Sects or women go to inadequately), and where some This is economic wow wa sranu saic and a Pays cany an elementary class on this particular issue, against their fellow women t equal pay need not mean hat? Do men have such idylli m any case. equality wit because under-valuing women bres that we want the same for urselves? In a world where People are valued as economic is regarded as just washing - rainer inan as people, to be un equal economic unit must not be the height of our ambition. monotonous Lasks at ony tor What we want is a revaluation of cabbages or servants, i.e. But surely dealing with the all people, men and women. in unfolding of new minds is a human terms not as adjuncts to Going out to work is not new and → got a sign ol growing equality or emancipation. In 1851, 25% of married women (and two out additional to housewife. For these of three widows) had a job nead tnat women's work automatically means the most lowly, menial, unskilled, badlyworking class women, work was paid work, instead of the most the home, as unskilled cheap an inevitable burden, in and out crcauve ane numane labour. In Victorian women were drudges and richer you are selling in this society you are announcing that you are a low-alue person. are now permitted to be both. Equal pay is therefire a very necessa step towards equality, they must act as organised and will have repercussions on the labour'. It is very easy to find value placed on women in general. working women in shops and factories. But they But the keeping down of women is not just a capitalist phenomenon and they are rare jewels in an a 1s nor Just capita ists whe do it. Other societies based on There are some signs that the property have done and men of all classes take part in it. words are turning, al rords and La lew otner places, but women in The fact that women are the mothers makes them both powerful and vulnerable, and men seek curb thi winerability. Children make oners guardians of the future with a direct and visible inmortality, while a man 1 can be dependent on the word of a women. This sort of statistic can Anan Cven therhood. This is power indeed r nis knowled e repeated throughout the But mothers are vulnerable because their sostages, and by depriving children are also their husbands meals soners of the guardianship of the burden mothe deble cop their children men have made full use of superior physical strength to ensure their dominance.
Lo take Leir olaces in the community, in political and trade Now we have an industrial society union activities. As long as even where physical strength matters many left-wing husbands expect less and less, where women have had to be educated (though often the babies while they go out to be uch wircs lo stay at nome with Fi te vanguard of the struggle, men see them as more of a danger there will be these missing women, Hau ever. aese are me men wno absent from a struggle which ally themselves with the capitalist concerns tact al cast as muca as much. last years workers Control Conterence was a splendid Conference - bu similar to the TUC and very I nese men are tneir own enemies, Labour Party Conference in on way, in the proportion of women mcaus unuct valuine neolnernood present.
It motherhood is under-valued sc is family life. Bringing up children The comment in a Union Journal that it would be a good thing for nappies and other unpleasant or more women to be delegates to the Trades Union Congress women. *because we are always short of dancing partners at the Mavor's Keception is not an isolated fascinating and creative thing. if example of male patronage within Burden, and hot a 24 hour a day the working class movement itself.
Women will have to assert themselves pretty strenuously to Reality has been so turned on its beat down patronage, and to overcome all the aspects of discrimination still existing. Equal pays cqual training opportunities equal guardianship of children (as • general right not just when ther s a Court Order), and the remova times, working class of all the smaller humilations.
wornen were decorations. It cannot There are hospitals which will not be regarded as more than a modest advance that working class women mustands consent. here are the Inurance Companies which demand the husband's If women are to achieve equal pay for compensation paid to a wife for her own accident at work. And biased. Perhaps it started antune peratons tels in Undis God the Father. I believe the pagans cia nave Crocdesseg Bo the Irish Civil Rights marchers eally meat man, one vote '? hope not. Sex-bias lies ver eneral are absent from the place deep, after centuries of conditionbe one the the nationate ecisions are being progress against it, including the ing, and to make any turther ommiteep Half the meaniors achievement of equal pay for work of equal value, women will have to chanenge ine role assigned to them by men.
women? They are at home cooking Where are these missing partners, so that each lives fully both outside and inside the home anod. Nesher will be upt parentwe otner, and neitner sex will abbieven pat of this pine The Will not have time or energy equality for women will raise the quality of the lives of men as well as women, and its achievement will be one measure of the success of the struggle against capitalism and other exploiting systems.
or How our society puts profits before people - and victimises those who want to put people before profits.
place is in the home', people like Mrs Bilocca, who have come forward with meeting at Grimsby, and has been publicly rebuked by influential figures like been asked', he said, 'by the wives of some of my members, to state that the action of Mrs Bilocca has not enhanced the image the public may have of to say about it, which is what we admire. The idea of forming a women's committee to fight battles for the men, is, to my mind, completely ludicrous.' the crew of the St Romanus, and that of the two women who went with Mrs Bilocca in the delegation to London, one had lost her father at sea and the other was the wife of a Grimsby trawler officer.
conditions on Hull's trawelers.
No doubt most people imagine that she is still famous, respected and a valued most people.
lives than the boss's balance sheet. Our hypocritical society was forced to praise proceeded to punish her for helping to expose one of its many injustices.
socialist society is once more demonstrated. Please send messages of support, etc. to: Mrs Lilian Bilocca, c/o Humberside Voice, 60 Southcoates Lane, Hull. In an isolated community like that of the Hull fishing industry, where ' women's demands and demonstrations, have to face considerable hostility and ridicule. Mrs Bilocca has received threatening letters, was shouted down when she addressed a Skipper Laurie Oliver, secretary of the Hull Trawler Officers' Guild. 'I have fishermen's wives. Women who have lost men on the three ships have had the least The short answer to Skipper Oliver is that one of the originators of the campaign lost her brother, the skipper of the Ross Cleveland, a few days later, that one of the leaders of the demonstration at the fish dock was the widow of a member of Millions of people all over the country, and nearly everyone in Hull will remember the splendid fight that Mrs Lilian Bilocca put up last winter for safety and decent member of society, especially as the enquiry into the disasters held early last month in Hull vindicated her actions in many respects, (although as she herself says, they did only the bare minimum to satisfy public opinion). Men who had served on the trawlers on earlier voyages were not called to give evidence about the conditions of the trawlers, and none of them dared to come forward for fear of victimisation. But that just goes to show how well the real nature of our society is disguised from another one - she has in fact 'got' other jobs - until they learnt her name... The hard-faced men who rule this country want disciplined servants from whom they can extract easy profits, not workers who care more for the conditions of people's Lilian Bilocca to satisfy public opinion, but once the fuss had died down it quietly The necessity for workers to stick together in the battle for a civilised, democratic,
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cased. Perhaps it started sex: scare in te rate ereon meanin,