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From: wmartin@brl-tgr.ARPA (Will Martin )
Newsgroups: net.women,net.singles,net.consumers
Subject: A *real* problem
Message-ID: <11626@brl-tgr.ARPA>
Date: Tue, 16-Jul-85 17:06:01 EDT
Article-I.D.: brl-tgr.11626
Posted: Tue Jul 16 17:06:01 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 19-Jul-85 02:08:38 EDT
Distribution: net
Organization: USAMC ALMSA
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Xref: watmath net.women:6472 net.singles:7972 net.consumers:2655

Here's an issue that affects every single person, every working mother,
every member of a two-person houshold where both work (no matter what
sex they are or what the nature/status of their relationship), yet I do
not hear complaints about it, do not see protests about it, and I
haven't even seen gripes about it on the net (so here's one! :-):

Stores and any other retail businesses that have hours like 9-5 on
weekdays and either limited or no Saturday or Sunday hours.

The vast majority of people who work have jobs that fall in the area of
9 AM - 5 PM weekdays; even if they have flexitime or different hours, the
time to travel between the workplace and the store/business location would
make it next to impossible to patronize businesses that have these
limited hours of operation. In many cases, there are no competitors that
can be patronized instead, due either to location or the nature of the
business -- these are often service-oriented or special-purpose stores
or operations that are unique in their region, or the area cannot
support more than one.

These operations insult women -- they are stating, by their hours of
operation, that they expect that evey household has a non-working member
that can come to them during the hours that they are open, and that
person has traditionally been the "housewife". 

Yet I see no feminist-organized protests, boycots, firebombings, attacks
on the proprietors, etc. I think there should be -- isn't this basic
discrimination? Why isn't there a movement to force the "normal" retail
store hours to become something like "noon-to-8 PM"? This would provide
both daytime and evening service, and yet the store operators and
employees would not be working longer hours. 

Comments? (This is inspired by my taking a special trip after work
yesterday to a small clothing store, which is one of the few places I
can find reasonably-priced stuff in my size, and finding it all closed
and locked at 5:25 PM, and then passing and noting an appliance-parts
store that also closed at 5 PM, and had only morning Saturday hours.)

Will Martin

USENET: seismo!brl-bmd!wmartin     or   ARPA/MILNET: wmartin@almsa-1.ARPA