Comments on: Sexism in the lab: Perception and reality mingle

By: rob

rob — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 12:18:53 +0000

the only problem with Greg is that he won’t shut up about Linux!!!!!!!!

everyone knows VMS is the wave of the future.

🙂

By: Scrabcake

Scrabcake — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 21:58:09 +0000

I might have a little something to add to this conversation. I am a female coder in the video game industry, (we’re a rare breed) and I don’t notice too much overt sexism. Well, there is that one guy who can’t talk to me without talking to my boobs, but I’m more amused than offended by that.
I do see a lot of what is in this joke, though. Not being included in lunch outings with the boys, having to constantly fight not to be pidgeonholed in non-hardcore coding jobs like high-level scripting, etc. (It’s funny. I don’t know a single woman who works on graphics or engine. It’s always scripting or build configs or sysadmin. Wonder if they want those jobs or have just been herded towards them. I know a lot for whom the latter is true.)
Our company even has a condescending newb who will walk by the office when I’m asking a question to another programmer and announce “That’s easy! You just do this! (MATH MATH MATH).” He’s a wanker to the other guys, too, so maybe that’s just a young coder-thing.

By: Nathan Myers

Nathan Myers — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 21:05:05 +0000

Jodi: No, you’re just smarter than most people. You knew it was a male undergrad because otherwise there would be no story: she would have crushed the whelp at the outset.

By: Anne Gilbert

Anne Gilbert — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 19:10:43 +0000

How typical. Of some guys and girls, anyway.
Anne G

By: Jodi

Jodi — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 18:46:04 +0000

Huh.
It’s funny you titled this with ‘perception’ because without knowing any other information about the post and taking it completely at face value I was left with a different perception than everyone else I guess. I was left feeling like the ‘friend’ was being sexist because she guessed that it was a guy undergrad. Now I admit that I also guessed part way through that it was a guy (so that wasn’t cool of me either), but by the end I thought that was Greg’s point.
Weird, have I got something totally wrong here?

By: Kate

Kate — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 16:46:04 +0000

How many times did I have this conversation with fellow women in grad school? “Oh, sexism never happens to me, we are in a post-sexist academia, hooray.” And then “I couldn’t believe that guy in my section and how he demeaned me and doubted everything I said” or “That prof’s eyes never went higher than my boobs” etc etc etc…

By: D. C. Sessions

D. C. Sessions — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 16:14:26 +0000

Passing it off as a ‘gender issue’ demeans everyone.

But it might actually be a gender issue.

The problem is that in the vast universe of human behavior, there are always ambiguous cases where there’s room for doubt [1]. For those of us who can deal with (or even like) ambiguity, uncertainty, error bars, etc. it’s a question of where we strike the balance between Type I and Type II errors — and the prices we’re willing to accept for being wrong. Which we accept will happen.

For those who can’t stand being wrong, can’t handle ambiguity, etc.? I guess that’s a different story.

[1] At least in the real world. I reject the degenerate cases of “there is no such thing as sexism” and “of course it’s sexism — now what was the question?”

By: ERV

ERV — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 14:47:35 +0000

Why am I going to kick Gregs ass? I agree with this post. Personality conflicts being degraded into ‘UR SEXISZT!’, when gender has shit to do with anything.

Their analysis program is wrong. The kid is right, and anal retentive. Has nothing to do with ‘boys’ looking down on ‘girls’ in math. Passing it off as a ‘gender issue’ demeans everyone.

By: CyberLizard

CyberLizard — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 14:11:40 +0000

I’ll be completely honest, I am confused by the whole thing. I’ve never quite gotten all the subtleties of the all this sexism stuff. Before I get written off as a misogynistic asshole, lemme ‘splain. Having some mental traits generally associated with Aspergers, I don’t get the subtleties of many social interactions. Unless it’s printed in 30pt courier font and prominently hung in front of my nose, I’m liable to miss it. Sometimes it’s easier than others. If I hear a man tell his wife, “Get back in the kitchen and make me some pie, bitch,” that’s pretty easy to call.

I’ve read a lot of Greg’s stuff and never had any impression of sexism. He can be obscure and obtuse (at least to me, but I never done gradiated from colluge), but I haven’t seen him be sexist.

*shrug*

whatever

By: Jason Thibeault

Jason Thibeault — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 14:10:22 +0000

I didn’t see Saint Comment. I suppose nobody kept it, either. Now how will I be able to see pareidolia of it in my toast? We’ll have to draw Westernized caricatures of Saint Comment in flowing robes and a halo now.