GENDER EQUALITY AND DISCRIMINATION AFTER #METOO

As we witness the events of past two and half years, the ‘#Metoo’ movement has become one of the mainstays for most gender-centred dialogues. The movement has taken a global reach and it remains a question whether it is an uprising of neo-liberal feminist theory or only a simple yet powerful globalization of ‘sisterhood’? There is no denial that #Metoo has presented itself as a transnational feminist phenomenon where women have actively voiced the discrimination and harassment that they faced. This movement is impacting behaviours and social norms, by highlighting them like never before.  The common conception was that bringing such harassment and abuse issues forth and then punishing the abusers, would have a deterrent effect on such abusive behaviour. In theory, this should make women feel safer and empowered. But is that so? Has #Metoo solved or reduced any problems for women or not?[1] In a recent article titled ‘The #Metoo Backlash,’ published by Harvard Business Review, it was argued that aggressive actions of #Metoo have resulted in substantial negative reaction. The article stated that ‘19% more men said they were reluctant to hire attractive women, 21% said they were reluctant to hire women for jobs involving close interpersonal interactions with men (jobs involving travel, say), and 27% said they avoided one-on-one meetings with female colleagues.’

In a world where men hold overwhelming majority of resources and wield absolute economic power, the #Metoo movement in all its glory seemed like a step backwards. On a theoretical level, it was already an uneasy blend of radical and liberal feminism. Practically, it has turned out to be an incomplete protocol. The not so heartening results rendered by this movement had made feminism look as if at an ‘impasse.’

Indeed, feminism is at an impasse.[2] Young women agree that women should receive equal rights and equal treatment, but many insist that they are not feminists. Women have made strides in educational institutions and as workers during the past few decades of human rights movements yet progress still seems to be at a snail’s pace. Most women continue to do most caretaking and domestic work at home and some now also work for wages. Most men are aware of these women’s second shift and its unfairness but are uninterested in change. Media treat women better in some ways but continue to focus primarily on men and on women in relationship to men. Most heroines are still delicate and beautiful. Women, particularly young women, are more obsessed than in earlier eras with weight and physical appearance as measures of merit. Real equality appears to be an ever-receding phenomenon.[3]

A major part of the problem is that those working for legal change have failed to look at the big picture: a social structure that is male-centred, male-identified, male-dominated, and which valorises qualities narrowly defined as masculine. None of the prevailing approaches to change dominant in legal circles, not even #Metoo, has the potential to seriously threaten this structure because they offer no values inconsistent with patriarchal values. The solution does not lie in substituting the hegemony of one for another or fear of one for another.  

Human beings, whether men, women, or children, do not flourish when hyper-masculinity is glorified, and traditionally feminine qualities are denigrated. Nor do human beings flourish when all males are pressured to adopt hyper-masculine attributes and repress feminine ones, and all females are pressured to adopt traditionally feminine attributes and repress masculine ones. [4]It is only ‘feminism with substantive value theory’ that has the potential to improve life for many people, and not just women alone.

Our notions of gender inequality and discrimination are inevitably linked to our notion of equality. Thus, in all situations, discrimination results in inequality. At the end of the twentieth century, the two most accepted gender equality theories are: liberal feminism with its standard of formal equality i.e. differential treatment of similarly-situated women and men; and secondly, the dominance approach i.e. rules, practices, policies, etc., that support the unequal distribution of power between women and men. 

However, there are two main problems with both these approaches:

• Neither helped in identifying how to get to its vision of equality; and
• Both were empty of values and consistent with worlds that would not necessarily be better for human beings, including women.

A legitimate question arises: Where shall we go from here? Neither formal equality nor dominance theory tells us how to reach to its equal world. Both present visions of equality, which are tautologically accurate in defining an equal world, but fails to inform what is coming next. The hype of #Metoo offers a good example.

Formal equality assumes that if women and men have equal choices, they will be equal. Here the term ‘choice’ would denote choices with the same meaning and consequences on all levels and in all areas of life. Hence, in a world in which women and men actually face the same choices, they obviously would be equal in some important sense. [5]In such a world, to give just three examples:

• Men would be free to be feminine if there be a need, as women would be free to be masculine if need demands.
• Women and men would face the same precise choices and the same consequences – in terms of social pressures, expectations, economic and emotional well-being – in deciding whether to parent and how to combine caretaking with the ability to support themselves and their children economically. 
• Women and men would speak with equal authority and credibility.

If these conditions are met, there would be equality between the genders in terms of choice. Still, requiring formal equality in such limited contexts, such as equal pay for equal work, will not yield equality in a world in which women and men do not face the same choices in other areas.

Talking in terms of ‘Dominance Approach’ of radical feminism also does not help in identifying the conclusions that are intended to reach. Here in this approach, equality consists of women and men with equal amounts of power. Of course, if women and men have equal powers, there would be equality in terms of power. [6]However, this equality cannot be extended to a generic exposition of equality. Again, this notion of equality says nothing about how we get to such a world, when we are stuck in one in which women and men do not possess same amount of power. This is particularly problematic in the light of the ubiquitous double blinds we face when working for social change. Often, a change – such as allowing women to work a mommy track – will increase some women’s power in some situations and depress other women’s power. The actual application can be seen in the #Metoo where while some women has succeeded in prosecuting their abusers and harassers by calling them out, yet many will suffer as they would become less attractive choice as workers and colleagues. There is in fact no way to weigh the loss against the benefits to arrive at a net power measure.

More fundamentally, neither formal equality nor dominance theory identifies a world that is necessarily better than our own for human beings, including women. [7]Imagine a world of actual equality according to both formal equality and dominance approach. Women and men face the same choices with the same meanings and consequences on all levels. And women and men also have equal power. But is it easy imagining such world with too little nurturing, one in which no one does any more nurturing than is done today by the average man? Is this a world we necessarily want to be moving towards just because it is equal? [8]Would it even be good for women, who after all, like men, begin and often end life in need of caretaking by others?

Before working for social change towards an ideal world, we need to know more about it than, that women and men are equal in it. Is it a world in which human beings, including women, thrive? This is one reason why we need a substantive feminism with values.

Consider these three factors which contribute in significant ways to inequality between women and men:

• Our culture insists that women and men are essentially different and that men play ‘masculine’ roles and women play ‘feminine’ roles.
• Our culture sees only men as fully human and men’s need as of prime importance.
• We overvalue the traits associated with narrow notion of masculinity: Aggressiveness, independence, and rugged individualism.

And we undervalue the attributes traditionally associated with femininity: Gentle characteristics such as capacity to nurture, support and caretaking.               

As for experiment, if third factor is focused, it will be clearly seen that society has culturally an inherent tendency to overvalue traits and activities that are seen as ‘masculine’ and to undervalue traits and activities that are seen as ‘feminine’. It is doubtful that an equal world can be created without changing these values; without deflating the overvaluation of those things that ‘real’ men do; and without inflating the appreciation of those things that ‘real’ women do. The notions of equality and discrimination must be approached through a value-based perspective, where qualities are valuable regardless of whether displayed by women or men.

One of the difficulties today, is that the narrow legal notions of gender equality i.e. formal equality and its flip side, gender discrimination, have come to dominate most culture’s understanding of gender equality and gender discrimination. Such a narrow definition may be entirely appropriate in certain contexts, such as a requirement of equal pay for equal work. But inequality is not just economic; it is deeply embedded in cultural beliefs and values, and these can only be challenged by a broader and substantive vision of equality.

[1]T Bower , ‘The #Metoo Backlash, Harvard Business Review,2019.<https://hbr.org/2019/09/the-metoo-backlash> Last Accessed : 21 January 2020

[2]A Tantaros ,Tied up in knots: How getting what we wanted made women miserable’, 1st edition, Broadside Books, 2016.

[3]C Gregory ,D Kelemen , K Whittington , and J Baer ,”Feminist Theory and the Law.” The Oxford Handbook of Law and Politics, Oxford University Press, 2019. <https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199208425.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780199208425-e-25>. Last Accessed : 21 January 2020

[4]M Fineman ,‘The Neutered Mother, the Sexual Family and Twentieth Century Tragedies’,1 edition, Routledge, 1995.

[5]L Goldstein ,‘Feminist Jurisprudence, The Difference Debate’,Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1992.

[6]C Mackinnon,‘Feminism Unmodified’, Harvard Business Press, 1994.

[7]D Rhode,‘Feminist Critical Theories’ , Stanford Law Review, 1990

[8]J Williams ,‘Unbending Gender: Why family and work conflict and what to do about it?’,Oxford University Press, 2000.