me:
> being in the labor force isn't the same thing as being in power. In > the US, feminists had to fight to break down the walls set up by the > old boys network and still haven't succeeded completely.
Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
No, but women need their own sources of income aside from what men bring in if they are to have more bargaining power within families and communities, and getting into workplaces outside homes brings women together with other women and men, which is a better political terrain than household labor that is often solitary in a country above a certain level of economic development.
"their own sources of income"? I don't know about Iran, but just because women earn money from wages doesn't mean they actually own or control their income. It wasn't that long ago that women's rights to property ownership were severely limited in the US. further, in many cases women participate in a workplace in a way that is controlled in an extremely paternalistic/patronizing/patriarchal way. It used to be that female teachers in the US had to live up to all sorts of "moral" rules, about their sexuality, etc. I doubt that a country which requires that women wear special clothing that covers their heads and bodies would be any more liberal here. It's a little strange to find myself making (Marxist-) feminist points to Yoshie. The fact is that there is no automatic process that produces the liberation of women. Throwing women in the workforce can easily lead to their being thrown out again (as with women in the US after WW2). Capitalist dynamics only create possibilities for gender equality: it is women's struggle that can realize the possibilities. -- Jim Devine / "But the wage of sin don't adjust for inflation. It's a buyer's market when you sell your soul." -- Jeffery Foucault, "Ghost Repeater."
