Women’s Emancipation — blessing or curse?
In my humblest opinion, I believe peace and harmony between the sexes does not depend on a contrived idea of equalisation, nor it needs to be defined by the elimination of individual traits or characteristics. The problem, as I see it today, lies on how to be yourself while at the same time being in oneness with another — to have the capacity to connect with people on a human level and still maintain one’s own qualities and individuality.
In my mind, the basis for a better future would be for men and women to meet as part of the same team without rivalry or opposition. The idea should be: Understand one another rather than forgive one another, because to understand someone is sufficient for a better team dynamic. Also, the admission that we can understand one another is the basis of my opinion regarding the emancipation of women and its effects on both sexes.
So, why is this? I have been reading a lot about the division of work between men and women in today’s society, and studies have suggested that women’s rights and roles “inside the home” in both the US and Europe have not changed much in comparison with the workplace. Women working outside the home still do the majority of the chores and child raising — they carry a double burden that they cannot shake off. Achieving emancipation hasn’t decreased the expectations or the work that still needs to be accomplished inside the home. This double burden when properly measured (as it has been in European countries), shows the influence that societal expectations have on how happy women feel. In fact, this double burden leads working women in Sweden to feel more miserable than women from other European countries, such as Greece. It’s perhaps because the Swedes’ expectations regarding gender equality are more widely embraced — Less than 35% of Swedish women do ¾ of the housework compared to 81% of Greek women, for example. In simple terms, Swedish women carry more of the double burden than the Greek women and their levels of happiness follow the same pattern.
Women’s emancipation has driven economic equality with men when taken into consideration our own profession and trade; but our physicality has not armed us with the necessary strength to compete with men, as we are often exhausting all our energy, using up our reserves, and straining ever muscle in order to reach the same value in the job market. It’s common knowledge that women teachers, doctors, lawyers, architects, and engineers are often not met with the same confidence as their male counterparts, nor receive equal remuneration still. And those rare women that succeed, generally do so at the expense of their physical and psychological wellbeing… Always feeling as if they’re neglecting some part of their life, either their career or time with their children or both.
How much independence is truly gained if the burden of looking after a “sweet home” is placed upon us after a hard day’s work outside the home, with its hardship of fighting for equality every step of the way? — Glorious independence! Not to mention that while we’re out there competing against our male counterparts, our children are missing out on much needed guidance, boundaries, love and constant role models just to name a few — as we’re not able to split ourselves in half to cater for our duality “mothers and career women”. I am not advocating returning to the past, nor I condemn women for their choices, but I believe that our mothers and grandmothers had more resilience when stuck in the spheres of kitchen and nursery, more kindness, simplicity and more joy than the majority of emancipated professional women trying to clone themselves to be able to accomplish everything. Not to mention the constant FOMO and the need to compare our lives on social media every step of the way, because if we aren’t accomplishing everything with golden start status we’re failing at being emancipated women, aka Wonder Woman!
Obviously, everyone has a different opinion and each household functions differently. But how much easier would it be if the idea that the duality of the sexes, or that men and women represent two opposing worlds did not exist? Wouldn’t it be much easier if both, men and women worked as part of the same team in order to build a better society? What if we women took a step back and decided to concentrate more on raising the next generation by being fully engaged, without feeling diminished by the stigma of being only a “stay-at-home” mum?
~ Whoever claimed that expanded consciousness brings satisfaction ought to rethink it! ~
