feminist news round-up 12.08.12
Harrods has a gender-neutral toy store
Boys play with blue toys, they like soldiers and trucks and legos. Girls, on the other hand, play with pink dolls and ponies and princess fairy castles. Or so goes the stereotype, anyway. Enter Harrod’s Toy Kingdom. The 26,000 square foot is not divided or signposted on gender lines. Rather, they’ve created a shop which is organised thematically.
While the move is good in terms of breaking gender binaries, certain toys are still most commonly picked up by girls, others most commonly picked up by boys. Worse, the female members of staff wear pink shirts while the male staff – you’ve guessed it – wear blue. Emma Moore, founder of Pink Stinks, which campaigns against gender-targeted products and marketing says the uniforms are ‘pathetic and lazy and just shows how entrenched these ridiculous stereotypes are’.
South African President commits to gender equality
South African President Jacob Zuma used an hour-long speech to touch on topics ranging from domestic violence and sexual assault to gender parity in the private sector. He has enjoined the nation to unite against the ‘hooligans who attack and sexually assault women and girls’. He said, ‘women must be free to walk anywhere, day or night, without fearing attacks. The police stand ready to deal with such criminals.’ Aside from problems with violence, there also exists problems with education disparities between girls and boys, with fewer girls graduating from high school and higher education. However, ‘The number of girls attending primary, secondary and tertiary education has improved significantly. This is important because education is central to development and can serve as a catalyst to address gender disparities.’
“Women for Romney” Exist
US Presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, is lacking with the ladies. A recent poll has revealed that in some states, including Virginia, he is not getting a large amount of support from women. Why would he, given that his Republican party wants to stop vital family planning services? An organisation, “Women for Romney”, is setting out to paint Romney as being a better candidate for women, using figures such as, ‘women have lost more than 400,000 jobs since Barack Obama became president.’ Never minding the fact that people do tend to lose jobs in a recession, that Obama didn’t cause the recession, and that Obama has recently passed legislation making it so that women on health insurance will get free birth control.
Helping Women Get on Government Boards
The Australian federal government has moved to announce a new network to help more women get on government boards. Finance Minister Penny Wong on Friday said the network would be established by the end of the year. It will identify potential candidates for government board positions, with a key focus on appointing women to their first board. Wong says that there is currently a significant ‘structural impediment’ which makes getting on a board quite difficult for most women. She says, ‘I recall being presented with an all-male short list for a board appointment, to which I responded that if we couldn’t even find a suitably qualified woman to short-list, let alone appoint, then we probably had some work to do.’ It is a goal of the Gillard government to ensure that at least 40 per cent of board seats are held by women by 2015.
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