Humankind has achieved unbelievable advances yet still has to fight a lot of times for basic human rights. Like women’s rights.
So, we are in 2022 and the world keeps being amazingly sexist. And I wonder, was it like this all along? And if so, is there a reason for why our society evolved this way? Does it have an origin?
Let’s start by defining sexism. Sexism according to Cambridge is referred to actions based on the belief that the members of one sex are less intelligent, able, skilful, etc. than the members of the other sex. Especially that women are less able than men.
But where does this belief come from? Patriarchy has been the norm in almost all agricultural and industrial societies and has tenaciously resisted political changes, social revolutions and economic transformations. And the biggest shock for me came when I discovered that even Neanderthals divided tasks by sex.
Seriously? That old is sexism?
Anyway, so we don’t precisely know the origin of sexism but sadly it looks like it has always been present in the history of humankind. About the reason why it exists, I found out 3 theories proposed by the Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari.
The first one hypothesises that men have subdued women because they are physically stronger. However, this is a half-truth (it is only true talking about averages and also women are more resistant to pain or disease). Moreover, social power does not usually depend on physical strength. Neither kings nor generals nor priests have reached their positions along history by their musculature.
The second hypothesis say men are prone to violence. This is a variation from the first hypothesis where the key is not the strength but the aggressiveness. Well, it could make sense since the vast majority of those convicted of violent crimes worldwide are male. However, in general, wars are won by strategists, not by brutes, a role that could be very well carried out by women.
And the last hypothesis is based on genetics. It suggests that men and women developed different survival and reproduction strategies. This reminds me of the sexual selection proposed by Darwin. Back then, he already proposed that men who managed to have offspring were the most ambitious and competitive; dynamic that made women become dependent, by propitiating the offspring of those who gave the profile of "submissive caregivers". Nevertheless, there are also some objections to this hypothesis. Given that in nature there are some species like elephants and bonobos, with a matriarchal society in which females create very effective cooperation networks against more individualistic males.
Either way, the fact is that sexism exists since the beginning of humankind and women have been fighting for their rights ever since.
From women like Agnodice, considered one of the first gynaecologist, who bravely practiced medicine in Greece (400 b.C) when women faced the death penalty for doing so. To Sister Juana Inés de la Cruz, who memorably defended women's right to education in 1691 by proclaiming "you may well philosophize and season dinner.". Anna Filosofova, co-founder in 1860 of a society that offered support to poor people, not only in the form of affordable housing, but also decent work for women. Kate Sheppard, responsible of making New Zeland to become the first self-governing country to grant women the national right to vote in 1893. Raichō Hiratsuka, who in 1911, co-founded Seitō, the first all-female literary magazine, which challenged the traditional role of women in the home. Doria Shafik, who made different actions in 1950s in Egypt that paved the way to obtain women's right to vote in 1956. Rosalind Franklin, who captured in 1951 photographic evidence crucial to the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA by an X-ray machine that she herself had perfected. Rigoberta Menchú, the first indigenous person to win a Nobel Peace Prize, that campaigned for social justice, ethnic-cultural reconciliation and the rights of indigenous peoples during and after the Guatemalan Civil War between 1960 and 1996, and co-founded in 2006 the Nobel Women's Initiative to empower women's work for peace, justice and equality. Billie Jean King, who threatened to boycott the U.S. Open in 1973 unless women received a cash prize equal to that of men. Unity Dow, who won a landmark case in Botswana in 1992 that granted women married to foreign nationals the right to confer their husbands’ nationality on their children. Vandana Shiva, who created the Navdanya organization and established a biodiversity, food and water programme that empowered women by protecting the livelihoods of communities. Loveness Mudzuru y Ruvimbo Tsopodzi, two married girls that made history in 2016 when a Zimbabwean constitutional court ruled in their favour ruling that no person in the country could marry, not even in unions enshrined in customary law, before the age of 18.
And despite everything these and more women have fought for, there still a long way to go until we reach somewhere close to gender parity. Since the truth is, nowadays a lot of women still die due to preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth, being 99 percent of them in developing countries. Disparities in education persist in some developing regions like Sub-Saharan Africa, where for every 100 boys, only 70 girls are in tertiary education. Poverty disproportionately affects women and girls, their health, employment and security. Women's representation in politics as well as in the news is still lagging behind. Although more than 140 countries guarantee gender equality in their constitutions, women face direct and indirect inequalities through laws, policies, stereotypes and social practices. Women make up only 30 percent of researchers in natural sciences, engineering and technology, medical and health sciences, agricultural sciences, social sciences and humanities. Women are vital to lasting peace and yet they are largely absent from peace negotiations. The gender pay gap still persists for women in all walks of life. In more than 60 countries, women are denied the right to acquire, change or retain their nationality, including the right to confer nationality on spouses who were not born in the country. Gender differences in access to land and credit restrict women farmers' economic opportunities. More than 700 million women currently living were already married by the age of 18, from which, 250 million married before the age of 15.
I hope I may live enough to witness the day we reach gender equality. For now, let’s keep taking steps towards sustainable progress in a world with equality for every human being.