4 ms·

A related observation (which I've been making for a long time) is that the absence of mediocre women in positions of power is strong evidence of bias. Men can s

by gizmo 11y ago

A related observation (which I've been making for a long time) is that the absence of mediocre women in positions of power is strong evidence of bias. Men can succeed when they're mediocre, but women have to be exceptional. Likewise for minorities.

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cookiecaper 11y ago
What's "exceptional"? I've known many women in my career and many of them were mediocre. Some were in positions of authority and some weren't. Another commenter lists several "mediocre" women in the corporate and political world (and leaves out some big ones, like Meg Whitman). If you're talking about becoming a CEO, you have to be an "exceptional" man to get there too, in absolute terms. I feel like the root erroneous assumption here is that an equal amount of people of all types are interested in the same things and that the only reason any group becomes more represented than another is that the others are getting alienated or funneled out somewhere along the way. That is a completely incorrect and invalid assumption. The fact that there are a lot more non-English-speakers in janitorial work in the US (when I worked as a janitor, I was 1 of 2 English speakers on the 12-person janitorial staff) doesn't necessarily mean the janitorial manager is biased against English speakers; it means that due to external considerations, like the fact that almost all other jobs require you to speak the native language, non-English-speakers are better suited for janitorial work, and therefore people do the logical thing, apply for work that they can do, and end up comprising a larger section of the application pool. People make decisions based on social, cultural, and physical expectations of them, and there's not anything wrong with that. By and large, women do not have an interest in computer sciencey or entrepreneurial work. It's OK if a woman does, but it's also OK to note that most women don't. There's nothing we need to fix about it. Most women don't want to do it, and there's no reason to force them. Why do you see fewer women becoming CEOs? Because fewer women want that kind of job and fewer women are qualified for that kind of job due to the biological realities of humanity that require women to take time out for pregnancy and child-rearing (sorry denialists, I didn't invent biology and choose that only women could bear and nurse children, so don't take it up with me), and the social and cultural expectations that have formed around these biological realities. In short, the serious applicant pool includes only a very small amount of women, so only a very small number of women obtain that position.
- gizmo 11y ago
  > People make decisions based on social, cultural, and physical expectations of them, and there's not anything wrong with that. I couldn't disagree more. If the culture is plain chauvinism ("women belong in the kitchen not the boardroom") then there's everything wrong with that. All oppression throughout history is essentially "just culture", but that justifies nothing. Your biological reductionism is completely at odds with our best scientific understanding of contemporary gender roles, as a few minutes on wikipedia will tell you.
  - cookiecaper 11y ago
    I didn't say "just culture"; I said the confluence of social, cultural, and physical factors. Why does "culture" develop? Because people are naturally evil and black-hearted? These things don't happen in a vacuum, they develop organically because they are the best way to support human and tribal propagation and prosperity. Perhaps some things can and should change, but things that are constant across nearly all successful human societies should be considered fairly well tested. We should note that it takes a long time to see the full effects of changes to social structures and institutions, generally at least 3-4 generations. If a society is "testing" something and the society itself expires or its success is greatly diminished within 6-8 generations of implementation, the test should probably not be seen as successful. The West will find that traditional principles that assign gender roles based on that gender's inherent advantages and disadvantages are much more useful than currently acknowledged. Forcing people to do things that they a) don't even want to do and b) aren't well-suited for is a losing proposition, no matter how much outrage you try to manufacture to justify it.
    - srtjstjsj 11y ago
      Before you take your theory too far, you need to explain why it's OK that your theory implies that black people in America were best suited to be slaves, up until the day they weren't.
      - cookiecaper 11y ago
hugh4 11y ago
I've seen plenty of mediocre women and minorities in positions of power. For a bipartisan example, consider Barack Obama and Sarah Palin.

by gizmo 11y ago

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cookiecaper 11y ago

What's "exceptional"? I've known many women in my career and many of them were mediocre. Some were in positions of authority and some weren't. Another commenter lists several "mediocre" women in the corporate and political world (and leaves out some big ones, like Meg Whitman). If you're talking about becoming a CEO, you have to be an "exceptional" man to get there too, in absolute terms. I feel like the root erroneous assumption here is that an equal amount of people of all types are interested in the same things and that the only reason any group becomes more represented than another is that the others are getting alienated or funneled out somewhere along the way. That is a completely incorrect and invalid assumption. The fact that there are a lot more non-English-speakers in janitorial work in the US (when I worked as a janitor, I was 1 of 2 English speakers on the 12-person janitorial staff) doesn't necessarily mean the janitorial manager is biased against English speakers; it means that due to external considerations, like the fact that almost all other jobs require you to speak the native language, non-English-speakers are better suited for janitorial work, and therefore people do the logical thing, apply for work that they can do, and end up comprising a larger section of the application pool. People make decisions based on social, cultural, and physical expectations of them, and there's not anything wrong with that. By and large, women do not have an interest in computer sciencey or entrepreneurial work. It's OK if a woman does, but it's also OK to note that most women don't. There's nothing we need to fix about it. Most women don't want to do it, and there's no reason to force them. Why do you see fewer women becoming CEOs? Because fewer women want that kind of job and fewer women are qualified for that kind of job due to the biological realities of humanity that require women to take time out for pregnancy and child-rearing (sorry denialists, I didn't invent biology and choose that only women could bear and nurse children, so don't take it up with me), and the social and cultural expectations that have formed around these biological realities. In short, the serious applicant pool includes only a very small amount of women, so only a very small number of women obtain that position.

gizmo 11y ago
> People make decisions based on social, cultural, and physical expectations of them, and there's not anything wrong with that. I couldn't disagree more. If the culture is plain chauvinism ("women belong in the kitchen not the boardroom") then there's everything wrong with that. All oppression throughout history is essentially "just culture", but that justifies nothing. Your biological reductionism is completely at odds with our best scientific understanding of contemporary gender roles, as a few minutes on wikipedia will tell you.
- cookiecaper 11y ago
  I didn't say "just culture"; I said the confluence of social, cultural, and physical factors. Why does "culture" develop? Because people are naturally evil and black-hearted? These things don't happen in a vacuum, they develop organically because they are the best way to support human and tribal propagation and prosperity. Perhaps some things can and should change, but things that are constant across nearly all successful human societies should be considered fairly well tested. We should note that it takes a long time to see the full effects of changes to social structures and institutions, generally at least 3-4 generations. If a society is "testing" something and the society itself expires or its success is greatly diminished within 6-8 generations of implementation, the test should probably not be seen as successful. The West will find that traditional principles that assign gender roles based on that gender's inherent advantages and disadvantages are much more useful than currently acknowledged. Forcing people to do things that they a) don't even want to do and b) aren't well-suited for is a losing proposition, no matter how much outrage you try to manufacture to justify it.
  - srtjstjsj 11y ago
    Before you take your theory too far, you need to explain why it's OK that your theory implies that black people in America were best suited to be slaves, up until the day they weren't.
    - cookiecaper 11y ago

hugh4 11y ago

I've seen plenty of mediocre women and minorities in positions of power. For a bipartisan example, consider Barack Obama and Sarah Palin.