DCI Banks (2010) S3 E3
dw99 2 points 3 years ago.

rapscallion, this is a battle worth fighting. “Man” has been used as a verb (man the battle stations) bc with few exceptions, only men had paid work — and women’s work was considered unimportant.

Maybe you’re too young to know how hard life was for women even in 1980, when they became a significant presence in the workforce, but I’m not.

  • My sister, a corp. lawyer, couldn’t get a credit card on her own despite having an excellent job/salary/education; her boyfriend, who earned less, had no problem getting one.
  • Women routinely got fired when they were pregnant — wasn’t illegal.
  • Ditto when they got married.
  • Ruth Bader Ginsburg was chastised by a Harvard law professor for taking a spot that cd’ve gone to a man; does anybody really think that she wasn’t more qualifed than her male peers? (Her CV shows us that she was.)

And on and on and on. And, women still face a lot of bull in the workplace, including lower wages for equal pay. Language matters ecause it expresses how we see the world, and too many people still have misgivings about women taking their place in the world. SO let’s stop using words that reinforce the idea that women don’t belong in the workplace, or that their work isn’t valuable.

A final thought: Would you be OK if the word “white” were used to refer to all people of all ethnic backgrounds ? “White the battle stations” and “We don’t have enough whitepower to get the job done.” It’s completely parallel — all Black people, and all women (of any color) didn’t have equal rights & protection under the law until recently.

Language matters.

Sherlocat 1 points 3 years ago*.

^ THIS.🙌 And I am so sorry to hear the ridiculous sexist crap your own sister went through in the bad old days.😣 I was just too young to really experience the dark side of that era, even though I was a girl.