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The Feminist Valuing the Devalued Process

created by:

Alexis Frank, Shaheli Guha, Hitomi Yoneya

Changing Values

Transformation Within, Expressing Transformation Without:
Changing Personal and Societal Values

Personal Value Shifts Traditionally, economists equate how much a person values something with how much time or money that he or she is willing to spend to get it. By those measures, many Americans seem to value their roles as workers and consumers more highly than their roles as parents and community members - they certainly spend more time on the former. And although many features of our society can influence our individual values, we have the power to consciously evaluate the content of our values using discernment. More and more, Americans are realizing that they have not been valuing their family life, and their relationships. These critical reflections and realizations can, and should, lead to changes in the way we spend our time and money, but this does not mean that money is the most accurate measure of a balanced and fulfilled life. Both women and men are looking for different ways to measure success in life, and are finding that the traditionally feminine roles of caretaking and nurturing are important, and need to be re-prioritized. Public Value Shifts Similarly, societies and governments typically express values through their funding priorities and the issues discussed in their legislative chambers, and even by how they choose the indicators that measure progress and inspire further research and explanation. When welfare programs are cut in favor of larger military budgets, the government signals its preference for negative, traditionally masculine values such as competition and dominance over positive, traditionally feminine values such as cooperation and care. When Wall Street meausures economic health through GNP instead of GPI, it signals the importance and legitimacy of traditionally masculine types of work. But, of course, citizens have the power to influence government and societal priorities, and we all need to pressure our government to create and implement policies that value the devalued. We need policies that create financial incentives to do women's traditional caring work, in addition to reducing penalties for those who already do. Parenting and caring are the key to a healthy society; some even call children a "public good" because good parenting has postive externalities for current and future society. We all need to work to ensure that this traditionally feminine work is valued not only in our own lives, but at all levels of our society, and throughout our culture.

When parents spend time with children or invests in their education, it is a choice that our society should be supporting.. Picture from stock.xchng

Men's Organizations Encouraging Participation in Traditionally Feminine Work:

When traditionally feminine work is equally valued, biological sex should no longer determine the allotment of these tasks. More and more, men are taking steps to redefine traditional gender roles and to value traditionally feminine work. Below are links to a selection of these men's organizations:

• Communications and Advice Site for Fathers by Fathers

Economic Utility versus Holistic Happiness

Mainstream economic theory measures happiness through the concept of utility. This measure focuses on individuals, who gain utility through a maximized optimum of goods and services. Obviously, this traditional concept of utility leaves out important factors that determine our holistic happiness, factors ranging from the personal meaning gained from a particular line of work, to the satisfaction of adhering to one's values by purchasing a particular product, to the intrinstic relational value of spending time with one's children. These other factors, which are crucial in determining holistic happiness, are difficult - if not impossible - to quantify in economic terms, but that makes them no less real and important. Yet, because economic utility serves as the dominant quantification of "happiness", and because this measuring concept carries over to a focus on "efficiency" and "maximizing output" in our private lives and in our larger society, other forms of happiness and work are devalued and ignored. We need to realize that economic utility is not an accurate measure of holistic happiness - that while it has the potential to discuss a broad range of factors, it is usually reduced to maximizing material things. Instead, we need to value the devalued aspects of work and caring that are so frequently excluded from mainstream economic indicators.

Leading a Fulfilled, Balanced Life: A Lesson from Buddhism

Buddhist Economics by Ven. P. A. Payutto, takes the idea of diminishing marginal utility and applies it to the long term[1]. Instead of looking at the hamburgers as having a single round of utility/disutility production, it looks at how the hamburger can lead to future problems or benefits in multiple rounds. For example, if the hamburger is high in cholesterol, it may lead to health problems later down the road, causing more overall disutility than the initial satisfaction of consumption.

Payutto defines tahna as "craving, ambition, restlessness, or thirst" from "wanting to obtain or wanting to have"[1]. It is the spontaneous, unanalyzed feeling that accompanies an experience of an object. To continue with the food example, being overwhelmed by tahna can cause a person to eat for pleasure rather than nutrition. On an individual scale, this may lead to indigestion, obesity, or an eating disorder. On a societal scale, overconsumption can lead to increased health care costs and depletion of natural resources. Chanda is defined as intelligent reflection based on knowledge. When one consumes in this way, overarching utility is achieved. Food becomes an agent of health and nurturing the body and mind. In Buddhist Economics, Payutto essentially asks us to be conscious of our economic preferences and utility curves, which are usually taken as given in mainstream economics.