Social Commentary Assignment

Wonder Woman: Stronger than Superman?

Long ago, and perhaps even up till now in some societies, women were seen as no much more than a possession. In order to gain allies, kings married off their daughters to princes of other countries. In China, when the one-child policy was implemented, families from rural areas abandoned their newborn daughters to die so that they could have another child, which had a chance of being a boy. And lastly, even now in India, to be married, the bride’s family must pay the groom’s family.

As such, given that women have such a low status in some societies, some people view them to be unfit of great power. After all, they seem to be inferior to men, don’t they? Well, not really.

Forbes magazine had recently published a new list of powerful women in its publication on the 19th of August. Heading the list was German Chancellor Angela Merkel, while the rest of the top ten held top positions in their companies.

People in societies where women hold a low status simply cannot fathom why women can be allowed to lead a company, even a whole country. As such, this gives them the fear that women, indeed, have too much power on their hands nowadays, and not without reason. They believe that women are not allowed to meddle themselves with “greater things” which are to be accomplished by men, and certainly not capable of accomplishing them either. When they discover the trend of more and more women being granted control of these “greater things”, they become fearful that women are getting more power than they deserve.

However, I think that this is not true, even though I am a male. The above argument solely builds upon an assumption that women are “lower beings”, which is formed in their society; hence they are unable and therefore not allowed to do “greater things”. However, from my point of view, which I believe is the mainstream mindset in the modern context, women are not lesser beings but instead stand on equal grounds with men. Therefore, in an argument built upon this view, women should get more power! Next, I will attempt to support this stand with two points.

First of all, these people seemed to have forgotten the fact that men still have more power than women generally. Even if Angela Merkel is the Chancellor of Germany, the leaders of many other countries, such as the United States, Singapore, and People’s Republic of China have male leaders. There are also more male millionaires than female millionaires. According to Forbes’ list of millionaires (2008), only one female managed to enter the top twenty. Therefore, men will still have more power than women, whether or not it is through monetary assets or by rank.

Secondly, more women still hold the title of the domestic mother in a household than men holding the title of domestic father. Although more and more females are entering the workforce, in many societies, women still choose to become a domestic mother if their husbands could earn enough to support the family. This gives the women more freedom on making the household run, but the men are still the ones who determine how the household operates since he is the one who brings home the money. Therefore, this shows that men still have power over the women in most households.

In conclusion, the argument of whether women have too much power really depends on the pre-determined assumptions made by the individual. Although the fact remains that their argument on how women have too much power is true and well-supported from their viewpoint, the mindset that women have an equal footing with men is the mainstream mindset and if anything goes, these people might have to change their argument to suit this mindset should they wish to be able to mix in the mainstream society.

(644 words)