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2004-08-21 - 2:45 p.m. Alright, I just found this article on the Guardian's homepage, and I'm a little torn on the issue.
Eight female members of Spain's new Socialist government have attracted the ire of the country's feminists by posing for a glamourous photo-shoot for Vogue Espa�a. The eight, all recently appointed by the prime minister, Jos� Luis Zapatero, will be seen in designer clothes at the Palace of Moncloa, this official residence, in the magazine's September issue. The feature was intended to celebrate the number of women in the cabinet. But women's groups and opposition parties have criticised the style of the images. "I don't want to see the minister of health posing like Claudia Schiffer, it's not right," Reyes Montiel, a leftwing member of Madrid's regional government, told El Mundo newspaper. "This haute couture image contrasts with the day to day reality of women in our country." Angeles Alvarez, a spokeswoman for Feminists Against Domestic Violence, added: "It irritates me that men never appear in features like this. "I don't feel that this feature represents me. What would have been revolutionary would have been to see the men in the cabinet posing like this." Alright, on the surface it seems like this is nothing more than yet another attempt by society to infer (not so subtly) that a woman's career and achievements are always secondary to her ability to please men. And, obviously, this happens all the time. But, then the article says this:
...Vogue's editor, Elvira Leal, said her magazine wanted to celebrate the fact that this was the first government in Europe to have equal numbers of men and women. Holy shit! Spain actually has gender parity in its government! Now, it should come as no shock to you that I simply adore Jos� Zapatero, and hearing this makes me love him all the more. Particularly, when I read shit like this:
..."Eighty-four years does not seem that long ago, does it? But today, 74 women are serving in the United States Congress, including 14 in the U.S. Senate. Women are making important decisions about the future of America," she said. So, 74 women in Congress, out of a grand total of 535. I'm supposed to be proud of that, Laura? I'm supposed to think, "Wow! What a great country we live in, where women are 51% of the population and 14% of our elected leaders!" Does this excuse Vogue Espa�a for pandering to patriarchal views of women? Of course not. But in a country where women are fully half of both society and government, I'm willing to overlook it. For now!
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