Sinfest

[Nekomancer]

Hi! I'm brand new to this forum, though I've been reading a lot of the comments for quite awhile. My son introduced Sinfest to me a while back and I've become a regular reader. I have found the insights of Sinfest to be, well, insightful! But todays' strip really wowed me and I decided to join up. So here I am. I don't really have much to say at the moment. I know some of the conversations here get pretty intense, but that testifies to the artist ability to communicate and stir up all these issues. So well done Tat!

I should mention that my son is gay and he's been sharing with me about a lot of the "patriarchal" issues I had/have inflicted family-wise. I've come a long ways, particularly by going from Christianity to Buddhism (and now a Buddhist minister), by I know I still carry a lot of baggage. But hey, it's attachments, and I need to let them go!

Anyway, carry on with the discussion!

[Dawn]

Mouse pretty much said in her post what I witness in the villages of my country, and pretty much every other third world country with villages.
Have you ever witnessed what the poor do? It's the *women* who sell their wares at the market, and most other sellers are a good mix of men and women. (Assuming that their lifestyle more accurately reflects a relatively recent past of villages before modern industrialization).

Try walking the streets of Bangkok, of Malaysia, Vietnam, etc. and you would see that many MANY of the sellers trying to make a living are adult *females*, selling their food, wares and everything under the sun.

Try walking the *villages* of said countries and you would see both men *AND* women hard at work with the fields.

Somehow I don't think the same applies in Africa. Life is *Way* too hard for the women not to be too far away from the house. She needs to get water, mind the children and do a variety of other things. I'm not sure, but I don't think she generates as much 'money/capital' compared to her Asian counterparts.

When modern industrialization came along, somehow some people decided that it would be a good idea to reduce the activities of women from farming and selling stuff to being a complete home maker, entertaining guests, socializing, cooking, singing, sewing, minding the children etc comes to mind (Pride and Prejudice anyone?) Just like it elevated one's status when one's skin was white (in Asian societies), because it meant that you could afford *not* to work under the sun.

(Which is why many Asians are so bemused by the Caucasian obsession with getting tanned)

However, I challenge your notion that women do not generate as much capital. In many poorer countries for thousands of years, Asian women are still doing the same thing they have always done - making ends meet by generating capital. It happened then, it is happening today.


China
http://www.fao.org/sd/WPdirect/WPre0107.htm

Women's role in relation to men varies depending on the agricultural production system and the agroecological conditions
• Women have extensive work loads with dual responsibility for farm and household production
• Women's work is getting harder and more time-consuming due to ecological degradation, male out-migration and the shift to the household responsibility system • Women have an active role and extensive involvement in livestock production, forest and water resource use but their input needs are poorly addressed
• Women contribute considerably to household income through farm and non-farm activities
• Women's work as family labour is underestimated
_____________________________________________________________

Cambodia
http://www.fao.org/sd/WPdirect/WPre0106.htm

• among the farming population, over 65% are women
• women have dual responsibility for farm as well as household management
• women have on average 20% lower literacy rates than men
• women are actively involved in artisanal fisheries and manage small livestock • marketing of agricultural products is mainly done by women
• women contribute actively to household income through petty trade, wage/exchange labour and handicrafts
• women's contribution as family labour is undervalued and never included in accounting as work
_____________________________________________________________

Nepal
http://www.fao.org/sd/WPdirect/WPre0110.htm

90.5% of women are engaged in agriculture as against 74.9% of men
• Women have extensive work loads with dual responsibility for farm and household production
• Women's work is getting harder and more time consuming due to ecological degradation
• Women play an active role in livestock production and forest resource use
• Women contribute considerably to household income through farm and non-farm activities
• Women are active as informal traders

_______________________________________________________

You get the idea.

[Miss Magenta]

[Rothide]

[Fuzzles]

I wonder if the Resistance will ever go toe to toe with the Sisterhood...

[Heretical Rants]

nyahahaha


_________________
butts

[Nekomancer]

[Samsally]

Wow, you sure picked a strange place to introduce yourself in, but none the less, hello Nekomancer.

You'll learn stuff here. Not sure it's what you'll want to learn though.
_________________
Samsally the Gray

[ChastMastr]

[Dogen]

Hello new catperson! Welcome, welcome. I hope you enjoy your stay. If you've been reading along in your Prairie Home Companion, you'll see that this is where the crazy lives. If you enjoy playing with the crazy, please feel free to hang about. If not, roam the grounds until you feel at home. And, as always, mind the gap.
_________________
"Worse comes to worst, my people come first, but my tribe lives on every country on earth. I’ll do anything to protect them from hurt, the human race is what I serve." - Baba Brinkman

[Miss Magenta]

[fritterdonut]

[Miss Magenta]

Yeehaw.
_________________

[fritterdonut]

[Yinello]