Sexism you have personally experienced or have heard of? *READ POST 1*

terryduff12

Guess gay men, trans people may as well not not apply will they allow women of a different colour also or is it whites only. A job for Wo(men) and Fe(males) how long before they make a new name for themselves.

I feel professors tend to be too tall. Not enough short people are represented in our irish colleges.

Calhoun

Its a nice little diversion though, us plebs who wont ever be in those elite circles and hardly on that type of money talking about it.

Meanwhile the 3rd level sector in itself isn't in the best of shape. Same FG tactic another day.

Zorya

silverharp wrote: »

i saw this posted elsewhere, is there even an 50/50 chance you can read either gender into this or is it one way traffic :pac:

Don't know how anyone else feels but I am beginning to flinch any time I read that word g*nd*r.

iptba

Calhoun wrote: »

Its a nice little diversion though, us plebs who wont ever be in those elite circles and hardly on that type of money talking about it.

Once there is a precedent for this, it could get replicated with other jobs also.

Employment experts say if the process is successful, the practice could well extend to other areas of the public sector where there is an under-representation of women.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/education/funds-for-women-only-professorships-aim-to-end-gender-inequality-1.3693939

Eric Cartman

iptba wrote: »

Once there is a precedent for this, it could get replicated with other jobs also.


https://www.irishtimes.com/news/education/funds-for-women-only-professorships-aim-to-end-gender-inequality-1.3693939

Drainage workers, not enough women in the Council drainage department, wheres the outrage for that ?

Calhoun

iptba wrote: »

Once there is a precedent for this, it could get replicated with other jobs also.


https://www.irishtimes.com/news/education/funds-for-women-only-professorships-aim-to-end-gender-inequality-1.3693939

Remains to be seen how successful it is, i don't see it becoming widespread without breaking the law.

Good chance it might go to europe if things don't go right here.

iptba

We also welcome the proposal to link the Higher Education Authority’s block grant to an institution’s performance in addressing gender inequality and the gender-proofing of recruitment and promotion procedures and practices across the sector.”

https://www.siptu.ie/media/pressreleases2018/mainnews/fullstory_21079_en.html

Minister Mitchell O’Connor said, “This Government and I are committed to eradicating gender inequality in our HEI’s. I am insisting on institutions setting ambitious targets for 1 year, 3 years and 5 years. I want 40% of professors within our institutions to be female by 2024.

https://www.education.ie/en/Press-Events/Press-Releases/2018-press-releases/PR18-11-12.html

The figure in 2017 was 24%.

It sounds to me like there is a very good chance men are going to be discriminated (i.e. this will encourage gender inequality/discrimination) so 3rd level institutions reach these targets; this is on top of their women-only professorships.

The Taoiseach, no less, was at the launch of these proposals.

iptba

I saw this on another forum. I imagine the principle doesn't just apply to high-powered positions in the 3rd level sector:
---
MMOC on Sean O'Rourke show this am. A big reaction from listeners and it would appear 90% plus not supportive and some women listeners very angry.

One listener's comment was especially interesting - she had worked on a research project about gender 'inequality' in third level education which found that women preferred to remain at lecturer grade with decent hours and good holidays. They made choices to have this which suited them rather than go for promotion and work longer hours, have more stress and lose half the pay rise in taxes. I would have thought that its obvious that these 'gender gaps' are due to women making sensible choices, but good to know research back this up.

iptba

I read elsewhere that this table is from Kinsella. It shows that the percentages of females applying for academic positions in Ireland over the last 10 years, is very similar to the percentage of the posts going to females.

Not sure how to do attachments for Boards.

https://imgur.com/a/RXgUkWH

gizmo555

This is just Mitchell O'Connor getting her own back (and setting a precedent for future appointments) for losing her full Cabinet post, which was claimed to be gender discrimination against her.

iptba

iptba wrote: »

I read elsewhere that this table is from Kinsella. It shows that the percentages of females applying for academic positions in Ireland over the last 10 years, is very similar to the percentage of the posts going to females.

Not sure how to do attachments for Boards.

https://imgur.com/a/RXgUkWH

Furthermore, I constantly hear that there's not enough women employed in STEM related occupations. I did both engineering and computer science in college and unsurpringly the percentage of women in those courses accurately represent the amount of women I encounter on a day to day basis in the field, which happens to be a minority.

The roots of these "problems" are far deeper than what is shown at the outcome at the highest level. Girls don't seem to be interested in STEM subjects as much as men. Once we tackle that issue, then there will be better gender representation. I believe its due to how society as a whole treat the genders. Boys are given tonka trucks and girls are given barbie dolls.

Zorya

Deleted User wrote: »

Furthermore, I constantly hear that there's not enough women employed in STEM related occupations. I did both engineering and computer science in college and unsurpringly the percentage of women in those courses accurately represent the amount of women I encounter on a day to day basis in the field, which happens to be a minority.

The roots of these "problems" are far deeper than what is shown at the outcome at the highest level. Girls don't seem to be interested in STEM subjects as much as men. Once we tackle that issue, then there will be better gender representation. I believe its due to how society as a whole treat the genders. Boys are given tonka trucks and girls are given barbie dolls.

Most girls don't want Tonka trucks. Some do, and most do sometimes, but overall a girl will choose a doll. With a doll a girl has a whole sophisticated world going on in her head, it is about evolving interpersonal relationships, intuition, imagination, perception, it is very complex and not just about ''caring '' for the doll or dressing them up in silly clothes, or whatever. It is a complex, ordered, inner adventure. I would imagine the same is so for a boy with a truck. Why the hell do we have to manipulate the species?

Zorya

Zorya wrote: »

Most girls don't want Tonka trucks. Some do, and most do sometimes, but overall a girl will choose a doll. With a doll a girl has a whole sophisticated world going on in her head, it is about evolving interpersonal relationships, intuition, imagination, perception, it is very complex and not just about ''caring '' for the doll or dressing them up in silly clothes, or whatever. It is a complex, ordered, inner adventure. I would imagine the same is so for a boy with a truck. Why the hell do we have to manipulate the species?

Are you claiming girls not choosing tonka trucks is innate to our species? I think this is nonsense. Trucks as a concept have existed for a split second in terms of the human evolution. Gendering trucks to be male is already manipulating our species. I'd argue if you put humans in a vacuum, there would be very little difference in what they play with. I can't prove that just as you can't prove that "most girls don't want Tonka trucks". I think its this kind of internal bias that creates these so-called inequalities in the first place. That doesn't mean I was downplaying the value of either toy. I was suggesting a reason why STEM has such a gender disparity and how it could be tackled in more practical manner than quotas.

Zulu

No

Deleted User wrote: »

Are you claiming girls not choosing tonka trucks is innate to our species? I think this is nonsense. Trucks as a concept have existed for a split second in terms of the human evolution. Gendering trucks to be male is already manipulating our species. I'd argue if you put humans in a vacuum, there would be very little difference in what they play with.

I'd suggest the salient point isn't trucks, but rather a different choice in toys. Which, as it happens I'd suggest is very valid.


I find it very amusing people who try to argue that boys and girls are all the same, and it's toy manufacturers/ad execs/society at large manipulating and forcing the hands of children; gendering toys and play. Frankly, as a father of a boy and a girl, in my own experience, it's utter bolloxology.



Boy and girls are different. The play different. They react to the world different. There's nothing at all wrong with that. In fact, its marvelous.

Zulu

Zulu wrote: »

I'd suggest the salient point isn't trucks, but rather a different choice in toys. Which, as it happens I'd suggest is very valid.


I find it very amusing people who try to argue that boys and girls are all the same, and it's toy manufacturers/ad execs/society at large manipulating and forcing the hands of children; gendering toys and play. Frankly, as a father of a boy and a girl, in my own experience, it's utter bolloxology.



Boy and girls are different. The play different. They react to the world different. There's nothing at all wrong with that. In fact, its marvelous.

I'm not claiming they're all the same. There are differences but I'm claiming the vast majority of these differences aren't innate. Choice of toys is not innate. Your children live in a society which pressures children to act according to their gender. Do you not see that at all. If an ad shows girls playing with a certain toy, girls are going to identify with that toy over another. This influence is unconscious by toy manufacturers/ad execs/society at large, to the degree that going against it is believed to be "manipulating our species". I don't think there is some mastermind behind this doing it on purpose rather we've all been conditioned like this.


I'm going to assume your daughter has long hair and your son has short hair. That's one of a million differences that is in no way innate. Also your sample size of two doesn't prove anything. My niece and nephew don't fit the usual stereotypes whatsoever. Have you ever wondered if you've subconsciously pushed them in certain directions without realising. Would you be proud if your son decided he wanted to be a ballerina. I'm sure you're very open minded and would have no problem with that but not everyone would feel that way. I think it's marvelous how individual humans can be so vastly different to each other.


The salient point for me is to what degree does nature versus nurture determine who we are. I obviously fall on the side that nurture is heavily influencing our gender differences. I'd weight it something like 95% nurture. I prefer to look at people as individuals rather than use sweeping statements to describe half the population.

Zorya

Deleted User wrote: »

Are you claiming girls not choosing tonka trucks is innate to our species? I think this is nonsense. Trucks as a concept have existed for a split second in terms of the human evolution. Gendering trucks to be male is already manipulating our species. I'd argue if you put humans in a vacuum, there would be very little difference in what they play with. I can't prove that just as you can't prove that "most girls don't want Tonka trucks". I think its this kind of internal bias that creates these so-called inequalities in the first place. That doesn't mean I was downplaying the value of either toy. I was suggesting a reason why STEM has such a gender disparity and how it could be tackled in more practical manner than quotas.

I am aware that Tonka trucks are not part of evolution

As far as I know archaeolgical toys tended towards being dolls or animal figurines for both sexes. And then the sort of games that we would consider common to both sexes now, casting dice, spinning things, pebble movement games, whistles, sticks and stone combos, that kind of thing. And miniaturised every day items that are effectively the tea sets that we would see nowadays for girls. So one could say it is boys toys that have been more genderised in modern times, in a way. Not girls.

Zorya

Deleted User wrote: »

I'm not claiming they're all the same. There are differences but I'm claiming the vast majority of these differences aren't innate. Choice of toys is not innate. Your children live in a society which pressures children to act according to their gender. Do you not see that at all. If an ad shows girls playing with a certain toy, girls are going to identify with that toy over another. This influence is unconscious by toy manufacturers/ad execs/society at large, to the degree that going against it is believed to be "manipulating our species". I don't think there is some mastermind behind this doing it on purpose rather we've all been conditioned like this.


I'm going to assume your daughter has long hair and your son has short hair. That's one of a million differences that is in no way innate. Also your sample size of two doesn't prove anything. My niece and nephew don't fit the usual stereotypes whatsoever. Have you ever wondered if you've subconsciously pushed them in certain directions without realising. Would you be proud if your son decided he wanted to be a ballerina. I'm sure you're very open minded and would have no problem with that but not everyone would feel that way. I think it's marvelous how individual humans can be so vastly different to each other.


The salient point for me is to what degree does nature versus nurture determine who we are. I obviously fall on the side that nurture is heavily influencing our gender differences. I'd weight it something like 95% nurture. I prefer to look at people as individuals rather than use sweeping statements to describe half the population.

My sons for the whole of their childhood had far longer hair than their sister, who was a divil with a scissors. They had waist length hair into puberty - gorgeous. They all also chose toys and activities that were effectively genderised - my daughter read abundantly and played with house making scenarios, the dens that she constructed were peopled with dolls and animals and showed complex hearth based facilities. The boys dens did not have occupants in this same way, except by chance, instead they had functions, complicated bridges, moats, pulley systems etc...and there was a constant desire for empire expansion and conquering And truly they were left to their own devices to figure it out.

I believe academic studies show that given choice overall children choose toys that are (ugh I hate this word) genderised.

Maxpfizer

Deleted User wrote: »

Are you claiming girls not choosing tonka trucks is innate to our species? I think this is nonsense. Trucks as a concept have existed for a split second in terms of the human evolution. Gendering trucks to be male is already manipulating our species. I'd argue if you put humans in a vacuum, there would be very little difference in what they play with. I can't prove that just as you can't prove that "most girls don't want Tonka trucks". I think its this kind of internal bias that creates these so-called inequalities in the first place. That doesn't mean I was downplaying the value of either toy. I was suggesting a reason why STEM has such a gender disparity and how it could be tackled in more practical manner than quotas.

Hm. I think that it's not necessarily true that all inequalities are bad.

I think, I hope, at a bare minimum we could agree that male homo-sapiens and female homo-sapiens have some inherent differences?

I think then we could agree that these differences could manifest in different and sometimes unforeseen ways?

So while I can agree that Tonka Trucks appear to be gendered in how they are presented to children and interacted with by children I suspect that some kind of "preferences" would present themselves even if we were put in a vacuum.

It might not be trucks and dolls specifically but it could be things like males prefer bulky or heavier or robust items and females might prefer softer or squishier or delicate items. I'm not proposing that things do specifically work this way but I am saying that it wouldn't be TOO surprising to find innate differences between males and females of any given species even if said species was indeed contained in a vacuum.

The question really should be whether or not these differences are inherently bad.

Then a further question is really to ask what are the consequences of overthrowing the status quo and replacing it with an, as yet, unknown situation.

Moving on to STEM...

Isn't the current "glorification" of STEM a social construct itself?
It's something I never really understood. Why does the idea that "we need more women in STEM" even exist? What's so good about STEM?

So, you have Silicon Valley in the USA where massive amounts of money are being made and pretty much in every industry you can think of people trained in STEM are bringing in decent money.

Is that it though? It's just all about the money?

I work in a STEM field and I have to tell you that most people in the job are miserable. It's dull and boring work. It's not like every student who studies STEM ends up raking in the big bucks and leading the world to a better future. Probably for 90+% it's just a boring-ass job.

So who decided that STEM is even worth women's time?

Ladies, we need you to get into these STEM positions! OK, but why?

When my mother was raising us back in the day my dad was working and she was at home looking after us kids. Now, that may seem awfully traditionalist and backwards but I'm not so sure that she would rather have a 40 hour a week boring as hell STEM job with an income that still really isn't enough to get by on.

My mother and father raised 3 children in a single income household. Their 3 children now struggle to make ends meet in partnerships where both parties hold down full time jobs.

Hell, we couldn't afford 3 kids nevermind having 3 kids and matching 40+ hour work weeks. So what if it's better for us to have an unequal division?

If enough partnerships agree to this unequal division of the partnership then wouldn't that scale up to inequality in society at large?

Is equality or representation in STEM or any other field even desirable?

It feels like I am moving towards saying "what if women aren't interested in STEM" and I know that the answer to that is "well lets get them interested".

Why though? Why is STEM held up as this glorious promised land of achievement and satisfaction?

It feels like we are at a cross roads between the traditional gender roles, allowing people to be whatever they want to be and convincing people that they should be interested in a particular thing on the grounds of "fixing " traditional inequality.

Is there a satisfactory conclusion we can reach there?

It would seem obvious that "allow people to be whatever they want" is the correct way BUT that leaves open the possibility that "be whatever they want" means "more men in STEM and more women in the kitchen".

So we do need some kind of "guiding hand", right?

I just feel that people look at STEM and think "woah there's loads of money in STEM" and then they look closer and say "and it's mostly all men here" and the conclusion is something along the lines of "how can we get more of this STEM money into the hands of women".

Then someone says "what if women aren't interested". To which the answer is "let's get them interested". Why though?

Surely changing someones existing interest in Area X to an interest in Area Y is only beneficial if Area Y is actually beneficial to the individual.

There are plenty of positives in traditionally female careers. Plenty of negatives too. However changing an interest in childcare or teaching to an interest in engineering brings the positives AND the negatives.

In reality, maybe STEM isn't all it's cracked up to be. So why would we want to socially engineer female interest in that field?

Is it only about the money?

sharper

Deleted User wrote: »

The salient point for me is to what degree does nature versus nurture determine who we are. I obviously fall on the side that nurture is heavily influencing our gender differences. I'd weight it something like 95% nurture. I prefer to look at people as individuals rather than use sweeping statements to describe half the population.

If it was 95% nurture we wouldn't be having this conversation because everyone would by definition be happy with the role they were raised within.

The key isn't whether boys or girls prefer trucks or dolls but how other preferences and interests lead them to choose those out of available options.

https://www.city.ac.uk/news/2016/july/infants-prefer-toys-typed-to-their-gender,-says-study

“Biological differences give boys an aptitude for mental rotation and more interest and ability in spatial processing, while girls are more interested in looking at faces and better at fine motor skills and manipulating objects. When we studied toy preference in a familiar nursery setting with parents absent, the differences we saw were consistent with these aptitudes. Although there was variability between individual children, we found that, in general, boys played with male-typed toys more than female-typed toys and girls played with female-typed toys more than male-typed toys.

This is also seen in primates

https://www.ehbonline.org/article/S1090-5138(02)00107-1/pdf

In this study, we found
that vervet monkeys (Cercopithecus aethiops sabaeus) show sex differences in toy preferences
similar to those documented previously in children. The percent of contact time with toys typically
preferred by boys (a car and a ball) was greater in male vervets (n = 33) than in female vervets
(n = 30) (P < .05), whereas the percent of contact time with toys typically preferred by girls (a doll
and a pot) was greater in female vervets than in male vervets (P < .01). In contrast, contact time with
toys preferred equally by boys and girls (a picture book and a stuffed dog) was comparable in male
and female vervets. The results suggest that sexually differentiated object preferences arose early in
human evolution, prior to the emergence of a distinct hominid lineage

Humans are not blank slates that can be moulded into anything you want. They come with their own preferences, interests and capabilities. Some of those are influenced by biological sex, certainly enough that almost everyone that has sons and daughters knows the difference from the very start.

Zulu

No

Deleted User wrote: »

I'm not claiming they're all the same. There are differences but I'm claiming the vast majority of these differences aren't innate.

Just interested to know, would you claim the same of other animals in the animal kingdom? (Claim that the vast majority of differences are not innate, but rather social conditioning?)

Choice of toys is not innate.

Perhaps choice isn't but how they are played with is.

Your children live in a society which pressures children to act according to their gender. Do you not see that at all.

I'm going to guess you dont have children. You'd be surprised how much (or indeed how little) exposure a baby has to "society-at-large". For the first couple of years of an infants life their "society-at-large" is their home; their mother & father.

If an ad shows girls playing with a certain toy, girls are going to identify with that toy over another.

Babies, at least our, didn't watch television. As toddlers, they didnt watch TV. At 4 & almost 6, they have very little "screen time", and watch Netflix & other streaming options - with very very little direct advertising. So much so, they complain that the telly is broken on the rare occasion ads do come one.

This influence is unconscious by...

I very much doubt that. They actively try their hardest, day & night, to maximise sales of their product.

...your sample size of two doesn't prove anything.

Of course it doesn't, it's simply a set of 2. Yet it is unarguably paralleled to society at large. But you reject that, I get it.

My niece and nephew

Ah so you don't have children. It figures.

Have you ever wondered if you've subconsciously pushed them in certain directions without realising.

Well I consciously push them in certain directions; I'm a parent, it's my role.

Would you be proud if your son decided he wanted to be a ballerina.

That largly depends. If it's what he wanted because of the love of it, sure. If he was doing it to prove some gender point, I'd be disgusted.

The salient point for me is to what degree does nature versus nurture determine who we are. I obviously fall on the side that nurture is heavily influencing our gender differences. I'd weight it something like 95% nurture.

I'd weigh maybe 70-75% nature. Sad cases like David Reimer's (See BBCs brilliant and tragic Horizon documentary) would tend to support that, along with my own 40 years of observation of the natural world around me.

I prefer to look at people as individuals rather than use sweeping statements to describe half the population.

Wow. Fair play for climbing onto a horse so high. Pray tell, considering the population is around 7.5 Billion, how long do you propose to spend meaningfully discussing 3.75 billion people at an individual level? (Never mind the obvious point that you've asserted there are only 2 genders - for shame, for shame...)

runawaybishop

No

sharper wrote: »

Humans are not blank slates that can be moulded into anything you want. They come with their own preferences, interests and capabilities. Some of those are influenced by biological sex, certainly enough that almost everyone that has sons and daughters knows the difference from the very start.

My daughter loves Optimus Prime, but she loves to pretend he is a baby to look after. My son liked to transform him and crash him into things.

H3llR4iser

Maxpfizer wrote: »

Isn't the current "glorification" of STEM a social construct itself?
It's something I never really understood. Why does the idea that "we need more women in STEM" even exist? What's so good about STEM?

Probably, part of the reasons are purely utilitarian from the industry's POV: there's always a a shortage of people in the field, especially when it comes to IT (when you're looking for ACTUALLY GOOD professionals!), and a very much untapped pool of humans, mostly made up of young girls who won't even consider the career at the time of choosing studies.



As I wrote here before, being in Software Dev myself for the best of two decades now I would absolutely agree with you about most jobs in the field being dull, monotonous and boring as it gets; On top of that, it's a professional exercise on constantly chasing one own tail as the whole field suffers from a constant influx of senseless fads - which keep repeating themselves every few years.



Yet, it's also a low hanging fruit for the "we need more women in [insert something here]" movements: it's a career path that gives access to relatively high pay at an earlier stage than most (a junior engineer starting on 40k or more a year is not unheard of), it's not physically demanding, it can be relatively flexible in terms of accessing part time or remote working arrangements and it's...kinda fashionable to talk about it right now (not to BE in it, at least if you're a guy...looooooong story).



We don't hear "we need more women in garages", "we need more women in metal working" or "we need more women on construction sites" very often, do we?

Zorya

There is a very comprehensive data chart here of sex representation in employment. You may likely have to provide an email address to see it, but after that it's one click. The jobs where males dominate have a few things in common - they require physical strength and are often dirty.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2017/03/06/chart-the-percentage-women-and-men-each-profession/GBX22YsWl0XaeHghwXfE4H/story.html

Maxpfizer

H3llR4iser wrote: »

Probably, part of the reasons are purely utilitarian from the industry's POV: there's always a a shortage of people in the field, especially when it comes to IT (when you're looking for ACTUALLY GOOD professionals!), and a very much untapped pool of humans, mostly made up of young girls who won't even consider the career at the time of choosing studies.

As I wrote here before, being in Software Dev myself for the best of two decades now I would absolutely agree with you about most jobs in the field being dull, monotonous and boring as it gets; On top of that, it's a professional exercise on constantly chasing one own tail as the whole field suffers from a constant influx of senseless fads - which keep repeating themselves every few years.

Yet, it's also a low hanging fruit for the "we need more women in [insert something here]" movements: it's a career path that gives access to relatively high pay at an earlier stage than most (a junior engineer starting on 40k or more a year is not unheard of), it's not physically demanding, it can be relatively flexible in terms of accessing part time or remote working arrangements and it's...kinda fashionable to talk about it right now (not to BE in it, at least if you're a guy...looooooong story).

We don't hear "we need more women in garages", "we need more women in metal working" or "we need more women on construction sites" very often, do we?

I think it would be fine if it was just down to a shortage of people in general. So if there was a need for X number of people in STEM and the maximum number of men who even want to be in STEM had been reached.

Plus their actions are kind of self defeating in a lot of ways. On one hand they want more women in STEM but also on the other hand they also want more women taking Gender Studies etc.

So, for example, Gender Studies courses are in competition with STEM courses for students but at the same time they are campaigning for women to take STEM courses. That almost makes no sense.

We never will hear "we need more women in garages", "we need more women in metal working" or "we need more women on construction sites".

What I think we will hear instead is demand for a discussion on the "value" of the work.

STEM is an easy one because, as you say, it's not physically demanding. So they just say "too many men, get more women in here".

Lets say we are talking about a large supermarket chain. They will have more women on checkouts and more men in the warehouse. That's gonna be a tough one to equalize because the warehouse work could be demanding in a way that causes many women to say "i'd rather be on checkouts".

What's the "value" of the individual work though? That's what they will go after next, in my opinion.

Why should a man in the warehouse be paid more than a woman on the checkouts? They provide the same "value" to the company so pay them the same.

So you won't hear "we need more women in metal working" but you will hear, eventually, "metal working has the same value as <inset majority female occupation here> so they should earn the same".

I think that the whole Feminist movement is kind of anti-capitalist and opposed to meritocracy at it's foundation and the "need more women in STEM" thing is a manifestation of that.

They can "fix" that one with quotas etc but closing the "pay gap" itself would require more control on what people are actually allowed to earn.

py2006

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQvSEGqwiUI

iptba

py2006 wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQvSEGqwiUI

Unfortunately, males can’t have full confidence in the kangaroo courts in US colleges.

fly_agaric

I do wonder sometimes what will happen to the gender balance in the student population once the "STEM" issue is sorted out to the liking of feminists (50/50 intake in stuff like maths, computer science and physics).

I think, even with the unconscionably high numbers of males in Engineering courses its around 60 % female students overall in Irish universities (not that you ever see that little stat publicised much!).

johnnyskeleton

Deleted User wrote: »

The salient point for me is to what degree does nature versus nurture determine who we are. I obviously fall on the side that nurture is heavily influencing our gender differences. I'd weight it something like 95% nurture. I prefer to look at people as individuals rather than use sweeping statements to describe half the population.

Nuture also affects the language you speak, the clothes you wear, the food you eat, your ability to wipe your own bottom etc. All these things are learned behaviour as part of growing up in society. None of these things are inherently considered to be bad, they form part of peoples cultural heritage and human biology has evolved and adapted to encompass these things, to such an extent that it has affected our nature in the sense of our higher brain functions, complex digestive system, lack of fur etc.

What I find baffling is that no one wants to change these social constructs of talking instead of bashing each others brains out, collectively working towards better quality food etc, but there is an attempt to change our genders based on the supposition that it is a symptom of a sick society! IMO its perfectly natural to have boys and girls, and if some people dont fit that mould we tolerate them, rather than using them as a basis to deconstruct our entire society

LostinBlanch

maybe

Deleted User wrote: »

I'm not claiming they're all the same. There are differences but I'm claiming the vast majority of these differences aren't innate. Choice of toys is not innate. Your children live in a society which pressures children to act according to their gender.

OK i'm coming into this a bit late and see that Zulu has demolished your arguments fairly comprehensively (IMO) but I'm going to throw my tuppence worth in and also call bollocks to that.

This study from Live Science/URL] showing that men and women do think differently - men have more grey matter in their brains compared to women who have more white matter.

In human brains, gray matter represents information processing centers, whereas white matter works to network these processing centers.

. Think of this as nature hedging it's bets since both men and women have been proven to perform equally on broad measures of cognitive ability, such as intelligence tests.

Then, there's also this Scientific American study that shows the differences between connections in and between brain hemispheres in men and women.

The research, which involved imaging the brains of nearly 1,000 adolescents, found that male brains had more connections within hemispheres, whereas female brains were more connected between hemispheres. The results, which apply to the population as a whole and not individuals, suggest that male brains may be optimized for motor skills, and female brains may be optimized for combining analytical and intuitive thinking.

So there's two major studies I found with two minutes googling that dispute your view that it's 95% nurture that's responsible for differences in play/behaviour/thinking between males and females. This of course is a major problem for those faux academics* with a point to prove and by God they're going to prove it whether it exists or not.

Feel free to reply with your own studies that disprove what I've said above.

*The ones involved in Grievance Studies as exposed so nicely by real academics in the Social Sciences who didn't think that in Social Sciences there is proper academic rigour applied to a lot a papers that are peer reviewed and published in "academic" journals such as Affilia which published a feminist rewrite of a chapter of Mein Kampf!

Anyway, I think that's enough from me tonight.