Gender, Politics, and Global Cultures

A judge has allowed for 9000 women to sue Disney for pay disparity. The plaintiffs say that Disney did not uphold California’s Equal Pay Act and discriminated against women. “Disney says that you can’t compare jobs over multiple sectors because it depends on the manager” (Maddus). This can be seen as a cop-out because the company should have a standard rate for each job. The lawyer also says that because the workers work together at the same job level, they do not have the same amount of work. Because of education, time of hire, tenure, or how long the person has been working there. Both of these sides have an expert that says there is a gender wage pay gap and that there isn’t one. The claim is that managers could use past pay history to be able to set pay for Disney jobs. While Disney says it could be used, it was never required, so the company shouldn’t be at fault.

            In my opinion, do workers have a case to win? In my opinion, they may have a chance to win this suit, but if they do, Disney will probably blame it on the managers, which seems like they are already doing. And also, with a class action lawsuit like this, it will probably take a few years to be settled.

            But it just shows that no matter how far as a country we advance, there is still gender discrimination that can happen. Especially regarding wages, it is interesting that managers can base the employee pay upon past pay. I don’t know if that’s illegal or not. The article did not say anything about it being illegal. So I guess they can do that, but to me, it seems like a gray era, which is one reason I think the lawsuit will win.

https://variety.com/2023/biz/news/disney-gender-pay-lawsuit-class-certification-approved-1235830178/

While the paper talked about what exact gender-based violence is, this op-ed is going to talk about my options in detail in this paper. The first thing that needs to happen is that it needs to be talked about more. And it needs to be talked about in layman’s terms to younger audiences. I think the audience that can benefit from this topic is high schoolers because they are usually in relationships and can be mature enough to have these conversations. So, once you have the younger crowd knowing what exactly gender-based violence is, you can engrain into them that this is a thing that they shouldn’t do. Next, you focus on the adults because, in a sense, you will have to educate them. There are ways to leave these abusive relationships and get those people the help they need. Also, you can help these people learn exactly what to look for in a partner that might exist. These types of things, such as if they have high anti-social behaviors, are things that you need to steer away from. I also think that people need to be able to understand their partners more and communicate with them. One of the factors that could control intimate partner violence is the idea that one person thinks their partner is too controlling, which could lead this person into thinking that they need to act out in aggression to relieve some of that controlling nature. So, if there is a chance to communicate this to your partner, it can lead to some positive outcomes in the future. That way, couples don’t have to resort to aggression to solve their problems. Also, they can be an internal problem the tone person in the partnership must fix. For example, if they always go to aggression to solve a frustrating problem, they must find ways to deal with it without hurting their partner.  The paper also talks about how the researchers wanted to flip the research and focus on women when it came to intimate partner violence. I wouldn’t say I like that Idea. Are there men who face this type of violence? Yes. Do these men have every right to make their voices heard and known? Yes. But the way it was framed in the paper made it seem like it was a center for women affected by this violence. Like how all live matter was to counteract black live matter. It seemed disingenuous to intimate partner violence as if they weren’t trying to figure out a genuine reason for why a woman might do this, at least in my opinion. They then try to use some factors to see which would have a more significant effect on IPV. They did teen birth rate as one of the factors for IPV. In my opinion, it seems like it would not have that much of an effect on IPV because I feel as if drug usage would have a more significant impact on IPV. If people are on hard-core drugs or something like alcohol, it could have a greater effect on a person who is more likely to engage in IPV behaviors. But when it comes to men and women in the legislature, I feel that is an excellent way to measure IPV. Because the mindset would be with more women in the legislature, more bills would have more women’s input, which could lead to solid punishments for people who actively engage in IPV. Because if the punishments are harsher, it can deter other people from beating their partners. Women in the labor force was another one that was talked about. On the one hand, if more women were in the workforce, they could have their own money and not rely on their partners. A woman might stay in an IPV relationship because she has nowhere to go and no money to stay away from that partner. So, if she has her own money, she may be more likely to be able to leave that situation, which can stop one case of intimate partner violence. When it came to the results, it was all over the place. Some states were high for women, and some for men. But overall, it showed that there were no significant statics when it came to men. This could be because of the small sample size. Men are less likely to come forward about things like this. Also, I would like to see how other-sex couples are measured through this. Will it be the same, or will it be different?

There is a new policy in the ICC for gender-based crimes. This is supposed to help victims who didn’t have any way of prosecuting these people before. The new policy was implemented on December 4 of this year. It was presented at a yearly meeting at the International Criminal Court of Assembly States. “This policy is for the survivor center and trauma-informed.” (Seelinger(Schoenherr) Now they are trying to find a way to operationalize this in actual court.

Seelinger Helps Draft New ICC Policy on Gender Crimes

A researcher did a gender budgeting study in Ecuador. He did this in Ecuador to see how gender budgeting has been working there. The article talks about how gender budgeting has been spread exponentially, especially in Latin America. In Latin America, it has been 18 countries that have implemented some gender budgeting in their country. There are several ways to think about gender before and after an event. Like opening a new infrastructure and thinking about how gender would be implemented. “Another way is to see how resources are spread across the country.” (Guzmán) This can be seen by how the money can move around and what the government does to help the women in their country.

            The researcher then did in-depth interviews with twenty-two people. “Ecuador got a recognition by the U.N. for their work in gender budgeting.” (Guzmán) Ecuador started their work in early 2010. They passed a law requiring the Ministry of Economy and Finance to include a gender budgeting statement in their yearly budget. It requires all ministries to look through their organization and ensure that there is a gender lens on what they are doing. But most of the effects of gender budgeting in the country has now had a real impact instead of just raising awareness. “women activist has said that gender budgeting has not been used well enough to implement systematic change.” (Guzmán) This could be because Ecuador has used gender budgeting to show that they are doing something but not doing something.

            One factor discussed is leadership and how that has led to the lack of leadership. “The policies do not work and are just swept under the rug.” (Guzmán) The interviewees talk about how the leaders don’t make real progress; they only speak for show. Also, the machismo culture has diminished the effect of gender-based budgeting. The country must be on one page for gender-based budgeting to be effective.

Gender-responsive budgeting as a tool for gender equity: the Ecuador case

This article talks about how judges in the UK government are allowed to block Scotland or gender ID reforms. “In Scotland, the government let people legally change their recognized sex last year.” (Sim) But the UK government says it would impact equality. The people who voted against the Scottish bill say it will harm the women and girls in same-sex spaces, which is like how it is in the U.S. They say in spaces like hospital wards and refugees. They may think that things that are specifically supposed to be for cis men and cis women will be taken from them and given to trans individuals. Support for this bill will say it makes it easier for people who want to change their gender to get a legal certificate to show that they have, and it will be less traumatic for trans people.

            There are a few components to the bill that are talked about. “It will remove the medical label of gender dysphoria that is put on these people by doctors.” (Sim) This is an interesting point in the bill because this is needed to change their legally recognized sex. This means that if the doctor doesn’t deem the person in the criteria for gender dysphoria, then they are not able to be legally recognized. Also, the age that a person can apply for has been cut down from 18 to 16. One of the most significant changes is that it brings down the time to live the acquired gender from two years to three months.

            There are back and forth that have come out about this bill. The Scottish government said that the UK government illegally rejected the bill. But when it got taken to the judge, she said the block was lawful, and the UK government took the correct steps to block the bill. One of the UK legislators says that “the Scottish legislature needs to stop wasting taxpayers’ money” (Sim). The opponents of this bill think that there is already a bill that covers the protection and freedom of women and transgender people. Ant this new bill will negatively affect the Equality Act of 2010. The Scottish minister will try to repeal the block to see if the bill can go through.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-67659791

My final paper is centered on the high rates of femicide in Mexico and the feminist mobilizations that have developed in response. It is important to acknowledge how gender inequality is strongly correlated with gender-based violence to grasp the mechanisms that have fostered such conditions.

Throughout history, a number of factors have contributed to the culture of gender-based violence in Mexico. The rape of Indigenous women by Spanish colonizers is often cited as the root of such culture. During La Conquista, Spanish colonizers arrived and created mestizos, people of mixed Indigenous and Spanish descent. In many cases, this was the result of the rape of Indigenous women. Furthermore, European colonization led to sexism through the spread of their values, which were evident in the practice of raping women who they viewed as inferior. Many aspects of Mexican law were based on the French Civil Code. In blatantly sexist terms, the French Civil Code classified women as dependent on men in all areas of their lives. Mexican culture was heavily influenced, and it is from this style of thinking that “machismo” emerged. 

Like toxic masculinity, machismo is an ideology in which men are perceived as superior to women (De la Morena 2020). Segrest, Romero and Domke-Damonte (2003) portray it as, “a patriarchal social system that legitimizes masculinist behavior and reinforces it through cultural values and norms” (p. 16). They state that there are both good and bad elements to machismo such as, “self-respect and responsibility to the family as a provider, as well as negative elements such as affiliate obedience, virginity, consent, fear of authority, and culture rigidity” (p.17). Thus, men are the dominant members of society, displaying very little vulnerability, and taking care of those who are disadvantaged, primarily through the control of women. Men are viewed as being naturally inclined to think independently and act independently. On the contrary, the ideology places women as dependent on men. As a result, women have been traditionally cast into roles subservient to men. They are typically the nurturers, the caregivers, the ones responsible for nurturing their families and taking care of their children. Due to these factors, women have historically played subordinate roles in Mexican society. Thus, “Machismo” has created the conditions for the systematic discrimination of women, which leads to gender inequalities in all aspects of life from education to employment (De la Morena 2020). 

De La Morena, Ines. 2020. “Gender Violence in Mexico: Machismo, Femicides, and Child’s Play.” Harvard International Review 41(3):14-17.

Segrest, Sharon L., Eric J. Romero and Darla Domke-Damonte. 2003. “Exploring the Role of Machismo in Gender Discrimination: A Comparison of Mexico and the U.S.” Equal Opportunities International 22(1):13-31.

Starkey et. al (2019) conduct this study to figure out how “silence breakers” occur in media in different nations – the United States, Japan, Australia, and India – and what other frames are used in regards to silence breakers. Silence breakers is a term that came from a Time Magazine issue, talking about those who have stepped up and spoken up about sexual violence and #MeToo experiences. Although this study includes a cross-national analysis, I will be mostly focusing on Starkey et. al’s (2019) analysis on the United States for this semester paper which focuses on comparing the United States and Sweden.

Starkey et. al (2019) introduces Hofstede Insights Country Comparison, which explores certain cultural factors that can affect cultural receptivity of the #MeToo movement. These factors include power distance, individualism, and masculinity. Power distance is defined as how little or much a society aligns with the concept that people have different levels of power and privilege, leading to inequality within the society. Individualism is defined as how little or much the people in a society value individual priorities over societal priorities. Masculinity is defined as how strong and inherent gender socialization is within societies; how stoic and strong men should be and how motherly and gentle women should be. The United States scored lower than the other countries when it came to power distance, had the highest score in individualism, and scored second highest in masculinity. This indicates that the United States does not recognize power differences and inequality as much as other countries, highly values individualism and heroism, and buys into gender norms and expectations heavily. This relates to Starkey et. al’s (2019) analysis because as reluctance to inequality, neoliberalism, and gender norms increases, so does the likelihood that media will be hesitant to accept #MeToo silence breakers and portray the movement as a surprise and cautionary tale, rather than a social issue and fact. 

In addition to this, Starkey et. al (2019) talk about a study by Wallin, where they found that newspapers in the United States regarded the #MeToo movement as a “surprise movement”, whereas Swedish newspapers recognized #MeToo as a movement calling out long-standing societal issues. 

Starkey et. al (2019) used news stories from 2017-2018 to code four different media frames, which included: the brave silence breaker, the stoic victim, the reluctant hero, and the hysterical slut. For the U.S. specifically, the authors examine these frames in the case of Susan Fowler, who spoke up about the sexual abuse she faced as an employee at Uber, and found that while each frame was present, Fowler was labeled a whistle-blower by the media. They also found that due to the nature of power distance, individualism, and masculinity outlined above in the U.S., it would lead Fowler to being more likely to speak up about her experiences, but that she still faced backlash and was silenced when she first spoke up. 

This article is important and relevant to my paper because it provides a large insight into how cultural aspects like measures of power distance, individualism, and masculinity within a culture can affect its receptivity of movements. More specifically, the authors showcased that the neoliberal, misogynistic, patriarchal, and capitalistic nature of American culture and media played into how silence breakers and the overall #MeToo movement was received by the U.S. 

Starkey, Jesse C., Amy Koerber, Miglena Sternadori, and Bethany Pitchford. 2019. “#MeToo Goes Global: Media Framing of Silence Breakers in Four National Settings.” Journal of Communication Inquiry Volume 43(4): 437-461.

Written by: Lily Philbrook

At the beginning of the semester, my paper was more focused on gendered differences in policing of protests. However, my paper topic has switched to focusing on conducting a comparative analysis on women in the workplace in the United States and Sweden, how gendered workplace mistreatment affects women’s health, and the cultural receptivity of the U.S. and Sweden of the #MeToo movement. There will be three articles I will discuss within the next three substantive blog posts, with the first being Stubbs-Richardson et. al’s (2023) work on conducting a content analysis on social media around #MeToo in the U.S., China, and Sweden. 

Stubbs-Richardson et. al (2023) discuss #metoo on a global scale, #metoo in the U.S., China, and Sweden, and digital feminist activism. The paper then discusses their study, methods, data, and findings. On a global scale, #MeToo blossomed in 2017-2018, though it was coined by Tarana Burke in 2006, using the phrase to help other sexual assault survivors know they weren’t alone. One big push that caused #MeToo to sweep across the world and the internet is Alyssa Milano posting on Twitter about her experience as an actress, and asking others to speak out about their experiences as well. However, as the authors explain, #MeToo is affected by cultural receptivity, with some countries allowing more or less people to speak out about their experiences and deeming it important, worthy, or appropriate. 

This leads to Stubbs-Richardson et. al (2023) to introduce the U.S., China, and Sweden into their content analysis. #MeToo came from the U.S., with a focus on sexual abuse allegations of famous/wealthy people like Harvey Weinstein and Donald Trump. However, the authors contest that #MeToo gained traction and had its original foundation from previous anti-sexual violence movements in the U.S., ranging back to African American women fighting against sexual violence in slavery and segregation to the updated definition of rape in 2012. 

Stubbs-Richardson et. al (2023) talk about how in China, #MeToo faced many challenges, with most being due to China’s decreased cultural receptivity to feminism and activism. China is not only uber-traditional, but the state actively censors its citizens, and anything denoted as “Western” (like protesting against sexual violence). However, women in China have spoken out anyway, with the beginning of China’s #MeToo occurring in 2018 after Luo Quinqian posted about her experience of sexual violence. One of the ways women combatted censorship – trying to avoid having their posts taken down by the Chinese government – was to use the alternative #MiTu, which translates to “rice bunny”. 

Lastly, Stubbs-Richardson et. al (2023) provides a brief background on #MeToo in Sweden. They discuss how Sweden has increased cultural receptivity towards feminism and activism and has increased regulations to help ensure gender equality like paid parental leave. When #MeToo came about in Sweden, there was this feeling across the board that change needed to occur rapidly to address these issues, and many public figures contributed to the movement. There was a large amount of activism, with thousands of petitions shared across all social media. Additionally, there was almost no negativity found in news articles on the movement in Sweden, and Sweden passed the consent law in 2018. 

Stubbs-Richardson et. al (2023) gathered #MeToo data from a multitude of global social media sites, and ended up coding through almost 3,000 documents based on their country, famous person involved (like Trump), social change, and the type of sexual violence. They found that: most of the documents said social change occurred from the #MeToo movement and most of it was legally or criminally based; the U.S. saw more social change than China or Sweden; and differences in word popularity based on the word clouds they created. In the U.S. the most popular words were women, sexual, and Trump. In China, the perpetrators’ names surpassed the victims’ names, but it was reversed in Sweden. 

This article is extremely helpful to my analysis comparing the #MeToo movement in the United States and Sweden and the differences in their cultural receptivity towards the movement. As one of the largest reasons of why I chose to compare the U.S. to Sweden was due to their seemingly oppositional political stances – especially on gender equality and worker’s rights – this study not only confirms their differences, but showcases that while Sweden seems highly progressive, there are still many issues that need to be adequately and appropriately addressed. This study showcased that while the movement started out in the U.S., it is still surprising the amount of social change that people attribute to the movement within the U.S. Conversely, Sweden’s laws of not allowing to mention perpetrators’ names – and how the court treated the victims – allows for a victim-blaming culture to thrive, with focus remaining on victims’ names and actions rather than the perpetrator.

Stubbs-Richardson, Megan, Shelby Gilbreath, MacKenzie Paul, and Audrey Reid. 2023. “It’s a Global #MeToo: A Cross-National Comparison of Social Change Associated With the Movement.” Feminist Media Studies 1-20.

Written by: Lily Philbrook

In this article, CNN explores the relationship between climate change and inequality, explaining that climate change exacerbates societal issues, including gender inequality. They explore girl’s education in Nigeria, food insecurity in Brazil, human trafficking in the Philippines, maternal health in Pakistan, migration in Guatemala, child marriage in Bangladesh, and gender-based violence in Kenya. 

In Nigeria, more than half of the girls in certain parts of the country attend school, and as climate crises such as flash flooding increases, so does absenteeism. In Brazil, women who use the Amazon rainforest to harvest natural resources (to eat, make into things, and/or sell) are trying to push back against corporate deforestation. In the Philippines – as we read in Parrenas’ Unfree – women live in poverty, leading them to be more vulnerable and susceptible to human trafficking and exploitation. CNN states that women’s increased state of poverty and human trafficking is at least partially due to the increased experiences of typhoons and hurricanes in this region of the world, which is due to climate change. In Pakistan, rising temperatures lead to increased stillbirths, premature births, lower birth weights, health problems like fainting and dehydration, and health concerns for the mother and her child trying to survive in the heat post-delivery. 

In Guatemala, the rainy season is now starting later and ruining harvests, which ruins prospects for business and livelihood. While the men in this region migrate to find financial opportunities, women have to stay home, take care of the family, and find resources to live. In Bangladesh, as climate crises increase and devastate the country, families face increasing pressures to find resources to live, leading to increased child marriage. Lastly, the people in Kenya face climate extremes, bouncing from drought to floods. With most of the country relying on farming, this yo-yoing from one to the other decreases their chance for successful harvests. This leads to increased stress and aggravation, adding increased risk for violence against women. 

While some of these effects are indirect and many of these issues are multi-dimensional, we can see the linkage between climate change and how it at least exacerbates societal issues that are already there. Knowing this can help government officials understand that when we put time and money towards reducing climate change and its impact, we are creating positive (generational) impacts for everyday citizens and other societal issues as well.

Link to article

Written by: Lily Philbrook

Last week, Russia’s supreme court banned LGBTQ+ activism, labeling it an extremist movement. A few days after the news broke, Russian police started raiding LGBTQ+ venues, claiming that it was a drug raid. During these raids, the police checked and took pictures of those they found in these clubs. There have been many LGBTQ+ venues who have closed down because of the law, given the vagueness of the law. 

While there are many things going on in the world right now, we can not neglect important news like this. When one country takes drastic actions like this, we must pay attention and take note.

Link to article

Written by: Lily Philbrook