GIP!! And release your inner Fred. You are among friends.

[stoney321]

HA HA HA!! I love Teen Girl Squad. Homestar Runner - brings families together through mockery. BUT. It perfectly suits my mood today. Anyone follow the world of science? Only me? Harvard is hosting a discussion panel on women and minorities in science and the President (Lawrence Summers, no relation to Buffy - duh) said there are innate gender differences which explain why fewer women succeed in science and math. There were walkouts during his lecture.

Quote: Nancy Hopkins (professor of Bio at MIT - what a dummy! /sarcasm) "I just couldn't breath because this kind of bias makes me physically ill." Same here.

I recall being the only female in a Calculus class of 150 students in college. NOT ONCE would the teacher call on me, and many times I was the only one with my hands raised. I walked out on the final (in protest) and STILL managed to get an 83 overall. The final exam was 25% of my total grade, and it was marked 0. (I rocked the extra credit, too) Many of the gender-superior men failed the course.

My genetics professor was one of the most highly educated scientists in the US at the time. SHE was the best teacher I ever had. I hate this "women can't do math" crap. Sure, some can't. Some men can't. Some men can't figure out the standard normal probability density function.

Did you know that most questions in math and science (for young children) have men as the protagonist? That Barbie once had a talking doll that said "Math is hard?" IT IS NOT HARD WIRED. It is a conditioned response to the world around us.

Any thoughts? Gripes? Discrimination you felt? Am I the only science/math nerd out there? (See? There's more to me than the hills alive with the sound of sucking...)

Comments

[tx-cronopio.livejournal.com]

ITA --- did you see the follow-up article in today's NYT? Summers still refuses to admit he said anything wrong, is insisting that it's a scientist's job to be provoking.

Hey, the man was just doin' his job.

Asshole.

I also made an A in calculus. :)

[inlovewithnight.livejournal.com]

Dude, in high school I was one of maybe six or seven people in my calc class who would've passed without the curve. At least four of the others? Also girls. I took Chem II, voluntarily. Here's the thing: I don't LIKE math, and I don't particularly like science. But I can, in fact, do them. If there was an innate inability that I had to overcome, than my lack of interest in the subjects should've made me LESS able to overcome it, right? Conclusion: Summers must die.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Here's the best part. Dr. Summers is an ECONOMIST. I like how is is speaking to Chemists and Biologists and Geneticists about his one time experiment is giving his daughter (probably conditioned with pink clothes and "babies") a couple of trucks and since she called them "daddy and baby" trucks, his theory is justified. Asshole, indeed.

Signed, Stoney who rocked straight A's in a competitive science world and has the ribbons and grants to prove it.

Go Texas girls!! (We're Fred!!!)

If A over O = Dr. Summers, the justification of Asshole is represented thus: nIn

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

No joke. Best thing? I totally schooled dad in math and science.

No, I can't play the guitar or piano well, but I got the state to build me a lab, didnt I? And good for you. Same thing happened to Chrissy. Bastard teachers.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Seriously. ANd he is the onle that has hired less females at Harvard. Not because they aren't applying. He just doesn't give them tenure, and his reasoning is that women can't do it because they are too busy raising children.

This is as stupid as Newt Gingrich's "women bleed so they can't do combat, but they can have the desk jobs" argument. BAHHH!!!

(And go you!!)

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

pretend there were no spelling mistakes. I'm shakey with anger.

AND I'M SMARTLY PRETTY!! LIKE FRED!! WE ARE ALL FRED!!

(I may be insane.)

[solipsiae.livejournal.com]

Two of my best girlfriends in college were physics majors and had to endure all KINDS of sexist shit. One was a genderfuck queer, so she had no problem dodging things, but it was harder for another.

I pursued philosophy instead of hard maths/science, but I loved calculus and physics in high school. The teacher (she) would assign me the role of administering labs for students who'd missed it the first time around, which I thought was a real honor.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_jealousy_/]

The head of the Biology department at my school is a woman. Roughly 85% of the science majors at my school are also women, myself included.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

I owe my academic love to my female science teachers. I think it's becoming easier for women to love the "nerd" stuff, but it shames me that our local paper dropped the "Science Section" in favor of more Fashion reporting.

Thus we have more dumb bottle-blondes who think the talking Barbie doll is "cute." I.E.: Paris Hilton. Blech.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

HOORAY!!! I was so glad so many important women in science were represented at this conference and left more determined than ever to ensure equality.

Go, You!! You're Fred!!

[smashsc.livejournal.com]

I was tracked down in math & science in middle school because I was sloppy and hated the whole showing your work element of stupid easy math. Like 8 = 7 + x easy. No way I was going to show my work on that stuff. And I got tracked down in science because I really can't memorize stuff well and middle school math was mostly memorization and no science. In middle school/9th grade when I was getting tracked down in math & science I also went to two wonderful all girls science camps (Duke Action (http://www.learnmore.duke.edu/Youth/act/actacademic.htm) & Smith Summer Science (http://www.smith.edu/summerprograms/ssep/)). Both programs were absolutely wonderful and I really reccomend them to anyone who is looking for something for their kids. I don't know how much of my getting tracked down (really) had to do with being a girl and how much was my lazy/sloppy nature. But I pulled myself back up and those 2 camps are what gave me the confidence to do so.

In high school I worked my ass off and doubled up in math (Geometry & Algebra II the same year) to get on the AP Calc track and strong armed my way into science classes so that I could take AP Physics in 11th grade. I was good at math and science.

Then, in college I took no math and the 2 easiest science courses at the school because I was too busy with other things. Now, I work in a science department everyday and will eventually be going into a math/fundraising/health field. The stupid middle school teachers who tracked me down can suck it.

[dusty273.livejournal.com]

I'm not a science/math nerd and yes, I knew there was more to you than the hills alive with the sound of sucking before. *giggles and winks* And yay for your Calculus grade, I guess you show them, didn't you?

I've experience discrimination first hand. With each passing year, there are more and more women lawyers in Guatemala, but we still get treated differently than men, condescendently even. Like we couldn't be better than them (which many of us so are, btw). There are some fields where it's practically unheard of that a woman gets involved in.

Also, divorced women in Guatemala are labeled as sluts (of course, I've known some women that confirm that rule). Even my dad, when I was about to go to the conciliatory hearing in my divorce case, told me to think it over to remember that divorced women are not treated the same way than a married one. I told him that I prefered that over having to be married to a cheating scum bag like my ex. And I've showed everyone that not all divorced women are sluts. I'm not and I have divorced friends that aren't either, so there.

I'm trying to teach my girls by example to be proud of being women, that they can accomplish anything they set their minds upon, that there's no limit to what a woman can achieve. Hopefully by the time they're ready to fly by themselves this will help them.

*hugs*

[marlo.livejournal.com]

I thought the Math Is Hard thing came from the Simpsons. Huh! Yes, any kind of sexism sends the Fists of Rage flying into action. OY GEVALT!!!

On another note, ICON LOVE. I made a "TWELVE-SIDED DIED!!!!" one last night. ;D

[phfeenikz.livejournal.com]

Not to mention he totally ignored this little ditty (http://www.indystar.com/articles/4/206881-6024-009.html). I myself would challenge the gender bias considering the fact that I tested at college level reading in 8th grade. As for math? Well let's just say I finally passed Freshman Algebra in my Senior year of high school. This was after being inundated with page-long equations, thetas, sines, cosines and the like, since I chose to take the two year tech school option -- in Electronics! I somehow overlooked the prerequisite "Must have strong math skills".

Signed: The Math Tortoise - Doh! what's cow cue lus?

[sangueuk.livejournal.com]

Some men can't figure out the standard normal probability density function. and very few can find the clitoris, even with all the time they spend looking at them in magazines. But we can find them, can't we. We can also find arseholes

:::hands everyone a map::: here -->>Lawrence Summers.

[violethamster.livejournal.com]

I was totally brainwashed into thinking I couldn't do math. To the extent that when my junior high algebra teacher asked me why I wasn't signing up for the highest level high school math class the next year, since I was getting an A in his class, I answered that I wasn't good at math.

Then in my senior year of high school, by which time I'd started to suspect that I could actually do math and decided to take the highest level math course, the teacher announced in the first class that he made a point of getting all the girls to drop out of his class. I was easily intimidated and couldn't stand up to being constantly ridiculed by the jerkwad, and eventually dropped out into the lower class. My friend Patty was the only girl who toughed it out and stayed in the class.

I still have a tendency to think of myself as not good at math. But, I've gotten through calculus, discrete math and probability & statistics so far. Hopefully I'll manage to get through linear algebra this semester.

[thebratqueen.livejournal.com]

This is part of why I'm so happy I went to an all girls' college. I didn't have to deal with this gender bias BS and could just be a student.

Never got the whole girls = math is hard thing, though I did have classmates who made me wince on behalf of my gender. OTOH, who's to say they weren't just as dumb in other subjects?

[desoto-hia873.livejournal.com]

Am I the only science/math nerd out there?

Nope. ::waves::

Undergrad in physics. PhD in atmospheric science. I think I was fairly lucky in terms of discrimination, though. I was the only female in many of my classes and there were no women faculty members in my undergrad physics department at the time (I think there are now), but I never felt like I was treated any differently from anyone else. A few of my professors seemed a bit nervous around me, but I attributed that mostly to lack of social skills in general. :-)

I think the relative fewer number of women in science and math is largely due to cultural conditioning and the fact that so many high school science courses are profoundly boring. I wasn't interested in science until I took an astronomy course at university - I read half the text book in one sitting when studying for the first midterm. Then I changed majors from business administration (talk about boring) to physics.

It's cool that you've gotten so many comments on this post from other 'Freds'.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

HA HA HA!! If only they made a lesbian slide rule... Huh?

Good for you. Smart chicks are sexy. Memorization has its place in math (tables and theorems) but without an understanding of the machanics of it, they make no sense. Without teachers that can teach the "why" element of math and science, no one gives a shit.

Without the few good teachers who want people to learn (and that desire is not based on gender) we are doomed to fail.

Good for you for being so goddamn smart.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

*gasps*
You shouldn't have even felt the need to justify being a divorced woman to me, Mari. That makes me sad that you feel the need to. And I understand first hand the need to leave a destructive marriage (and a cheating scum bag, to boot.)

I am proud of you for being smart. I am proud of you for living in a male dominated society (and I understand first hand the male-domination in the Latin world) and having the job you do. You are smart, you are teaching your daughters to be all they can, and it's another reason why I'm proud to have you on my flist.

I love you, you are terrific, and don't forget it.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

12 sided died made tears come out, I was laughing so hard.

Do you know how lucky you are to be you? ANd to have the friends you do? And Toren? And your mommio? You are smart, cookie, and I'm glad to know you.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

This is another reason why I am glad you are on my flist. Funny, goofy, and smart. But not as smart as meeeee! (Ha ha ha!)

Plus? In this icon you have a Jeff Goldblum thing going, which is of the good.

It's funny. Everyone in my immediate family is an accomplished artist in some medium. I ended up with the math and science and tutored all of their stoned friends. Huh.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

HA HA HA HA HA!!! I have TEARS pouring down my face at that. HA HA!! Ah, my leetle Sanguelina. I feeda you tha best of the cheese -s-cake.

You are priceless.

[poshcat.livejournal.com]

Best comment ever! :0)

[marlo.livejournal.com]

You know, I realized after posting the pic of my mom that there were no pics of my dad. He was the one who arranged that party.

Not that it matters. Just so your knowledge of my family is more complete. My parents ARE in fact together