First women

A comment on a woman's physical appearance coming from a man, especially in a professional or public context, is blatant sexism, writes columnnist Jennie Rhodes

Jennie Rhodes

Malaga

Friday, 7 March 2025, 18:05

Listening to an interview with British radio presenter Zoe Ball recently, I heard her say, in response to a question about being the first female to present two major breakfast shows on UK national radio, "I hope I was chosen because I am good at my job, not because I am a woman."

On a different programme, presenter Nick Robinson asked the UK's chancellor Rachel Reeves - another 'first woman' in a job - if she wanted to be seen as "the iron chancellor". "Would you like to be compared in some ways with Margaret Thatcher even though you pretty much disagree with everything she stood for?" I think you have just answered your own question.

Forty years on and apparently Thatcher is still the only point of reference female ministers in the UK have. "Have you got her steeliness? How about the comparison of a strong woman taking difficult decisions. Is that a comparison you're comfortable with?" He continued, seemingly oblivious to the enormous hole he was digging for himself.

The chancellor spoke for millions of women when she answered: "When you talk about a man, you wouldn't say 'oh he's a strong man' but people feel they've got to put that adjective in front of a woman." Robinson rambled on about sexism: "Does it feel like you get treated differently...?" Until, I hope, a producer (a woman, maybe?) shouted in his ear to shut up.

Here in Spain second deputy PM Yolanda Díaz has also been at the centre of a recent row over sexism. Her version of events is that a journalist told her that she gets more beautiful by the day. The journalist says he said that she gets richer by the day and it shows physically.

Either way, a comment on a woman's physical appearance coming from a man, especially in a professional or public context, is blatant sexism. Not so, says the leader of the Partido Popular, Alberto Feijóo, getting embroiled in the row, who only believes "machismo is when men try to prevail over women just because they are women".

If women in power are faced with this kind of behaviour from men, what hope have the rest of us got? It's a sentiment echoed by Díaz during the recent sexism storm: "I am deputy PM of the government, imagine what we women go through on a daily basis," she lamented.

As the women I spoke to this week about equality in the workplace told me, the barrier isn't about a lack of expertise or capability on the part of women. Instead, it is a systemic issue upheld by outdated beliefs, (un?)conscious bias and long-standing power structures that continue to favour men. When will women be able to get on with the job in hand, knowing they got it because they are good at it and not just filling quotas, without having to deal with the sexism that goes with it?

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