The start of the media blitz on Sheryl Sandberg's new book, outlining how women need to "lean-in" in order to break the glass ceiling.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/22/us/sheryl-sandberg-lean-in-author-hopes-to-spur-movement.html?hp
A comment:
anyone who says they thought they would run a social movement has
clearly never been involved in one ... a social movement is not a
business, movements are necessarily messy and no one person runs them.
it seems she is trying to start up a new self-help quasi-commercial
enterprise which is far from the same thing. And most women don't want a
seat at the table as currently configured, in fact most people aren't
very happy with the way society is now organized with executives like
Sheryl being wildly overpaid. I would venture to guess most women want a
new table where everyone is afforded a decent and dignified job with
respect and parents are enabled to take care of their children.
Finally, social movements are about changing society, if her vision is
women running the world in the same way men now do, that is not social
change and is most definitely not social justice.
my reply to that comment:
Here here.
I am in my 40s and found peace in my highly
competitive career (I'm a professor) when I decided to stop playing by
the old-boy's-club-rules. I realized that I'd never win at their game
because they were the ones deciding where the goal line is, and
constantly moving it away from me. They'd never be impressed with me,
ever, just on principle. This isn't the world I want to live in.
So,
I readjusted and created my own definition of personal success, and it
includes things that make me happy and give me a sense of self outside
of work. I found happiness and peace within my career by "leaning OUT",
for exactly the reasons Cathy from New York raises. And in all
honesty, I see the younger women around me finding my new approach much
more inspiring than when I was vigilant about "leaning in."
reply from someone else to me:
As the son of a '60's/'70's era Feminist, who spent his 16th birthday
with his mom in Washington D.C. marching for the Equal Rights Amendment,
I can say with some confidence that my late mother would be nodding her
head in agreement and smiling. You get the point exactly.
I agree. I find the 'beat the boys at their own game' shockingly bigoted. Not every one is defined by their gender or by their money. Doing something with integrity is the only focus my feminist mum and conservative father taught me and I am happy to say that has nothing to do with leaning but with walking tall.
ReplyDeleteYES. The system I opted out of was broken, unjust, and inhumane. We need a new system with no walls, never mind the ceiling.
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DeleteSorry- said something that I realized was offensive (not to you! but maybe to someone reading), and then tried to qualify it, and realized I was better off deleting the whole thing! The gist of my comment was that I hope that women who want to 'lean in' CAN do so as long as men can. And for those females born with a corporate raider's heart, it WOULD be a shame to form a more compassionate and fair society just as some of them were beginning to be taken seriously as sharks ;). But seriously, of course I want a more fair and family-oriented society. And I really love this excerpt that you quoted here.
ReplyDeleteI love this post. I too leaned out, but in a different way:I stepped off of the crazy path to partnership at a big, highly competitive firm and instead found work I love with hours that I can control and limited travel. I'd like the option to be open to those women who want to be one of the masters of the universe to do so, and so I appreciate Sheryl's point (although I sort of scoff at the idea of her founding a social movement from her present perch) but just have chosen not to need or want to buy into it.
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