Performance improvement is one of the many names given over to the process of figuring out that something needs to work better. There are a number of official-sounding methods for doing this---I personally like LEAN. Its why I bought a Toyota (the 50 MPG didn't hurt, either). But any method is fine as long as it is used correctly. Systems should be efficient and effective--processes should not include steps that are unnecessary or nonproductive. Who really wants to waste time doing a bad job?
Which brings me to the cause of the title. Every day in this area, people study the data and make suggestions that don't relate to it or don't study the data and make suggestions that don't relate to the issues at hand. My point is---the first step is seeing the problem. Looking at what is causing the problem. Understanding how the steps of the process work together and what is going on that is making them not work together has to be the first goal. It doesn't matter if you read about a wonderful way to move the mail if your problem has to do with getting the right piece into the box before it is mailed.. The people that love to fix problems don't want to do the first step. They have a fix in mind when they begin, or think something they read in a trade magazine or heard at a management meeting should be tried. So it is tried, with no baseline data and no analysis of what that information meant.
Now we have a change, but not necessarily an improvement. People are fired for resisting the change. People are moved around to find a way to create the change. AND if everyone is very lucky, the new process actually related to the original process issue and cause what was subjectively seen as an improvement.
Serendipity!
I love chance, randomness, creativity, but for some areas of work, a more scientific method (pun intended) is needed. In science you start with an hypothesis, but we aren't doing scientific research, we are using a more rapid, goal-driven method, so we start with the problem. And the first step is identifying the problem. The exact problem. Not the vague problem. "we waste a lot of time and energy on getting information " is vague. Ask the right questions. Get the right information. See if the industry has any benchmarks that give you something for comparison. It is fine to improve against yourself, but not until you have defined your processes in a way that allows comparison. While some of the world is subjective--everything can be quantified. DO THAT. If your business invests a lot of time and energy (translation--money) into performance improvement, and the end result is everyone thinks it was probably a good investment and the customers and employees think they can see a difference, will you do that again? Will you make sure the changes stay? Or will it be back to business as usual as soon as the improvement project is finished.
Define everything.
Do a library search: to find benchmarks, what other companies have successfully done about the same or similar problems, read about identifying problems, see if there is stuff out there that is evidence-based.
Identify the problem: there may be several that need to be separated and fixed individually, there may be several that are part of one process or one system. And sometimes a problem is a person problem, but it will not be an "all people " problem. If your research is pointing toward "all the people" in purchasing, you may need to talk to all those people, see what they say the problem is, it is probably something built into that department--part of their process which is frequently the result of policies and the people doing the work not communicating.
Administrating is not about sitting up in the clouds dictating to the workers who are so far away the two groups don't recognize each other except with large font badges. If you are making policy, find out what is being done from the people doing it. A policy is not a writing assignment, it is supposed to represent the organizational process. If the two are not related, you-the administrator- are not effective and your process can not be made more efficient if it has nothing to do with what is really going on.
Be OK with finding out that your favorite system/process/person may need to be improved. Nothing stays the same. Anyone that works with technology knows that. The game is always changing. Nothing can be too special for improvement. We all love our babies, but not every baby is going to last forever. My least favorite conversation is with the person that helped to create the old computer system. The bragging never ends, every new change is compared to the greatness of that original system she made---and that every person using it has complained about daily for 15 years. It was her pride and joy, but it was never a very useful system.
So, for this part of the job, be the detective, be the scientist, be the illustrator, be whatever is needed to identify the problem. The original method used to identify the problem should create a data baseline. Use the same types of data collection to document the improvement. And use numbers--they are really not that scary.
Monday, May 26, 2014
Saturday, May 24, 2014
SAUCE FOR THE GOOSE
I was raised on this homily. You know the one, "what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander." But it was usually being used as code for someone's extramarital affair backfiring and the gossip in the kitchen trying not to be understood by the little ears wandering in and out.
It isn't bad--a little golden rule, a little equal rights, but these days, while we all know that there is a lot of inequality going around, we have a weird little subset of ridiculousness in which women think they are to be treated like princesses by their spouse and they are supposed to treat him like their personal servant and whipping boy. Where did this come from. I have heard a lot of women referring to this as if it is something to be proud of. I have heard mothers tell their sons, "no matter what she does, a gentleman doesn't hit,yell, curse her, or walk away" Amazingly, some of these women are even still married. I would never expect my son or daughter to "just take it". That implies that a marriage is more important than they are. A marriage that sucks the life from one person so the other person can enjoy it more is wrong. Marriage must be a partnership between equals, neither more or less important than the other.
If you have slapped, pushed, punched, kicked, grabbed, cursed, yelled, denigrated, insulted, or otherwise abused your spouse, you were wrong. It doesn't matter if you were mad, it doesn't matter if you were right or they were wrong in the original conversation, and it doesn't matter if you are the female. You were wrong. If you do any of those things, and they respond in kind, you are getting what you gave--a simple law of physics only applied to behavior--think pendulum. If I kick you in the shin and you kick me in the shin back, what kind of jerk am I to complain.
But I here it from young women all the time, "my mother and father told me I should expect to be treated like a princess, like a queen and no real man ever hurts a woman." OK! Got that. So only fake men don't like to be hurt, the real ones are OK with being treated like crap. I've never met one of those, that doesn't even sound human.
In addition, isn't it a little insulting to women to think that their nasty behavior is so expected and so unimportant that it shouldn't be responded to in kind? I never wanted to be treated like a delicate and silly creature that can only be expected to act foolish. I want to be treated like an equal. I want my respect to have been earned, just like everyone else's respect is earned.
So, princess, next time you hit your spouse and he hits you back, that is wrong but that is sauce. Equality is not about being treated like a special little princess, its about acting like an adult human being.
It isn't bad--a little golden rule, a little equal rights, but these days, while we all know that there is a lot of inequality going around, we have a weird little subset of ridiculousness in which women think they are to be treated like princesses by their spouse and they are supposed to treat him like their personal servant and whipping boy. Where did this come from. I have heard a lot of women referring to this as if it is something to be proud of. I have heard mothers tell their sons, "no matter what she does, a gentleman doesn't hit,yell, curse her, or walk away" Amazingly, some of these women are even still married. I would never expect my son or daughter to "just take it". That implies that a marriage is more important than they are. A marriage that sucks the life from one person so the other person can enjoy it more is wrong. Marriage must be a partnership between equals, neither more or less important than the other.
If you have slapped, pushed, punched, kicked, grabbed, cursed, yelled, denigrated, insulted, or otherwise abused your spouse, you were wrong. It doesn't matter if you were mad, it doesn't matter if you were right or they were wrong in the original conversation, and it doesn't matter if you are the female. You were wrong. If you do any of those things, and they respond in kind, you are getting what you gave--a simple law of physics only applied to behavior--think pendulum. If I kick you in the shin and you kick me in the shin back, what kind of jerk am I to complain.
But I here it from young women all the time, "my mother and father told me I should expect to be treated like a princess, like a queen and no real man ever hurts a woman." OK! Got that. So only fake men don't like to be hurt, the real ones are OK with being treated like crap. I've never met one of those, that doesn't even sound human.
In addition, isn't it a little insulting to women to think that their nasty behavior is so expected and so unimportant that it shouldn't be responded to in kind? I never wanted to be treated like a delicate and silly creature that can only be expected to act foolish. I want to be treated like an equal. I want my respect to have been earned, just like everyone else's respect is earned.
So, princess, next time you hit your spouse and he hits you back, that is wrong but that is sauce. Equality is not about being treated like a special little princess, its about acting like an adult human being.
Sunday, May 18, 2014
who is successful?
Rich man poor man, beggar man, thief, doctor, lawyer, Indian chief---when jumping rope as a small girl, that is how we determined who we would marry. Women trying to determine who they would marry and thus their fate or place in this world was neither new nor novel. Neither was determining a persons worth by their job. It wasn't what they did, it was their position in life, relative to other people, hierarchical and not even seen as judgmental or prejudicial or in other ways wrong.
Sounds archaic but we are doing it still. We want our kids to have a college education and every parent of a poor but very smart child pushes them toward medicine and law. Average children are pushed toward entertainment, music, acting, professional sports. If you can't be rich then be famous and you might get rich from that. No one ever really pushes their children toward middle-class anymore and parents and schools have not recommended the blue collar skills as a life choice for generations. We don't want our sons to grow up to be cowboys---or carpenters, or bakers, or electricians or gardeners or farmers (unless we have been farmers for generations, farmers are their own strange group, I kind of like them, but the sons always get the family farm, the girls are still in the back yard jumping rope and wondering about their fate).
I'm not going to pretend I wasn't bought in--I have a lot of college, which was supposed to help me meet a successful man and thus guarantee that happily-ever-after. That college has bought my home and paid to raise my kids and feed me and keep my car functional, but as an over-educated woman, I make about the same as the average skilled blue-collar worker. If I had stayed with teaching, I would be making less per year than high-school dropouts that attended a year of VoTech. I got lucky in my area of study, it qualified me for a job that is in demand and there is almost always a shortage. (why there is a shortage is its own story--another time)
But truly, what comes to mind is that silly nursery poem,
"If all the world was paper,
And if all the sea was ink,
And if the trees were bread and cheese,
What would we do for drink?"
Sounds archaic but we are doing it still. We want our kids to have a college education and every parent of a poor but very smart child pushes them toward medicine and law. Average children are pushed toward entertainment, music, acting, professional sports. If you can't be rich then be famous and you might get rich from that. No one ever really pushes their children toward middle-class anymore and parents and schools have not recommended the blue collar skills as a life choice for generations. We don't want our sons to grow up to be cowboys---or carpenters, or bakers, or electricians or gardeners or farmers (unless we have been farmers for generations, farmers are their own strange group, I kind of like them, but the sons always get the family farm, the girls are still in the back yard jumping rope and wondering about their fate).
I'm not going to pretend I wasn't bought in--I have a lot of college, which was supposed to help me meet a successful man and thus guarantee that happily-ever-after. That college has bought my home and paid to raise my kids and feed me and keep my car functional, but as an over-educated woman, I make about the same as the average skilled blue-collar worker. If I had stayed with teaching, I would be making less per year than high-school dropouts that attended a year of VoTech. I got lucky in my area of study, it qualified me for a job that is in demand and there is almost always a shortage. (why there is a shortage is its own story--another time)
But truly, what comes to mind is that silly nursery poem,
"If all the world was paper,
And if all the sea was ink,
And if the trees were bread and cheese,
What would we do for drink?"
We don't just need doctors and lawyers and famous rock stars, we don't just need CEO's, we need food that is good for us and clothes that fit and keep us warm enough and cool enough and places to live safely, we need \ people to help us teach our children so they can know about those things that we don't understand or care about, thus improving their ability to make choices, firemen for when we get unlucky or screw up, policemen and plumbers, chefs and pastry artists and yes, sometimes we need doctors so everyone doesn't die young of simple things and lawyers and leaders to keep us from living in chaos with violence being how we decide who gets their way.
But who decided that success is measured by power and money? If I make the best bread or grow amazing watermelons or take great wedding photos, am I only successful if those things make me wealthy? Where do healthy and wise come into it? Or Happiness, contentment, joy, love, comfort (and not the definition of comfort that really means "we are pretty rich but I don't want act like I'm impressed with myself"). What about that feeling of self-satisfaction that comes with learning something new or finishing something where you did a good job. When we raise our children to adulthood and they become self-sufficient, are we only successful if they become rich and/or famous? Are we not successful if they are just honest, ethical, loving people that do what they do well?
If you check your own genealogy, you will probably find that people did a lot of things in your family, and few of those things made them rich or famous. Does that mean most of our ancestors were losers? I don't think so. I think the real losers are the people that are buying into the success game. Life is a gift, not a competition. Don't waste it on stupid stuff, spend it wisely. You may be worth billions when you die and some people think that as long as their name is remembered they are immortal, so billions would buy a lot of remembrance, but I think that I would rather be remembered for more personal reasons, even if it was only by those people I loved. If my kids pass on that quilt I made or use my version of a recipe or find themselves smiling because they just sounded like me when talking to their own grandkids.
So, the moral of this story is, be careful what you ask for, you might get to drink ink.
So, the moral of this story is, be careful what you ask for, you might get to drink ink.
Saturday, May 17, 2014
Why not update the kitchen?
The first thing everyone says when looking for a house is either "too bad the kitchen needs updated" or "its great, the whole kitchen has been updated" Maybe there is something wrong with me. The modern kitchens are either steel and rock--cold, hard, impersonal, or a cheesy knock-off of grandmas kitchen from my childhood. Its cheesy, because it has the same lines as the steel and rock, and is just as cold and impersonal as the commercial wanna-be.
I miss grandma's kitchen. The old, rounded corners on the white enamel gas stove. The deco emblem. The sound of a match striking to light it up. Add to that the kitchen table, chrome and formica in some mock-rock pattern, and vinyl seats and backs that sort of matched it. The cabinets were also enamel, but the same homeliness was also present when the cabinets were carpentered in the house by the local woodworker. Floors were linoleum or wood or occasionally varnished brick. Rag rugs were thrown in front of the cast-iron sink and the stove. A round and white refrigerator occupied a space that was obviously never intended to house such a thing and it hummed or chugged depending on whether it ran on propane or electricity. The fridge has never lasted as long as the other appliances.
In the morning, everyone parked at that table in various stages of wakefulness, the coffee percolating, the smell of toasting bread and frying bacon. We complain about the end of the family dining together, eating and talking and breaking bread, but such a thing is hooked to the heart of the house and a cold and impersonal kitchen that looks just like a miniature restaurant kitchen has no heart. It will never nurture the soul as it nourishes the body. It can not be made to look comfortable. At best, some stuff will be added--"decor" in an attempt to make it look more homey.
I think this new need to make everything look like it belongs to a rich family is a strange exercise in self-delusion. A 100,000$ home with top of the line steel appliances and granite countertops is not a sign of affluence, it is just one more attempt to keep up with the
Jones', not the neighborhood Jones', the filthy-rich Jones' whose house was featured on the Parade of Homes with estimated worth of 2.5 million in a town where you can get a bungalow for under a hundred thousand that is over 1500 square feet.. What most older homes have is character, and removing that and replacing it with overpriced items seen on the many house-fixing shows (those are basically reality shows, and not nearly as helpful to the person redoing their own house as a trip to the internet and a u-tube of caulking the tub or installing a new doorknob. New is good, old is bad. It doesn't matter if it works, it doesn't matter if you like it, all that matters is if it all looks new.
So don't gut the soul of your home. Clean it if its dirty, change the curtains to colors from this century, or take it back to its original new-time (ebay is fun for that, the search is on) or take it back to the time of your grandma's house when you loved it the most. Replace what is broken with something functional and similar, love it, use it, laugh and cry in it, but don't try to make it something it was never meant to be.
It will thank you for this as you would when you are trying to figure out why you no longer enjoy your kitchen rituals nearly as much, but I just saved you from that.
I miss grandma's kitchen. The old, rounded corners on the white enamel gas stove. The deco emblem. The sound of a match striking to light it up. Add to that the kitchen table, chrome and formica in some mock-rock pattern, and vinyl seats and backs that sort of matched it. The cabinets were also enamel, but the same homeliness was also present when the cabinets were carpentered in the house by the local woodworker. Floors were linoleum or wood or occasionally varnished brick. Rag rugs were thrown in front of the cast-iron sink and the stove. A round and white refrigerator occupied a space that was obviously never intended to house such a thing and it hummed or chugged depending on whether it ran on propane or electricity. The fridge has never lasted as long as the other appliances.
In the morning, everyone parked at that table in various stages of wakefulness, the coffee percolating, the smell of toasting bread and frying bacon. We complain about the end of the family dining together, eating and talking and breaking bread, but such a thing is hooked to the heart of the house and a cold and impersonal kitchen that looks just like a miniature restaurant kitchen has no heart. It will never nurture the soul as it nourishes the body. It can not be made to look comfortable. At best, some stuff will be added--"decor" in an attempt to make it look more homey.
I think this new need to make everything look like it belongs to a rich family is a strange exercise in self-delusion. A 100,000$ home with top of the line steel appliances and granite countertops is not a sign of affluence, it is just one more attempt to keep up with the
Jones', not the neighborhood Jones', the filthy-rich Jones' whose house was featured on the Parade of Homes with estimated worth of 2.5 million in a town where you can get a bungalow for under a hundred thousand that is over 1500 square feet.. What most older homes have is character, and removing that and replacing it with overpriced items seen on the many house-fixing shows (those are basically reality shows, and not nearly as helpful to the person redoing their own house as a trip to the internet and a u-tube of caulking the tub or installing a new doorknob. New is good, old is bad. It doesn't matter if it works, it doesn't matter if you like it, all that matters is if it all looks new.
So don't gut the soul of your home. Clean it if its dirty, change the curtains to colors from this century, or take it back to its original new-time (ebay is fun for that, the search is on) or take it back to the time of your grandma's house when you loved it the most. Replace what is broken with something functional and similar, love it, use it, laugh and cry in it, but don't try to make it something it was never meant to be.
It will thank you for this as you would when you are trying to figure out why you no longer enjoy your kitchen rituals nearly as much, but I just saved you from that.
Saturday, May 10, 2014
Time, that great equalizer
I've been in mourning, lately. I looked out my kitchen window and instead of seeing nothing but trees followed by pasture, I see the framing of a house. Its a pretty big house, no McMansion, but a good sized farmhouse and its going up pretty fast. It's positioned so there is no way to look out the kitchen window and not see the house.
Suddenly, the love affair I've had with my old and strangely put-together house is over. For the first time, I'm thinking of selling, thinking of buying something closer in, smaller, smaller yard, one story....I feel old. I feel hopes and dreams sliding away from me, the plans of my youth are gone, and good riddance to most; unimaginative, traditional, just-like-every other girl's dreams. But now I feel the things I wanted after I dealt with all those white-picket fence ideals are no more realistic at this point in my life than the other's were.
I feel a little lost, a little sad, a little mortal and small and pointless.
The American Dream passed me by. I am not rich, or famous. In fact, I am living within 20 miles of where I was born and 10 miles from where I was raised. My traditional, working-class father/housekeeping mother had a lifestyle very close to mine, only they paid their house off earlier and saved more money. Yet, I did those things as a teenager that promised to make me a success---studied hard, went to a good university, got 2 degrees that were aimed at preparing for jobs that paid a middle class living and were in demand. Went to church, was respectful to adults, acted like a lady, and on and on and on.
By 20, I knew it wasn't working for me. The one thing I couldn't do at that time was be blonde and beautiful---and I tried. Back then, success was easier to marry than to be.
So instead of marrying my high school sweetheart (not advice from everyone but frequently a plan parents suggested to other girls, and definitely a step more successful girls my age were taking, I bought a house--by myself. OK, that was a bit odd, but successful. Then I met someone, and if not prince charming, we got married, had 2 kids and worked, and worked, and worked. Then we divorced, which if not a sign of success was a sign of the times and very average. It also killed the teenage girl dreams that oddly mimicked every Disney princess that has ever been branded and marketed. What a relief.
The earth mother dream was born, home in the country, strong, independent, grow your own food, do your own repairs, keep it simple. Of course, it is not cheap to keep such a dream so twenty years of time-consuming jobs to make enough money to work toward the goal. And during that time, things that were fixed wore out, broke, became obsolete and always at a higher price. The end result, no time to enjoy the land, the dream, just time to work toward maintaining it. Time passes and passes and everyday is very similar to the day before and few are filled with much joy.
Suddenly, the stairs hurt your knees and a little fall breaks a bone instead of just making a bruise and a feeling of foolishness. The gas powered tools are too hard to start. The hand tools are much more tiring, And what happened to the weather. Its too hot! its too cold! its too dry! Nothing lives long enough to make food unless the water bill is sky high and you spend hours and dollars altering the soil, and then, some 20'somethings raised in the country inherit the pasture behind the house and decide to build.
I'm done. I want to paint. I want to quilt. I want to make soap. I want to retire while I still can. And I can't pay for the upkeep here on my retirement funds. I don't want to move to a retirement home. That is not even a goal, that is giving up. That is admitting its about over- that I'm just spending time waiting for the end.
What do rich people do when they reach this spot? I have no idea. Do they reach this point? We all have 1 lifetime. It has no prearranged endtime but money doesn't necessarily buy good health, sometimes it just buys the same excesses that the homeless and downtrodden get for almost free. Even if you do everything for your health that you should, human life expectancy is only sooooo long.
I watched bucket list---money paid that down, but it was still a bucket list, mortality's shadow lying low over the enjoyment. Am I mourning this part of my life, or mourning the reality that is my life.
We all get a piece of time and it is up to each of us to do with as we will. But how much more could I have done?. Perhaps I'll just get some goats, and sheep, and maybe a couple of rescue donkeys, that would handle the grass maintenance and might annoy the new neighbors as much as the new view bothers me.
The American Dream passed me by. I am not rich, or famous. In fact, I am living within 20 miles of where I was born and 10 miles from where I was raised. My traditional, working-class father/housekeeping mother had a lifestyle very close to mine, only they paid their house off earlier and saved more money. Yet, I did those things as a teenager that promised to make me a success---studied hard, went to a good university, got 2 degrees that were aimed at preparing for jobs that paid a middle class living and were in demand. Went to church, was respectful to adults, acted like a lady, and on and on and on.
By 20, I knew it wasn't working for me. The one thing I couldn't do at that time was be blonde and beautiful---and I tried. Back then, success was easier to marry than to be.
So instead of marrying my high school sweetheart (not advice from everyone but frequently a plan parents suggested to other girls, and definitely a step more successful girls my age were taking, I bought a house--by myself. OK, that was a bit odd, but successful. Then I met someone, and if not prince charming, we got married, had 2 kids and worked, and worked, and worked. Then we divorced, which if not a sign of success was a sign of the times and very average. It also killed the teenage girl dreams that oddly mimicked every Disney princess that has ever been branded and marketed. What a relief.
The earth mother dream was born, home in the country, strong, independent, grow your own food, do your own repairs, keep it simple. Of course, it is not cheap to keep such a dream so twenty years of time-consuming jobs to make enough money to work toward the goal. And during that time, things that were fixed wore out, broke, became obsolete and always at a higher price. The end result, no time to enjoy the land, the dream, just time to work toward maintaining it. Time passes and passes and everyday is very similar to the day before and few are filled with much joy.
Suddenly, the stairs hurt your knees and a little fall breaks a bone instead of just making a bruise and a feeling of foolishness. The gas powered tools are too hard to start. The hand tools are much more tiring, And what happened to the weather. Its too hot! its too cold! its too dry! Nothing lives long enough to make food unless the water bill is sky high and you spend hours and dollars altering the soil, and then, some 20'somethings raised in the country inherit the pasture behind the house and decide to build.
I'm done. I want to paint. I want to quilt. I want to make soap. I want to retire while I still can. And I can't pay for the upkeep here on my retirement funds. I don't want to move to a retirement home. That is not even a goal, that is giving up. That is admitting its about over- that I'm just spending time waiting for the end.
What do rich people do when they reach this spot? I have no idea. Do they reach this point? We all have 1 lifetime. It has no prearranged endtime but money doesn't necessarily buy good health, sometimes it just buys the same excesses that the homeless and downtrodden get for almost free. Even if you do everything for your health that you should, human life expectancy is only sooooo long.
I watched bucket list---money paid that down, but it was still a bucket list, mortality's shadow lying low over the enjoyment. Am I mourning this part of my life, or mourning the reality that is my life.
We all get a piece of time and it is up to each of us to do with as we will. But how much more could I have done?. Perhaps I'll just get some goats, and sheep, and maybe a couple of rescue donkeys, that would handle the grass maintenance and might annoy the new neighbors as much as the new view bothers me.
Prohibition, sexual harassment and world domination
The current focus is on sexual harassment and rape in traditionally male environments. The military, universities, prisons, you know--everywhere. A coworker asked the question "what makes men want to put that ....." you get the drift. But it made me think. And while most people seem to equate the whole men and their penis which controls them. I can't help but think that that is not the answer. If it really was just men being dragged around by their sexual natures with no ability to control themselves, we would have a very different culture. I can't imagine humans being the dominate species if that was the driving force of our natures.
There are infamous dolphin rape gangs but scientists say we can't say that is true as we don't know if the females consented or if that behavior is aberrant or normal. If human males were truly acting on instinct, then female consent would never have been needed and society would be completely different.
Why do people commit rape?"Can i commit a rape?" Reality is, most of us don't want to hurt other people. We don't want to hurt their feelings. We don't want to cause them pain. We don't like the feelings that come with stealing the peace-of-mind and feelings of safety from another person.
If you watch a lot of TV, you will hear repeatedly that rape is not about sex, and that people prone to rape that have been castrated either physically or chemically are prone to stabbing as it has the same up-close-and-personal type of action against the other person.
The temperance movement (which had a high Venn diagram-type cross-over with the suffragettes and was probably the same women that are called feminists, only 100 years before, felt that prohibition was the answer as alcohol was the cause of male misbehavior. To live, women needed a husband or a male employer to have a place to live and food to eat. It was not illegal to beat your wife or children or your female employees (or male employees or child employees for that matter). A drunk was more likely to beat or rape or in other ways act out. Rather than blame the men, the 'demon drink" was blamed. Therefore, if no more alcohol, no more beatings and rapes and other forms of control and domination.
But where does that need to compete/drive to control/desire to dominate actually come from? I recently heard an NPR article about the new attempts to aim the campaign ads at women by removing the facts and issues and focusing on grabbing at the emotional strings that control women because "THAT IS HOW WOMEN THINK" (I'm probably foaming at the mouth right now) Is that a stereotypical statement? Are all women really that alike? I don't like it when women say things like all men are dogs or all men are cavemen and have never heard anyone say that Blah-blah-blah is how all men think. In other words, I don't think testosterone is causing men to rape and pillage. In fact, men are not all alike . Most of those things we consider to be male or female are learned, society teaches them, and most of us humans just fall into line. "girls need to be submissive, real women are emotional and caring and not at all analytical, women are mothers because it is there inborn nature to be soft and nurturing, men are hunter, protectors, dominant and violent because that was needed to fight off the men of the other tribes"
Reality check #1---women are mothers because that is the word we gave the people with uteruses (uteri?) that gave birth. Reality check #2, the only reason one sex needs to be submissive is to get along with the other sex that is thinking that it is dominant (learned behavior, not inborn or there wouldn't be so many people of both sexes having such a hard time with that) Reality check #3, men have to be dominant to protect women from other men that have to be dominant (really? is that not circular enough to make your head spin?) Reality check #3 women are weak; minded, bodied, spirited, add your area, there is no evidence that this is true, but plenty of women that have proven it is not, minded--think Rosalyn Sussman Yalow, Madame Curie,Irène Joliot-Curie, Barbara McClintock, Rita Levi-Montalcini, bodied(would it be shocking to know that when this is googled, half the returned hits include the words sexiest or hottest?)--Dr. Jan Todd, Babe Zaharias, Lisa Leslie, Llyn Padarn, Spiritual--Mother Theresa, Emily Dickinson,Jane Addams,Tawakkol Abdel-Salam Karman, Tamara Siuda, Ida B. Robinson, Ellen Gould White, and just plain powerful--Emperor Wu (not empress as she didn't want anyone thinking she was anyone's subordinate) Margaret Thatcher, Indira Gandhi, Susan B. Anthony, Hillary Clinton, Aung San Suu Kyi, Gudit, Trieu Thi Trinh, Boudicca, Ahhotep I. (if you don't recognize them all, look them up, women have been doing more than birthing babies, housekeeping and making men happy for a very long time.
So that reality check was the lead in to what is actually behind the myth of why men are dominant and therefore women must be submissive.
There are infamous dolphin rape gangs but scientists say we can't say that is true as we don't know if the females consented or if that behavior is aberrant or normal. If human males were truly acting on instinct, then female consent would never have been needed and society would be completely different.
Why do people commit rape?"Can i commit a rape?" Reality is, most of us don't want to hurt other people. We don't want to hurt their feelings. We don't want to cause them pain. We don't like the feelings that come with stealing the peace-of-mind and feelings of safety from another person.
If you watch a lot of TV, you will hear repeatedly that rape is not about sex, and that people prone to rape that have been castrated either physically or chemically are prone to stabbing as it has the same up-close-and-personal type of action against the other person.
The temperance movement (which had a high Venn diagram-type cross-over with the suffragettes and was probably the same women that are called feminists, only 100 years before, felt that prohibition was the answer as alcohol was the cause of male misbehavior. To live, women needed a husband or a male employer to have a place to live and food to eat. It was not illegal to beat your wife or children or your female employees (or male employees or child employees for that matter). A drunk was more likely to beat or rape or in other ways act out. Rather than blame the men, the 'demon drink" was blamed. Therefore, if no more alcohol, no more beatings and rapes and other forms of control and domination.
But where does that need to compete/drive to control/desire to dominate actually come from? I recently heard an NPR article about the new attempts to aim the campaign ads at women by removing the facts and issues and focusing on grabbing at the emotional strings that control women because "THAT IS HOW WOMEN THINK" (I'm probably foaming at the mouth right now) Is that a stereotypical statement? Are all women really that alike? I don't like it when women say things like all men are dogs or all men are cavemen and have never heard anyone say that Blah-blah-blah is how all men think. In other words, I don't think testosterone is causing men to rape and pillage. In fact, men are not all alike . Most of those things we consider to be male or female are learned, society teaches them, and most of us humans just fall into line. "girls need to be submissive, real women are emotional and caring and not at all analytical, women are mothers because it is there inborn nature to be soft and nurturing, men are hunter, protectors, dominant and violent because that was needed to fight off the men of the other tribes"
Reality check #1---women are mothers because that is the word we gave the people with uteruses (uteri?) that gave birth. Reality check #2, the only reason one sex needs to be submissive is to get along with the other sex that is thinking that it is dominant (learned behavior, not inborn or there wouldn't be so many people of both sexes having such a hard time with that) Reality check #3, men have to be dominant to protect women from other men that have to be dominant (really? is that not circular enough to make your head spin?) Reality check #3 women are weak; minded, bodied, spirited, add your area, there is no evidence that this is true, but plenty of women that have proven it is not, minded--think Rosalyn Sussman Yalow, Madame Curie,Irène Joliot-Curie, Barbara McClintock, Rita Levi-Montalcini, bodied(would it be shocking to know that when this is googled, half the returned hits include the words sexiest or hottest?)--Dr. Jan Todd, Babe Zaharias, Lisa Leslie, Llyn Padarn, Spiritual--Mother Theresa, Emily Dickinson,Jane Addams,Tawakkol Abdel-Salam Karman, Tamara Siuda, Ida B. Robinson, Ellen Gould White, and just plain powerful--Emperor Wu (not empress as she didn't want anyone thinking she was anyone's subordinate) Margaret Thatcher, Indira Gandhi, Susan B. Anthony, Hillary Clinton, Aung San Suu Kyi, Gudit, Trieu Thi Trinh, Boudicca, Ahhotep I. (if you don't recognize them all, look them up, women have been doing more than birthing babies, housekeeping and making men happy for a very long time.
So that reality check was the lead in to what is actually behind the myth of why men are dominant and therefore women must be submissive.
Dominance and submission is a set of behaviors, customs and rituals involving the giving by one individual to another individual of control over them ... this implies that the submissive voluntarily gave over their will to another, but frequently in history this giving is at the behest of the religion and/or laws of the land. In hindsight, most of us have no problem with seeing that slavery was wrong (still is, but no longer legal in this country). But while the first feminists were getting us the right to vote and trying to "stay the powers of demon rum" they were being ruled by a religion that told them to submit. The book by Alice Walker "Possessing the secret of Joy" described very well how the little bit of power that is given to women over women but under the domination of the men can make us our daughter's worst enemy. The book, (read it, beautiful and tragic and in her style which is like staring at a haunting painting while listening to the wind) the highest women in the tribe are also the ones that perform the female circumcision, and they do it to make the girls marriageable, and clean and acceptable. Even when they know that it makes sex a nightmare and childbirth a life-threatening event, they continue. And they are no different than our own society. We would rather call our daughters sluts and whores when they do what teenagers do than educate them on how to be safe. We discourage careers that compete with male applicants and train our female children to do laundry and wash dishes and clean house while our sons watch TV.
So men are raised to believe that their will is more important than the will of women. That boys are better than girls at everything that matters. That it is alright to expect someone of the opposite sex to take care of them, their laundry, cooking, cleaning, raise their kids, make them happy, and if the woman is not happy with that, there is something wrong with her. Wrong with her. But if she expects a man to make her happy she is a nag, a princess, a bitch, a tease, or "not a real woman".
So men are raised to believe that their will is more important than the will of women. That boys are better than girls at everything that matters. That it is alright to expect someone of the opposite sex to take care of them, their laundry, cooking, cleaning, raise their kids, make them happy, and if the woman is not happy with that, there is something wrong with her. Wrong with her. But if she expects a man to make her happy she is a nag, a princess, a bitch, a tease, or "not a real woman".
If you were born with a uterus (or for the transgenders out there--should have been) you are a real woman. There are no fake women anymore than there are fake men or fake horses or fake pastures. The word has a meaning. It does not include behavior, expectations, submission, roles, jobs, intelligence (or lack thereof) in that meaning.
Who we each are, no matter what sex we were born, or race, or culture, or religion, does not give us the right to dominate another person, nor does it make us have to submit to be acceptable. There are no excuses for dominating other's against their will, neither drugs nor alcohol, being born male, not mental illness, not cultural upbringing, not badly written laws or excessive money gives anyone a right to dominate another person. The need to dominate, compete, win is an act of utter selfishness. It implies that the person acting in that way thinks they are in some way superior to the people they are treating that way. If they were 3 on the playground they would be stopped, but they are grown, and they are bullies and they always find someone like them that will slap them on the back and tell them they are fine, they are great, and they deserve to treat others badly because they are strong and powerful.
There have a been a number of men that wanted to be the king of the world. Such ego, such an immense need for power. What is missing from the people, and how do we fill that need without letting them abuse the people whose on egos and needs are more on scale with the less than 100 years we each have.
Perhaps, the first step is to stop playing to them. And stop training our own sons and daughters to fall into the same old patterns. We all deserve to be happy as humans.
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