is it reeeeaaally true that males generally get paid higher for doing the same job as females? i took sociology last sem, and we were given statistics that definitely proved this so. but somehow it only hit home when i had to interview a pharmacist at a hospital for one of my pharmacy modules. during the interview she revealed that guys typically get paid more than girls (for the first job. not sure about after that, but probably so.), even if you've got the same grades and all that. and i thought that was incredibly unfair! she mentioned it had something to do with them serving NS. but.. i honestly don't quite see the logic in that (i'm sure the guys would object haha)!
it is so ingrained in some societies that men deserve more than women. like, it's such a natural thing that people don't usually stop to question it or to think about it. okay, maybe i put it across too harshly, but i guess that's pretty much it? dr deng shared some little riddle at the start of the lecture. can't recall it exactly, but i fell for it! i thought the doctor was a man. no, wait, let me correct myself. i didn't even consciously think that the doctor was a man! the whole process was sub-conscious. to classify it as a thought would be inaccurate. i guess you could say that it didnt even occur to me that the doctor might be a female.
i never really noticed how language was sexist though. that was an eye opening session. now the world seems a whole load more unfair haha! but oh well, i'm sure all things will work out good in the end. one thing to think about would be how women should respond to it though. i'm not really into confrontation, and more for addressing the issue in a calm, elegant way.
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You know, my guy-friend also said that men should get paid more because they serve NS, since they spend 2 whole years doing 'useless' things. Nonsense logic, I say. But I think it's not that guys get paid more, but it's the girls that get paid less, due to the possibility of getting hitched and having babies later. The reasoning might be because females might be more likely to quit after getting married, so it doesn't make sense to invest in female employees. Even if they don't, they'll have babies, which spells more trouble as the entire maternity leave, child sick leave thing kicks in. Lose-lose?
ReplyDeleteI fell for the 'trick' too! Heh. I guess I never really thought of English as being sexist before lecture either.
-Huimin
Yeah, in Singapore, people seldom pay attention to the issue of sexist language use. Hence, some kind of awareness raising should be in order, at least from the educational arena.
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