4 ms·

I really think the author really draws the wrong message out of this. It sucks that, because there is really no objective way to determine "merit", your positi

by smky80 14y ago

I really think the author really draws the wrong message out of this. It sucks that, because there is really no objective way to determine "merit", your position in the social graph can be more important than your talents in terms of your career. Meaning a person with some amount of social power can affect your career negatively just because they don't like you. That applies to both men and women, and it happens an awful lot to both. Anyway, there are quite a few advantages to being a woman in Western society. If she really hated this guy, she could have just married him and then took half his stuff.

underwires 14y ago
I really don't think you are in a position to say what message the author should be getting out of her personal life. Your comment reeks of privilege.
- smky80 14y ago
  I'm in a position to post my opinions, be they popular or not, on a discussion of an article I read on the internet. Your comment reeks of a worldview that I don't share.
mnicole 14y ago
> Meaning a person with some amount of social power can affect your career negatively just because they don't like you. Right, but it should be based on something a little more tangible than a Twitter picture and denying sex after creepy DMs and fake client calls. This is the type of behavior that should be called out. I'm as on the fence as anyone else about naming names in these situations (because even if it is true, the fame of the accused could backfire on the victim), but this one seems pretty cut-and-dry. I personally don't know, based on her descriptions of him, who he is, but if these allegations are true and other women can come forward with similar stories, something should be said. > If she really hated this guy, she could have just married him and then took half his stuff. Oh for crying out loud; damned if you do, damned if you don't. He was married and lying to her and other women about it while going around conferences sleazing on them and then badmouthing them in front of his equally celebrity-status peers when they turned him down. If this was a story about a girl who was pressured to be with someone for all the wrong reasons, I can only imagine what the comments here would be like.
- smky80 14y ago
  I'm not defending the guy at all. My point is that this general scenario -- upset some person with a certain amount of power, who then makes your life miserable -- happens quite frequently to men as well. The title of the post is that "it sucks to be female" and I don't agree that follows from the post. The marriage comment was mostly a joke, but it does illustrate the point that Western women enjoy a lot of "priviledge" themselves. It shouldn't need to be said, but I'll add that this doesn't make sexual harassment acceptable.
  - mnicole 14y ago
    I'd be interested in seeing this list of privileges.
    - smky80 14y ago
      For starters, women live about 6 years longer than men [0], and currently make up about 67% of college graduates [1] , which is partly due to affirmative action. I can't find a great link, but I believe it's been projected that women are or will own a greater than 50% of total wealth in the Western world in the next decade or so. Divorce court isn't too friendly to men either. [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expec... [1] http://www.womenmovingmillions.org/how-we-do-it/facts/ http://www.womenmovingmillions.org/how-we-do-it/facts/
      - mnicole 14y ago
        I questioned responding to this at all because privilege is a social aspect, not a biological one. An extra six years of life isn't exactly a benefit because those extra six years aren't added to my childhood or adulthood, but at the end of my life when I'm waning. But if we're going to talk about biology, we can talk about the wonderful stuff most women have the pleasure of dealing with on a monthly basis for the majority of their lives, we can talk about childbirth and the expectation of what constitutes 'a woman' (which is really a mix of both of these things) and we can talk about how it's more likely a girl will be judged/ridiculed based on her appearance. Your second link also says that more women graduate high school than their male counterparts, and that 70% of college Valedictorians are women. Does that have anything to do with affirmative action, which was put in place to create equality to begin with? It's projected we're going to own greater than 50% of the total wealth in the West for the first time in history? Fantastic, because we're greater than 50% of the population. I don't get this point at all. You're reaching for statistics here, and I'm not even going to touch the divorce thing. I'll leave that for Reddit and Men's Rights, plus I'm biased because my father abandoned our family and three of my best friends growing up were equally raised by single mothers.

by smky80 14y ago

underwires 14y ago

I really don't think you are in a position to say what message the author should be getting out of her personal life. Your comment reeks of privilege.

smky80 14y ago
I'm in a position to post my opinions, be they popular or not, on a discussion of an article I read on the internet. Your comment reeks of a worldview that I don't share.

mnicole 14y ago

> Meaning a person with some amount of social power can affect your career negatively just because they don't like you. Right, but it should be based on something a little more tangible than a Twitter picture and denying sex after creepy DMs and fake client calls. This is the type of behavior that should be called out. I'm as on the fence as anyone else about naming names in these situations (because even if it is true, the fame of the accused could backfire on the victim), but this one seems pretty cut-and-dry. I personally don't know, based on her descriptions of him, who he is, but if these allegations are true and other women can come forward with similar stories, something should be said. > If she really hated this guy, she could have just married him and then took half his stuff. Oh for crying out loud; damned if you do, damned if you don't. He was married and lying to her and other women about it while going around conferences sleazing on them and then badmouthing them in front of his equally celebrity-status peers when they turned him down. If this was a story about a girl who was pressured to be with someone for all the wrong reasons, I can only imagine what the comments here would be like.

smky80 14y ago
I'm not defending the guy at all. My point is that this general scenario -- upset some person with a certain amount of power, who then makes your life miserable -- happens quite frequently to men as well. The title of the post is that "it sucks to be female" and I don't agree that follows from the post. The marriage comment was mostly a joke, but it does illustrate the point that Western women enjoy a lot of "priviledge" themselves. It shouldn't need to be said, but I'll add that this doesn't make sexual harassment acceptable.
- mnicole 14y ago
  I'd be interested in seeing this list of privileges.
  - smky80 14y ago
    For starters, women live about 6 years longer than men [0], and currently make up about 67% of college graduates [1] , which is partly due to affirmative action. I can't find a great link, but I believe it's been projected that women are or will own a greater than 50% of total wealth in the Western world in the next decade or so. Divorce court isn't too friendly to men either. [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expec... [1] http://www.womenmovingmillions.org/how-we-do-it/facts/ http://www.womenmovingmillions.org/how-we-do-it/facts/
    - mnicole 14y ago
      I questioned responding to this at all because privilege is a social aspect, not a biological one. An extra six years of life isn't exactly a benefit because those extra six years aren't added to my childhood or adulthood, but at the end of my life when I'm waning. But if we're going to talk about biology, we can talk about the wonderful stuff most women have the pleasure of dealing with on a monthly basis for the majority of their lives, we can talk about childbirth and the expectation of what constitutes 'a woman' (which is really a mix of both of these things) and we can talk about how it's more likely a girl will be judged/ridiculed based on her appearance. Your second link also says that more women graduate high school than their male counterparts, and that 70% of college Valedictorians are women. Does that have anything to do with affirmative action, which was put in place to create equality to begin with? It's projected we're going to own greater than 50% of the total wealth in the West for the first time in history? Fantastic, because we're greater than 50% of the population. I don't get this point at all. You're reaching for statistics here, and I'm not even going to touch the divorce thing. I'll leave that for Reddit and Men's Rights, plus I'm biased because my father abandoned our family and three of my best friends growing up were equally raised by single mothers.