Speaker 1: Welcome to stuff mom never told you from how supports
Speaker 1: not come. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Caroline
Speaker 1: and I'm Kristen, and today we're talking about women on money,
Speaker 1: because it's happening, you guys, it's happening. What Yeah, women,
Speaker 1: there's gonna be a lady on some money. And as
Speaker 1: of this recording, we don't know who yet, but we
Speaker 1: know that a woman's face in portrait possibly will appear
Speaker 1: on the ten dollar bill in the United States of America.
Speaker 1: In the United States, that's right, it's happening on the
Speaker 1: ten in because that is the one anniversary of the
Speaker 1: ratification of the nineteenth Amendment, which gave women the right
Speaker 1: to vote. So the U. S. Treasury was like, oh, hey,
Speaker 1: we haven't had a woman on paper money in a really, really,
Speaker 1: really long time, and people have been talking about women
Speaker 1: getting on the twenty or something like that, so let's
Speaker 1: compromise and put her on the tin all right, It
Speaker 1: will be seventy eight smaller than the regular tin um
Speaker 1: but a Treasury Secretary, Jacob Blue, said that it will
Speaker 1: be a woman who was a champion for our inclusive democracy. Uh,
Speaker 1: and the current ten dollar inhabitant Founding Father and O G.
Speaker 1: Treasury Secretary Alexander. Hamilton's will still be on the bill,
Speaker 1: but they haven't decided if he's still going to be
Speaker 1: on a ten dollar bill like normal, and then women
Speaker 1: will have their own ten dollar bill, or if Hamilton's
Speaker 1: will just be somewhere else rather than in that prime
Speaker 1: center position on the bill. I really hope that they
Speaker 1: have the woman's face front and center, and then sort
Speaker 1: of a tableau off on this side, like a nature scene,
Speaker 1: and you can see Hamilt peeking out from behind a bush,
Speaker 1: all like what happened the money tree? Yes, exactly, Hamilton's
Speaker 1: scrambling up a money tree, little binoculars like who is this?
Speaker 1: Who is this female? Well, I mean that description of
Speaker 1: like a potential imagery on on money sounds like it's strange,
Speaker 1: But that's what our money used to look like. Not
Speaker 1: Hamilton's peeking through a money tree or bush or something shrubbery. Uh,
Speaker 1: But our money did used to have so much crazy
Speaker 1: imagery on it, whether it was animals or plants or
Speaker 1: buildings or just general like scenes from history, roller coasters. Frankenstein.
Speaker 1: Fun fact used to be on the five Brian to Frankenstein. No,
Speaker 1: not the Brian Caroline is a woman. Oh my god.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, the face is actually on our paper. Money
Speaker 1: in the US haven't changed since nine, when Andrew Jackson
Speaker 1: replaced Grover Cleveland on the twenty and more about Andrew
Speaker 1: Jackson on the twenty in a minute. But the reason
Speaker 1: why this change to money happened in twenty nine was
Speaker 1: when because the US government was instituting some new rules
Speaker 1: about US currency. Because in one case, one of the
Speaker 1: I don't know if he was Treasury Secretary or not
Speaker 1: um and I don't have his name in front of me,
Speaker 1: but a guy with the power to do so decided
Speaker 1: to put himself on a bill, and all of the
Speaker 1: other folks were like, whoa, Okay, we need to we
Speaker 1: need to make some rules. So one of which is
Speaker 1: that whoever is on money has to be dead. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that way, living people can't, you know, play god and
Speaker 1: put themselves on cash. Well, I mean, other people have
Speaker 1: the faces of currently alive individuals on their money. I mean,
Speaker 1: look at look at the Queen of England and British
Speaker 1: Commonwealth States and all of her Crown dependencies. She's on
Speaker 1: plenty of money and she's still truck and right along
Speaker 1: she's always making a rain with with her face all
Speaker 1: over cash. Um. But as a lot of people have
Speaker 1: probably heard now in the reporting on this forthcoming ten
Speaker 1: dollar bill, this woman will not be the very first
Speaker 1: American lady on paper money in the US. In fact,
Speaker 1: the first was Lady Matha Washington. That's right, first first
Speaker 1: Lady Martha Washington was on one of the first one
Speaker 1: dollar silver certificates, which used to be a pretty common
Speaker 1: type of currency, and legend has it that Martha even
Speaker 1: donated some silverware to be melted down and made into
Speaker 1: some of the country's earliest money, the half Disney, which
Speaker 1: I really think that they should just bring back the
Speaker 1: half Disney. Yeah that totally looks like a typo. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like I think you meant dimes, no Disney, okay. Um yeah.
Speaker 1: So some people are saying, well, well, maybe that was
Speaker 1: actual like payback in a way, like thanks for that
Speaker 1: silver owen, for being the first first lady. Here here
Speaker 1: is a silver certificate. But then she was removed when
Speaker 1: the redesigned silver note was issued in eighteen nineties six.
Speaker 1: But she wasn't the only one. There was also pocahanas
Speaker 1: A Ka Mattawaka, who appeared on a twenty dollar note
Speaker 1: from the mid nineteenth century. But she wasn't the only
Speaker 1: person on there, and it was a depiction of her
Speaker 1: Christian baptism, which isn't exactly honoring her so much as
Speaker 1: us just celebrating cultural erasure. Sure, so while we might
Speaker 1: not have been super big on putting real life women
Speaker 1: on our money, we were pretty cool about putting putting fake,
Speaker 1: allegorical mythological women on our money. Yeah. We actually found
Speaker 1: a really fascinating paper about the symbolism of American money
Speaker 1: in a journal called the Communication Review from two thousand
Speaker 1: eight and talked about how pre Revolutionary War each colony
Speaker 1: had images of things relevant to itself. So this is
Speaker 1: what Caroline was talking about earlier in terms of how
Speaker 1: money in the United States seems to be a lot
Speaker 1: more fun. So this pre Revolutionary War currency would have
Speaker 1: things like flora and fauna and ships and buildings and
Speaker 1: not actually Frankenstein or Frankenstein's bride, as I joked earlier. Um,
Speaker 1: Whereas during the Revolution, imagery on money really started to
Speaker 1: veer into more anti monarchical patriotic tableaus that we think
Speaker 1: of more today. So when it comes to these allegorical women.
Speaker 1: You have, of course, like Lady Liberty, you have women
Speaker 1: symbolizing fertility, history, even science, science was dressed up with
Speaker 1: a nice little gown on or hair all up hashtag
Speaker 1: distractingly sexy. Exactly in these allegorical or mythological characters were
Speaker 1: largely done a way with when Treasury Secretary Line Engage
Speaker 1: called for quote less less whirling dervish figures, nude or
Speaker 1: otherwise basically in an effort to make bank notes all business,
Speaker 1: all business, all the time on our money. No no
Speaker 1: more of these women with their flowing robes symbolizing liberty
Speaker 1: and agricultural fertility and God forbid science. And this was
Speaker 1: a sentiment that ended up getting echoed by senators wives
Speaker 1: in the late nineteenth century when a partially nude but
Speaker 1: with beautiful flowing capes and robes, woman holding a light
Speaker 1: and symbolizing the power of electricity graced the back of
Speaker 1: a special edition five dollar bank note. Electricity ended up
Speaker 1: getting removed. Did the senator's wives think she was to scandalous?
Speaker 1: To scandalous? And I would refer these these women to
Speaker 1: our episode on the nude. Yes, we need to listen
Speaker 1: to that episode on the female nude. And I just
Speaker 1: love the idea Lady Electricity. She hanging out with Lady
Speaker 1: Liberty on the weekend, she should be Yeah, she's holding
Speaker 1: up her light bulb like she's got a great idea
Speaker 1: all the time. Man, you know what. I but their
Speaker 1: rivals then, because you got Lady Liberty holding up the
Speaker 1: torch and she's like, what is this I got? I
Speaker 1: got fired, You've got this new fingled Electricity. And they're
Speaker 1: both like, can I can I put my arm down?
Speaker 1: I'm like, my arms are real tired. I would love
Speaker 1: to like reach down and be able to pull my
Speaker 1: robes across my chest. But it's just like, so breezy,
Speaker 1: can I Now? All right? It's hard out there for
Speaker 1: an allegorical female figure on US currency, Caroline, That's right, Um,
Speaker 1: we we did have actual, real life women portrayed on
Speaker 1: some coins. I mean, this whole discussion is based on
Speaker 1: the fact that we are about to get a woman
Speaker 1: about to about she had a woman on paper money.
Speaker 1: But we did have some women appear on coins, three
Speaker 1: of them. Three of Oh my gosh. But watch out,
Speaker 1: especially if you don't count allegorical, fake not real women
Speaker 1: like the Statue of Liberty or Lady Liberty. Um, we
Speaker 1: had Helen Keller, Saka Daweah, and Susan B. Anthony who
Speaker 1: have all been on coins. But historically, like this country
Speaker 1: just doesn't do well with coins, we tend to get
Speaker 1: very confused about them. Um. So, back in the nineteen seventies,
Speaker 1: when the debate was going on over what woman would
Speaker 1: go on the dollar coin, the Treasury didn't recommend Old Treasury.
Speaker 1: They recommended the Statue of Liberty, to which Colorado Congressman
Speaker 1: Patricia Schredder said, you guys, we have real birds and
Speaker 1: real buffalo on our coins. It's time we had a
Speaker 1: real woman. No more of this shirtless electricity we need.
Speaker 1: We need a woman who actually lived and breathed. So
Speaker 1: in nineteen nine we got that with suffragists, Susan B.
Speaker 1: Anthony winning out over the statue, becoming the first woman
Speaker 1: to appear on a US coin. But the downside of
Speaker 1: that is that fewer than eight hundred million were produced,
Speaker 1: and people were very confused about the Susan B. Anthon
Speaker 1: me coin. They often thought it was a quarter and
Speaker 1: then we're like, oh no, wait, it's a dollar. What
Speaker 1: do I do with this? This is coke machine? Except
Speaker 1: Susan B. Anthony coin. I know, I feel like I've
Speaker 1: used somebody. I I feel like instantly when someone gives
Speaker 1: me a dollar coin, I look, I look at it
Speaker 1: in my hand, and then I look at them like
Speaker 1: do you hate me? I think you're doing this is
Speaker 1: like a passive jab at me somehow, because ultimately, when
Speaker 1: I go to the freaking vending machine, the vending machine
Speaker 1: will give me what I want, but it gets confused.
Speaker 1: See it's confusing even robots, and then I don't get
Speaker 1: my change. I need three quarters back, although I don't
Speaker 1: know what an a vending machine would only be a quarter.
Speaker 1: I will stock up on my singles for you. Well.
Speaker 1: The same thing, though, happened with Saka Jewia on the
Speaker 1: Golden dollar coin, which came out in two thousand, where
Speaker 1: again people were like, what do I what do I
Speaker 1: do with this? Hello? I mean I feel like, uh,
Speaker 1: Europe has coin money figured out, only better than the
Speaker 1: US as we are just well, we really have some
Speaker 1: just incompetence when it comes to not only making but
Speaker 1: also spending money. And then you've got Helen Keller. She
Speaker 1: was not on a on a dollar coin. She was
Speaker 1: on the back of a quarter so so less confusing
Speaker 1: for people to to use. She appeared on the back
Speaker 1: of the special edition Alabama State quarter. You know, every
Speaker 1: state if you're in America, you know this. I'm not
Speaker 1: explaining anything new to you, but there was a state
Speaker 1: series released and so a quarter had George Washington on
Speaker 1: the front. On the back, it had something symbolizing the
Speaker 1: state in recognition of when it joined the Union, blah
Speaker 1: blah blah, and so Alabama put, among other things, Helen Keller.
Speaker 1: So that was good and a lot less confusing for
Speaker 1: Americans who really only know what to do with paper money,
Speaker 1: paper money and quarters. Quarters do you get used? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's really just the dollar coin that really throws people off. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but other countries have had no problem at all. It
Speaker 1: seems like putting women on their money. So Time magazine
Speaker 1: did a whole roundup of currency around the world featuring women.
Speaker 1: So let's hop on over to Syria, which features Queen Zenobia, which,
Speaker 1: if you don't know who Queen Zenobia is, first of
Speaker 1: all stuff you missed in history class. Our sister podcast
Speaker 1: has a fantastic episode on her, and we mentioned her
Speaker 1: in a roundup of queens who fought to rule over
Speaker 1: its stuff. And I've never told you dot Com learn
Speaker 1: more about Zenobia. She was quite a woman. And then
Speaker 1: if you go to the Philippines, you have Corazon Aquino,
Speaker 1: who was the first female president of the Philippines on
Speaker 1: some money. Head over to Israel you have a poet
Speaker 1: Rachel Blue Seene who's on on money. You don't even
Speaker 1: have to be a president, you can be a poet,
Speaker 1: that's right. And then other countries with women on their
Speaker 1: money include Turkey, Mexico, Argentina, New Zealand, Sweden, and Australia. Um.
Speaker 1: But there is another country that it's it's not without
Speaker 1: controversy when a woman wants to when someone wants to
Speaker 1: put a woman on money, uh, And that that's England.
Speaker 1: The Bank of England announced that it would replace Charles
Speaker 1: Darwin with Jane Austen on its ten pound notes. And
Speaker 1: and the whole point is like, let's pick someone who's inoffensive,
Speaker 1: non controversial, like you know, somebody who everybody can kind
Speaker 1: of get behind. And Jane Austen is a pretty safe choice.
Speaker 1: But nobody, nobody was happy. People freaked out. They called
Speaker 1: her a sneering chronicler of petty squabbles. They called her ugly,
Speaker 1: which anyway, they protested the fact that she was a
Speaker 1: white woman and not a person of color, that she's
Speaker 1: too obsessed with money, and other people just simply said
Speaker 1: she's too safe a choice. We need somebody who's either
Speaker 1: a leader or an activist of some kind. Do you
Speaker 1: think that part of the uproar over that was that
Speaker 1: she was replacing Charles Darwin and so maybe they're like, well,
Speaker 1: you know, those are big. I mean, it could be
Speaker 1: because a lot of the arguments here now regarding Alexander
Speaker 1: Hamilton's on the tent, I mean, it kind of echoes
Speaker 1: the same argument. But then you have to look at
Speaker 1: the fact also that the two women who led the
Speaker 1: campaign to put a woman on paper currency ended up
Speaker 1: themselves facing threats of rape and other violence. So it's
Speaker 1: probably not about Jane Austen exactly. Yeah. The fact that
Speaker 1: some people were issuing bomb threats, threats of violence, threats
Speaker 1: of rape against the woman who in Great Britain, who
Speaker 1: campaigned to get this Jane Austen bill through is mind
Speaker 1: boggling to me. I know I shouldn't be surprised, but
Speaker 1: for that it is surprising because it's like, why, why
Speaker 1: would someone have such a personal steak in a dead
Speaker 1: person's face on money that you would make a rape
Speaker 1: threat to a stranger. Yeah. Well, Kristen, when you put
Speaker 1: it that way, you know, I mean, that's that's wild.
Speaker 1: Well let's let's talk though about those women in the
Speaker 1: US who spearheaded this campaign which has ultimately led to this. Well,
Speaker 1: so here in the US, people aren't fighting over Jane Austen,
Speaker 1: entrepreneur Barbara Ortiz Howard, and journalist Susan Aids Stone teamed
Speaker 1: up to launch the Women on Twenties campaign, and they
Speaker 1: got the idea when President Obama said something in a
Speaker 1: speech about it being a pretty good idea to put
Speaker 1: a woman on US currency. And the thing is he
Speaker 1: has the power to do that. He could tell the
Speaker 1: Treasury Department to do so. Um. But Ortiz, Howard and
Speaker 1: Stone specifically wanted to replace old Hickory on the twenty,
Speaker 1: not Hamilton's on the tin, because this is a guy
Speaker 1: who helped pass the Indian Removal Act of eighteen thirty,
Speaker 1: which ultimately led to the Trail of Tears, basically sought
Speaker 1: to wipe out Native America, ends to further the progress
Speaker 1: of white people. Um. And he wasn't super big on
Speaker 1: paper money anyway. This this is a guy who was
Speaker 1: all about the silver and gold standard, who also would
Speaker 1: have had nothing nice to say about Americans who can't
Speaker 1: figure out the dollar coin. And when it comes to
Speaker 1: how he got on the twenty to begin with, the
Speaker 1: history is murky. There wasn't even a compelling reason at
Speaker 1: the time for him specifically to get on that bill.
Speaker 1: So in March and April, Women on the Twenties pulled
Speaker 1: more than a million visitors to their website and to
Speaker 1: find out who people think should replace Jackson on the
Speaker 1: twenty and Harriet Tubman came out on top, followed by
Speaker 1: Eleanor Roosevelt, Rosa Parks, and Wilma Mankiller. And this grassroots
Speaker 1: campaign was so wildly successful it got so much media coverage.
Speaker 1: Um there was even a room for debate section at
Speaker 1: the New York Times featuring all sorts of female luminaries
Speaker 1: sort of doing their own nominations for who they think
Speaker 1: should be on the twenty. Yeah, Gloria Steinham promoted to
Speaker 1: journal Truth, Roxanne Gay advocated for Margaret Sanger, and Linda Chavez,
Speaker 1: who's the president of the conservative nonprofit Becoming American Institute
Speaker 1: recommended Emma Lazarus, who's a poet whose words appear on
Speaker 1: the Statue of Liberty. Give me your tired, your poor,
Speaker 1: your huddled masses yearning to breathe free and so on.
Speaker 1: Um and so this, all of this media attention, all
Speaker 1: of these voices chiming in together, was enough to inspire
Speaker 1: some action. New Hampshire Senator Jean Shaheen introduced a bill
Speaker 1: to mandate that a woman be placed on the twenty
Speaker 1: again the twenties specifically. So why why was the ten chosen?
Speaker 1: Were women just being short changed? So I speak, I
Speaker 1: like that numismatic punk Caroline. Well, the reason why the
Speaker 1: ten was chosen, so the Treasury Department says, is because
Speaker 1: it was on their to do list for a redesign.
Speaker 1: It was next in line to get a little bit
Speaker 1: of a makeover, and officials decided on the tin back in.
Speaker 1: And really the design is for the purpose of beating counterfeits.
Speaker 1: So it takes about a decade to redesign and produce
Speaker 1: a new note, because government, because government. Um. So it
Speaker 1: was sort of a record scratch moment though for the
Speaker 1: twenty dollar campaigners, because on the one hand, it's like Okay,
Speaker 1: we are getting a woman on some paper money, but
Speaker 1: it's not the twenty And there was something very specific
Speaker 1: and so so pointed about women on the twenties. They
Speaker 1: weren't campaigning for the ten. They wanted specifically to get
Speaker 1: rid of Andrew Jackson. So Ortiz Howard told The Atlantic quote,
Speaker 1: this was originally supposed to be a celebration of women
Speaker 1: and their contributions to this country, and a rate by
Speaker 1: product was going to be replacing someone who represents hate,
Speaker 1: i e. Andrew Jackson. And now she said, we have
Speaker 1: a bit of a curve ball. Yeah, And so that
Speaker 1: curveball has helped spark a bit of a backlash. So
Speaker 1: not only is our old buddy Hamilton's getting pushed aside,
Speaker 1: but he's getting pushed aside for a woman, which is
Speaker 1: really offensive to a lot of people. And not only
Speaker 1: is Hamilton getting pushed aside for a woman, but it's
Speaker 1: happening because of a campaign by women about women. It's
Speaker 1: the same kind of aggressive response that a lot of
Speaker 1: people had to the women who started the campaign in
Speaker 1: England to get not necessarily specifically Jane Austen, but just
Speaker 1: to get a woman on the money. A lot of
Speaker 1: people have had a lot of strong responses, and one
Speaker 1: big name who has come out against particularly a woman
Speaker 1: replacing Hamilton's has been Bernankee. He's the former Federal Reserve
Speaker 1: chairman who chimed in on his blog and said, I
Speaker 1: must admit I was appalled to hear if Treasury Secretary
Speaker 1: Jack lose decision last week to mote Alexander Hamilton's from
Speaker 1: his featured position on the ten dollar bill. And he
Speaker 1: was basically saying that, yeah, it's fine to put a
Speaker 1: woman on paper money, but it shouldn't come at Hamilton's expense.
Speaker 1: And so what is the deal? Why are people so
Speaker 1: upset about Hamilton's leaving. Well, he was an incredibly influential
Speaker 1: founding father, and he wrote two thirds of the Federalist papers,
Speaker 1: which were written to persuade people to ratify the Constitution.
Speaker 1: And in the process of all of this, he designed
Speaker 1: much of the executive branch, including what would become the
Speaker 1: Federal Reserve. So he really helped lay the groundwork for
Speaker 1: our treasury system. He was instrumental in that money getting
Speaker 1: into our hands. Well, he was climbing all of his
Speaker 1: money trees to spy on Martha. What wasn't Martha Washington
Speaker 1: know well bossby Martha Washington, but any woman, you know,
Speaker 1: be on the news. I've already left. Yeah, I've already
Speaker 1: there we go. I just I can't get the picture
Speaker 1: of Hamilton's in a tree out of my head with
Speaker 1: a little little telescope. And I agree, honestly with Bernankee.
Speaker 1: Great idea. Put a woman on some money, but leave
Speaker 1: Hamilton's in place. He's the one that makes sense out
Speaker 1: of really anybody who's on our money. She's Christen's waving
Speaker 1: her hands for him. My hands are in the air.
Speaker 1: I'm waving him like. I just don't care, Caroline, because
Speaker 1: it's wild to me that Andrew Jackson is staying in place,
Speaker 1: and that just I know that there's the the Treasury
Speaker 1: very valid argument of listen, there's an order that we
Speaker 1: do this in the ten is next. And you ladies
Speaker 1: are going a little a little wild with this women
Speaker 1: on Twenties campaign. We're getting a lot of pressure. We've
Speaker 1: got the centennial of women's suffrage coming up Boom special
Speaker 1: Edition ten. But I'm just saying it's not good enough. Well,
Speaker 1: there are other people saying that this isn't good enough either.
Speaker 1: If we replace Hamilton's with someone like Harriet Tubman. You
Speaker 1: know a lot of people have advocated for not just Tubman,
Speaker 1: but to Journer Truth, Rosa Parks, women who have been
Speaker 1: important in the civil rights movement throughout our country's history.
Speaker 1: And for instance, Kirsten west safali over at the Route
Speaker 1: wrote that no amount of subversive symbolism changes the fact
Speaker 1: that the US does not value black women. And she's
Speaker 1: pointing out that, yes, yes, we should honor these women,
Speaker 1: We should honor Harriet Tubman and to General Truth and
Speaker 1: Rosa Parks, but putting them on money in the United
Speaker 1: States is not the way to do it. She says,
Speaker 1: that's not progress, it's huh money. And she says, also,
Speaker 1: why would black women celebrate the one anniversary of the
Speaker 1: nineteenth Amendment when they weren't able to vote somewhat freely,
Speaker 1: she says, until the Voting Rights Act of Yeah, a
Speaker 1: lot of of people like that have pointed out how
Speaker 1: this whole money and capitalism system is directly related to, oh,
Speaker 1: I don't know, slavery and the things that to General
Speaker 1: Truth and Harriet Tubman and Rosa Parks were dedicating their
Speaker 1: lives to break free from and the legacy of slavery,
Speaker 1: So it is it just seems darkly ironic to then
Speaker 1: put one of their faces on the ultimate symbol of
Speaker 1: that capitalist system. Yeah, so she's basically saying, yes, find
Speaker 1: other ways to honor these women, and honor them loudly
Speaker 1: and constantly, but find a different way other than putting
Speaker 1: them on money. And then, of course you have the
Speaker 1: backlash that's gotten a lot more traction in the media
Speaker 1: I feel like, which is from a lot of various
Speaker 1: men's rights activist groups who are saying that there there
Speaker 1: are not enough qualified women to even consider putting on money.
Speaker 1: Um or there's the argument that unless a woman has
Speaker 1: fought for the rights of men and women, she should
Speaker 1: not go on money. People like uh so Junior Truth
Speaker 1: didn't do enough to advocate from men, eleanor Roosevelt didn't
Speaker 1: do enough to advocate from men's specifically, No matter the
Speaker 1: fact that these people were dedicated to helping African American lives,
Speaker 1: or women's lives or human rights in general, it's not enough.
Speaker 1: A lot of men's rights activists are saying, but we
Speaker 1: need someone who actively fought for men too. But men
Speaker 1: men's rights activists also operate from the faulty logic that
Speaker 1: gender equality is a zero sum game, and I got
Speaker 1: no time for that. Yeah, and I think that is
Speaker 1: a sentiment that's been underlying a lot of this, a
Speaker 1: lot of the more fringe discussions on this topic. Now,
Speaker 1: maybe so much the Time magazine or New York Times
Speaker 1: discussion of putting a woman on the ten or the twenty.
Speaker 1: But yeah, this idea that somehow putting a woman on
Speaker 1: money takes something away from men, well, because it does
Speaker 1: actually take away in this case, it does take something away.
Speaker 1: It takes one man's face away from us seeing it
Speaker 1: when we pull it out of our wallets. But I mean,
Speaker 1: other countries redesign money, and we in our country's history
Speaker 1: have a long history of redesigning money and putting plants
Speaker 1: on it. And you know, so, oh, I know, it's
Speaker 1: absolutely ridiculous. But I feel like this starts to stray
Speaker 1: off into a whole other conversation of how equality and
Speaker 1: civil rights and recognizing contributions of a diverse group of
Speaker 1: people does not always inherently come at the expense of
Speaker 1: someone else, That uplifting one group does not simultaneously push
Speaker 1: another group down, and creating your own oppression in that
Speaker 1: way is just faulty. But then again, men's rights say
Speaker 1: that women are oppressing themselves. So again I don't even
Speaker 1: have time or interest in engaging in that. Well. And
Speaker 1: you could also ask, what's the big deal what's the
Speaker 1: on either side? What's the big deal about putting a
Speaker 1: woman on money? What's the big deal about taking a
Speaker 1: man off of money? You know? But uh, that study
Speaker 1: that you cited earlier, Kristen from the Community Asian Review
Speaker 1: in two thousand and eight, they looked at this this
Speaker 1: meaning behind money, and it's a very purposeful thing that governments,
Speaker 1: not just the United States, but that governments do is
Speaker 1: to imbue money with a lot of meaning. Um. So
Speaker 1: they're looking at money basically as mass communication and reinforcing
Speaker 1: a national identity. And they say that since paper money
Speaker 1: itself is essentially worthless, the documentary and aesthetic conventions of
Speaker 1: it reveal a government's attempt to insert value, legitimacy, and
Speaker 1: also social trust. And so our money combines imagery associated
Speaker 1: with the formal political and legal authority, but also nationalist themes.
Speaker 1: I mean, as we talked about, you know, in in
Speaker 1: our early history, you had women symbolizing liberty or science
Speaker 1: or or progress um. And so they write together these
Speaker 1: mutually reinforcing strategies merge the contractual obligations of the state
Speaker 1: with the sacred bonds of national identity. And so we
Speaker 1: are supposed to connect with the ideas on money. We're
Speaker 1: supposed to see the political stuff and the legal stuff,
Speaker 1: to consider our money a very official thing that we
Speaker 1: can trust that when we take it to the gas
Speaker 1: station to pay for a candy bar, that we will
Speaker 1: get that candy bar. Um. But it's also um something
Speaker 1: that portrays images of national pride, so that we also
Speaker 1: really identify with our money. It's pride and also national values,
Speaker 1: such as in God we trust being printed on paper money,
Speaker 1: specifically during the Cold War to contrast those godless communists. Right. So,
Speaker 1: whether we support capitalism and its outcomes, which have not
Speaker 1: been very kind to a lot of people in this country,
Speaker 1: UM or not, you can't deny that the symbolism of
Speaker 1: currency around the world is quite powerful. I think, and
Speaker 1: I do, and I am happy to see that there
Speaker 1: will be a woman on some kind of paper money
Speaker 1: in the US, especially when we again going back to
Speaker 1: that time roundup of global currency featuring women. It's just
Speaker 1: like yet again, it's like the United States, just catch up.
Speaker 1: Just put a woman on some currency, for instance, just
Speaker 1: quick shout out to New Zealand want some of their money.
Speaker 1: Features Kate Shepherd, who was the suffragist or suffragette, I
Speaker 1: think she would be appropriately labeled, who pushed through voting
Speaker 1: rights for women in New Zealand, making it the very
Speaker 1: first country in the world granting universal voting rights to women,
Speaker 1: and to then put her face on that currency, to me,
Speaker 1: says a lot about how New Zealand takes a lot
Speaker 1: of pride and values that work. But it is funny
Speaker 1: in that awful way, not in a great funny ha
Speaker 1: haaway um that the response to women or anyone advocating
Speaker 1: for women to be on money is not that far
Speaker 1: away from the response to women who wanted to vote.
Speaker 1: And how appropriate, because that's what this is marking, is
Speaker 1: the hundredth anniversary of women getting the vote, and so
Speaker 1: people are still telling women, sit down, we don't want
Speaker 1: to hear what you have to say. Why are you
Speaker 1: asking for so much? Shouldn't you just be happy that
Speaker 1: you have money in your wallet? Why do you have
Speaker 1: to be on it too? Exactly? Yeah, if we oh,
Speaker 1: it's a slippery slope. Put a woman on on money,
Speaker 1: next thing you know, there will be one spending it
Speaker 1: in the White House. Um. I think that really the
Speaker 1: appropriate commemorative bill that needs to come out is just
Speaker 1: a cent um paper paper bill, because that's That's another
Speaker 1: thing too that doesn't sit entirely easy with me. Where
Speaker 1: it's like, but there's so much economic disparity that still
Speaker 1: exists between the sexes, and uh, why don't we talk
Speaker 1: more about that? You know, I wonder if if the
Speaker 1: do you think at all this conversation distracts away from that,
Speaker 1: especially talking about women of color. I mean the fact
Speaker 1: that if you start drilling down into economic disparity when
Speaker 1: it comes to women, that black women and Latino women
Speaker 1: are even more disproportionately disenfranchised when it comes to our
Speaker 1: money in the US. Yeah, I just don't want to
Speaker 1: see and and No, I mean, I agree with you
Speaker 1: in the extent that I would like to see Andrew
Speaker 1: Jackson removed before Alexander Hamilton's. But I just I hope, uh,
Speaker 1: that it's not just a special edition bill, because all
Speaker 1: of those dollar coins were essentially special edition. Yes they
Speaker 1: were supposed to be used, Yes they were minted and circulated,
Speaker 1: but again not as many of them were minted as
Speaker 1: like a regular coin, um, and so people were just
Speaker 1: dismissing these things as like not being useful. And so
Speaker 1: I would like to to see the woman on whatever
Speaker 1: bill it is and whatever woman it is actually be,
Speaker 1: you know, regular money. Well, and speaking of regular money,
Speaker 1: we don't have the stats in front of us, but
Speaker 1: there was that uh infographic we saw of money circulated,
Speaker 1: paper money circulated in the US, and it's pretty much
Speaker 1: all ones in twenties. The ten is rarely used. I'll
Speaker 1: use a five before I use a t. I don't
Speaker 1: know the last time I had a tin in my wallet, Caroline,
Speaker 1: because yeah, the at M only gives out I wish
Speaker 1: the a t M gave out ten dollar bills. The
Speaker 1: ATM only gives me twenties. We've got a laundry list
Speaker 1: of currency updates that we want to we want to
Speaker 1: press through. Maybe maybe we just needed like a women's
Speaker 1: face on all debit cards because I really just used
Speaker 1: that now. Yeah, really really ruffles some men's rights. But
Speaker 1: rs UM, and with that, what do you think about
Speaker 1: the currency debate? Do you think it's a great thing?
Speaker 1: Do you have a woman that you would love to
Speaker 1: see on the ten? Are you equally distraught that Hamilton's
Speaker 1: getting kicked off instead of old Hickory Mom's stubbit. House
Speaker 1: Stuff works dot com is where you can send us
Speaker 1: your thoughts. You can also tweet us at mom Stuff
Speaker 1: podcast or messages on Facebook. And we've got a couple
Speaker 1: of messages to share with you right now. Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: I have a letter here from a listener who would
Speaker 1: like to remain anonymous, and she's a new Sminty listener,
Speaker 1: and she says, I've been particularly enjoying your podcasts about
Speaker 1: women working in different male oriented roles such as carpentry, construction,
Speaker 1: and architecture. I also work in a male oriented environment
Speaker 1: because about a year ago I resign my very sensible
Speaker 1: office job and joining the ambulance Service. I'm currently working
Speaker 1: as an emergency care assistant, so I spent a lot
Speaker 1: of time running around after the paramedics and carrying their bags.
Speaker 1: But we all have just started somewhere. Right when I
Speaker 1: joined the Ambo service, I really imagine that i'd be
Speaker 1: working with caring people who treated people really well. Sadly,
Speaker 1: there are many people who let the team down with
Speaker 1: an endless stream of sexist and or racist comments. I'm
Speaker 1: constantly subjected to sexual harassment, bullying, and moaning about how
Speaker 1: they shouldn't let women do this job. I've been groped
Speaker 1: by co workers and made to feel like I'm utterly
Speaker 1: useless by men who pushed me out of the way
Speaker 1: and won't let me help carry sick people or help
Speaker 1: out with the other physical demands of my very physically
Speaker 1: challenging job. Other women in my workplace have experienced the
Speaker 1: same problems, and some are more bothered than others. One
Speaker 1: of my female workmates says that if some chauvinistic man
Speaker 1: wants to hurt his back carrying a two fifty pound man,
Speaker 1: rather him than her. A lot of these guys seem
Speaker 1: to think that they are he man and that a
Speaker 1: tough guy attitude is all that's needed to get the
Speaker 1: job done, never mind the fact that we spend a
Speaker 1: lot of our time taking care of little old ladies
Speaker 1: who feel threatened by this overly macho approach. As for
Speaker 1: a racism, there is not a single black person working
Speaker 1: for my ambulance trust, and I do wonder if they've
Speaker 1: all been pushed away. Despite all this, I'm sticking with it.
Speaker 1: I do love the job, if not the people, and
Speaker 1: find it endlessly rewarding. I've been accepted into the country's
Speaker 1: best paramedic training program and start in September. I'm hoping
Speaker 1: that will show a few people what I'm made of.
Speaker 1: So although I continue to let people think I am
Speaker 1: tough as old boots and wear my emotional armor to work,
Speaker 1: I must confide that I spend every day quivering inside.
Speaker 1: Thanks for the great podcast. Please send my love and
Speaker 1: support to all other women dealing with similar issues in
Speaker 1: the workplace and tell them to stick with it, as
Speaker 1: I do believe that eventually all of this will get better.
Speaker 1: So I've got a letter here from Stephanie about our
Speaker 1: skateboarding women to Parter, and she writes, greetings from Australia.
Speaker 1: I'm a longtime listener and fan of the podcast and
Speaker 1: found your recent episode on skateboarding particularly interesting as it's
Speaker 1: a hobby of mine, something I do mainly just to
Speaker 1: get from A to B. I had a bit of
Speaker 1: an aha moment while listening to this episode because if
Speaker 1: few weeks ago, I was researching buying a particular board
Speaker 1: and found myself on the website for a major skate
Speaker 1: brand element and something stood out to me and made
Speaker 1: me feel a little sad inside. They sell a whole
Speaker 1: lot of non skateboard products, like clothes, so they split
Speaker 1: the site into men's and women's stuff, and interestingly, they
Speaker 1: put all the actual skateboarding stuff under the men's category.
Speaker 1: The women's section is purely clothing and accessories, which just
Speaker 1: seems to be blatantly loaded with too many assumptions for
Speaker 1: my taste. I never really stopped to consider the gendering
Speaker 1: of skating before this, because I had always thought about
Speaker 1: it as just a fun thing to do, and it
Speaker 1: was quite popular when I lived in a women's dormitory
Speaker 1: at university. I hope you found this interesting stuff, and
Speaker 1: I went to that website and checked it out, and
Speaker 1: it's so true. Yeah, so much, so much cute clothes
Speaker 1: for women, and you just kind of had to dig
Speaker 1: in the men's section to find the skateboard. So gendering
Speaker 1: of skateboards totally exists, y'all. And if you have emails
Speaker 1: to send to us, mom stuff at house works dot
Speaker 1: com is that email address, and for links to all
Speaker 1: of our social media as well as all of our blogs,
Speaker 1: videos and podcasts, including this one with our sources. But
Speaker 1: if you want to learn more about women on money,
Speaker 1: head on over to Stuff Mom Never told You dot com.
Speaker 1: A little more on this and thousands of other topics,
Speaker 1: doesn't how stuff works dot Com