A chara, - It was with great interest that I read Mary Maher's article "A woman's sole goal was a wedding ring" (Irish Times, November 2nd). It outlines the plight of Irish women in an outrageously patriarchal society extremely well.
Mary Maher writes in her final paragraph: "At last, come the 1970s, the commission for the Status of Women and the Irish Women's Liberation Movement was born." The subtext here appears to be that the movement cast the light of liberation on Irish women's lives. The reality is that, although the situation of Irish women has certainly improved since the 1960s, there are still areas where true equality has not been achieved. Further, there are areas which remain effectively unchanged. These are the remnants of the dark ages which the light of liberation has failed to dissipate.
Yes, women can now have broader access to university education, but it is doubtful if this benefit extends to lower-income/ working-class women. Certainly women can permeate the so-called "higher professions", but they tend to populate the lower-paid echelons. Women are still thin on the ground in the powerful, decision-making bodies which really influence Irish society. The judiciary, the Government and the business community remain male-dominated.
Women have been bombarded daily with images of pornography and misogyny which have now found their way into the mainstream in the guise of men's magazines. Women are pressurised by media influences to conform to an unreal physical stereotype. Irish women are told that they can "have it all" - children, career, success - but are denied adequate childcare. Women who work in the home are largely ignored by the State and under-valued by society. Violence against women has escalated.
In the 1960s, single mothers did not officially exist, Mary Maher writes. In the 1990s they receive a paltry allowance from the State. In the 1960s, she writes, "abortions were possible in England but before 1967 they were difficult and expensive to obtain". Irish law still denies women free choice and we continue to export thousands of young women each year.
Mary Maher describes the 1960s passing with "barely a murmur of feminist discontent". In 1990s Ireland there appears to be a similar silence, a tacit acceptance of the remaining injustices and inequalities affecting women. Is feminism seen to have served its purpose? Has it become a dirty word?
Maybe Mary Maher should apply her journalistic skills to a summary of the lives of Irish women 1990 to 1999. Perhaps disturbing parallels would emerge with the generation of the 1960s. Maybe, on seeing this, Irish women would, in the words of Germaine Greer, see that "it's time to get angry again". - Is mise,
Nicola Sheehan, Lower Mount Street, Dublin 2.