Female CEO’s: Progress in the Wrong Direction?
Every so often in feminist dialogues and articles concerning the progression of women, the statistic of what percentage of the world’s CEO’s are women is mentioned, as if it is accurate of female progression. The idea is that the more women who make up CEO’s supposedly means the more ease and acceptance there is for women in the occupational world. To me, it rather means that women have become more like the negative caricatures of men that we find wrong in the world. The characteristics associated with CEO’s are what much of the world views as negative – greed, ceaseless ambition, ruthlessness, corruption. So why is it that when more women are CEO’s, we see it as a progress in the world order?
On a similar tangent, what often pervades the topic of female progression is the removal of docility and nurturing aspects of motherhood, as it is seen as limiting of women and subservient to her male counterpart. This suggests that the only option is to instead adorn the bloody gauntlets of the male oppressor to crush the patriarchy and break the shackles of motherhood and female stagnation. Rather, should we not be encouraging men to instead relinquish the bloodthirsty gauntlets to the fires that birthed them, instead of having women take up the mantle and replace the man as avaricious warmongers? Should we not be encouraging men to be fathers, instead of discouraging women to be mothers? Shouldn’t we encourage the curbing of corruption and CEO aggrandizement instead of congratulating women for capitulating to the corrupt system of the past? When you stoop to the evil levels of the opposing forces, is it really progression, or have you replaced the enemy with yourself?
What should be the more accurate and widely-used is both the general statistic for female occupation composition and niche jobs that represent key areas of stagnation for women – doctors, engineers, diplomats, etc. – that also represent quality characteristics such as analytical competency, leadership, and healthy competitiveness. Along with the monitoring of these stats growth, we should also monitor the status of jobs that are associated with positive feminine qualities – social workers, mothers, teachers, etc. – and look to see they approach equal division of occupation by both sexes, indicating men have adopted the positive qualities associated with those jobs, such as being nurturing. However, if women are found too scarce in these positive feminine jobs and found too prevalent in rather negative masculine jobs, what it might indicate is the reversal of roles and the adoption of these negative masculine characteristics of men, leading to a world of continued oppression which works against the goal of feminism. Feminism looks to reach equality, not take up the mantle of the patriarchal oppression.
Share This Article
