And being forced to work here means "being punished for talking about possible pregnancy or needing more rest in the last few weeks or it or in case of health issues".
Whether patriarchy or not, these are not contradictory.
Or, less succinctly -- that there isn't an actual literal plot, there's just people reacting to incentives, and those incentives change?
Unless you're an anti-natalist, you can argue that X=pregnancy is really important to society as a whole, but then the burden should be carried by the whole of society, not just the slice that happens to run a business.
Either way, we have to admit that you can't be a mother and have equal career prospects to someone who stays childless, just like you can't put the same amount of work into two different careers and still get the same result for each as if you had put all the work into just one.
The prisoners dilemma can only ever be solved by an entity that sees the whole picture, i.e. the federal govt. They have to mandate everyone play by the same rule, or else those who stick their head out for charity’s sake may endure all the sacrifice that entails (which is not fair).
I actually find the notion of "patriarchy" incredibly sexist -- were not men the canaries in the coalmine -- the original victims -- for the dehumanization of capitalism?
I happen to support capitalism as a means of production -- but it should be understood as an abstract, inhuman force like an optimization algorithm. "Patriarchy" is a red herring.
"Patriarchy" is intertwined with the means of production but is also distinct therefrom. Women in Victorian England were not fully legally recognized as persons and did not have the same property rights as their husbands, and this is in a period during which capitalism obtained in England. This arrangement with men as the "patriarch" of the household, exercising control over subaltern women, predates capitalism by millenia (c.f. Roman "pater familias").
This "patriarchy" doesn't only consist of formal law, but may exist in tradition and social mores. For example adultery may be technically equally penalized for men and women but carry a vastly greater stigma and punishment in practice for women, as in feudal China. As another example, women may technically have recourse to the law if they are subjected to domestic violence but be prevented from doing this by the fear of social opprobrium and further mistreatment by family and community, as was again the case in Victorian England. "Patriarchy" doesn't refer to any concerted effort or plot, but is a description of the outcome of social institutions and cultural attitudes which, AS A SYSTEM, disadvantage women.
> capitalism ... should be understood as an abstract, inhuman force
Capitalism, and patriarchy, are BOTH generally understood as being systemic: i.e. properties of human institutions. The concepts DO NOT inherently place blame on individuals, or even make judgments about the morality of the system.
Whether or not our society exhibits patriarchy is an empirical question, to be answered with reference to data. Arising from but separate from this, there is the ethical question of value-judgment about the society. But there is absolutely no basis to call the notion of patriarchy "sexist".
Given that women didn’t have a vote when the Industrial Age made coal mining into a primary power source, and given that marriage was seen as making the concept of rape logically impossible until 1992 in the UK [0], I disagree.
Separately, I would argue that while capitalism will exploit such prejudices, I don’t think it is the origin of them.
[0] obvious trigger warning applies: http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKHL/1991/12.html
I'm not following how this relates to the comment you're replying to. Are you saying that women are the original victims of capitalism? Or that capitalism was created by men? Or something else?
Lots of men had their humanity disregarded, but women were treated worse, and that legacy continued for a very long time.
These issues still exist in some places, based on what I’ve seen reported by trans people who transition so successfully that people who knew them before the transition mistook them for their own opposite gendered siblings and treated them differently in accordance with gender stereotypes rather than by merit.
I doubt anyone here would disagree that women have suffered more from sexism.
Incidentally, and unrelated to that point, you chose oddly mild examples of bad treatment of women. I'd much rather live in a society where I couldn't vote or charge my spouse with rape than be a coal miner and suffer from black lung and be in significant danger of dying in a workplace accident. You could have gone with the awful treatment of women under the Taliban, to name one example.
I find your preferences shocking, considering when childbirth anaesthetic was invented, when abortions and woman-centric contraceptives became commonplace, and when the idea of doctors washing their hands between autopsies and the maternity ward became common sense rather than being treated as an insult.
I really couldn’t use the Taliban. They’re (1) modern day and (2) primarily a theocracy.
Yes, the industrial system was not built for women... it was built to make cheap knick-knacks... which has no relation to having babies. It is indifferent to women, not beneficial by design to men... the scape-goating is counter-productive, and behind the male mask -- falls to deaf ears. That is my point.