It’s official: End of the Paternalism/ Weaker Sex

A couple of years after the Economic Survey explored the possibility of rolling out universal basic income (UBI) as a poverty alleviation measures, moves are afoot to actualize it. Sikkim may be the first of the block. The Sikkim democratic front has included UBI in its election manifesto and believes it can be done in three years. These developments are welcome as India’s extensive but in-efficacious welfare system needs an overhaul. The main arguments in favour of UBI are administrative simplicity once a benefit is universal and flexibility it offers beneficiaries. It will mark the retreat of a paternalistic state which claims to knows better than its citizens what they want. Neither concept is new to India. Tamil Nadu and Chattisgarh, states with a widely admired PDS system, have universalised benefits. Also, government has for long been offering old age pension through cash transfers to people below poverty line.

A feminist perspective and a gender analysis – avoiding conflation of gender and women – can usefully contribute to the discussion on the UBI. Indeed, it helps analyse the concrete situation of women and of men, by looking into power relationships between them and structural discrimination based on sex, including multiple/intersectional discriminations. The UBI, if unconditional and at a level covering basic needs, would help tackle the structural inequalities inherited from the past, due to the sexual divide between the public and private sphere.

As women, especially heads of households, are exposed to a far higher degree than men to poverty, they also are more exposed to the stigmatization and marginalization provoked by poverty. An unconditional UBI would contribute to freeing them from this vulnerability and would respect their dignity. It could also help balance unequal power relationships with (male) relatives and/or partners. A UBI would help social security systems to keep up with the challenges they face: increase of inequality and persistence of gender inequality, recurring economic and financial crises, technological change and globalization and their effects on jobs (number and quality) and social protection, demographic evolution and migration patterns. It would also contribute to strengthening the social fabric, needed for the future of democracies.

Given India’s fiscal constraints, UBI cannot be an addition to the existing welfare schemes. It has to substitute for some existing schemes which have outlived their usefulness. The survey pointed out that there were 950 central schemes which collectively account for about 5% of GDP. Some of the schemes have been around for decades and their benefits need to be reviewed. It’s entirely plausable to replace some of the schemes with a cash transfer. Ideally this should tend towards universalization as it makes it administratively simpler and cuts down problems associated with targeting beneficiaries. India’s welfare system needs to keep up with changes in society and UBI should be the next stage. This was the economically described matter, further equalization or the sense of more is upcoming towards the feminism.

Contrary to cultural assumptions that boys are stronger and sturdier, basic biological weaknesses are built into the male of our species. These frailties leave them more vulnerable than girls to life’s hazards, including environmental pollutants such as insecticides, lead and plasticizer. Mother Nature has always acknowledged and compensated for the fragility and loss of boys by arranging for more of them: 106 male births to 100 female newborns over the course of human history. Boys are also more than two-thirds more likely than girls to be born prematurely – before the 37th week of pregnancy. And, despite advances in public health, boys in the 1970s faced a 30 percent higher chance of death by their first birthday than girls. Once they make it to childhood, boys face other challenges. They are more prone to a range of neurological disorders. The male’s problems start in the womb: from his more complicated fetal development, to his genetic makeup, to how his hormones work.

On top of that challenge, the human male’s XY chromosome combination is simply more vulnerable. The two XXs in the female version of our species offer some protection: In disorders where one X chromosome has a genetic defect, the female’s healthy backup chromosome can take over. But with his single X chromosome, the male lacks a healthy copy of the gene to fall back on. The X chromosome, which never shrank, is also a larger chromosome “with far more genetic information than the Y chromosome,” finds Irva Hertz-Piciotto, a University of California, Davis autism researcher, “so there may be some inherent loss of key proteins for brain development or repair mechanisms in boys.” Females also have a stronger immune system because they are packed with estrogen, a hormone that counteracts the antioxidant process.

“Women have to reproduce. That means being pregnant for nine months. They’ve got to lactate. They’ve got to carry these kids. There’s something about being a human female that was shaped by evolution. There’s a lot of mortality along the way that really can account for it,” Zihlman is quoted as saying. “There is something about the female form, the female psyche, just the whole package, that was honed over thousands and thousands, even millions, of years to survive.”

After centuries of being labelled “the weaker sex”, it turns out that women are officially as physically tough as men.With the right training, women are not more susceptible to health problems than men in extreme physical conditions. Physically women coped up very well, so their bone strength has also become more strong. There is a little dip in hormones but within two weeks hormones are back to normal.

One study dictated that in all the populations, women had lower mortality across almost all ages, and with one exception, women lived longer on average than men. Gender differences in infant mortality “contributed the most” to the gender gap in life expectancy, indicating, “that newborn girls were able to survive extreme mortality hazards better than newborn boys”.

While not forgoing the push for fairness and equality, it seems wise to accept the scientific reality of male weaknesses. This likely won’t mean the end of men, but their vulnerability to environmental contaminants and diseases could have serious ramifications for the future of the entire human race unless we find ways to protect them from harm.

References:

1. Times of India, Ahmedabad, Sunday, 25th November, 2018 .
2. Times of India, Ahmedabad, Saturday, 12th January, 2019.
3. Patricia Schulz. 2017. Universal basic income in a feminist perspective and  gender analysis. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1468018116686503
4. Saini, Angela. (2017, 11 June). The weaker sex? Science that shows women are stronger than men.” The Guardian. Retrieved from: www.theguardian.com
5. Alice Shabecoff. 2014. Environmental Health News.

By: Dr. Bhawana Asnani.

Happy to see Reviews, Additions, Suggestions and Comments, further.