why can’t a woman be more like a man?

This isn’t my issue, but I inherited an interest in it from my mother, who was, before she retired, a scientist—and who suffered horrible discrimination because she was a woman: salary caps, infrequent promotions, and frequent, corrosive disrespect from male peers and superiors. Science was a man’s world. Any woman who dared enter it knew exactly what she was getting into, and if she didn’t, she soon found out, and made her choices.

Science is still a man’s world, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Read, for example, this book and marvel at the politics of science and think about how many women you know would volunteer to play in that game. Still, the women I know who could have gone into science because they were qualified and skilled but decided on other fields did so by choice, often because their chosen professions were more people-oriented than lab-oriented, as scientists’ jobs mostly are.

That’s a purely anecdotal, conventional-wisdom kind of “prejudice” of mine, so I was interested to have it confirmed.

Tom Maguire:

The NY Times tells us that women are under-represented in science and technology because of a deplorable macho sexist workplace environment.

The Boston Globe (owned by the Times, but evidently not read) tells us that women are underrepresented in these fields because they aren’t interested.

‘Round and ’round we go …

——–

p.s. Lately, I’ve been using song lyrics as post titles. I feel guilty about not attributing them, though.

Today’s post title is from the eponymous song “Why Can’t a Woman Be More Like a Man?,” by Lerner and Loewe, from the musical My Fair Lady … and I can hear Rex Harrison “singing” it now …

I won’t insult you by tell you where this comes from.

This is from “Free Fallin’,” by Tom Petty.