- 1 percent of the property in the world is owned by
women.
- 50 percent of the world's population are women.
- 75 percent of the work is done by women.
- 10 percent of the wages are paid to women.
These figures were on women's lib posters, probably from the seventies.
I don't know the source and the figures are always abstract and
dependent on how you use them.
Still I am convinced that there is a reality behind these
percentages. I have heard scientist claming that by the year 2000,
poverty can be personified by a 15 year old non white women.
Globally, women are an economical underclass. People are not
subject to economic and social oppression what we are fighting
against only for class or race reasons, by also depending on
gender.
It's still women that do most of the unpaid and therefore
invisible housework. Women get paid less then men even if they do
the same kind of work.
But above all, men and women don't have the same
jobs and you can criticize this because of the different
experiences we get, but the catastrophic thing is that our
work is valued so differently.
Many more women than men work in the reproductive sector,
taking care of children the elderly, and the sick. That is
nothing a capitalist can profit from-- capitalism only values
productive work, even if reproduction is necessary.
Therefore the workers movement /unions has had the
productive sector as its main area of struggle.
The syndicalism and anarchist movement claim to
be against
wage slavery, so hopefully we can come to an
understanding that we all are working people and most be valued
accordingly . In certainly is not obvious. Our structures
and ideologies are also product of a worked where the
half the population, the male population, has been norm. In SACs
declaration of principle this problem is only mentioned in
one sentence. "women are still discriminated in the labor
market."
If I am supposed to take the revolutionary struggle for a
better future seriously, then we have to present a well thought
out view on the relationship between women and men economically,
politically, and socially, This would truly be revolutionary.
The hierarchy between men and women is one of the oldest
examples of power and oppression.
To actively question the relationship between the sex is
not easy and puts solidarity to the ultimate test. I believe
equality is an absolute concept, you cannot compare it. We most
still be a class based movement but not need the ambition to
change our mutual relationship without becoming enemies.
Written
by -- Ann Ighe
Central
Organization of Swedish Workers (SAC)
