Does Society Favor Men?

Well, the only way to answer this question is to ask: Is the Pope Catholic?

Of course society favours men. Men have always been in charge and in command of their world. They built it, they dictate behaviour in it and they control it. The biggest and most noticeable area is in jobs and careers. Only today I was reading the latest fascinating surveys on the best and highest paid jobs for women, and even in careers where women are represented at least 75% (like nursing, paralegal, human resources etc), somehow that 25% of men manage to earn at least $5000 annually MORE than the women! How does that happen? How can the majority earn less than the minority in those fields? And that trend is repeated across society. Worse still, even in fields like IT where men dominate, they still earn far more. So, right across the board, society favours men much more than women, which is why they earn an average of 20% more in pay than their female colleagues. But we have to look at the root of the favouritism to appreciate how it is maintained.

Women, of course, began with a disadvantage. Up to a few years ago, society was run by men, for men and to reflect men and their values and ideals. Women were invisible, as their 'natural' place was regarded as being in the home. A lot has happened in the past 50 years to change those perceptions, and we do have some women forging ahead in isolated instances. Many young women are also achieving much more academically to give them that brighter start in life, and a few are reaching the boardrooms. But they still represent only about 2% of what is possible. Men still have a strong grip on the economic, political, educational, media and technology structures of our society, the important bases of power, continuously recruiting and nurturing in their own image and likeness, especially where men are regarded as 'natural' authority figures. In this way they maintain their iron hold on opportunities and access for all.

Some might argue that women are getting more access to male domains and so society is beginning to favour them above men. But access is not influence or power, which men have retained in abundance. Access gets you on the ladder, to survey enviously those already in place. Without the men in power opening that door wider to let women through, women will always have that glass ceiling obstructing their progress to greater heights. It means that the good intentions might be there to improve the balance of opportunities and contributions between men and women, but vested male interest and a firm hold on power ensures the actual action remains tiny and the status quo continues to favour men for a long time to come.

Dealing with prejudice in today's society

Prejudice is a natural by-product of making choices in life. We are presented with a diversity of choice daily, from which we are required to select what matters to us most, what we like best, the things which keep us in our comfort zones and anything that enhances us the most, while resisting the rest. From choosing a partner to choosing a fashionable item, we are exercising the prejudice of accepting one thing while rejecting another. So we are all guilty of exercising prejudice in some form and we all have our prejudices relating to lifestyle and culture.

However, such prejudices become an issue where choices are mainly negative, made out of deliberate malice to show dislike, to stem personal fear, to demonstrate superiority, to exclude others and to denigrate or deny their presence and rights. In fact, prejudice becomes intolerable when it is applied to people who cannot change their colour, their disability, gender or sexuality. One always has the opportunity to lose weight, if one is too big, to stop smoking, if the smoke offends others, or to stop behaving badly, if it annoys one's peers. But prejudice against people who cannot change who they are, or their identities, hits below the belt and becomes unacceptable.

Dealing with such prejudice is often a traumatic process for those on the receiving end, especially if they are not supported by the system, by neighbours or the community. People affected by mindless prejudice often feel impotent to deal with it and many are left scarred by its effects. However, the room for those malicious types of prejudice is gradually contracting because of the global exposure to difference, the networking opportunities to deal with people of different cultures and communities, and the educational advantages available. In fact, the vast amount of information available on the Internet and elsewhere, the dramatic increase in travel over the years and the proliferation of social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook, are doing more to break down such prejudices, and the barriers to the acceptance of diversity, than anything that has gone before them. They now make it difficult to exercise real prejudices, especially when one has been out of one's locality or is trying to make 'friends' on a global scale.

Dealing with prejudices have never been easy, and prejudices will always be there. But thanks to education, technology and greater exposure to one another, such prejudices can gradually be minimised instead of being allowed to cause real damage.

The Dilemma of Being a Teenager Today

Teenagers in today's society have, to a great degree, the best and the worst of all worlds.

First, they are born into a society that couldn't be more revolutionary and innovative. They have all these gadgets at their disposal that their parents dreamt of and their grandparents couldn't even imagine. They have an incredible amount of information to aid their development. They also have opportunities galore to express themselves, to extend their reach, to discover their potential and to enhance their life quality. They would not be able to imagine what my world was like, 50 years ago, having to read by candles, having no phones at all, having nothing electrical and hardly any buses (we had to walk everywhere!). The mobile, the microwave, the video and Internet appear to represent an alien world I would not have believed capable of existing in my early childhood. So our youngsters couldn't be more fortunate.

However, they are having to learn even more than we had to do. There are so many things expected of them that they have to cope with, AND teach their parents as well, it must be kind of heavy to deal with, when all they want is to be looked after themselves. Many are confused about their identity, their ability, potential and direction. They have little guidance on innovations and, on top of that, many are kept back in their own development because of their parents' fear of this new world; the mental barriers the parents might have erected in their bid to cope with a new and threatening environment; one that has partially robbed them of their confidence and authority.

Finally, teenagers are increasingly operating within a world of their own through technology, especially with the new games, often lacking human warmth and comfort. They occupy a suspicious world where hugs and basic affection come with questions, doubts and caution. Many of them go through each day missing out on a simple cuddle, a word of praise, a hug, an affirmation of how wonderful they are and without understanding, affection and value. Without the extended family of friends and neighbours who used to affirm us and look after us, many youth now feel isolated, excluded and unloved. This increases the deviant tendency among them as many struggle to deal with their anger and pain. Teenagers live in a remarkable world compared to the one of yesteryear, but one which is slowly losing social connections while it traps the young in an oasis of insularity and virtual reality

What Causes Apathy in Society?

Apathy is a direct by-product of fear, disappointment and neglect. It exists when people's values are not reflected, their desires are unfulfilled within society and they feel a sense of alienation from what is happening around them. It is difficult to feel involved and included if we do not feel a part of our social milieu, if we believe there is nothing in it for us and if we feel excluded from the outcomes. In such situations there is no feeling of attachment or association and so there is likely to be detachment in the form of an apathetic response to prevent further hurt or disappointment and to dampen expectations.

There has to be some kind of payoff for people to feel they have a stake in their situations, surroundings, or society. The payoff could be practical, physical, emotional or social, but there has to be something which makes it worthwhile for that person to participate. Today's world is changing so rapidly, especially for older folks, there is a general air of apathy through fear and apprehension. Many people feel on the periphery of life, excluded and unwanted. Much of what they cherished or which brought them to where they are now are no longer valued, respected or upheld. This has left those people without an anchor, feeling isolated, fearful and expendable in a morass of new technology and outdated customs.

When we fear and feel disconnected it is easy to be apathetic, to feel disjointed and on the sidelines. Apathy today is most obvious in the field of politics where many people believe they are not represented by politicians, that democracy isn't really working to their advantage, their wishes and feelings are being ignored and they are without a voice. That is reflected in the increasingly low turnout at elections and the disappointment in the politicians themselves. That might explain why Barack Obama is galvanising the young around him with his leadership, especially those who have been apathetic to the political process because they have felt excluded from it. It seems that they get a sense of emotional connection with Barack's vision and feel aligned with where he is heading.

A feeling of irrelevance breeds apathy and many people who cannot relate to what is happening in our modern world feel more comfortable simply being apathetic instead.

Why Ken Livingstone was Wrong to Apologise for the Slave Trade

The 200th commemorative anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade was marked by Ken Livingstone with a suitably emotional and tearful apology on behalf of London and its part in it. The capital's Mayor wept openly as he told the audience about the atrocities millions had to endure during their transportation from Africa and the legacy of that singular act of inhumanity.

Having thought deeply about it for a few days, I believe he was wrong to apologise.

It is easy to seek current retribution for past wrongs. It has become increasingly fashionable to demand an empty apology, one that applies guilt by proxy, hoping that it will somehow make things better 200 years down the line. But apologies are just words which make the people who utter them feel good and those hearing them feel vindicated, but offer no guarantees of the sincerity to match or the political will to bind those words to future actions. For an astute politician as Mr Livingstone, that was a master stroke of sensitive PR which is bound to garner him a few words of admiration, on top of the expected votes of appreciation.

However, regardless of his feeling of sincerity, apologies are mainly palliatives for those wishing to blame others for their problems in a selective way without really doing anything to change the miserable status quo many of them might still endure today. Apologies do nothing for the endemic racism, the continuing invisibility of minorities in Britain, the embedded inequality between communities, the lack of confidence, pride and self-esteem among Black people, or the alienation felt by their youngsters to the extent that they would wish to continually destroy themselves - the real legacy of slavery through displacement, lack of identity and a lack of self-worth.

There are also other important reasons why there should be no apology for the slave trade, or any other historical atrocity.
First, regardless of how inhuman the act, we cannot take it upon ourselves to apologise for the values and beliefs of people of a bygone age. That is to imply our superiority over their judgement based upon limited knowledge of the reasons for their actions or the mood at the time. They were the best judges of their time because they LIVED in it and based their decisions on the nature of THEIR society, whether it is agreeable to us or not. Just as we are now living in the 21st century and are making decisions based upon what is appropriate to us and the knowledge we have, so every age bases its actions on the beliefs, resources, information and aspirations they have. They behaved in the only way they knew how, until new information, new values, developing reason and being challenged taught them otherwise.

For example, the fact that Bush and Blair were wrong to go into Iraq will not be decided in 200 years time by a different world. We will make that judgement now, based upon our values of what is ethically right and wrong for us as a people in this time and space. If we do not admit any wrongdoing over the tens of thousands of lives lost in that country and the parlous state it is in, should we expect a future American president and a future British prime minister, who might not have any experience of 'terrorists', to publicly apologise to the future Iraqi people for what is happening now? To use their limited judgement in a different era, a different mood and different objectives to judge our actions now? That would be very silly because they would be taking upon themselves authority which they do not possess over our age, dictating to us what they believe to be right by THEIR ethical standards and interpretation of our actions, while ignoring the world we are inhabiting now and its dangers. Not only would they not understand the fears that drove the decision to invade, but they would also deprive us of the right to decide our own destiny. Any apology for Iraq should be made by current leaders, in our time and age, because they carried out the deed and were sure of the reasons why it was necessary, not by some self-righteous people in 200 years using their inappropriate ethics to judge us.

Livingstone broke down in tears as he apologised for his London's role in the transatlantic slave trade. ©Daily Mail

The Value of Each Age
Each period of time has led us, in turn, to this one through exploration, education and innovation. Every era is thus a natural phase in our evolutionary development, teaching us something new every step of the way as mankind advances. No age is better than the other because every age is essential to our unique emotional and professional journey, continuing stages which have brought us to where we are. We cannot judge a past age by our standards because that age did not have our knowledge, beliefs, social mores or resources. We are learning all the time, improving on past actions, with the hope of not repeating the mistakes we make along the way. To use our current knowledge to denigrate the actions of a bygone age and apologise on its behalf is rather arrogant and foolhardy because without the curiosity, experiments and mistakes of that age we would not be where we are now.

Improved information and education ensure our growth, one which should give us a greater understanding of, and appreciation for, the limitations of the past. Seeking apologies for past acts might sound honourable but this is simply applying guilt by proxy, being made purely for appeasement or a superficial notion of 'justice' without any real value. For example, why on earth would I apologise to my best friend now because my great grandfather might have killed her great grandfather? The fact has to be acknowledged by us, but the most important thing is the friendship we now share and the journey we are prepared to make together in the spirit of forgiveness and mutual appreciation. We cannot build anything or improve our lives if we are both in resentment and recrimination mode. Furthermore, apologies do not denote remorse or real regret because the pain, magnitude and true consequences of any act can never be understood by anyone outside that age. They can only be guessed at with compassion.

Apologies are also highly selective. We only apologise for those atrocities which carry the most condemnation or voice. What about all the other violent acts and unjustified killings in history? Who is going to apologise for those? And why are only European peoples being asked for an apology regarding the slave trade? What of the African chiefs and leaders who sold their people in slavery? Who is asking current African leaders for an apology? Or doesn't their part in it matter too?

So Ken has publicly apologised. What now? What is the point of an empty apology without anything else to change the status quo of inequality and disrespect, of resentment and recrimination, of continuing prejudice and discrimination? Apologies are inappropriate in these instances because it is not the apology that is important, but actually moving on in the future being kinder and more understanding people because of what happened. Apologies merely accord history more precedence over the present and future while preventing any real practical changes in perception or respect. The words soon replace the necessity for healing actions.

What matters most now is a clear acknowledgement of past atrocities by everyone, especially the part such acts play in hampering the progress of a community, and a genuine desire to learn from them to prevent repetition and to appreciate the enormous cumulative consequences down the years for those involved. The most important time should be the present, that's all we are guaranteed, no other. Instead of apologies, there should be the sincere desire to make the present and future a much more richer experience for all concerned in a spirit of reconciliation, real equality and genuine justice.

That can only be achieved through greater visibility, affirmation and reinforcement for people of African origin, utilising their talents, appreciating their contribution to British society and encouraging personal education and emotional development. However, along with such external actions, many displaced Africans (like African Caribbeans) need to relinquish the slavery mentality they still have, the lack of self-belief that plague them, the sense of impotence and victimhood which embraces them and the huge barriers to achievement that exist mainly inside their heads which no amount of apologies can ever eradicate.