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A 60 Minutes Story on Gender Equality Accidentally Proved the Persistence of Patriarchy (qz.com)
Over at Quartz, Ephrat Livni reports that a 60 Minutes story about gender equality accidentally proved the persistence of patriarchy. Reader theodp shares the report: Good intentions are nice, but they aren't enough, the TV news show 60 Minutes recently proved. The show's producers apparently meant well when they decided to do a segment on women in technology and the gender gap, which aired on March 4. But they ended up punching women in the gut, as the founder and CEO of Girls Who Code, Reshma Saujani, puts it in her response to the segment. Ultimately, 60 Minutes featured a man, Code.org CEO Hadi Partovi. His [tech-backed] organization's mission is to expand access to computer science education in schools.
Women technologists like Saujani who were tapped to appear on the show about a year ago and worked with producers to provide research and interviews, ended up on the cutting room floor while Partovi spoke on their behalf. Here is the cruel irony: As a result, 60 Minutes' segment was accidentally exceptionally effective-it proved that women in tech really can't catch a break. [...] Ayah Bdeir, the founder of STEM learning toy company littleBits, also responded to the episode in a Medium post. She noted that she worked with 60 Minutes for a year, planning interviews, providing research, talking to the producers and reporters, telling her story and that of her organization, which is focused on closing the gender gap in technology. Yet producers wrote to her last August to say that the focus of the segment had shifted and that littleBits would no longer be central in the story. In an email, a producer explained to her, 'It's not that the important points you made in your interview are ignored in the story, or that you didn't make them very effectively, they're just made by others'.
Women technologists like Saujani who were tapped to appear on the show about a year ago and worked with producers to provide research and interviews, ended up on the cutting room floor while Partovi spoke on their behalf. Here is the cruel irony: As a result, 60 Minutes' segment was accidentally exceptionally effective-it proved that women in tech really can't catch a break. [...] Ayah Bdeir, the founder of STEM learning toy company littleBits, also responded to the episode in a Medium post. She noted that she worked with 60 Minutes for a year, planning interviews, providing research, talking to the producers and reporters, telling her story and that of her organization, which is focused on closing the gender gap in technology. Yet producers wrote to her last August to say that the focus of the segment had shifted and that littleBits would no longer be central in the story. In an email, a producer explained to her, 'It's not that the important points you made in your interview are ignored in the story, or that you didn't make them very effectively, they're just made by others'.
It doesn't prove "the patriarchy". It doesn't even prove that media organisations are full of shit (which we knew).
It merely proves that the precious darling bitterly complaining doesn't understand that media organisations are full of shit and that sometimes being a woman isn't enough to get special treatment.
Sometimes.
> But wait a minute: Isn't diversity... EVERYONE?
The best way to be more inclusive is to exclude white male hetrosexual Christians.
Because we can never tolerate intolerant people.
Political correctness can be achieved by sacrificing logic and internal self consistency.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
No! You are so wrong!
Don't you see? This IS an ATTACK ON WHITE MALES.
The white males said so, and since they are in charge it MUST BE TRUE.
QED.
Now go make me a drink and clean this place up.
>Isn't diversity... EVERYONE?
It is. But right now, as a white, CIS male, we are in the historic majority, and almost everything about society caters to us as being "a normal person", so that everybody else has to adapt to function in a society designed for people like us.
That necessarily means that as society embraces diversity, it *must* turn partially away from us, in order to embrace all the other kinds of "normal" that actually exist. And in order to continue to function effectively, we are going to have to learn to adapt to the unfolding, less discriminatory new "normal".
And of course, as that happens it's going to feel like we're being discriminated against, because people are becoming less tolerant of us. That's not discrimination though (mostly, there's always exceptions) - that's just loss of privilege. We're just starting to have to face the same difficulties of adapting to a society designed for an alien "normal" that everyone else has always had to deal with.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Yes, that's exactly the problem. It's like you didn't see major female lead action movies very often, Black Widow figures were hard to find... And then Wonder Woman came along and suddenly Hollywood realizes that a movie starring a woman and directed by a woman can actually do pretty well. Now there are more of them coming, maybe even a Black Widow solo movie after the other core Avengers all got them.
Also, is 60 Minutes really supposed to be about chasing ratings, or should there be an element of trying to do the right thing or draw attention to important issues even if it means a few people tune out? "Ratings" are a pretty lame excuse.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Maybe try not reading every story as a personal attack?
Also please try to understand what patriarchy is. Men are sometimes disadvantaged by the legal system due to their gender, but that's because in a patriarchy women are seen as the more "natural" parents and toxic ideas about masculinity, that men are less suitable parents and less loving, are all part it.
By addressing this the system will get fairer for everyone, including men.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
There's never pressure to get more women in to menial or low paying jobs
In fact the whole women's equality movement really got moving when women started doing factory work during the first world war. Low paid, lower than the men in fact, dirty and dangerous. But very welcome.
These days examples would include sports, plumbing, the armed forces...
There's also no pressure to get more men to win custody battles
There is. Getting equality for fathers, such as equal access to parental leave, is all part of an effort to get men to participate equally in child rearing. That in turn helps courts see fathers are equal to mothers, as loving parents with an equal entitlement to access, and that the relationship between father and child is equally important.
Another example would be the push to recognize domestic violence towards men. Unfortunately it's still the butt of many jokes or simply not believed when presented to law enforcement and courts.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
They're starting too, which is why you're pissed off.
Every time people call you out for saying sexist or racist things - that's the check not being in the mail any more.
Every time you go looking for an apartment and don't have the vacancies mysteriously disappear - that's the check in the mail.
Every time you've gotten a job rather than a better-qualified minority guy - that's the check in the mail.
Every time you negotiate a higher salary or assert yourself in a meeting without being considered a pushy bitch - that's the check in the mail.
Those are all common problems women and minorities deal with on a regular basis - the fact that you never see them is because you're in the privileged class. Most racism, sexism, etc. is largely invisible to those not effected, precisely because it's only done to other people, so unless you're actually in the room and paying attention when it happens to someone else, you'll never see it.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Many who have privileges feel that equality looks like oppression.