Archive for the 'gender' category

Announcing #AlliesFTW Q&A

Oct 04 2012 Published by under academia, gender, queer

A while back on twitter, I got in a conversation with Joe (@josephlsimonis) from charismatics are dangerous about what folks in academia can do to be allies for the queer* students in their midst, especially trans* folks**. As we were chatting about things that profs/teachers/faculty can do to help queer students feel welcome and comfortable in academia I realized that I really had no idea.  I don't know what will help other queer folks feel comfortable in any given lab group environment. And yet, I am in a position where there may be queer students in the classes that I teach. And if there is anything I can do to foster their interests in science, I want to know what it is, so that I can do it. In short, I want to be an active ally. But how? What specific steps can I take to make the academic environment better for queer students? We talked about allies in the DiS Blog Carnival earlier this year, and came up with some good ideas when Labroides asked what a new prof could do to create an environment that fostered diversity, so that ze could recruit and retain folks from different backgrounds into hir group. And now is a great time for all of us to up our game. This leads us to the announcement:

ANNOUNCING #AlliesFTW

Queer students often have widely different classroom experiences that can vary based on their specific queer identity/expression, as well as and any other identities which might intersect with their queerness in the classroom. Many young adults are coming out/identifying as queer while in college, and so the classroom and other academic settings are important places to make as welcoming and affirming as possible.

We are hosting a blog Q&A to discuss the issues that queer students have in academia, and to try to figure out what those of us in a role of  professor/teacher can do to foster an environment that allows our queer students to thrive. Since every student and environment is different, we hope that we can get a diverse group of folks both asking questions and contributing answers. So here's the plan: over the next couple of weeks, we are going to be asking for you to submit questions for the Q&A carnival. If you are a teacher/prof, what questions do you have about how to be a super ally? If you are a queer student, what do you wish the teacher/prof would take into consideration? Submit your answers in the comments section here or on Joe's blog, or email your responses to me (gmail at primaryinvestigator) or her (gmail at josephlsimonis). If you would like to remain anonymous we will strip your emails from any identifying information before posting questions on the blog. And if you are on twitter, join in with the hashtag #AlliesFTW.

We will collect question/comments until Oct 19 or so. Then Joe and I will put together the list of questions and post them on our respective blogs so that you can all chime in to give us a sense of which are the best ones to answer first. Then we will try to address each question/comment on the blog. We can only speak from our personal experiences, so the hope is that we will spark a good discussion that includes and reflects the spectrum of experiences.  We will try to keep the series going as long as progress is being made. In the end we can all be better allies!

 

*by queer, we mean anyone who falls under the broad lgbtqgqia+ or "gender and sexual minority" banners
**the trans* notation, with asterisk,  is a way to note that gender is not binary, and there are not just "boys" and "girls". I learned about it from Joe, and it is pretty awesome.

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Say it with me: XX are not inherently "bitchy"

Jul 10 2012 Published by under academia, gender

Today as I am flitting about spastically trying to get shit done before I leave town tomorrow, I was distracted by a conversation on twitter that pissed me off SO MUCH. I don't know how it started, I noticed when someone made a comment about hiring (I think it was Namnezia [ed: OK, so it was apparently ProfLike Substance. My bad - gz]) wondering if the boilerplate diversity statement "woman and minorities are encouraged to apply" actually did anything to encourage women or minorities to apply. A fair question, I think.

And then shit went off the rails. There are apparently a lot of tweeps that are urging their PIs to hire men for open positions in their lab. Not because the XY candidates are more qualified or anything. But because there are already "too many" females. Now, I think that most labs have too few members to make an argument about over- or under-representation (statistics of low n and such). I tried to ignore this conversation - I have a lot of shit to do! But I couldn't resist pointing out that the XX faculty are pretty underrepresented where I am. Other folks chimed in that this was true for them, too. Now this is just another anectdote, I know. But there is a certain amount of hand-wringing about the "leaky pipeline" that I think XX representation in science IS actually a problem*.

So why do the tweeps (many of them XX, btw) feel the need for more XY lab mates? Because "too may XX - more conflict/bitchiness/problems in the lab".

OH FOR FUCK SAKE PEOPLE. Can we stop with this already? Men are just as conflict-prone and bitchy as women. It is just that we hold it against the XX. This is the classic no-win situation. Please, stop this shit. Everyone. It drives me insane to hear WOMEN make this argument. Ladies. We can do better than this.

I think I may have bitched about this topic before.

 

*again, I'm a little swamped so I don't have time to look up the stats.

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weekend fun: #usethe19th

Mar 24 2012 Published by under gender

I few days ago, while ranting about discussing the hostile attitude toward women in the current political environment, I raised up the idea that we should consider a 19th amendment solution to this problem. I know this will come as a shock. Really. But other people had the same idea! And even better they followed up and started a whole twitter-hash-tag thing that is getting some attention!! The idea is that we don't have to just sit here when some idiot says something ridiculous. What we need to do is get out there and VOTE so that the idiots don't have a platform anymore. That's right...let's vote the misogynist fuck knuckles out of office. WOO HOO!

You can learn more about the #usethe19th campaign by checking out the twitter or facebook. And join in by adding the #usethe19th hashtag when you tweet (yet another) example of stupid legislation or idiot rhetoric. Good times!

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falling back

Mar 11 2012 Published by under gender

There are a lot of folks complaining right now about the "lost hour" from daylight savings time. And tomorrow morning when my alarm goes off I will have the same thoughts.

But really there is something much worse going on. There is a group of d00ds out there that would like to turn the clock back more than just one hour. Way more. These fellows believe that women aren't smart enough to make good choices. State after state has been passing laws that dictate what information must be provided a woman before she gets an abortion. Even if she (and her doctor) don't think it is necessary. Even if the information requires an invasive exam, like a transvaginal ultrasound. It is no surprise that the GOP wants to make abortion illegal. But recently things have been getting really nasty. Not only are women not to be trusted to gather all the important information. But sometimes, us ladeez will make the wrong choice if do have the info. As Dr. Jen Gunter points out, there are already NINE states that have made it legal for doctors to lie to women.

What. The. Fuck.

Even though these d00ds - and they are almost ALL d00ds - are not only convinced that we can't make good choices after we get pregnant. They are also pretty sure that we shouldn't really get to choose whether or not we get pregnant. For reasons that I can't comprehend, the GOP has decided that birth control shouldn't be a thing. OH, and they also are not a fan of sex ed. Basically, they seem to think that everything would be OK if the wimmin would just quit bein so damn slutty. And they would probably like it if we would kindly retreat back into the kitchen to make them a sammich.

It is a little hard for me to believe that we are going to argue about whether or not women should be treated equally in society during the 2012 presidential election. I always thought that the heavy lifting (for this) was done by the women in my mom and grandmother's generations. Like many, I have called my congressional representatives to make sure that they know where I stand on this issue. And I've given some cash to planned parenthood and such.

Last week, after I re-tweeted a link to another news story about the latest way to make sure the ladeez were doin the right thing, Cackle of Rad wanted to know how she could join in to fight against this bullshit. I wish I knew the right answer. I feel like we are lacking a cohesive and powerful response to the fuck-knuckles that are pushing these stupid policies. We need to look back on how our mother's generation organized themselves, and learn from their success. But in the short term, we need a nineteenth amendment solution. Everyone that believes women should be treated as full and equal American citizens needs to get out this year and make sure that folks with these horrible viewpoints are not elected.

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Kate Clancy is putting together a internet-derby team!

Jan 25 2012 Published by under gender

Hey all, just lifting my head above the rising water that is this grant application for a second. In the craziness, I almost missed the fact that Kate Clancy has a post up about Blogging While Female. You should all go over there and read it, then sign up to join her posse. I was resistant to jumping through the registration hoop at SciAm, but she convinced me.

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seriously? who writes this stuff?

Jan 21 2012 Published by under academia, gender

"The application should be no more than 3 pages. They need not be in the detail requested by NIH for R01 grants"

Is it just me, or are those two sentences stupidly redundant?

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Sometimes people are just assholes

Jan 11 2012 Published by under academia, gender

The other day my new lab had a happy hour to ring in the new year. I have also just landed a new grad student (WOO HOO) and also convinced a super-awesome high-level research scientist* to join my group. I'm seriously psyched. :)

While my newly-expanded group was all sitting around a table I realized all of the sudden that we are overwhelmingly female. Including undergrads and rotation students right now we are 7 women and 1 man. Weird! When I first started my lab we were pretty close to 1:1 but when numbers are small it is easy to fluctuate pretty quickly, I guess. I'm really happy with my group right now. Everyone is engaged and works together really well. I don't really care how many X or Y chromosomes we have.

Shortly after noticing that my lab had skewed in one direction someone on twitter made a comment about how the gender distribution of their lab was skewed (I'm not sure who started the thread-the first one in my timeline is @27andaphd). As expected with low n numbers, there were labs that were mostly male, and some that were mostly female. No big deal, right. But then the conversation took a weird turn. Someone* mentioned that they were in a male-dominated group and that this was good because they don't like to work with women because "I'm a hard ass". This was followed by @agreenmonster who tweeted:

I have a big problem here. This is an idea that gets kicked around a lot. The idea that women who are faculty are somehow not as rigorous as their male colleagues. And the ones that are competent are mean or psycho or evil and "pull up the ladder" because they don't want junior women to succeed.

I CALL BULLSHIT.

Yes, there are some women academics that are assholes. There are also men down the hall that are assholes. Sometimes, people are just assholes. It has nothing to do with their gender. But there is a common stereotype that women are worse than men. And THIS is the kind of attitude that makes it hard to be a women in the sciences. If you get along with everyone you are "soft" and probably not rigorous. Maternal, maybe. But if you are a hard-ass then you are a "psycho" that is "pulling up the ladder". This is a ridiculous double standard. If this is what you expect from a woman scientist, then this is what you will perceive. It will be a self-fulfilling prophesy And it is FUCKED UP.

There are some shitty mentors out there. Some of them are women. But not all of them. If we only highlight the women that are assholes this leads to a perception that women and men are different. This sets the bar for all women, and it makes the whole academic situation harder. Because now, if you are a woman in academia you might try to behave in such a way that everyone won't think that you are "psycho". Maybe you try not to be aggressive or "bitchy" (the feminine of aggressive, to some). Now you are perceived as less rigorous or engaged. You can't win.

We have to stop this. If you hear this kind of bullshit, call it out. The twitter conversation about this topic ended with everyone agreeing that assholes gonna be assholes. And hopefully convinced some folks that they can't let these kinda statements just fly by without comment.

There is no such thing as a "male" way to do science. There is just culture and the way groups interact. I'm kinda a hard-ass, myself. I've been told that my lab has a pretty "male" culture**. In my group, I expect a lot of people. It's OK to be wrong, because if you are never wrong you are Doing It Wrong. But you have to be willing to defend your ideas and recognize when your arguments fail. Sometimes discussions get pretty animated (even aggressive). But we all understand that, while it is OK to be wrong, it is not OK to be disrespectful. You can tell someone their idea is full of shit, but it's not personal. Attacking ideas is expected, attacking people is not tolerated. There is nothing "male" about that. It is just kick-ass science.

 

*since they have a protected twitter account I won't list them by name here.

**don't worry-I also make sure the person that said this knew how fucked up it was.

NOTE ADDED IN PROOF: Hermie totally scooped me!!! Make sure that you go and read her views on this, which are spot-on.

[edited to remove my html cheating]

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fucking awesome (chapter 2)

Dec 23 2011 Published by under awesomeness, gender

I am apparently on a mission to restore (my own?) faith in humanity this week! This entry was brought to my attention by the Most Fantastic Tideliar on the twitter. If you can read this without getting all warm and fuzzy then I don't think we can be friends:

One Teacher's Approach to Preventing Gender Bullying in a Classroom

My job is not to judge, but to teach, and I can’t teach if the students in my class are distracted or uncomfortable. My job is also about preparing students to be a part of our society, ready to work and play with all kinds of people. I found that teaching about gender stereotypes is another social justice issue that needs to be addressed, like racism or immigrant rights, or protecting the environment.

I think this is the first time ever I wished I lived in Wisconsin. And I'm gonna forward this link to Mini-G's preschool teacher. Just Awesome :D

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WTF?! "Equal" Pay Day

Apr 11 2011 Published by under academia, gender

It is not news that, on average, men make more than women to do the same job. This year 12 April is Equal Pay day. From the AAUW website:

Equal Pay Day is the symbolic point at which the average woman's salary finally catches up to the average man's earnings from the previous year. This year, Equal Pay Day falls on April 12.

How fucking much does that suck?!?!!! It really blows my mind that this is state of affairs. It may be that some women "choose" jobs that are lower-paying because it works better for their family. I don't have a problem with this, really. Everyone has to make decisions that are best for their family and situation. It strikes me, however, that it is overwhelmingly the woman that ends up passing on a career for the good of the family. I can't help but wonder about how society exerts pressures on us that maybe we aren't even aware of.

When I was negotiating my faculty position, I had heard that women make less than men on the tenure track because they just don't ask for more. I work at a public institution, and the salaries of all government employees are publicly available. I had also looked up the numbers for my state on the AAUP Faculty Salary Survey. So I knew going in to the negotiations that women in every department of my university makes ~10% less than their male counterparts. I find this rather embarrassing, but the data are there. In fact, other recently hired women in my MRU made significantly less than men. When I got my offer, the salary was lower than what I had been expecting based on my research. So I asked for more. That's the right answer, yes? But when I brought up salary during the negotiations, mentioning what I considered relevant similar salaries. But my Chair did not find this a very convincing argument, even after I raised up the fact that women in the school routinely make less than men. I think that he knew I would probably not walk away from the job over this amount of salary. It was only when I reminded him that I would be bringing in indirect $ from Day 1 (from my R00) that he agreed to talk to the Dean. In the end, I got what I think is a pretty fair deal. Could a man have done better? I don't know. Based on the data, I can only say "probably". Maybe I could have pushed harder. But, being a woman, that could also have backfired.

So I don't know what the right answer is. But today I will advertise Equal Pay Day, and I will attend the local AAUW event. I hope that by raising up  this problem, we can start the process of correcting the situation.

h/t to Pascale over at WhizBang, who brought "Equal" pay day to my attention.

UPDATE: Don't miss these other excellent "Equal" Pay Day posts on Scientopia:

Pascale-$16,819 for a Penis
Dr. Beccca-Equal Pay Day Epic FAIL
GrrlScientist-Penis Parity Day

And while you are at it, make sure you call your Congress/Senate Critters to make sure they support the Paycheck Fairness Act, which is being reintroduced today.

MOAR UPDATE! Even more "Equal" Pay Day posts at Scientopia

Janet Stemwedel-Equal Pay Day: there is power in a union
FCS-Good Hair Day, Fair Pay Day
PLS-Equal Pay Day!

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true colors?

Mar 11 2011 Published by under academia, colleagues, exhaustion, gender, hiring

As you may know, my department is in the middle of a junior faculty search. I went through the search process as a candidate last year, but this year I'm sitting in the room on the other side of the process. It is...illuminating. The process has certainly made me see some of my new colleagues from a very different perspective.

First, the statistics: we had almost 600 applicants for our position. 30-50 were very, very good. We picked less than 1/4 of these to interview.

I noticed that there were several women that disclosed in their application that they were married to male scientists that would also be looking for a job. Many of these women were REALLY good. In fact, I would say that all of the men were the trailing spouses. We did not interview ANY of these women (or men). I would like to know who gave these applicants the HORRIBLE advice to disclose this info in the initial job packet. Negotiating a two-body issue is something that happens after a job offer has been made. Please, women of the sciences that aspire to the tenure track: DO NOT MENTION YOUR MARITAL STATUS IN YOUR COVER LETTER.

And now, a thing that really pisses me off: the extra scrutiny. I have noticed that the white d00ds that I work with have a habit of looking at certain candidates a little more closely than normally. Not in a good way. For instance, when women did not mention a 2-body problem, there was generally some discussion about whether we could "guess" if there was a second body. This was NEVER brought up for male candidates, though I assume that the men were just as likely to be married to another scientist. But the real kicker was that EVERY single non-white sounding name would lead my colleagues to reveal that they are assholes. People would wonder whether their English was "understandable". Yes, we do some teaching in our department. BUT SERIOUSLY, these are folks that have had a very successful postdoc. They wrote papers and gave talks at conferences. Many have been in the US since they were undergraduates. WTF?!

And then, there were a few instances of bad behavior that made me so mad that I wanted to throw something. I am not going to go into details with these, because I would like to maintain some level of pseudonymity. These events often involved ridiculous statements made directly to candidates. And this is when everyone was supposed to be on their best behavior!! I tried to "nudge" my more senior colleagues when I witnessed these incidents. I tried to explain why their "innocent" statements were offensive (in the most respectful way possible). On one occasion I was so horrified that I even went to the Chair to make sure he knew what was going on.

So, here is a question for my esteemed reader(s): as a junior faculty, should I just shut my trap and keep my head down? Or should I keep pointing out when things are fucked up, in the hopes that I will be able to "nudge" the d00ds to behave better?

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