From: robohen@ocf.berkeley.edu (Henry Robertson)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: SEXISM--CHANGING?
Date: 25 Dec 1992 03:34:44 GMT
Organization: U.C. Berkeley Open Computing Facility
NNTP-Posting-Host: tsunami.berkeley.edu

In article <Bzs5Kt.8L8@CAM.ORG> cheung@CAM.ORG (Shirley Cheung) writes:
>
>Hello all,
>
>I have been following up the sexism issue on the net for days now. And
>there's an intriguing question that has been bugging me. Given the fact
>that most Japanese women are now VERY well educated, how can they bear to
>have a salaried position less than men. Are they stupid or something?
>Don't the companies look for QUALIFIED workers regardless of the basis of
>gender. In fact, the gender issue here is totally irrelevant to the
>productivity of one firm. Why are people still be that TRADITION?
>
>As the world is getting smaller and smaller, as more information regarding
>to the social situation of both the Western and the Eastern countries, I
>like to know how long will the Japanese society take in order to achieve
>sex-equality. 
>
>I know that the Japanese women are the most brilliant people in the world.
>How can they be so closed-minded and let others to decide their own future
>and also let them to DEPRIVE their RIGHTS in the workforce?? In my
>opinion, I strongly believe that if there's a GREAT (1-2million) of women
>who are willing to initiate some drastic actions in Japan (demonstratio,
>petition, etc.), the society will accelerate in a faster pace. 
>
>Sadly, there are so few Japanese women on the net which makes me almost
>impossible to understand them. Do you know any women who wants to talk
>about this issue with me?
>
Please.  You make Japanese women sound like they all have exactly the same
qualifications.  As for "how long will the Japanese society take in order to
achieve sex-equality," my guess is that women will continue to have breasts&
genitals for the next hundred years or so.  Unless, feminism becomes so
popular that everyone gets their reproductive organs surgically removed,
let incubation machines grow humans.  As long as there are physical
differences,
along with rounder facial features, difference in fat distribution, etc.
etc. you can never expect exactly the same from people.  America is in
a phase right now that confuses equality with diversity.  We respect
diversity, yet we plan to treat everybody exactly the same.  Something
overlaps there.

As for companies paying less, mathematical justifications can be made.
On the postulate that no men will quit work to raise a family, but a 
significant portion of women will, you have a justification for increased
investment in the former group.  By paying them more, you provide an
incentive to stay, so they won't switch companies.  With the latter group,
even if you pay more, there is a good chance they will quit anyway.

The world is getting smaller & smaller?  In what way?  That people choose to
live in smaller worlds?  The reality is that the US is saturated with
homestay-Japanese women learning English as a second language, for those
of them smart enough to learn a second language.  And in talking to most
of them, I don't find them to be particularly intelligent.  The difference
is that they have discipline, if it takes reciting words 200 times to remember
it.  Even that is too much of an assumption.  Many of them will simply
give up, and go home, or open up a grocery store or beauty parlor here
serving Japanese clients.  You have to understand, women play their part
to support the economic miracle, by relinquishing freedoms.  If all Japanese
women said to hell with kids & just divorce all the time, you will have a
country as screwed up as ours.







Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan