OPINION/NEWS – U.N. DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME: The 2020 Human Development Perspectives report makes dire reading for women. Although the statistics, due to poor presentation, are unclear to me, the general conclusion is clear: across 75 countries surveyed, 90% of people are biased against women. Yes, things are changing and improving but this is work in progress and there is a long way to go in gender equality.
In short women of the world continue to live in a male dominated environment in which there is bias against them in various sectors of society ranging from business to politics.
But as mentioned the data as presented by e.g. the BBC is unclear. They say that ‘globally, close to 50% of men said they had more right to a job than women’. That’s less than half of men. Where’s the bias in that statement? What about the other half? Do they think that women have more of a right to a job then men? Or do they think there is bias and don’t like it? They also say that about half of the world’s men and women feel that men make better political leaders. Do we presume that the remaining 50% feel that men don’t make better political leaders? And if so where is the bias? I am just making a point about presentation which is terrible in my opinion.
However, the overall conclusion seems to be unequivocal: there is bias against women and I wonder if some women retreat from society and find solace in a supportive relationship with a companion animal i.e. the domestic cat. This would partly explain why older, single women are more typically attracted to living with domestic cats.
I feel that older women become more fearful of men and as a consequence steer clear. There is a lack of trust in men by women. I am generalising of course. If this is true it may partly be due to this underlying bias against them. Perhaps the bias presents itself sometimes as misogyny. In which case it is right that women should retreat to the safety of their home and find peace, quiet and friendship with their ever reliable and present cat companion.
To compound the problem a section of male society belittles women for their general love of domestic cats. The ‘crazy cat lady’ label comes to mind. So men create the problem and then feed on the result with glee. It looks dysfunctional to me and the dysfunction is caused by men or lets be kinder to men and say it is caused by the failures of the human condition.
P.S. Remarkably, the report also says that there is a tendency for women to hold some sort of bias against their own gender. Is this a result of indoctrination by men to keep women down? Is this women lacking in self-esteem because of this inherent bias? We don’t have to look far to see horrible examples of men keeping women down: Saudi Arabia? The Muslim faith?
