At last someone is addressing those feminist myths.

By Steve Doughty
Last updated at 1:02 AM on 08th November 2008

Further sex equality legislation should be stopped because it is unfair to men, according to an analysis published by a Labour think tank.

The idea that all women at work are victims of discrimination is a ‘feminist myth’, argued a senior academic. Many want to raise families rather than pursue careers.

‘The myth that all or most women would be just as careerist as men, if only they were given the opportunity, has been exploded,’ Dr Catherine Hakim said. Stressed Young Man

While women can choose between work and family, men have fewer choices, a senior academic said

‘The trend towards flexibility in the workforce has also made it clearer that some occupations and jobs will never be family friendly.’

The call from Dr Hakim will provoke unease among ministers and Labour MPs because it has been published by the Institute for Public Policy Research, the party’s most influential think tank over the past decade.

Business Secretary Peter Mandelson is already thinking about whether to push on with planned new family-friendly laws next spring because of their impact on small businesses.

However, the Government’s Equality Commission and feminist ministers are determined to bring in laws to combat what they see as widespread prejudice against women workers.

Dr Hakim, a senior research fellow at the London School of Economics, said: ‘The most misleading feminist myth is that women are united in their goals and priorities.

‘Around one quarter of women - and men - now remain childless, mostly by choice, and their interests and priorities differ substantially from those of parents.

‘I predict that men will continue to dominate in the workforce and public life while women will continue to dominate in family life, even in the absence of sex discrimination, because there are some residual differences in tastes, values and lifestyle choices that have a cumulative impact.’

In a direct challenge to the official Whitehall view, she declared: ‘So why do feminists continue to demand a strengthening of gender equality laws?

‘Largely because feminists continue to manufacture myths about women’s oppression.’

Dr Hakim said that while women could choose between work and family, men had fewer choices. ‘Perhaps equality legislation should address this imbalance,’ she said

What is “Sati”?

Sati is the practice of widow burning (being cremated with her dead husband). A woman who dies burning herself on her husbands funeral fire was considered most virtuous, and was believed to directly go to heaven, redeeming all the forefathers rotting in hell, by this “meritorious” act.

The woman (Hindu widow) who committed Sati was worshipped as a Goddess, and temples were built in her memory.

The most high-profile Sati incident was in Rajasthan in 1987 when 18-year-old Roop Kanwar was burned to death.

The case sparked national and international outrage.

Police charged Roop Kanwar’s father-in-law and brother-in-law with forcing her to sit on the pyre with her husband’s body.

Sati is believed to have originated some 700 years ago among the ruling class or Rajputs in India.

The Rajput women burnt themselves after their men were defeated in battles to avoid being taken by the victors. But it came to be seen as a measure of wifely devotion in later years.

The custom was outlawed by India’s British rulers in 1829 following demands by Indian reformers.

But this cruel inhumane Hindu practice still occurs rarely, mostly in parts of northern and central India.

A Religious Split
Jewish women abandoned but unable to remarry.
Full article here

BY BARI WEISS Friday, August 24, 2007 12:01 a.m. EDT Susan Rosenfeld’s marriage wasn’t what you’d call romantic. She was thrown up against a wall, doused with a bucket of cold water in bed, and, toward the end, became her husband’s punching bag. “Since I wear long sleeves, no one really knew,” she says. Looking back, Ms. Rosenfeld regrets keeping the abuse a secret. But “in the Jewish community, you don’t call the police on your husband.”

In her mid-30s, Ms. Rosenfeld hopes to remarry and build a new life for herself. But as an Orthodox Jew, a civil divorce is not sufficient. For Ms. Rosenfeld to be officially released from her vows, her husband has to grant her a Jewish bill of divorce, called a get. The document, which certifies the termination of the marriage–the Aramaic text declares “you are hereby permitted to marry any man”–not only allows women to remarry, but ensures that future children will not be deemed mamzerim (bastards able to marry only other mamzerim).

Two years have passed and Ariel HaCohen, Ms. Rosenfeld’s husband, has refused to grant her the get. This makes Ms. Rosenfeld an aguna–literally, an anchored woman–trapped in a dead marriage.