Womens Rights in the Workplace

Every day the question is asked, are women treated equally in the workplace? This is one
of the biggest controversies and subject for discussion of this century. There are many people
that feel differently about the subject. There are many people that think that women arent
treated equally while there are some that think that the statement is not true.
Throughout the world women are fighting for equal right. In Canada, there was a group
of women that fought to get equal rights in leadership positions in different work jobs. Linda
Briskin wrote an article about this movement. This article says, Womens equality issues are
being sidelined, and the long-fought-for gender lens is disappearing. (Briskin, 2014). This
statement means that these women feel as though their issues are not being worked on. These
women are wanting a change and they feel as though they are not important enough to discuss.
In 2013, there were three women that were fired to be replaced by men. These women
then took their story and the business that fired them to court. Two of these women were fired
even though they had good reviews. Though the third women are who makes this court case
different from the rest. This woman was pregnant with twins and had to leave early due to
premature labor. She lost one child due to health reasons and then had to take care of her other
hospitalized child. Once she was able to come back, she was asked to take a mans shift. She
was not able to take this shift because she had to take her child to the doctors. Within a week,
she was given a bad review and fired. These three women won the case including a total of
$607,000 (Greenwald, 2016).
Ever since the beginning of time, women and men have different views on how things
are. In 2015, a study by Catherine Fox found that 72% of executive men thought much

progress had been made toward womens empowerment and career progression while 71% of
women executive disagreed (Liswood, 2015). This statistic just goes to show that men and
women see things differently. In another study done by Kieran Snyder states that 76% of women
wrote on a survey that they felt judged in their workplace while 2% of men thought the same
(Liswood, 2015). With each of these different studies show that even in the same work place,
men and women feel as though they are not treated equally.
When discussing rights, two authors explained the womens rights fall under the subject
of human rights. This article gives examples of what womens rights entail. The two authors
said, women have a right not to be discriminated against on the basis of gender (Momenirad,
2014). This means that companies that are hiring should not hire based off of gender.
While discussing womens rights, there are many people that are trying to give solutions.
In an article from 2015, Andrea Cornwall and Althea-Maria Rivas, wrote about several ways to
give women equality in the work place. They said:
It is not just about improving womens capacities to cope with situations in
which they experience oppression or injustice. It is about enabling women
to question what they might previously have considered normal, and to
begin to act to change that reality via the acquisition of a collective selfconfidence that results in a feeling of we can (Rivas, 2015).

This statement explains how women should feel in their work place. With this statement, it gives
women the power to know that they do have a decision on how comfortable they feel in any
given situation. Women dont have to stick around and feel uncomfortable or judged.
Even though women and men may do the same job, women make 78 cents to a mans
dollar (Sierminska, 2014). With women not making as much as men, women arent as stable

financially. This can cause problems if an emergency comes about. With todays economy and
the need for a job, women can become vulnerable. With the divorce rate being fifty percent,
women need a secure job to provide for themselves and even their family (Sierminska, 2014). In
Eva Sierminskas article from 2014, she stats that women need to be well-educated
(Sierminska, 2014). This means that women need to go and get an education to then get a wellpaid job to support themselves and their family.
Anna Simons is a woman that thinks that there is a reason that women are not included
equally in certain work places. One place that women are kept out of is combat units. In an
article that Anna Simons wrote, she explains some of the reasons why women are not and should
not be included in combat units. One of the first reasons is because when men and women get
together, couples form. The different kinds of relationships are romantic, friendship, and
enemies. In these combat units, those soldiers need to be professional and women could change
the atmosphere. Another reason that women should not be included in combat units is because if
multiple men are going for a woman, there could be fighting and in those circumstances, they
cant have people not getting along. One of the main reasons is for safety. These units need to
be safe and women could bring a distraction and different vibe to the units (Simons, 2014).
When there are, studies done for womens rights, there can be bias or factors left out.
Steve Tobak is someone that tried to bring out some of the different factors that could bring a
different view to womens rights in the work place. Some of his reasons are 1)men choose more
time consuming and dangerous work fields, 2) men are more likely to choose higher paid jobs,
and 3) men are more likely to work in an undesired work area (Tobak, 2011). Men go for the
jobs for the money while women want comfort, security, and time off. This makes comparing
men and women hard because of the different things that men and women want and do.

Men and women think differently. No matter what the facts are, there will always be a
disagreement. Even though this subject may cause a disagreement, people need to be respectful
and understanding to different viewpoints.

References
Briskin, L. (2014). Leadership, Feminism and Equality in Unions in Canada. Official
Journal of United Association for Labor Education, 223-231.
Greenwald, J. (2016, February 1). Business Insurance. Retrieved from
businessinsurance.com:
http://wwww.businessinsurance.com/article/20160228/NEWS06/302289998
Liswood, L. (2015, February 11). World Economic Forum. Retrieved from
weforum.org: http://www.weforum.org/agenda/2015/02/how-men-andwomen-see-gender-equality-differently/
Momenirad, A. S. (2014). An Argument against Considering Women's Rights as All
Belonging to the Category of Human Rights. Letter to the Editors, 459-464.
Rivas, A. C.-M. (2015). From 'gender eqaulity and 'women's wmpowerment' to global
justice: reclaiming a transformative agenda for gender and development.
Third World Quarterly, 396-411.
Sierminska, E. (2014). Does Equal Opportunity Bring Men and Women Closer to
Weallth Equality? The Review of Income and Wealth, 985-989.
Simons, A. (2014, November 18). Charlie Mike. Retrieved from warontherocks.com:
warontherocks.com/2014/11/heres-why-women-in-combat-units-is-a-bad-idea/
Tobak, S. (2011, April 17). CBS News. Retrieved from cbsnews.com:
http://www.cbsnes.com/news/the-gender-pay-gap-is-a-complete-myth/