many people are resistant to an "equity" type solution,
>    especially since so many people on the political side of things spend
>    so much time talking about "equality", when what they really mean is
>    "equity".

I know very well why people are resistent to the equity argument. It means
they have to give up the (unfair) advantages given to them by society.  I'd
resist it, too!

And no, when "we" talk about equality, we don't really mean equity. We mean
equality.  As I said in my base note, equality is a *goal*.  It is something
to be worked towards. I think the only way to get there is through the
righting of current inequities.

Twice in your note you used the phrase "past wrongs".  This is a common
phrase from Equalists.  The flaw is that the wrongs we want righted are
not *past* wrongs, they are *current* inequities. The past wrong was putting
the bucket on some people's feet - the way to right that is to remove the
bucket. That's easy enough. but the *current* inequity is that some of
the racers are behind because of the bucket through no fault of their own.
The way to equalize it is to help the bucket-people catch up with the no-bucket
people.

Equalists (such as yourself) seem to believe that they are being made to pay
for "past" wrongs, and that if everything right here and right now were to
suddently become equal that all would be well. The fallacy is that wrongs
and the inequities still exist, and even if suddenly every employer were to
stop discriminating, every college professor were to be free of bias, every
misogynist were to suddenly "see the light", women would *still* be behind,
and they would remain so until something came along to help them catch up.

D!
D!

    re. 'offering up theirselves and their families for sacrifice ...'
    
    While I find the language a bit lurid, it's a fair expression of a
    truth that I've found in my own life.
    
    The truth is the only thing in our Western Society I had going
    _against_ me was being female.  I was born to well-educated,
    well-connected, wealthy, white Anglican parents who saw to it that,
    should I live the prescribed life, I would inherit _all_ of the
    preference, advantage, and priviledge of my class.
    
    I was 7 years old before it dawned upon me why the little girl I'd play
    with on Saturdays at The Mall [in DC] could not be asked back for tea.
    She was black. She understood. She didn't even seem to mind.  I cried.
    I was spoiled and didn't like being denied. But I cried, too, because
    she was my friend and I wanted for her all the fine and pretty things
    and places that I had.
    
    It wasn't fair.  I was going to grow up and change all that!
    
    When I was 10, I flew to join my parents where they were living in
    Portugal during my Christmas break.  In the car on the way to their
    house I saw old women staggering under heavy loads, children in worn
    clothing laughing and running beside my car, idle men standing on
    street corners eyeing me with resentment.  By this time, I knew that I
    was 'different' and 'better' -- concepts that left me feeling
    uncomfortable and often ashamed, but always lucky.
    
    It wasn't fair.  When I grew up I was going to feed and clothe the
    world.
    
    In my late teens, I stepped outside the protective web of influence and
    priviledge when I went to the 'wrong' school, in the 'wrong'
    discipline, and began to live my _own_ life.  It was a big adjustment
    and I put many a foot wrong.  Seeing the _effort_ behind _so many_
    things I had always taken for granted was both appalling and a voyage
    of wonder. 
    
    My perception began to shift.  It was obvious that there just wasn't
    enough 'stuff' in the world to provide everyone with what I had.  Why
    should people like me have food to throw away, when children living in
    the same town were going to bed hungry?  Why should some people drink
    and party their way through school, knowing that they had a lucrative
    job awaiting them regardless of their performance, while others worked
    two jobs between classes and lived on No-Doz [and them the lucky ones
    who had even enough money to do _that_]?
    
    It wasn't fair.  It was apparent that them like me had some giving up
    to do.
    
    Sure I look back sometimes, wistfully missing shoes that _really_ fit
    and dishes that were always clean and not worrying about mortgage
    payments and fitting electrical repairs into the budget.  But I still
    have an awful lot more than most -- a comfortable home, a <fairly>
    secure job that I _like_, pretty clothes, a shiny red Toyota,  ...
    
    I don't feel I've made any real 'sacrifices' and I _was_ able to help
    someone[s].  I still try.
    
      Annie

    I'd like to continue the "foot-race" analogy a bit because I think its
    important.
    
    In any race, there are winners and losers. In this foot race, among all
    the people with no buckets, some are going to speed ahead, and some are
    not. Some are going to pass out in the first stretch, some are going to
    get cramps because they didn't train, some are going to trip and get
    disqualified, etc. Of the people with buckets on their feet: most will
    trip. Most will take a few falls. And a couple of incredible ones are
    going to figure out how to run with the bucket, and they will pass the
    bucketless people! One or two might actually be contenders for the top
    1/5 percentile, though probably at the bottom.
    
    Now, if you take the buckets off (pretend to turn off sexism/racism like a
    switch) some racers will catch up. Some will pass the mainstream. Some
    may become 1st place contenders. On the other hand, some will have no
    concept of how to run without the bucket, and will continue to trip
    because they are used to tripping! Some will be too discouraged and
    will sit on the sidelines because they know they'll never catch up
    (along with some folks who didn't have buckets to begin with!). In
    general, the folks who had buckets will be BEHIND.
    
    Now, if you FREEZE all the previously bucketless people, then some of
    the ones who were in the middle will get real pissed. Because now, even
    more people will be able to pass them, including those people whom they
    had kind of expected to beat. If you freeze it long enough for the
    previously bucketed people to really feel like they've got a chance,
    some of the people UP FRONT will get pissed, because the competition
    just got stiffer! And they won't like competing with people who have
    something to prove, because they used to have buckets.
    
    At the same time, there will still be plenty of people who had buckets
    still in the back. There may be no reclaiming those people. Starting
    out a race with a bucket can drain all hope, no matter how much you
    encourage folks. Some of these people may even tend to trip each other,
    just so that someone else will feel as hopeless as they do.
    
    But the race goes on.
    
    In America, as soon as Affirmative Action comes along, the competition
    DOES get stiffer. And the person who must now compete, and LOSE, is
    gonna get mad. In fact, many of the people who are running as fast as
    they did before, but are now being outdistanced by people who were
    previously behind them, are gonna get mad, rather than running harder.
    What they don't realize is that a lot of the people who are helped by
    AA are people who decided to run harder. Its hard for AA to help people
    who won't even run.
    
    I have seen Affirmative Action put me ahead of some front-runners. And
    I have seen some very unhappy former front-runners. But this is a
    marathon. Obviously, if I can't run, I WILL fall behind. AA is only a
    temporary gain in the big picture. But the front-runners never seem to
    see that. They only see me running with them, when I was supposed to be
    behind them. And they are pissed. And they take it out on me.
    
    Sometimes it makes it so you'd just as soon let them pass, just so
    they'd shut up. Unfortunately, the race is too important, and too many
    people need to see me up front so that they will feel the run is worth
    the effort.

    Another reason I think men are more likely to be equalists is
    that often they are still thinking in patriarchy mode. (My definition
    of patriarchy is an entire social system modeled on the way little
    boys interact - that is, if there are two of anything, one has to
    dominate.) In patriarchy mode, it's always win/lose, so equalists
    are afraid of equity because they think our ultimate goal is to
    behave as they behaved. (Imagine the horror of turning on CNN and
    seeing an almost all female Senate deciding your fate. There
    might be a couple of men there, but they're hard to spot since they've
    chosen to dress for success and are wearing outfits by Norma Kamali.)
    Relax, equalists, we don't want to turn the tables. We only want a
    metaphoric minute or two to catch up.
    

Thanks for the note, 'ren.  I agree with all you said!

But...what is the solution.  I think the bucket analogy extends quite well -
but, what do you do about the people so discouraged by the bucket that
they've given up?  What do you do about the people who won't even run because
the race is fixed from the start?  Taking the buckets off isn't enough.
(Equalism.)  Freezing the bucket people till the no-bucket people catch up
isnt' enough (equitism.)  So - what do to?

D!

    D! keep in mind that it isn't only the bucketed people who feel the
    race is fixed. Some people feel the race is fixed for the simple reason
    that they aren't good at running. Oh, they can swim, sing, paddle a
    boat, or race on bicycle! But they can't RUN. So, the race is fixed for
    them TOO!
    
    The nice thing would be if we stopped racing. But the fact is, there
    are too many people who are motivated by the race, and who believe that
    society would stagnate if we didn't run. The alternative is to provide
    for the people who cannot run, or who drop out of the race. Not giving
    them anything equivalent to those who run, but enough to live dignified
    lives without running. This promotes the race without fully penalizing
    those who cannot run.
    
    I think the biggest, most important challenge is teaching every child
    what the race is about, letting them know that its somewhat fixed, i.e.
    you can only win by being a great runner in top shape with no
    handicaps, and teaching them not to roll up their sense of self-esteem
    and self-worth in where they place in the race. Some kids will go for
    the race. Its understandable; it holds certain rewards. But there has
    to be a way to live without running. And we need to explore and exploit
    that concept.

    "what would work?" is THE interesting question.  Equalists might point
    to the USSR as a failed example of equitism.  Equitists might point to
    the US as a failed example of equalism.

    Moving away from the analogy:
    
    Racism and sexism tend to flare up the most when there is a perception
    that life's necessities are not plentiful enough to share or go around.
    When the average American is struggling to get a piece of the pie, its
    not the right moment to be expanding the competition! Not without a
    fight.
    
    So, I think, seriously, that the best way to combat racism and sexism
    is to work harder at creating meaningful work with realistic salaries
    for the majority of people. I think it may also include some
    redistribution of wealth within the population, from the rich to the
    poor... not from the middle class to the poor! And I think it also
    includes defining a standard of living that's achievable, and putting
    that within reach of all Americans. Food, clothing, shelter...
    education, health, cleanliness. No more roach infested, condemnable
    housing for the poor, no more substandard education.
    
    BUT... I also recognize quite well that all this and more does not help
    those who will not do for themselves. And I STRONGLY FEEL that this
    nation needs to send a strong national message to its young people
    about the responsibilities of adulthood and parenthood. And that if you
    don't feel up to the responsibilities, don't parent. We have a growing
    population of young people who are undisciplined, in part because their
    parents didn't know how. And we're going to pay for it soon.
    
    Oops... I got on the soapbox again...

      re .10
    
    Sara, you said what I didn't want to say.

    re: .4 (D!)

    A good and fair reply, D!  

    First, I would like to comment on my usage of the phrase "past wrongs".
    I'm afraid you caught me with my Freudian Slip showing.  Of course, you
    are right, racism and sexism are not just in the past, but are here
    right now.  While I was writing my last reply, I was thinking about a
    specific incident that happened to me a long time ago, hence the reason
    why my focus was sort of in the past.

    Your comment that people who belong to groups that are in "power" and
    are reluctant to give up power is true, but only to some extent.  Those
    who are actually in power know who they are, and work against equity
    solutions because they don't want to lose power.  That's clear,
    understandable behavior in humans, and obvious.  What isn't always
    quite so obvious is that not all men, white or otherwise, perceive
    themselves to be in any particular position of power.  They feel that
    they are scratching and clawing their way along, and trying to do their
    best for themselves and their family, just like everyone else, and feel
    no more powerful than anyone else.  Now, if one takes the long view, it
    is plain that such men do have the advantage over women, but that is
    something that isn't always obvious when one is down in the trenches
    trying to get along.  They are sometimes only conscious of the daily
    struggle that they face, apparently made all the more difficult when
    they believe that someone is accusing them of doing something they feel
    no part of, and then denying them a "fair" shake because of that.

    I'm not looking for sympathy for anyone here, but I do think it is
    worth remembering that not everyone feels as empowered as others think
    they do or ought to, and that the possibilities for resentment are
    definitely there, and ought to be taken into account when developing
    programs designed to help the truly disadvantaged.  At least that's how
    it seems to me.  Oh yeah, and please don't ask me how one should take
    all this into account, because I haven't the foggiest idea.  Maybe just
    recognition that this situation is out there is enough.

    Also, in my opinion, it isn't really reasonable to discount the
    validity of feelings that people have who are in the position I
    describe.  The feelings may be based on wrong assumptions, or on
    ignorance, but the feelings are valid nevertheless.  One invalidates
    human feelings felt by others at one's own peril, I think.

    Again, none of this is meant to deny that injustices past, AND
    PRESENT(!) must be redressed.  I just want to indicate that the group
    of humans called men isn't quite as heterogeneous as some portray us, or
    believe us to be.

    Mike
                                      

Well, it might be that communism is a form of Equitism, but since the USSR
is a failed example of communism, I don't think the USSR's failure works as
an argument against Equitism.  I think communism, *real* communism, is a
form of Equitism, but not the only one.

Getting back to our bucket analogy, communism in essence says "*everyone*
wins, everyone gets exactly the same prize."  It is obvious (to me, anyway)
why this hasn't worked exceptionally well in the past.  It definitely 
compensates for inequities, but it also provides no incentive to keep
running.  There are other systems which can compensate for the bucket
handicap without removing the incentive to win.  Affirmative Action is a 
start - it encourages bucketted-types to race because it gives them a push
forward, but it still holds a carrot out at the end only for those who
finish well.

As for the US being a failed example of Equalism, again, I think that is
true in theory, the same way that the US is in theory a democracy. But
the basic premise of equalism is that everyone is treated equally *now*
(regardless of past inequities) and that is simply not true.  Not everyone
is treated equally by the law, by the system or by society.  (Folks, we
don't even have the ERA!!)

'ren, what you suggested in your notes is essentially communism - redistribution
of the wealth, removing the incentive to run, etc.  I'm not saying this is
wrong - myself, I think communism is closer to "right" than our system.  But
it has it's flaws...

D!

Mike, you make a lot of good points, and I essentially agree. I guess my
basic feeling is: so what?  Yeah, the people without the bucket, *especially*
those who are falling behind the other no-bucket people, the ones who aren't
very good runners even without the bucket, are going to feel angry and
gypped.  Yeah, well, that's the race and that's how it works.  I can feel
sympathy but - c'est la vie.  (I am willing to be persuaded that the race as
a whole is a bad idea...)

>The feelings may be based on wrong assumptions, or on
>    ignorance, but the feelings are valid nevertheless.  One invalidates
>    human feelings felt by others at one's own peril, I think.

I think "invalidating feelings" is a buzz phrase with little meaning. 

You said that some people who are in "empowered" groups would feel that
this "Equitist" treatment isn't equitable at all.  I said that his feelings
are "invalid" - not meaning he doesn't have a right to feel them, or that
his feelings are not understandable, but that those feelings have little
to do with reality.  Just because he feels gypped doesn't mean the system
is unfair.  While he may *percieve* himself as being in a disempowered 
group, the truth is, he has still been running without a bucket, and therefore
has had advantages, whether he sees them or not.

D!

    aye, Ren, and shorter too! ;-)
    
    it's tough, since we have here a conflict between the rights of
    individuals, as near to a sacred concept as we have in the U.S.A., and
    the injustice and long-lasting effects of wrongs inflicted on a
    minority group.
    
    I think the only workable solutions would involve those with views on
    both sides agreeing to a compromise path somewhere in the middle, with
    a clearly defined path that redresses past inequities, and has a
    defined end, a point in time in the future after which equality will
    rule.                    
    
    Now!  all we have to do is define what will redress the past
    inequities, decide how long it will take, and get the whole country to
    agree to the plan.  Details, details.

    The following is entered for a noter who wishes to remain anonymous.
    
    					Ann B., co-moderator
    
    ====================================================================
    
There's a big fallacy with freezing the bucketless people.

Say that one of the bucketless people makes running shoes.  When you
freeze him, you shut down his factory.  But now that the bucket people
are catching up, we find they're coming along at a walk because their
buckets kept them from learning how to run.  To learn to run, they need
running shoes.  But they can't have any because you won't let him make
any for them.

The better way is to get the shoemaker to sell his shoes at a discount
to anyone who brings in a bucket.  This is partly what Affirmative
Action tries to do, but instead of making him sell them at a discount,
Affirmative Action makes him give them away.  That hurts his profit
picture enough that he goes out of business, and nobody gets any shoes
after that.

    Egads, this issue has really grabbed me!
    
    I was wondering: WHO CARES ABOUT EQUALITY ANYWAY???
    
    Ya know, as Americans, we're pretty strange. When I look at other
    countries, namely: England, China, India, to name a few, I see places
    where inequality, sometimes even within a fairly homogeneous society,
    is commonplace! There are the poor, who stay poor, and the rich, who
    stay rich. And I start to wonder, why are we on this equality kick
    anyway?
    
    I think it has to do with a very idealistic but unacheivable sentence
    in our Declaration of Independence about all men being created equal,
    having unalienable rights to include life, liberty and the pursuit of
    happiness, etc.  As everyone knows, even the penners of the document
    didn't really believe this. Half of them had slaves (well, blacks
    aren't people, right?) they certainly, obviously didn't mean women, and
    in general, they didn't really mean anyone without the money to back it
    up.
    
    But once it got written down, the country seems to have taken it to
    heart. Without considering whether its really possible to achieve.
    
    Life is already unequally threatened in this nation depending on
    whether or not you're black and make the dreaded mistake of killing a
    white person... the fact that the lives of black people are less
    valuable than the lives of white people has not changed all that much
    in the last 300 years, especially depending on who does the killing!
    
    Then there's liberty. Lets talk freedom from rape... and then lets look
    at how rape cases are prosecuted, and how the typical defense line is
    "She was asking for it". If we throw in color issues, things really get
    bad. Because its damned difficult to prosecute a white man for raping a
    black woman. Its hard enough to prosecute a white man for raping a
    white woman. But its EASY to prosecute a black man for raping a white
    woman even if all he did is LOOK at her, or worse still, even if its
    jut mistaken identity (we all look alike). Okay, maybe I'm
    exaggerating... it was like this 50 years ago, it may be better today.
    Lets hope I never have to test that theory.
    
    And then there's pursuit of happiness. Geez, let's get real. You can't
    pursue happiness without some money. So, freedom to pursue happiness
    includes freedom to find gainful employment. Or legal income. And we
    have yet to EQUALIZE this process. The saying "its not what you know
    but who you know" still means something in America, even if its not
    supposed to.  
    
    My point... I think the search for equality is unrealistic. I'm not
    saying that I want to spend my life on the bottom, but I think its more
    important to work at raising the standard of living for those on the
    bottom than fighting for equality for those in the middle.
    
    Work calls...

Huh?

I don't follow you at all.   Please try to explain how your analogy of
a shoe store corresponds to the real world.

D!

    The following is a reply from a different writer who prefers to
    remain anonymous.
    
    					Ann B., co-moderator
    
    ========================================================================
    
    re: .17  Anon

    The line in your analogy that has Affirmative Action "giving [something]
    away" is the real fallacy (with insulting implications to minorities.)

    It almost sounds as if you're trying to imply that if very many white
    men lose their positions as leaders in the workplace, we might as well
    shut it all down and go home (since no one else would be able to handle
    the responsibility.)

    Surely this wasn't the point of your analogy.

    The following is from the anonymous author of .17.
    
    					Ann B., co-moderator
    
    ======================================================================
    
How does a shoe store relate to the real world?

Try education.  Instead of giving inadequately educated 16-year-old
black boys the three R's, which is what certain ones of them really
need, you make them study biology because that's what you teach in the
10th grade, which is where you put them because they're 16. That takes
so much effort from the teacher that there isn't time to give that
little extra push to the whites who are ready for it, so the class
slows down, and the white girl who was going to discover a cure for
AIDS doesn't get her college degree.  And the black boys, who weren't
ready and couldn't absorb the biology, get frustrated and quit school
and end up out there on the streets.  I don't like this, but it's real.
Sure, it's unfair.  To both boys.  And, in the long run, to the world.

Try jobs.  Affirmative Action's quota system forces a biomedical
company to give a job to a black woman even though there is a white man
who is more qualified for the job.  The white man was going to be the
one who discovers a cure for AIDS, but now he can't get into the field.
I don't like this, but it's real.  Sure, it's unfair.  To both workers.
And, in the long run, to the world.

Solutions aren't quite as simple as substituting equity for equality. 
And to save you the trouble of asking, no.  I do not have a solution. 
But, to borrow an analogy from another string, I'm not part of the
problem, as you seem to be asserting.  I'm part of the precipitate, and
it so happens that in this particular reaction some of us who are part
of the precipitate are strongly inclined to go back into solution.

Anon, I *still* don't understand how your analogy relates to the real world.
What are the "shoes" that are being sold, and what is the "store"??

As for the 16 year old boy who should be learning to read but is instead
learning biology - what does that have to do with the issue?  It seems to
me that is a problem of underfunding in the schools - we should have
remedial glasses for the kid who can't read, and advanced classes for the
8th grader who wants to study calculus. Unfortunately, not all school systems
have classes for all types of kids.  I think this is because education, and
children in specific, are undervalued in our society, but that is a different
issue.

The fact that it is a *black* boy who can't read, well, that's what I said -
it is because he had a bucket on his foot.  The bucket, in this case, might
be that he lives in a poor neighborhood with a bad school system, that he
wasn't encouraged in his pursuit of intellectual activities and had no 
immediate or celebrity role models, and a hundred other things.  I think this
lends support to the Equity argument, that saying that people should be
treated equally from here on in doesn't make sense.  The Equality argument
says that all people should be able to teach biology.  The Equity argument
says that that doesn't do much good to the kid who is already behind because
of hir "bucket".

I am totally missing your point about the affirmative action and the cure
for AIDS.  Are you saying that there are flaws with affirmative action? 

I am *highly* uncomfortable with your use of AIDS in this context. I get
the feeling you are appealing to emotion to make your point, but disguising 
it as an appeal to logic.  The "rightness" of an action doesn't matter whether
the job being applied for is as a researcher in a bio-med firm or a janitor
at a computer company.  What does AIDS have to do with it?

>Solutions aren't quite as simple as substituting equity for equality. 

I can't imagine where you got the idea that anyone said any solution was
"simple". There have been 21 notes in this string about how *difficult* the
problem is and about how solutions are hard to think up and harder to 
implement.

>But, to borrow an analogy from another string, I'm not part of the
>problem, as you seem to be asserting.

Is that "you" supposed to mean me, personally?  *I* am asserting that you
are part of the problem??  I don't even know who you are!  (Perhaps you have
forgotten that you posted this note anonymously?)  I haven't said *anything*
in this note about who is the problem and who is the solution.  You have to
look into yourself and decide whether you are a part of the problem.

>I'm part of the precipitate, and
>it so happens that in this particular reaction some of us who are part
>of the precipitate are strongly inclined to go back into solution.

I'm missing your analogies again.  Precipitate - like, what, you have 
fallen out of the solution?  What do you mean by solution in this instance?
(Clearly you have switched contexts from meaning "solution" to a problem to
"solution" as being one chemical dissolved in another.)  What makes you
precipitate?  What does it mean to be part of the solution?

I get the feeling you are defensive about this (you claim I am asserting you
are part of the problem) but I can't figure out why, or what you are even
defending.

D!

To give credit where credit is due, I didn't come up with the Equality/
Equity dichotomy.  It was presented to me by my senior (high school)
year psychology teacher.  She asserted that men are more likely to be
Equalists (my term, her concept) and women more likely to be Equitists;
she didn't approach it from a political stand-point though - she said
that Equitism was just more feminine (in our culture, women are more
"emotional" and men are more "logical".)  I disagree with her about *why*
women are more like to be Equitists - I think it isn't because of their
nurturing and emotional nature so much as because they see first hand the
nature of inequity.  (I don't know if this is *her* concept, or somebody 
else's that she was teaching us.)

(Some people who have been in this file may have watched my progression from
self-identified "humanist" to self-identified "feminist."  I think that 
Feminism, as I use the word, is largely based in Equitism, where as humanism,
as I use the word, is largely based in Equalism.  Two years ago I definitely
identified more with the Equality argument.  The past two years have opened
my eyes to a lot of the inequality and inequity in the world, and just how
pervasive the effects of the "bucket" are, and I have shifted more toward the
Equity argument, and therefore to feminism.)

D!

    The following is from the author of .20, who still wishes to remain
    anonymous.
    
    					Ann B., co-moderator
    
    ====================================================================
    
    RE: .17 and .21  Anon

    Sorry to say that after reading your second note, I still get the
    unmistakable impression that you can't conceive of a situation
    where a black student with the cure for AIDS is denied the chance
    to give the world his gifts because of worries that a program like 
    Affirmative Action will keep whites (our only Intelluctual Hope) 
    from their places as the providers of answers to the world's problems.

    More simplicity may be needed in this discussion, but a view of
    minorities as dragging the majority down is a simplistic, insulting
    stereotype.  And it's damn unfair.

     re .21
    
    Anonymous author, I hope that you will help all of us who are fighting
    to see to it that Affirmative Action does not GIVE AWAY jobs to the
    unqualified. I am a big supporter of Affirmative Action, but I also
    hate quotas. They do more than just fill jobs with unqualified
    minorities, they also circumvent the purpose of AA, which is to force
    companies to find QUALIFIED people.
    
    There is an implication, which I'm sure is not true, that only a white
    person will find the cure for AIDS, because a white person is always
    more qualified. And that is far from true. There are plenty of capable,
    talented, articulate minorities who are just as likely to cure AIDS, if
    given the challenge. The point is that these minorities need to be
    given that opportunity, so that the pool of PEOPLE working on the cure
    includes EVERY QUALIFIED INDIVIDUAL, not just the white ones. That's
    what Affirmative Action is about. Not putting unqualified people in
    jobs. Such action horrifies most black people as much as it angers
    whites. Many of us don't want a free ride. Many black people are well
    educated. Intelligent. Capable. But for years were denied the
    opportunity to work to their capability. That is what AA seeks to
    address.
    
    I think it is unfortunate for a school not to have an honors track, for
    its brightest and best. Many schools do. So, your gifted white female,
    if she blooms early, will hopefully not be hampered by education. But
    what about the gifted black male? Surely you would not keep him OUT of
    the honors track, just because he talks differently and uses slang? Or
    because his potential hasn't always been exercised. The question is
    whether or not it is wrong not to seek out ability in a child. And when
    assumptions are made that black children cannot learn, cannot excel,
    cannot achieve, then we have a big problem.
    
    There are plenty of schools where the gifted white female is as likely
    to be held back by white trash as by black hoodlums. I personally find
    your analogy insulting, especially since we're only 14% of the nation,
    its hard to believe that we can hold the rest back so effectively.
    
    Most of us want to fight against quotas. But we just differ in how to
    do it. I say that we need to work harder to make sure companies find
    QUALIFIED minorities, based on the assumption that they exist. I
    personally think that anyone who isn't ready to make that assumption
    has some serious prejudices about the intellectual capabilities of
    black Americans, and they need to change. 
    
    I'm not saying that this is your belief, I'm making a general
    statement.

>    Sorry to say that after reading your second note, I still get the
>    unmistakable impression that you can't conceive of a situation
>    where a black student with the cure for AIDS is denied the chance
>    to give the world his gifts

Thanks, Anon #2, you put your finger on something else that was making
me uncomfortable about Anon #1's note that I wasn't quite able to.

It seems much more likely to me that a black person with the cure to
AIDS or cancer or whatever would be denied a job because of discrimination
than that a white person with said cure would be denied the job because
of affirmative action.  Either way, if you postulate a situation in which
there is only one job, and two people applying for it, you can't know for
sure which person is going to be better, and any system of determining it
is sure to sometimes fail.

D!

    re: .15 (D!)

    Okay, fair enough.  We are close enough to agreeing that I don't think
    it's worth debating the difference.  The points I've been talking about
    are obviously something that you don't feel a lot of ownership for,
    (your expressed feeling of "so what", pretty much said it all), nor
    would I feel much different if I were you, I guess.

    The race, and should there be one?  Now that is an interesting question
    in it's own right.  I'm not too sure how how else we can live,
    considering that nature has pretty much set up survival as a
    competitive situation at the individual level.  Of course, we humans
    have taken this competition to an unnecessarily high level, especially
    here in the West, I think.  So, I guess I'm convinced that we need to
    turn down the level of competition a bit, not only amongst us humans,
    but with the rest of nature as well.   But I'll be darned if I would
    know how to go about it.  Besides, I don't it's possible, or even
    desireable, to eliminate competition from life completely. 
    
    Mike 
                                       

    The following is from the anonymous author of .20 and .24 (a.k.a.
    Anonymous #2).
    
    					Ann B., co-moderator
    
    =========================================================================
    
    By the way, if the majority does allow for equity in the race by giving
    the people with buckets on their feet a chance to make up the lost ground
    - I don't see it as "dragging anyone down."

    Increased competition will make the race more interesting (and even the
    leaders will be spurred to try harder, which will bring more excellence
    to the playing field!)

    Anon #2....Yes!  I agree completely - Giving one group a fair shake
    does *not* drag the other down, but makes life better for all
    concerned!  Thanks.
    
      -HA

    seems to me that folks are talking past eachother here.
    
    anon #2, 0f .17 and .21 fame, seems to me to be giving us the Ayn Rand
    point of view -- which does not really address racial issues.  Rand
    would say that if you hamper the makers of running shoes enough, they
    will throw up their hands and say "why bother!" and stop making shoes
    altogether.  Now, if running shoes are a necessity of life, here, then
    we are all out of luck, no?  D!, stop being so literal about them being
    shoes :').  The point of it is, that even if the buckets are melted
    down and everybody made equal next week, there will still be no more
    sneakers.  It's a problem not of intent or goals, but means.
    
    (I don't recommend that folks wade through the drek of Rand's prose,
    which is simply dreadful imo.  But her ideas provoke thought.  Get the
    liner notes :-)
    
    anon #2, the real question is how to keep the sneaker maker in business
    and profitable, while getting to the goal of an equitable society, so
    that we can then be a society based on equality.
    
    it can't be forced (Mao failed).  It can't be done by browbeating
    (religion has failed).  Capitalism as practiced has failed.  
    
    What works????
    
    Sara
    

    Hey wassa matter with Rand's prose?  I think she wrote in pretty good
    English, for a Russian.  
    
    Mike

    Buckets on their feet?  This is too funny.
    
    The last generation of AA should have removed those buckets.
    
                                      L.J.
    

    >The last generation of AA should have removed those buckets.
    
    Yeah, it *should* have.  But it didn't.
    
    And even if it had, they previously bucketted people would still be
    behind, no?
    
    D!

	All people with buckets, why did you let them get tied to you in the 
	first place, and if you did, why didn't you untie them and throw them 
	away.
	Alternatively, when you were running, or walking, why didn't you use the
 	bucket to collect things along the way, then sell them for a car, and
	overtake the rest?

	If you are always looking at others to define the rules and boundaries,
 	then you will be dissapointed, whether you have the bucket to begin 
	with and are behind because of this "rule", or whether you are at the 
	front, and the others catchup - because of a "rule change".

	Heather

Heather, think a bit about the last 150 years in the USA, then post again if you
still stand by your .34.  It's a lot different here than in the UK.

Rand's prose is awful.  It's actually not the prose, so much as the fact that 
she beats you about the head and shoulders with Her Message, for hundreds of 
pages at a time.  And she seems to believe in wordless-mystical-attraction love
affairs, which no one resents when they end. A new kind of fairy tale.  And she
has no regard whatsoever for the "little people", they are either stupid and
willfully blind, like the folks who socialized John Galt's factory, or they are
stupidly noble and dedicated, in which case she kills them off in an abandoned
train in the Mojave desert, like Dagby's faithful dog I mean underling, whose
name even I forget.  Nice reward he gets, eh!

Back to the topic.  I don't believe that Equity or Equality is wrong.  The
problem is, they are both right.  Somehow we need to combine the right parts of
both....

    
    re: .34  No one ever said to me, plainly: 'Look here, you've got to
    have this bucket tied to your foot.'  If they did, I didn't understand
    because I was only a baby.  It took many years for me to realise that 
    I had that bucket there and sometimes it feels like I'm IN the damned
    bucket!
    
    CQ

    
    Heather, maybe I'm wrong, but I've gotten the impression that people of
    color in the UK also have buckets on their feet. White people in the UK
    do not flock to employ them and allow them to have similar employment
    opportunities. As minorities, there is only so much you can do when the
    majority wants you to fail, because they prefer not to see you compete
    with them for jobs.
    
    If this is inaccurate, if people of the islands, India, etc. enjoy full
    status as members of the Commonwealth and are welcome at any time to
    reside in the UK and achieve their fullest potential, along side white
    citizens, then I stand corrected. Let me know if there is absolutely no
    racism in the UK. Because that's ONE of the buckets we speak of, and
    its not something that people of color raised their hands and asked
    for.

    A brief digression on the concept of "the last generation of....".  The
    underlying assumption in that statement is that we have had a
    generation of AA (or feminism, as the two movements have synchronous
    beginnings, and much of the legislation impacting one impacted both).
    
    I would suggest that we haven't *had* a generation of AA/feminism yet,
    in spite of the traditional demographic stance that 20 years
    constitutes a generation.  Instead, for the purposes of the vast kind
    of social change that AA/feminism is striving for, a "generation" means
    the time it takes for those who were raised to the new standards or in
    the new pattern of thought to *complete* their careers/family raising. 
    Until that occurs, the opportunities that are available are colored by
    the old mind-sets of those whose world-view was set before the new
    thought pattern took hold.
    
    Alison  

    The following is, as stated, a reply from an anonymous author.
    
    					Ann B., co-moderator
    
    =================================================================
    
I'm anon #1, the author of .17 and .21.  Obviously, my use of analogy
is not making my point, so I'll explain in clearer terms.

The shoe store.

    The shoe store is the real world, in which we all have to function
    *together*.  Regardless of who has had running shoes (a good job, a
    good education, an X chromosome, white skin, any advantage you care
    to name), it doesn't make sense to arbitrarily deprive those so
    advantaged of their advantages just so those who aren't so
    advantaged can catch up.

    The inequity of the present situation, which I freely admit exists,
    cannot be adjusted in that way.  You cannot legislate morality or
    charity.  You can encourage the advantaged to share their wealth.
    By wealth I mean advantages of any kind, not just money.  Teaching
    an advantaged person how he or she will benefit by giving an assist
    to disadvantaged people will work, and it does work.  New
    Hampshire's Conservation Corps is one example of its success.  We
    can all make better use of New Hampshire parks because some of
    those people with money and good homes choose to share that wealth
    with some young people who have neither.

Biology and the three R's.

    My use of a cure for AIDS was not an emotional appeal disguised as
    a logical argument.  Substitute a cure for the common cold, or a
    way to make gasoline from peanuts, or any other earthshaking
    discovery you like.  Or substitute Albert Einstein or George
    Washington Carver for the white woman or the white boy.  The point
    is the same: you can't just take away the advantages from those who
    have them and magically give them to those who don't.  I used AIDS
    simply because it is something that concerns us all, white or
    bladk, male or female, rich or poor.  It's an equal-opportunity
    killer.

    It's quite possible that a black boy was going to be the one who
    found the way to transmute lead into gold.  My point is that you
    can't throw out the silver that the process is producing.  Silver
    is worth something.  Lead *might* be worth something someday, *if*
    someone really does figure out a process.  I know, this is another
    analogy.  It simply means that it's stupid to throw away what you
    have now in the hope that tomorrow you will have something better. 
    A bird in the hand (a white girl's existing education) is worth two
    in the bush (a black boy's possible education).  Yes, I know it's
    unfair.  And it sounds biased, but it's not the product of a biased
    mind.  It's the product of a realistic outlook.

    You have to help the disadvantaged to get the advantages for
    themselves.  Or, in actual fact, for their children's children's
    children.  The wealthy white men of today are largely descendants
    of serfs who managed through perseverance to rise into the merchant
    class half a millennium ago.  Their sons had a better place to
    start, so they rose a little higher.  And so on.  It's not bias,
    it's just who happened to get there first.  Yes, I know whites
    exploited blacks as slaves.  That is a product of who got there
    first, not the cause of it.

    Trying to level out the wealth overnight by fiat would cause the
    entire world system to collapse, partially because the
    disadvantaged simply would not understand how to manage their
    newfound riches.  To pick an obvious example, observe the buying
    habits of people on food stamps.  As a group, they buy a high
    percentage of junk foods and prepared foods, which are easier to
    fix but less nourishing and far more costly than basic ingredients.
    Studies have shown that part of the reason they do this is that
    they view this mode of living as part of the American dream,
    something that equates to financial wealth.  It gives them the
    leisure time they've been led to believe is what living is all
    about.  Not their fault, but in so doing, they sacrifice spiritual
    and physical well-being for the quick upward step.

    Work toward the goal, but don't imagine that you will see it in
    your lifetime.

Solution and precipitate.

    D! has phrased her argument, whether intentionally or not I don't
    know, so that anyone who disagrees with her equitist position is
    cast in the light of being part of the problem because those people
    want to preserve the equalist status quo.  I think this argument is
    fallacious.  The analogy I borrowed from the "Do men benefit from
    sexism?" string allows three possibilities:  the problem, the
    solution, and the precipitate.  The precipitate is that group of
    people who admittedly benefit from the inequitable situation but
    did not cause the problem and do as little as possible to aggravate
    or perpetuate it.  I infer from D!'s line of argument that these
    people are part of the problem simply because they benefit from it.
    As I say, I reject this position.  But I do understand it, and I
    accept that the anger which promotes it is very real.

    Some of the precipitate people are simply settling out on the
    bottom of the beaker.  They like what they have, and they aren't
    about to do anything to rock the boat.  I'd class these people as
    part of the problem because their presence slows the reaction that
    will produce a better world.  But not all the precipitation
    products in this reaction are the same.  The world is too complex
    for that.  Some of the precipitate people are serious about
    righting the inequity of the world and, while they don't
    necessarily consider themselves in a position to be part of the
    solution, they'd like to be there.  They're highly prone to go back
    into solution, meaning that they are perhaps doing things around
    the edges that have a positive impact.  Tutoring a college student
    whose background just wasn't up to snuff.  Giving money to the
    shelter or the soup kitchen or the skid row mission.  Teaching
    English to illegal Hispanic immigrants.  Maybe you view these
    people as part of the solution.  If you do, thank you.  I'm one of
    them.  I've done all of these things.

Racism.

    No, 'ren, I do not imply for one moment that whites are better than
    blacks, any more than I imply that men are better than women.  I
    do, however, recognize that the average white is better educated
    than the average black *today*, in this world *now*.  This fact
    makes the average white more likely to contribute something of
    value to the world than the average black.  It also, by virtue of
    the reward system, means that the average white is more likely to
    be financially well off.  I admit and proclaim that this is an
    unfair situation.  But I can't fix it, and neither can you.  We can
    both work toward it.

    Establishing quotas based on minority does not, will not, cannot
    fix this unfairness.  What those quotas can do, and in fact *do*
    do, is diminish the overall level of precious metal being produced
    by the transmutation process.

Reality *is*.  Whether it's black/white inequity or male/female
inequity or hetero/lesbigay inequity or American/Ethiopian inequity,
it's what exists.  It won't go away if you/we/I alienate the ones who
benefit from it by lashing out angrily.  Use it to your/our advantage. 
Make the world a better place for tomorrow's generations by pushing the
envelope instead of trying to poke holes in it.

Ah, Anon #1, I see your point now.

Basically (back to our bucket analogy) you are saying that the Equitist
propose solution - to stop the non-bucketted people while the previously
bucketted people catch up - is no good because it will slow down the race.
You see the race as being towards things like a cure for AIDS and how to
make gasoline for peanuts. Therefore slowing down the race to allow 
bucketted people to catch up will make it take all that much longer for
*someone* to get to those important points in the race; you think that it
is more important that *someone* gets there as quickly as possible (so that,
for instance, we have a cure for AIDS) than that the race be equitable.
Do I understand you?

We disagree fundamentally, then. I don't think the race, in and of itself,
has an all-important goal.  If it was true that there was some sort of
absolute goal that humanity must reach, then of course someone reaching that
goal would be more important than who reached that goal.  But I don't think
that's the case.  I think the equitableness of the race is more important
that someone, anyone, winning.

Ya see, I don't think there *is* a goal.  I don't think one person is going
to cure AIDS - I think the progress towards that cure is inevitable, and
slow, and that's all there is to it. And I think when AIDS is cured, something
else will come up.  I think the obstacles, or checkpoints, or what have you,
are created by ourselves, and will always be there.  The faster we cure
AIDS, the sooner we will have to worry about over population.  The faster
we get to turning lead into the gold, the sooner we will have to worry
about the lead shortage.  You are saying you are willing to sacrafice
equity for the "good of humanity" in the form of some earth-shattering
discovery.  But I don't think that's the way it works. 

And, as I said, I think it is just as likely that one of those hindered
bucketted people is going to win the race if you removed hir bucket and give
hir a push than one of those non-bucketted people.  The little white boys
education is *not* a bird in the hand and the little black boy's education is
not two birds in a bush. They are both birds in a bush - neither one is
guaranteed to find the cure for AIDS, nor even to be a productive member of
society.

As for whether I have painted "Equalists" as part of the problem...well, you
refer to "Equalism" as the status quo!  That's a laugh!  I think Equitism
is righter than Equalism, but I certainly think Equalism is better than the
status quo.  I think we should stop the race while the bucketted types catch
up.  You think we should remove the buckets but keep the race going.  The
status quo is that blacks, women, handicapped people, etc STILL HAVE THE 
BUCKETS ON!!!  Equalism is an ideal - that everyone be treated equally.  I
don't think that is the solution but it is a damn sight better than what we
have now.

D!

>What isn't always quite so obvious is that not all men, white or
>otherwise, perceive themselves to be in any particular position of
>power.

I'm not quite so sure, Mike, so here's the acid test.  Ask any of them
if they would trade places with a woman or a person of color.  If they
say no, (and I bet virtually all of them will), then they know durn well 
they are in a relative "position of power".  In the absolute sense, sure
they may be clawing and scratching their way to the top.  But in the relative 
sense, they aren't clawing and scratching nearly so much as non white
males, (nwms for short?), and further, they have the luxury of believing that 
*their* efforts could indeed get them to the top.  So many men seem to think 
that nwms are saying, "white males have it easy."  This is just not so.  
White males simply have it the easiest.  However difficult it may be for them, 
that difficulty would increase greatly and the reward potential would diminish 
just as greatly, if they were not white men.

>it is plain that such men do have the advantage over women, but that is
>something that isn't always obvious when one is down in the trenches
>trying to get along. They are sometimes only conscious of the daily
>struggle that they face,

This also may be true, but it's my belief that since most white men would
not want to be anything but white men, (what's the old daily prayer of
Jewish males that goes something like "Thank you for making me a male"?),
I attribute their "blindness" to egocentricity rather than innocence.

>the possibilities for resentment are definitely there, and ought to be
>taken into account when developing programs designed to help the truly
>disadvantaged.

I don't know, when white men were "developing programs designed to help
the truly white and male, (by placing buckets on select groups of race
runners), they didn't seem too concerned about the resentment factor of
the bucketees, they just did it.  If a wrong can be done with such 
impunity, why must a right be introduced so gingerly?  Possibly because
this time we're dealing with the potential resentment of white men?

> All people with buckets, why did you let them get tied to you in the 
> first place, and if you did, why didn't you untie them and throw them 
> away.

First, I second Chris Quiry that nwm are "broken" to the bucket early.  How 
can a single rope around one leg hold an elephant to a little post?  Because 
when the elephant was a baby, it *was* strong enough and now, though fully 
grown, the elephant has come to believe in the strength of the rope.

But secondly, there *are* some people who attempt to cast off their 
buckets, who collect things in them and try to sell them for cars to better
run the race, etc.  Rosa Parks comes to mind.  This black woman did *not*
sit in the back of the bus.  But there are many other examples.  
Prostitution, for instance, is a woman making a good use of her bucket,
if you'll pardon the pun.  If her culture limits her to being a sex object,
she certainly could take that and "run with it".  But men outlawed that, 
(sort of, they still wanted access to them so they put it in one of those
grey areas).  Surrogate motherhood is another one.  But again, men outlawed 
it's use in the race.  You can do it, but not for money, i.e. not for getting 
ahead in the race.  When a bucketee attempts to do any of the things you've 
suggested, there is retribution.  Women "daring" to cast off their "veils" 
can often be raped with impunity.  A man accused of rape in Florida got
off just last year because of what she was wearing.  She dared cast off
her bucket.  The woman raped on the pool table at Big Dan's in New Bedford
wasn't sympathized with too much because she was flaunting her unbucketted 
foot by drinking in a bar.  She pretty much became "the accused".

The buckets are kept on by social pressure and legal constraint and those
bucket people who dare to cast their buckets off or who smile, say thanx
and make that bucket *work* for them, generally pay for what is seen as a
form of "insubordination".  A bucketted person in a free world would indeed 
simply cast it off.  But in sexist culture, the bucketted person is the 
same as the huge elephant who is expected to be restrained with a relative 
wisp of a rope.

> It simply means that it's stupid to throw away what you have now in the
> hope that tomorrow you will have something better.

It is more than mere hope, Anon, most people *know* it would be better with 
a more fair culture.  What about all the philosophical discussion around 
"sexism hurts everyone, ultimately", which is going on in the "Do Men Benefit 
From Sexism" string?  *Men* are saying that.  It seems that intellectually, 
most people believe that in the long run, sexism holds back an entire culture 
from being the best it can be.  But now once we get down to it, it's diminished
back to being mere hope, and possibly not strong enough to warrant "throwing 
away what [we] have now".  The current state of sexism and racism does not 
constitute a bird in the hand to anyone but white men.

>Their sons had a better place to start, so they rose a little higher. 
>And so on.  It's not bias, it's just who happened to get there first. 

Oh?  I assume some of these people must have had daughters.  So why *is*
it that their sons seemed to "get there first"?

>Yes, I know whites exploited blacks as slaves.  That is a product of 
>who got there first, not the cause of it.

Oh?  That doesn't seem to explain apartheid.

> Trying to level out the wealth overnight by fiat would cause the
> entire world system to collapse, partially because the
> disadvantaged simply would not understand how to manage their
> newfound riches.

This seems a little patronizing.  Plenty of wealthy white men don't know
what to do with their riches, newfound or otherwise.  But we laugh about
it as long as it's played by white man Dudley Moore in the movie "Arthur".  
The idea that sexism and racism should end s-l-o-w-l-y because nwms will go 
over the deep end once they experience the heady joys the everyday white 
male does is pretty sexist and racist in itself.  Perhaps someone should 
decide for you how much money you should be getting so that you don't 
mismanage it in your excitement.  How does that sit with you?

>  To pick an obvious example, observe the buying habits of people on food 
> stamps.  As a group, they buy a high percentage of junk foods and prepared 
> foods...

So do white men, as a group.  What should we do about that?  Limit their
incomes, perhaps?  Perhaps, then, women should be given *all* the money
since as a group, they are far more knowledgeable and concerned about
nutrition.   That's the logical extension of your argument.  Do you
still agree with it?

> the problem, the solution, and the precipitate.  The precipitate is that 
> group of people who admittedly benefit from the inequitable situation but
> did not cause the problem and do as little as possible to aggravate
> or perpetuate it.

I think you've intentionally created a grey area where white men can hide
from the crossfire and still enjoy their advantages.  The point is that 
most white men don't understand *what* things they are doing that is 
aggravating or perpetuating the situation and they don't want to hear what 
it is, either.  Sorry, I don't buy your "precipitate".  As the saying goes,
"The only requirement for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing".
We do *not* have a group of white males in this culture who have the right
to sit around innocently and say "What?  Who me?  Huh?  Whaddya mean?".
I remain forever unconvinced of male ignorance/innocence in this regard.

> They like what they have, and they aren't about to do anything to rock
> the boat.

And here is where you agree with me about their lack of ignorance/innocence.  
They are merely hiding, hoping to be left alone with their advantages for as 
long as possible.

After a discussion on all of this with a male friend back in 1980, we
finally boiled it down to how he really felt and I think it fits in with
your "precipitate", (cowardice), men.  He agreed in theory and principle
that sexism and racism is wrong, but he didn't want it to "have to start
with him".  He still wanted his woman to do all his housework, prepare
all his meals and not earn more than he did.  These are the men in your
grey area, the ones who believe it in principle but really don't want
to have to put it into practice in their daily lives.  So their words
mean nothing.

>It won't go away if you/we/I alienate the ones who benefit from it by 
>lashing out angrily.

It doesn't go away by sucking up to them, either, as we've found out.  And
people get angry and resentful when they have no recourse.  Shouldn't that
have been taken into consideration when these "traditions" were being 
formed?  Sure.  But they weren't.  And now that white men are edging toward 
the "other" end, suddenly they're starting to say, "Hey, come on, we're
all in this together, let's work together, you can't alienate people, etc."
Watch closely any kind of table-turning scenario in any movie and the
original aggressor immediately begins to soften and smile.  That's how
I see this kind of "don't alienate us" argument - a simple "save your
ass" move and nothing more.
    
Perhaps white men should never have been in power in the first place if they 
can't grasp the concept that "don't alienate us" is going to fall on deaf,
unsympathetic and/or very resentful ears.

Sandy Ciccolini
    

    
>    If this is inaccurate, if people of the islands, India, etc. enjoy full
>    status as members of the Commonwealth and are welcome at any time to
>    reside in the UK and achieve their fullest potential, along side white
>    citizens, then I stand corrected. Let me know if there is absolutely no
>    racism in the UK. Because that's ONE of the buckets we speak of, and
>    its not something that people of color raised their hands and asked
>    for.

	Commonwealth citizens, whether from India, Canada, or Australia have
	no automatic right of entry or residency to the UK, they are all 
	treated equally, independant of colour.

	Just as British citizens, are treated equally - independant of 
	their colour.

	I do beleive there is some racism, however, this is practised by people
	of all colours, and across all nationalities. It is not exclusive, and
	no-one is exempt.
	It is in the nature of some people to be clan-ish, and to be predudiced
	against someone who they believe is not "one of them".
	One of the worst examples of this is the football hoolaganism where fans
	dress in their teams' strip and wage war against opposing fans.
	It can also be found in many villages in the UK, where "outsiders" can
	walk into a pub, and the whole bar stops talking.
	If you settle in one of these villages, it can take generations before
	you are accepted into the community, and not predudiced against for
	your ancestry.


	Back to the buckets:
	I was born female, and in a poor area, I did not go to university
	because I had to go to work to help get enough money to feed and clothe
	the rest of the family.

	I do not regret it, many people could look upon this as a bucket, I 
	never have, and it has never been one.

	If you look for handicaps under other peoples rulebooks, then you might
 	just find them. Let them keep their rulebook

	Heather

    The following is entered anonymously.

    					Ann B., co-moderator

    =====================================================================

One last reply from anon #1, then I'll bow out of this string and let
others have their collective say without me.

D!, I think we're actually agreeing violently here.  The goal isn't to
win the race, it's to live and prosper in an equitable world.  We're
all racing to achieve the first part of that goal, and some of us are
also racing to achieve the second part.  I don't see stopping the race
as the way to achieve it.

Make the race more evenhanded.  Give the participants who didn't get
off the starting line a chance to get back in the race.  One way that
some very serious and concerned educators are trying to make the race
fairer is by sending black boys (voluntarily) to schools for them
alone, in the hope that they will learn to compete without being buried
by the need to compete one-to-one daily with whites who already know
the things the blacks need to learn.  It has been shown that when
placed in this kind of separate but equal environment, motivated
students learn faster.  They achieve more than the official one-year
curriculum in a year.  They catch up without stopping the others.  This
is not to advocate segregation as a total policy.  As with EVERY tool
at our disposal, we should use it if, and where, it proves to work. 
And it does work in this situation.

I don't think I said equality was the status quo.  I interpreted from
your earlier remarks that the people you called equalists want to
preserve the status quo rather than participating in the equitist
agenda that will, you claim, lead to equality.  If this is a false
inference, I apologize, and I'll read your further remarks to clarify
my understanding of your position.

Thanks for your replies.  This has been a very stimulating discussion,
and I expect that sitting on the sidelines will continue to instruct
me.

'ren,

I certainly admire much of what you say here, but IMO, you have made some
assumptions about AA that I think bear examining.  I totally agree with
you if you are saying that we would REALLY gain if people understood and
complied more with the spirit of AA than the letter of AA.  However, I
do see the times (maybe even some now) that made the letter of AA
necessary, and I have also seen the positive impact of the letter of AA.
There have been (and there still are some) companies/people who left to
the spirit of AA would continue to do exactly nothing.

<Knee-jerk liberal alert>

If quotas are necessary, then quotas should be used.  There, I said the
word and used it positively.

<off/alert> 

>    I am a big supporter of Affirmative Action, but I also
>    hate quotas. They do more than just fill jobs with unqualified
>    minorities, they also circumvent the purpose of AA, which is to force
>    companies to find QUALIFIED people.

I find your assumption here to be that quotas necessarily mean that 
unqualified minoritied will make it into jobs.  I would be more prone to
think "at least some of the qualified minorities will now make it into
jobs."  Why?
    
>    I say that we need to work harder to make sure companies find
>    QUALIFIED minorities, based on the assumption that they exist. I
>    personally think that anyone who isn't ready to make that assumption
>    has some serious prejudices about the intellectual capabilities of
>    black Americans, and they need to change. 
    
You said it better for me than I could for myself.  I only have a minor
disagreement here - I don't think we have to work all THAT hard.  IMO,
all we need do is open our eyes to see the qualified people standing in
front of us.

Sara,

I think the idea that allowing others "into the race" spells disaster
for those already in the race, aka sneaker makers, to be a very powerfull
"urban myth."  First of all, less profit does not equate with going
out of business (as those businesses "who have" would like us to believe).

>  anon #2, the real question is how to keep the sneaker maker in business
>  and profitable, while getting to the goal of an equitable society, so
>  that we can then be a society based on equality.
 
I truly admire much of what you say, but here, I simply do not agree.  The
real question is usually trying to figure out how much the sneaker maker
is lying when crying hardship.

Anon #1

> Racism.
>
>    No, 'ren, I do not imply for one moment that whites are better than
>    blacks, any more than I imply that men are better than women.  I
>    do, however, recognize that the average white is better educated
>    than the average black *today*, in this world *now*.  This fact
>    makes the average white more likely to contribute something of
>    value to the world than the average black.  It also, by virtue of
>    the reward system, means that the average white is more likely to
>    be financially well off.  I admit and proclaim that this is an
>    unfair situation.  But I can't fix it, and neither can you.  We can
>    both work toward it.

You may not realize it, but, IMO, this is a perfect example of someone who
does not see their cultural racism.  IMO (and some facts would not be that
difficult to come by), your assumptions are false.  Even if they were
true, by accepting your *now*, we would damn the situation to continue, 
as is, the here and now.  Shucks, after this many hundreds of years, 
isn't anyone getting tired of doing the same old thing - nothing? 

>    Establishing quotas based on minority does not, will not, cannot
>    fix this unfairness.  What those quotas can do, and in fact *do*
>    do, is diminish the overall level of precious metal being produced
>    by the transmutation process.

Ummmm, I have written and erased at least five replies to the above.  I'm
afraid I simply cannot reply within DEC P&P.

I realize I come from a "different place" than some number of others here,
but the harsh realities to me say you hold a hard line on such nonsense
as "we couldn't find any qualified <mumble>" - yes, you know that's what
would happen without guidelines - WHILE you try to change attitudes.

Barb



    
  

    Barb, my understanding of AA is that it involves expanding the search
    for qualified minorites so that they are included in the pool.
    Logically then, a minority who is most qualified will be chosen with
    more frequency than before. If this does NOT happen within a period of
    time, then a corporation is told what number of minorities it needs,
    and quotas go into effect. At that point, any "body" will do.
    
    It pisses me off when companies won't put in the time to do the work to
    expand the pool so that quotas are avoided. And yes, it DOES take work
    because many minorities are disillusioned with the job hunting process
    and you can't just use "normal" methods to find them. Like "word of
    mouth". At my school, blacks were 3% of the population. Slim pickin's.
    If you want a decent selection, you HAVE TO go to a black school. There
    are at least 4 black engineering schools that I know of, namely:
    Howard, Hampton, Tuskegee, NC State. I'd be surprised if they weren't
    using similar textbooks. RPI's state-of-the-art equipment was reserved
    for grad students for the most part, so I don't think those kids have
    any less hands-on experience than the average RPI student. Moreover,
    those kids are usually in a more nurturing environment in which the
    instructors really want the students to learn. On that basis, the kid
    from the small black engineering school might even be BETTER.
    
    At any rate, my point was that going and finding qualified individuals
    often does take more effort than some companies want to spend. Although
    I think its as simple as sending a few posters, contacting the black
    engineering organizations, putting ads in their publications, etc. 
    
    At any rate, that's how to get more black professionals. SHPE was the
    Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers, so it works similarly. And
    you can recruit at UPR pretty easily from what I understand.
    
    To my knowledge, the letter of AA uses quotas when the company fails to
    achieve diversity without them. My opinion is that a company that was
    too lazy to search for qualified minorities without quotas will
    probably f*ck it up when quotas are enforced, by grabbing bodies.
    That's why I don't like quotas, except as a threat.
    
    Let me know if that differs from your viewpoint.

'ren,

No, I don't feel flamed at all - your reply was very helpful to my
understanding.

    Barb, my understanding of AA is that it involves expanding the search
    for qualified minorites so that they are included in the pool.
    Logically then, a minority who is most qualified will be chosen with
    more frequency than before. If this does NOT happen within a period of
    time, then a corporation is told what number of minorities it needs,
    and quotas go into effect. At that point, any "body" will do.

My response to this is that it just should not happen.  The any "body" 
will do response is not only more expensive that college recruiting
(which many companies have been doing for a loooonnnggg time at the "right"
schools) - it is just plain stupid! 
        
    If you want a decent selection, you HAVE TO go to a black school. There
    are at least 4 black engineering schools that I know of, namely:
    Howard, Hampton, Tuskegee, NC State.

I think where we disagree is whether or not making a recruiting trip to a
black enginnering school to find engineers constitutes work or opening up
your eyes to see what is in front of your face.  Maybe I missed something
along the way, but I'm from the school that says spending a few dollars 
on airfare/hotel/etc. to find productive employees with the expertise you
need is far less expensive that filling a "slot with a body" and paying
salary/fringes/etc.for little productivity.  At this point in the game,
with everything business/people have learned, it is my opinion that black/
women's/<insert any minority> schools do not get visited by sheer virtue
of residual/cultural racism/sexim/<mumble>ism. 
    
    To my knowledge, the letter of AA uses quotas when the company fails to
    achieve diversity without them. My opinion is that a company that was
    too lazy to search for qualified minorities without quotas will
    probably f*ck it up when quotas are enforced, by grabbing bodies.
    That's why I don't like quotas, except as a threat.

I do think there is something that can be done about that - maybe a suit
that alleges no reasonable *search* for minority candidates was conducted,
with the redress being a *continued search* for qualified candidates and
NOT the placement of bodies in positions.  What do you think?

Barn
    
    

    
    not re: the past few notes on Affirmative Action
    re: nothing in particular
    
    I believe in equity, equality, AA, spending money on people
    instead of weapons and all that good stuff.  But I don't
    believe that white men are the cause of all the world's 
    problems and I don't believe we'd be better off if they
    were forced to hibernate the next 100 years.  There are
    good white men, and there are women and minorities who are
    part of the problem.  bye, Sue

>I don't
>    believe that white men are the cause of all the world's 
>    problems and I don't believe we'd be better off if they
>    were forced to hibernate the next 100 years.

Yeah - your point?

D!

    
    In my personal opinion, AA does NOT stop the race for ALL the
    bucketless folks so that the bucket folks can get ahead.
    
    Barb and I agree on a lot of things. But the one thing that pisses me
    off repeatedly is that minorities are just that: minorities! For that
    ONE instance in which a minority gets ONE slot in a company, that
    company is still FULL OF WHITE PEOPLE. There are no more than 40 black
    people in my plant out of 1500. How many jobs could we have POSSIBLY
    displaced? That's correct, students, 40 out of 1500. So, if we were
    really displacing people, we only displaced 3% of the whole building.
    And that's assuming that we're incompetant... which is bullsh*t.
    
    When I listen to the ire that comes from AA what I really see is
    someone who lost looking for a reason to complain. I can't believe that
    the average white person ALWAYS loses a job to a black person. There
    aren't enough black people to go around. There aren't even enough
    MINORITIES ALL TOTALLED to displace all the white people in America.
    So, when it happens, every once in a while, and somebody complains,
    recognize the Bull for what it is. If that person had lost out to
    someone white, they'd be quiet. Why are they automatically supposed to
    win just because they're white? If that person lost out to the boss's
    son, they might STILL be less likely to fuss than if they lost to a
    minority. And somebody tell me what made the boss's son more qualified?
    
    There are TONS of unqualified white people working in America. Somebody
    gave them a chance, and they got lucky. But nobody likes to think about
    it. Everyone wants to believe that only minorities are unqualified, but
    white people are always competent. More BS. Duds come in every shade
    under the rainbow, and one of the biggest telltale signs of racism is
    that black duds stand out more than white duds.
    
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------
    
    Ironically, I wanted to move this back toward discussing women and men.
    And equity vs. equalism. Because, in my mind, men and women will
    never be equal. Equity is all that is possible. Unless each sex as a
    whole decides that it wants to be a full participant in the roles of
    the other sex. And I just don't see that happening.
    
    We have a problem in America, in that the male-provider/female-home-
    maker model is crumbling. Either because mom is working or dad's gone.
    I don't think there was anything inherently wrong with that model,
    except that it didn't leave room for a lot of exceptions. Men who lost
    their wives got new wives or housekeepers. Women who lost their
    husbands did their best to acquire new husbands. To take on the role of
    the former mate was unthinkable for many, and impossible for lots of
    people. So, in many ways, the bucket situation is arising because women
    want: equality in the employment ranks, equality in civil rights, and
    equality in role valuation. And it doesn't exist. I'm not sure it can.
    Especially since men are NOT fighting for equality in the kitchen,
    equality in the washroom, or equality in the nursery. 
    
    By comparison, the race issues are simplistic.

'ren,

Couldn't help one more issue on AA because you just so eloquently stated the
worst danger of quotas while you were venting (thanks, I needed that and I
didn't have the energy for it myself).

The worst danger of pushing the letter of AA - quotas, if you will - is not
that unqualified <mumbles> will be placed in jobs.  It is that once the
quotas are filled, managers/owners will sit back fat and happy and say
"that's that...I don't have to hire any more <mumbles>."

If you follow the sprirt of AA, then you hire the most qualified person for
the job, making sure you actually make the effort to interview qualified
<mumbles>.  If your plant did that, 'ren, there would be far more than 40
black people out of 1500, and no quotas would ever need to be.

Barb

Hypothesize for a moment an organization - say an engineering organization -
made up almost entirely of white men.  It's always been that way.  For many
years, the only applicants to join the organization were white men.  The hiring
manager has developed skills at estimating in the course of an interview
whether a given white man possesses the skills necessary to contribute to the
group.  These skills include the ability to come up with good ideas,
communicate them to the rest of the group and the world, and "sell" them.

Now suppose the world changes (slightly and slowly).  There are some applicants
who are not white men.  The hiring manager does not possess the skills to
estimate well which of them will contribute to the group and which will not. 
They look different.  They talk differently.  Some of them even seem to think
differently.  Even if these people have good ideas, it seems likely they will
have a special challenge in communicating them.  What's a hiring manager to do?

It's clear to the hiring manager that the best safest course is to ignore the
new people he doesn't know how to deal with.  There are plenty of white men
applying, and the good ones are identifiable.  Who knows what these others are
like - what is to be gained by finding out?  This hiring manager does not think
of himself as sexist or racist... just a pragmatist.  His corporation will be
better off *in the short run* because he will make fewer hiring mistakes.

Enter affirmative action.  Even in the form of quotas.  He *has* to hire x%
women and y% non-whites (non-white women frequently count double).  What
happens?  He makes some hiring mistakes.  And he makes some non-mistakes.  He
learns that some of these people *do* have something to contribute.  He might
even learn that they have something different and better to contribute.  The
group dynamics will shift - sometimes for the better.  And he will learn from
his hiring mistakes better skills at predicting who will contribute to the
group.  In the long run, his corporation is better off because it can hire the
most qualified applicants from a larger pool (because it now has a hiring
manager who can identify them).

This is AA at its best.  It's not throwing a bone to the underprivileged in the
name of "equity".  It's not about giving people jobs they can't do, paying them
more than they are worth, and keeping them on after it's clear it isn't
working.  That will happen occasionally, but it's an undesirable side effect
rather than a goal.  AA is a bumpy road to a better world.  I've never seen it
actually work.  But I don't see any other roads that lead in that direction.

Do you?

    Kaufman, I think I get it now, you tell me.
    
    
    One of the interesting things that I learned in a seminar about women
    and self-image is that most times the definition of best qualified is
    HIGHLY subjective. You don't give the job to the person who can do it,
    you give it to the person who will grow into it, to benefit that person
    AND the company.
    
    HOW THE HECK DO YOU KNOW WHO'S BEST QUALIFIED? The real answer is you
    often don't know. You take a chance and offer it to someone, letting
    them know that this is their opportunity, and they have to run with it.
    
    In this presentation (somebody else must have seen it, a famous video!)
    the woman explains that women frequently think that they must be able
    to do a job before they can apply for it. BULLSHIT. How many managers
    know how to manage on their first day? Where did their experience come
    from? How many project leaders know how to lead a project on their
    first day? Which day did they learn? In both these situations, someone
    is being given an opportunity to learn to do something they can't
    presently do.
    
    Even if you are GREAT at a particular skill, you have lots of things to
    learn on each new job. Even the best secretary has to come up to speed
    when joining a new company. Even the best manager has things to learn
    when moving from IBM to Digital... 
    
    So, a part of hiring is deciding whom to give this golden opportunity
    to. And sometimes, the person with experience is not innovative enough,
    not flexible enough to try a new way to approach an old problem. In
    such cases, that person may NOT be the best person for the job.
    
    That's why we have a college hire program. People with next to ZERO
    experience, but dying to have a chance. Half of your judgement is based
    on the candidate's enthusiasm. Some of it is based on a mastery of some
    fundamentals, but I've seen that waived in many race and gender
    independent cases, and some of it is based on pure randomness.
    
    Every job that includes a training program has built-in leeway for a
    range of candidates. Any job that leaves NO room for training is
    courting disaster.
    
    My point: we develop very dangerous mindsets when we start talking
    about "best qualified applicant". More experience and more education
    don't guarantee the "best qualified" label. I'd rather have an
    enthusiastic kid with average grades who nursed farm animals than a
    bored kid with perfect grades who strangled animals as a child for my
    vet school.  I'd rather have an average student who passed the bar
    after two tries but was always bringing up neat cases over lunch than
    a perfect suit and tie student with straight A's and a great board
    scores who was just in it for the money, if I was picking a law clerk
    for my firm. Go ahead and set a minimum standard. Let's say: anyone who
    can't achieve 700 combined score on the SAT's is not college material.
    But after that... sometimes going for the kid with the BEST SCORE does
    not ensure the best or most qualified person. Maybe the kid who was
    number one in school knew s/he'd be whipped for bringing home B's. But
    hey, that's a pretty neurotic kid. I'd rather take a well adjusted B
    student. 
    
    
    Answering my own question: given the choice between a neurotic
    over-achieving male, and a female with family responsibilities, who is
    the better candidate? Well, lets look at the job, and lets look at the
    people. Does the job require creativity? Which candidate demonstrates
    creativity? Does the job require fast thinking? Which candidate
    demonstrates fast thinking? Does the job require people skills? Which
    candidate has people skills? 
    
    Also, be honest: does the job TRULY require identical past experience?
    Or is there room for training? If it doesn't other factors can add
    weight to the candidate who shines in other areas. Does the job REQUIRE
    a graduate degree? If not, then does a graduate degree really make one
    candidate better than the other? Does the job REQUIRE 80 hours per
    week? If so, why aren't you hiring two people!!!  If the person who can
    do the job cannot give you 80 hours, but a person who is not as
    creative, innovative or competant can put in the time, which do you
    choose???
    
    One of the neat things I always liked about Affirmative Action is how
    it challenges stereotypes about job requirements. Education, rankings,
    experience, etc. have always been used to make screening easier. To
    rule out 9900 candidates out of 10000. But most people know that there
    are plenty of people in that 9900 subset who are PERFECTLY CAPABLE of
    doing the job. And a few of them are probably going to be better than
    the ones you didn't screen out. Affirmative Action forces employers to
    be more realistic about their screening process. Okay: lets say
    minority candidate has a 2.5 average, 1100 SAT scores, non-minority
    candidate has a 3.8 average, 1450 SAT scores. Question 1: are you hiring
    someone to take tests? (I don't think so.) Question 2: are you hiring
    someone because of a superior vocabulary? (Well, I got a dictionary
    when *I* started...) Question 3: is the job you are offering going to
    utilize more than 50% of what this person learned in college? (PROBABLY
    NOT!!!!!).
    
    All of a sudden, you gotta wonder, what are grades and SAT scores
    telling me. Does it tell me that one kid is brighter? Maybe. Does it
    tell me that one kid works harder than the other? Maybe not. Does it
    tell me all that much at all? NO, IT DOESN'T.
    
    As a person who had 1400+ SAT scores and 1500+/1600 GRE scores, I can
    ASSURE YOU, it doesn't make me better qualified than many of my peers.
    Its just a convenient screen. And sometimes, screening means you miss
    the candidate. So, sometimes screens have to be modified.
    
    There was a time when I thought to myself that those scores really
    meant something. After all, I had some self-esteem wrapped up in those
    scores. A lot of kids do. But its bull. Really. Its NOT a good
    indicator of potential. Hard work and enthusiasm and recommendations
    tell you more about a candidate than board scores and grades. For ANY
    job.
    
    So, next time you hear someone talking about "X minority got a job and
    was 'less qualified' than me" recognize that sometimes, gpa's and
    scores and multiple degrees or even 10 years experience does not
    guarantee that you are the person with the most potential for growth in
    a job.  

    I'm surprised but happy to see that no one's tried to justify
    race or gender norming yet.  That's when aptitude tests are
    automatically scaled up or down based on race or gender.
    
                                      L.J.

>   So, in many ways, the bucket situation is arising because women
>    want: equality in the employment ranks, equality in civil rights, and
>    equality in role valuation. And it doesn't exist. I'm not sure it can.
>    Especially since men are NOT fighting for equality in the kitchen,
>    equality in the washroom, or equality in the nursery. 
    
 
	Do you have to fight?

	My husband loves cooking, and, although I don't mind, I can't be 
	bothered with all the fiddly stuff, sauces etc. and B-B-Ques are
	much to smokey and hot for me to want to cook on them.

	No problem, no fight, he cooks most of the time.

	Nursery - no problem, neither of us want children, no fight.

	Washroom - when we were both single, we used to do our own cleaning and
	ironing, we didn't much like it, but their wasn't much of it. Now we
	are married, neither of us do it, we pool resources and have someone to
 	provide these services for us.

	I know many people in similar and differing circumstances, and together
 	they work out what is best for them.
	Sometimes they follow the "traditional" roles, and sometimes they don't,
	Mostly it's a mix. It's their choice.
	
	Heather

    Heather, I'm glad that you've found something that works for you. It
    may have a lot to do with who you are, who your husband is, and maybe
    even what country you're in. 
    
    
    Fight is just a word, it may mean something different to you than it
    does to me. What I'm saying is that men are not as eager to assume
    women's traditional tasks as women are to assume men's tasks. I think a
    lot of it has to do with the fact that there is money attached to the
    provider role. My limited experience has shown me a lot of women doing
    an uneven share because they are working, but still doing 75% of the
    household chores. And in every case but 2 that I've ever seen, its not
    50-50 when a baby comes along. This puts a lot of extra work on the
    shoulders of women. And I think that goes a long way to keep us from
    feeling equal. Add to that the fact that divorce can throw even more of
    both the provider burden and the homemaking burden on women. That's
    what I see. That's why I stated what I did.
    
    But there's room for disagreement...

    
    This is probably my last note i =wn=. For the simple reason that my
    time in Digital has come to an end.
    After 16 years (of which 10 in sales management), my values has changed
    although I'm not sure to what...
    I do not know for sure what to do right now, except caring our cat,
    brushing up my house (bulidt in 1886) and so on.. I'm lucky, I'm a man,
    I'm white, I benefitted from rules of the race, I now have the economy 
    to relax for a couple of years (if that's what I want).
    
    To all of you that want to freeze the "unbuckeded" and to release the
    bucked ones...You know, you accept the race as such. Is that good?
    Isn't that to be a "follower"?
    How about saying "hey, the goal is in the other direction (another
    goal), suddenly your'e in front! Define it as a bucket race! Be a
    leader! Belive you can do that without "beeing in power"!
    
    I will follow this discussion till my last day in DEC (May 31st).
    
    Keep up the good work!
    
    
    PerS,
    
    

	There are some traditional roles that women have done, and some that
	men have done.

	There will be clashes where both the women and men want to do roles, 
	and some where neither of them want to do the roles.

	I do not understand why a reasonable share cannot be managed. Because
	of some dislikes/likes, then some couples may be more matched than 
	others.

	If you are alone, then you get both.

	My sister does not work, she is a housewife, and proud of it. Her
    	husband wanted to give up work to stay home and look after the kids
	and do the housework. They both couldn't do this, and they eventually
	came to a compromise, they are both doing things that they like, and 
	some that they don't. In fact, my sister has a better "deal" of doing 
	what she wants here, although they both agree that they have the best
	compromise.

	My mother works as a nurse, my father is a cabinet maker and works 
	from home, it was best for him to prepare the evening meal, as he
	could fit it into his work schedule more easily. my dad loves cooking,
	my mum never has, and is thankful to be rid of the task.
	However, my mum loves ironing, she says it is like therapy to here, 
	where she can do an "automatic" task and switch off to the world.
	Neither of them like gardening, and they pay some money to the local 
	scout group, who are more than willing to do something that gets them 
	outdoors, away from their parents, and earns them funds towards summer 
	camp.

    	I have difficulty in thinking of any of my freinds that think they get
	a raw deal from any situation.
	I some people looking from outside may think - especially in my sisters
	case, that she has a raw deal, she doesn't, and wouldn't swap it for 
	the world, if she wanted to, her husband would swap today.

	Heather

    Heather, one thing that may not be occuring in England is the high
    level of divorce that we see here.  As I said, what you may have seen
    may be very balanced. I think you and I have spoken to people
    experiencing different things.
    
    My mother was partial provider and homemaker when my dad left, dad
    continued to help financially. She had an uneven load. She didn't
    complain because there wasn't anything she could do. Most of her
    friends were in similar situations. 
    
    Please recognize that I'm not saying that ANYTHING is wrong with your
    sister as homemaker. Because she is paired to a provider, it works.
    She would, however, have to make some changes if he left or died.
    
    The divorce rate in America is at least 30 if not 50% of all marriages.
    And I've seen MANY unhappy marriages where the people don't believe in
    divorce. Its hard to negotiate in an unhappy marriage.
    
    What is the divorce rate in England? And what percentage of married
    women work? What percentage of women are single parents? Large
    differences between American and English lifestyles could explain why
    we see things so differently.

    
    Last I heard, the divorce rate here was soaring but has now
    evened out at about 30-35%.
    The number of single parents is rising rapidly.
    I'll see if I can find any supporting stats.
    
    Heather, you haven't mentioned Newbury's statistics yet ;-)
    As I don't know your friends or family I'd find it easier to
    grasp your argument if you could be a bit more general.
    
    'gail
    

    
>    What is the divorce rate in England? And what percentage of married
>    women work? What percentage of women are single parents? Large
>    differences between American and English lifestyles could explain why
>    we see things so differently.

	The divorce rate is 1 in 3 - 33%

	I don't know the percentage of married women that work, but from my 
	friends family, and work colleagues, I would have thought that of those
	who are married, and have children under 18, it is over 50%, increasing
 	as the youngest passes 5 and starts school, but this is only a guess.

	Single parents? I don't know percentages either, I do know its fairly
	common, and increasing.

	At the end of the day, the work has to be done by someone, if there's 
	one of you, you probably have to do it all, whether you are male or 
	female. 
	If you have kids, there's usually more work, which, as the kids get 
	older, they can start to take a share of the work. 
	If you have a partner, they can help.

	Heather - who remembers teaching her younger brothers to iron at the
	age of 11, so they could do their share too.

So what's the point?  Because some woman is happy as a homemaker makes it
justified that many women are forced into that role???

D!

>So what's the point?  Because some woman is happy as a homemaker makes it
>justified that many women are forced into that role???


	Many people belive that those who do it must be forced, and forget that
	different people like different things.

	So, who is forced into the role? 


	Heather

>	So, who is forced into the role? 

Those who don't realize they have a choice, or realize it after they have
committed to a marriage to a spouse with the traditional unspoken
expectations, or can't afford to 'go independent'.

Consciousness-raising is important.  We're not born with
a view outside the choices presented to us -- we have to be lucky enough
to see something different.  And then we have to be strong enough to choose 
something different if we want, even if it means rebelling against the
expectations of our family or church or community.

Once you've seen your choices and made them, it's hard to remember not having
seen them, maybe.  Once you've stepped outside your community's expectations,
it's hard to remember how hard that might have been.  The second step is
something that can maybe be achieved through will (and enough economic
resources).  The first is more random -- when do you see the lightbulb,
that I don't have to live the life of my mother and my grandmother and
my aunts and sisters, if they all did?

	MKV

    The financial aspect is key.  I too wanted to be the homemaker and
    child tender, my husband wanted to be the breadwinner.  It worked 
    well for many years, but then my husband wanted out.  That hurt
    (understatement) but that's the way it was.  Suddenly my getting what I
    wanted (homemaker and child tender role) was revealed as not very smart
    financially in that I had no salary and so no savings, and certainly no
    traditional work experience.
    
    Am I saying that I regret those years at home?  No.  I loved being wife
    and mother, making our home and being with our children and am glad I 
    was able to do it as long as I did.  In fact, I wish I could have finished
    the job. 
    
    As it happened, after I went to work my husband and I patched together 
    a relationship and will probably stick it out until the youngest leaves 
    the nest, maybe beyond, who knows?  And that, I suppose, is my point.  
    Who knows indeed?  We make the best decisions we can at the time, but 
    I must admit that, at the time we decided I would stay home, I didn't
    even consider the possibility of divorce.  
    
    Perhaps women who have and want the opportunity to stay home
    should contract legally with their spouses for compensation...and
    there's a container of annelids if ever I saw one.  But then, so is
    marriage.  :)
    
    aq
    

>I do not understand why a reasonable share cannot be managed.

It's because, Heather, most men simply do not want to take on a share of the 
work at home.  And that resistance is the basis for tons of conflict
even if it's just conflict within the woman who comes home after working 
all day to face "the second shift".  That's how it was when I was married 
and I just plain got out.  And afterward, he admitted that it was easier to 
bring me flowers than wash the floor.  Well sure.  It would have been 
easier for me to stay home than get up every morning and go to work, too, 
but I did my part and he, knowing quite well what he was doing to me, 
simply didn't do his.

This is more than a personal anecdote, it's pretty much the norm in the 
majority of American households, differing only in degree.  I thank heaven 
I didn't waste a whole lot of time trying to "reason" with him because I
would end up just another overworked and angry married woman.  But I had
a job and that gave me the power to get what I wanted if not from him,
than from someone else.  If unemployed, I'd be at his mercy.

> it was best for him to prepare the evening meal, as he could fit it into 
> his work schedule more easily. my dad loves cooking

And his love for cooking is probably a larger factor in his willingness to
make dinner than his availability.  My husband got out of work at 3 and
sat there waiting for me to walk in at 5:30 and start dinner.  He didn't
do laundry, didn't pick up a shoe, didn't feed the cat.  Just waited.

> If you have a partner, they can help.

Sure they *can*, Heather, but most just don't.  And sometimes when they
do, they intentionally bungle it, (more than one has admitted this),
shrinking your best lambswool sweater in an "innocent" attempt to wash it
in the machine, or breaking the crystal champagne flutes they're "trying"
to wash, so that you are less inclined to bother them with such requests in 
the future.  Men have a lot of little tricks to getting out of housework
and they're not above using them.

>Perhaps women who have and want the opportunity to stay home
>should contract legally with their spouses for compensation...

They do.  It's called marriage.  But marriage isn't a cage and if a guy
decides he no longer wants the deal, he can just opt out and then you
have an unskilled woman eating annelids, trying to find the guy to enforce
the terms of the contract.  Staying home is nice.  But to my mind, it's
about as wise as spending all your money on lottery tickets.  You may win,
but more likely you're going to lose everything, sooner or later.  I'm
not going to risk those odds with my one life.

But we're digressing...
    
Sandy Ciccolini

>>I do not understand why a reasonable share cannot be managed.
>
>It's because, Heather, most men simply do not want to take on a share of the 
>work at home.  And that resistance is the basis for tons of conflict
>even if it's just conflict within the woman who comes home after working 
>all day to face "the second shift".  That's how it was when I was married 

Some of the work is seen by everyone as chores, some things are liked by some.
Why, if you both find it a chore, can't you come to a solution, why start to
pick up all the "undone" jobs?

You can chose to share the jobs, you can choose a solution, you can choose to
separate.
However, if someone does start to do all the "undone" jobs, than that's a 
choice they make too.


>> it was best for him to prepare the evening meal, as he could fit it into 
>> his work schedule more easily. my dad loves cooking
>
>And his love for cooking is probably a larger factor in his willingness to
>make dinner than his availability.  

My dads love of cooking came after he had fitted it into his schedule when
my mum went from permanent nights to permamnent days, and he went from working
on sites, to working in the garage at home. 
His first few attempts were very straightforward. When he started to
experiment with different herbs and spices, he really started to enjoy it. He 
is much more adventurous in his cooking than mum ever was, and than I am.

>My husband got out of work at 3 and sat there waiting for me to walk in at 
>5:30 and start dinner.  He didn't do laundry, didn't pick up a shoe, didn't 
>feed the cat.  Just waited.

Well, he'd have a long wait with me.............you did say the relationship
didn't work out.

>> If you have a partner, they can help.
>
>Sure they *can*, Heather, but most just don't.  And sometimes when they
>do, they intentionally bungle it, (more than one has admitted this),
>shrinking your best lambswool sweater in an "innocent" attempt to wash it
>in the machine, or breaking the crystal champagne flutes they're "trying"
>to wash, so that you are less inclined to bother them with such requests in 
>the future.  Men have a lot of little tricks to getting out of housework
>and they're not above using them.

If they don't want to work out an acceptable soulution, then they're not a
partner in the sense that I understand. These are silly games from an immature
person.
The choice is still there for you.

Heather - Who has lost count of the number of crystal glasses she has broken.

>Why, if you both find it a chore, can't you come to a solution, why start to
>pick up all the "undone" jobs?

Most men can live happily in filthier conditions than women and I attribute
that to the fact that for them, the choices are clean it, or wait long 
enough and she will.  So they wait it out.  I have waited it out too and
let *his* parents visit us in squalor, (not mine!), but of course, society
is/was behind the "woman's work" myth and his parents blamed me for their son's
living conditions.  It's often a no-win situation so that's why I cut my 
losses and booked.  I'm sure more than one woman has been shocked to find
her lazy ex vacuuming the rug in *his* apartment.  But once they install
a woman in their houses, they revert and suddenly forget how, or suddenly
don't see any dirt.  It's a child's game and playing it once is enough.

>You can chose to share the jobs, you can choose a solution, you can choose to
>separate.

No, you can't chose all by yourself to share the jobs.  You either choose
to live in the filth, choose to do it all yourself, or choose to leave.
You're making the erroneous assumption that the guy who knows he is 
sleazing out is willing to engage in dialogue about it.

>My dads love of cooking came after he had fitted it into his schedule when
>my mum went from permanent nights to permamnent days...

Well bless your dad, Heather, and I mean that sincerely.  But he is not
even remotely representative of the average situation here in the US.  He
remains an exception.

>Well, he'd have a long wait with me

And you'd have a pigsty for a home and a set of inlaws who'd have no 
respect for you.  If you can live with that choice, fine.  My life's too 
short for me to be willing to play games with men.

>....you did say the relationship didn't work out.

Oh it "worked out" fine.  He was an angel otherwise, and totally stunned
the day he came home from work and I was gone.  But his surprise proves 
that he though his sleazing out of doing his part was fine and normal and 
should be accepted happily by me - another level of sexist thinking with
which I wanted no part and certainly not the loser's part.  But we're 
talking 1972 here and there was no such thing as feminism except among
the wealthy.  He wasn't considered a bad man by anyone, I was a failure 
as a wife if he went to work with a wrinkled shirt.  And he *did* go to
work with wrinkled shirts.

>If they don't want to work out an acceptable soulution, then they're not a
>partner in the sense that I understand. These are silly games from an immature
>person.

Bingo.  Now you are beginning to understand.  Marriage is only *beginning* to 
be seen as a partnership.  Traditionally, the husband has considered himself 
simply the kid in the family with the most seniority.

>Heather - Who has lost count of the number of crystal glasses she has broken.

Intentionally, to make a point?

But we continue to digress.  We've gotta let this topic get back on track.  
I'll be glad to continue offline, if you like.
    
S.
    

    just one more brief aside:
    
    my brother is perfectly capable of cleaning his own house, doing
    laundry, cooking and washing up.  But whenever he lives with someone
    (female) she is expected by him to do these chores, even is she is
    working too.  it just amazes me.  i always make a crack like, "gee, he
    used to do all these chores by himself when he lived alone."  he still
    doesn't get it though.
    
    sue

On the subject of domestic chores:  I don't think ANYONE, male OR female, 
particularly WANTS to do them (Do you wake up in the morning just DYING
to wash a pile of dishes or iron some shirts, even when there are none
that need it?  I didn't think so...).  As a result, people do them when
they percieve the NEED to do them.  Face it; women in this society are
brought up to be MUCH fussier about neatness than men.  When a boy goes
tromping thru a mud-puddle, he might get a bit of a tongue-lashing, but
when a GIRL does the same thing (ruining a nice frilly pink dress in the
process), she never hears the end of it!  Repeated lessons like this
drive the point home to girls that neatness is important.  Since boys
don't get the same message, they wonder what the big deal is about.

As Dave Barry says, tongue-in-cheek, women can see individual dust molecules, 
whereas men can't see dirt until the dust bunnies are so big they're eating 
the dog food!

The result is that, on average, women will perceive the need to do household
chores sooner than men will.  If the woman is removed from the picture, the
chores WILL get done:


.68>    my brother is perfectly capable of cleaning his own house, doing
.68>    laundry, cooking and washing up.  But whenever he lives with someone
.68>    (female) she is expected by him to do these chores...

My father is the same way:  when my mother was recently bedridden with a
back injury, he had no problems cooking for her and keeping house.  But as
soon as she was up and walking again, he went right back to whining that
his lunch wasn't ready when he wanted it...

--jim

    
    re .69
    
    I definitely don't agree with you. I am as messy or messier than every
    man I have EVER dated. It appalled all of them. With one, I did
    contract to cook, which I enjoy, in exchange for him cleaning. But
    every other man has made very nasty comments about my mess, even though
    their's was equivalent. And when they lived in mess, there was always a
    good reason. When I let my house go, I was told, point blank, that I
    was a disgraceful housekeeper.
    
    Among the black community at least, many men expect the women to maintain
    the same standard of cleanliness as their mothers did, who were probably
    neat as pins. And yes, they can find microscopic dust balls. Its one
    of their criteria for a "good woman". Another reason why I'm single.

Re: .70

>    I definitely don't agree with you. I am as messy or messier than every
>    man I have EVER dated. It appalled all of them.

Well.... remember: I was talking about TENDENCIES as a result of socialization.
I certainly wasn't saying "all women are neat and all men are messy".
However, you do have to agree that as a result of socialization women
BY AND LARGE consider cleanliness more important than men do, and they'll
act sooner to clean things up than men will.  These tendencies drive
stereotypes, which in turn drive expectations.  Your men were appalled
because you blew their expectations right out of the water, and they
didn't know which way to turn next.

BTW - my wife is just as messy as I am, so I KNOW that the female
tendency towards neatness is just that: a tendency and not a hard-and-fast
rule!  And unlike the men you describe, I was RELIEVED to find that
Tamara had the same "relaxed" standard of housekeeping that I did 8-)

>    Among the black community at least, many men expect the women to maintain
>    the same standard of cleanliness as their mothers did, who were probably
>    neat as pins. And yes, they can find microscopic dust balls. Its one
>    of their criteria for a "good woman". Another reason why I'm single.

Well now, for what purposes are the dust-balls being noticed?  Obviously
not for their own comfort, since as you said they could make all KINDS
of excuses for the dirt when they lived as bachelors 8-)  I think this 
is more of a control thing... the more fault they can find, and the further
they can push you into trying to correct these faults, the more control
they have over you.  It's not just a man-woman thing, either: men do it
to each other.  Drill sergeants are also capable of spotting microscopic
dirt-specks after the privates are done cleaning the latrine...

--jim

I agree with 'ren.  All woman are messy and a pain to be cleaning up
after all the time.

Signed,
Still looking for Ms. Clean

I didn't even know dirt existed until I left home at 17.  My little bed
was always impeccably made when I arrived home from school, the sheets
clean and crisp; yesterday's playclothes were miraculously sucked into
the the washer and returned just as miraculously neatly pressed, folded
and stacked in my dresser, each sock perfectly mated.  Dust was
something I would be turned into one day, but it's existence was unknown
in my house.  The floors were as squeeky clean as our dinner plates.
And our house must have been equipped with the instant food machine you
see on Star Trek because meals appeared at perfectly timed intervals and
in endless variety.  As I grew older, I began to suspect my mother of
being a human cleaning machine.  She could detect dirt at the subatomic
level, before it became dirt -- dirt in embryo, nascent dirt.  She
practiced "preventive cleaning" with Zen-like concentration, cleaning
things before they became dirty to avoid even the insinuation of dirt.
She was a cleaning zealot.  I never asked how she had come to adopt this
religion; I assumed she was born to it as I was born to its benefits.
This privilege, however, did not translate well when I emerged from
childhood into the real world.  I married a woman named Sandy ...  Just
kidding.

As an adult, I realized I could never compete with the depth and
thoroughness of someone who's passion was cleaning so now I hire an
agency.  And when I come home from work my little bed is always
impeccably made ...

    Uh...
    
    This discussion on cleaning habits is all well and good, but I really
    wanted to see some discussion on the relative merits of two points of
    view, and how the conflict between those views might be reconciled...
    
    D!

    um, D!
    
    maybe you could start a spin off note ?
    
    huh? maybe?
    
    :-) X 100
    
    Bonnie

                           -< she who proposes, disposes? >-
     
    Yeah, except this "she" isn't particularly interested in the new
    conversation. Oh well, I'll do it anyway...
    
    Say, isn't there already a not about sharing housework?   Jody...?
    
    D!

Re: .74

>    This discussion on cleaning habits is all well and good, but I really
>    wanted to see some discussion on the relative merits of two points of
>    view, and how the conflict between those views might be reconciled...

Ooops... sorry, d!  That's what you get when you haven't been around for
a while, dive in, get overwhelmed by the backlog, and do a "set seen".
You get caught up in a rathole and think it's the main discussion 8-).

Anyhow: I peeked back in on .0 and some of the topical replies, and
here's my 20 millibucks:  I personally believe that *equality* should
be the goal AND it should also be the default condition.  In other
words, when an inequality (or inequity) is cited, one should try as
hard as possible to implement a solution which has all involved playing
by the same rules; in other words, and "equalist" solution.  Only when
this proves to be impossible or highly impractical should one consider
some measure of inequality so as to provide equity.

The problem with trying to implment "unequal-but-equitable" policies
is that social engineering is an EXTREMELY inexact science.  Any attempt
to balance things out by deliberately engineering certain biases into
the system is tricky at best and typically unworkable.  It's like the
cartoon cliche about the guy who tries to fix a wobbly table by sawing
a little off each leg.  Now it's wobbly in a different direction, so he
saws a little more off.  In the last panel of the cartoon you inevitably
see a legless tabletop sitting on the floor...

--jim

    maybe it was in 
    
    topic 109 - homemaker compensation How to Implement
    
    see also:
    
    Womannotes-V2
    119 - today's housewife
    168 - help with housework problems
    195 - working woman's unworkable world
    
    
    -Jody
    

    Re <<< Note 821.67 by TALLIS::TORNELL >>>

    >>My dads love of cooking came after he had fitted it into his schedule when
    >>my mum went from permanent nights to permamnent days...

    >Well bless your dad, Heather, and I mean that sincerely.  But he is not
    >even remotely representative of the average situation here in the US.  He
    >remains an exception.

    I have to say that he is not even 'remotely representative' of the average 
    situation in the UK either, just in case you got that impression! Rather, 
    the 'exception that proves the rule', as the saying goes...

    June.

The problem with using equity as a standard it is very a much a matter of
personal taste.  I think the race issue admits more dramatic extremes, so I'll
use it for my examples:

A black person might define equity as "You can be our slaves for a few hundred
years and then we'll talk".

A white person might define it as "You're better off here in the country we
built (after stealing it fair and square from the Indians, but that's another
story) than you would be if we had left you in Africa, so we don't owe you
anything.  Everything you have is by our grace, and it's grotesquely unfair
that you aren't more grateful."

Those two people might agree that equity is a reasonable goal for the
structuring of society, but it seems unlikely they will reach a compromise on
anything else.  There is no basis for a shared standard of equity.  "Equality"
is a compromise that few people will believe is actually fair, but which most
people will agree would be an improvement over what exists today.

Of course, equality is also a slippery standard that is difficult to apply in
complex real-world situations, but it's not quite so subject to abuse.  That
makes it a convenient thing to rally around.

>    >>My dads love of cooking came after he had fitted it into his schedule when
>    >>my mum went from permanent nights to permamnent days...
>
>    >Well bless your dad, Heather, and I mean that sincerely.  But he is not
>    >even remotely representative of the average situation here in the US.  He
>    >remains an exception.
>
>    I have to say that he is not even 'remotely representative' of the average 
>    situation in the UK either, just in case you got that impression! Rather, 
>    the 'exception that proves the rule', as the saying goes...

>    June.

	Tha't odd June, becuase I see that it's about 35-35% split, with the 
	other 30% being done by bying in services for either cleaning, 
	childminding etc.................the Creche at Digital is full, the
	agency cleaners are doing a booming trade, and getting somone locally
	to help out is like trying to find goldust, there are so many people 
	who want the services.

	Heather

    
    Actually, I think amongst my friends and colleagues the house work split
    is about 50-50 for working couples and 20-80 for one income families.
    
    Of course, I married an extreme, he does 0 housework. So, after couple
    years of squabbling, we hired a cleaning lady. I still cook, since
    I enjoy it and do laundry, since I'm picky. Fortunately my husband
    doesn't sit on his rear while I work around the house. He is a zealous
    gardener and carpenter. So, he contributes in different ways (not
    always in the ways I prefer, but I've got to work with what I've
    got). When I was growing up, we always had a live-in maid to do the
    housework, so I don't feel guilty about having someone else to
    do my toilet bowls.
    
    The way I see it - if I can change it, I'll change it, if I can't
    I'll work around it. Life is too short to be angry all the time.
    
    
    
    Eva

    Womannotes-V2, topic 727: "Second Shift"