It's pathetic you know... how much more us women pay for things. I know this has been covered in the media, on Facebook and on every type of media device possible.
However, I spotted a major difference today.
I was out looking for new thongs - aka: flip-flops - to use on holidays. I found some (Ha! Some! There were 3 aisles at K-Mart!) around where I lived and took a look. The lady's pairs were all pretty with flowers, jewels and cartoons on them and came in a huge variety of sizes and colours. They were all $8.00 a pair no matter what they were made of; but they were really crappy and made from terrible materials.
The men's thongs were very cool. They had wicked colours, pictures of people surfing, people at the beach, had 'Billabong' on them and 'Star Wars', 'Star Trek' and other wickedly cool stuff the typical nerd loves... and they were around $6.00 each. Then, I found pairs of the Aussie Flag in the men's department and they were only $3.50 for any size. So, I grabbed a pair of those and tried those on; finding I fitted into a size 6. They were nice, thick-soled and comfy... the lady's ones I had chosen were pretty, had a jewel on them, and were made from thin synthetic soles... I bought both. One pair to wear because they were nice and pretty (yeah, it's the fashion victim in me) and the other to wear on holidays to the toilets and showers (after all, who need athlete's foot?). I mean, what to manufacturers think that us women do in caravan parks? Do we walk into the showers with our slippers on and think we're going to let our feet get all grundgy and disgusting while the men are going to wear their cool, $3 - $6 thongs on their feet that last a lifetime? Women aren't all about what pretty things to put on our feet... we are also making sure we don't get disgusting crap growing on our feet we really don't want to catch at the public toilets.
And why does it cost so bloody much more for us women to buy clothes and get hair cuts than it does for a man? Okay, we wear make-up, but then, that's added on. Men get paid more and climb the corporate ladder faster than a woman does - and what is with that? Men are treated better, taken more seriously by others, and when a woman asks for help, they are treated like idiots. Does it make them feel superior? Does it offer them some kind of comfort that they have attempted to pull a woman down while standing over them? Do they forget that their mother was a woman who brought them up?
But the one thing I do find about being a woman in this time and age - which hasn't changed - is that we still get treated terribly by politicians, by the workplace and by magazines and the media. We are still expected to make ourselves beautiful for men, make ourselves sex symbols and are still expected to not only go out to work, but also come home and hold the fort here as well while our men flop down into the Easy-chair and complain they're tired. We are expected to get in and work harder to get the laundry done, do the cooking, cleaning, pick up the kids from school and do the shopping and then perform our 'duties' in the bedroom too... yeah, sure!
Being a woman is not only more expensive, more exhausting, still sexist and demoralising, but nothing has changed about our treatment over the last three or four generations. We are still chained to the kitchen sink, we are still doing the shopping, we are still the ones who do all the things around the house, while the men do everything around the yard and 'The Man Cave'... I wonder if it will ever change?
However, I spotted a major difference today.
I was out looking for new thongs - aka: flip-flops - to use on holidays. I found some (Ha! Some! There were 3 aisles at K-Mart!) around where I lived and took a look. The lady's pairs were all pretty with flowers, jewels and cartoons on them and came in a huge variety of sizes and colours. They were all $8.00 a pair no matter what they were made of; but they were really crappy and made from terrible materials.
The men's thongs were very cool. They had wicked colours, pictures of people surfing, people at the beach, had 'Billabong' on them and 'Star Wars', 'Star Trek' and other wickedly cool stuff the typical nerd loves... and they were around $6.00 each. Then, I found pairs of the Aussie Flag in the men's department and they were only $3.50 for any size. So, I grabbed a pair of those and tried those on; finding I fitted into a size 6. They were nice, thick-soled and comfy... the lady's ones I had chosen were pretty, had a jewel on them, and were made from thin synthetic soles... I bought both. One pair to wear because they were nice and pretty (yeah, it's the fashion victim in me) and the other to wear on holidays to the toilets and showers (after all, who need athlete's foot?). I mean, what to manufacturers think that us women do in caravan parks? Do we walk into the showers with our slippers on and think we're going to let our feet get all grundgy and disgusting while the men are going to wear their cool, $3 - $6 thongs on their feet that last a lifetime? Women aren't all about what pretty things to put on our feet... we are also making sure we don't get disgusting crap growing on our feet we really don't want to catch at the public toilets.
And why does it cost so bloody much more for us women to buy clothes and get hair cuts than it does for a man? Okay, we wear make-up, but then, that's added on. Men get paid more and climb the corporate ladder faster than a woman does - and what is with that? Men are treated better, taken more seriously by others, and when a woman asks for help, they are treated like idiots. Does it make them feel superior? Does it offer them some kind of comfort that they have attempted to pull a woman down while standing over them? Do they forget that their mother was a woman who brought them up?
But the one thing I do find about being a woman in this time and age - which hasn't changed - is that we still get treated terribly by politicians, by the workplace and by magazines and the media. We are still expected to make ourselves beautiful for men, make ourselves sex symbols and are still expected to not only go out to work, but also come home and hold the fort here as well while our men flop down into the Easy-chair and complain they're tired. We are expected to get in and work harder to get the laundry done, do the cooking, cleaning, pick up the kids from school and do the shopping and then perform our 'duties' in the bedroom too... yeah, sure!
Being a woman is not only more expensive, more exhausting, still sexist and demoralising, but nothing has changed about our treatment over the last three or four generations. We are still chained to the kitchen sink, we are still doing the shopping, we are still the ones who do all the things around the house, while the men do everything around the yard and 'The Man Cave'... I wonder if it will ever change?
No comments:
Post a Comment