May 12, 2014

Wreckers

From the NYT:
The Public Editor's Journal - Margaret Sullivan

Still Talking About It: ‘Where Are the Women?’
By MARGARET SULLIVAN  MAY 12, 2014, 10:00 AM 23 Comments

Some facts, according to a recent Women’s Media Center study: 
* At the nation’s 10 most widely circulated newspapers, men had 63 percent of the bylines, nearly two for every one for a woman. 
* Among those papers, The Times had the biggest gender gap – with 69 percent of bylines going to men.

I'm shocked to hear that the best newspaper is the most male-dominated.
* Women are far more likely to cover health and lifestyle news. They're less likely to cover crime, justice and world politics.

Women are also far more likely to read health and lifestyle news. They're less likely to read crime, justice and world politics articles.
* At three major papers, including The Times, and four newspaper syndicates, male opinion-page writers outnumber female writers four to one.

Nearly a quarter of a century ago, back before the WWW, I started writing op-eds as a hobby and mailing them off to newspapers around the country. I noticed that most of the salaried op-ed page editors who chose my unsolicited contributions and sent me my check for $150 (or whatever) were women, but most of my fellow op-ed contributors on the tear sheets of the Cleveland Plain Dealer or Christian Science Monitor were men.

This seems like basic evolutionary psychology: males gravitate toward riskier career paths where they try to broadcast their acumen to the public at large, and women take more stable roles where they get to choose the individual men.
After three decades in journalism, I find it hard to believe that – while things have changed radically in some ways – there’s still such a gender imbalance.

After four and a half decades in which feminism has been conventional wisdom (for example, look at how the the Equal Rights Amendment was ratified by 30 states from March 1972 through March 1973 before Phyllis Schlafly's critiques started to be understood), wouldn't it seem likely that the distribution of types of jobs that has been fairly stable among young people for a approaching a couple of generations now reflects enduring sex differences?

A lot of conventional wisdom these days sounds like a Joe Stalin speech from 1937: the Five Year Plan cannot fail, except for the Wreckers, those relics who are on the Wrong Side of History, who are secretly sabotaging everything.
           

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

Speaking of the ERA, it seems that it has been mooted by novel interpretations of the 14th Amendment by the courts.

Anonymous said...

With all this homo stuff(also dominated by men), feminists getting envious.

Whitehall said...

Reminds me of the horrors of STEM education - few women want to become engineers, mathematicians, or scientists.

AND ITS ALL THE FAULT OF THE PATRIARCHY!

One of the most motivating factors in my daughter's education was, as a freshman majoring in physics, a TA shared with the class the low statistical prospects of women getting PhDs in physics.

She was so mad that she worked twice as hard, finished early, and is now in grad school.

Maybe the above facts can motivate Maureen Dowd to write more cogent columns?

Anonymous said...

One of the most motivating factors in my daughter's education was, as a freshman majoring in physics, a TA shared with the class the low statistical prospects of women getting PhDs in physics.

She was so mad that she worked twice as hard, finished early, and is now in grad school.


Your daughter is enraged by statistics? Great, looks like we can look forward to a future generation of female scientists prone to fainting during Larry Summers speeches.

Jeff W. said...

It's not fair to blame wreckers for everything that has gone wrong.

Joe Stalin himself used to spread the blame also to drunkards, hooligans, counterrevolutionaries, reactionaries, saboteurs, and toadies to the West, among others.

Wreckers are a misunderstood and oppressed minority who are unfairly blamed for the failures of the larger society which is composed mainly of drunkards, hooligans, etc.

Anonymous said...

The Big Bang theory is very red pill. Except for the female science episode. Still nlamed 'society'. A severe taboo here, Steve.

Anonymous said...

Maybe the above facts can motivate Maureen Dowd to write more cogent columns?

I don't believe Maureen Dowd writes she trites.

Anonymous said...

The most masculine 10% of women want to be treated like they're 50% of the total population.

Don't mistake pushy, arrogant, envious, etc. for masculine. Part of being a man is taking responsibility for one's actions. When powerful but effeminate men refuse to do so, and women look up to those men, the results are predictable.

Whitehall said...

"Your daughter is enraged by statistics?"<

I asked her if it was true or not. She agreed that it was probably correct.

Then, I said, you should thank him for imparting knowledge. You needed to hear this piece since WE'RE spending $100k for your BS degree.

While her first reaction for PC, I think I got my point across that the truth is far better than pretty lies.

Anonymous said...

I say we enforce absolute gender equality at every major newspaper in the country (then watch as female reporters get all upset when a bunch of unemployed men who know a lot about crime, justice and world politics overthrow the government and reinstate some kind of 60/40 patriarchy).

Whiskey said...

Steve, it occurs to me two things are at work here.

First, a shrinking pie and shrinking job base particularly in media, which has seen the OC Register and the LA Times cut hundreds of jobs. The only thing keeping the NYT alive is Carlos Slim. Key indicator: they sold their HQ and leased it back for the cash; maintenance in the place is so bad it is infested with roaches and rats to the point where both drop down on desks during the day.

The other of course is White guys being more and more placating and supplicating, which enrages women. As Roissy points out in his post today, what women want is to be dominated. Not placated and supplicated. Women constant test for dominance in men, demanding stuff hoping to be told "no" in a dominant Alpha way. Stupid men and White guys are beta to the core, just placate them which only makes them angrier because they wanted to be told no in a dominant way.

Yes this fairly stupid, but that is the fruit of a wealthy society not focused on survival every moment. Women demand ever more dominance the more life gives them.

Anonymous said...

So why is this human biodiversity stuff important? Lets say you have 1000 Asians, 1000 Whites, and 1000 Blacks. Lets also say You end up with 20 super smart Asians, 10 super smart Whites, and 5 super smart Blacks. So what? Who cares? Why would a super smart Asian care that there were only 5 super smart Blacks? IQ is an average, but you hire, talk to, read books by and get advice from individuals.

David said...

Increasing the supply of talented people in your space is a good simple enough that even libertarians ought to be able to understand it.

But since I am probably wrong about that, think of grocery stores. Chain A has 20 good food items for every 100 it sells. B has 10/100, and C has 5/100. Who says, "It doesn't matter if Chain A is crushed out of business by the government, because you can put only one piece of steak in your mouth at a time"?

Anonymous said...

"IQ is an average, but you hire, talk to, read books by and get advice from individuals." - We don't have the ability to treat everyone as an individual, our brains can only do that for about 150 people total. So group averages are going to figure into peoples thinking because they are, on balance, a fitness promoting pattern to recognize. And this goes to all human behavior, not just IQ.

SRBEL said...

This is just more of the same "old Boys Club" bashing. Of course anything by men, for men, must be inherently evil. What is the gender spread of newspaper readers? I wouldn't be surprised to find out that ~66% of print newspapers are purchased by men.

They just can't leave well enough alone.

Bert said...

Who still buys newspapers?

Harry Baldwin said...

Lets also say You end up with 20 super smart Asians, 10 super smart Whites, and 5 super smart Blacks. So what? Who cares? Why would a super smart Asian care that there were only 5 super smart Blacks?

Of course the super smart Asians won't care about the blacks. Only the whites will care about them and feel guilty.

BTW, if you call "super smart" an IQ over 130, there would be seven times more whites then Asians("IQs of over 130 are 7 times more likely to be found in European populations than in East Asian populations"--Arthur Hu) and 20 times more whites than blacks, if figures gleaned from the net are correct. The percentage of whites with IQs over 130 is about 2.3 - 2.5.

Anonymous said...



maintenance in the place is so bad it is infested with roaches and rats to the point where both drop down on desks during the day.


What do maintenance have to do with hiring journalists?
Isn't that HR's function?

Anonymous said...

Pitting your rivals against each other really is a lot more enjoyable than fighting them all yourself.

Anonymous said...

So why is this human biodiversity stuff important? Lets say you have 1000 Asians, 1000 Whites, and 1000 Blacks. Lets also say You end up with 20 super smart Asians, 10 super smart Whites, and 5 super smart Blacks. So what? Who cares? Why would a super smart Asian care that there were only 5 super smart Blacks? IQ is an average, but you hire, talk to, read books by and get advice from individuals.

Sit down and think about it for a few weeks, as opposed to trying to make a point with the question. A great many reasons will come to you.

I'll give you a freebie: because leftists rule the west and have baked the delusion of human equality into the cake. And they blame whites when blacks fail to measure up. Setting up white babes in swaddling to take the fall for black failure down the road smacks of evil.

Anonymous said...

That's not from Arthur Hu, it's from an email to Hu from "juan pablo montoya."

http://www.arthurhu.com/2002/09/montoya.txt

There is no cite.