On the Third Hand…

7 Comments

1. Doug_S
   Posted 29 Sep, 2005 at 14:09 | Permalink

   The Soviot Union had women’s equality in 1960 and declined economically and in population. Japan limits women to minor positions in the workplace and is the 2nd largest economy in the world.

2. Kathy K
   Posted 29 Sep, 2005 at 16:22 | Permalink

   The Soviet Union’s problem was not women’s ‘equality’. It was their government and their ‘5 year plans’.

   Things are improving in Japan, albeit slowly, as more educated women make their way into the work force. (I’d say that they are about where we were in the early 70s) - and that’s a few centuries ahead of Saudi Arabia.

3. tree hugging sister
   Posted 30 Sep, 2005 at 15:51 | Permalink

   Dead on, Kathy. Outstanding piece you linked to, with so many thoughts near and dear to my heart. I thought the Iraqi constitution draft was a complete sell-out of what was promised Iraqi women-a voice. Under ( what an appropriate word) it, they are chattels yet again and less free than when Saddam Hussein held sway. How wrong is that?

4. Jerry
   Posted 1 Oct, 2005 at 11:35 | Permalink

   Democracy and freedom are admirable goals…but just because they may be the best answer for society doesn’t automatically mean they will win out. One only need consult all of human history to see it’s largely been undemocratic with very limited freedoms. It’s going to - in my opinion - require some better leadership than we’ve seen so far to accomplish what should be our goal.

5. Purple Avenger
   Posted 2 Oct, 2005 at 02:15 | Permalink

   The Soviet Union had womenâ??s equality in 1960
   

   ---

   Yep, that’s what the USSR constitution said. I’ve read it - very gender neutral. Looked great on paper, murdered tens of millions when deployed in the field.

   Curiously, those “equal women” never managed to raise much above local adminstrative posts though isn’t it?

   I don’t recall seeing any females waving to the crowd in a May Day parade. I suspect politburo gender ratios never even got close to current US house/senate levels.

6. trailing wife
   Posted 2 Oct, 2005 at 18:40 | Permalink

   Purple Avenger is correct; de jure rights are often enough not in effect de facto — especially in non-democratic societies. Certainly, the putative equal rights of women under Saddam Hussein were not enforced in actuality, although it was women more often raped in front of their families by Hussein’s bully boys than their fathers, sons or brothers. And it was pretty young women rather than pretty young men who were taken off the street for Uday and Qusay’s umentionable pleasures.

   The reality is that most Iraqi women have no less de facto freedom under the soon-to-be ratified Constitution than they did in the bad old days. And the Constitution can be amended, just like America’s. So let’s look hopefully to a future where the de jure rights of women grow to match their increasing de facto power, just as occurred in this country.

7. Kevin
   Posted 8 Oct, 2005 at 08:05 | Permalink

   New Scientist has a similar story from a different point of view. It sees it as a struggle between “Enlightenment values” - reason, pluralism, democracy and freedom of thought–and fundamentalist religions that reject rational enquiry as the best way to explain the world, and empirical evidence as the best way to formulate policy. It notes that there has been an explosion of fundamentalist movements in all the worlds major religions and that they share a commom thread: a fervent belief that they alone are in possession of the truth - usually an overtly literal interpretation of a sacred text - and an equally fervent desire to impose that truth on others. And, unlike mainstream religion, they cannot tolerate dissent.