A little while back I was infuriated by a comment made by the new Google CEO, Marissa Mayer, that women bring the inequities in the business world on ourselves when she was interviewed by CBS News. We are to blame for the fact that only 4% of Corporate America executives are women. We are to blame that female CEOs make 17% less than their male counterparts. We are to blame that we make an average of 30% less than our male counterparts across the board. Imagine. It's all our own fault. Well, maybe. One, we quit Corporate America at an amazing rate. Over 53% of all Bachelor's Degrees earned per year now are by women. Just ten years ago, we were over 40% of the earned Bachelor's Degrees. At the 10 years experience level, there should be a higher representation of women in Corporate America, but there's not. So I'm thinking Marissa Mayer is one of those women. Yes, one of those. While Marissa Mayer made her name taking Yahoo into the wave of the future where there were split work weeks, flex hours, and more home offices--making it easier for women to be intrinsic to the Corporate America fabric--she reversed that as soon as she got to Google. She's one of those women, those women who beat other women down because. Because? Well, because we were abused coming up the ranks so should anyone below us. Because we have become accustomed to beating each other down for the attention of men for literally millenia. Because we are groomed, we groom our own daughters and granddaughters, to beat down the pretty girl, the ugly girl, the smart girl, the athletic girl, the any girl different than ourselves. Those women, well, are us.
My Grams used to say that it was really important for women to start recognizing that we could take care of ourselves and that we didn't need to beat each other down anymore. I didn't get it at the time. I was a teenager and it didn't make much sense. Partially because she had raised me to consider the person, not the gender, to decide what I thought of someone else. Actions speak louder than words. Someone that treats you well whether they look like a Victoria's Secret model or Hillary Clinton should be judged on their actions. But the truth is that women, we judge each other on the most superficial stuff. We don't like a woman who seems too confident. Yet even the most confident woman in the world is still not as confident as the most confident man. We don't like a woman that speaks out of turn, especially around men. Yet, men do it all the time and no one ostracizes them for it. We don't like women that dress nice. Yet, we spend billions of dollars on glam magazines, fashion, shoes, purses, and time picking out just the right outfits. We don't like when other women attract a lot of attention from men. Yet, all of that is based on the archaic belief that the more attractive women will end up with the men who make the most money. Just an hundred years ago, that was the case. Women didn't work and therefore needed to end up with the greatest bread winner. It was horribly matter of fact that the homelier women had less chance of landing the "right" man. We don't like women that speak their minds. Yet, we wonder why men still berate us if we speak our minds. We put down any women that we perceive as better than us in any way, shape, or form. Yet, we profess that we're not jealous. Any one of us, at any time, has been, can be, one of those women.
What's ironic is that most of those women are the product of men. I'm sure Marissa Mayer's mentors, while maybe one or two females have influenced her life, her main mentors have been men. Men who have made her the exception to the rules, made her feel special in her skill set, and more importantly fed her ego compared to other women. She, unlike other women, is definately aware that she is not like other women. Therefore, she can disconnect herself from other women. Is that because of her or the people around her? Double edged sword. Another thing, Marissa Mayer isn't an ugly duckling like Hillary Clinton. Marissa Mayer is an attractive, blonde haired, blue eyed woman. Being attractive can open doors, but I'm sure she, like any other attractive woman, has put up with the snide comments from other women, jealous of her intelligence, looks, the fact that she's confident and can hold her own with men, all reasons that those women would hate her guts. Yet, the real reason to hate her guts--she's sold out other women. And that's got nothing to do with the way she looks, her confidence, her skills, her intellect. Nope. At some point, the abusee becomes the abuser. There's no doubt that coming up the beautiful woman who has to prove that she's not just a pretty face has a lot of obstacles. However Marissa Mayer manuveured them, she blames other women for limiting themselves. Either she has had her head in the sand as she came up the corporate ladder or she has started buying the Corporate America line that work has to be a miserable experience, working yourself to death, and family comes last. Sure, Mitt Romney was a successful business man, with a dedicated family and wife. But anyone that has ever worked in the Corporate machine knows damn well the man wasn't working a straight 40 a week. Women give up a lot, just like men do, to survive crawling in the Corporate America trusses. The attitudes that the men have becomes the same attitudes of the women. The inherent male chauvinism that still permeates the trusses inevitably affects the women in the higher levels--for the best sometimes, but sometimes for the worse.
This is no different than people that hang out in any other organization. Women spend a lot of time tearing each other down instead of building each other up. Not all women, but one thing that any woman can tell you, it only takes one to make all the other women miserable. It's amazing how miserable just one of those women can ruin everyone else's parade. The funniest part is that other women, that might not react as one of those women often will jump on the bandwagon. The reason we're so fascinated with "mean girls" isn't because there are millions of them and everyone has known at least one. The reason that we are so fascinated by them is often they manage to turn other women against each other, turn other women into those women. Men don't turn anyone into something that they are not--men, for all the huffing and puffing, are just who they are. If they are an heinous asshole, they're always a heinous asshole. Might be a smart one or a dumb one, but heinous will come out sooner or later. With women, even the most benign woman when it comes to other women, might jump on the heinous bitch bandwagon just to fit in. Marissa Mayer might be right. We bring that shit on ourselves, because we are willing to immediately start participating in another woman's demise for absolutely no reason or justification on our own observation or experience. And worse yet, even on the say so sometimes of other women that we already know we wouldn't piss on if they were on fire. The next thing you know there's either a divide or an entire entourage jealous, insecure, and tearing other women apart. It's like a cancer.
How do we control those women? We don't. We control ourselves. We recognize women that beat other women down and avoid joining in the reindeer games. And, we definately need to observe control over letting men's opinions--especially since they don't think anything like we do about other women--have too much impact on how we view other women. Men love to look at an attractive woman like Marissa Mayer. I'm absolutely sure that some women that Mayer has worked with made the assumption that only her good looks open certain doors. I'm sure Mayer heard rude comments floated under the breath but just loud enough for her to have to endure, adapt and overcome. At the same time, Mayer engulfed in the corporate trusses with mostly men had to adapt some of their views. Ultimately, all of this turning her on both the women that made the snide comments and the women that were rooting her on. The ability to separate the good women from those women lost on her. All women are beating each other down, all women are shallow, all are quitting Corporate America, because all are those women. It's exhausting and the way of shaking it off is to place blame, and honestly, there's plenty of blame to go around.
How do we place blame? "Ugly up a little. The plain women hate you." We dumb ourselves down when we're smart. We shut up when we are correct or have a better idea or just have an opinion to share because we don't want to seem too eager, too bright, too interesting, too risky, too confident, too, too, too. We do it simply because we are women. No other logic at all--just our sex. Men do not. Men do it because of their personality, or calculated measures, or just because they've decided to. But never just because they don't want to come off as "too". The fear of those women make us consider whether as a woman we should and no other reason has to be offered up. I think Marissa Mayer is the last woman on the planet that should be telling anyone what we should or shouldn't do or how we beat each other down. She's become one of those women, and eventually will be doing volunteer service at a Boys & Girls Club to help young girls reach their potential for all the women that she has insulted, dragged down, or simply hated on because some of those women did the same to her. My advice for what it's worth. Be yourself. Who cares if you're "too" anything? No one ever gives a shit that a man is "too" anything.
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