Posts Written by

By Sarah • 11 years ago

The real problem with Marrisa Mayer’s Maternity Leave

Debate has been blowing up over the New Yahoo! (YHOO) CEO Marissa Mayer, who took an even shorter maternity leave than the already truncated one she announced back in July. An inner office email has been circulating around my agency in regards to her extreme leave and the responses are definitely impassioned. The biggest response that caught my eye is “Why do we care? Let her do what she wants.” But it’s not that easy. Read below to find out why.

It’s not about what is right or wrong when it comes to maternity leave. Those decisions are deeply, intensely personal ones that depend on a variety of factors such as family composition, household income, job requirements etcetera. I think that’s why a lot of these responses are getting so personal and  a little heated.

But what’s really at stake here is our ability to be able to make these decisions about our maternity leave. The reason we care about how amazingly short Mayer’s maternity leave was is because she has, in effect, set a standard that many women can’t or don’t feel comfortable measuring up to. Because of her high profile career, her personal decision to take a short maternity has a halo effect on the rest of women. I don’t think anyone could argue against the fact that corporations routinely jump on any piece of evidence that can help build a case to limit women’s access to distinctly female necessities (i.e. nursing rooms, ...
By Sarah • 11 years ago

The female side of working for the man

A SYTYCB entry

When I graduated college as a philosophy major (art double major) and signed over my soul to the advertising industry for a salary just barely half of my total student loan debt, I figured I had committed the ultimate anti-punk rock, anti-feminist, anti-bad ass move: I’d sold out. Not only was I now working for the man, but I was working to sell, no… shove the man down consumer’s throats in a display of the ultimate capitalist ideals that I’m not too hot on. Pretty much, I was now the man… or not really even the man but like… an entry-level, wannabe, mostly underdeveloped man. With a vagina.But we all have debts to pay and my car doesn’t ...

A SYTYCB entry

When I graduated college as a philosophy major (art double major) and signed over my soul to the advertising industry for a salary just barely half of my total student loan debt, I figured I ...
By Sarah • 11 years ago

“Could hyper-masculinity be ruining your marriage?”

A SYTYCB entry

The Huffington Post recently published an article discussing the effects of income differences on heterosexual relationships, specifically speaking of those differences in which the female partner out-earns the male. Based on a study published in the online journal “Sex Roles”, the article reports that men who possess traditional views about masculinity are often off-put by female partners who earn more than they do, stating that the income gap contributes to “poor quality relationships.”

This article came about at a really interesting time in my life and left me wondering how gender roles affect relationships when she brings in more money than he does? How can it be fixed? Can it?

I would love to know how ...

A SYTYCB entry

The Huffington Post recently published an article discussing the effects of income differences on heterosexual relationships, specifically speaking of those differences in which the female partner out-earns the male. Based on