Amazonia
The women are coming!
The latest issue of Investigate magazine talks darkly about a lesbian/feminist (same thing, apparently) plot that infiltrated the Labour Party in the 1970s and then set about feminising New Zealand society, crushing the nuclear family, and taking ownership of children from parents and giving it to the state.
However, as feminists prepare for another United Women’s Convention next week, thirty years after the last one, we should be under no illusions that women have reached equality in our society, let alone usurped men’s privileged position. The Herald has an excellent graphic this morning (offline), which illustrates this point. While women have made great strides in the last thirty years, they still have some way to go.
The graphic has the female rate of participation in particular areas of society, as a percentage of the male rate. So, 50% means women faring half as well as males. The percentages in the power section make for sober reading:
Cabinet ministers: 29%
MPs: 40%
Mayors: 23%
Councillors: 37%
CEOs of NZX listed companies: 3%
Govt department heads: 35%
School principals: 66%
CEOs of health boards: 40%
And this despite the fact that the graphic also shows women doing better than men at secondary school and university. So, the next time someone says to you at a pub, “I’m sick of women running the country”, smile politely, and reply, “Well, actually, they’re not.”
