Posted on 03/10/2011 8:25:09 AM PST by pabianice
If women are so equal, why aren’t there more of us in science and, for that matter, in politics? On the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day, I got an earful about this stuff. The gender lopsidedness in certain fields obviously proves that, despite women’s impressive gains, we still have a long way to go before we can declare victory in the battle for women’s rights.
The trouble is, it’s not at all obvious why these gaps persist, or what should be done about them. The hackneyed old complaints about systemic bias against women no longer seem convincing. Yet, other hypotheses can be downright dangerous. Just ask Larry Summers, the former Harvard president who was ultimately ousted after he speculated that the preponderance of men atop certain math-heavy fields might partly be explained by the higher variance of male IQ scores at the extreme top and bottom of the Bell curve. Kapow! Instead of defending his right to think freely, academics demanded his head.
(Excerpt) Read more at theglobeandmail.com ...
Since then, UMass has simply increased the stupidity and ignorance of what had been a good school of social sciences. The schools of chemistry, engineering, and computer technology remain first class. Alas, there are very few women students there.
If there is an issue that provokes further study it may be why women outnumber men 3-1 in veterinary school.
So when do we declare "victory" in this battle?
When all men are dead?
When all men are unemployed?
When all men work for women?
What, exactly, is the goal, and how will we know when we have achieved it?
I am sick to death of this crap. I am tired of hearing it. I do not give a rat’s ass why there are not more women in science. It has nothing, Nothing, NOTHING to do with opportunity.
Maybe...MAYbe, MAYBE women just don’t WANT to go into those fields.
Here is an idea-let’s have the government FORCE them into those fields. That is a real winning idea.
I am sick of this. I have seen and heard it bemoaned over and over and over and over and over again.
Women control the most valuable real estate in the world. They already run circles around us. What more do they want? All out war??
It is Marxist ideology that women and men are exactly the same—that is why the perceived “discrimination” rant. It is communists that are yelling so tell them to shut the hell up.
Biology proves that men and women are different so how can there be the same outcomes?????? Only in a fascist society can there be quotas, etc., which is what we are becoming because of Marxist ideology. QUOTAS are FASCISM and we used to outlaw that.
Best to get back to the Founding principles of this country and throw out the flawed, evil, fascist thinking of communists.
Is there a separate category for Muslim women that are hung or stoned to death?
I agree completely. My rant was directed that way, not women in general. Most women I know do not regard this as a major issue. They have more important fish to fry.
If you don't have that way of thinking long before you get into college, you aren't likely to thrive in that environment during or after college. It isn't solely pure intelligence.
If aliens from another planet came to earth, they would almost certainly view men and women as two different species.
Actually, many men and women view the other sex as a different species...:)
Great post—and I’m a woman, raising 3 boys, and I know exactly what you mean. . .science may be interesting to girls (and it was and is to me) but it is rarely FASCINATING to girls like it is to boys, maybe not to all but to many. . .
LOL...so true.
I remember taking my dad’s temporarily non-functional Rolex as a 7 year old, and disassembling it to fix it. This is no small feat, and required a vice, a hammer and a screwdriver. Needless to say, there was “sproinging” involved and missing/non-fitting components, and I surreptitiously threw his er...Rolex into a field so he wouldn’t find it.
For the rest of his life, he would stroke his chin and sometimes muse about “What happened to that Rolex I used to have?”
I was never able to tell him. Even as an adult, I just never had the courage. Of course...now that he is in heaven, he knows the whole story...:)
Has it occured to these brain-dead liberal morons that its possible, just possible that more men than women are interested in STEAM careers?
My wife and I had a discussion about this very thing (well, making explosives in general, I think it was thermite, in particular) not long ago.
"Why would you want to do that?", she asked.
"It's fun. Why wouldn't you?", I answered.
"Well, I don't know anyone who did that as a kid."
"Well, I don't know anyone who didn't."
Different sexes, different mindsets. I don't know too many guys who had tea parties with their other guy friends, either.
I’m such a good mommy. That picture makes me laugh so much that I couldn’t resist showing it to my 15 year old son.
There are people who think that to harbor that thought is to be an evil sexist.
Maybe so, but I have always thought it was true to a degree.
I know some spectacular female engineers (far more talented than I will ever be) so it is not brainpower that is the issue, and I have never thought it was.
It is interest. And I do think there IS a difference. But liberals have a problem with that. They cannot believe for a single second that is true. In Nature vs. Nurture, they firmly believe that Nurture will win 100% if the time, no questions asked.
My brother and sister-in-law felt that way, but when their boy was growing up, no matter how hard they kept him away from those “sexist violent influences”, they couldn’t restrain him from going where nature wanted him to go.
For example, they did all they could to make guns bad and evil, but my brother once told me he actually took a slice of Wonder Bread and tore the crust off in the shape of a handgun and brandished it as such!
An no matter how hard they tried to keep dolls away from their daughter, she would make dishtowels into dolls.
My eldest daughter, when looking for what she wanted to do with her life, took one of those tests that tell you what your strengths and weanesses are. Well, she is so smart that there were no weaknesses, she could do whatever she wanted. So, I began going over a list of things; doctor, dentist, etc. And, although she wasn't sure about a major, she was definitely sure she did not want to go into a science type of career. It had nothing to do with intelligence, she just didn't like that type of stuff and didn't want to spend her life doing it. I think a lot of young women fall into that same type of category, where they are intelligent; but, they just don't like science or math and don't want to spend their lives in those fields. It has nothing to do with bias.
I think she surprised herself, though, when going for her Masters, that she really liked statistics.
Time or Newsweek, believe it or not, back in the late 80s:
“If aliens from came to earth and saw the vast array of career and life choices available to women, and the automated, electronic devices that ease and simplify modern women’s traditional or chosen roles, the aliens would likely comment that no one group has ever had so much freedom and self-determination. And they would likely be vehemently condemned and villified for saying such.”
“The trouble is, it?s not at all obvious why these gaps persist”
Oh c’mon!
“Most women I know do not regard this as a major issue. “
I couldn’t agree with you more.
I’m female. Thirty years ago, I earned a Chemistry degree. There were several of my female high school classmates that went on to college and earned degrees in biology, chemistry, engineering, etc. and went on to have wonderful careers, so I never saw myself as an isolated case.
Furthermore, in college, out of 14 chemistry majors that graduated in the same semester, 6 were female. Three wanted to go on to professional schools (pre-med and pharmacy), and three (myself included) wanted to get jobs in industry. We all got what we wanted — the applicants to med school got in and those of us that wanted to work had jobs lined up before we ever graduated.
There are no barriers if someone has the aptitude and is willing to work hard. Not 30 years ago, and certainly not now.
BTW, the guys did just as well. Out of the 8, the 7 that were pre-med, pre-dental, etc, ... all got in. The one that wanted to work in industry had a job lined up with a signing bonus before even beginning our final semester. The science programs at this university had the reputation of being rigorous, too (still do). No grading on curves.
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