Biological basis for inequality

Press, 2 June 1977, Page 7

Biological basis for inequality

The core of women’s inequality in society has been. Dr Helen Marieskind believes, based on her biology. “The fundamental discrimination is based on childbirth, which manifests itself in economic terms. It influences the jobs women have held, which in turn has been limited by their education. Control of our reproductive potential is critical,” she says.

While she was at the University of California Dr Marieskind helped run a daycare centre. There she learnt of the ambivalent feelings some women have about i child care. “All the women' wanted to be in university,! they knew they and their children needed the creche, but the problems came when they found it hard to accept that someone else had control of their child for a good part of the day. “If those feelings of guilt and possessiveness are very strong, child care — no matter how good — won’t work,” she says. Dr Marieskind has little faith in what is often called “natural” behaviour. She sees us as products of our society. Women’s anxieties about'leaving their children even in good child care springs, she is sure, from the pressures which go back to Victorian society. Then the status of the emerging middle class was measured by whether the husband’s earning capacity enabled his wife to stay at home with the children. "Our so-called ideal nuclear family is a very recent development. Until recently child care was always shared among an extended family. And who condemns the mothers of children!

away at boarding schools? “Women can feel it’s natural to just be at home with their children. Perhaps it’s a self-defence mechanism, a feeling that this is what they do best because it is the only thing in their lives. If so, that’s fine. But so many women have to work these days to provide the necessities. It’s unfair that they be made to feel guilty, because society wants to feel wrapped up in a sense of economic security,” shei says. “Other women really! do need to work for their own well-being.” ‘ Although Helen Marieskiind is working for quite; fundamental changes in I I American health care, she' ■regards the New Zealand system quite highly. “People here have told me some worrying things that have happened to them, but I think you should always remember that here, basically, no-one is denied health care,” she says. She fully approves of this country’s system of patients seeing a general practitioner before being referred to a specialist. In America most women obtain their principal health care from a gynaecologist, which Dr Marieskind believes has led to specialisation at considerable cost “It is expensive care economically, and is often at the risk of missing out total health care.” In the future she envisages less specialisation in gynaecology and obstetrics, as women are dying less from diseases dealt with byi these specialities than from! illness such as lung cancer! or coronary heart disease. Much of the effort of I women’s health centres in; I the United States has been.'

to “humanise” medical care, for women. “We want a more rational and sensible I use of medical resources,” says Helen Marieskind. “Most people complain that their doctors don’t listen to them, won’t tell them anything. If we had more personnel such as nurses working at a lower level this would not happen.” “Most people are not suffering from dramatic illnesses, they are sick with (everyday aches and pains. .'Many people too are lonely and depressed, and they use their medical encounter to icope with this. Nurse prac--1 titioners trained in minor : medical procedures, and I nurse aides would have time ;to listen and provide help.” Dr Marieskind hopes the women’s health centres, which now see about 200 to 300 patients a week, will continue to provide a viable choice for women. But she sees practical difficulties for many women who need health care for themselves, their children, and their partners under one roof. She hopes the concepts of the centres will eventually be incorporated in community medical centres. But first must come a change in the doctor-patient relationship with women patients. And there are signs of that coming even among the most conservative representatives of the profession.

“Research has shown that doctors do have a different relationship with their woman patients from that with their male patients. I This is inevitable when even ■in 1973 the leading gynaecological text book in America defined the “core of the Ifemale personality as female I narcissism, masochism, and I passivity.” And in spite of

, Masters and Johnson’s findings, doctors are still taught (that a woman’s sex drive entirely depends on a man and women generally go to a gynaecologist for treatment of sexual problems,” she says. Doctors, and women themselves, she maintains, must be convinced that women need not be child-like, that they are intelligent adults who can understand and accept the facts. How does Helen Marieskind see the future for her two daughters, Francesca and Melinda? She and her husband, Andrew Dolan, a former lawyer now lecturing in public health, are setting an example of equality which applies both in the home and work place. When she finds herself really worried about the vulnerable teenage years ahead, Dr Marieskind clings to the hope that parental guidance will help her girls weather the storm of social pressures. "But then, teenagers are not noted for taking any notice of their parents,” she says wryly. “It scares me to death, particularly for our older daughter, who is already two years ahead of her age group in class. We just have to prepare them as best we can, give them stability in the home and the message that they have to do something with their lives.” And what of the name Marieskind, which she chose a.-> her professional name after her divorce? Her mother’s Christian name is Marie. She wanted a name which suggested matrilinear descent so she chose Marie’s child, which became Marieskind.