Working in science I see a similar kind of situation - historically this wasn't work that women did, with rare exceptions (up to say 1960). We created a level playing field, but still we do not see women taking up as many of the roles as reason would suggest that we ought. And so we ask why they aren't. There seems no difference in competence between the sexes, and girls perform as well and as numerously as boys at school level in science subjects these days. But they don't yet come through to the scientific professions in the same proportions.
I asked that same question of a friend who certainly had the academic ability to work in science or engineering, quoting an interview I'd read of the boss of an engineering firm. The reporter asked him why it was that his firm had taken on dozens of apprentices that year, yet not one was a girl. The boss told him that, of all the applications they had had that summer, only two were from girls.
"So why", asked the reporter, "didn't you offer them apprenticeships?"
The boss replied, "We had them both in for interview, we offered both of them apprenticeships - and they both turned down the offer."
So I asked my friend why she thought so few had applied, and why they both refused the offer of an apprenticeship.
"With the 'A' level grades I got", she said, "I could have opted for a career in science - but I chose to become a librarian because I wanted to have children."
She then went on to ask me how my job (as an engineering draughtsman) had changed in the four years I'd been working at the same place - and how much would it change if a woman left it to have children, and didn't go back for about seven or eight years. I told her that the nature of the work I was doing, and the techniques involved, had changed significantly every year, for the last four years - and I saw no sign of that rate of change slowing down. As for leaving for seven or eight years, and then trying to pick up from where you left off, no chance!
"And that," she said, "is exactly why I opted to be a librarian! I left to have children, went back when they were both well on into primary school, and the only thing that had changed was the introduction of computers - and I'd taught myself to use a computer at home, so re-starting was no big deal."
So my basic pitch is that, just because the majority of brass band composers are men does not mean that the activity is "male-dominated". I mean, has anyone on here ever felt reluctant to play a piece because it was written or arranged by a woman? Or skimmed across such a piece in a list of possible inclusions in their programme, because of the sex of the composer? And has anyone heard a man complaining about the way petit-point embroidery is "female-dominated"?
Going on to musical composition, I was watching some 'very famous at the time' singer songwriter (John Denver, Don McLean?) who was playing to a small studio audience, and answering questions from the floor. One young lad said that he wanted to be a singer songwriter, and was shaken rigid by the response:
"So, who's
stopping you?"
Who, indeed? And who is stopping women from composing or arranging? Nobody.
As Tom King says, above:
Too many people these days, in all kinds of different contexts, seem to conflate "equality of opportunity" and "equality of outcome" - the one is actually equality in that everyone has an equal opportunity to succeed and the other is a dogmatic insistence on creating certain outcomes, relying on discrimination to achieve that goal.
(my emphasis, JE)
That is why I'm totally against efforts to enforce equality of
outcome, because the only way they can be achieved is by
inequality of opportunity - whether it is done by rigging the qualifications, or imposing quotas.
If I like a piece of music, I like it - and, if I'm capable of playing it, I'll want to play it, too. As for whether the composer / arranger / musician is black, white, English, foreign, male, female, or whatever - who cares? Not me.
With best regards,
Jack
