Shrinking Violets

This web piece, discussed over at Pandagon, is scary mostly because it rings so true. Mob Logic found that, when confronted with a person conducting interviews in public, women tend to avoid answering questions more than men. Women tend to pass on an interview altogether or defer to the man standing next to them. Often men will just jump in and speak for the women they are with, allowing the ladies to pass on even having to decide whether or not to answer.

Why this is the case seems obvious to me. Pandagon does a good enough job of answering that question but I'm so heated about it I'll summarize it here as well: Women learn early on that we are considered dim or superficial until proven otherwise. This puts a lot of pressure on every word that comes out of our mouths. One wrong sentence or fact and we will have provided more than enough evidence to confirm what is already "known": we don't know anything. It's better to remain quiet until there is a situation where we can be sure to best represent our brain power (if we even want to do that-it's not like we are conditioned to think smart women are especially foxy anyway. And being foxy is what counts in the long run. Duh!)

This piece gave me horrible flashbacks of middle school. That was about the time I started to realize that I was talking too much and wearing makeup not enough. But we were all promised that real life wasn't really like middle school. You know, if you survive 7th and 8th grade and then graduate high school it will be alright. The real world, I was led to believe, is full of rainbows, puppies and little pink chicks, and respect and acceptance for every one, no matter their gender, race, sexuality, or economic status. Where are those damn pink chicks!?