With March being Women’s History Month I can’t imagine a better way to celebrate than to recognize women who are making history as we speak. Women in Iceland are doing just that.
Iceland is being hailed as the world’s most feminist country. There are several factors that seem to support this designation. Many of us cheered the election of Johanna Sigurdardottir as Prime Minister of Iceland. Not just because she is a woman, but also because she is a gay woman. Johanna erodes the patriarchal norm like no other. So, not only does she break leadership barriers, but she is a symbol of sexual freedom; a reminder that women do not exist solely for the sexual pleasure of males and the creation of progeny.
In addition to PM Sigurdardottir’s political achievements, women are also represented in their government in significant numbers.
Iceland, and these other Scandinavian countries, are establishing strong precedents about how women should be treated throughout the world. Strong and abundant representation by and for women is resulting in groundbreaking paths for legislation addressing the treatment of women in society. Nowhere is this more evident than in the recent efforts to shut down the sex industry.
Imagine a world without a sex trade. It appears that Scandinavian women are more acutely aware of the driving forces behind sex workers who find themselves trapped in such jobs. The patriarchy benefits when women acquiesce to being entertainment for male sexual gratification. The greater damage comes when women buy into the myth that female sex workers willingly participate. It is this fundamental acknowledgment that underlies the efforts of Iceland’s political leadership to erode the cultural view of women and their sexual role.
What do you think?
Filed under: General |
The Confluence 
All I can say is, I want to move to Iceland.
No, seriously, this is great news. Must go read the whole article.
Oh, and to answer your question. No, I don’t believe that the two can be compatible. But what do I know? I never caught the third wave.
If a society can be organized along patriarchal lines, religious lines or secular philosophical lines, why not feminist ones (for some definition of feminist)? Why the hell not? It’s about time in fact.
I don’t think that the terminology you are using is precise enough. There is no way that a stripper is selling his or her body, any more than the person who cooks my dinner at a restaurant is selling their body.
We all put our lives into our work. We all expend effort and our life’s time in our work. We have skills and attributes that we can put towards our work.
The very refutation of the idea that these people are selling their very lives lies in the fact that in ten year they probably will not be in that line of work. The demand for their talents and attributes probably will have faded.
The same goes for many professions.
I’m sorry if I’m not catching the wider significance. I just got hung up on this idea that people who are, mostly, doing what they can to earn money, using their talents and God-given attributres, are somehow “owned”, any more than any of us are owned.
Of course, I do not condone, nor am I referring to, any form of human trafficking or enslavement. I’m talking about people who freely choose to engage in lines of work that we ourselves may not consider or condone.
Enslavement or trafficking can be both obvious or as a condition of social culture. And yes, I believe you are missing the wider significance from a woman’s perspective.
Creating a cultural acceptance of the “sex trade” has been the result of patriarchal educational efforts. Turning back this worldview is essential to the progress of women. I applaud these leaders in their efforts.
Calling a stripper’s employment an exercise of her “talents” is merely a recitation of what our culture has taught people to believe.
Yes! What Stateofdisbielf said!
Cultural institutions such as religions, sex industries, slave holding, fix in the collective society certain attitudes and rationalizations to ensure their continued existence. These institutions are often “accepted” and “tolerated” and thus very hard to dismantle.
I applaud Iceland.
Women are most likely to sell their physical attributes because of the lack of pay parity in employment. Fix that alone and women will be less likely to “freely choose” lines of work in which they must fondle their genitalia publicly for others.
It is interesting that (according to the Guardian) the proponents found it necessary to point out that very few Icelandic women found employment in strip clubs and that most of the workers were foreign. I’m always a little uncomfortable about appeals to xenophobia in tough economic times – but I’m sure that this did cut short the inevitable appeals to economics to defeat the measure.
Exploiting people for money should not be rationalized away, whether it’s underage laborers or sexual workers. Most of the time, the children or women are taken advantage of precisely because they don’t have a choice. In cases where society deems women do have adequate choice in a “sexual” line of work, it has a responsibility to closely regulate that space. I’m guessing the Scandinavians have good lessons there as well.
having been born with breasts is not a talent.
That would be an attribute. Being good at what you’re doing is the talent.
Oink oink
Well said! Or is that well oinked?
So, unable to make an intellectual argument, you resort to name-calling.
I was merely clarifying the terminology in my comment. No need to upset.
The point I’m trying to make, indirectly, is that we’re all exploited, not just women.
If we divide it up into exploitation of just women, which is defined as worse, then we can overlook the bigger exploitation.
I’m not anti-feminist. I may be under-educated in the subject. Still, no reason for name calling.
I’m done with this group. Bye
Mansplaining and concern trolling doesn’t go over too well in these parts.
I wasn’t calling you names, I was trying to speak to you in your native language.
“I’m done with this group”
Don’t let the door hit your @$$ on the way out.
I was going to add “Porky”, but Porky Pig is usually portrayed as a nice fellow, so Porky doesn’t deserve the comparison.
One can also be a talented servant, harem slave or concubine.
I agree. The system that we’re in pretty much dictates our options.
I thought you were done with us?
troll poop on isle 7
No Smoking. Flammable Straw Man.
Is it trolling to comment on how separating exploitation out as just a women’s issue is short-sighted and divisive?
Here’s a little story: many years ago now I volunteered at a local battered women’s shelter. During the long training period, I grew increasingly upset as the teachers would put down men, but never talk about female marital abuse.
I was a victim of emotional abuse by my wife and I finally could not take it any more. I told the class that my wounds were just as real as theres. Can you prove otherwise?
I finally got my point across in that class. If you can’t see that exploitation is something that is perpetrated on all of us and come together with those that you’d label and name call, not even knowing them, then too bad.
You really don’t get the concept of GBCW, do you?
Myiq, I don’t get that acronym.
Does GBCW = Gender-Based Conventional Wisdom?
GBCW = Goodbye Cruel World
i.e, I hate you and I’m never coming back.
No battered women’s shelter should have a man as a counselor/worker. Not because men can’t be compassionate, but because battered women have learned to be afraid of men.
If you wanted to volunteer, why not work at a battered men’s shelter? You couldn’t find one?
Yes, women can be perpetrators. However, women are more likely to be responsible for children and men are more likely to inflict serious injury.
Unless the cook is working the grill nude and in an area where the customers can see him or her then it’s not the sex trade. It seems like the terminology that you are having trouble with is “the sex trade.” Strippers are not paid to dance, they are paid to remove their clothes for the customers’ sexual gratification. And, BTW, a cook’s “talents and attributes” don’t “fade” with time. In trades outside of the sex trade, a worker gains “experience” and is usually paid more for that experience, as opposed to having his or her “talents” considered worth less than someone younger and less experienced.
I think whenever and wherever women can approach parity or surpass men in their earning potential in the workplace, the outcome and implications for society are almost always good. More women in government helps make that happen. These countries may also show that shutting down sex work doesn’t have to equate with suppressing sexuality and its expressions in society – such as the prudish ethos we see in fundie communities – just another way of controling women.
Excellent point. I agree wholeheartedly.
very well put
Why Women Don’t Want Macho Men – New research suggests that women from countries with healthier populations prefer more feminine-looking men. Jena Pincott on the science behind attraction and masculinity, and the future for manly men. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704100604575145810050665030.html?mod=WSJ_hps_sections_lifestyle
anyone who tries to portray sex workers as happy worker bees and their work as legitimate should be asked if they want their daughters doing this work. Most of the time they are honest and say no. Sometimes they do the “Oh I am so open minded, I would not care…” bullshit and at that point you know they are so open minded that their brains fell out, or they are lying.
Being a sex worker is degrading and dangerous. Claiming it can all be regulated and healthy is crazy. The very women who most need to rely on that work could never pass the requirements for being a licensed sex worker.
If they say they don’t care, ask them how they’d react if they ordered a call girl on a business trip, opened the hotel door and lo! their daughter is standing there.
ack! I can just imagine.
One good thing I can say (there are more actually) about my ex-husband is that he never went to strip clubs or made crude comments about women. We had a family friend who was a real pig and he would pick up hookers, go to strip clubs etc… and could never understand why “D.” just was not interested. He would feel humiliated FOR those women. He would think “what if this was my sister or mother or wife? Would I want them to be doing this?”
After we were divorced and he was seeing the women who is now his second wife, he told me she said he was a prude. I can’t imagine objecting to your husband not being a creepy voyeur.
It’s so classic prog dude, too. They can’t just say screw it, I’m going to do whatever I want, exploitation be damned, they have to maintain their virtuous self-image and turn it into a noble good. We’re providing profitable work for the underprivileged. We’re providing a creative outlet for god-given talents. Heartwarming, really.
And it’s sex-positive and liberating and empowering, too. Don’t forget that.
Meanwhile, France considers re-legalizing brothels, and sex workers protest. ??
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10634367
Ugsome, looked to me like “sex workers” think legalization of brothels will put restrictions on their independece. Looked like they want repeal of 2003 law that made solicitation illegal.
Kind of a libertarian position, they want legality without regulation.
Way to go Iceland! India takes step forward towards equity in gender representation, Iceland takes step forward in freeing women from sexism, US takes step backward threatening women’s autonomy in it’s most basic form- autonomy over ones own body.
France is no feminist paradise but: Securite Sociale just upped the reimbursement for abortions from 300 euros to 450. They have a political parity law–lists must contain equal numbers of men and women. The woman who led the fight to legalize abortion, Simone Veil, has just been elevated to the highest cultural institution in the land, l’Academie Francaise. Major political parties are headed by women (Parti Socialiste, Parti Communist Francais, Europe Ecologie, etc).
I’d add the proposed burqa ban to the list but I see that more as chum to the xenophobic far right rather than as a feminist initiative.
question for ya girls since it pretty clear that most of you girls that you would if you could you would be in favor of the shutting down strip clubs & are in favor of icelands law dose the but dose the same law in iceland apply to clubs that feature the chippendale dancers . or other groups like that?
Hate to break it to “ya” but most women consider male strippers comedic entertainment. I find that men are much more enamored with the visual of penis than women are. And that includes hetero men. Women are interested in its utilitarian value.
Go ahead and shut those Chippendales down. There’s plenty out there for us to point and laugh at if we need entertainment.
Right on! men tend to project on us the things that tend to excite them forgetting that we are built way differently. In fact it’s the ignorance of those differences that is at the root of most man self-loathing/women loathing
No kidding! I find it absolutely amazing that men think all that hair, bones and balls are all that attractive let alone jiggle worthy!
You do realize play girls’ main subscriber base is the gay man?
I’ve always considered male plumbing on the outside to be unfinished engineering work. Or a misguided aesthetic choice like the Centre Pompidou.
Now, there is certain plumbing I find attractive, but it’s because of the person it’s attached to.
I know. Why on earth would you feel comfortable with something so strategic and vulnerable out there dangling for the world to kick?
Inciting violence?
Playgirl. That takes me back. In my college dorm there was a single shower on the first floor that was used by male guests. It was customary to tack a ‘Male in Shower’ sign to the door while in use. One of the residents took a Playgirl centerfold of a back view of a man holding a hose cascading water over his head and wrote MALE IN SHOWER on it. That became our standard sign for the rest of the year.
Man holding a hose over his head…now that supports DK’s statement about the subscriber base.
LOL!
Why do you want to deprive myiq of his livelihood?
Us lady Conflucians love to see him expose his petulance.
😯
😯
Answer for ya boy: (from the link)
“the law, which was passed with no votes against and only two abstentions, will make it illegal for any business to profit from the nudity of its employees.”
If this happened in the US, I would expect the sudden formation of large numbers of new “nonprofits” to circumvent the ban. I’m sure Goldman and Citibank would find a way to cash in. I would also expect to see the formation of “private clubs” (memberships sold at the door of course) which paid “independent contractors” to come in and disrobe.
Imo, an equivalency test works better for some gender parity issues than others.
I am 53, it’s been a long time since I was a girl. The word “women” works much better.
Do we even know if Iceland has Chippendale dancers? I went to a club once because it was a work related thing.. trying to stay in the favor of a female boss. I thought the men were about as appealing as a cartoon cutout and when the show was over and we were all supposed to be turned on and ready for guys at the bar to pick up and screw, I was so disgusted that I swore “never again” and I kept that promise to myself.
I’m one of those women who really does like the male body. I find the male physique much more attractive than the female. And yet I’ve never been to male strip club. I find the whole idea of paying someone to take their clothes off and shake whatever wiggles in front of your face to be, well, just plain wrong as well as stupid. But then I’ve never considered sex to be a spectator sport.
The “you girls” thing is pretty condescending.
Easy for Icelanders to say! It’s cold out there, they for fully closed, temptations are easier to resist – hence women easier to not hate…
Okay, here’s what I don’t understand… The tone that pops up when a discussion about feminist/ women’s issues come up. Anywhere there are men… And even in the company of women sometimes…
On other issues, say unemployment there are no five jokes about what a slacker the unemployed person is before you get to the issue of how lousy being unemployed is; on race there are no five stupid jokes to endure before u get to the heart of the matter… But women’s issues– equal pay, freedom from violence and hate crimes, etc… and there’s this whole feeling of “isn’t this amusing, the girls think they can think.”. WTF is with this?
Oh yeah, should have made distinction between regular humor (which there never can be enough of) and humor that mocks women.
Isn’t patriarchy vile? It’s breathtaking in its scope. And yes, I encounter that attitude all the time. I have truly come to hate librul dudes with a flaming passion. At least conservative men don’t pretend to be on my side.
I learned to despise fauxgressive doodz in 2008, because of their gleeful sexism in supporting 0bama.
I voted for Edwards on Super Tuesday [of course, if I’d known then what a skunk he was, etc.]. Of the two Democrats left, I ended up supporting Hillary partly because of the contempt I felt for all those doodz attacking her for being a woman, rather than on her positions on the issues.
I was never a huge fan of Hillary–I thought she was too DLC conservative, much like Bill–but I ended up wishing I could vote for her in November. [I voted for McKinney.]
These days, I wonder how much of my perception of Hill as too far right was the result of Corporate Media distortion.
I think it’s the hangover from preschool potty humor. Folks that don’t know how to handle something with emotional maturity revert to banal jokes.
Poopy! Poopy!–Oh, were you saying something?
lol
with no insult to the men here who have perfectly healthy ego’s as far as I can see, it is all about the delicate male ego. They have to mock us because they know damn well they can not win the debate with us. Women are simply more articulate and self aware the majority of the time. Of course there are exceptions.
Yes, insecurity is rampant in the male culture here. I don’t really know why.
There something about an immigrant society like the US, where communities have held on to some of the traditions and values from the old country, and these mores and values have become frozen in time, while the old country has continued to evolve. Of course the opposite has happened too where we’ve modernized faster in many ways.
I’m just wondering if patriarchy isn’t really unhealthy for the men too. Because I think you may be onto something when you say men have an insecurity problem going on. Maybe it’s annoying to be a cog in patriarchy’s spinning male wheel as well.
Of course it’s unhealthy for us – anything that systematically dehumanizes a segment of the population is probably bad for everyone to some extent. .
Yes being part of a system that denigrates a subset, denigrates all.
But I am thinking that patriarchy for men is destructive in how it approaches the male in and of it self… The pecking order (interesting root of word), the lock step obedience, the devaluing of traits consigned to the other gender (but that all must possess), the obsession of linear thought, the constant drone to succeed and be productive…
Yes, the heirarchy tends to be more vertical in male organizations compared to female organizations.
It’s a generalization, but with the possible exception of the British Isles, chauvinism seems to increase as you go further south and east in Europe. Maybe it’s the latin and slavic history, dunno. Hard to tell if some of the region’s experience with socialism has been a positive force for feminism. One would think it might have been, though not sure the Soviet bloc was really socialist.
It’s a nuanced thing. Speaking strictly from my own impressions, I see that Frenchmen can be sexist as all get-out, yet I also get the idea that they genuinely like women in a way Americans do not. I think American misogyny is crude and untempered.
I think American men are taught to really see women as threats to their masculinity and independence. I have no idea where it comes from but they are almost stuck, in perpetuity, in both needing and rejecting mommy. I’m not sure a lot of them actually get to the point of having adult relationships for some reason.
That would certainly explain their attitude towards Hillary. The O candidacy offered up a psychologically potent two-fer: they get to be seen with their cool new friend and kick Mom in the teeth at the same time. No wonder O exerted a Pied Piper-like pull on progdudes.
When it comes to individual leftist men overall, I’m not sure they’re much different from liberal men. They’ll lecture you on what you really want and need and what your role is and your false consciousness, and there’s this giant block that their leftism runs into, what’s easily understandable in terms of a class or race context all of a sudden becomes absolutely befuddling. But on a society-wide level, yeah it wouldn’t surprise me if it was beneficial.
I see you’ve met my brother.
Lol
He’s the master of radical mansplaining.
Generalizing again, but I also see your point to a degree with men in China. There is nod to the twentieth century political culture of socialism and equality that they come from, but it dissolves fairly quickly when it’s about substantive gender issues. And the more recent culture of hyper business capitalism aggravates the sexism even more imo, as it has in the States. It would be interesting for someone to do a study on the very different brands of socialism inherent in the modern cultures of China versus Japan, and how both societies mostly fail women in the workplace and beyond.
Interesting to hear capitalism heightens sexism in China.. It has always felt that capitalism’s dependence on whipping the citizenry into unneccessary spending was right smack dab in the sexism ferment. Targeting women continually: u aren’t thin enough; eat chocolate to get over those feelings that you aren’t thin enough; join health club to get thin after eating that chocolate; oh shit, now yer just too old, but Botox can help with that…
Dear Patriarchy and Capitalism,
STFU already
sincerely, a woman
SoD, this post and the comments are rich, indeed. Thanks for the Women’s History Month salute!
I was thinking the same thing about the comments. TC is always a good place for just the right balance of intelligence, sincerity, and snark.
Go Iceland!
/*dreams beautiful dream in which sanity is catching*/
To those confused by the Chippendales, here’s the difference. The Chippies are supposed to appeal to women’s desire for sex. However, nobody knows any women who find them a turn on. They’re just funny. I sometimes wonder if that isn’t the point. Haha, the idea that men should strut their stuff for women is a crazy laugh.
The million upon millions upon millions of females in the sex trade (the difference in the numbers tells you something all by itself) aren’t there primarily for the sex. An animal with opposable thumbs doesn’t need to pay anyone for sexual release. And anyone who’s willing to please someone else generally can find someone to have sex with. That’s not what the sex trade is for. The men are paying for someone who can’t say no.
That’s true even in jobs where the women can’t be touched. Then the ego boost is just the atmosphere of women palpitating to please men. It would ruin the mood if the women had demands. (“Hey, you. Pull in that pot belly!”)
Women could sell sex by choice in a world without any economic pressures where both sexes pleased each other equally. We’re so far away from that world, most people can’t even imagine it.
That’s obvious when people think the Chippendales have anything to do with the sex trade.
You’ll need your Obama Lexicon to navigate these times
http://edgeoforever.wordpress.com/2010/03/27/obama-lexicon/
I’m guessing they have fewer sex crimes and violence against women in Iceland. I suspect that, with no sex industry, the violence is even less.
The sex industry presents people as objects. It depersonalizes people. That is the first step toward violence against a person or a group.
Comparing forcible rape statistics (rate per 100,000):
Iceland (2005): 24.9
US overall (2007): 30.0
(Sources: US Census Bureau 2010 Statistical Abstract http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/cats/law_enforcement_courts_prisonscrimes_and_crime_rates.html
Iceland National Police: http://www.logreglan.is/default.asp?cat_id=1216)
However, the US statistic varies a lot from state to state. For example:
Wyoming 13.2 (lowest)
Alaska: 85.1 (highest)
Some places one might expect to have comparatively high rates are actually quite low:
New York City: 11
In other words, the rate of forcible rape in New York City it less han half the rate in Iceland.
Iceland doesn’t break out domestic violence from other assaults, so it’s very hard to compare rates.
In desperate times, I’ve had to go stripping to pay the bills. It’s not fun work.
I’ve had this “consensual” sex-for-pay argument before (with an Australian I consider to be pretty open minded). Personally I don’t think sex can be consensual until the woman has another viable way to feed herself and her children. If her choice is between “have sex” or “starve to death” it’s not a free choice.
My friend’s objection is that he says Australian feminists are referring to the sex trade as “rape”, which then confuses the heck out of the police who then have a hard time viewing rape as a crime, since they believe prostitution is consensual. Has anyone ever heard of this Australian thing? Any ideas about how to respond to this argument? It creeps me out a bit.
Also… would it be important to know if a potential boyfriend had ever had sex with a prostitute or should that be private? What kind of a man has sex with a prostitute?
I’ve heard prostitutes themselves who say it’s rape. Others who seem okay with it. Either way, buying a person who can’t say no is some kind of very weird mind set.
Speaking just for myself, I’d run like hell rather than get involved with someone who thought that was okay.
I often wonder if Iceland would have elected a lesbian if the high male rollers of finance didn’t send the country off of a cliff.
the recognition that the high male rollers had sent the country of a cliff was after the election, afaik. In any case, Iceland being what it is, the answer is, yes, they would have elected her.
Perhaps banning the sex trade is easier in Scandinavian countries because their extensive welfare states–LIKE I WISH WE HAD HERE–make it unnecessary for any woman to enter that trade to keep a roof over her head.
Well it obviously isn’t what most here want to hear, but the fact remains you can drive commercial sex underground but you can no more eliminate it than you can eliminate drug use, alcohol use, or gambling. So the question then becomes whether doing so hurts or helps those (male and female) who engage in it.
>What kind of a man has sex with a prostitute?
Well even a cursory study of the subject would demonstrate every kind: liberals, conservtives, old, young, kind, cruel, rich and working class, pacifist and soldier, lonely virgins and men who never have problems getting bed partners.
>Perhaps banning the sex trade is easier in Scandinavian countries because their extensive welfare states–LIKE I WISH WE HAD HERE–make it unnecessary for any woman to enter that trade to keep a roof over her head.
Well that is the crux of the issue-everything ought to be done to prevent women (or men) from choosing to sell sexual favors out of desperation. But in any society there will still be commercial sex because the demand will always be there, and there will always be people who choose to supply it not because they have no other choice but because they choose to do so. And that includes Iceland.
I have had several friends who at one time or other were strippers or prostitutes, and none of them did so because they saw it is their only option but because they saw it is as a relatively easy way to make a good deal of money in a short period of time. I make no claims they are typical:they were not addicts, they did not work for pimps, or walk the streets. Many (most)people in the sex trade are clearly victims. Others are not, and again, as commercial sex will always be with us, I think it makes a lot more sense to figure out how to reduce the number of the former in favor of the latter, rather than passing bans that will ultimately work about as well as Prohibition.
But clearly others MMV.