Don’t shun traditional roles for women – says Emmeline Pankhurst’s great-granddaughter!
TRADITIONAL women’s roles should be valued as much as those in maledominated sectors, says the great- granddaughter of suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst.
Nursing, teaching and fulltime parenting should be treasured as much as jobs in technology or engineering, said Helen Pankhurst.
The leading feminist campaigner said society should ‘revalue’ positions traditionally shunned by feminists and ‘ let individuals decide what they want to be’.
Speaking at the Hay Literary Festival yesterday, she said: ‘How can you not value the work of nurses, teachers of young kids, parents at home? How did we get into a state where such things are not as valued as some of the mechanical, IT, traditionally maledominant spheres?
‘It’s about revaluing things so women’s role in the home is as valued as those outside – for those who want it.’
But Miss Pankhurst said those women who want to pursue roles in public life still face hostility in the form of social media abuse.
She said: ‘The world is incredibly tilted, we have to un-tilt it.
‘Today, any woman who leads a visible life is likely to be targeted by all forms of abuse, so maybe she won’t do it.’ She added: ‘If you look at the history of who gets the Twitter abuse, it’s very biased.
The feminist said continuing problems include ‘Twitter misogyny’ and the fact women MPs ‘have to fireproof their doors’.
Asked whether Labour MP Jo Cox’s gender was a factor in her death, she said: ‘I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the first MP murdered because of political issues, apart from those killed by the IRA, was a woman.’
She added that the Me Too and Time’s Up campaigns against sexual harassment in the workplace show the fight for equality is not yet won. And women’s issues are still ‘trivialised, sexualised’ by media. She added: ‘Girls’ exposure to social media is reinforcing that idea that what you look like is important.’
Miss Pankhurst recalled how a beautician told her ‘80 per cent’ of women requesting some intimate procedures and treatments were only having them because of pressure from their partners.
‘There is men’s sense of entitlement over women’s bodies,’ she said. The audience was also told that inequality in the workplace ‘now resonated around issues of pay gap’. However, Miss Pankhurst said she was ‘really positive that something is happening’ to drive forward social change.