Not misogyny. Willful blindness. Because it’s hard to accept that our own hard work alone isn’t quite the only reason that we are where we are. We don’t want to believe that if everyone else had had the same opportunities as we did, they would have done just as well or better. And, of course, not all of them would have, by any means.
Not everyone suffers equally. Some have more problems than others. Some have more ability to deal with it than others. Some simply have a personality that tends to deflect it. But get it through your head; it’s there, and the fact that there are some successful women doesn’t change that.
^^This. I don’t think you’re misogynistic at all. I do think you have a tendency to conflate in your arguments the hurdles one has to overcome due to one’s individual circumstances with those one has to overcome due to one’s gender/race/whatever.
“Having a job gap on your CV” = individual circumstance
“Being a woman and thus having the potential to have a future job gap for maternity leave” = gender-based circumstance
It is reasonable for an employer to reject (or at least think twice about) a candidate for the first reason but not the second. Or, to put it another way, if the criteria for rejection is met when the employer has only read as far as the candidate’s name on their CV, there’s a problem.
We also seem to be running into an issue that is common in racism discussions: people not understanding or being unwilling to admit that there is a difference between a systemic discrimination issue and personal prejudice. Just because the individuals involved do not show personal hostility to a group does not mean there is equality of opportunity. As I said earlier, just because no one is saying, or even thinking, “I can’t promote/hire this person because a woman can’t do the job”, does not mean that there are no external factors holding back women.
In the same way even a color blind judiciary can result in racist outcomes due to laws that give harsher sentences to different forms of cocaine. On there face the laws also look color blind, but the outcome is longer average prison sentences for blacks than whites on offences that are largely the same.
And then there’s the X-ism that is so far below the surface that the person who has it has no idea that it’s there. Oh my heavens, I think we all have this. We have certain preconceived expectations of a person based on gender and heritage. Here in the US, how often have many of us been surprised because we have met someone black who had “sounded white” or vice versa? That is very gradually fading away, but the operative word there is gradually, and the key is, how open are employers to having their expectations overturned?
I mean, we all have expectations based on very limited information. We can’t help it; humans are unable to function without classifying, and that means stereotyping to a certain extent. This applies to everyone from everyone, and it’s absurd to say it should go away, because it can’t. It’s one of the defining things humans do; we create abstract categories and put things into them, and that includes people. The problem becomes when we get too rigid about those categories, and refuse to recognize that our classification system is not writ in stone, or maybe that’s it’s entirely mistaken (a very bitter pill to swallow).
What Quartz seems to be doing right now is to be unable or unwilling to see that these people exist, that because some people are able to readjust their classifications, then all must be able to. I think perhaps his classifications need a bit of work themselves.
What is really jarring is to come face to face with the flaws in your own classification systems. I had a roommate and good friend who was short, blond, and spoke with a midwestern accent. He was smart, funny, and an all around great guy. Fast foward a few years and I ended up working with his doppelganger. Looked extemely similar, same accent, similar mannerisms, but a compelete ass. No one like the guy, he was self-rightous, full of himself, and not that bright. I felt completely off balance around the guy for months. I expected him to conform to the pattern my roommate had set, but he was completely different.
If I had been interviewing him for a job I would have probably had a favorable impression of him solely based on my previous exeriences. We all make have these unconcious attitudes based on what we have previously experienced. It makes us uncomfortable to admit we are wrong, so we often try to justify them with post hoc logic, but it comes down to the way or brains are wired.
And the worst of it is, half the time, we have NO idea we’re doing it! We don’t really we’re liking or disliking someone because of our classification. We think it’s something specific to them, and as you say, coming up with post hoc justifications for our “intuitions” about a person.
Trying to find that survey again, I’ll relink it when I get the URL.
As for what would the percentage be in zero prejudice conditions, that’s very hard to say. Sweden seems to manage pretty well, with near zero gender disparity for politicians:
“We have had over ten years’ experience with a nearly gender-equal government and Parliament,” says a very pleased Gertrud Åström. “Do you understand what this means for today’s ten-year olds? For as long as they can remember, politicians and cabinet ministers are just as likely to have been women as men.
…Gertrud Åström conducts research on equal opportunities issues. “Moreover, all these female politicians got to where they are on their own merits, not as the result of statutory allocation of quotas,” she says. “Other countries have had to set formal quotas just to achieve at least a 30 percent female representation, but Sweden has actually had a higher success rate without legislation.”
