Every. Single. Time
I was listening to the news a while back while getting ready for work, and the talking heads, while reviewing the newspapers, were discussing a new business regulation that is to come into force in 2018, wherein businesses with over 250 employees will have to publish their gender pay gap. Not a bad thing. It might encourage businesses to stop thinking they can get away with paying women less just because they do not have a penis. Although the gap has lessened in the last couple of decades it is still a whopping 19.1% for all employees (in the U.K). A recent report has suggested that it will take 200 years before the pay gap is eliminated. There is still much to do and I suppose the government has decided that naming and shaming the biggest and the supposed best might be a tool in the armour of fighting for gender equality. I do not agree with much this Tory government does. In fact, they are, generally speaking, a bunch of privileged white male elitists who live in a bubble of bullshit. But on this I think they have it right.
So back to the news. A group of chaps chatting about this new regulation. First thing out of their gobs.....
(Sic)"Well as long as this applies to men as well, it happens both ways, you know"
NO. NO. NO.
You, white, privileged, educated, middle class on the telly chap does not get to claim that you are somehow the victims of an anti-male wage gap.
NO
Every. Single. Time.
Every single time a step forward is made in the fight for a minority moving towards equality, out come the false equivalency brigade. They diminish our experiences by trying to make it all about them. They are thieves. They are pilferers of our inequality. They deny systematic, paternalistic abuse over millennia to claim victim status. They are white male privilege writ large.
In the UK the gender pay gap is 19.1%
In the US the gender pay gap is 21.4%
Chaps, this is NOT about you.
