A new bronze statue was added to the median island in which the Wall Street “Bull” has been living on for decades. The bronze girl faces the Bull with her hands on her hips, in a stance of determination, with her skirt flying in the wind.
The investment managers who commissioned the piece are State Street Global Advisors. Their stated intent by paying for the new statue, is to encourage corporations to place more women in their boardrooms.
In an article by written by Elyse DeFranco for the San Francisco Chronicle, made a very different point. Ms. DeFranco makes a compelling point that putting more women on a corporate board of directors, such as Exxon Mobile, will not change the toxic, capitalistic decisions that are causing our country’s decline. She says women don’t need to “adapt to the ideals of capitalism, when we have been shown by skyrocketing inequality that in fact the opposite needs to happen.”
She states that joining men in boardrooms isn’t feminism.
Feminism is “about eliminating the idea of putting profits before community.” The demand women are making today is to be free of oppression from profiteers (don’t the Republicans always espouse freedom?), that those in power respect their right to exist in the world, and to make decisions for themselves (such as Trump ignored by signing an executive order, with only men present, reinstituting a “global gag rule” against educating women on family planning.)
Ms. DeFranco is saying that for our country’s future we must abandon the simplistic thinking that all we need to do for gender equality is to have a few more women in the boardroom, and realize that “male-dominated worlds of corporations and government are taking us down a path of global decline.” How could anyone argue with that? We have had a male-dominated society from the beginning of country and how is that going for us? It’s time to embrace community and let girl-power have a chance.
As Elyse De Franco concluded: “In this way, the statue of the defiant girl is perfect. She is challenging the bull head-on, fearlessly blocking its path of destruction with her life.”