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The male and female privilege checklists
Here is the male privilege checklist. Here is the female privilege checklist. Robin Hanson, scientist, continues: "The next obvious step is to assign point values to such privileges, so we can add them up and compare totals." You can imagine how much fun we had at lunch on this topic and yes a woman was there too.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on July 3, 2008 at 08:35 AM in Education | Permalink
Comments
"robin hanson, scientist"
you never say such things about anyone but Robin. Is Robin an idiot that you try to support or do you have a man crush on him?
At least this time you didn't say amazing.
Posted by: at Jul 3, 2008 8:57:41 AM
18. I am allowed to wear clothes that signify ‘vulnerability’, ‘playful openness’, and ’softness’.
It's just so hard to balance these. Just this morning, I was torn between wearing a "playfully open" dress or my "soft and vulnerable" suit. I couldn't decide (because females are indecisive, duh) so I skipped work all together. I might get fired for that, but after all, number 7 says... I have a much better chance of being considered to be a worthy mate for someone, even if I’m unemployed with little money, than a man. cha ching.
Posted by: katiet at Jul 3, 2008 9:00:50 AM
Robin is an *amazing* scientist, in case there was any doubt...thanks for the clarification...
Posted by: Tyler Cowen at Jul 3, 2008 9:03:52 AM
"It's just so hard to balance these. Just this morning, I was torn between wearing a "playfully open" dress or my "soft and vulnerable" suit. I couldn't decide (because females are indecisive, duh) so I skipped work all together. I might get fired for that, but after all, number 7 says... I have a much better chance of being considered to be a worthy mate for someone, even if I’m unemployed with little money, than a man. cha ching."
I did the same thing, but fortunately for me, "If I’m careless with my financial affairs it won’t be attributed to my sex." Nice.
Posted by: Robinson at Jul 3, 2008 9:29:29 AM
Another female privilege: If I am convicted of a crime, I likely will be sentenced to fewer years in jail than the average male convict is for the same offense.
Posted by: Richard at Jul 3, 2008 9:45:19 AM
A female knows that her child is HER child.
Posted by: P_Rank at Jul 3, 2008 9:58:46 AM
The female privilege list seems rather incomplete and slanted toward a female perspective -- by which I mean that the ability to wear 'open, vulnerable clothing' doesn't interest most men in the slightest. And all of the intimacy items seem written from a female's perspective. Which is to say, though it may mystify women, one can have an intimate male relationship without hugging and sobbing. The actual (implicit) female privilege in these items is the general presumption that female relationship patterns are 'normal' and 'healthy' and that males should aspire to emulate them (in place of their current 'stunted', 'unhealthy' male patterns).
What's missing from the list are things like the female legal advantages in divorce, child custody, domestic violence and even criminal proceedings. There is no possibility whatsoever that a group of female students would have received the legal treatment of the Duke Lacrosse players (some are presumed more innocent than others).
What else? In those cases where professions remain male-dominated, that is a problem to solve (e.g. engineering, hard sciences). But the fact that Veterinary students, for example, are now 80 percent (80!) female is not a problem to be remedied.
Decades ago, when females still underperformed males in education, this was a sign of a problem with the system (e.g. hostile classroom environments, too much competitiveness, biased standardized tests). Now that boys substantially underperform, this is taken as a sign of problems with boys themselves (e.g. insufficient attention spans). And how many school systems are worried about their grossly unbalanced teaching staffs and the effects this may have on boys?
Also missing are the relentlessly positive messages that females now receive about their sex. These are nicely captured by the 'Althouse Rule':
http://althouse.blogspot.com/2005/11/scientists-remember-to-portray.html
And 'The Onion':
http://www.theonion.com/content/news/women_now_empowered_by_everything
In general, the 'the female privilege checklist' focuses on personal items (some of which are dubious) and misses the most significant female privileges (and those most subject to change) which are legal, social, and political.
Posted by: Slocum at Jul 3, 2008 10:08:28 AM
Amazing scientist Tyler fan that is. :)
Posted by: Robin Hanson at Jul 3, 2008 10:24:12 AM
slocum the male list is also written from a female perspective. a hostile feminist perspective! 19. If my day, week or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or situation whether or not it has sexist overtones.
For real? Like anyone says, "what a crummy day. I missed the bus and my dog is sick. Let me examine these situations for sexist overtones."
Posted by: katiet at Jul 3, 2008 10:40:26 AM
Most of the "privileges" are not privileges, they are disadvantages that women suffer.
Posted by: John Bailey at Jul 3, 2008 10:46:48 AM
How about never having somebody use the phrase "man crush" in relation to you.
Posted by: josh at Jul 3, 2008 10:52:12 AM
John Bailey,
Could you enlighten us how some of the advantages listed are really disadvantages only? Your comment seems to be little more than an off-the-cuff dismissal. For example, women do have an advantage when it comes to interacting with stranger's children. This may not be an advantage you want, but it hardly follows that it is really a disadvantage in disguise.
Posted by: mt at Jul 3, 2008 10:59:12 AM
From the male list: "25. I do not have to worry about the message my wardrobe sends about my sexual availability or my gender conformity."
If a man deviates from the norm of casual or business attire (too tight or too colorful) you're labeled as being gay.
"41. Magazines, billboards, television, movies, pornography, and virtually all of media is filled with images of scantily-clad women intended to appeal to me sexually. Such images of men exist, but are rarer."
If I recall there was a study that for men, viewing sexual imagery increased impulsive purchasing where as for women, there was little to no affect. This could explain why the media is filled with sexual imagery geared towards men.
Posted by: Matt Blank at Jul 3, 2008 11:19:04 AM
Reading through the privilege checklists I'm reminded of how large the cultural differences are even between industrialized, western european, countries. Some examples from the male privilege checklist:
12. If I have children and a career, no one will think I’m selfish for not staying at home.
One of the recent debates in Sweden centered around whether it should be mandated that parental leave has to be split 50/50.
14. My elected representatives are mostly people of my own sex. The more prestigious and powerful the elected position, the more this is true.
While not necessarily reflecting the composition of the parliament, Zapatero's Spanish cabinet has a majority of female ministers, which includes a female minister of defense.
In 2003 Finland saw the combination of a female president and female prime minister for the first time.
34. I will never be expected to change my name upon marriage or questioned if I don’t change my name.
Women in Belgium keep their maiden name even after marriage.
This is based on just the countries I've actually lived in, and that the list can be made much longer.
Posted by: Johan at Jul 3, 2008 11:33:02 AM
Someone should submit this article to digg.com. I see it as prime digg material. Robin Hanson has become one of my favorite scientists/thinkers.
Posted by: Gary at Jul 3, 2008 11:45:10 AM
I love these one size fits all summation stereotypes of people lives. I disadvantaged because... or I'm advantaged because...
One big pile of crap. People have so much difficulty living with each other, its a wonder the species survives at all.
Posted by: james at Jul 3, 2008 11:49:03 AM
Many of these boiled down to: Women and men both have certain gender roles laid out for them, failure to conform to those gender roles will create certain cultural resistance or consequences. Within this broad category of gender non-conformity consequences there are a couple factors that can make things better or worse. One if one gender role is more satisfying. I think generally both gender roles would on average be more agreeable to those of the gender assigned the role even in a culture neutral petri dish. I am just guessing though and will never know.
Then I would look at the amount of individuals who have preferences different from what is typical of their gender. I have no idea which gender is most likely to have preferences that run counter to cultures expectations. On one hand I expect it to be men because men are more likely to deviate from the norm in just about every way when compared with women on the other hand in America at least women more often do deviate dramatically from their gender roles. It seems that their are more women who flout gender norms to pursue prestige careers than there are men who flout gender norms to be primary care givers.
Finally I would look at how big a cost a person pays for deviating from their gender role. My sort of circuitous point is that none of this you can measure. For example if you asked people which gender they think is better to be, I bet more women would say men than men would say women. Should we take this as proof that the male gender is preferable, or that there is a higher cost for a man who deviates from it and men are sensitive to that cost?
Posted by: Michael Foody at Jul 3, 2008 11:50:43 AM
Men have the privilege of dying 7 years earlier then women, on the average. Cheaper annuity rates. Less worry of outliving one's money. Easier to fine mates in old age. Don't have to die alone as often.
Posted by: ziggurat at Jul 3, 2008 12:03:28 PM
Men have the privilege of dying 7 years earlier then women, on the average. Cheaper annuity rates. Less worry of outliving one's money. Easier to fine mates in old age. Don't have to die alone as often.
Posted by: ziggurat at Jul 3, 2008 12:04:42 PM
More competive complaining. Who's the biggest victim? Who cares?
Posted by: Jeff at Jul 3, 2008 12:13:46 PM
Women could become men in Albania, and gain all the privileges thereof.
Posted by: at Jul 3, 2008 12:28:39 PM
If I seek political office, my relationship with my children, or who I hire to take care of them, will probably not be scrutinized by the press.
Not true. Giuliani's relationship was scrutinized, so were both Clintons, Cheney and others. I think it has to do with the nature of political campaigns.
Posted by: Mo at Jul 3, 2008 12:37:54 PM
Men have the privilege of dying 7 years earlier then women, on the average. Cheaper annuity rates. Less worry of outliving one's money. Easier to find mates in old age. Don't have to die alone as often.
Women's longer life expectancy is of course a major type of female privilege. On the other hand, there's some evidence that the gap is starting to shrink a bit, most likely because more women are smoking.
If one has a choice between (a) living to 85 in more or less decent shape, and then going quickly; or (b) living to 90, with the last five years spent senile and wearing adult diapers in a nursing home, I'm not altogether certain that (a) is necessarily the less-desirable option even though it involves five fewer years of life. The relevant point to the present discussion is that (a) may be somewhat more characteristic of males while (b) is somewhat more characteristic of females.
Posted by: Peter at Jul 3, 2008 12:49:47 PM
"13. If I was born in North America since WWII, I can be almost certain that my genitals were not mutilated soon after birth, without anesthesia."
This goes to Johan's point that these lists look awfully specific to the US (maybe all of North America to be generous) in the last, say, 30 years.
If you're a woman in many places in Africa and certain locales in the Middle East, that's very much a going concern.
The female privilege list is extremely lacking in ways that Slocum points out. I imagine that in general men in contemporary American culture are much less concerned about fashion than they are being accused of unbecoming behavior around minors or having their own children taken away from them in custody battles.
Posted by: meter at Jul 3, 2008 12:56:01 PM
Mexican Law also allows women to keep their maiden's name when they marry, if they so desire. Some do.
Posted by: Fernando Valdez at Jul 3, 2008 1:33:26 PM
