Male Scientist Writes of Life as Female Scientist

[sunnydale47]

Stanford neurobiologist Ben Barres has a unique perspective on gender discrimination in the math and science field.

An F2M transsexual who used to be Barbara Barres, he said his experience as both a man and a woman had given him an intensely personal insight into the biases that make it harder for women to succeed in science

Comments

[ms_interpret]

The comment about the work being better than his sister's was one of the points I brought up with Josie. We all talked about whether the guy who said could have actually not realized that he was sexist in his thinking and that it was completely unconscious, and what we can do to stop that sort of thinking in its tracks when we notice it in ourselves.

I have read Black Like Me. It was required reading in Grade 9 English. Josie will probably need a few years on her before she can manage that one. She's pretty sensitive.

Black people here aren't the victims of racism like they are in the US (with the exception of some of the bigger cities like Toronto and Montreal, where I perceive it to be similar, but I'm a white woman so... grain of salt time). However, the Amerindian/Native/Indian/Aboriginal/insert culturally appropriate term/ people are. Especially in the prairies and in the rural areas of the rest of the country. I grew up with it. It's utterly sickening. Every disgusting racist joke you ever heard about black people has also been told of the Indians here. The repercussions of the residential schools are still felt everywhere. It makes me cry when I think about it. They are treated so poorly it is no bloody wonder there's a problem with alcoholism and drugs in their communities. And you know where that leads. Well, that and the miserable poverty.

Gah. I could go on for days. I'll shut up now before I drive my own mood into the ground.

[sunnydale47]

Oh, Indians (which I've heard most of them prefer to "Native Americans") suffer from as much prejudice in the US as black people do -- in some areas, more. There is almost no Indian middle class; the tribes that have casinos are rich, and all the others are dirt poor. The poorest counties in the US are populated mostly or entirely by Indians. For example:Pine Ridge Indian Reservation is an Oglala Sioux Native American reservation located in the U.S. state of South Dakota. Pine Ridge was established in the southwest corner of South Dakota on the Nebraska border and consists of approximately 2.7 million acres (11,000 km²), roughly the size of Connecticut. Most of the land comprising the reservation lies within Shannon County and Jackson County, two of the poorest counties in the U.S.

Unemployment on the Reservation hovers around 85% and 97% live below the Federal poverty level. Average annual family income is $3,800 as of 1999. Adolescent suicide is 4 times the National average. Many of the families have no electricity, telephone, running water, or sewer. Many families use wood stoves to heat their homes as opposed to more modern ways to keep warm. The population on Pine Ridge has among the shortest life expectancies of any group in the Western Hemisphere: approximately 47 years for males and in the low 50s for females. The infant mortality rate is five times the United States national average.
This is not exactly the portrait of an empowered group of people.
  We had the same abusive residential schools, the same trains filled with children.... Argh, no sense going into it or I'll be up all night researching and grumbling to myself.

But anyway, here it's the black people and the Indians who are marginalized. (I thought they were called First Nations in Canada, but you didn't mention that. Is that no longer used?)

The very first principle of the Unitarian Universalists is that we covenant to affirm and promote "the inherent worth and dignity of every person." Why can't other people agree on that?

[ms_interpret]

Oh yes, things are bad for them there too. I realize. I used to belong to an internet group about the Lakota language, and there were a number of Pine Ridge residents who were members (thank goodness their library has internet access!) I'm well aware of what goes on there and it's appalling. We drove through the area on the way back from a conference in Nebraska. It's shockingly bad. The situation is much the same here.

The biggest difference is that they're a bigger proportion of the population here, and so they get more of the scapegoating. For example, in Saskatchewan, about 14% of the people are Indians. And they're almost all quite poor. As a result, there is a higher concentration of them in the prisons, and therefore according to the assholes, "Indians are criminals".

I don't know why people can't affirm and promote "the inherent worth and dignity of every person." I think it has to do with fear and ignorance. :(

Yeah, the term is First Nations Peoples. I always forget that one because it's so cumbersome.