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Topic: According to McLeans
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Rabid Gerbil
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 2066
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posted 13 February 2002 09:16 AM
Believe it or not, most white men are not vying to be the "most influencial" anything. They just want a middle class job somewhere. And it serves noone to put quotas in place that essentially legislate these men out of jobs. You CANNOT look at the Fortune 500 or the Senata or anyother institution made up of overachievers and draw some sort of conclusion about all white men. Most of them are just individuals struggling to get by who want the same consideration as any other individual.
From: Nova Scotia | Registered: Jan 2002
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judym
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 29
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posted 13 February 2002 06:51 PM
quote: That's the secret to ranking high among the influential in this country: you must not only possess genuine clout within your chosen field, but be widely perceived as one of those rare individuals who actively shape Canada's political, economic and cultural landscapes. In other words, influence is legitimized by its effective use. We all know those rare moments when our influence is felt, and the many occasions when it is not. Until recently, most Canadians tended to impose their influence deferentially, held back by a "who me?" quality that perpetuated our profound (and profoundly false) conviction that we live in an egalitarian society. We don't.
As can only be written by one Peter C. Newman. [ February 13, 2002: Message edited by: judym ]
From: earth | Registered: Apr 2001
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Rabid Gerbil
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 2066
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posted 14 February 2002 09:45 AM
I don't know where you work but all of the Insurance Companies, Banks, pension plans and consultant companies in downtown Toronto have many many women working for them in managerial and executive positions.Certainly most government offices have more women than men working there. Look, I'll admit that there is a ceiling of sorts in the corporate world, but that ceiling is under the CEO's feet. Women are well represented at ALL levels of most companies right up to the SVP's offices. More women are graduating as lawyers than men. Do you see this as an inequity, should universities reserve 50% of their seats for men? The vast majority of teaching and nursing jobs are occupied by women. Is this unfair in your eyes? These are excellent, well paying, jobs. Should School boards and hospitals invoke an affirmative action program and give preference to men? And what about Human resources - an excellent career field - every compeny has a HR office and virtually every office is staffed mostly, if not completely by women. Should we be demanding equity for men in the Human resources field? [ February 14, 2002: Message edited by: Rabid Gerbil ]
From: Nova Scotia | Registered: Jan 2002
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Tommy_Paine
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 214
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posted 14 February 2002 10:27 AM
Others have corrected other points, but it falls to me to straighten this one out: quote: You CANNOT look at the Fortune 500 or the Senata [sic] or anyother institution made up of overachievers...
Considering that we usually associate good qualities when applying the word "overachiever", the use of the word "senate" here is way, way out of line. I mean, one can be the most pustulant, odiferous syphalitic sore on the sphincter of a grave worm, as I would liken our Canadian senate to be, and only be considered an "overachiever" in the most wry sense of the word.
From: The Alley, Behind Montgomery's Tavern | Registered: Apr 2001
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Chickenbum
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 1917
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posted 14 February 2002 04:39 PM
I have a theory that women and minorities make up a small portion of executive and upper political posts a simple reason: women and minorities haven't been striving for these jobs long enough. Let's say the requirement for executive finance or executive politics is 30 years in the workforce with many years in either upper management or in politics. Given that the women's movement hasn't really been seriously influencing what women do for a living for more than about thirty years, it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that most of those women who will become executives are still in their thirties or early forties at most, and even more are in their twenties. So statistically, less of them have the requirements of the jobs than do white men, who've been at it much longer and have a longer history. And to a smaller degree, this applies to minorities. We may not be far enough out of the white-collar 50's and 60's for minorities to have advanced far enough, generationally speaking, to be on par with the countries majority ethnic population. Many experienced minorities of the baby-boomer to pre bb generation still work in craft-related jobs that they may have brought with them from their homelands, i.e. before the knowledge economy. Of course there is all that other prejudice stuff...but if people aren't qualified for senior positions, then neither constituents nor shareholders wlll support them.
From: happily functioning in society | Registered: Dec 2001
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WingNut
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 1292
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posted 14 February 2002 04:54 PM
quote:
I have a theory that women and minorities make up a small portion of executive and upper political posts a simple reason: women and minorities haven't been striving for these jobs long enough.
Theories are a wonderful method of avoiding the truth. I recommend them to everyone.But for those wet blankets who prefer facts to the half-baked: quote:
Survey #2 results: What's the profile of the typical U.S. chief executive according to Forbes Magazine? At least 55 of the top 800 CEOs were not born in the USA. The majority of the foreign born from theU.K., Germany, India and Japan, among other countries. The proportion of the foreign-born is even higher—one in seven—among chief executives who founded their own company. Most—797 of the 800—are males. Their average age is 56 years old. Most came up through the ranks: On average they've spent 21 years at the company they head. 52 out of the 800 lack college degrees, but 53% have graduate degrees. Their age range spans half a century: The oldest is 83-year-old William Dillard, who founded Dillard's, Inc. when Franklin Roosevelt was President (1939). and the youngest is Michael Dell, 33, founder of Dell Computer. source: CEO Facts
So that would mean the average CEO began his (seldom her's) climb to the top in 1980/81.
From: Out There | Registered: Aug 2001
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Pat
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 2064
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posted 15 February 2002 03:31 AM
Rabid Gerbil it’s great that you’ve found some companies that have progressive hiring practices unfortunately it’s all too rare. Government offices have one advantage that companies and corporation’s don’t-we can vote on the government and turf them out. Corporations are not accountable to the general public and for the most part have a poor track record of hiring minorities and women. Teaching and nursing have always had a high rate of women in them. Men haven’t flocked to these jobs because after 5 years of university, teaching is one of the lesser paying jobs (compared to other jobs requiring a degree). People don’t go into teaching and nursing for the money. 20 years ago a guy could get a good paying job in the resource sector without a high school diploma. Women had to have a degree to come close to making the wages of a resource sector worker. In a program I was in at university it was not advertised that most of the guys went on to get well paying jobs while most of the women were rewarded with jobs in the service sector after graduation. Some women were hired but they found that they were the token woman on the job as well as being the lowest paid. I suspect that human resources isn’t a field that many men wish to go into. But I could be wrong. Sure maybe more women are graduating as lawyers but are they getting the good jobs? Women and minorities report from these professions that they are often relegated to the lesser paying and lesser prestigious roles in these firms. This is a common complaint from women and minorities who work for the private sector. There are some exceptions but for the most part the companies and corporations reward conservative white guys. The left has a much better track record in this area. I could go on at some length on this topic but it’s getting late.
From: lalaland | Registered: Jan 2002
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Michelle
Moderator
Babbler # 560
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posted 20 February 2002 10:30 AM
Well, it's a nice perpetuating circle isn't it? Talk to a Republican or the average male Alliance supporter, and there it is. They push family values, which, translated, means that the wife should put her family ahead of her career and leave the husband free to put his career before his family. Then they say that they're all for equality in the workplace, but that it's women's own fault they don't get as far ahead as men do, because, silly them, they put their family ahead of their career, unlike men.What do political conservatives call women who put their career ahead of their family? Bad mothers, ballbusters, (gasp!) feminists, or even worse (double gasp!) RADICAL feminists! And we can't be having any of that.
From: I've got a fever, and the only prescription is more cowbell. | Registered: May 2001
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Trinitty
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 826
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posted 20 February 2002 11:48 AM
I just don't understand. Why can't two people just do what they can to raise healthy, happy balanced children while at the same time finding some sort of income generation that fufills them and pays the bills?I realise that being a single parent complicates things, and there should be support services that are there to help. It just doesn't seem like rocket science to me. I know that I haven't had kids yet, but people have been doing it since we became people, and our own plans seems sound. If someone elses plans don't work out, well, again, we need some structure there to help them over the bumps... and we shouldn't be slagging eachother over it all of the time and trying to cast some sort of winning formula in stone. My parents sure didn't plan on having triplets, but, it happened, they dealt with it, they stayed married, we survived despite being on one income for many years, and we turned-out fine. Nobody's perfect and that goes for parents too. They are going to make mistakes, they're human, for me, the important thing is to enable those parents to do their best to raise understanding, healthy children so that when they look back on their childhood, they will accept the fact that their parents are just people and not infallable Gods. I realise that there are some important things that parents need to do... but for me they're pretty basic. We don't need all of these experts scaring the starch out of new parents. It doesn't involve black and white mobiles mixed with nursery Mozart. If you want to do that fine, but your neighbour that doesn't do it isn't a bad mother. Basics. Be there for him. Listen to your child, and teach him all that you can. Keep him well fed, keep him safe, and make sure he knows that he's loved and no matter what you'll be there. Sorry to drift the thread, I just wish we didn't politicize parenthood so much.
From: Europa | Registered: Jun 2001
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R. J. Dunnill
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 1148
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posted 20 February 2002 09:38 PM
quote: What do political conservatives call women who put their career ahead of their family? Bad mothers, ballbusters, (gasp!) feminists, or even worse (double gasp!) RADICAL feminists! And we can't be having any of that.
When you say "political conservative", are you by chance referring to the Jerry Falwell types? They're the only political commentators I've seen who would label career women in such a manner.I was a member of Reform/Alliance, and I signed up because I liked their ideas regarding Senate reform, the curbing of policies designed to keep various have-not regions underdeveloped and dependent on federal subsidies, etc. IMO the "racist" and "sexist" labels that were slapped on us by political forces benefiting from the status quo were just (highly successful) attempts to deflect efforts aimed at meaningful political reform. RD [ February 20, 2002: Message edited by: R. J. Dunnill ]
From: Surrey, B.C. | Registered: Aug 2001
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R. J. Dunnill
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 1148
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posted 21 February 2002 04:32 AM
quote: Since the Triple E Senate the Deform Alliance supported meant that PEI and Ontario would have equal numbers of Senators, it was supremely undemocratic.
It doesn't seem to ruffle any feathers that B.C. has about 30 times the population of P.E.I., but only 50% more Senate representation. The fact that New Brunswick, with 1/5 the population of B.C., and Nova Scotia, with 1/4 the population of B.C. get 66% more Senate representation doesn't seem to faze many Canadians either. Or that my riding here in Surrey had more population than all of P.E.I., yet we got 1 seat in the Commons and they got 4.A Triple-E apportionment might be unfeasible in a country where 2 regions out of the 10 comprising it contain over 60% of the population, but that doesn't rule out a regional power sharing scheme altogether. There is a need for regional power sharing. Right now, the Canadian Senate serves little purpose other than to field investigative committees, and as a place to gently ease old political warhorses into retirement. Thus, regional representation in the Parliament gets shifted into the Commons, and instead of having one chamber represent the people and one represent the regions, one must juggle both, with the result that votes in some parts of the country are fortified at the expense of diluting others. The legislative apportionment as it sits results in a partial disenfranchisement of voters in B.C., Alberta, and Ontario. With regional representation shifted to an elected and effective Senate and the Commons apportioned on one-person one vote, those three under-represented provinces could at least bring their full numbers to bear in one house of Parliament, a definite improvement over their current lot. My apologies to the moderators for drifting off-topic. I had merely wanted to point out that my reasons for joining Reform/Alliance had nothing to do with wanting to turn back the clock on social issues like the progress of women in the workplace. RD [ February 21, 2002: Message edited by: R. J. Dunnill ]
From: Surrey, B.C. | Registered: Aug 2001
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