The Not-So-Female-Friendly Skies

I've been planning at some point to write a post about female pilots. I did a bunch of flying in the last few weeks, something I haven't done in a while. But for a period of time I traveled for business constantly and was on a plane 5 times a week. I've flown a few hundred times, all told, but I have NEVER had a female pilot. Not once. Not even a female co-pilot. It seems to always be that same deep male voice coming over the loudspeaker to tell us what the weather is like where we're landing.

In an age where there's a significant effort to even out the gender gap in nearly every possible industry, I have to wonder why pilots are so different. Salon's Ask the Pilot column addresses the issue, though not directly. According to him, in the mid-90's women made up 3% of "cockpit crew members." It's unclear whether this means only commercial pilots, those employed by airlines, or some larger group. But it's still an abysmally low number.

The same question was asked on All Experts and was answered by Dottie Norkus, a pilot and charter member of Women In Aviation International. She uses data from the FAA, but it's similarly vague. It shows women making up 6% of total pilots in 2006, though this includes everything from student pilots to commercial pilots. Norkus claims that part of the problem is that aviation is still considered a "male" career. That doesn't convince me, there are plenty of women in other careers considered dominantly male.

So I went to a final source, a dear old friend of mine who happens to be a military pilot. She cites a major issue as the large number of commercial pilots who come from military backgrounds. It's one of the few ways to get enough flying hours to fly commercially. Once you open that door, the forces pushing women away from flying in the military are numerous. My friend describes the male attitude towards women among top pilots this way:

They're fine so long as you're junior or less experienced. As soon as you become an equal, you're a threat and a problem. Fighter pilots are not your every day, average dudes. They're guys who love to be foul, practically live without female contact except for their wives (and that's for only part of every year), and they are continually pumped up about being the biggest, baddest, guy in town.

Another big factor isn't so much the outside pressure as the internal one. If you have any plans on getting pregnant, that'll get you out of the cockpit for your pregnancy. Afterwards you'll have to start your training over again. And, of course, there are the long deployments that would separate you from your child or family for months at a time.

Despite our progress in many job markets, there are still those with a pre-existing male preference, and aviation seems to be one of these. It's also arguable that any career path with these obstacles for women (such as the military) is going to take a long time to change, if they ever do. I admit, I do look forward to the time when my friend gets back into civilian life and we can have the kind of normal friendship that isn't really possible when she's deployed for months on end.

The Greatest Affront to Feminism in History

The greatest affront to feminism in history [since the last Fox reality show] is called "Battle of the Bods". [For the perversely interested, full episodes are available on Hulu.com, which is how I accidentally came upon this show.] It is grossly offensive, but somehow appealing in the same way you always look when driving past a wreck. I feel like mankind has fallen into a moral abyss.

The host:

• Unknown British lady with a shockingly prim accent for the filth that comes out of her mouth. She sexually harasses the contestants in a way that would make my beloved Bill Clinton blush.
  

The contestants:

• 5 women with cripplingly low self-esteems preen for men behind a 2-way mirror. These women would likely refer to themselves as 'classy', which is never a good sign.
  
• 3 men of professional distinctions including surfer, bartender, construction worker, out-of-work male model, frat boy. The men criticize and demean the women the entire time while in the protection of their cozy booth.
  

The motivation:

• The women get $500 per person in the correct position, to be divided into 5 at the end. After the travel costs and costume budget, clearly not enough to be humiliated.
• Oddly, there seems to be no prize for the men...
  

The rounds:

• Round 1: Face. The women get to wear 'silk' robes and trampy makeup.
  
• Round 2: Ladies' Choice. They get to wear swimsuits while arguing that in fact they have the 3rd best bottom, not the 4th.
  
• Round 3: Total package. They get to wear boudoir clothing and argue that they truly deserve #1. The saddest ones however are the women that insist that they should be #5. They applied for the show, auditioned, and yet in the moment to show their stuff, they just seem sad and dejected. It's extra pitiful. Like they spent all of that money to surgically enhance themselves and in the end they realize that it wasn't enough.
  
• Round 4: Men. In a shocking turn, the men are ranked by the women. Just as demeaning.
  

I shudder to think of the corporate brainstorming session that imagined this monstrosity.

Slim, Hot Women Need Not Race

I simply must tackle the "Danica Rule". Now, I know that the Indy Racing League (IRL) is hoping that the Danica Rule label does not stick, but good luck on that as far as I'm concerned.

The short version of the Danica Rule is this: the IRL has instituted a new rule designed to equalize the weights of the car. There was already weight limit in racing as far as the car itself goes, but the IRL has added in the rule that takes the driver's weight into account. The IRL is playing with the idea of establishing several weight categories that will either add or subtract weight from the total amount of the car/person. The reasoning here is apparently, "10 pounds equals one-tenth of a second, so if you're 100 pounds heavier than somebody it's a second a lap you're giving away."

I can obviously not debate the physics behind that fact. What I do find intriguing is the timing of this rule. Danica Patrick began her IRL career in 2005. She has never won a race. What she has done is garner more attention to the sport than it has received in a very long time, save for the Indy 500, which I was forced to watch with my father each year. Now, Danica weighs 100 pounds. Apparently, the heaviest man weighs 165 and the lightest man weighs 125. I have not heard much moaning and groaning about that 40 pound difference between the men. No weight adjustment had been called for them. Oh, but put an incredibly hot woman in a car who manages to race well (but remember...still she has never won) and *now* there is a problem.

I like the following statement...it sums up my frustration here, "...I began to wonder whether sports, which typically has been a stage for change in America, is lurching backward just as the rest of the nation slowly – and almost historically – moves ahead."

Allow me a short summation here. I have no problem with including a driver's weight in the total car weight to equalize the driving field. I get it. However, it took until 2008 for the IRL to decide upon such a rule? Please. The rule is the Danica Rule...I can see no way around that conclusion.

Friday Cheers and Jeers

We'll start with the jeers - a pregnant woman was fired from a plastic surgery office "...after being told to suck in her belly so she wouldn't scare away patients." The plaintiff, Erin Griggle, "was told to keep 'sucking her belly in' by Dr. Brian Vasser Heil...so she didn't scare away patients who came to the office to look better." Yes, folks, according to this doctor, all you have to do to hide a pregnancy from prying eyes is inhale deeply. Apparently we humans are still so uncomfortable with our own biology that after a mere 200,000 years, we are still absolutely terrified by the sight of a pregnant woman. Terrified. And here I though that being pregnant had become trendy. Via Feministing.

Jeers to Italy for ordering stiletto heels as a mandatory part of the uniform for its female police officers. Via Jezebel.

Cheers to the US Senate for finding a way to "extend federal hate-crime protection to people victimized because of their sexuality," but jeers to Bush for making them have to sneak such reasonable legislation in with an unrelated military bill.

Finally, can you do a cheers and jeers post without paying homage to Stephen Colbert's Tip of the Hat/Wag of the Finger? I can't. And this one is on a SI hot debate topic - breast feeding. So, without further ado - I give you Wag of the Finger - Breasts.

Five Star Hotels – Only for the white?

Well, actually they might let you in if you just try to look like you’d like to be of European decent. Power, it seems, is in the donning of the power suit and no amount of fame can save you from being considered a poor peasant if you eschew the dress codes set by London, Paris and Hollywood.

If you think I’m being overly dramatic, consider Tuesday’s expulsion of Rigoberta Menchú from a Cancun hotel. If you’ve ever taken a Spanish class here in the States, you have probably seen Menchú’s picture in the front of your text book - included in the list of famous people from Latin America. Menchú is an author, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, and a presidential candidate in her home country of Guatemala. As El País reports, Menchú was invited to Cancún, Mexico by Felipe Calderón, Mexico’s president, in order to participate in the inaugural ceremonies and first meeting of Mexico’s National Association of Clean Water (my translation). However, no presidential invitation, Nobel Prize, or fame as an author could convince hotel workers that Menchú, who prefers the typical Mayan dress of her people to European fashions, belonged in their hotel. She was mistaken for a street vendor who was inappropriately mingling with the real guests and escorted off the premises. This is not the first time that Menchú has been asked to leave a luxury establishment where international conferences are held. Menchú maintains that the assumption that anyone who chooses a regional dress must be poor and unimportant is an example of "racismo, incomprensión y machismo" – racism, lack of understanding, and chauvinism.

Update: The Guardian now has the story in English - just don't forget who brought it to you first...

Monkey Boys

I shudder to think what some sexist economics professor will try to do with this article. That’s right, there is a difference between real science and the absurd pseudo-scientific claims that sexists use to justify the subjugation of women as “natural.” So, according to new fossil evidence, “early female hominids were much smaller than males.” Why do I think that this will be used against us? Well, animals with a significant size difference between males and females tend to form social groups where the males fight for breeding privileges, winner mates all. As Dr. Emma Mbua, on of the team of researchers studying the fossil explains, "This sexual dimorphism is considered a primitive character because it occurs in other apes," and that “this could also mean the sexual behavior of Homo erectus was more like that of apes, where individuals, especially males, mate with several partners, sometimes in a few hours, than that of its more monogamous human successors.” It won’t bother the idiot who tries to use this to justify sexism that modern humans no longer have such a significant size difference between the sexes, nor that a lot of things gorillas do would not be justifiable in human society. Repeat with me now: being descended from apes does not mean you’re allowed to act like a chimp, chum.

Some Good News, Some Bad

Since the recent Supreme Court ruling against Lilly Ledbetter, I have been feeling a bit gloomy about not having yet achieved one of the most basic aims of second wave feminism, equal pay for equal work. I had, in fact, started feeling a bit like a character from the movie Nine to Five. Then this article in this morning’s NYT gave me a bit of hope. According to the Times, “Young women in New York and several of the nation’s other largest cities who work full time have forged ahead of men in wages, according to an analysis of recent census data.” The article also notes that “…the wage gap between men and women nationally has narrowed more slowly and has even widened in recent years among one part of that group: college-educated women in their 20s.” Despite that bad news, it is still good to know that in some parts of the country, at least, we are achieving some of our basic aims.

Yet, I could not ignore the disturbing news that being perceived as angry, even when that anger is justified, hurts women in the work place more than men. According to a recent study done by Victoria Brescoll of Yale University, this bias translates into real differences in salary. The Reuters review of Dr. Brescoll’s research explains:

She conducted three tests in which men and women recruited randomly watched videos of a job interview and were asked to rate the applicant's status and assign them a salary.

In the first, the scripts were identical except where the candidate described feeling either angry or sad about losing an account due to a colleague's late arrival at a meeting.

Participants conferred the most status on the man who said he was angry, the second most on the woman who said she was sad, slightly less on the man who said he was sad, and least of all by a sizable margin on the woman who said she was angry.

The average salary assigned to the angry man was almost $38,000 compared to about $23,500 for the angry woman and in the region of $30,000 for the other two candidates.

So, I guess I still feel like I’m trapped in a 80’s movie like Nine to Five or Working Girl - it is possible for working women in New York to get ahead, as long as they cover their justified anger with fake smiles or sighs. The message seems to be: sure, be successful – but only if you can be sweet while charging ahead.

Amygdala Balls

I am always a sucker for primate research, and even more so when the lead scientist of a study that sparks my interest is a woman. So today I’d like to draw your attention to the work of Katerina Semendeferi of the University of California. Dr. Semendeferi is comparing the brains of different primate species of varying degrees of social ability in order to understand what allows us to identify the emotional states of others. The theory du jour seems to be that a round-ish region of the brain called the amygdala might be veritable empathy center, evolved to help members of cooperative social groups know which members of the community they should trust, and which should be avoided. So, the next time you are stuck in a conversation with some block-head who tries to chalk up all your insights to some mysterious women’s intuition, perhaps it will help to know that he is in fact arguing that we have bigger, well…