Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site uwmacc.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!whuxlm!harpo!decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!think!harvard!seismo!uwvax!uwmacc!oyster From: oyster@uwmacc.UUCP (Vicious Oyster) Newsgroups: net.women,net.social Subject: Re: "pleasant" work vs. "dangerous" work Message-ID: <1257@uwmacc.UUCP> Date: Tue, 2-Jul-85 11:57:34 EDT Article-I.D.: uwmacc.1257 Posted: Tue Jul 2 11:57:34 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 5-Jul-85 04:27:17 EDT References: <826@oddjob.UUCP> Reply-To: oyster@uwmacc.UUCP (Vicious oyster) Organization: UWisconsin-Madison Academic Comp Center Lines: 64 Xref: watmath net.women:6244 net.social:786 In article <826@oddjob.UUCP> cs1@oddjob.UUCP (Cheryl Stewart) writes: >>> >>If by "good education" you mean a degree in English, or Art, or Urban >>Planning, then I'm not surprised. Men who get those degrees usually >>end of getting inferior jobs after college as well because those degrees >>are produced in numbers far in excess of the jobs that require those >>degrees. Unfortunately, women have tended to concentrate in studies that >>do not lead to high-paying jobs. > > >Oh, don't give me that crap. Men who get "those" degrees become bank presidents >stock-brokers, lawyers, Madison Avenue advertizing tycoons, insurance magnates, >architects, clergymen, and sometimes even computer programmers and engineers. >Women who get "those" degrees are told that they don't have any useful skills-- >except typing of course. And women who do make sure to acquire higher-level >skills (programming, engineering, chemistry, physics) tend to be exploited >for those skills and those skills only--under the assumption that they're not >really planning of making a career out of it, that they'll be going to seed >soon anyway. Being exploited for those skills and those skills only means-- >you got it--writing subroutines instead of planning software, doing linear heat- >flow problems instead of nonlinear reaction-diffusion equations, working in an >chemical lab as a technician instead of being encouraged to go to graduate >school, working as an exploration geophysicist for an oil company rather than >being the theoretical physicist who formulates a consistent unified field >theory. There is nothing LESS satisfying than doing less than what you are >capable of--which is why so many women are unhappy with their "pleasant" work. > I have some friends who are married; the male has a B.A. in English, the woman an M.S. in Bacteriology. The male has been working his way up in the world of banking from bottom-of-the-heap teller for over three years now, and has gotten to the lofty position of Head Teller. The female has just gotten her first "real" (not limited-term) job. He is taking shit from people both above and below his "station", and barely earning a 5-figure salary. She is making AT LEAST double his salary, and only taking shit from specimen containers (:-). I certainly believe that she will still have a better-paying, more enjoyable job ten years hence. I do, however, acknowledge that this is not how things happen everywhere, and in every situation. >But if he still wants a job after his children are grown--that's fine with >me. As long as he's fulfilled his duty as a husband and a father by staying >home with the children while they're young...and as long as it's a safe, >pleasant job that won't upset him or make him cry. I really think that >his wife should LET him work, if that's what he really wants to do.... >and even if he wants to go back to school, I think his wife should let him >do that, too. But of course, if he finds that the big girls out there >in the real world play too rough for him, well, maybe it's better that >he occupy his time by joining the garden club, or do volunteer work -- >something that would gratify his social needs perhaps even better than a >job would. > Bitter invective isn't any more effective coming from females than it is coming from males. Your point was well made without resorting to "male tactics" (to use a net.women concept). I disagree with his "women take lower paying jobs because they enjoy non-monetary benefits" argument, but I find it hard to be sympathetic to somebody who feels a need to alienate half the population just to make a point (<- this applies to a lot of stuff here, from both men and women). -- - joel "vo" plutchak {allegra,ihnp4,seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!oyster "Take what I say in a different way and it's easy to say that this is all confusion."