201 karma · joined June 27, 2013
Cold applications are well and good at scale, particularly when combined with custom cover letters. But using your network often yields a faster response. Also, being open to relocation helps.
Additionally, when a woman works with a man on something often the woman's contribution is assumed to be less than the man's contribution if they're listed as co-authors - I would be very surprised if this weren't the case beyond academia but also in artifacts like design docs.
One is a historical fact that is never going to change, the other is a job in society where the demographics can and will change --- at least partially as our expectations of what "normal" looks like for that role are updated. By perpetuating the current (or historical) norm for a given role the biases of what person we naturally consider appropriate for that role remain unchallenged.
I don't think it's binary "sucks/not sucks", but I do think, for me, it'd clearly be sig LESS fun to be old without kids based on what I've seen of the older people in my life with different family situations. Seems shitty to me.
I'm sure there are people who have the opposite experience, but I was trying to explain why the "sacrifice" of prime years can be seen as an investment rather than a straight loss.
And we spend HOURS per day with our parents when living at home, even when teens. Evenings were hanging out as a family usually, whether that meant reading in the same room, watching movies, playing board games, whatever. All during the evening when they got home from work.
Heck, family dinner alone is an hour a day.
I assumed I'd hate having kids until they were like 11/12 but to have the adults would make it worthwhile --- even just the chance of a close relationship with them as adults. But I'm actually shocked to find I even enjoy the baby/potato stage.
And it is not the same at all. So many things I do for my dog I do out of obligation. I do not often want to walk her. Once I'm walking her or going to the dog park or whatever, I have a nice time but I don't naturally WANT to do it.
In contrast, I want, like actively WANT, to do all sorts of absurdly unpleasant things for my eight month old. And society is set up to bring kids to all sorts of activities my dog can't go to --- despite my pup being sig more pleasant to have out and about than my baby.
I will say I think a sig portion is hormonal. I would say having a kid was a genuine metamorphosis for me. In contrast, I think my husband had more of a dog-like sense of obligation and is only recently enjoying the kid.
As sexist as it may sound, I'd suggest most women who are financially stable with good partners to have at least one kid because I am shocked, utterly shocked, by the fundamental shift in self I've experienced and, frankly, it's cool. Life is short. It's a cool, unique experience worth having.
But men? Unless they actively want kids, I'd suggest staying away from it --- the sacrifice to their relationships, lives, etc. seems sig harder to bear since they don't seem to have quite the same hit to their hormones. As my husband says, I take care of baby and he takes care of me. Who takes care of him? I try but baby comes first. That's a hard hit for a man not excited for kids (thankfully my husband is and remains so).
Like some of my strongest memories are of leaving notes for my Mom about how I felt neglected and was in <x> room waiting for her just to BE there with me. She'd last about ten minutes before she'd begin multi-tasking. Not because she was a bad mom but because she just had so. much. to do with five kids and a full-time job.
If you're going to have a large family older kids have to take on some of the emotional labor or the younger kids are totally shafted.
I moved back in with my Dad with my husband. I'm 32, hubby is 30. He had two strokes and my little sister didn't want to be the only one nearby. It's been 6 months. Is it the easiest? No. But it's amazing to have this day-in-day-out time with my Dad again after not having lived at home for years.
My older sister moved back in with her husband and two kids for 2 months as she studied for her medical school USMLE exams so she could take advantage of the free baby-sitting.
Neither my sister's family or my own would've made this decision without the pandemic. My husband and I were both pushed remote (same salary) and my sister's child care plans went up in smoke.
While 2020 has been shit, moving home in some cases isn't an indicator of a problem. It's just a smart reaction to the new reality of working from home.
For example, company A offered 100k, B offered 120k, and C offered 130k. You want company A. You say to company B that company C offered 130k and you're interested but not sure with that diff. They up to 135. You say to company C, hey, company B offered 135, can you help me lower the diff? They up to 140. Then you go to company A, say you'd love to, but you have offers for 135 and 140, so if they could do anything to lower the diff, great. They offer 130. At this point, you have three offers, all higher than you began with and can make a choice.
However, as other have mentioned, there are already biases to hire people "like you" and offsetting those biases is valuable. Often, I'd argue "culture fit" is an umbrella term used to keep people who are different out.
I would argue there's often correlation between these types of diversity
23andMe. I looked up family members, for fun. WHAM, half brother. I called my dad who, after some prodding, confirmed it was his child. I reached out. The man knew he was adopted.
Now we have a new brother at family events. Likely his Mom and him are going to spend Christmas with us.
This attitude is the exact sort of attitude causing all the problems. And, no, not everyone has it.
It's a problem.
2. Acknowledge right off the bat that both of you, really everyone, is racist, sexist, etc. Reference a few studies, talk about how we all grow up in a racist, sexist context and there's no escaping it only mitigating the problem. Once again, bunch of nods.
3. Talk about the divide within politics and how important it is to do the work of understanding the other side's POV. Acknowledge how hard it is on BOTH sides. More nods.
The tone so far, and for the rest of the conversation, should be soft and concerned.
At this point they think you agree with them 100% and that they have the moral high ground on you because you're impressed with their noble spirit and actions.
4. Initially present it as a POV someone else has that find yourself being persuaded by or agreeing with. Make sure you know the priority difference or fact disagreement that leads to the two sides disagreeing, so you're able to say either, "I looked it up, and I was surprised to see that they're right. X has been proven / did happen. It's hard to see how that fits into the other side's narrative." or "I might disagree with them, but it's clearly a difference of opinion/morals and who am I to force them to have my opinion/morals?"
5. At this point in the conversation, you can FINALLY admit that you actually DO agree with the other side. But you've soft-walked them there, the entire time showing why and how you reached that conclusion. You began from THEIR context, rather than yours. You didn't start at A when they were at Z. You met them at Z and walked them to A.
> If co-worker comes to work and says guns are bad. Ok whatever your opinion man. But if they come to work and like yo guns are awesome, 2nd amendment bros. I own one, then for other side this person might be perceived as threat.
If you genuinely feel like you have been threatened by the above to the extent that your work is now an unsafe place for you so conservatives should keep any chat about their guns to themselves, I'm sorry, but you are having an extreme emotional response disconnected from reason. Aka hysterical.
> I can easily imagine a non-hysterical person feeling threatened if they have zero experience with gun owners and zero context with which to personally relate to gun owners
Look, I can see how someone might have been brainwashed to find all guns so scary that the concept of someone near them who isn't a police officer having access seems like a direct threat to them...just like I can see someone being so brainwashed as to view all African-Americans as innately dangerous and feeling unsafe working with them. But in both cases I'd claim you are being irrational to an extreme sufficient to call your reaction hysterical.
Sorry about the misunderstanding :)
Hopefully we can both agree these are bad things to occur due to race, gender, sex, political orientation, etc. You should be judged for how you treat and speak to people, not for your political opinions.
I've worked with men that genuinely believe that women should not be educated and just stay home with children. Whatever. They treated women well in class and outside of class and THAT is what they should be judged on for jobs, housing, and connections --- not their personal opinions when they vote.
Strict immigration laws, particularly around deportation or punishments for illegal entrance = racist
Lowering or abolishing minimum wage = racist and you hate the poor
Any comment on Islam that isn't rah-rah = racist (which is fascinating since religion != race, but there you go)
Death Penalty = racist (disproportionate representation of African-Americans on death row)
Religious as a man = usually leads to sexist claims if a member of a conservative sect
As a white woman who tries hard to find common ground before disagreeing, has lived extensively in different African countries, and firmly believes we are ALL sexist and racist, I tend to get more attacks that I'm heartless and/or brainwashed. I try to defang the racist/sexist attacks right off the bat by getting mutual agreement that we all are and our job is to work on offsetting it as much as possible.
But my white male SO who, God help him, isn't willing to do the 10-20 minute reassurance dance before getting to the actual debate? My God, he can't even TALK about most of these issues without getting labeled something horrible or a shut down of "check your privilege" that, if he ignores it, leads to some kind of racist/sexist label.
No one is asking you to sit quietly. Your welcome to disagree. We expect the conservative to be able to hear about your approval (from their perspective) of the violent murder of babies for your personal convenience without losing their ability to work with you effectively as a co-worker and treat you with dignity while disagreeing. It's fair to think there'd be reciprocity and you should be able to do the same when they discuss gay marriage.
Usually when I point the above out, I'm told that OF COURSE it's cool to expect the conservative to handle talk of abortion or public approval of abortions "appropriately" in the workplace because their perspective it's murder is merely an opinion---and a wrong one at that. But your perspective that gay marriage is not a sin is a FACT, not an opinion, so they should suck it up and keep their filthy biases to themselves.
Unsurprisingly, conservatives do not appreciate the attitude that their opinions are wrong and should be hidden as shameful secrets and liberal opinions are right and should be trumpeted from the roof.
That is exactly the attitude that auto demonizes you when you share conservative viewpoints at work.
You might as well have asked, "Am I so wrong in knowing I'm right and they're sexist, racist assholes?"
Quite a few conservative positions are put under the heading sexist/racist/etc unfairly. It's a pretty neat way to stop conversation in its tracks.
I'm not sure "safe space" is the right word. People lose jobs, housing opportunities, and professional connections for being conservative in the Bay Area. There's a damn good reason to be afraid and it isn't about our "feelings". There are professional repercussions.