We know that women students and staff remain underrepresented in Higher Education STEM disciplines. Even in subjects where equivalent numbers of men and women participate, however, many women are still disadvantaged by everyday sexism. Our recent research found that women who study STEM subjects at undergraduate level in England were up to twice as likely as non-STEM students to have experienced sexism. The main perpetrators of this sexism were not university staff, however, but were men STEM degree students.
The undergrad boys in STEM I swear have never met a woman aside from their mothers. No, please don’t follow me home. Please don’t buy me food because I was next to you in line. Please don’t follow me into a store so you can buy me anything I’m purchasing. You are not invited into my conversation because you think I’m pretty, even if you just want to interrupt to tell me I’m pretty and you want to take me on a date. You are not allowed to hug me and hold me as long as you want just because you want to and it feels good for you, I didn’t want a hug and I didn’t know you. It isn’t cute for you to take things from me and play keep away because you are stronger and taller, it makes you a bully.
Teachers: please don’t ignore me when I try and participate or ask a question. I’ve gotten Cs with no explanation, no marks aside from the grade itself. When I check other’s work, theirs is written up with mistakes and they have a higher grade. Honestly that was just one teacher in an undergrad, the rest were pretty awesome, or at least not sexist.
My CS classes were 90% male, and every professor was male, too. They all genuinely enjoyed my participation, and it was the only environment where I wasn’t objectified or disrespected. Same with my coworkers (again 90% male) when I went into the FAANG workforce; the men were happy to see women excel in a previously male-only field.
The general public was a different story until recently. Women were thrilled, a disturbing number of men refused to listen to me.
It probably depends on the university. There are definitely dregs of “incel” culture that get in but they can’t socialize and are usually left alone. In the workforce, interviews stop them from getting much further then that.
In the workforce, interviews stop them from getting much further then that.
Hahahahahahahahahaha
They probably haven’t. My experience was a lot of these guys were on the spectrum and the only social understanding of women they have is media. I would say the sexism is very malicious from the faculty, but from fellow students a lot of them this is the first time they’ve been allowed away from their helicopter parents and to begin learning social skills, sadly at your detriment.
Fortunately the ones who seemed socially awkward were the ones who did understand no. The majority who gave me scares were likely on the spectrum but none went too far. The ones who went too far and never respected no were definitely not on the spectrum, they were self centered and didn’t pay attention to others.
There are plenty of men who act like boys because they have seen grace for their actions their whole lives. The result is that they cannot learn from their actions because they never learned how. They cannot understand when others don’t let them do whatever they want, and they don’t recognize consequences for their actions because they never had any. This may describe some on the spectrum but it has nothing to do with autism.
I’m not even involved in a STEM job any longer but I still see tons of STEM employed men spewing manosphere bullshit all the time. I’m also starting to see more and more well educated, articulate women parroting it. These women also tend to be overwhelmingly conservative in their political positions, too. Especially well educated white women.
In my experience the technology related fields are greater perpetrators than the base sciences. Though there is still an image problem for things like math (the not tech, engingeering or finance version) and a problem with people outside the field having sxcist expectations about those in it, I genuinely think the environment itself to be very inclusive.
I don’t know why any women sticks it out in that segment. The crap they deal with. No amount of money could make it worth it. The shitheads won.
Not to mention that gay STEM students are more likely to face homophobia. It was rampant at my uni. We could not keep any sort of gay-related posters up without them getting ripped off and trampled within hours. Which in retrospect is wild because there were so many of us, and more who came out years later. lol
“why aren’t heterosexuals subject to homophobia!?!?”
(ti’s a joke)
As a woman engineer, yeah we’re probably disproportionately responsible. I’m sure science and math have more sexism than say art, but biology has to treat women better than engineering I assume.
I’m a guy so I realize I don’t see or understand everything from women’s perspective, but I’m genuinely surprised by this. I’ve worked for decades at companies with mostly engineers and mostly men, and my experience is that engineers have on average much more progressive views than, say, my neighbors. My current company recently switched from a male to a female CEO and I haven’t even heard anyone mention her gender, much less express any negative views in connection to her gender. My previous employer also had a female CEO and it just wasn’t a thing on people’s mind. At my current employer we have anonymous surveys to find problems in the workplace, and there were exactly zero people who reported observing any sexist actions.
I’ve heard sexist remarks twice in 20 years, and both times I was so flabbergasted that I didn’t know what to do or say before the conversation had already moved on. So if I’m bad at speaking up when it happens, it’s only because I didn’t get enough practice.
Anecdotally, the biological engineering department at my university has a much higher fraction of women than the rest of the college of engineering, while mechanical/aerospace has the lowest, so it varies even within engineering.
One truth about the modern media landscape: stories that pit groups against each other play well
The division was there already, some just didn’t notice it. If you think we’d do better united, maybe consider challenging the sexists and other bigots creating the division.
It reminds me of MLK Jr denouncing the “negative peace which is the absence of tension” as an obstacle to true equality, as opposed to the “positive peace which is the presence of justice”.
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We can be less bigoted than the past while also having a long way to go still. You could even count as a sign of this improvement that these issues are taken seriously and discussed rather than ignored as “just the way things are”.
But we can’t take it for granted, because progress is not guaranteed and equality can decline. Say, such as the matter of abortion rights in the US and consequently how pregnancies are policed, leading to possible arrests even for natural miscarriages.
If you acknowledge that we aren’t finished fighting bigotry, I don’t really understand what’s your concern here.
We are less bigoted compared to the past, what the 1720s?
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I get that clickbait is a thing, but as a community focused on Technology it seems pertinent to consider what the experience of different people in this area is like.
Should we pretend it doesn’t happen so that the journalists don’t “win”? It is upsetting to know that this happens, but I don’t see how we “lose” by being informed. This isn’t someone trolling on social media, it’s the reality of the world we live in.
What is good example comment of gaslighting for $400 Alex?
Must be nice being able to go thru life and thinking bigotry doesn’t exist while blaming the people who are reporting it. Yes it is the messenger that is at fault.
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Name 5 societies in all of history, that are as diverse as the western world today and have the levels of opportunity for minorities
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Bullshit and it’s time for the Western World to admit that is bullshit.
Just in my city, solid blue district in solid blue state, the local Jewish temple has a police car in-front of it every time they have services due to a bomb threat over a year ago. People dropped fliers in mailboxes complaining about a person putting up a sign on their door in Arabic that said “god bless this house” The fliers called it un-American. The city next to mine had a mass protest against a Mosque being built.
Ever been to Thailand? The tolerance of the pagan feels like an understatement. Everyone there believes whatever they want without any shame. People worshipping statues and making offerings to ancestors. Signs everywhere bragging about hallel food and prayer rooms. And before you even try it I am an atheist and have had zero issues there, unlike the US where I have to occasionally lie. The atheist groups I go to half the members don’t want their picture taken or name recorded.
In what way are we Westerners less bigoted? It isn’t racism, it isn’t feminism, it isn’t religion, it isn’t LGBT. Go ahead and get a few beers in any minority in your country and ask them what they really think. Or you know you could spend thirty minutes of your life looking at all the documented peer-reviewed evidence gathered that paints a picture of our supposed tolerance.
One truth about the world is that oppressor wants the oppressed to shut up and take abuse.
We coulda told you that without a study bruh
STEM (both technical university and workforce) has been a cesspit of misogyny from my personal experience.
Comments are a shit show 🙂
I’m a woman in STEM. I only went to a CC, so maybe there’s a difference there, but I didn’t experience much sexism in my time there.
I have experienced it at work, but usually from the younger, unsocialized men. Is it a problem? Sure, but I’ll take that over my bosses being sexist.
Also, along with the sexism does come some privilege. When I do something wrong, I tend to get taken easier on when it comes to punishment. I also am able to form… different (non-sexial) bonds with the higher ups. These dynamics are much different to any bonds I had with female bosses from my previous field of work, and they’re different than the bonds the higher ups have with my male counterparts. I can say that I don’t worry about being laid off or fired.
However, I’m also fairly certain that I have a sharp awareness of these bonds and how to manipulate them to get what I want.
Not trying to poo-poo any sexism claims, just that there’s also certainly a privilege to be had being a woman minority in a male-dominated field.
That entire post was an ode to Internalized misogyny.
Is it a problem? Sure, but I’ll take that over my bosses being sexist.
Both can be wrong…When someone asks you if you’ve experienced sexism, It isn’t to fill some imaginary, arbitrary quota we’re reaching. No need to omit. No one’s grading your essay here.
Ah yes someone has a different experience?? They must internally hate themselves. 🙄
I’m not omiting anything, just adding that some privilege comes along with the sexism.
You don’t know what internal misogyny is. This is sounding more and more like a pipe dream of an MRA incel trying to strawperson stories that situations women find themselves in are a privilege of power just so you can misogyny about it.
I know what it means, its just used incorrectly a lot, like it is here.
Jesus fuck you sound horrible
Why’s that? People like me fine.
According to you. Get comfy with the block list psycho.
It’s lemmy. Who cares
There can’t be many places in uni where women are outnumbered by men. It seems like that are taking a majority and trying to make out they are not the minority.
They aren’t talking about university as a whole. They aren’t talking about courses where men are massively outnumber by women. It seems they are using the one group of people where women come off worse than men to fit a narrative.
Either use the data from all the the university or not at all. Otherwise it’s data selection and biased.
Also the self reported sexism is very tiring because it in itself is biased. You hear it all the time something like Woman A : I get so much sexism of man A. He always talks over me.
Man b: yea man A is an arsehole. He talks over everyone, I don’t think he can help kt.
Yet you use that data and it looks like sexism because it is self reported. It’s not, I’ve noticed many women struggle in loud environments, that’s not sexism if she is treated the same as everyone else and just struggles with it.
This is the most “not all men” answer I could ever imagine. You literally got angry at the data, not because there’s sexism, but because there are other men who exist in other places who aren’t sexist.
It’s well-documented that women don’t go into STEM. When data explains why women don’t go into STEM, getting pissy because there are men who are in other fields who aren’t sexist completely misses the entire goddamned point.
I think he may have stumbled past a interesting point (his main point was kind of dumb)-
While I would say the STEM crowd is more susceptable to a certain kind of intellectual narcissism that allows shitty behavior, anyone doing this kind of study should hopefully be making an effort to address the idea that if like 1/6 of dudes are extra shitty then are the STEM students uniquely shitty or are they just normal shitty and the classroom breakdown just means that there’s like 50% more shitty dudes and half as many targets for their shittyness.
That said, I’d love to see the stats on law schools as they tend have the “bro-est bros”
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Or, hear me out, it’s just sexism.
So not worth studying? How do you address things like sexism without attempting to understand it? the tech bro sexism itself might be an overlap with incel culture which may be solveable in a variety of ways or religious sexism which could be harder for a public US institution to address.
IMO it also affects how many extra counselors you’d need to hire to expand tech degrees vs non tech degrees and whether maybe some kind of socializing class should be included in curriculum - this isn’t just some game, both the victims and perpetrators are real people who have to be accomodated/resocialized appropriately.
No it doesn’t.
I’m getting pissy that it’s always about women and women alone that are underrepresented.
If this data also included data on subjects where women outnumber men to the same rate then it would be interesting as a control. But seeing as they are just looking at data where women are already outnumbered it is manipulating the data to either get nothing or the result you want. It won’t for example show the result you don’t want.
The question is are people just sexist when they outnumber the other sex? We don’t know because it doesn’t get asked. Something needs to be done but what is unknown until you find out.
Girls quite possibly don’t enjoy stem as much as boys. That’s an entire possibility for men outnumbering women. But nevertheless there is a push to put more women into the only departments were they don’t already outnumber men. But there is never any push to put men into areas they are under represented. Like I said one sex might naturally enjoy something at a higher rate and that’s not a problem I don’t think, but with one exception. I think teachers should largely be evenly distributed. Especially in primary school there was 0 male teachers we could talk to or could help us with anything. I was lucky I had male role models that could teach me about being a guy at home and in afterschool clubs. But some kids don’t, they might not get a male role model until they are 13, then it might be too late.
Yep. I was right. You turned a conversation about “women are being harrassed” into how upset you are that we aren’t talking about problems men face. If you want to advocate for the problems men face, actually do that, instead of bitching when we are discussing problems women face.
Sorry I belive in equality and think the data should be for the whole population.
Science doesn’t work when you hope for a certain answer and select the data in a way to maximise that outcome.
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I abhor sexism and racism and what I say next may sound like both of those things but what if women and POC are worse at math than Tall White Guys®?
Should we make it even harder for them to access STEM fields? My workplace is a total sausage fest and I desperately seek the touch of wamman.
what or whom are you even trying to troll? this is a strawman of 100% of everything
You coulda keep this to yourself hope you find some solace in your life
Thanks. I hope you can one day interpret subtext and nuance.
Such experiences included sexist microaggressions and stereotyping; such as questioning women’s academic legitimacy,
That’s the core of a STEM degree. You are constantly challenged about your conclusions. That’s not sexism, that’s how science works.
Other types of sexism include disbelief when a woman explains their experiences and baselessly denying evidence they present to support their claims.
Which proves my point. I question the data, I’m a sexist pig. It’s a hard field when your data is shaky.
It’s sexist if you don’t look further into the claims, instead just relying on your immediate assumptions about them being false.
If you immediately assume women are lying about experiencing sexism, and you don’t look into it further at all, and your reasoning is based solely on them being women as opposed to men, then yeah I’d say that’s pretty sexist. I’m not sure how someone could think otherwise.
I didn’t make any assumptions. By default, the statement made in the paper is not sexist.
By making assumptions, you bring in your bias and sexism. You just made 3 or 4 to justify your position
LMFAO ok bud, nice deflection
I’m curious if they asked the men if they’d experienced sexism too. Most stem subjects are predominantly female so this seems to be a study seeking an answer that suits a narrative.
STEM is dominated by men. Especially the workforce. https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf23315/. About 50% of women that take STEM majors switch to non-STEM majors, while about 35% of males switch. This is a Yale source, though.
You’re being disingenuous. The study posted relates to sexism at university where stem subjects are predominantly female.
Workforce stats /= University stats which I think you’re aware.
Source? The Yale link above specifically mentions:
Nationally, women make up 57.3% of bachelor’s degree recipients but only 38.6% of STEM bachelor’s degree recipients.
Anecdotally, I was in a STEM-focused school and major over 20 years ago, and it was overwhelming male-dominated. One of my colleagues graduated less than 10 years ago, and her experience was not dissimilar. She had to deal with quite a bit of sexism too, unfortunately.
Your own damn link contradicts that bullshit stem bachelor degree stat.
I’d search for another but people shooting themselves in the foot amuses me to no end 😂
What are you even going on about? It literally says:
Women represent 57.3% of undergraduates but only 38.6% of STEM undergraduates
That means women are obtaining most of their degrees via non-STEM studies.
Women represent 52% of the college-educated workforce, but only 29% of the science and engineering workforce.
And that is reflected in the study’s figures for employment as well.
I’d search for another but people shooting themselves in the foot amuses me to know end
Well let’s look over the score here. Someone has provided two different links to back up their argument and you’ve provided… Oh look, none. You’re making claims and pointing out things that clearly do not exist or are anecdotal. Nothing you have done in the last three comments indicates to anyone that any of us should take anything you have to say with any kind of value.
So I guess you are amused to know [sic] end, but a point or logical argument you have not made. But hey if you thinking you took the W here and that keeps you quiet, then good job you totally owned everyone here. Amazing wordsmithing.
Your Yale link is nonsense as I think you’re aware. Your original link shows a closer stat to reality though it’s based on 2020 data - currently stem is predominantly female.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6759027/
Interesting; you have to dig past the usual misandry sites to find an impartial source but Pew research found 53% of stem graduates female in 2018 and rising.
You can also just check unis individually.
Well I mean, do you read the links you provide?
While women now account for 57% of bachelor’s degrees across fields and 50% of bachelor’s degrees in science and engineering broadly (including social and behavioral sciences), they account for only 38% of bachelor’s degrees in traditional STEM fields (i.e., engineering, mathematics, computer science, and physical sciences; Table 1).
There’s where your 50% comes from. And as you can see, your link also aligns with the 38.6% previously mentioned.
See? Now was that hard? See how once you explained yourself we could clear up the confusion you were having? Nothing wrong with that, easy to be confused by the various terms that are being tossed around.
Interesting; you have to dig past the usual misandry sites to find an impartial source but Pew research found 53% of stem graduates female in 2018 and rising
I mean, at this point you’re just cherry picking and not doing all that well with it. As indicated from, again YOUR source.
The gender dynamics in STEM degree attainment mirror many of those seen across STEM job clusters. For instance, women earned 85% of the bachelor’s degrees in health-related fields, but just 22% in engineering and 19% in computer science
That lines up with the whole thing I had mentioned here. You keep wishing otherwise, but you also keep providing evidence to the contrary.
So I mean at some point I guess you’ll read your own sources OR you won’t. But the sources you keep providing agree with the original statement that women are under represented in traditional STEM studies. So I mean you square that with yourself however you want.
Dude is crying about misandry. 🎻
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That seems to say that there is a slight over-representation of women in STEM (degrees earned) overall but only because of a single subject/job-cluster, “health-related”, with a slight to very large under-representation in all others.
No “predominant” anywhere.(well maybe health-related)Yep, pretty much. Slightly more women in stem these days and rising.
Slightly to much less in traditional stem, and rising in some subjects/clusters, decreasing in some. I get that you have a hard time understanding that I pointed out that what you said was wrong, but you should admit to it too, instead of just posting another comment that is misleading.
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44% is workforce stem. This article deals with university stats.
The relevant data is:
In STEM fields, the pipeline is leakiest in life science, psychology and social science fields, which are female-dominated at the undergraduate level — the female share of degree recipients in these fields was 58% at the doctoral level compared with 66% at the bachelor’s level in 2017. In contrast, the four fields with the lowest female shares among bachelor’s degrees recipients — geoscience, engineering, economics, and computer science — have higher female representation among PhD recipients (see here).
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