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The meaning crisis, and how we rescue young men from reactionary politics - The Skeptic
How do you make ‘strong’ men? According to the right, it’s by making them cruel. “Owning the libs” isn’t just entertainment and sport, it’s important psychological training for the civil war they believe is to come. Men must be callous if they’re going to ignore the demands for compassion that are weakening our society. If they can’t laugh in the face of someone who claims to be suffering, how will they be able to make the hard decisions needed to keep our country safe and prosperous? That’s the meaning narrative that seems to be attracting a significant portion of young men. It simultaneously shields them from all the moral obligations that progressive society wants to place on them, while providing them an alternative set of obligations that feel more empowering to them to fulfil. They get to be warriors who stand against the horde that threatens to overrun their society, both internal and external. They get to stand athwart history and shout “stop”.
The majority of news influencers are conservative men, study finds
According to Pew's sample, men dominate the news influencer space space by a margin of roughly two to one, comprising 63% of all news content creators compared to just 30% who are women. This gender disparity is compounded by a political tilt: 27% of news influencers explicitly identify as conservative, significantly outnumbering the 21% who lean liberal—a gap that balloons on platforms like Facebook, where right-leaning influencers outnumber left-leaning ones by a staggering three-to-one ratio. 39% of news influencers explicitly identify as conservative on Facebook, compared with just 13% who identify as liberal.
Scientists' sex
A project launched in the 1960s asked school children to “draw a scientist”. By 1983, it had collected 5,000 drawings, of which only 28 depicted a female scientist. By 2018, 33% of the more than 20,000 gathered drawings, showed women. In science, too, there has been a shift towards gender equity. But serious obstacles remain, says science writer Lisa Munoz in this practical analysis, complementing it with female scientists’ vivid career stories. “No single intervention, policy, or law is enough,” she rightly notes.
Research: Adding Women to the C-Suite Changes How Companies Think
Our study begins to explore those mechanisms, finding that when women are appointed to the C-suite, they catalyze fundamental shifts in the top management team’s risk tolerance, openness to change, and focus on M&As versus R&D.
College classrooms are still chilly for women, as men speak more, study finds: Gendered participation has a long way to go to reach equity -- ScienceDaily
Men speak 1.6 times more often than women in college classrooms, revealing how gender inequities regarding classroom participation still exist, according to a Dartmouth study. By comparison, women are more hesitant to speak and are more apt to use apologetic language. The findings are published in Gender & Society.
When students didn't have to raise their hands to participate in class, men spoke three times more often than women. "You would think that it would be more equitable for students to not have to raise their hands to speak in class because then anyone could talk but our results showed otherwise. The higher level of participation relates to the idea of who may have felt like they were entitled to speak or had permission to do so," explains Janice McCabe, an associate professor of sociology at Dartmouth College. "Once you take away the structure of a professor calling on students, you see more of the cultural expectations that people may have, and the gender hierarchies present in the college classroom today."
When power is toxic: Dominance reduces influence in groups -- ScienceDaily
"Dominant individuals can force their will on the group by being pushy, but that also makes them socially aversive. When it comes to bringing peers to consensus during more sophisticated tasks, it is the least aggressive individuals that exert the greatest influence. Our results illustrate that although domineering individuals most often ascend to positions of power, they can in fact create the least effective influence structures at the same time."
The Art of Dying | The New Yorker
The shock of feminism came none too soon for guys, including me, who had lorded in a sixties bohemia that mandated women be doting helpmeets to their entitled—because genius—men. Those domesticities went down like a row of dominoes at the first breath of female revolt. With no new model for relationships, libertinage reigned. I guess it was fun for some people, but it piled up emotional wreckage left and right.
Research: Women Score Higher Than Men in Most Leadership Skills
According to an analysis of thousands of 360-degree reviews, women outscored men on 17 of the 19 capabilities that differentiate excellent leaders from average or poor ones.
Men ask most of the questions at scientific conferences; we can choose to change that -- ScienceDaily
"When women are 70% of a room, they still asked only about 40% of the questions," says Natalie Telis, then a graduate student at Stanford University. "At that rate an audience would need to be 80% or 90% women before question asking would be split evenly between men and women."
Telis was inspired to study Q&A participation after a conference she attended as an undergraduate. She asked one question, but every other question she heard that day was asked by a man. To determine whether the ratio of questions asked was representative of the gender makeup of the audience, Telis and co-author Emily Glassberg recorded data about who asked questions after presentations they attended at seven conferences.
Why money cannot 'buy' housework -- ScienceDaily
To negotiate their housework participation, men either hand over their income to their partners, who manage the money, so they use money to 'exchange' their way out of housework, or they hold on to their income to 'bargain' their way out of housework.
"Men get away with not doing housework through both channels," explains Dr Hu. "It puts women in a very compromising position as they are left to do the lion's share of housework."
Given wage penalties and a glass ceiling in the labour market, women are unlikely to win the 'war' over housework by 'exchanging' and 'bargaining' with men.
They are seen to negotiate in a different way. Going 'solo', some working women are seen to opt out of housework by taking control of their own earnings and developing a sense of autonomy.
Indeed, women's income only reduces their housework time when they can access their own earnings and have a say in household financial decisions. But the study finds that in the UK, less than 12% of working-age women kept separate purses, another 23% managed household finances, and only around 15% controlled financial decisions.
Rich guys are most likely to have no idea what they’re talking about, study suggests - The Washington Post
Using a data set spanning nine predominantly English-speaking countries, researchers delineated a number of key findings. First, men are much more likely than women to master the art of hyperbole, as are the wealthy relative to the poor or middle class. North Americans, meanwhile, tend to slip into this behavior more readily than English speakers in other parts of the globe. And if there were a world championship, as a true devotee might appreciate, the title would go to Canada, data show.
That’s when Chua stepped in and, according to the student, suggested that she “dress ‘outgoing’ ” for the interview with Kavanaugh.
“She strongly urged me to send her pictures of what I was thinking of wearing so she could evaluate. I did not,” the woman said.
Reached for comment on the account, Chua did not deny it but told HuffPost, “For the more than ten years I’ve known him, Judge Kavanaugh’s first and only litmus test in hiring has been excellence.”
Research: Adequate statistical power in clinical trials is associated with the combination of a male first author and a female last author | eLife
Here we investigate whether the statistical power of a trial is related to the gender of first and last authors on the paper reporting the results of the trial. Based on an analysis of 31,873 clinical trials published between 1974 and 2017, we find that adequate statistical power was most often present in clinical trials with a male first author and a female last author (20.6%, 95% confidence interval 19.4-21.8%), and that this figure was significantly higher than the percentage for other gender combinations (12.5-13.5%; P<0.0001). The absolute number of female authors in clinical trials gradually increased over time, with the percentage of female last authors rising from 20.7% (1975-85) to 28.5% (after 2005). Our results demonstrate the importance of gender diversity in research collaborations and emphasize the need to increase the number of women in senior positions in medicine.
Who's smarter in the classroom -- men or women? New study shows it's all about perception -- ScienceDaily
The researchers were surprised to find that women were far more likely to underestimate their own intelligence than men. And, when comparing a female and a male student, both with a GPA of 3.3, the male student is likely to say he is smarter than 66 percent of the class, and the female student is likely to say she is smarter than only 54 percent of the class.
In addition, when asked whether they are smarter than the person they worked most with in class, the pattern continued. Male students are 3.2 times more likely than females to say they are smarter than the person they are working with, regardless of whether their class partners are men or women.
Changing Rituals: A Conversation with Nancy Jo Sales | Cody Delistraty
Social media is not some kind of natural space. It’s not like a forest or something or a beach where you go and create things. It’s more like a room in Hawkins Lab [a fictional Hawkins, Indiana-based scientific laboratory that conducts futuristic, largely unethical experiments in the Netflix TV series Stranger Things]. It’s like a room in Hawkins lab and Papa [the alias of the fictional director of the Hawkins National Laboratory] is Mark Zuckerberg. Papa is putting little girls into the rooms in Hawkins lab and exposing them to certain tests and images. But the girls who are coming out of this social media experiment are not powerful with super powers [like in the show]. I’m not saying they’re being stripped of everything, but their power, I think, is being undermined by the fact that Papa is a guy whose whole vision of the world is “hot or not.” Which is why “Facemash” [a precursor to Facebook that Zuckerberg created while an undergraduate at Harvard] wasn’t even an original concept. It’s an insidious concept. Mark Zuckerberg takes that and he bases this whole new social media site [Facebook] on that. I think that that’s the Rosetta Stone of all social media: it’s about “hot or not.” Is your body hot, or is it not? How about your face? How about your whole life? Hot or not? Is it validatable?
Screenwriter close to Weinstein calls out Hollywood: 'Everybody f**king knew'
And here’s where the slither meets the slime:
Harvey was showing us the best of times.
He was making our movies.
Throwing the biggest parties.
Taking us to The Golden Globes!
Introducing us to the most amazing people (Meetings with Vice President Gore! Clubbing with Quentin and Uma! Drinks with Salman Rushdie and Ralph Fiennes! Dinners with Mick Jagger and Warren-freaking-Beatty!).
The most epic Oscar weekends.
That seemed to last for weeks!
Sundance! Cannes! Toronto!
Telluride! Berlin! Venice!
Private jets! Stretch limousines! Springsteen shows!
Hell, Harvey once took me to St. Barth’s for Christmas.
For 12 days!
I was a broke-ass kid from Boston who had never even HEARD of St. Barth’s before he booked my travel.
He once got me tickets to the seven hottest Broadway shows in one week. So I could take a new girlfriend on a dazzling tour of theater.
He got me seats on the 40-yard-line to the Super Bowl, when the Patriots were playing the Packers in New Orleans.
Even got me a hotel room, which was impossible to get that weekend.
He gave and gave and gave and gave.
He had a monarch’s volcanic generosity when it came to those within his circle.
And a Mafia don’s fervent need for abject loyalty from his capos and soldiers.
Screenwriter close to Weinstein calls out Hollywood: 'Everybody f**king knew'
Because I was there.
And I saw you.
And I talked about it with you.
You, the big producers; you, the big directors; you, the big agents; you, the big financiers.
And you, the big rival studio chiefs; you, the big actors; you, the big actresses; you, the big models.
You, the big journalists; you, the big screenwriters; you, the big rock stars; you, the big restaurateurs; you, the big politicians.
Under challenge: Girls' confidence level, not math ability hinders path to science degrees -- ScienceDaily
The research team found perception gaps are even wider at the upper levels of mathematics ability -- among those students with the most talent and potential in these fields. Boys are significantly more confident in challenging mathematics contexts than otherwise identically talented girls. Specifically, boys rated their ability 27 percent higher than girls did.
Perceived ability under challenge was measured using a nationally representative longitudinal study that followed 10th grade students over a six-year period until two years after high school. A series of questions in the 10th and 12th grade surveys asked students to indicate their level of agreement with statements such as "I'm certain I can understand the most difficult material presented in math texts."
Street walking as subversion
“There is still this element of transgression for a woman to walk in public and claim her space and claim her right to be there without being spoken to or troubled or commented on or even looked at with anything other than neutrality,” says Elkin. Women bothering or stalking men on the streets—like Calle—tend to be seen as subversive or crazy; men bothering or stalking women on the streets, by contrast, are seen perhaps as unfortunate but to be expected. The flâneuse has always had to deal with this unequal expectation. Her accomplishments, therefore, have been even harder won.
Why Men Don’t Want the Jobs Done Mostly by Women - The New York Times
“Traditional masculinity is standing in the way of working-class men’s employment, and I think it’s a problem,” said Andrew Cherlin, a sociologist and public policy professor at Johns Hopkins and author of “Labor’s Love Lost: The Rise and Fall of the Working-Class Family in America.”
“We have a cultural lag where our views of masculinity have not caught up to the change in the job market,” he said.
PC is for wussies (just don't call me a hick!)
Objecting to this sort of thing is for the coddled, the liberal, the élite. […] The ability to shrug off the mean crack, the sexist joke, the gratuitous jab at the weak is, in some quarters, seen as a form of strength, of “being flexible,” of “not taking shit serious.” A woman who wilts at a sexist joke won’t last long in certain workplaces. A guy who prioritizes the sensitive side of his nature will, trust me, not thrive in the slaughterhouse. This willingness to gloss over crudeness becomes, then, an encoded sign of competence, strength, and reliability. Above all, Trump supporters are “not politically correct,” which, as far as I can tell, means that they have a particular aversion to that psychological moment when, having thought something, you decide that it is not a good thought, and might pointlessly hurt someone’s feelings, and therefore decline to say it.
Lessons in the Delicate Art of Confronting Offensive Speech - The New York Times
Researchers have detailed the difficulty of confronting prejudice, but they have also found that even the politest of objections – or subtle corrections to loaded words – can almost instantly curb a speaker’s behavior. With a clearer understanding of the dynamics of such confrontation, psychologists say, people can develop tactics that can shut down the unsavory talk without ruining relationships, even when the offender has more status or power: a fraternity president, say, or a team captain or employer.
Trump recorded having extremely lewd conversation about women in 2005
“Grab them by the p---y,” Trump says. “You can do anything.” […]“This was locker room banter, a private conversation that took place many years ago. Bill Clinton has said far worse to me on the golf course - not even close,” Trump said in a statement. “I apologize if anyone was offended.”
Compromise nearly guaranteed when a woman is involved in decision-making pairs: Study finds when making joint decisions, men need to prove masculinity, 'push away' from compromise -- ScienceDaily
"The compromise effect basically emerges in any pair when there is a woman. However, surprisingly, when you have men choosing together, they actually tend to push away from the compromise option and select one of the extreme options. Say two men are choosing a car and the cars they are considering differ on safety and fuel efficiency -- they will either go for the safest car or the one that offers them the most fuel efficiency, but they won't choose an option that offers a little of both." In contrast, individuals and mixed-gender and female-female pairs will likely go for the middle option since it seems reasonable and is easily justified.
How Vector Space Mathematics Reveals the Hidden Sexism in Language
The team does this by searching the vector space for word pairs that produce a similar vector to “she: he.” This reveals a huge list of gender analogies. For example, she;he::midwife:doctor; sewing:carpentry; registered_nurse:physician; whore:coward; hairdresser:barber; nude:shirtless; boobs:ass; giggling:grinning; nanny:chauffeur, and so on.
The question they want to answer is whether these analogies are appropriate or inappropriate. So they use Amazon’s Mechanical Turk to ask. They showed each analogy to 10 turkers and asked them whether the analogy was biased or not. They consider the analogy biased if more than half of the turkers thought it was biased.
My Gen X Hillary problem: I know why we don’t “like” Clinton - Salon.com
I’ve lived through enough to understand that if Hillary were a man she’d be the front-runner hands-down. I haven’t suffered the overt sexism of earlier generations, but in its place has come a more oblique, more insidious variant. It’s the kind that makes you question whether the fault might lie with you and your abilities. It gives rise to questions about why people aren’t enthusiastic about you, why they didn’t like it when you took a strident tone with them and then, when you adjusted course, complained that you weren’t aggressive enough, or why there’s something about you that just feels wrong. In politics people call this likability. And the female politicians we “like” are few and far between, because they remind us of our mothers or wives or that girl you hated in gymnastics class. We don’t have a frame of reference for what it looks like for women to be running the show, so if she’s not a man, she comes across as all wrong. In the tech world people don’t talk about “likability.” Instead they say, “Mike is going to present to the client because he’s got a great style. But don’t worry, you’ll still have a few slides that you can really own.”
