Links and so forth

[oursin]

Lionel Shriver in yesterday's Guardian on women and their discomfort about ambition: except that I'm not entirely persuaded that some of the phenomena she describes are about gender rather than right- vs left- pond cultural norms...

Another article about the medicalisation of female sexuality and the marketing of 'quick-fix' pharmaceutical

Comments

[cassandre]

I'm not entirely persuaded that some of the phenomena she describes are about gender rather than right- vs left- pond cultural norms

Yes, that occurred to me too. In academia anyway, unembarrassed self-promotion is far more acceptable in the U.S. than in the U.K.

That said, even in the U.S., women do less of it than men do.

Funny - I basically agreed with everything Shriver said, and yet the article left me with the feeling that she isn't a person I'd like to be friends with. Of course, this could be just another example of female discomfort with competitive women!

Feel better soon...

[oursin]

There's that whole 'backing modestly into the limelight' Brit trad, as well as the whole array of sporting metaphors about 'playing the game'. There's also the whole subtle poison in the teacups and unsuspected backstabbing trad too, though!

[sam_t]

I agree that, while there may be something in what she's saying, the difference she has noticed is probably down to more factors than she acknowledges. For a start, I'm not sure I do know more men than women who will expect (and admit they expect) things to go right. Perhaps I don't know enough 'type-A' males...

Feel better soon! I recommend curry with lots of chilli and garlic, and lemon-and-honey with grated root ginger (which also tastes pretty good).

[oursin]

There seems to be an assumption that all men everywhere are Mr Toad, whereas most of us know at least a few Eeyores.

Yogi lemon and ginger tea consumed!

[sam_t]

I don't know the Yogi lemon-and-ginger tea. The licorice and chocolate ones are pretty good, though, assuming we're talking about the same brand.

I don't think we need personal experience to realise that statements, or implied statements, that start "All men are ..." (or "All women are", for that matter) are usually going to fall down somewhere, obvious things like '... human' excepted. Why do they keep turning up, though? I suspect that in most case it's shorthand for "I expect most people will recognise that many men are ..." or "I have encountered many men that are ..." rather than an absolute belief, but it gets my back up either way.

[forthwritten]

I'm not sure if that's even true for all women - I went to quite an academically competitive all-girls school and knew several people who'd sulk all day if you did better than them in a test or would be quite chilly or false if you got higher marks than them. There were people who were ambitious and didn't really bother to hide it.

I don't know if that article is about women and their discomfort with naked ambition or if it's about the different education, upbringing and influences they may have had.

[oursin]

Oh yes, there are plenty of women who'll stomp over anyone and everyone in their spiked heels if they have to, but often while putting on a sweet girly smile and fluttering their eyelashes.

[forthwritten]

Oh no, not really any girly smiles there...a friend describes it as the kind of place where people stab you in the front rather than the back.

I think the author of that article is confusing behaviour with what the women actually feel. Maybe she wasn't the only one to have prepared a speech. I reckon that even as they swapped addresses and invitations to stay they were also determined to win. I wonder if it wasn't a display of them being so terribly nice to each other, but a way of deflecting resentment when one of them did win.

Seeing that the competition was going to be judged on their writing than how they came across in interview, displaying naked ambition could have been seen as too pushy. After all, they've already shown that they have ambition and confidence in their abilities by going around publishers, trying to sell their book and getting a publishing deal. I'm not convinced about this article.

[oursin]

The article did rather have an air of 'oooops, now I've won, the Guardian wants me to do a piece, oh dear, what can I write about...'

[shiv5468]

I've always been very open about the fact I'm ambitious especially at interview or appraisal time. No point shilly-shallying. My impression is that the youngsters coming up behind me either aren't as open about being ambitious or aren't as ambitious, though that seems to hold tru across the genders.

Maybe they feel that it's something that is bound to happen in due course without scrapping for it.

[oursin]

This lack of overt ambition does sound to me like those dear young things who don't think we need feminism any more in this era of justice and equality for all... or maybe general unjustified sense of entitlement.

[shiv5468]

Oh yes. They are young and blonde and pretty and the partners are nice to them because of that, and they think that they are getting on. I think they're in for a very nasty shock when it comes to the senior management promotions.