"For example I am very good at economics and mathematics, but I'm much worse in keeping my room tidy which makes me better in some areas than most women and worse in some areas than most women." Tidying your room's not a skill! It's not something you can be better or worse at, it just depends on how much you're prepared to do. I think this is why it comes across as strikingly patronising, it's as though you can't think of any actual skill for your example. Perhaps you were just trying to wind people up though? Incidentally, this article about gender bias in mathematics is very interesting - https://www.stanford.edu/dept/psychology/cgi-bin/drupalm/system/files/cdweckmathgift.pdf

Agree with icvictoria and Naomi here.

I do think you were intentionally trying to troll around a bit here Carl.
Sorry to say but I expected more from you.
Especially in the context of first calling me childish and using no arguments with my metaphor it's extremely childish to then use a very similar metaphor to degrade women.
Although you have no time to explain anything to Naomi I do recommend you find the time to look up the word - "hypocritical" - it might apply in this case.

Furthermore you're saying my arguments are declining over time but did you, or anyone else for that matter, actually take the time to read my longer responde at the start of page 10 ??
I don't think so...nor did I expect anyone to do so.
On a discussion site like the internet it's mostly just better to do one-catch one liners then bother with long elaborations of one's opinion.

Ok, how about I change that room thing which is seen as very bad for some reason and replace it with patience... especially patience I do not have to continue discussion when people focus on meaningless details rather than the actual meaning.

As far as the article goes, statistics in psychology and sociology is a very poor excuse for science, so I would never go as far as to say that women are genetically programmed to be less effective with analytical thinking. The fact is that really does not matter, I've been teaching maths and economics in extra-curricular activities since high school and what I know from experience is that as far as attendance go I have at least 10:1 men:women ratio. Does it say something about inherent predispositions? No. Does it say something about the general average? Probably much more.

Oh, I did not see your response in time...

I did not use a single metaphor Aranka, nor did I degrade women or had the intention to. You also should learn to read it seems...

Carl - I wasn't trying to imply that you were suggesting anything more than statistics by posting the link, and I didn't post it for your benefit. A lot of the arguments against sexism on here have been winding me up, and I have found some of them more offensive than anything that they're a reaction against. I'm trying to spread about a more informed view of gender issues to counter it. Women are just as much a part of the problem as men are, and we all need to take an active role in remedying it. And by active role, I don't mean shouting about how terrible is, I mean looking at ourselves and identifying the areas where we hold irrational views, and by educating ourselves by reading academic articles, studies etc. It's particularly important for women to do this, I think. I felt I had to post about your example simply because I knew other people would... I did think there was a lot of truth in your post. Equality isn't something that can be applied without context. As such, there's no blanket equality between men and women, simply because the term doesn't apply.

aranka, on the internet no one f***ing cares who you are in real life, they dont give a shit if you are a male or female, so stop drawing attention to yourself trying to say you are different, and should be treated differently. This whole sexism discussion wouldnt have started in the first place if you hadnt tried to gain attention

Ironic how the people who say that tend to emphasize the difference though.

It's comical in a twisted way xD

Victoria, this is for you http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2013/01/no_self-respecting_woman_would.html It's a short essay on contemporary feminist theory, its badly written but easy to read and packed full of insight.

The stanford article was misleading garbage, I assume you read it. Would you like to discuss it?

"the view of math as a gift can not only make women vulnerable to declining performance, it can also make them susceptible to stereotypes, so that when they enter an environment that denigrates their gift, they may lose the desire to
carry on in that field." This is a HUGE leap and there is not evidence cited to support it. Why does the writer assume they become suseptible to stereotypes? why does she assume there is a negative stereotype/environment? A terrible lack of scientific rigour, as one comes to excpect from a female psychologist =D. She then breezes into what can be done about this problem, which turns out to be "addressing students’ beliefs about the nature of ability." Which doesnt need to be gender specific at all.

She goes on to say that a group given 8 training sessions on, among other things, how to do their homework, tend to do better in their school work. No shit? Where was the control group that was given 8 training sessions on how math is an ability? Or on maths. Was this double blind?

The message here is surely, "work hard and you will succeed", boy or girl, intelligent or stupid, black or white. Why is it being dresssed up as a feminist issue?

looks like you're back from vacation aranka.

are you gonna accept my challenge game or will you back out?

Such as how women are typically more diplomatic and men are more violent

Really now? You're trying to fight gender stereotypes by bringing up just another one of those stereotypes? Please, sort out how you think of yourself and your role in society and if your being a female is of any relevance for your perception of yourself in the competition that is our everyday life. Then we may be able to talk.

Thanks for the link, dead. I had all these things to say about it, but it has all flown out of my mind, and it's bedtime so I can't be bothered to read it again right now. Tomorrow! I'll just say that lots of it I found good and all of it interesting. Needs a re-read.

The Stanford article, I'm not really sure I understand why it's misleading? It's not being dressed up as a feminist issue, it's addressing the disparity between males' and females' success in scholastic maths. That's the point. The message is that if girls are told that maths ability is not a gift, but something that needs to be developed, then those girls will perform better. I don't think this is feminism, is it? Perhaps it is, to be honest, I'm not particularly well informed when it comes to feminism. There are plenty of studies into how biases affect scholastic achievement, and how simply pointing out that these biases exist removes the disparity (potential disparity?) http://scienceblogs.com/mixingmemory/2007/12/19/combating-stereotype-threat-in/ says it better than me. The control group thing, I think you're nit-picking. There's no need to have a control group who are told the opposite of what the experimental group are told. You don't have to dehydrate a bunch of potatoes when you're learning about osmosis. Besides, I doubt they could've got it past the ethics committee. There are a couple of things in the article I baulked at -- "Beliefs that put women at risk" ugh. "What messages do we send in our maths classes and do these subtle messages make a difference? More important, can we use these messages to help females?" Puke. (Poor little vulnerable women, ever the victims, never able to help themselves. What kind of damage is this bias going to do? Surely that's the WHOLE PROBLEM IN THE FIRST PLACE?!) But whatever, that kind of thing doesn't remove validity.

As far as the article goes, statistics in psychology and sociology is a very poor excuse for science

says the economics guy - lol.

Also - just seen your post in that other thread - why do you think it's making any claims about sexism? Is it the language she uses, like the things that were making me vomit? Or the context into which I posted it? I didn't think it was about sexism or feminism or anything, just maths and women and gender biases and stuff.

I'm really glad you liked it =D.

The article does not address the disparity between boys and girls in school. It pretends to. We both read the article and we are no closer to understanding 1. what is the disparity between males' and females' success? There were no numbers in that article and no links to the references at the bottom, which is where I suspect the massive failings have been made. Without those references the whole article is pontification. 2. Why does the disparity exist. She suggested some reasons without research to back it up. She did not explain the process that women go through vs the one that men go through, in their heads, that causes women to do worse in certain situations. This is essential. Its the difference between knowing that throwing something in the air means that it will come down, and theory of gravity. Knowing how and why something works is more important than knowing that it works.

We do know what she thinks we should do about it. More education, specifically she wants us to give girls a more positive, proactive attitude to their school work. Oh and maybe give boys the same? Whatever.

This is feminism because she never needed to focus on girls. This is at heart an article about the benefits of children understanding that hard work is more important than inate talent. Apparently the effect is more pronounced in girls than boys at certain ages. Does that actually matter? No. Why not write an article about how to improve boys and girls scholastic achievement, without worrying about who gains more? The language and the choice of topic both stink of feminism.

The language stinks, I am with you on that. I also agree that it's not particularly elucidating, and where are the references and numbers, and yeah, it's pretty crap. This bit though "hard work is more important than innate talent," that's not what it's about. It's saying that if you believe that maths is an innate talent, and then if you believe in a stereotype that says you are part of a group that is less likely to have this talent, then you will be less likely to succeed when faced with challenging maths problems. Get rid of the belief that maths is a gift, and boom, you're golden. Or something. It might not be saying it particularly well. Come to think of it, it might not be saying that at all, I might be reading all of that into it. At the start of pretty much every module at uni, we were told that there are certain biases in place, and that simply this act of telling us about them made any difference in performance that may result from them go away, and then they would give us lots of stuff to read if we were interested, and this was one of the things. So I read the article with that in mind, which has maybe coloured it for me.

You studied psychology?

You posted the link (in the middle of a discussion about gender) and said that the study was interesting and about gender biases. I thought I would point out that you were wrong on both counts =P.

Also, whoever told you to read that article is not to be trusted. Your should be more suspicious of material youre told to read, and the people giving it to you.

Also read piggy's article and I didn't find it so appealing as victoria did.
I don't know what it is with her that she tries to appease the men here so much. It's not just that she wants to promote intellectual debate because this totally agreeing is getting rather tiring and actually leading to the negative.

So....what did I think of the article ?? It might be interesting from a discussion point of view but let's just cut it down to size.

I - "Women need make-up and force this on themselves. Men would never do this"
Is that so ?? Personally I rarely use make up and when I do it's mostly for a social event. Do guys do nothing for a social event or a formal event ?? Of course they do. When you have a job interview you go into a tailored suit and prepare well. If you're going on a formal date you'll also take time to look nice, nice deodorant or a parfum. Seemingly cosmetics for men IS becoming a new issue and no, this is not from a women's perspective:
http://www.askmen.com/fashion/keywords/mens-cosmetics.html <---Guys...I guess we can agree that this is a mens point of view so yeah..............

II + III - "I watch more porn then Quaqmire. On a side note....feminism and job equality is bullshit anyway. Women are just filling in gaps by more worthless men"

While I agree that men can be seen as a form of downscale and that there are a lot of fucking idiots who happen to be of the XY gender I don't think this is the only reason women excel in carreers. Yes, positive discrimination is an issue which helps. On the other hand though, it's mostly through the commitment and determination of the individuals and the society which FINALLY gives women these chances. Like already begrudingly accepted by the topic starter women indeed do better then college. Finally job equality actually means much more then just the job. It means women are not dependent on men anymore for the income, a very liberating issue.

IV - "Guns are internal. We don't need a gun to make us feel like a man even though commercials make it out like that."

Is he serious ?? He whines on so much about Issue 1 - make up and then when it applies to guys then all of a sudden it doesn't matter anymore. No no no no no mister, you can't play with double standards. That women is partly right even in adressing that a culture and a society which upholds gun usage as a way to make you feel good is inherently wrong. I won't discuss the dangers of gun usage and the violence it entails in this thread (although it's interesting).

V - "Women whine on too much about their perceived lack of audience things aimed at them"

Well the way the evidence is presented here I would have to give him this point. On the other hand though, citing only 1 piece of an article to then set that as a evidence base for all women's writing is rather short minded and narrowed.

VI - "We don't dare to question our internal thoughts"

Well oke...I don't get what this has to do with sexism. Glad to see he's not so narrow minded not to whine on only about feminism and sexism. It's hard to argue either for or against here for it all boils down to an "what if" question. I don't know if I would have done things differently or would have put efforts down to change things.

VII - "A girl gets raped and no one protected her, not even other women. Seemingly women won't stand up for each other like men will"

Well first off I know nothing of this rape which happened so many years ago in one American city. Telling that it's a singular case again where he bases his whole generalization of women on. If it is true it is quite sad that other women didn't help them. But would men have done it any differently ?? There's a lot of needless violence (if there even is such a thing as needful violence) in which a person gets beat up in public. Guys don't help victims either. Bullying at school, not a lot of people would back the bullied people up. I can't judge others based on their behaviour but personally I do tend to stick up for people being victimized,bullied or mistreated. I don't know what others do but it's their choice to stick up for others or not. Bottom line being is that I don't think it's a women only thing that they let it slide by.

Victoria, I just read the "combating stereotype in the wild" article you linked, and passed a hasty judgement =D. I much prefer its style but again, no numbers, a little description of the tests and the way they were done, and no mention of the reason why asking someone their gender at the start of the test should make them do worse. This writing is worthless. Is this a case of someone in charge tells you youre going to do better, so you do better?

"But the goal of stereotype threat research is not to screw with people in the lab, of course, it’s to understand and perhaps alleviate real-world problems like test score gaps between various groups." That is not a noble aim. The researcher has lost their way. A real world problem would be we are not educating children as effectively as we could be. But a test score gap?

"gender stereotypes in math are pervasive, so it’s likely simply taking a test will activate them" Baseless.

Not psychology, philosophy. The blog cites some articles where you can find the results of the tests and stuff that he's on about. Some of them you'll need an Athens login or something similar to read them, but I don't think he needs to include all of the results, numbers, procedures etc, as his article's just a summary. I'm not sure why you don't think that research into the stereotype threat isn't a case of addressing the problem of how we are not educating our children as effectively as we could be, nor something that is interesting. Everyone is affected, so to alleviate it would mean that a lot of people's performance will be improved, that they will learn more than they would have had whatever stereotypes still been in place, and that they will go on to further study in whatever the relevant areas are. How's that not a move towards educating children as effectively as we could be? I find this kind of thing interesting because I can't bear to see people just wandering blindly through their lives without critically examining any of their beliefs. It doesn't make me sad, it makes me sick. A lot of things that have been said on here are adhering just as closely to stereotype tropes as anything that would be considered sexist. It seems a bigger problem to me when the adherents are those people who feel that they are the victims of whatever bias it is that is in question. So someone's being sexist on the internet, so what? Talk to them about it by all means, try to alleviate their ignorance out of the goodness of your heart, but there's no point in taking it personally; it says nothing about who you are, your place in society, what activities you are free to pursue. Those things are for you to define, you are free to be who you choose. And allowing for any stereotypes/biases in your way of thinking removes part of this freedom. I'm not saying that I'm so perfect that I am able to spot exactly when an opinion I hold is not my own, or that all of my beliefs are perfectly well reasoned. (I am saying that, I'm like a god.) That link you posted, (much more speculative than anything I've posted!) still haven't reread it, but it seemed to me that it was saying something similar, that people allow themselves to participate in these tropes, and that's where the problem comes from. Rise above it, and it's gone. People allow themselves to be marginalised, and pointing out that fact helps to reduce the problem. And Aranka, shush you, we're having a nice chat.

By not responding to my response to your article piggy I presume you concede that all the points I made were valid.

Good to know a piggy can also back out gracefully when he knows he is defeated :)