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As an anecdote, living in a college town, I know many academics at various levels in their career. I happen to know 3 couples where both partners in the marria

As an anecdote, living in a college town, I know many academics at various levels in their career. I happen to know 3 couples where both partners in the marriage are in academia, and actually in the same general branch. In all three cases, the women have been talked to about how they must be treated tougher because their spouses are in academia as well and it the administration needs to prove to the academic world that the women are not riding on the coattails of their husbands. The men have not had any such discussions with their superiors. Additionally, why is assuming there is no sexism and proceeding with the status quo better than the assumption there is sexism and trying to improve the situation?

ralusek 7y ago
Because if there is no sexism, then what needs to be improved? Strategies that have been used in the past, such as affirmative action or quotas arbitrarily seek to create representational parity regardless of the input. That is a bad thing, and you're acting like it's at worst neutral.
charliesharding 7y ago
The same reason we don't assume the accused is guilty. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presumption_of_innocence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presumption_of_innocence
- BigFish12 7y ago
  We do assume the accused of rape or sexual harassment against a woman is guilty though. In that case, it's guilty until proven innocent. Allegations only are enough to ruin a man's whole career.
- gilbetron 7y ago
  From your link: "In civil proceedings (like breach of contract) the defendant is initially presumed correct unless the plaintiff presents a moderate level of evidence and thus switches the burden of proof to the defendant." There is absolutely a moderate level of evidence of discrimination against women.
pnw_hazor 7y ago
My BIL is on the hiring committee for his CS dept at a state school. They recently have been barred from ranking candidates because it was embarrassing for the administration when they would offer positions to lower ranked candidates while no-offering higher ranked candidates. Though, he said, in most cases it doesn't matter, because the lower ranked candidates who received offers were usually preferred minorities who received several offers from other more desirable schools.
cybersnowflake 7y ago
Its called burden of proof. And its the core of scientific thinking we don't automatically put the assumption that gyms are secret powerplants that exist to siphon off energy to feed space aliens at equal likelihood to its negative. Likewise the existence of sexism, especially at the broad global conspiratorial heights at which it is postulated is the more complicated hypothesis so its up you you guys to provide the compelling evidence.
- SantalBlush 7y ago
  >Likewise the existence of sexism, especially at the broad global conspiratorial heights at which it is postulated is the more complicated hypothesis It's no more complicated than the hypothesis of the existence of false accusations of sexism, especially at the broad global conspiratorial heights at which it is postulated. Beginning with the assumption that sexism is not a big problem only gives the appearance of neutrality. In reality, we probably all agree that sexism exists and false accusations exist, and we're trying to determine how prevalent each is. That is an extremely difficult task.
  - cybersnowflake 7y ago
    No...I don't think it works that way. You can't bootstrap the likelihood of one hypothesis by proposing a counterhypothesis. The existence of the Easter Bunny doesn't become more likely because someone hypothesizes that there is a global conspiracy to cover up the existence of said Bunny. BTW, the 'false accusation' movement in sofar as it exists is a drop in the bucket compared to the sexism victimhood industry.
    - SantalBlush 7y ago
      >sexism victimhood industry This is your hypothesis, which illustrates my point perfectly. You are not merely refuting the existence of a certain degree of sexual harassment, but you're hypothesizing that a "sexism victimhood industry" exists. The fluff about "hypothesis" and "scientific thinking" is just useful subterfuge.

ralusek 7y ago

Because if there is no sexism, then what needs to be improved? Strategies that have been used in the past, such as affirmative action or quotas arbitrarily seek to create representational parity regardless of the input. That is a bad thing, and you're acting like it's at worst neutral.

charliesharding 7y ago

The same reason we don't assume the accused is guilty. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presumption_of_innocence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presumption_of_innocence

BigFish12 7y ago
We do assume the accused of rape or sexual harassment against a woman is guilty though. In that case, it's guilty until proven innocent. Allegations only are enough to ruin a man's whole career.
gilbetron 7y ago
From your link: "In civil proceedings (like breach of contract) the defendant is initially presumed correct unless the plaintiff presents a moderate level of evidence and thus switches the burden of proof to the defendant." There is absolutely a moderate level of evidence of discrimination against women.

pnw_hazor 7y ago

My BIL is on the hiring committee for his CS dept at a state school. They recently have been barred from ranking candidates because it was embarrassing for the administration when they would offer positions to lower ranked candidates while no-offering higher ranked candidates. Though, he said, in most cases it doesn't matter, because the lower ranked candidates who received offers were usually preferred minorities who received several offers from other more desirable schools.

cybersnowflake 7y ago

Its called burden of proof. And its the core of scientific thinking we don't automatically put the assumption that gyms are secret powerplants that exist to siphon off energy to feed space aliens at equal likelihood to its negative. Likewise the existence of sexism, especially at the broad global conspiratorial heights at which it is postulated is the more complicated hypothesis so its up you you guys to provide the compelling evidence.

SantalBlush 7y ago
>Likewise the existence of sexism, especially at the broad global conspiratorial heights at which it is postulated is the more complicated hypothesis It's no more complicated than the hypothesis of the existence of false accusations of sexism, especially at the broad global conspiratorial heights at which it is postulated. Beginning with the assumption that sexism is not a big problem only gives the appearance of neutrality. In reality, we probably all agree that sexism exists and false accusations exist, and we're trying to determine how prevalent each is. That is an extremely difficult task.
- cybersnowflake 7y ago
  No...I don't think it works that way. You can't bootstrap the likelihood of one hypothesis by proposing a counterhypothesis. The existence of the Easter Bunny doesn't become more likely because someone hypothesizes that there is a global conspiracy to cover up the existence of said Bunny. BTW, the 'false accusation' movement in sofar as it exists is a drop in the bucket compared to the sexism victimhood industry.
  - SantalBlush 7y ago
    >sexism victimhood industry This is your hypothesis, which illustrates my point perfectly. You are not merely refuting the existence of a certain degree of sexual harassment, but you're hypothesizing that a "sexism victimhood industry" exists. The fluff about "hypothesis" and "scientific thinking" is just useful subterfuge.