Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men - Caroline Criado Pérez

[somber nova]

BR duration: <t:1698883200:D>-<t:1701475200:D>
BR leader: @wintry iron
Link: #buddy-reads message

[wintry iron]

@past mortar @scarlet cliff @stuck sail @ancient osprey @velvet valley @robust light @wintry iron @whole hearth @somber nova @remote relic
@worthy plinth @next notch @hollow python Hey there everybody, I'm thrilled to announce that our buddy read for "Invisible Women: Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men" by Caroline Criado Perez is starting <t:1698883200:R>

What:
"Invisible Women" delves into the hidden gender data gap, revealing how the world we live in, from smartphones to public transportation, is predominantly designed with men in mind. This powerful exploration of data bias exposes the far-reaching consequences of a world that neglects the experiences and needs of half the population.

When:
The duration on our buddy read is <t:1698883200:D> - <t:1701475200:D>

How to Participate/Get Reader Points:

1. Discuss the book throughout the buddy read period and finish it before the BR due date

Notes:

1. you can use spoiler tags if you’d like but there is no inclination to do so since it’s a nonfiction book (and it’s not a narrative nonfiction)
2. If at some point you do not wish to participate in this BR anymore then please go to this post and unreact #buddy-reads message
3. I will make announcements periodically to ask about everyone’s progress with some discussion questions
4. As many of you already have guessed I am the BR host of this book so feel free to ask me for assistance if you have any questions about this

Questions:

1. what made you join this BR/ read this book?
2. Have you ever read any nonfiction books/research articles with a similar premise(data bias/gender gap)? If yes, then do tell us!!

[wintry iron]

1. I have heard from many of my irl and online friends saying that their menstruation cycle has been disrupted after the taking COVID shot and even that their period cramps have gotten significantly more painful than before, I didn't think much of it at first cause I myself has experienced nothing but after some time, I came across a journal on statnews about the lack of sample diversity in clinical trials (I am talking mostly about mRNA vaccines) which made me more aware about the skew in clinical trials and I also get to know this book after digging up a bit.

answering my own questions

[past mortar]

1. I care a lot about equality and feminism in general and feel a strong sense of injustice in some parts as a afab person myself. I already know about some biases in the world such as how seatbelts are not really designed for women and could potentially do more harm to women (this is one of the things I think about every day when I'm driving for instance) but I'm hoping to learn more about the bias from a data perspective from this book. I also like reading non-fiction in general and thought it was a great suggestion.
2. I have not read about this subject before, however I've noticed in some non fiction books a sense of male bias as well. Such as in The Magic of Thinking Big, the male writer has sometimes neglected to address the male bias in his book in certain parts and that frustrated me a lot.

[wintry iron]

2. I have read 2 nf books on data bias/statistical misrepresentation - How to Lie with Statistics, calling bullshit and some informative books on the gender gap- the second sex, a room of One’s Own, and Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists.
   I have read several articles/journals but truthfully I don't keep track of them I even forgot the statnews journal that actually got me thinking (i am hounding for it in case someone's interested in reading it)

[wintry iron]

ooh after reading your answer to question 2, I remember that I was looking forward to reading a book called the body keeps the score but I read several reviews saying that the author has a problematic stance towards female victims

it seems pretty common even in this day and age

[somber nova]

1. You /hj
   It's been on my radar for a while but i've also have heard some more negative things so i am on the fence about reading this but since there is a BR for it, i thought why not give it a try now. Also, there's a game i play with my friends when we go to a bookstore: we pick a book that we think fits the other person's personality/outfit/interest and one time someone picked this book for me lol

2. i don't think so, not sure lol

Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men - Caroline Criado Pérez

[worthy plinth]

1. This book's been on my tbr and I kinda want at least one non-fic this month for Non-fiction November
2. Not really on gender gap but I did recently read Divergent Mind which explores the gap in research and resources available

[worthy plinth]

OMG YESSSSS
I've had loads of discussions too on this for it has affected me too so yeah, kinda looking forward to the digging up here

[somber nova]

I am starting this!! I love the dedication

||For the women who persist: keep on being bloody difficult||

[somber nova]

Preface
||this was interesting and i hope the book will continue like that. but i can imagine it's very difficult to write about a gap and trying to sort of visualise the absence of something and i am looking forward to how the author is going to do that||

[ancient osprey]

1. I had this book on my tbr for a while, I saw a youtuber mentioning it and I was super curious.
2. I've read articles about it. I know some stuff, like seat belts not being suited for women, and how clinical trials are male predominant because women generally don't have time to participate (they work, shop, take care of thr children, take care of the house, etc) so the trials are really biased. I am hoping to find these here and more about in depth about it, and to learn other stuff as well

[ancient osprey]

I'm starting this!
The preface was nice, I like how she set up her goals with this book, the premise is there. Now let's see how it rolls!

[ancient osprey]

Introduction: The Default Male (middle of the chapter)
||Okay, so far I'm on the fence about 2 things the author said. First of all, she mentions language, and how predominantly masculine it is, which I agree with to a certain degree. I understand the prejudice of referring to a group of 10% men and 90% women by masculine terms, and how the general masculine is the predominant form, but I come from a gender-inflected language, where literally everything has a gender. I don't bother me personally if someone refers to the group I am part of with a "masculine" word. Usually, and more commonly, people just tend to use both like "ladies and gentlemen" ("senhores e senhoras" in portuguese) so I never felt excluded or not seen. I understand the prejudice and the problem, I just don't think every women suffers from it/because of it.
Secondly, I am at the part where the author talks abour Doctor Who and comments what Colin Baker said: And in any case, he mused, do you have to be the same gender as someone to be a role model? 'Can't you be a role model as people?'.
The author response to this is a bit rude in my opinion lol I believe Colin Baker is 100% right, people should and can be role models just by themselves, it is about what people do and represent, not about how they look or present themselves. At least it shouldn't be, in my opinion. A person doesn't have to look exactly like me for me to loom up to them, thrive to be like them, for example. What inspires me is what they represent, what they defend, what they do, regardless of being a men, a women, black, white, etc. In my opinion, the only reason the author beefed with that comment was because Colin is a man. The same statement from a woman and the author wouldn't even bat an eyelash. ||

(I hope all that makes sense, I am typing on my phone and I hate it)

[quartz ingot]

(I hope all that makes
sense, I am typing on my
phone and I hate it)

- Scarlatte 🥕

[ancient osprey]

||Right after the Doctor Who bit, she talks about videogames and how men were glad that you could only play as male in Assassin's Creed. I am sorry, just check any MMO and you'll see 90% of man playing as females... ||

(still about the same chapter, just about the following page)

[next notch]

1. I'm here for the history and hopefully a sense of ultimate optimism, but I'm expecting this book to make me really angry
2. I've lived the gender gap, but not done any real formal research into it. I don't read much nonfiction in general, but I'm invested in this topic, so I plan to give it a go

[cursive bobcat]

i've joined the br as well!

1. i found the premise of the book really interesting! and this genre is something i havent really explored.
2. kinda - i havent read non-fiction books about this, but am aware of the existence of data biases and gender data gap. in grade 11 & 12, we had something called as theory of knowledge (a class to basically question knowledge and it's existence & everything in between). We spent enough classes discussing the existence of biases in information - we also talked about BMI, and how it's sexist and racist - women & poc werent included in "initial clinical analyses" and it was mainly used by white men, which then extrapolates data to fit into the norms. speaking of clinicial trials, i once read that it's harder to diagnose women with adhd because of the gender gap - there's essentially so less info about the symptoms that's it takes a girl into adulthood to even get diagnosed

[ancient osprey]

Chapter 1
||I am not sure the favelas were a good example. It is widely known that favelas are basically ghettos, they are illegal, crime rates are through the roof there, there are gangs, etc. Maybe the government didn't think the whole thing through, they should have thought about work and transportation, but just leaving women (and families) in general in favelas is not better, quite the contrary. Saying that outside of the favelas mothers have to watch out for their children is just ridiculous when there are literal gangs fighting each other in the favelas. The whole thing just seems weird to me, I would have to research it myself. But saying it would be better to stay in the favelas is just mental. Awful conditions, illegal housing, illegal work, drugs, crime, guns... I don't know. ||

||Overall, it was an interesting chapter. Honestly, and even as a woman, I wouldn't think of improving sidewalks and bus stops to improve women's quality of life. But it makes total sense. I still think that those should be prioritise in general just so we can all travel in a more eco-friendly way, which in the end benefits everyone and the planet ||

[somber nova]

Introduction: The Default Male
||the male-unless-otherwise-indicated thinking 😭 yes. that. also like, they looked at bones that indicate it was a woman but because of the weapons they said it had to be a man, what is this?? this doesn't make sense to me, they had to be scientists right? 😭

yeah it's definitely in language too but it has been changing a lot in the past couple years in the English language. If you say men, women are not included. I remember a discussion during one lecture i had about there being a category for architects and one for female architects. It implies that architects only includes men and that's why you have to explicitly have a category for women too. (i mean there are other implications with this too like women not being 'good' enough to be in the same category) but the people who came up with this, did have that male-unless-otherwise-indicated thinking imo.

i have seen the 'generic male' in my field of studies change to a 'she' and now to a 'they'. I still come across a 'he' once in a while but if the author is female, it's often a 'she'. I prefer 'they' though because 'she' is not read in a gender-neutral way either, but it was more like to point out that 'she' can be an academic too and do what 'he' has been doing all along.

i think the use of generic masculine affects the people who grew up having to always think this way the most. As in, they always had to think in the binary genders and choose to do what is 'appropriate' for their gender. If something says 'he' it would exclude anyone who is used to identifying as 'she' and vice versa. I am lucky that i didn't grow up that way and i mostly saw gender-neutral words and even saw how they made sure to use the gender-neutral form rather than 'he' or 'she'. there is definitely some influence when you use a certain pronoun and the assumptions/impressions the reader has, but depending on how they grew up/past experiences, it can be very different. I'm not sure i'm making sense here lol.

maybe this is just because I am thinking according to English rather than other languages, but if i use the masculine generic form of a word in a gender-inflected language, i do mean it gender-neutral and also perceive it as such. but someone else who is used to either-or or does not feel like it's gender-neutral and includes women, then i totally understand why this is such a problem. i sound like my professor rn, but context matters. it always matters and is very important to understand why or the implication something can have.

LOL as someone who is studying this rn (language policy and stuff), it's just hilarious

When researchers did test its impact they found that it made no difference to the exclusionary impact of using the generic masculine on its own - illustrating the importance of collecting data and then creating policy.

I kind of want to do some research on this now because this is not really.. conclusive? clear? If this introduction is talking about language and gender, then i need to know the stats, the research, the theory, the methods. I am feeling very dissatisfied rn because it just pointed out all of this out and I know this has changed in the past couple of years, and now i need to know how (or if) it is still the same and what impact it has on real people. this is not to criticise this book negatively (already) but i'm just used to reading actual research and not a superficial overview, especially if it's on language.

this is something to think about for sure:

if you can't mark gender in any way you can't 'correct' the hidden bias in a language by emphasising 'women's presence in the world'. In short: because men go without saying, it matters when women literally can't get said at all.
I never thought about the genderless languages before and I agree with this. it does appear to be very important to make sure women are included because of that male-unless-otherwise-indicated thinking||

[somber nova]

cont.

||i think there has been some change lately with the singular 'they' because at least for me it is genuinely gender-neutral and i don't assume the person to be male. I'm sure that in some ways i still have the male bias somewhere, but i'm at least consciously working on that. it would make sense though that women are less likely to be gender-biased because i also think that you'd think of your own gender first. Like if i think of a professor, i tend to think of a female professor first because i identify as female (and i have a lot of female professors). but this is just my observation and also why i am working on being more gender-neutral.

oh this was what i was saying before about the architects - the male sex goes without saying and women have to be indicated.

the loss of a role model for boys
seriously??? 😭 it's not like there are a ton of role models for boys but barely any for girls wtf
it's just the men being upset about this because now they have to deal with the fact that they're not alone on this planet...

When you have been so used, as a white man, to white and male going without saying, it's understandable that you might forget that white and male is an identity too.
😭

the more hostile voters where toward women, the more likely they were to support Trump
this is.. concerning and scary af...

i don't know much about the researcher the author did to write this introduction but it seems a bit exaggerated compared to the world now. because i don't think it's as (white) male biased as it was when this book was written perhaps. it still exists in many ways and within many people but not as 'extreme' as pictured here. Makes me wonder if this is a way to shock/intrigue/engage the reader..

the last paragraph is definitely persuasive. it uses persuasion and includes a call for action... cringing a bit here lol ||

lol sorry if i go a bit overboard with my comments this is something i sometimes i have to deal with in my studies, so i am very aware of all this

[ancient osprey]

Regarding your last couple of paragraphs
||In general, I really found this chapter to have the "shock value" to intrigue the reader. It had so many numbers and percentages about so many things, it was a bit overwhelming at times. So I hope she picks up some of those initial stats and expands them in the next chapters. ||

[ancient osprey]

Also, I am on chapter 2, still didn't finish it but ||I find it interesting that she started with the gender neutral bathrooms. This might be a really controversial opinion nowadays, but I am also not sure (just like the author at the begining of the chapter) that gender-neutral bathrooms are the solution and should be the norm.
I understand their importance in a lgbtq+ lense nowadays, but as a woman I don't feel safe, period.
Interestingly enough, I actually changed my opinion about this subject this week. I was 100% on board with gender neutral bathrooms and I couldn't see a problem with them (because people only go there to do their business and go out, right?) until I was "forced" to use one myself.
Last Monday I attended a congress about environment & sustainability. It was paid, there were not many people there, I would say 200-250 at max., and it was full of politicians, scientists, small companies with sustainable ideas and projects, overall just a well-educated, moderate income, open-minded audience. I felt nice there and it was a really good vibe. Until I had to go to the bathroom. It was a gender neutral bathroom with 4 stalls. I entered one of them to do my business and I guess there was a man already inside the bathroom and he starded whistling. Just whistling a random melody, not like catcalling, but I was instantly so uncomfortable, I felt so small and my heart was shrinking in my chest. I wasn't able to pee, I left the stall and he stopped whistling, still inside his stall. I washed my hands and left, I never even saw him, but it was such a tense, dreadful moment for me, I felt so unsafe and it was like from 8 to 8000 in 2 secs, I was pale when I left the bathroom.
I am not sure what the solution should be, but exclusively gender-neutral bathrooms in public spaces are NOT a safe option for women. ||

[wintry iron]

about the shock value factor yall(Lae and Scarlatte) said, ||I think it is largely country-specific, as someone who debates in academic and personal spheres, western European countries like Germany, France and Nordic countries perform far better in sociological acceptance of gender equality than the UK and specifically the USA. especially after the boom of TikTok and yt shorts (during the pandemic) and the viral algorithmic spread of red pill content, which affected teenage boys severely I have read several people saying that their schools had to ban listening to certain misogynistic podcasters on school premises and had to inform parents to monitor their children's behaviour because the school boys started harassing other classmates while listening to the advice of some shitty podcasters. Also, a recent poll in the UK suggested that 25% of men think that Andrew Tate is right about gender sociology(after him being jailed for sexual assault) is very painful to see, not to mention that Twitter has been a cesspool of sexism, homophobia after Elon Mask took over, I think nature journal did a poll on this too, (sorry I read so many newsletters that I get very confused and forgetful). I am not even gonna mention Asian countries, the situation is quite bad even in high-income countries(women have more economic parity now but sociology is still shit), the world economic forum published a new gender parity journal earlier this year, it has comprehensive stats on all aspects of gender parity
(sources for things that I have mentioned here https://www.bbc.com/news/education-64234568 https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/19/world/europe/andrew-tate-uk-teachers.html and https://www.statista.com/statistics/1417619/gb-men-opinion-andrew-tate-by-age/ )|| spoilers till introduction

i sincerely hope the stats aren't the real picture of our daily life

[somber nova]

this makes me so glad that i never had to do deal with this on such a level i know that it is still happening but it's also kind of difficult to realise that/wrap your mind around that if you've not really seen/experienced it yourself.. i think in this respect i'm quite sheltered from this and am extremely lucky to have people around me that are not like this at all..

[wintry iron]

admittedly, I face more direct sexism online rather than irl so I think it has anonymity has something to do with the stats and all

[ancient osprey]

Midle of Chapter 3
Just a quick disclaimer: ||the author says that Portugal offers only 6 weeks of maternity leave with 100% full paid, but that is incorrect. Portugal offers 120 days (4 months) of 100% full paid leave. If you chose to take maternity leave for 150 days (5 months) they pay 80% of your salary. The 6 week period the author mentions is just the mandatory time women have to take off (aprox. 42 days).
It kinda gives me ick that this information is completely wrong, now it makes me question all other statistics and numbers :/||

[wintry iron]

Chapter 1 ||hmm,, I think this chapter pointed out things that are very obvious irl but I have really thought about it consciously, I mean I wasn't aware of the fact that public transport is not so sufficient for women whose travel paths are quite different from the majority of men...
I also do not understand why a grid-like public transport system would be more efficient than a spider web ||

||This whole argument reminds me of 15-minute cities cause they would literally be so cool||

|| and i am glad she addressed how so many women (and a lesser percentage of men) get sexually harassed or groped on public transport, and for this many of them get uncomfortable using public transport||

[wintry iron]

Chapter 2 || Hmm the gender-neutral public toilet debate, I think it is an amazing proposition considering it reduces the construction budget, saves space, is beneficial for people who don't fit into the gender binary, useful for parents who cant accompany their children to the public toilet cause the toilets are gender segregated, I particularly think that gender neutral toilets with cubicles only structure would be perfect, my uni has them and they are great, I think implementing gender neutral toilets in schools and unis can be quite easy too, but gender neutral toilet in malls, train stations and other public places can be quite tricky since there is little to no safety protocol in most of them and there's always be the risk of people getting sexually harassed by random men, even gender segregated toilets are at risk in such places but at least some outsider will be sus if they see a man entering a women's restroom/ hear men's voice in a women's restroom ||

||I also got super paranoid about public restroom after watching some documentaries on how so many people installs tiny camera in ladies washrooms and blackmail them/ seels the vids on adult websites ||

[wintry iron]

hmm ||I think I have read somewhere that many people suffer from symptoms like yours and it is called shy bladder syndrome which is a social anxiety disorder ||

[ancient osprey]

||It doesn't bother me if I hear or see other women in the toilet, I can use the bathroom regardless. What bothered me was hearing a man and having him whistle the moment I got inside the bathroom.
I agree with everything you said on your previous comment about gender-neutral bathrooms, I just don't think they should be the only option/the standard option. As you said, those might even work poorly in certain public spaces, and for me safety is key, regardless of gender. A solution for a group of people might be detrimental for another group, so if we really want to change something we need to consider all groups and not just the group that is "least comfortable" at any given time.||

[ancient osprey]

||this is scary as fuck, not gonna lie.||

||I actually have black tape covering my laptop camera, and I generally leave my phone "face-down". Just in case... ||

[wintry iron]

||The concerns you have mentioned are absolutely valid. Also, considering so many women and people who have stereotypical feminine features get so much trauma from unwanted catcalling,and inappropriate groping while being outside, safety is very much an applicable concern here.(not saying that men don't get groped or catcalled just the percentage is lesser)||

[wintry iron]

haha when I bought my first laptop, multiple people advised me to cover the webcam with a tape, there's scary shit happened to some people irl

chp 3 ||idk what average she is counting for the average parental leave in European countries?? like arithmetical average, median, mean or mode cause the math aint mathing also After Scarlatte pointed it out, I checked at saw that Portugal's info was wrong? and it didn't even have any references, the others did have references but very odd mistake here ||

||I was reading the oecd report that was referenced, and dyam the unpaid labour gap between male and female are quite huge in many countries, and it seems like the unpaid care work of female housewives alone accounts for 7-8% of GDP in many countries ||

haha this chapter not so strangely reminds me of the countrywise job satisfaction report that my sis was talking about yesterday

|| I mean amen to the universal pension scheme reform idea, I think since childbirth is an essential part of keeping this humankind( default male?) from dying out then why give trouble to women who are contributing to the cause? even after all this, some people question now why many women do want to get a baby like duh so much inflation, long working hours,a bad social security system, shitty pension policy. I mean look at Japan and Korea 💀 ||

||I think she also should've mentioned how giving adequate parental leave to the father makes the childrearing activities and work more evenly distributed for both of the parents||

um ||um wow us has no fixed paid maternal leave policy?? I cross-checked on the web and it seems to be true , yikes||

[wintry iron]

||oh here is it in the last bits , sorry author ||

[wintry iron]

||I am sorry what? fathers aren't taking their paternal leaves, i mean 💀 tf||
|| Also I think flexible work and work-from-home opportunities have increased a little bit after the pandemic||

[somber nova]

ch 1
||women are invariably more likely than men to walk and take public transport → is there a country where that is not the case? Is this still the case, especially in Europe where a lot of people walk and take public transport? And also the reason why — is it still the same? Would there be a difference in age groups?
Preventing injuries always seems like a better investment to me.

the sad truth indeed

The men (and it would have been men) who originally devised the schedule knew how they travelled and they designed around their needs. They didn’t deliberately set out to exclude women. They just didn’t think about them. They didn’t think to consider if women’s needs might be different.

It’s very interesting to read about these travel patterns. It makes me think about how I usually travel. I should ask my friends how they travel and if it mirrors what is written here. I can imagine that the whole public transport system is comparably worse in the US than in Europe and I had no idea that they made those improvements in Vienna. Obviously, I wouldn’t know notice them now but I should pay more attention to them and if there’s a difference to what I’m used to from home. What I can say is that the pavement is wider and there are lots of street lighting which makes it a lot safer to walk around the city after night (which I have done plenty of times too).

The public transport system in London being radial annoys me too whenever I’m there. Getting to where you want to go is a pain sometimes unless you just want to go in and out of the centre.

Kind of sad if you think about it, do we as human beings only exist for work or why is employment travel taken more seriously?||

[somber nova]

getting around within a ||spider web is a pain bc you either travel too far from where you intended to go or not far enough and would have to walk a lot. it's mostly the places not close to the centre that are a pain to get to. I remember going into London was easy but trying to go around with the public transport was awful and I ended up walking a lot anyway.||

[wintry iron]

ooh thank you for clearing that up

[somber nova]

i'm not sure if you can compare it to this but i am used to cities with such a structure or at least the public transport ||always leading to the centre. That means you have to go there to change and then travel out again if you're for example visiting a friend who lives in a different part that is not the centre. I'm currently in a city that doesn't have this kind of structure and it's so much easier getting around. I don't even have to go to the centre of the town to change if i don't have to||

[somber nova]

do you know if this is still a thing? i kinda ||stopped doing this bc i use face rec to unlock my laptop...|| 😳

[wintry iron]

I still do it cause I got paranoid by all the documentaries and idk some black mirror TV series episode showed some accident in this respect

[somber nova]

should i do it too then

i'm not particularly paranoid bc i uhm am kind of too trusting and only get paranoid if there's something going on with my camera..

[wintry iron]

i mean prevention is better than cure but if you always need face unlock then it can be a pain ]

[somber nova]

i mean i don't need it but it's better than having to enter a pin bc in places with cameras and crowds, everyone would see my pin

or password

[wintry iron]

maybe stick a reusable tape around it

[somber nova]

and removing it every single time i use my laptop? 😭

yes i'm lazy af

i'm kind of worried about my screen too bc like it seems so... fragile?

[wintry iron]

chp 4 || The myth of meritocracy- I mean meritocracy is the last hope
I am not sure which calling bullshit lectures I have watched which talked about self-citing among men and women researchers is purely sample size bias or if the author is picturing the whole story here hmmmm||

[somber nova]

Ch 2

||wtf? how is this gender neutral?? i mean this is more about people’s biological sex than gender if you divide it into cubicles vs urinals. i’m always so relieved when i enter a toilet and there are a lot of cubicles and not just one or two in places that usually have a lot of crowds and people coming and going. Like universities, airports, etc. My department has an actual gender-neutral toilet, they recently put tampons and pads for those who need it as well, which is honestly great. There are only cubicles and very few toilets too but it’s a small department so it’s fine.

Women are often scared in public spaces. In fact, they are around twice as likely to be scared as men.
yes.

women adjust their behaviour and their travel patterns to accommodate this fear. They avoid specific routes, times and modes of transport. They avoid travelling at night.

yes. I’m not going to lie, using public transport to me is safer than driving. Because parking garages are where the scary things happen. The second place I lived at after moving out of my parents’ place had to add parking spaces just for women because it has happened way too often that they’d park their car inside and then are harassed or assaulted because it was dark and there were no witnesses. Now they added those parking spaces and more lights but even during the day, I was terrified to walk in there and get into a car. Especially, when I heard footsteps. I immediately lock the door but still.. it’s terrifying.

Assuming they do realise that what has happened is wrong
this!! like you first have to realise that because no one talks about and who do you even ask?? how would you know??? and no one who witnesses it and tells you that it’s wrong?

again, i really hope that there are some improvements since this book came out.. there’s a lot of this shock-factor here with all these stats and the lists of incidents.. they can make a person truly paranoid ngl..

I looked up the most dangerous transport systems for women:
1. Bogota, Colombia
2. Mexico City
3. Lima, Peru
4. New Delhi
5. Jakarta, Indonesia
6. Buenos Aires
7. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
8. Bangkok
9. Moscow
10. Manila, Philippines
11. Paris
12. Seoul
13. London
14. Beijing
15. Tokyo
16. New York

In total, 6,555 women and experts were surveyed. (2014)

The part about the gym though because yes.. This is why I do not go to the gym and probably never will. I hate it so much.
social conditioning is so real. ||

[somber nova]

i agree with you too, ||if i think about a gender-neutral toilet in such a public space with this many people I wouldn't feel safe at all. But the only safe gender-neutral toilets i've encountered are the ones that are in smaller places where there is some sense of community too. I don't have any problem with going to a toilet knowing that other people use as well and not just people with the same gender as me. But actually being in a cubicle next to a man does sound very uncomfortable like i get paranoid af unless i know them but then that's just a tad weird ngl. I usually leave, wait or go to a different one if that happens. i think the main purpose of gender-neutral toilets would be to accommodate those who do not identify with the binary gender but there should still be an option for women because it's just safer. It's also safer for children and those who are more vulnerable imo||

[wintry iron]

|| bruh I remember the new Delhi public transport gang rape case || TW: Rape dont read this if you are uncomfy

[somber nova]

omg

that was honestly terrifying to read

there is so much use of this shock-factor though...

[wintry iron]

i mostly go to the gym in the morning cause there are not many people in there but then again an empty gym is also dangerous,

[somber nova]

yes exactly

it just takes one man to make you feel unsafe ngl

[wintry iron]

hopefully some stats have improved now

[somber nova]

i hope so too. i have witnessed and experienced some changes in the last couple of years but i can only speak about my immediate surroundings/cities/countries

i had a discussion with a friend once about what is safer at night - when there is no one or when there are people

and i still don't the answer

[wintry iron]

haha trick question

[somber nova]

yes but i need to know lol

[wintry iron]

I would take more people

[somber nova]

whenever i hang out with my friends in the evening, i have a long way home and it's usually around 1 or 2am and I tend to stick to places with more people but walking home when there is no one outside would also be an option

and yes, if no one is around then no one will bother you. but if you're around people, the chances that they will bother you is higher

[wintry iron]

i get the heezy beezies if I get any min late from 11.30 pm while walking home

[somber nova]

me having spent every saturday with my friends and almost always went home at around 2am

it doesn't help that i live far away and my travel time is about an hour.. i usually pick the route that has more people but there are lots of drunk men too.

[wintry iron]

a very creepy man stalked me when I was only 18 ( I was walking alone at 12 am after attending private tutoring seasons at my uni) and since then I get super stressed if I get too late

[somber nova]

i'm sorry that happened to you

i would be paranoid too now if that happened to me

probably really depends where you are too.. when i went to London last time.. the amount of men who tried to talk to me spiked vs when i'm at home or even the city where i currently live

[wintry iron]

absolutely some western European cities are doing much better in this respect

[somber nova]

but then you have Paris and London on that list i mean those two are really unsafe ngl, i speak from experience

blows my mind that New York is at the bottom of that list though but then it was a really limited poll

[wintry iron]

london is quite unsafe amen to that, idk about Paris but I think many big capital are heaven for thieves and perverts

excluding vienna ig, vienna always ranks very high on liveability index

[somber nova]

Paris is worse i think

[somber nova]

yeah it's funny how many examples there are from vienna in this book lol

but vienna is not a very big captial though lol

it's the capital of a small country and is really small compared to paris or london

[wintry iron]

yeah specially compared to Paris and London

[somber nova]

having been to all three cities, it's much nicer indeed lol

[quartz ingot]

having been to all
three cities, it's much nicer
indeed lol

- Laelia 🌧

[somber nova]

LMAO

[wintry iron]

chp 4 continuation the myth of meritocracy || This graph seems to be applicable for both the self-citing tendencies and nominating yourself for work promotion, not to mention there's an expected parallel between native English speaker students and ESL student behaviour ||

[wintry iron]

chp 5 || This chapter has so many things to cover
the outdated thermal model of offices
Most research evidence on gender differences in thermal comfort would suggest that overcooling is likely to affect women more than men. Laboratory studies of temperature preferences by gender report the largest differences in cold environments15. Reasons for higher dissatisfaction in cold temperatures for women have been attributed to physiological and clothing differences. A biophysical analysis showed an underestimation of the metabolic rate of women in the heat-balance model codified by international thermal comfort standards16. The outcome of a systematic error like this would be the specification of cooler temperatures that align with the typical metabolic heat produced by men. Field studies confirm this pattern, with women reporting lower thermal satisfaction overall17 but particularly in summer18. This gender gap in comfort widens when larger groups of people share one thermostat controlling the same space19. Greater dissatisfaction for women occurs despite them being more compromising than men when resolving conflicts20. This leads to less favorable outcomes in comfort negotiations21 Parkinson, T., Schiavon, S., de Dear, R. et al. Overcooling of offices reveals gender inequity in thermal comfort. Sci Rep 11, 23684 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-03121-1
||

chp 5 continued ||the women and men have different types of adsorption rates for different hazardous chemicals??? i mean i have never even thought about it . Gender differences in toxicology begin at the gamete and embryo stage, continuing through development and maturation and into old age. Sex influences exposure, toxicokinetics, and toxicodynamics. The effects of sex have often been overlooked in both epidemiology and toxicology. In addition to the obvious modifying effects of the sex hormones and conditions affecting the male and female reproductive organs and sex roles, both genetic and hormonal effects influence many aspects of life and toxic responses. All aspects of toxicology should consider gender-balanced designs so that a more comprehensive understanding of differences and similarities can be obtained. Differential gene expression is a new frontier in toxicology. Risk assessment should account for gender and life cycle differences. The biological basis for altered sex ratios observed in several populations should be sought in animal models, and expanded to other compounds that might exert sex-selective effects Marie Vahter, Michael Gochfeld, Barbara Casati, Mona Thiruchelvam, Agneta Falk-Filippson, Robert Kavlock, Erminio Marafante, Deborah Cory-Slechta,
Implications of gender differences for human health risk assessment and toxicology,
Environmental Research,
Volume 104, Issue 1,
2007,
Pages 70-84,
ISSN 0013-9351,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2006.10.001. ||

|| I have also read the nail salon worker report briefly but I am kinda of sceptical cause the report was written by someone is is not well versed in toxicology but the project had a good impact on the Canadian government for increasing the safety standards for cosmetics. Although I doubt how regulated the cosmetic industry is especially in the USA and Canada. I mean they still haven't banned tanning beds even after several countries banned it for increasing dermal cancer risk||

[wintry iron]

|| This also reminds me that someone with severe eczema from birth told in some yt shorts how their doctor talked of the implication that some hazardous chemicals in regular cleaning products pose multiple health risks, esp for pregnant women. you can read more here https://www.rcog.org.uk/guidance/browse-all-guidance/scientific-impact-papers/chemical-exposures-during-pregnancy-dealing-with-potential-but-unproven-risks-to-child-health-scientific-impact-paper-no-37/||

oof I forgot about the most important thing ||although I think it isn't necessarily gender biased considering risk assessments of many toxic chemicals are faulty in a general sense too, the infamous disposable period pad and tampons I actually stopped using after reading an old toxicology report and knowing it's environmental impact but this study seems quite recent so ig not much have changed huh link https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2020.105740 ||

chp 5 continues ||the industrial tool size disparity, I feel so silly when some podcaster on yt says that industrial tool sizes don't need to pertain to average female physiology cause there are only men in that sector and for the next video the same podcaster says women don't want to industrial physical work because they are princesses and lazy, unlike true alpha men. Like man the contradiction? how do you expect females to participate in industrial jobs when the sector doesn't take accountability y of the basics of a worker's productivity? Not to mention several factories did not allow women to work(until the 50s in USA,UK) in the physical labour market when ww2 ended and the men came back from war. don't even get started on workplace bullying (where the workforce is typically male). Not just in the physical labour sector, some higher academia which are largely male-dominated can be nasty to women overall.
sorry I got a lil off topic there ||

||Although I have to say that I find cleaners and care lift more weight in an hour compared to miners and construction workers a little bit dodgy, although it may be cause there's enough automation atm for mining and cosntruction worker||

[ancient osprey]

||I use pads because that is the only comfortable option for me, but it always bothered me that some pads have a fragrance. Fragrance is known to irritate and cause infection in skin products, dermatologists recommend fragrance-free products, but pad companies love to make scented pads. How can that not be bad for your vaginal flora? I always try to avoid those.||

[ancient osprey]

||I found this information a bit strange as well. I know that caregivers might have to do some heavy lifting when they need move or help people around. And sometimes we're talking about people with 0 mobility. But usually those are not "on the move" the entire day. Construction workers carry bags of cement that are sometimes 50 kg or more, and they have to carry them on their backs, back and forth, sometimes 2 at the same time, and usually several of them throughout the work-day (which isn't a 8-hour shift either, most private construction workers here work from sun up to sun down)||

[wintry iron]

ik you probably have tried all the alternatives but I still am mentioning this thing since I have seen many people still not aware of this option both irl and online, have you ever used a reusable menstrual pad? I used to be itchy all the time when I used to wear disposable pads but now switching to reusable pads made it poof, I am not insinuating that it is the ultimate solution but it may work

[wintry iron]

||hmm maybe it has something to do with countries? I was reading someone's, blog on Medium where he talked about automation in oil rigs and construction sites in Norway and some Nordicthe countries vs the lack of automation in the same thing in USA, and I was trying to find how much construction work is automated in USA and one report mentioned it is around 55% in 2021 https://www.cmaanet.org/sites/default/files/resource/Construction Automation.pdf here btw. I checked the reference she has mentioned for this and it seems like the references (those were mentioned in the report that the author mentioned) land on dead links which is a bummer
idk if has to do with this or something else or the author is just bluffing ||

would love some more non ambiguous references on this

[ancient osprey]

I have a couple of reusable pads yes! I use them on lower flow days. I bought one for heavier days but I just can't use it, it feels worse than wearing a diaper, it is super thick and it only gets worse with heavy flow, it is truly uncomfortable but for nicer days I really like them!

[somber nova]

ch 03
||it can't be easy to write a book about events that are happening while they are happening and then when it's published, it's already all over and solved or moved to another stage... and again i would like to know how up-to-date these stats, these situations are and whether they have changed in the meantime or not... because reading this is making me miserable and makes life on this planet, in this kind of society rather bleak. it makes to never want to work... ||

[wintry iron]

chp 6|| Wow a quick search told me that BPA is still rampant in plastic products other than baby bottles. I wonder why there is so much problem with using other solvents that are properly risk assessed ||

[somber nova]

i made a friend put this next on his reading list

idk if that was a good a idea lol

lmao i'm sorry did i interrupt your typing?

please keep on typing

[wintry iron]

||I do not have much knowledge of employee benefits that entitle part-time/independent contractors but I wonder why there are so many more female part-timers than males? is it because people by default don't take female employees(for full-time jobs) in case they get pregnant and demand maternity leave or is it because the majority of female workers are underqualified for full-time jobs?? which doesn't seem likely but idk honestly || chp 6

|| Also the thing about healthcare workers especially nurses being attacked routinely is quite true from what I have heard from anecdotes of people I know, especially for nursing homes which aren't government funded, patients are more likely to verbally abuse the nurses. I think I also know a very famous criminal case with this parallel of sexual and physical abuse , the more you know the more you get disgusted ||

||and I don't understand why the nursing home said putting plexiglass on every bed-chamber can stigmatize patients, huh?||

[wintry iron]

it's highly unlikely that the survey and statical programmes are done so frequently and as such for such 'niche' topics, I checked for newer version in some of the factors but for most cases I found nothing new stats

[somber nova]

idk if this has changed recently but when i was still doing my undergrad, ||most employers didn't want to take on female employees full-time because they can get pregnant and demand maternity leave. Also, part-time allows mothers to take care of their children, like half of the day is to earn money, the other half is to take care of the children. I think chapter 1 touched on that a little bit too. it's not that they are underqualified per se but usually they do lack more things because of their unpaid work, taking care of children/family/household and thus miss out on some things in their careers ||

[wintry iron]

ohhh that freaking suck

[somber nova]

yeah and it's just that you have organs that can produce a child like even if you never want a child etc people take a look at you and your gender and decide that it's not beneficial for their business/company etc

produce a child lmao that sounds so wrong 😭

i am not quite awake yet lol

pls ignore my ungrammatical sentences, they make sense in my head but i can't even figure how to make them grammatical lol

[wintry iron]

iss alright, i have awake so long but I am still lacking proper grammatical sense, so you're fine in my book

[somber nova]

i just wanna say that i'm really enjoying reading non-fiction rn lol even though i've got reading assignments to read through - and i thought it would make it more difficult because i'd be reading only non-fiction the entire time - it's kind of fun to read this from a non-academic lens and discussing it with y'all

[wintry iron]

||I freaking hate that I will have such a considerably weaker body than the majority of men even if I am rigorously trained , frekaing shitty evolution. I wish all sexes were built with similar physical capabilities and could do parthenogenesis like ants || chp 7

[wintry iron]

That's so nice to know that you are enjoying this even if it is freaking depressing and pessimistic, go Lae ,slay queen

[somber nova]

right? it is awful LOL it makes me mad and miserable the entire time but it's still just a book so i am enjoying the reading part lol

[wintry iron]

continued ||Women make up 43 percent of the global agricultural labour force source fao.org ||

[somber nova]

ch 4
||What I’d be interested in would be if these evaluations of female vs male professors also depend on the students’ genders. Is this something that mostly male students say or is this also coming from female students? And if so, is it indeed because the professor is not that good or is it because the female students have been conditioned to think like male students and also criticise female professors?

Well, they are indeed conditioned to think that way… I don’t think I do though but at the same time I feel like it is there… whenever I don’t like a teacher/professor I always as myself, is this because the prof is really not that good or problematic or is it this? The whole brilliance bias sucks. Everything in this book sucks ngl.

why should we accept that the way men do things, the way men see themselves, is the correct way?

oop yeah, I tend not to apply if the job ad has the word ‘ambitious’ in it. it’s just not me or an environment i’d personally like to put myself into. It sounds exhausting and competitive and can easily be toxic.||

[somber nova]

i am amazed that i know what you mean with ||arithmetical average, median, mean and mode i had to do some statistics last semester and even though idk how or what i know these words LOL||

[somber nova]

it's the ||taking care of children and the household is a woman's responsibility and task and not a man's because that would make him less of a man kind of thinking... || i think about the time i graduated from high school, male teachers at my school started taking paternal leaves

[wintry iron]

||I think pop culture also influences a lot of these stereotypes I mean I read Josei mangas for fun and every one of them has villainous female characters who a white lotus always steals others' man, has no legitimate female friends, is extremely haughty has no skills that are useful other than seduction and sewing not to mention the old tv series which always portrayed women being gossipy, dumb and always only concerned about beauty stuff||

[somber nova]

😭 ||from now on i will perceive myself smarter than everyone else i still pretend to be dumb as shit to make people feel better or whenever i notice that i'm dealing with someone who thinks i am and it's just easier to play along than try to be different||

[wintry iron]

solid tactic

[somber nova]

oh totally!!!

[wintry iron]

imma copy that too

[wintry iron]

i mean missing paid leaves for this shit 💀

oh nvm I kinda got confused what was I actually trying to say

[wintry iron]

I binged the whole thing yesterday and finished it

now it's time to cross-check the refs and I am going to share my thoughts after that

[somber nova]

Ch 5 ||

an uncomfortable workforce is an unproductive workforce.
yes, i’ve had my fair share of cold offices and uncomfortable work places…||

[somber nova]

yess this!!?! ||if they would accommodate female physiology in places that appear to only have men, they might see some women?? it's about giving them the option and including them?? and some women just don't want to work in those places and that's okay but that doesn't mean you can generalise that half of this planet's population are princesses ||

[somber nova]

to continue this convo ||I feel like that's realistic because men get to clock out of work and not lift anything heavy but women have to keep doing so. and the lifting and movements they have to do is very different to the work men do - it's inconvenient, uncomfortable and you are expected to do it even though you don't have the strength. idk how to explain it but yes, as someone who has a tiny amount of experience in the medical field and had to just push through even though I had no strength or had injuries myself, I feel like this may really be reality for a lot of people||

[wintry iron]

I mean ||how many men would have been able to do the work if all the tools/resources are exclusively designed for men who are above 6'2" tall? People are not considering womn's body morphology and expect them to be happily do the same work ||

Not to mention ||if I do not consider women who dont have any children or male spouse, the majority of child reaering and housework falls upon the women, and these types of manual work demand a lot of more hours of work and frequent travelling||

[wintry iron]

Some of the stats/facts here are mentioned just one liner based which I really hated, like please elaborate it ma'am. if I tell these to someone else and if they question me how? I would be tongue tied

[ancient osprey]

Chapter 10
||(...) we should be routinely and systematically tracking, recording and collating pregnant-women's health outcomes. But we aren't - not even during pandemics: during the 2002-4 SARS outbreak in China, pregnant-women's health outcomes were not systemically tracked and 'consequently', the WHO points out, 'it was not possible to fully characterize the course and outcomes of SARS during pregnancy'. Another gender gap that couls have been so easily avoided, and information that will be lacking for when the next pandemic hits.

This did NOT age well ||

[somber nova]

totally, there are no explicit examples too, it's like the author just read something and based it off of this and their impression. i also would like to know how this statement came to be, it can't be the case for everyone and every country and every job??

[wintry iron]

yeah I just assumed it was about UK or US

[somber nova]

oh right, it didn't even mention where right? most of the chapter was about the US iirc

[hollow python]

Im beginning to wonder if its even worth reading after all this critique

[wintry iron]

Even after all the complaints i have for this book, I am pretty sure that it is the most comprehensive and informative book on gender data bias , i doubt there has been any book except this to address almost all the spheres of data bias based on gender (till now)

[next notch]

I’m starting this one next. I’m very interested in reading everything you’ve all said under the spoilers

[somber nova]

I don't think it's really complaining but just being more critical about what you read and not taking everything the author says at face value

if I gave the impression here that I'm criticising the book and not enjoying it, that is not the case. I can't help but be more critical about what the author writes because its something I also deal with in academia and I am trained to be more critical about anything I read and consume in general.

but this book is very informative and gives a great overview on a lot of things that still need to be addressed and because of that it lacks in some other areas or at times becomes too generalised and that is what Acid and I (and Scarlatte) picked up on and talked about

so it's definitely worth a try although I already hate the effect it has on me lol

[wintry iron]

I was searching for revised stats for several things Perez mentioned here. Thus far I have been hugely unsuccessful in retrieving the updated stats

i mean I was not too hopeful but still, it was very disappointing

ping me if yall find something

[somber nova]

what were you looking for? i can try to find them for you if you'd like

[quartz ingot]

what were you looking
for? i can try to find them
for you if you'd like

- Laelia 🌧

[wintry iron]

Hmm I was looking for all of the things mentioned chapterwise

But holdup I will sort out the ones I am more interested in knowing

[somber nova]

make me a list and I'll try and find something through my institution

[quartz ingot]

make me a list and
I'll try and find something through
my institution

- Laelia 🌧

[somber nova]

goddammit haiku bot, i love you too 💛

[ancient osprey]

This book was published before COVID right? And with COVID the world was basically on hold for 2-3 years, so I feel like that might explain the lack of updated data

[somber nova]

ooh that could be!! and also unless it's an ongoing study and there are significant changes, researches won't release their findings to the general public immediately. it takes a lot of time to get to that point

[wintry iron]

i forgot about the pandemic, even census of several countries got delayed cause the pandemic so I think it's highly probable that other stats havent gotten updated in quite some while

Also kinda hate that Perez didn't list the references(of her book) in a accessible format on her website even though the book has gotten highly popular

I have seen several new nonfiction author doing this thing

Attaching references and furthuer readings on their website

[somber nova]

oohh interesting, i didn't know that!!!

[wintry iron]

Ooh I found her substack where shares updated news on gender data bias

[somber nova]

that one time i looked up the stats/link it didn't exist so i stopped doing that

but i can imagine it's quite a task writing a non academic non-fic and adding references, sources etc and then those being moved somewhere else and then they're basically gone

[wintry iron]

Oh nvm invisible women updates are paid

[somber nova]

rood

do you think i can get behind that paywall with my institution lol

[wintry iron]

I mean I love substack but individual subscriptions suck

[somber nova]

ooofff

that's about how much i pay for my two library cards a year lol

the annual option i mean

[wintry iron]

Yeah if only they had a university/library access

[wintry iron]

my sis knew that I was reading Invisible Women and so she told me to search on gender disparity in living organ donors and well it's as I have expected (living organ donors are mostly females and recipients are mostly male) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4964018/ , although one factor can be said that in some families men are sole breadwinners so they can't really take long leave but I doubt that's the primary reason

[ancient osprey]

End of chapter 13
||I really liked to read more info about sanitary products. The author only mentions it in one sentence, but for a book about women I think it would be important to make a deeper dive, idk||

[ancient osprey]

I finished it! I'll give my final thoughts as soon as I am on my pc

[heady zephyr]

I finally got this from the library today

1. This has been on my TBR for a while. I love reading about topics regarding equality and feminism and I've seen a lot of praise for this book.
2. I've read many articles on data biases, not just against women but also against POC and disabled people. I've also listened to an interview or two with the author and I'm excited to hear her expand on some of the points she makes in those interviews.

[next notch]

Intro - The pace of this seems like it’ll be pretty quick. I’m not sure that I’m loving the author’s tone yet. (I tried to start with the audiobook that she narrated herself, and that was a nope for me) I noted that this book was published in March 2019, and likely researched and written earlier, so this info is going to be at least 5 years old at this point. Nothing that has been discussed has been particularly surprising yet, but I’m 56 years old and jaded on this topic, and I think life perspective is going to matter as we read this book. ||I was interested in the discussion of the gendered vs. non-gendered languages and wondered how that would land with native speakers of the gendered languages. I will say that in my lifetime I’ve personally witnessed a great deal of change, especially with occupational names (like flight attendants, servers or waitstaff, firefighters, police officers etc) becoming standard. And ofc more recently with the wider usage of the single "they" pronouns.|| I’m really interested in reading all of your thoughts as I go along, especially since we are such a global group, and it'll be so valuable to read your POVs from other countries and generations than my own

[heady zephyr]

Intro: ||I live in the US, and I feel like we've made improvements with using gender-neutral language for things like occupational names and representation, and even the more widespread use of the singular "they" is a huge improvement. I find it odd that she doesn't mention the singular "they" at all when it was coming into more widespread use around the time that the book was written. Maybe it wasn't used as much in the UK, where the author is from.||

[somber nova]

ch 15
||how do these men think the food their wives cooked for them was made? did they think it just appeared out of nowhere or something?? It blows my mind like how close-minded must you be that you don't even think that a kitchen should be part of a home? ||

[wintry iron]

Ikr its so funny and ridiculous at the same time

[ancient osprey]

||Yeah this was so ridiculous. When I read that my brain kept trying to find other justifications. Maybe they were just focused in providing shelter (a place to sleep) to everyone first and then upgrading the houses because they had public places to eat (food provided by whoever was helping)? I don't know, but forgetting to add a kitchen just sounds too stupid like out of a comedy sketch ||

[somber nova]

ch 16
||now i'm also terrified of natural disasters... this book is truly bleak and pessimistic 😭 like there's no way it has drastically changed in the past 5 years so this is ig reality and going to be our future too???? I don't wanna women are not even safe anywhere it seems ||

i finished!!

that was a tough read... mentally i mean

[remote relic]

Sorry for joining the BR late , Hoping to finish it before the deadline .

[remote relic]

1. well I think , reading the synopsis made me curious enough , and it very much overlaps with my academics as it deals with the social injustice and gender inequality that I read regularly .
2. read any other nonfiction book that deals with the same ideas ? No . Yes read many articles and cross cultural research articles that entails the very notion of inequality.
   Meanwhile reading this kind of books help us make more sense of the society that we live in .

[next notch]

Ch 1 Transportation || I’d say that there’s a major difference between urban and rural communities too. My understanding is that back in the early 1900s, Henry Ford made some sort of deal with the US govt. to prioritize building a roadway system over a rail system and that is why our continent has minimal train travel as compared to Europe, and it is definitely more frustrating to use.

• However, getting around in the rural US is still a major issue. There are major thoroughfares between major cities but once you get off the main highway, road conditions change drastically. Idk if that’s really gender-related tho, because it’s just that way for everyone. It is not atypical to need to drive 20+ miles (sorry Idk what that means in km) to get to a significantly supplied area for shopping/services etc.
• As a new mom, I definitely did a lot of the trip-chaining, and it certainly increased as my children got older. I was a single mom for 6 years too, with kids under 10, so my days were completely full with work and then driving around, lots of doctor's appts (my eldest daughter had 2 specialists for her vision) and all the parenting.
• I grew up in a Northern US state with regular snow, but for much of our country, if it snows everything just shuts down. I’m curious now about the stats for the US with cold weather related accidents for pedestrians, because idk if it would have an impact on government spending. Is that because Sweden has national healthcare?
• I think there’s a class status condition specific to car ownership too, and it’s mostly the lower incomes that need to take the public transportation (which also here codes as minorities) so there’s other biases involved with city planning and zoning||

Also, an anecdote that is tangentially related. In 1999, I bought a new car on my own with a car loan from my bank. Paid it off in 4 years instead of the 5 projected (which took a bit of juggling as a young mom with 2 kids). Go me. Got the car title from the bank in my name, registered with the state in my name. My car. Then in 2011, I got married. And we ended up using the car as collateral to the bank for another loan to pay off wedding expenses and other debt at a lower interest rate because it was worth more at the time than his car. We paid that off early too. But. When the bank returned the car title to us… it was suddenly in my husband’s name and only his name. All state registration was in his name. When I complained about it, and you better believe that I did to everyone involved, I was told that was just “the way it worked” and not to worry about it. So. The state essentially gifted my car to my new husband. And the real kicker is he couldn’t even drive it, because he doesn’t know how to drive a manual transmission. 21st century sexism is alive and thriving

[next notch]

ch 2 Sanitation & Safety || This chapter was infuriating.

• How can this simple thing that everyone needs be so challenging to accommodate? I had never really thought about equal access to sanitation facilities, but it is quite disheartening to read about the situation in other areas of the world.
• I don’t even know how to begin with my frustration over the situation with sexual harassment and underreported crimes against women. It is endemic and totally ridiculous that nothing is yet being taken seriously. The situations outlined with the airlines are unconscionable! It’s a confined space, do something! Don’t let anyone off the plane until authorities can meet you at the gate. Seriously. Grrrrrrr.
• I’m glad that some cities are taking gender behavior into account while designing things, (like the parks in Vienna) but it seems to be that only women are leading the way with considerable roadblocks.||

[next notch]

ch 3 Imbalance in “unpaid work” || ngl, I’m very lucky here. My husband is not employed outside of our house anymore (due to disability) and he does the lion’s share of our house/yard work. All I really do is my own laundry, and make my own lunches, and that’s by choice. Our situation is definitely atypical tho, and I do appreciate that I don’t have to do any of it anymore. When we both worked, I certainly did. (and I do it better lol, but I don’t complain about it)

• I’m also nervous about what is going to happen with my parents as they age (they’re in their 80s), since they are on the other side of the country from me. Luckily, they are both independently healthy atm
• husbands create more housework - lmao facts.
• I am 100% not going to be able to retire with financial stability
• Another thing here in the US about women in the workforce is that the expense is large and availability of childcare is low and in high-demand. I know many mothers who have opted to not be employed due to the fact that they would not profit from the situation.
• The more I read this book, the more I wish I lived in Sweden
• it would be interesting to know the “work from home” stats now in 2023, because I suspect they are vastly different. I know maybe people have been allowed to continue in this post-pandemic world, now that we know that it is possible||

[next notch]

||We're lucky if we get unpaid leave in some occupations. We also have to account for a certain number of hours to be eligible for our medical insurance plans, so even tho I was allowed 12 weeks at 60% pay, I had to account for 20 hours per week with some sort of accrued non-maternity leave (sick or vacation) to keep my insurance plan for myself and my kids. So I worked throughout my pregnancies and took as minimal time off as possible to bank it for post-partum pay periods. It really sucked. Cuz when I had to go back to work.... I had no leave at all.||

[next notch]

||This is ... awkward and understandably scary. Do you think he started whistling to alert you that he was in there? Like maybe he thought if he made other verbal noises you'd be more freaked out? Otherwise he's just a creep||

[next notch]

Ch 4 Meritocracy || that’s amazing about the orchestra!

• I pretty much always assume that anyone who publishes anything with initials is female
• women and STEM. It’s starting to turn around with the current generations, I think? It seems like more female students are being encouraged to these occupations than before. Maybe? I think this power-shift has happened within my lifetime. I remember as a young girl being enthralled with dinosaurs to the point of proudly declaring to everyone I knew that I would become a paleontologist when I grew up, which was a new word to some of my extended family. I was soundly told, after I’d explained what it was, that girls were not allowed to become paleontologists, and why didn’t I try being something nice like a teacher or a nurse instead. I think of this every time I do a dinosaur related storytime at the library; because it’s frustrating irony fr

I also was a very sick kid, and an only child until I was 9, so I spent a lot of time alone and out of school, mostly reading books. I think I missed a lot of the socializing that happened around gender roles during that time. Thus I never learned to hide my curiosity or my ability, and have lived my life using open and direct communication, making independent decisions, and voicing my opinions mostly unapologetically without a filter that other girls learned. I have regularly been called “emasculating” by men who have been threatened by this. It also means that I don’t relate well to most women of my generation, and have a difficult time respecting anyone who simpers and uses femininity to advance, to manipulate or “play the game” in general. I just have no time for that. And yet, I’m in a profession which is traditionally dominated by women, and not a paleontologist||

[wintry iron]

Omg the situation is tough there

[wintry iron]

||Yeah the mindset has shifted quite a lot but still representation is quite less in the leadership roles or in like higher academia of STEM||

||I cant speak of anyone else but for myself. But during my bachelors and masters i have always seen more women professors in liberal arts and in Biological sciences(which is considered easier than earth sciences idk why tbh ) rather than in mathematics and earth sciences , I got like 3 women professors and rest of them 7 are men . Now when i am looking for someone to work under for my phd (in abroad ) almost all of them are men . So yeah seems like in higher places are still male dominant ||

[next notch]

||Your experience is much more direct and trustworthy than my outside observations. I work with youth in a library setting, and I just know I’ve had many teen girls talk about their plans to get into science fields, which has been heartening ||

[next notch]

What is your area of study? For your PhD?

[wintry iron]

Yeah I think getting into sciences frm an early age also leads to higher percentage participation for the higher academic fields so hopefuly we will get more marginalised people in leadership roles

[wintry iron]

Chemistry and I am thinking of doing phd in environment chemstry/ atmospheric chemistry

[next notch]

Important work

[wintry iron]

Yeah considering mother earth cant handle us anymore

[next notch]

She’ll probably survive, but we won’t

I should say “recover” lol

[hollow python]

About the author ||"forcing Twitter to revise its procedures for dealing with abuse" im not sure she was that succesfull at that ||

[hollow python]

The earth has survived worse than humans but i dont think humans will

[next notch]

Yes. She will recover from our damage is exactly what I meant

[next notch]

Ch 5 Environmental factors at work || not surprised about the chemicals in salons. I can’t even walk into one without being affected. I once tried to wait for a haircut at a salon that offered both hair and nail services, and I couldn’t even manage to stay for the next available stylist

• wth Always pads? Yikes
• omg, yes about the uniforms and other equipment. I worked as a security guard for a manufacturing company in my hometown during summers in my college years, and that uniform was awful! I can only imagine how stressful it would be with equipment meant to protect you that didn’t fit right. Such an out-right aggression that these things are not thought about by the agencies that are employing women. It feels like they’re just saying, well, we can’t not hire you nowadays, but we can sure make it difficult for you to stay. grrrr ||

[past mortar]

Gonna start this book today 🙂

[wintry iron]

Hello fellow readers! @everyone

We've officially hit the 20-day point in our buddy read of Invisible Women and it's time to check in on everyone's progress and delve into some discussion questions.

Progress Check: So far the book has been finished by Acid, Scarlatte, and Laelia . If you haven't started yet, no worries, there's still some time to catch up! This BR is going to end <t:1701475200:R>

Questions:

1. Chapter 3 - The Myth of Meritocracy: What were your thoughts on the gender gap in science and academia discussed in this chapter? Do you think meritocracy is as objective as it seems? Do you have any personal experience regarding this topic?
2. Chapter 4 - The Great Gender Data Gap: How does the media contribute to the gender data gap?
3. Chapter 4 - The Great Gender Data Gap: Reflect on your own education. Were there instances where gender bias was present in the curriculum, textbooks, or teaching methods?
4. Chapter 2 - The Mismeasure of Women: Were you aware of the differences in symptoms and reactions to medication between males and females? Do you think it is justifiable for people to treat females as inferior because in some physiological aspects, female bodies are weaker than males?
5. Chapter 1 - The Default Male: does the concept of the "default male" influence your day-to-day experiences? Consider aspects like public transportation and language.

(p.s-I know most of these questions are anecdotal, the reason being that I want to know more about your personal experiences since most of us come from quite diverse backgrounds)

[past mortar]

I like the quote after the dedication already by Simone:
||> "Representation of the world, like the world itself, is the work of men; they describe it from their own point of view, which they confuse with the absolute truth." ||
Even in everyday life by talking with my SO, male friends or male collegues I keep noticing these, even in the small things

[worthy plinth]

I’m going to start this today!

[hollow python]

Introduction || "bias is so firmly embedded in our psyche that even genuinely gender-neutral words are read as male" I have noticed that even in myself where I automatically put a gender on a gender neutral term even though I'm trying to catch it when I assume a gender whether the assumption is man or woman ||

[next notch]

1. Chapter 3 - The Myth of Meritocracy: What were your thoughts on the gender gap in science and academia discussed in this chapter? Do you think meritocracy is as objective as it seems? Do you have any personal experience regarding this topic?
   As a public librarian, I am in a profession that is dominated by women, and I do think that male staff get treated differently by the public. It’s been my completely unscientific observation that they are more likely to trust male staff for information requests, but they are more likely to modify problem behavior if asked by female staff. However, mothers will seek out female staff for anything related to children.

2. Chapter 4 - The Great Gender Data Gap: How does the media contribute to the gender data gap?
Oof. This could be the topic of a full book most likely. I’m going to say in insidious subliminal ways that we don’t even perceive including image, integrity and language (which is completely a cop-out, I know)

3. Chapter 4 - The Great Gender Data Gap: Reflect on your own education. Were there instances where gender bias was present in the curriculum, textbooks, or teaching methods?
I mean, yes. I was in US public schools during the 1970-1980s. Dead White Protestant Men everywhere. All classes were “lecture and learn and recite back on exams”, no real critical thinking required. My collegiate years were not much better, but I did take a few classes that were more discussion based. Tho we did have a Dean of Students who was a Black man, which was considered very progressive at the time.

4. Chapter 2 - The Mismeasure of Women: Were you aware of the differences in symptoms and reactions to medication between males and females? Do you think it is justifiable for people to treat females as inferior because in some physiological aspects, female bodies are weaker than males?
I think it makes complete sense that there would be differences in how our bodies react to medications and no, it’s not justifiable to be treated inferior physically. This is not directly related, but I once had a male doctor accuse me of looking up symptoms in medical reference materials when I asked to be tested for hypothyroidism. I convinced him finally to run the blood tests due to my family history, but he still didn’t believe me when the tests showed an extreme condition. He re-ran the tests which yielded the same result, at which point he conceded that I did indeed have the condition. He did not apologize. I found a new doctor.

When I was pregnant with my first child, my male doctor knew that I was a low-income patient and did not perform many screening tests. Meanwhile, I was very concerned that something was wrong with the baby with a deep internal insistence that I can’t describe. Throughout my mid to late pregnancy, I reported this each time, and he brushed it off as “first time mom jitters”. When my daughter was in fact with congenital birth defects to her eyes, I was relieved to know what was wrong, and could proceed to find out what to do about it. The hospital staff was very concerned that I’d reject the baby, and the doctor actually apologized to me for not taking my concerns more seriously. For my second child, I found a new doctor.

5. Chapter 1 - The Default Male: does the concept of the "default male" influence your day-to-day experiences? Consider aspects like public transportation and language.
My daily commute is minimal, and just a few basic blocks from my library, so I don’t think that’s gender affected. I no longer have school-aged children, so the “trip-chaining” discussed doesn’t affect me as much as it used to.

[next notch]

Just thought of something: why do we say “ladies and gentlemen” but “men and women”? Like there’s a status quo aspect to the gender order of groups? maybe it’s different in other languages?

[wintry iron]

I am not particularly sure about this but on a similar note in Japan, kids are always taught to write father and mother in the specific order

[wintry iron]

omg that is horrible, I think the dismissive behaviour of doctors pushes people to find alternative medicine practices, which are mostly scam and further jeopardizes people's health

I haven't personally faced gender-biased behaviour of doctors here but the majority of doctors here are dismissive regardless of gender

[wintry iron]

It’s been my completely unscientific observation that they are more likely to trust male staff for information requests

well I did not expect that tbh

[somber nova]

i think it's because it's more 'gentleman-like' to let the ladies go first but in society it's men first

[next notch]

Interesting… here it is “mother and father” but also “brothers and sisters”

[next notch]

That’s what I think too, but there’s also the point where your social status drops to the point where politeness is no longer necessary, in a way

[hollow python]

introduction ||Well with the star wars movies even though misogyny might have played a part there was also other reasons why the fandom hated the movies||

also introduction ||not be controversial thats going to be hard ||

[heady zephyr]

1. I'm not surprised to hear about the gender gaps in academia. Women are automatically seen as less credible than men. Meritocracy is not objective at all. It takes a lot of luck and good relationships to get ahead in the world, and some people will automatically think less of you because you're a woman, POC, disabled, or whatever else outside of the "norm". And if you're not a well-off white cis man, you won't get as many opportunities to get ahead.

2. The media definitely ascribes to "default male" thinking. They portray the world as it is to a man, and any women's experiences are not as important.

3. I don't think I learned a whole lot about famous historical women in school. It was mostly white men lol. All of the explorers, scientists, inventors, politicians, artists, and musicians were men. And a lot of the women I'd hear about were famous for doing "womenly" things, like Clara Barton being a nurse or Betsy Ross being a seamstress. And others weren't mentioned outside of their role of helping men, like Sacagawea helping Lewis and Clark.

4. I knew that some conditions presented different, like heart attacks, but didn't know about things like reactions to medication. But it makes sense because women have different hormones and body masses than men. It's definitely not justifiable to treat women as inferior to men because of their bodies, but it happens all the time. Doctors dismiss women all the time because they think we're being too weak/sensitive or our symptoms don't match a common diagnosis. My mom was dismissed as a paranoid helicopter mom when she brought up my symptoms when I was a child, and I feel like some of my pain may have been dismissed because I'm a "weak" woman.

5. I play a lot of video games, and I know that in online lobbies, you're assumed to be male unless stated otherwise. It doesn't really bother me, though I can see how it would bother others.

I could write an essay about how doctors don't listen to patients, especially when they're women I haven't gotten to the medical chapters of the book though.

[heady zephyr]

I've been thinking a lot about Chapter 1 even though I'm a lot farther in the book haha. My mom doesn't drive, so growing up, my mom and I didn't have reliable transportation when my dad was working. We always got rides from my grandparents or family friends, or sometimes we would walk or bike around. We never thought of using public transportation because it's pretty bad around here. The closest bus stop is 1-2 miles from my house, and I've never been able to walk/bike that far without significant difficulty. Also the routes wouldn't have suited our needs. Luckily the school bus was a lot more convenient lol.

I have my driver's license now, but our family still only has one car 🥲 My mom and I started taking Lyfts sometimes, but I've never felt comfortable taking one on my own. Which makes me think that even if the public transportation here were good, I probably would still feel unsafe if I was travelling on my own.

I've always thought of bad public transportation as a class or disability issue, but with my experiences, I should have thought of it as a woman issue too. And I think about this chapter whenever I walk our poorly maintained sidewalks

[next notch]

Ch 6 ||Back in the early 90s, (before life slapped me up the head and said “wth are you doing, go be a librarian), I worked in a reservation call center for an airline, translating for French speaking customers. It was the worst job that I have ever had and the working environment was atrocious. I didn’t get a single day of paid leave during the entire 2 years I was there, and worked every single holiday. In order to get more than 2 days off each week, you had to “shift-trade” with others to work their days off for you to create a vacation. Then you had to work your days off to cover their vacations. It was 100% awful. They also had a system where if the call volume was low, you could be randomly sent home, without pay, of course. As for sexual harassment, you know who likes to call 24/7 phone numbers like for an airline? Lonely men who have no intention of traveling, but are desperate to know the color of your underwear (or worse)||

[next notch]

My elder daughter has only ever had 1 eye, and while she had some vision as a kid, she is now legally blind. She lives in a medium sized US city, and is dependent upon public transportation, primarily to go to campus for classes. She can still make out color differences, and can see high contrast print if it is zoomed in very large. So she has an oversized iPhone that she can use to facilitate and navigate, well everything really. But for the bus, she uses Google Maps to follow her location and can know where she is on the route, since everything beyond about 12” (30cm) is completely blurry and indistinct and she can not see out the windows for landmarks. But she gets harassed constantly for sitting in the special seating for disabled passengers because she has both a mobility cane and a giant phone inches from her face. She has stopped wearing her prosthetic eye, because I think she thinks it makes her look more legitimate, but I think she gets harassed for that too. The upshot is that she uses Uber whenever she can, and I’m constantly worried about that too. It totally sucks.

[next notch]

Ch 7 ||Ultimately, more than anything else, this book makes me aware of my 1st world privilege in spite of the gender inequalities I may experience ||

Ch 8 Nothing in this chapter has been surprising, but it is all quite infuriating. I don’t avoid voice recognition software whenever possible and I try to speak extra clearly when I know that it is in place (like the voicemail system we have at work). but wth ppl, get it together with your AI protocols

Another tangential anecdote, I was dating a guy who worked at Apple in 2006, and he was involved with the beta testing of the iPhone. He took it on vacation with us (a long story about how men can’t leave their work behind), so I saw the first smartphone in action long before the general public. I totally could have scooped Apple to Microsoft… but alas. I have integrity

[heady zephyr]

Ugh, yeah, the harassments for being disabled while young is awful :/ I'm glad the Ubers have been better for her so far. But yeah, both options do suck.

[hollow python]

i once in 30c weather was supposed to take the bus but it was literally stuffed so i said nope turned around and asked my mom if she could drive me
I can imagine how such a situation would be extra hard with a physical disability and also for the many people who dont have the luxury of being able to call someone

but as someone with anxiety i would rather have waited an hour for rush time to pass than step into that bus

[hollow python]

part 1 chapter 2 ||the data that groping was more usual than catcalling might also be because people are less likely to report on ther if its someone catcalling than groping||

[worthy plinth]

And I didn’t
I’m just not in the mood rn, like I read a couple lines and then moved to another book I’d been reading and never got back

I’m going to try and start it soon-ish though

[hollow python]

Part 2 chapter 4 ||I think as much as its a problem with women being more likely to get the teaching instead of research because it is lesser its also a problem that we view teaching as lesser since teachers are very important in the process of getting new researchers||

[past mortar]

I think the book is super interesting, but it makes me super angry and sad as well ngl.
I'll try my best to finish it this week

[wintry iron]

if yall need br date extension then let me know

[next notch]

I should be able to finish it by Friday, there are a lot of source pages

[hollow python]

Part 3 chapter 8 ||The voice recognition thing is actually something i have experienced where it perfectly understands my dad but not me and i dont even have a very high pitched voice||

[next notch]

Ch 10 - Is it any wonder that so many of us distrust doctors? sheesh.

[hollow python]

chapter 13 ||Why anyone would think sanitary products are a luxury and not essential is beyond me ||

[hollow python]

chapter 14 ||There is currently a scandal here in denmark where an male politician in his late 20s was found to be in a relationship with a 15 year old girl after it was revealed there ofcourse was major outrage but the annoying part is that since she was 15 it wasnt technically illegal so they couldnt kick him out the worst part is that there are rules in their guidelines on such occasions they just cant be followed since it would be illegal to throw him out||

[wintry iron]

so I am going to ask extension for 7 days i hope it works for yall

[hollow python]

chapter 16 ||i cant imagine having an untreated UTI last time i had one i ended up in the hospital for 5 days and if it hadnt been treated i probably would have suffered kidney damage||

I finished it is a very interesting and needed topic to be informed about even though there was some problems with the sources i still think it was a very informative look and tbh some parts actually made me mad even though im lucky in the regard of sexism ii can still relate to alot of the points brought up in this book
i liked to the point where i now have made my mom read it

[stuck sail]

Preface - *"When we say human, on the whole we mean man" *is such a profound quote. Absolutely horrible but it's so true that men have traditionally been prioritised when talking about anything

Introduction - I was just thinking about this! The fact that more 'male' terms can be used as gender neutral terms by anyone e.g. dude, guys but typically 'female' terms are used less as gender neutral terms or if they are they're typically used by women is really interesting

And by that I mean it sucks

[stuck sail]

Chapter 2 - I'm getting pretty cis vibes from this chapter so far. ||Arguing that women take longer at the toilet than men because of their periods (true) but what about trans men? Some of them will have periods. Unless the author is just going off an average.|| Also not gonna lie but I feel like some men out there also have poor personal hygiene as well and don't wash their hands.

People being made to feel like an inconvenience/they're the ones in the wrong when they report harassment is just gross but I know it happens. Makes you wonder what the point of reporting is sometimes.

[stuck sail]

Chapter 6 - some of these statistics absolutely blow my mind. 90% of single parents in the UK are women. I grew up in a single parent household and it's not something I ever really considered before but when you think about it you do expect a single parent to be a 'mum' rather than a 'dad'

[stuck sail]

Chapter 10 - I've heard so many stories about women not being diagnosed with medical issues by men. I've had it myself and all doctors tend to say is 'lose weight' like that can fix everything.

[stuck sail]

If you live in the UK like me and work for a company that has over 250 employees you can go here to find the gender pay gap info

For my company 'women earn 63p for every £1 that men earn when comparing median hourly pay.' which is just a little bit depressing

For average hourly pay it's 34.1% lower so I'm assuming 66p to every £1

Surprisingly women earn more bonuses (£1.14 to every £1 bonus a man gets) but fewer women get bonuses, presumably because fewer women are in roles higher up in the company. Sorry for the block of text there but I thought it was interesting.

[next notch]

Ch 11 ||omg, this is the most infuriating chapter yet! I have a complete distrust of the medical system in general, after several incompetent experiences involving either myself or one of my daughters. It is so unconscionable that there could be remedies for “women’s conditions” that are just being dismissed. Since my younger daughter just struggled through a difficult pregnancy, that section was particularly hard hitting for me||

[next notch]

Ch 12 ||I also think there’s a shift in thinking that needs to happen regarding the need for childcare. Here it seems like an admission of defeat to need to work instead of staying home with your child. There’s a very sympathetic nature to those conversations that I overhear regularly between moms with young children. An “aw that’s too bad” kind of a thing. Also, childcare here is very expensive and so many moms figure that it just doesn’t make sense in the long run. And for those of us who had to put our kids in childcare/after-school care, we also hear it from the kids later on. My daughters frequently let me know that they think I put my job ahead of them, but someone needed to pay the freaking bills. smh||

[stuck sail]

This is also really timely whilst reading this book and the difference in how genders can be treated whilst receiving healthcare https://www.huffpost.com/entry/selma-blair-recalls-doctor-telling-her-to-get-a-boyfriend-while-battling-ms_n_6567798ae4b066e398b63cbc/amp

Imagine being in chronic pain and being told the ‘treatment’ being to get a boyfriend

[wintry iron]

Omg this kinda thing happened to someone close to me. A gynecologist (who is a male) told my sister to get married while she was getting consultation for pcod 💀

[stuck sail]

It's so bizarre and also gross that he's insinuating that 1. it's all in your head and 2. a man can fix it 🤢

Also I did finish this last night and I really enjoyed it, as much as you can enjoy a book that points out gender gaps throughout society. I thought it was really well laid out and easily accessible. So many bits were relatable and sadly it shows just how far we've still got to go for equality.

[next notch]

Ch 14 || As a US female who lived through multiple election seasons, this chapter was discouraging. The electoral process here is so completely rigged and needlessly complicated. There are so many systemic biases in place and it is incredible when women get elected at all. When Trump won in 2016, my ex apparently told our daughter (who was an outspoken Clinton supporter) that finally the “white man is back on top where he belongs”. So disgusting.

I also think it’s interesting that in so many futuristic sci-fi movies or books, there’s female leadership as if it’s saying if we just hold on the future will be better. Idk. Seems patronizing to me||

[next notch]

Finished. I know this book is intended to be a rallying cry and inspire progress toward representation. But. I kinda feel like it’s not going to be read by the ppl who would benefit from having their eyes opened. (And sadly, not all of those ppl are male)

[stuck sail]

Definitely agree with this point but I feel like marketing a book and getting it in the hands of people who need it would be incredibly difficult, especially if they don’t think they need it

[wintry iron]

@everyone hello everybody, quick update our BR has been extended till <t:1702060200:d>

[somber nova]

BR has been extended
<t:1698883200:D>- <t:1702080000:D>

[heady zephyr]

Ch 15
||How tf do house rebuilders keep forgetting a kitchen??||

||Also, I feel like the rebuilding schemes after the US hurricanes discussed in the book are more of a capitalism problem than a sexism problem. It's more profitable to rebuild businesses and demolish public housing in favor of non-public housing (where landlords can charge higher rent). It just so happens to affect women and poor people more.||

[worthy plinth]

I’ve started reading this but I won’t be able to contribute to this BR (or any other that I’m currently a part of) as I’m facing something sort of an expressive blockage

I’m glad this BR came to be though or else it may have taken me forever to get to it! Thanks for hosting, Acid!

Looking forward to reading everyone’s thoughts here once I’m done

[heady zephyr]

Finished! I'm glad this book was written. It's a great collection of all the ways women are screwed over in society. But I agree that I'm sure the people who need to read this probably won't.

However, I'm bothered by how little intersectionality there was in this book. ||We got some mention of POC women, especially in the blurb about black women being very likely to get worse medical care in the US when giving birth. But barely any mention (if at all) of disabled women or queer women. I wish there was some discussion about how these additional identities compound the data gap. And I didn't like how she attributed several things to sexism that were better attributed to classism/capitalism (eg. basically anything regarding housing or transportation)||

Also ||I'm surprised there were zero mention of trans women or non-binary people. I know this book heavily focuses on cis women with all the talk about how women's bodies are different from men's, but it feels weird (and a little sus) that a book about women published in 2019 has no mention of trans women.||

[past mortar]

Hi Acid, just letting you know that I really appreciate you starting this BR however I'm afraid I won't be able to finish it either. I'm very much nterested in finishing this book, but I'm currently in a massive reading slump I love reading everyone's thoughts though and when I get to reading it again I will share my thoughts also

[cursive bobcat]

intro: the default male

oh we had this conversation in the BR for The Left Hand of Darkness ||where the people on the planet were gender fluid, yet, everyone was referred to as a "he", which iirc the author defended saying it was gender neutral. & i looked up government documents from 2007 & before, and they mostly used he/him,,, and then have started using him/her. ||

the male default linguistically ||was an interesting observation. the change to a male default for refering to a mix crowd, and adding of female in front of occupations,,, ive definetly noticed that in eng/spanish but not so much in hindi/korean. with hindi and korean, they usually add a suffix in the plural form, so it doesnt distinguish despite hindi being a gendered language with even the door having a gender lol||

role models- ||i recently watched jennifer lawrence's interview on actor on actors, where she mentioned how sorta reveloutionary? it was that a female could be a lead/action/hero of the movie. and how we''ve all always been told how "boys & girls can both identify with a male lead, but boys cannot identify with a female lead"||

sexism in science|| is still bizarre. like how tf do u dismiss bones? dna tested bones telling u its belongs to a woman, after you dismiss the pelvis theory? Rosalind Franklin’s thing makes me so mad, they stole her data, didnt credit her at all, and also won the nobel prize for the groundbreaking discovery of dna's double helix structure. when she had submitted her own paper, it was used as a instrument to support the men's research & data||

one thing i didnt enjoy as a reader, || was the author moved too quickly, it was kinda midly aggresive/intense way of telling me stuff, and rapid fire of too many topics😭||

[cursive bobcat]

chapter 1

ngl most of the chapter was enlightening but didnt really apply to what ive seen around me. ||my city isnt walkable, and generally speaking most women prefer autos over buses bc buses take longer and arent as convienent and dont drop u at the doorstep. besides, the traffic and congestion itself would force people to choose trains/metros/autos/bikes over cars. with trains & metros, i'd say, that there are women only compartments but the ratio for general (for everyone) to women is quite big. there's women only train but im not sure how frequent it is.||

the part about unpaid/paid work|| hours is higher for women is true. the pay is also not equal, moreover, most working women have "family obligations" therefore have less chance of promotions jic they'd have to have flexible working hours for added responsibilties. ||

[wintry iron]

@everyone Hello, fellow buddy readers!! Our journey through "Invisible Women: Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men" by Caroline Criado Perez is coming to a close on <t:1702080000:D> /tomorrow and so far the ones who have finished this book are Acid, Scarlatte, Laelia, Amanda, abi, sugarlemon fairy and Vetrina. If I have missed anyone please let me know

now some small questions time-

1. Reading from all the responses here we can all agree that there were several instances mentioned in this book that have shocked us, among these which ones are the most noteworthy to you personally?

2. Do you think knowing these biases will help you in any way to empower yourself or spread awareness?

3. Are there any things you didn't like in the book? if you were to advise the author on it, what would that be?

(p.s- I am thrilled that I decided to put a br req for this book, otherwise I would have missed such engaging convos. Thank you everyone for accompanying me on this wonderful and informative journey, hope to see you all again in the future BRs )

[stuck sail]

1. Honestly for me I think the most shocking thing is kind of realising how society is still somewhat 'by men, for men' and women have struggled to create their own space and be heard. It's not just one thing and more generally how widespread patriarchy still is. Developments have been made but there's still a long way to go.
2. 100%. It's definitely more at the forefront of my mind seeing how I should be making the world better for me rather than just accepting that this is how it is and it won't change.
3. I do think because the book was intended for as wide of an audience as possible that some elements were a little bit basic/obvious, but I don't think it's something the author should change as the more people who read this and understand it, the better.

[cursive bobcat]

1. chapter 3: honestly, it wasn't surprising to know that academia || is sexist, given that historically education was mainly a privilege given to men. the part about male vs female data being drastically different from data of fathers vs mothers was quite shocking. I've never considered that. i used to think jobs/ opportunities based on merits was an ideal thing, until I read this chapter. the example used for citations being deliberately male dominated was quite shocking I didn't know it was a conscious choice.... like I'm kinda dumbfounded. ||

2. ||speaking of advertisements, firstly, women are underrepresented. and if they're shown, it's mostly always in a family setting, which isn't a bad thing but compared to men who are shown in all ages it's harder to wrap my mind how a woman's representation and value is only tied if she's "wifey" material. there's probably more but I can't think at this moment 🤔||

3. ||i don't remember a single chapter on women in history textbooks ||

4. ||adhd and heart attack were like the two things I knew abt where it was harder to detect in women due to the lack of sufficient data. imo female bodies aren't weaker, statistically we have higher pain tolerance. I've read so much about doctors dismissing female patients complaints - either blaming their weight (as if obesity and overweight scales aren't derived from another white male centric scale: BMI).||

5. I can only think of household chores why can't my brother be held to the same standard

[cursive bobcat]

I've finished as well!!!

1. in the introduction, the part about scientists came to the conclusion that || Birka warrior's bones must've been mixed up.... that was definitely shocking to me bc it's.... science, how do u value assumptions more that the data in front of you|| one quote from the book I constantly think about,|| "is women’s unpaid work under valued because we don’t see it – or is it invisible because we don’t value it?" like is it ignorance or deliberate sexism||

2. oh for sure, it's astonishing to know the dept the male default mindset has set it's roots in our society. and it won't be easy to tackle the bias, too, when things like city planning itself are catered to the male default. fuck the patriarchy, i feel inspired by that movement initiated by South Korean women more & more as I read about how unfair the world is for women: the 4Bs.

3. i don't dislike it but I feel like the examples were mostly from oced countries. like I'm pretty sure class and privilege extensively come into play, probably societal conditions for women are even worse in developing nations.

[next notch]

1. I think for me the most shocking was the lack of basic human rights for things like sanitary facilities in areas of the world
2. It definitely inspires me to think critically about infrastructure in a different way. This will impact how I vote on local issues and hopefully point things out more clearly
3. It did feel a bit combative at times which is great for firing up people who are already working against this imbalance, but maybe not great for winning new allies

Thanks for hosting acid!!

[stuck sail]

Have points been added for this one yet?

[wintry iron]

I don't think so

[somber nova]

we're working on it but we haven't moved this BR to Gregg yet, please be a little patient with us