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Posted by Lizzie on Sep-5-2008
There’s a lot of talk about women’s issues this election cycle. Thanks to Hillary Clinton, and now Sarah Palin, we’re back in the spotlight. In that vein, Congress is pressing for a revote on the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which failed to pass previously. McCain has come out again it:
“I am all in favor of pay equity for women, but this kind of legislation, as is typical of what’s being proposed by my friends on the other side of the aisle, opens us up to lawsuits for all kinds of problems,” the expected GOP presidential nominee told reporters. “This is government playing a much, much greater role in the business of a private enterprise system.”
I’ve recently engaged in a half-hearted IT job search - in anticipation of my eventual graduation from the Tech program. There seems to be a little available, but I’ve heard that women are not treated favorably in the IT industry. It would please me, and thousands of other women, tremendously if this actually became law. Would I know that my male counterparts were making more than me? Probably not. But this act would give me recourse should I find out about a pay discrepancy after the fact. As a woman hoping to work in a male-dominated field, I would feel just a little better knowing I had a safety net.
There was some talk that this law isn’t necessary. I beg to differ. I worked with a company (unrelated to the tech field) that cut me a mystery check. When I inquired to what the purpose of the check was, I was told that it was to make up for a pay difference between me and my male counterparts. I had no idea that the men were making that much more per hour than I was, but there was a lawsuit and the settlement agreement was that this company would pay the hourly difference to each female for whatever period of time they agreed to (I think it was 3 months, even though I’d been there for over a year at that point). I left that company not long afterward, but my eyes had been opened. The reasoning for the lower pay was that women are mothers and so are prone to miss work because of their sick children. Men, on the other hand, are more reliable and should be rewarded. Really?
At a time when a major political party has nominated a self-proclaimed “hockey mom” to be vice president, there should be no more “she should get less because she’s a mom”. This woman is seeking a job while parenting 5 children (and potentially helping parent a grandchild) so the reason listed above would apply to her and her pay should be cut significantly. Right? No. Wrong. Her husband will be able to tend to the children while she runs for office and he can tend to the children while she continues to govern Alaska (except that he’s got a full-time job plus an extra job on the side in the summer, but that’s not this issue). It’s only fair that the rest of American women enjoy the same equality in pay as the women who govern them.
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Archive for October, 2007
Oct
29
Posted by Lizzie
Because of my upcoming trip to Florida, I’ve been looking for things to do while I’m down there. Of course, there’s Disney World, Universal Studios and Busch Gardens, but I’m looking for something a little more adult oriented. But not that kind of adult. I’d like to hunt down something Old World as a souvenir instead of the usual Mickey Mouse glitter globe.
St. Augustine holds a marketplace event the last Saturday of every month. It’s called “Uptown Saturday Night”. They have live music, food, and antique dealers put out their best stuff at the best prices. That’s right up my alley. I’d love a party that’s not centered around cartoon characters and my kids, for once. I love doing that kind of stuff, of course, but my personal tastes are way more grown up now. And I might even be able to buy my mother-in-law something she actually wants for her birthday.
If you’re in Florida and love antiquing, you don’t want the St. Augustine events coming up. They just had an “Uptown Saturday Night” this past Saturday (October 27), but they’ll be doing it again November 24th. Mark your calendar so you don’t miss it. Make sure you tell me all about it when you’re done.
I’ll be heading there in May, for sure. I can’t wait.
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Oct
27
Posted by Lizzie
I just received an email from a friend. I thought. It reads:
Jonathon [Last name not important] wants you to join Yaari!
Is Jonathon your friend?
Yes No
Please respond or Jonathon might think you said no 
I know a Jonathon, but he doesn’t go by “Jonathon”. So I was immediately suspicious. The email gives you two options: Yes or No. Clicking on either option will bring you to this page. There you’ll find a registration form.
I happened to look at the small print. I don’t trust anything anymore, but there are plenty of naive souls online that don’t bother checking, so… At any rate, the small print reads:
By registering for Yaari and agreeing to the Terms of Use, you authorize Yaari to send an email notification to all the contacts listed in the address book of the email address you provide during registration. The email will notify your friends that you have registered for Yaari and will encourage them to register for the site. Yaari will never store your email password or login to your email account without your consent. If you do not want Yaari to send an email notification to your email contacts, do not register for Yaari.
Now, the small print obviously says that they don’t store any information. HOWEVER, when you sign up you agree to allow them access to your email contact list. How do you suppose they get that information? They don’t ask for it. They just take it. They send in their little spy worms and take your information and then spam your friends and whoever else is on your contact list.
So, my advice is to not open an email if it is from Yaari. Just send it to the spam folder. Or, better yet, send it to your email provider as phishing. Because, really, that’s what they’re doing. They’re using the email to get to your private information to use for their nefarious gain. Don’t let it happen to you.
Yaari is a shady little startup trying to cash in on the popularity of social bookmarking sites, like Blog Catalog and MyBlogLog. Don’t fall for it.
Now, I’m off to send an apology to all my contacts.
Update:
Found more at Desicritics.org
Aran Gupta of Miles to Go was an unfortunate victim of Yaari. Aalaap.com explains how this is pulled off:
The next page was asking for my Gmail password so they can find and “match me up with my friends.” This is pretty common these days - they take your password, see who’s on the site, and sneakily send an email to everyone in your address book telling them that you’ve invited them. I usually skip this step, but this is where Yaari.com pissed me off. They had no “skip this step” link or button anywhere. I tried entering a rubbish password to see if they’d let me skip that step in the next page, but no. There’s no way to register on this site unless you give out your Yahoo/Hotmail/Gmail password. To the junta, entering the password seems to be the only way to proceed, so that’s what they do. And everyone gets spammed. Just like I did.
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Oct
27
Posted by Lizzie
I’m in a lot of pain today. Pain makes me grouchy. I’m very grouchy today.
I’ve been working on some projects since this morning and I just keep getting sidetracked. Everywhere I look I get sucked in. Ok, yeah, that’s my fault, I need to stay focused. But focus is not my strong point. Neither is patience, but that’s not the point. I think I’ve been looking in the wrong direction as far as working from home goes and that’s got me all twisted around.
A couple of months ago I was very sure where I was heading. I charted my course and set sail. Then I got sidetracked by something along the way. I thought that something was a more financially beneficial course, but I think I was wrong. But only because I’m not looking just for financial incentives with this blog. And I don’t think I started it out as such. I’m a WAHM and that means I’m pretty isolated, so that means I’m looking for other WAHMs with whom to interact. All this worrying about pagerank and SEO and what have you just isn’t my thing. At least the way I was going about it isn’t my thing. So, I’m going to have to change course again.
I love to blog. Mostly because of the interesting people I’ve met over the years, but also so that my opinion gets heard. That sounds vain, and it is completely. I have something to say and shouting it out at the t.v. isn’t going to get that said. Now, when what I say gets an audience, well… Obviously that makes everything even better. When members of that audience become friends it’s like a high. That makes blogging worthwhile to me. When a stranger links to me in a favorable manner and I just stumble upon that link it makes blogging worthwhile. It means that I’m getting out becoming part of the world. Somehow along the way, I forgot about that. Or I thought I could separate that part of my blogging self from something else. I was wrong. I don’t do this to be important or to make money or to teach someone something. I do this to be a part of the world because really it’s the only way I can do that. Somehow I moved out of that part of my blogging self and into another part for which I don’t really care.
There was a time when I couldn’t be arsed about Google. I didn’t give a flying monkey’s butt if I was ranked or not. I used to write interesting opinion pieces and feel good about myself afterward. I wasn’t afraid to comment on blog posts because that blogger might consider my pr a turn off. I didn’t consider a link to someone bad because of the all might SERPs. I didn’t (still don’t, I think) even know what the hell SERPs were. But I somehow managed to keep on blogging and not feeling like my eyes were going to bleed out of my sockets. Honestly, I don’t know what I’ve been thinking lately, but it hasn’t been working. I’m very unhappy with the way I’ve been going about things.
That changes now.
My goals are the same. But my methods are going to change. If that doesn’t rank high in someone else’s opinion, then oh flippin’ well. I was doing something that worked and then I threw it out for something I thought would work better. I was wrong.
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