Men did a great
job of putting women in their place, keeping us in the kitchen looking pretty,
staying quiet and out of the “men’s business.” Women have always been told to
keep quiet, to let men do the talking, and take care of business. We have come a long way from the 1950s where
we just stayed in the house. We are now
being educated in higher rates than men, and we are taking over typical “men’s
work.” Women have it far from easy; at a
young age little girls are on the path to perfection, while boys can be boys,
screwing up over and over throughout adolescence and into early adulthood.
Recently
in classes we have talked about gender inequality. In my media class we have
talked about women’s portrayal in the media, and in economics we have talked
about income inequality. The movie Miss Representation does a great job of
looking at how women are belittled by men in the media because there are a lack
of females in power in Hollywood and media corporations around the world. Media
paint the very black and white picture of how women are objects of sex, and
secondary in a male dominated society. Girls start seeing themselves are
smaller than men and as objects that can be perfected for men. Boys seeing
themselves are mightier; that they have to use their physicality to get what
they want, and that women are for them. Photoshop and other editing software
have not helped this situation because magazine, television, and film editors
have all used these software to “perfect” actors and models’ bodies, causing
body image issues because normal people can never achieve the perfection of a
computer-generated body.
This
blow to a woman’s self esteem is damaging, causing a ripple effect in her
normal life; a lack of confidence in relationships that could put them in a
dangerous position, and a lack of confidence in a male dominated industry where
women do not try to achieve the same success that men do. In my economics class
we explored the reality that women do not achieve dollar for dollar compensation
compared to men in their same field. Though this may be true that more women go
into lower paying jobs in a service or human-interest related field, could this
be because of a lack of confidence? Katty Kay and Claire Shipman explore this
question in their article from the Atlantic, “The Confidence Gap,” where they
reason that the lack of gender equality stems from the apparent fact that women
are less confident in the work environment. Victoria Brescoll sees this lack of
confidence in some of her best and brightest Yale MBA female students who
instead of competing with their male counterparts in high paying finance jobs go
into “less competitive fields, like human resources or marketing” (Kay and Shipman) . Women want to achieve
perfection in everything they do, so a little doubt goes a long way; “women
applied for a promotion only when they met 100 percent of the qualifications.
Men applied when they met 50 percent” (Kay and Shipman) . Women have the qualifications
and the competence to do these jobs; they just do not have the confidence to
reach for the professional stars.
The
thought that confidence could be an underlying factor in women not trying to
achieve these jobs is devastating. Many of my friends and I have struggled with
confidence and body-image issues over the years as teenagers, and I see no end
in sight for these issues to disappear; but to think that they will make the
roads for our careers harder is unbearable. In high school I was very shy and
needed the confidence to break out of my shell; I found this confidence through
my high school’s public speaking club, the Forensics Club. That club made the
thought of getting up in front of a group to speak tolerable, and by the end of
my high school career I actually enjoyed it; I could see myself as a leader and
a public speaker. As the president of that club my senior year it gave me hope
when I could see that fear transforming into a passion in the younger students,
mainly females, and the simple, yet often overlooked, skill of public speaking
can do so much for someone’s confidence.
We
need to work together as women—to be there helping our friends and fellow women
gain the confidence they need in the workplace. Be friendly, encourage each
other, and stop judging each other so harshly. Also, we need to stop shaming
assertive women as “bitches.” Women can be assertive and pushy in the workplace
just like men, if we stop judging woman to woman so harshly. We cannot change men’s
minds without first changing our own minds. Sure some of the lack in confidence
is from how we are raised and purely biological. If we could stop being so
judgmental towards one another we could also be less afraid of judgment and
more confident in our choices. Women need to come together, stop judging, and
shaming one another to become the powerful people that we can be.
