Insults or Lack of Support?
Dear friends of women in science,
Sorry to have disappeared last week. My mother passed away and I was away attending her memorial service. It was unexpected so I didn't have a planned backup.
I got into a conversation with some students the other day about various things I have encountered in my career in science. The consensus of the women I was talking with surprised me. They felt that the outright negative comments I heard would have deterred them more than long periods without a feeling of support, with no compliments on their work as a scientist or suggestions for future career moves.
I felt the opposite. It has been easier for me to deep freeze negative comments, to figure that person has a problem with women in science and I don't need to share his opinion. With a long term lack of support, I feel more like every day something bad could happen to me, to my research, to my teaching, and I wouldn't have someone to whom to turn. It's much more corrosive. That's why I feel more attention should be paid to erosion of women who have been tenured. This "chilly atmosphere," in the terms of older reports on women in science, saps the career prospects of a lot of women who have tried hard to persist in science. It's the reason I wrote a list of ways men can help women in science for The Scientist a few years ago. Warming up that chill is not just a detail. I think it's very important. But maybe you perceive it differently. Take our poll below and comment if you like.
cheers,
Laura
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The long-term lack of support eats you. I am glad to hear I am not the only one who thinks this is an issue, and also glad to see it is not just my problem. Sink or Swim is seen at some institutions to be the best way to weed out talent, but it does not develop talent.
I've experienced both insults and the cold shoulder, and I find a negative atmosphere more tolerable (it's easier to ignore). I had a professor who refused to answer my questions, insisted I was an idiot, and repeatedly interrupted his lecture to demand that I drop the class. I found that if I had the man sitting next to me ask my question then I would get a satisfactory answer. I earned an A and had the last laugh.
While challenging and unpleasant, the disdain of others doesn't have to be a morale-breaker. Instead, it can be used as motivation to improve. That being said, I don't think any amount of negativity could drive me out of science. It's the only thing I have any interest in and the only thing I'm any good at.
Hi Laura,
I was sorry to hear about your loss.
I resonate with what Susan expressed. When I was young (20yrs ago), the over comments bothered me, but as I've matured I've learned to handle the few that still come through. It is the lack of support that is draining. It's draining, emotionally and psychologically to the point where the science just isn't enough anymore. And given just how fun science used to be, that's saying a lot!
Laura,
I'm sorry to hear of your mother. I have missed my mother almost every day for the last 30 years.
The negative things are killers, but we can leap over them. They stay with us and hurt, but we can count them as coming from clods, at best. I think the more difficult thing is the constant lack of support and respect. It is far harder to deal with. Over time, it wears us down, pushing us to give up, entirely.
Marian
Laura, I'm so sorry about the loss of your mother.
As a young faculty member, I would have said the negative comments were most demoralizing... I could ignore the rest, and if they would just leave me alone, I'd be fine! BUt as an older, wiser woman, I think that the unsupportive environment is ultimately far more damaging. It's a steady drip, drip that undercuts without you even realizing it. You know where you are with someone who is direct about his disdain, especially if others are supportive. You can learn to ignore that. But tepid support that damns with faint praise can end up like sabotage. It embitters. I also think you point out an important issue, the "erosion" of tenured women espeically from such environments. I know of far too many women who have left science despite the evident achievement of tenure and position, because they are simply too weary to keep struggling in a cold community. THis is a huge loss of potential leadership in science generally, and it rarely gets noticed amidst the concern for the other end of the pipeline. But it is a contributor to loss at all stages: after all, what model does it give our younger scientists when their seniors are bone-weary and unhappy? Therefore I think retention as part of the chilly climate is an issue that the women-in-science activists would do well to examine.
Well, ladies, I don't know. If someone said to me some of the negative things Laura talked about in her book, I think I would just quit right then and go be a sociologist or social worker. I've always been a little too ready to believe other people's assessment of me, though. I guess not everyone is like that.
Hi Laura,
I went to a small school so I could avoid this lack of friendship with my colleagues. I hated that. It was one of the things I heard my female mentor complain about frequently in my postdoc.
Small Science Woman
Hi Laura
I don't think you can choose between these in a vacuum. You have to live through them and then think about how they affected you. I suspect I'd have picked the insults as worse a priori, but now that I've experienced both, I'd pick the negative atmosphere as worse by far. It made me change jobs when it was very hard for my family, just so I wouldn't dread going to work every single day.
CRM
