Gender discrimination as a TA/student attendance

[GeoDUDE!]

I think there is a lot of really sloppy logic in this thread. I find some of the responses offensive in their vitriol, especially considering what both my mother and aunt had to go through.  The enemy of knowledge and critical thinking is the assumption of knowing in itself; when you think you know you stop thinking. A postmodern conundrum. 

 

To be clear, wanting to be around people you find attractive no way means that you disqualify other attributes. The large assumption you all made is that just because in my situation I chose the cute TA in my case, because she was cute, does not mean I completely disqualify other attributes to build my preferences.

 

Which is the more reasonable assumption, that because the cute TA is hired by the university I  think she is qualified for her job as a base or that an educated man would choose to ask questions of someone who is completely unqualified on the basis of their looks?  You all forget that both have the same job, so both should be equally qualified to do their job. ALL other observations are subjective. 

 

As a male, who has TAed for 3 years, I've been uncomfortable for many reasons. Whenever I am uncomfortable because a student is out of line, I let them know. I know there are societal pressures on women that there aren't on men, but lets be clear: I've had few cases were a student has shut the door on my office and has made completely inappropriate comments to me. It happens to everyone.

 

There is an implication from the responses to my question: that just because someone is uncomfortable it means that person causing it should stop. There would be solid ground for that implication if even a polarity of women TAs felt that every time they got male students asking them questions, it was because of their looks. But how can we know this? And how do we not know that some women don't mind, or a majority of women don't mind? How do we know that every woman thinks of it this way?

 

If a student goes up to a female TA and says "oh your the cute TA, so i'll ask you questions", that is unquestionably sexual harassment. Preferences are  not this case. Being unprofessional and having preferences are two different things. And my thoughts are my own. She might make assumptions about my reasons, but I have no control over that in reality. I have no idea what assumptions she's making unless she voices them.  Some people are more insecure about things than others. I get that. I just don't see the logic against what most people already do anyway, even if they aren't willing to be honest. 

Edited February 8, 2015 by GeoDUDE!

[GeoDUDE!]

No, it's a bunch of women coming into the thread giving their accounts. I am trying to point out that there are two sides to this coin which seems to the large devil in the room. These so called instances of "gender discrimination" (whether they were actual discrimination or due to a large number of other factors is irrelevant) seem to only matter when they are happening to women given the tone of this thread. And the post above me is a perfect example of that.

 

 You might want to tone down the "bunch of women". I think there is some truth in what you are saying about this thread, but I am not sure this is a productive way of communicating that. 

[victorydance]

 You might want to tone down the "bunch of women". I think there is some truth in what you are saying about this thread, but I am not sure this is a productive way of communicating that. 

 

I don't mean it in a negative way. Just a description (and I think perfectly accurate) of what has unfolded in this thread. I mean, the sentence that I was replying to, the one in bold, was kind of useless considering the vast majority of the anecdotes or opinions have come from, well, biased sources. 

Edited February 8, 2015 by victorydance

[jujubea]

Holy cow!

That benschmidt link FuzzyLogician posted is paradigm-altering!

What a cool study!

(And sad...)

[fuzzylogician]

I don't mean it in a negative way. Just a description (and I think perfectly accurate) of what has unfolded in this thread. I mean, the sentence that I was replying to, the one in bold, was kind of useless considering the vast majority of the anecdotes or opinions have come from, well, biased sources. 

 

And what would be an unbiased source, exactly? Maybe the study I linked to that clearly shows a gender bias in teaching evaluations? And lets not be naive, this bias also comes up during the semester, and it affects people's careers through hiring decisions and promotions, not just people's feelings (in case that isn't enough). I don't understand why people think it's acceptable to argue that "I am a man and this has happened to me too, so there is no problem of gender discrimination here." The study (and it's not the only one out there) clearly shows an overall trend, and that doesn't mean that there are no exceptions but there is something here that we should pay attention to.

 

People write about their own experiences as a way to share and to learn that they are not the only one that this has happened to. The OP specifically asks for these stories. It can be a lonely place to be in when you think you are being discriminated against but aren't sure. There aren't too many places where you can share this. As I already wrote, it's really hard to know, when you feel something like this is happening to you, why it is and whether it has to do with your gender or the color of your eyes or just that the student isn't sure how to pronounce your name, or a million other things. But the data shows that it happens, so I am inclined to believe that at least some of the "anecdotes and opinions" that you say come from "biased sources" are real. We should listen to people when they tell us they feel discriminated against. 

[Vene]

How did you come to make these assumptions?

From this very thread, actually. You brought up a women manipulating a male TA using her looks. Prior to that there was discussion about a male student wanting to talk to a particular TA because she's attractive. This is the dynamic seen. Surely you don't believe these two events are equivalent to each other, do you?

[dr. t]

Relevant link: http://www.fastcompany.com/3034895/strong-female-lead/the-one-word-men-never-see-in-their-performance-reviews

 

Extra credit reading: http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/reasons-you-were-not-promoted-that-are-totally-unrelated-to-gender

[Cass]

And what would be an unbiased source, exactly? Maybe the study I linked to that clearly shows a gender bias in teaching evaluations? And lets not be naive, this bias also comes up during the semester, and it affects people's careers through hiring decisions and promotions, not just people's feelings (in case that isn't enough). I don't understand why people think it's acceptable to argue that "I am a man and this has happened to me too, so there is no problem of gender discrimination here." The study (and it's not the only one out there) clearly shows an overall trend, and that doesn't mean that there are no exceptions but there is something here that we should pay attention to.

 

People write about their own experiences as a way to share and to learn that they are not the only one that this has happened to. The OP specifically asks for these stories. It can be a lonely place to be in when you think you are being discriminated against but aren't sure. There aren't too many places where you can share this. As I already wrote, it's really hard to know, when you feel something like this is happening to you, why it is and whether it has to do with your gender or the color of your eyes or just that the student isn't sure how to pronounce your name, or a million other things. But the data shows that it happens, so I am inclined to believe that at least some of the "anecdotes and opinions" that you say come from "biased sources" are real. We should listen to people when they tell us they feel discriminated against. 

A+ 

Combining discussion of personal experiences with studies (and, as you say, there are many) that demonstrate the existence of gender discrimination in the sciences is extremely useful, especially on the internet  (http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/womens-blog/2015/feb/06/sharing-stories-of-sexism-on-social-media-is-21st-century-activism?CMP=share_btn_tw) where it feels less risky and where others are more likely to feel safe enough to speak up. 

I try to be as outspoken as possible at school, but it can be hard. Some friends and I had a blatantly sexist professor last semester who also happens to be in a position of some authority in the department. Warranted or not, a lot of the girls are afraid that he'll be able to ruin their careers if they say anything to make him angry. He's already gone out of his way to make things extremely difficult for one of the girls and it scared everyone else so much that a couple people wouldn't even write anonymous evaluations for fear that he'd be able to tell who they were. So, it's difficult for anything to be done about the problem because the voice of 1 student isn't really enough to make a difference against the voice of a distinguished professor. But we're not going to get to the point where others feel brave enough to add their voices officially to a situation like that if they're afraid to even discuss their experiences, casually. Knowing that others have been through similar things really helps soften the blow. My own advisor, who often side-steps conversations like that, finally told me some of her own experiences (I think she finally started to see what a hard time I'd been having with that professor) and it was terrifying, but also extremely refreshing. 

I don't think anyone here is suggesting that anecdotes are science or that there is no element of bias when women are adding their personal experiences to the discussion, but 1) where there's bias in women saying sexism exists, there is just as much bias in men saying it doesn't and 2) as mentioned above, a variety of studies have demonstrated the existence of sexism in science, so even if some of the personal anecdotes are not actually the result of sexism it seems likely that many of them are exactly that and knowing that there's at least a possibility that you're not just paranoid is an extremely positive thing. In fact, the paranoia itself is the result of sexism. Because we know sexism exists, we know it could be affecting us, but we can't always be sure that it is. So, people are sometimes afraid to speak up because they know there's a chance they're wrong and if nobody else is speaking up we have no way of recognizing when patterns emerge or any way of dealing with them.

[Usmivka]

Here's a study that shows similar results to your experience: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10755-014-9313-4

Good link. This sort of (sometimes unrecognized) bias makes a big difference to how TAs and younger profs (but apparently not older faculty) are perceived re knowledge, competency, and preparedness. Because I don't think I've seen it pointed out in this thread (instead it's focused on male students), this sort of implicit bias is not limited to male students either, the linked study and other educational research studies suggest that female students similarly rate female instructors lower than their male counterparts of similar teaching skill (or rate the males higher if you prefer to think of it that way).

 

If I think back to how I've perceived instructors at the college and graduate school level, I have been more likely to perceive young female TAs and faculty instructors as unprepared, poor instructors, or unduly harsh/combative, and I've been more likely to skip their classes and come up with flimsy excuses or otherwise act in a contrarian manner. It's possible some of those instructors really were bad at their jobs, but I rarely acted the same way with an equivalent male instructor (again, trying to more objectively evaluate this years later, and memory is fickle). I wonder how many of of those participating in this thread, male or female, would come to the same conclusion looking back now?

Edited February 8, 2015 by Usmivka

[victorydance]

From this very thread, actually. You brought up a women manipulating a male TA using her looks. Prior to that there was discussion about a male student wanting to talk to a particular TA because she's attractive. This is the dynamic seen. Surely you don't believe these two events are equivalent to each other, do you?

 

....

 

 

 

Two examples (from the same colleague): for a while, male students would break rules of varying seriousness and then simply wink at her, thinking they're being charming and that flirting with her would be cause for a pass. She was understandably freaked out by this and consulted a supervisor. Another time, a male student was very touchy with her and would always touch her arm when trying to finesse an accommodation.

 

 

There are men trying to hit on female TAs.

 

There are women trying to hit on male TAs.

 

There are men trying to hit on female TAs for personal gain.

 

There are women trying to hit on male TAs for personal gain.

 

None of this is gender discrimination. Are they ridiculous and completely unprofessional behaviours? Certainly, but hardly a form of discrimination. 

[fuzzylogician]

....

 

None of this is gender discrimination. Are they ridiculous and completely unprofessional behaviours? Certainly, but hardly a form of discrimination. 

 

Then why do you insist on derailing the conversation with what you yourself admit has nothing to do with it? 

[victorydance]

And what would be an unbiased source, exactly? Maybe the study I linked to that clearly shows a gender bias in teaching evaluations? And lets not be naive, this bias also comes up during the semester, and it affects people's careers through hiring decisions and promotions, not just people's feelings (in case that isn't enough). I don't understand why people think it's acceptable to argue that "I am a man and this has happened to me too, so there is no problem of gender discrimination here." The study (and it's not the only one out there) clearly shows an overall trend, and that doesn't mean that there are no exceptions but there is something here that we should pay attention to.

 

My problem stems from the idea that both genders should be considered completely equal and anything that deviates from that is deemed gender discrimination or sexism. That's a dangerous path to go down if you want to continue to improve gender relations in society. 

 

The simple matter of the fact is that genders, and let's just keep it male and female for simplicity sake here, are different. Women and men are different both because of our biological makeups but also because of how were are conditioned in society and the general behaviour we are taught to follow. 

 

Studies have shown that women are more risk adverse, women are more passive, men are more aggressive, women are more organized, women talk and are more likely to express their emotions while men are not, ect. There are innate differences between those genders.

 

I think the study you pointed to is a good place to start for the discussion because it's interesting.

 

Looking through some of the words you will see that women TAs rank much higher in things like organization, 'niceness,' and helpfulness. This to me, is not surprising. Women in general are more organized and willing to go the extra mile to help others. And this is actually interesting because this could be why the OP was perceived, and perhaps backed up in her behaviour towards her students, as more helpful and organized and hence more likely to relay the absence excuse to her professor. 

 

On the other hand, men were perceived to be funnier, geekier, and boring. This does not surprise me as either. Men are less animated than women, hence perceived as boring in a classroom setting. Also, the way that mating has evolved in our culture, men are encouraged to be impressive in terms of their story telling and joke telling; one of the reasons why the vast majority of comedic stand-up actors are men today. 

 

These are all generalizations of course, but perceptions often result from behaviour that has been observed. Of course, any individual of either gender can cross either threshold of typical norms within their gender for sure, but the overall trends are fairly hashed out.

 

Now, things like people perceiving men as smarter, without any data or empirical experience to back this up is definitely a problem. Women getting passed over for certain things, whether positions or awards is definitely a problem. 

 

However, my beef comes with calling attention to every perceived discrimination under the sun as discrimination. This to me is more harmful than good because it results in backlash. Just because someone perceives someone as more helpful or organized, because they are a women and their behaviour has reinforced this, does not make it discriminatory. We need to understand the strengths of both women and men, protect those strengths and weaknesses, and work towards equality of opportunity for everyone, but that doesn't involve pointing out discrimination in every corner of the country when it may or may not exist.

 

Regardless...I realize I am curbing this thread towards more of a treatise than somewhere where someone, or others, can share their experiences or ask questions or whatever in comfort. And I also realize I didn't necessarily explain myself that well earlier either...so yeah, just wanted to state my opinion; take it or leave it.  

Edited February 8, 2015 by victorydance

[Cass]

I think you make the mistake of believing that the idea behind feminism (or gender equality, if the word makes you uncomfortable) is 'equality' in the sense of 'everyone is the same' rather than equality in the sense of equal opportunities. If we lived in a culture that allowed everyone equal opportunities based on interests and merit, but men happened to be statistically more likely to be interested in/good at certain things and women happened to be statistically more likely to be interested/good at other things, but there was 0 discrimination of outliers, that would be great. That is, however, not the world we live in. And that is a problem and one we shouldn't be ignoring because "omg men and women are different, get over yourselves!" 

[dr. t]

Further reading (puts a lot of stuff that's been said here together): http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/07/upshot/is-the-professor-bossy-or-brilliant-much-depends-on-gender.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0&abt=0002&abg=0

Edited February 9, 2015 by telkanuru

[fuzzylogician]

Victorydance, I unfortunately do not have the time to carefully address everything you say in your post, so I hope others will take the time to do that. I just want to point out your interesting choice of comparisons out of the long list of words I gave above. You look at "nice" and "helpful" vs. "boring" and "funny." I also mentioned words such as "best," "worst," "great," "terrible," etc. These have nothing to do with how men and women are perceived on average, unless you want to say that men are simply better than women. I don't know about you, but if that's where we're going then we might as well stop the discussion now because we are not going to convince each other of anything.

 

I think a more useful way to look at this data is that men appear to be judged more often on professional attributes, and tend to generally be judged more favorably, and women tend to be judged more on personal attributes, and tend to be judged more negatively. Men and women are different, but that alone can't explain the data (or, again, we end up saying that men are better than women). For more along these lines, compare "caring" or "helpful" vs. "brilliant" or "genius," and also "early" vs. "late," "fair" vs. "unfair." Telkanuru has posted links to several other studies that show this finding: men are judged more favorably, given more constructive criticism, and are judged on professional, not personal attributes. This is a systemic problem, and I don't know how else you explain it except as a problem that needs to be addressed. I don't know why the word "bias" is so difficult for you to deal with, but what else do you suggest accounts for these differences? "Different" is not enough.

[dr. t]

I just lost a whole post for no good reason whatsoever, so this is going to be more terse than I originally intended.

 

This is not tit for tat. You cannot balance the scales by adding inequality to one side as a counterweight to inequality on the other and achieve justice thereby. When someone provides an anecdote to illustrate how they felt injured, ignored, or discriminated against because of some inherent feature they happened to possess (race, sexual or gender identity), the correct response is not to provide a counter-anecdote which shows that you, too, have once been injured, ignored, or discriminated against. 

 

The correct response is to listen to that person's story and try to understand how their worldview differs from yours, why this might be the case, and how you might act in the future with their personal experience in mind.

[Cheshire_Cat]

I'm just not sure how wondering if someone else is discriminating against you is helpful.  If there is any other reason for them to act a certain way towards you, then maybe you can fix it, however if it is discrimination, then it is a lost cause.  There are obviously instances of blatant discrimination that can be fixed, but aside from that, I think assuming discrimination just builds walls instead of bridges.  I also think we use that word too much and it loses its meaning.

[dr. t]

I'm just not sure how wondering if someone else is discriminating against you is helpful.  If there is any other reason for them to act a certain way towards you, then maybe you can fix it, however if it is discrimination, then it is a lost cause.  There are obviously instances of blatant discrimination that can be fixed, but aside from that, I think assuming discrimination just builds walls instead of bridges.  I also think we use that word too much and it loses its meaning.

 

So if a given behavior is not accompanied by the screaming of misogynist slurs, the only solution is to ignore it? That is, frankly, nonsense.

 

We call things "discrimination" when they fit into the general pattern of discrimination that we have observed (see the numerous articles linked in this thread). This does not mean that a person is consciously discriminating when they commit behavior that falls into that pattern, but it remains discrimination.

Edited February 9, 2015 by telkanuru

[fuzzylogician]

I'm just not sure how wondering if someone else is discriminating against you is helpful.  If there is any other reason for them to act a certain way towards you, then maybe you can fix it, however if it is discrimination, then it is a lost cause.  There are obviously instances of blatant discrimination that can be fixed, but aside from that, I think assuming discrimination just builds walls instead of bridges.  I also think we use that word too much and it loses its meaning.

 

It helps because I am tired of always checking what I did wrong to deserve to be treated differently than my male colleagues, and I am tired of the assumption that I should (and could!) work hard to "fix" it. I am just as good as my male colleagues. In fact, I don't think I am the only woman who feels like she sometimes works twice as hard to win the recognition that men get for free. Why should I always have to doubt myself? It's hard enough even without this extra layer of crap. 

[lifealive]

My problem stems from the idea that both genders should be considered completely equal and anything that deviates from that is deemed gender discrimination or sexism. That's a dangerous path to go down if you want to continue to improve gender relations in society. 

 

The simple matter of the fact is that genders, and let's just keep it male and female for simplicity sake here, are different. Women and men are different both because of our biological makeups but also because of how were are conditioned in society and the general behaviour we are taught to follow. 

 

Studies have shown that women are more risk adverse, women are more passive, men are more aggressive, women are more organized, women talk and are more likely to express their emotions while men are not, ect. There are innate differences between those genders.

 

I think the study you pointed to is a good place to start for the discussion because it's interesting.

 

Looking through some of the words you will see that women TAs rank much higher in things like organization, 'niceness,' and helpfulness. This to me, is not surprising. Women in general are more organized and willing to go the extra mile to help others. And this is actually interesting because this could be why the OP was perceived, and perhaps backed up in her behaviour towards her students, as more helpful and organized and hence more likely to relay the absence excuse to her professor. 

 

On the other hand, men were perceived to be funnier, geekier, and boring. This does not surprise me as either. Men are less animated than women, hence perceived as boring in a classroom setting. Also, the way that mating has evolved in our culture, men are encouraged to be impressive in terms of their story telling and joke telling; one of the reasons why the vast majority of comedic stand-up actors are men today. 

 

These are all generalizations of course, but perceptions often result from behaviour that has been observed. Of course, any individual of either gender can cross either threshold of typical norms within their gender for sure, but the overall trends are fairly hashed out.

 

Now, things like people perceiving men as smarter, without any data or empirical experience to back this up is definitely a problem. Women getting passed over for certain things, whether positions or awards is definitely a problem. 

 

However, my beef comes with calling attention to every perceived discrimination under the sun as discrimination. This to me is more harmful than good because it results in backlash. Just because someone perceives someone as more helpful or organized, because they are a women and their behaviour has reinforced this, does not make it discriminatory. We need to understand the strengths of both women and men, protect those strengths and weaknesses, and work towards equality of opportunity for everyone, but that doesn't involve pointing out discrimination in every corner of the country when it may or may not exist.

 

Regardless...I realize I am curbing this thread towards more of a treatise than somewhere where someone, or others, can share their experiences or ask questions or whatever in comfort. And I also realize I didn't necessarily explain myself that well earlier either...so yeah, just wanted to state my opinion; take it or leave it.  

 

What you've written here is just gender essentialism masquerading as the "hard truth" or "simple facts" and "basic biology." Women "in general" are "more organized and willing to go the extra mile to help others"? Gee, I wonder why that is. Moreover, do you want to cite a source for that? And the whole idea of needing to "protect" the special strengths and weaknesses of both genders smacks of paternalism.

 

Seriously, we're grad students. Can't we do any better than this post-feminist backlash biological determinism crap?

[victorydance]

http://swns.com/news/woman-beat-men-to-be-most-organised-in-the-workplace-2003/

 

https://books.google.ca/books?id=5YNfNAorfuIC&pg=PA197&lpg=PA197&dq=%22women+are+more+helpful%22+study&source=bl&ots=gJmHhLcATQ&sig=yQRdPFoDdGrgtCDW-Pw6ZhLIkwk&hl=en&sa=X&ei=TzvZVITsHcTHsQSslIG4Dw&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22women%20are%20more%20helpful%22%20study&f=false

Edited February 9, 2015 by victorydance

[lifealive]

The internet also told me that women are more likely to be chronic hoarders. Ergo, it must be basic biology--a difference to be cherished and "protected" and evidence of the way the female brain works.

[victorydance]

Hilarious, you are exactly the type of person my post was directed at. 

Edited February 9, 2015 by victorydance

[lifealive]

Hilarious, you are exactly the type of person my post was directed at. 

 

Yes, exactly. I am a disagreeable, not-nice woman who calls evolutionary psychologists on their bullshit. I guess I won't be "mating," as you put it, anytime soon. Anything else? Would you care to share links about how women are automatically attracted to the color pink because they spent their cave years picking berries?

[victorydance]

I don't even know what the fuck you are talking about at this point.