BY SHAY CULLEN
IT IS THIS attitude of male dominance that poses one of the greatest challenges to women in fighting for equality and justice in the world today. Women are among the most successful businesspeople in the world and it is the working mothers who work hard and long hours for little pay to support millions of single-mother families. Penguins are more faithful husbands than many men.
The abandoned working women bravely struggle to survive with their children. We found Jemma, one 35-year-old mother of seven small children whose 13-year-old child was sexually abused by her third live-in partner. She is uneducated and has to work as a live-in house help for a rich family and leave her kids with a neighbor, hungry and neglected.
Help will be provided now. Not only on the factory floor, but in the highest level of business management, women are not only conspicuously absent but they are on average paid less than men doing the same job.
The BBC China editor Carrie Gracie quit over a pay dispute when it was revealed that she was being paid much less than her male counterparts. A culture of gender inequality was at work, she said. A finding later revealed that men are being paid 9.3 percent more than women.
Women have achieved great triumphs in sports and endurance achievements. I mentioned recently the young 22-year-old English woman who recently rowed a boat singlehanded across the Atlantic in 70 days.
In tennis, unequal gender pay was and still is notorious in many sports today. It was not until the famous tennis champion Billie Jean king said she would boycott the 1973 US Open tennis grand slam unless the prize money was equal as that of the men. She won and the male-dominated sports surrendered and the organizers capitulated.
At the Miami Open championship, she said: “Everyone thinks women should be thrilled when we get crumbs, and I want women to have the cake, the icing and the cherry on top, too.”
However, the English Wimbledon Tennis Club did not pay equal prize money until a fracas and protest arose that forced them to close the gender prize money gap only in 2007 no less. However, in 2015, at the tennis championship tournament in Ohio, the prize money for women was less than that for men.
Roger Federer was paid US$731,000 while Serena Williams received only US$495,000.
Today, the struggle and campaign for equality, rights, respect and human dignity of women goes on because the rights of women are not universally respected. They have become stronger, more vocal and empowered in recent years where the exposure of abuse is on the centre state with the #MeToo Movement and the successful campaigns against child sexual abuse. In past years, it was taboo, the no talk culture of silence has instilled fear in almost every woman and child who suffered abuse. It is only many years later that a man or woman find the strength and opportunity to speak out. It is usually when one bravest of all steps up and complains. (To be continued)/PN
