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Science Has a Sexual Assault Problem
cold fjord writes: Phys.org reports, "The life sciences have come under fire recently with a study published in PLOS ONE that investigated the level of sexual harassment and sexual assault of trainees in academic fieldwork environments. The study found 71% of women and 41% of men respondents experienced sexual harassment, while 26% of women and 6% of men reported experiencing sexual assault. The research team also found that within the hierarchy of academic field sites surveyed, the majority of incidents were perpetrated by peers and supervisors. The New York Times notes, "Most of these women encountered this abuse very early in their careers, as trainees. The travel inherent to scientific fieldwork increases vulnerability as one struggles to work within unfamiliar and unpredictable conditions."
I can't think of a single profession which doesn't seem to have a "problem." Makes one wonder.
If you were me, you'd be good lookin'. - six string samurai
I've got to think that women are more likely to actually report sexual harassment than men are. Probably wouldn't make up the entire difference, but would still be something to think about.
And that's a recurring problem in these discussions. That the sexists will imagine a strawman version of the methodology in order to dismiss it. Strawmanning these kinds of concerns is one of two tools in their toolbox. The other is "ignore this, there's [other vaguely comparable problem] so it's balanced" as if the correct thing to do isn't addressing both issues.
You're not comparing like against like. This study only looks at sexual assault in one particular environment (which, obviously, is part of someone's lifetime). The NIJ report looks at both physical and sexual assault, over an entire lifetime.
So that comparison does nothing to show whether sexual assault happens more or less often "in science" than "in general" or compared to any other workplace environment.
2) If the men have a significant response rate, then just maybe that means the problem is YOUR QUESTION IS TOO VAGUE, rather than both genders experiencing sexual issues.
The mere fact that this article claims that 40+% of men experience 'sexual harassment', proves that their definition of 'sexual harassment' is not reasonable - the kind of thing only a PC fool trying to prove a problem exists would use.
Similarly, 6% of men experience sexual assault seems on the high side, though not as ridiculous as the 41% claiming harassment.
The only thing going on here is idiots using bad definitions for their poll.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
The article looks at field work, not science as a whole. The results are self-reported, not verified or verifiable. And "harassment" and "assault" are defined so broadly that many normal day-to-day interactions can fall under them. In short, there is no evidence that "science has a sexual assault problem" in any standard meaning of those words.
Much as feminists and other progressives like to establish such a principle, in reality, just because you feel uncomfortable or believe that something was inappropriate doesn't mean anybody has actually done anything wrong.
Well yes, you are, guilty of deflecting criticism by claiming the definitions are too broad.
That's a common defensive reaction.
Problems should be well-defined. Someone can take that position whether they're doing it defensively or not and still be making a legitimate point. Calling it defensive, notably on a topic where there is moral stigma associated with being defensive about it, is just an ad hominem attack.
There are plenty of legitimate critiques of Parent's message--he appears to be dismissing out-of-hand an issue that affects hundreds of millions of people a year. He also failed to state what definitions he thinks are too broad to be useful. Responding with a question about one or more of those that might make people think about the issue is the difference between trolling and dialogue.
"you transsexual weirdo"
"I did *NOT* bother "shim"
The others included references and links to a pic from Rocky Horror Picture Show, saying that I was nuts for "cutting off my balls", "He/She", Frank. N. Furter, "you are mentally unhinged by taking estrogen to attempt to upset your body's natural order of things, which yes, includes your mind taking a huge hit. You have mentally unbalanced yourself more than doing something quite insane in a sex change to yourself also."
And a lot more. And this goes on every day ...
Sexual harassment in a thread about sexual harassment? This all started because someone asked "What is APK" and I told them.
Now, back on topic, the headline is mislabeled (so what else is new). It says "Science has a sexual assault problem," whereas the actual survey talks about sexual harassment. And a lot of posters seem to have failed to make the distinction.
One (not exhaustive) definition of sexual harassment I would use is words or acts containing references to sex or sexual identity that either make me uncomfortable, or, or, in APK's case, were intended to make me uncomfortable but failed. Sexual assault, on the other hand, is when I'm lying on a hospital gurney in emergency with paper towels stuffed between my legs to stop the bleeding after being attacked. And for the doubters that sexual assault is under-reported, I didn't report that incident - the doctors did. I couldn't tell them. I just wanted the whole world to leave me suffer alone in peace.
Sexual harassment is not a case of "I'll know it when I see it", because too many of the harassers simply don't get it in the first place. Saying so doesn't make me a feminazi - there are plenty of men who do "get it". And there are other parts of the world where it's a heck of a lot worse, due to a culture that treats women as 3rd-class citizens.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.