On 2 Apr 1999, S L Forsburg wrote:
>> > From: Linnea Ista <lkista at unm.edu>
>> > Think this is part of the remaining bastion of discrimination: It is
> > assumed that the AVERAGE white male is competent, while a woman or person
> > of color must be excellent to even deserve a crack at the same position.
>>> Well put. I have noticed that when it comes to hiring, some
> senior faculty will be very impressed with the same few female
> superstars but will ignore the vast majority of other women who
> are just as competent as most of the men being considered. It is
> very annoying, but allows them to say that they considered a woman,
> but gee, 20 other institutions wanted to hire her too, so they couldn't
> get her. Part of the problem also is that women lack the talent
> (if you can call it that) for self-promotion that allows the average
> guy to stand out.
And I think self-promotion in women tends to backfire anyhow. It is seen
as being "too aggressive" and thinking too much of herself.
>>> > The assumption is that a white male deserves the job (I often hear
> > references to "our" jobs) and that anyone else must be more than competent
> > to be taken seriously. And I think to a certain extent the rest of us
> > internalize this a bit, thinking WE don't deserve to be taken seriously
> > unless we are excellent.
>> Absolutely. I am sure this goes a long way to explaining the cracked
> pipeline from postdoc to faculty. And the attitude about "our" jobs
> is deeply ingrained even in young men, who persist in the totally
> misguided notion that being a woman will make job-hunting easier.
OOOOOO! Does that ring true to me. A few years ago we had two seniors in
out lab. One was an African American woman with a 4+ GPA (we give A+'s at
UNM). The other was an pretty smart but average white male. The young
woman, I'll call her Celia, got interview after interview at some pretty
high tech power companies, while the young man got a handful at some so-so
places. His comment to someone visiting and talking about their job search
was going was "Well, you know why CELIA is getting all those interviews.
Us white guys don't have a chance with all this preferential treatment."
I am afraid I lost it and asked what they would think if Celia's name was
Bob, was blond haired and blue eyed and had a 4+ average. To what would
they attribute a multitude of interviews then???? The answer was that well
in that case, the guy clearly would be the best candidate. I asked them to
think about what they were saying VERY carefully. They then told me I just
didn't "get" how hard it was to be a white male these days.
> Part of the problem is that women are so few and have such high visibility
> as a result that any failing stands out, whereas who notices the
> guy who is having difficulty, since he is one among so many? He gets
> to be the exception. The women are made the rule.
Exactly. And I know that I am very sensitive to this and just CRINGE when
a woman does something really dumb, because I know it is going to either
reflect on me, or be thrown in my face. That whole "walking on eggshells"
has to take its toll as well.
The question is, how do we change this?
Linnea
