My friend Claire just turned me on to this article by one of my favourite ever columnists, Charlie Brooker.
It’s brilliant funny, incisive and pretty sweary, as I’ve come to expect from him. But beneath the jokey central premise that men are ruining the world and that women should take over *everything* lies a fundamental problem. And it gives me a chance to get something off my chest that I’ve been meaning to for ages.
Y’see, I agree in principle with Charlie. There aren’t enough women in positions of real power, and the world would be a better place if it wasn’t so patriarchal. But unfortunately the women that do get to power (or try to get to power) almost always seem to do it by emulating male traits. I honestly can’t think of many women I know who have got to the top in their game without apparently resorting to being battleaxes, bullies or bitches. They put on a mask of aggression that makes them harsh and unapproachable. Take the two women who’ve been sat on the panel of Dragon’s Den; Deborah Meaden and Rachel Elnaugh.
I’m not entirely sure I saw either of them crack a smile once in all the eipsodes I watched. And they seemed to be particularly unpleasant to female “contestants” who tried to appeal to them on a feminine level. I’m sure both of them are lovely in real life, but when in business mode they lose all the humour, warmth, and approachability that are their strengths. But because we live in a male dominated society they are probably seen as weaknesses, because us blokes have made aggression, suppression and bullying the de facto modes of business.
Of course, these are all generalisations, and maybe there’s not a fundamental problem in Brooker’s proposal – maybe we just need to change the way we see leaders & entrepreneurs. I’d just love to see a new generation of women leaders coming through who were brilliant, warm, friendly and aren’t scared to lead as women, and not as “men in dresses”.
I wonder though how many of those bad powerful women were promoted by men, looking to fill positions in the image of themselves. I think patriarchy (and I do believe in it) runs deep and I think Brooker is being facetious when he says appointing women to power will solve all the problems. That said, I do wonder if true equality is achievable without some kind of formal equal opportunity measure. The problem – the measure will still be implemented by the old boys club.
As you can see, I don’t have any answers, just questions. Thanks for writing about the article – I wouldn’t have come across it otherwise. Hope you’re well!
I couldn’t agree with you more! I think though that there’s a wider aspect to this as well which is that a lot of people think that to succeed in business or a career you have to dehumanise yourself and become some kind of business automaton. Which just doesn’t help anyone or anything, frankly. But it does seem that women are often worse at this than men, due to the overcompensation for inequality etc.
I agree! Thanks for posting about this article, likewise I wouldn't have come across it otherwise. There is a movement of women in business who are starting to get together to share a different vision of entrepreneurship – based on more feminine values. See Lynne Franks' Seed Networks as just one example. It's a delicate path to tread without falling into the scary man-hating feminist camp, but do-able (I want to think so anyway!)
I have had a female theatre director/boss who was bullying and awful to work for/with and agree that the acquisition of power tends to sit uncomfortably with women – but I don’t think an equality policy is the answer, it simply creates a sense of unfairness. Women have to learn to support each other and the male colleagues who are comfortable in working with them. In the arts there are a lot of women “in-charge” but the pay sucks and you often hear the comment – they’re only there because a man wouldn’t work for that level of pay. POWER = BIG ISSUE lets hope women find their way into successful leadership sometime this century, after all we’ve got some years to catch up on and the “old boys” are already taking on ‘dinosaur’ characteristics, ‘extinction’ here they come!