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For two months now, I've held back on writing a Raw Hooksexup about the Lawrence Summers incident. For those of you sensible enough to skip over the story — which seems to have a lifespan of a tortoise — here's a synopsis: in a January 14 speech, Lawrence Summers, the president of Harvard, caused a national uproar by stating that women may lack an "intrinsic aptitude" for science. While I don't agree with Summers' theory that women's brains aren't wired for organic chemistry1, I'm less bothered by his statements than by the intelligentsia calling for his head. From my mouth to their ears: shut the fuck up and leave the man alone!
You'd think the folks at Harvard would have heard the adage "sticks and stones." You'd think the professors would point to the First Amendment, or at least appreciate Summers' declaration, however erroneous, as a catalyst for fiery classroom discourse among feminists, proto-feminists and horny male undergrads. You'd think the students would appreciate said discourse as a much needed respite from lectures about things — the Yanomamo, the various social and political implications of the Spanish verb chingar2, the importance of democratic spaces in urban settings — that will have absolutely no bearing on their lives outside of the venerated institution3. At the very least, you'd think some of the brightest bulbs in our country would focus their energy on more pressing issues: Iraq, Iran, AIDS, tsunami victims, social security. You'd think wrong.
Last Tuesday, Harvard's Arts and Sciences faculty passed a no-confidence vote, the first in the university's history, against President Summers. The vote was 218 in favor and 185 opposed, with eighteen abstentions. J. Lorand Matory, a professor of anthropology and African and African-American studies, told reporters after the announcement that Dr. Summers should step down. "There is no noble alternative for him but resignation," said Professor Matory, who introduced the resolution. But just in case we think the professor overly harsh, a second resolution was proposed, expressing regret first at Dr. Summers's "management style" and then his remarks about women. The faculty approved the second measure, like the first, by taking a silent ballot.4 This time, a larger majority (253 to 137) voted no-confidence. "This is not even about just style anymore," said Mary C. Waters, chairwoman of the sociology department. "There is widespread dissatisfaction with his substantive decisions as well as his style." Ah, semantics!
Does this mean Summers will lose his job? Not at the moment. Harvard Corporation, which governs the university and has the authority to dismiss its president, continues to support Summers, so the vote remains symbolic5. But it does mean that Summers, who apologized and promised "to hear all that has been said, to think hard, to learn and to adjust" will now spend the rest of his tenure wandering the campus, avoiding his colleagues.
Do I feel bad for Dr. Summers? Sure. It must truly suck to be him at the moment. Do I think he fucked up? NOT AT ALL. In fact, I encourage all those women who felt personally slighted by Summers's comment to get over it and sign up for a biology class. What happened to my feminist mores?6 They're not the problem here. What is? The frightening national trend toward hypersensitivity that reminds me of when I was seven years old and refused to call the operator because I was worried she would hate me for disrupting her day.7 It seems that while I spent the last twenty-two years working at being a little less sensitive, everyone else (or at least the faculty at Harvard) was becoming increasingly fragile, like a little ideological bird. Unfortunately, if Janet Jackson, Howard Stern, Whoopi Goldberg, that airline exec who got canned for having an affair, and now Lawrence Summers can ruffle their feathers, what are they going to do when a real problem comes along?8 — Tobin Levy
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Key to full disclosures:
1 In college, astronomy for asshats fulfilled my science requirement. And I had to take it twice.
2 Literal translation: to fuck. Although, according to my professor in Latin American Feminist Literature, the aggressive nature of the word and "the extent to which it alternately damages or liberates the women to whom it is directed as well as the women brave enough to employ it themselves" depends largely on context.
3 I went to two Ivy League universities; Harvard was not one of them.
4 Silent ballots? Who does silent ballots anymore? Aren't silent ballots something you do in third grade, when you're trying to decide whom to vote out of your slumber party?
5 Ah, symbolism. "Ceci n'est pas une pipe."
6 I attended Barnard, a women's college at Columbia University for two years. There, I was indoctrinated in Mary Wollstonecraft, Maya Angelou, Margaret Sanger, Gloria Steinem, Naomi Wolf, Rosa Parks, Ruth Ginsberg, Betty Friedan, Kate Chopin, Judy Chicago and Suzanne Vega (a Barnard alumna). My point? I'm not sure.
7 I was also deathly afraid of escalators, but that's another story.
8 A rhetorical question.
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Comments ( 26 )
You're missing the point on Summers...
Harvard's record of appointing women to tenured positions has been, under Summers' leadership, absymal. His comments, ill-judged but certainly within his rights, are a reflection of a deeper attitude about women and their role within the academy. If you don't think this is a real problem, what is?
Like everyone else, you've badly paraphrased what Summers said. He didn't say that women may lack "intrinsic aptitude" for science. He said that there were more men than women at both ends of the bell curve -- dolt and genius -- and that this may have an effect on the ratio of men to women at the highest levels of achievement in engineering and the hard sciences. There is a huge difference between saying that women lack a certain aptitude and saying that not as many women as men have it.
I mean, his logical position on the tenure issue is still very shaky for many reasons, but let's stick to nailing him for what he said, not what he didn't.
You don't get it.
You think what he said is not that big of a deal, since you don't believe it actually impacts anyone's life.
You would think differently, if you knew women who are actually IN science and have to deal with this type of shit coming from men on a constant, demoralizing basis.
The problem with what Summers said is this:
When you grow up as the smartest kid in your math class year after year, spending most of your time either helping other kids or staring out the window because you finished half an hour early than everyone else,
Then you get to high school and your math class still moves at a snail's pace, in large part due to the guys acting out like morons and wasting time, so you learn more by reading the textbook on your own than you do by going to class,
Then when you get to college to study engineering, and you have to do group work with guys, and once again you're the smartest person in the group but nobody listens to a word you say, until eventually a guy says the same exact thing and then suddenly it's a revelation to everyone,
Then all of a sudden some douchebag from Harvard pretty much says his brain is more suited to science than your just because he has a dick,
IT MAKES YOU FUCKING WANT TO KILL PEOPLE!!!!!
THAT'S WHAT THE FUCKING PROBLEM IS, MOTHERFUCKER!!!
P.S. Serious, non-sarcastic question- if you think of what humanities students study as a game of make-believe and bullshit that can't be applied to "the real world," then why the fuck are you a part of the humanities???
I'm a microbiology student at the University of New Hampshire. I'm also premedical. I think his statement is the crap that blocks my credibility as a female student and my abilities to become a doctor. I think he deserves the reaction he got, Maybe shoving some statistical figures of grades of women in organic chemistry.
Sumner's comments were likely most disturbing to women working to find long-term employment in academia.
What Sumner's said would be the equivalent of a magazine editor or other hiring entity saying he thought more men than women were predisposed to being good magazine writers. The statement is sexist, and it is sexist in precisely the way that limits gains for women in academia (which may have as its dark secret that it is among the most conservative institutions in the United States with regard to hiring practices).
With people like Sumner in positions of power, no wonder women have trouble getting tenure at top-tier schools.
A recent Maureen Dowd column discussed scientists discovery of how different men and women are. Men are simple compared to how complicated women are--biologically and emotionally. It is amazing that a wacko like "Professor" Ward Churchill at the U of Colorado can make vicious statements about the 9-11 victims ("little Eichmanns") vs. a college president who voices an opinion based on much scientific research gets more flak. If Bush and the Congress had declared war as we did back in 1941, nuts like Churchill would be arrested, as was the old wacko poet Ezra Pound for his insane statements. How can we allow nuts to say anything they want without consequences? I am of German descent, and the only good Nazi is a dead one, period. Summers has a point of view--there are few women math or science professors with PhDs and tenure out there compared to the number of men. Doesn't free speech end with yelling fire in a crowded theater? I am a Democrat and maybe my party has gone overboard with "PC", the ACLU, etc.
Quess he should have called them little eichmans instead.
Bravo, Tobin!
I believe I said pretty much the same words to John Constantine when he was vacationing out here a couple of weeks ago. It's refreshing to know that there are women of your generation who, like my wife and daughter, understand that success is a matter of expectations and doing what you came to do....instead of wasting your time on mind-fucking and whining.
here here. you'd think it was the mid-90s with this PC, hyper-sensitive response to Summers statement. to the rest of you below: though you may think what he said was offsensive, it's not categorically wrong ... indeed its the most logical conclusion given evidence on the table. There are undoubtedly other areas in which women have innate advantages -- for instance, there is evidence that women have superior lanugage skills. male and female homosapiens have had a division of labor for hundreds of thousands of years, and their respective strengths reflect that division of labor. Have a look at the list of the top ranked 1,000 chess players in the world. how many are women? are the chess tournaments rigged? is its all a matter of environment, of little girls not being encouraged to play chess? this is a factor, certainly, but it does not explain the extent to which men dominate chess tournaments. If you we are not willing to ask these questions with a sober mind, there are many far larger problems that we will not be able to confront as a society. in other words, get over it. assemble countervailing data, make logical counterarguments, but don't tar and feather people who pose possible explanations in emminently rational ways.
I think that this whole article was a thinly-veiled escuse for TL to brag that she went to 2 ivy league colleges and brag about all the feminists that she's read.
CAK's comment below is actually quite on point: women DO dominate the publishing industry in New York, and increasingly the legal industry as well. this dovetails logically with the fact that girls develop language skills earlier than boys and indeed may demonstrate superior language skills as adults. there are probably many factors that result in women dominating these industries including greater innate aptitude. where's the outrage? if Summers had said this, would he be hanging on to his job by a thread? (interesting aside: mental strengths in studies comparing male and female performance in different areas seem at correlate with a basic hunting / gathering division of labor: women remember objects in a room with great detail and accuracy than men; they remember color and texture in greater detail than then. this correlates to words and language effectively. Men are better at spacial math, which is part of the process of calculating trajectories of objects thrown).
"ted"- that was the most illogical drivel i have ever read. if you think the historical division of labor has anything to do with math/science abilities of men vs. women you are a nut. until ~200 years ago, 99.999% of all men were *farming.* i've got to say, you used some great logic skills in making that argument, fella.
Women studying at Harvard might like to know that the president (his comments matter more as he is not some random dumbass talking his mouth off in a bar) of that venerable institution views their potential no different than their male co-students. That they are considered and judged according to their ACADEMIC PROWESS, not their gender. That is their right. And as you subtly let us all know, being an Ivy League student yourself, one would think you'd put yourself in the female Ivy League students shoes. But apparently not.
So really, this isn't about your past experiences with feminisn or having once sat in the same chair as Suzanne Vega, riveting stories as they might be, this is about female SCIENTISTS who are trying damn hard to get creds for their work, and THEY are not the ones wasting years reading Gloria Steinem and then whining. They are just trying to get a tenureship. Or be seen as equals by the institution they work for. Don't read your own qualms about feminismoverload into their struggle. Or, alternately, come up with a more compelling argument about why this is an "overreaction" other than referring to yet another gripping anecdote from your childhood/youth.
MV -- you clearly have not read anything about evolutionary theory. most of our ancestors were farming during most of the last 10,000 years; the evolution of homosapiens has occurred during the last several hundred thousand years, and during most of that time most of our ancestors lived as hunter gatherers.
eva, you make it sound like he is actively condoning sexual discrimination. i am confident that Summers would be happy to have gender blind applications if it were feasible. his point is that there are probably a number of explanations for the difference in numbers between women and men in these programs. many fewer women apply for these programs.
is there evidence that harvard science programs are turning down women who are more qualified for positions given to men? is there evidence that Summers supports such a position? Summers was clumsy in his statements; let's try not to be.
The First Amendment is irrelevant to this discussion; it applies only to government action, not private action, such as by the Harvard Corporation. The issue here is academic freedom and whether Summers' remarks were so far beyond the pale that Harvard should remove him. I think that although the remarks do not descend to that level, but that Summers' effectiveness as Harvard's president has been so compromised as a result that he should resign in the institution's best interests. What he said was akin to Al Campanis's remarks years ago about blacks not having the "necessities" to manage or coach.
i still love reading whatever you write, ms. levy, and i'm all for freedom of speech, but i would have serious problems paying a fortune to attend an ivy league school only to hear that its president considers me less likely to understand a certain subject than my male counterparts. even if he truly believes that, the fact that he would say it aloud in front of his peers calls his own intelligence into question. how could he think he wouldn't get shit for that?
"ted"- if all you have to offer to support what you say is totally unsubstatiated conjecture about what life was like before recorded history, you'll have to try harder. the prehistoric model of man-hunter/woman-gatherer is not based on any hard facts but solely on the speculation of researchers. that's it. why do you so blindly believe something for which there is no proof- because it "feels right" to you?
This essay is very poorly informed. A recent NY TIMES article documented how fully LS has been carrying out a campaign to limit nonmainstream thinking at Harvard, i.e., anything to the left of Clinton democrats. LS is thus a threat to academic freedom and the faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences acted couragesly in taking a stand against LS. On the specific issue of LS's statement about women in science, did the Hooksexup author even read the transcript of LS's comments. He spoke in needlessly polemical ways on an issue about which he had no real expertise--and he spoke without concern for the fact that his comments might limit the opportunities of girls for science education.
In short, this Hooksexup essay was so bad that informed and responsible editors would have rejected it and sent it to the rubbish heap--where it belongs.
Thank God some people aren't complete fucking imbeciles. (I.e. Tobin Levy).
My sentiments... wish I had written this. Thanks for speaking for me and making me laugh.
MV -- i am not sure where your resistance to evolutionary theory comes from ... you are arguing not with me but with Richard Dawkins who wrote the Moral Animal and Nonzero, and Steven Pinker who wrote the Language Instinct and the Blank Slate, both eminent scientists, among many others. What we know about human evolution comes from all we collectively know from archeology, biology, genetics, linguistics, and so on. Is your resistance to the idea that men and women are biologically different? is that a scary idea? would you prefer that men and women were duplicates of one another? do you think that all the scientific studies that show differences between men and women are wrong? do you think that if there are differences, none of these differences have to with what men and women have had to do to survive during the last several hundred thousand years? its pretty evident that there has been a longstanding division of labor between the sexes -- a division which privileges neither above the other, but a division nonetheless -- and i find it pretty facinating that that division of labor coincides with current research on the strengths of men and women respectively. Here's one example: when men and women who spent time in a room full of objects are asked to list the objects in the room, women can list far more. Here's another: Women are better at navigating based on remembered points of interest, but men are better at navigating based on sense of direction -- north south east west. Now its possible that these differing strengths have nothing to do with the fact that men spent more of evolutionary history on long trips chasing big game and women spent more of evolutionary history around the home locating food sources, etc., but its more likely that there is a relationship here. this is called logical analysis based on the scientific method. what is so scary about men and women having different but overlapping strengths? what is so scary about men, on average, being better chess players and women, on average, being better scrabble players? is it a terrible thing if men dominate some fields and women dominate others, assuming everyone has a fair shake? fair treatment in the workplace and an ethical outlook should not be dependent on protecting the fallacy that the sexes are identical.
To expand my earlier point:
Women seeking tenured positions face major obstacles in any field -- not just the sciences. The percentages on tenure are shockingly bad. This is not limited to the sciences -- check out the Guerrilla Girls for some information on fine arts education. Women outperform men in every field academically at every level beginning with kindergarten and continuing through graduate school. Something is clearly wrong with hiring practices in the ivory tower.
I agree completely.
My only problem with your piece is that fails to mention that the bigger phenomenon does seem to encompass many in the academy, not just this group that has flipped out on Larry Summers. The reaction of the Harvard faculty is a lame way to go about challenging Summers' ideas, or addressing the real world problems he was speaking to and which everyone acknowledges are real (the under involvement of women in the sciences in this country).
As far as the actual substance of what Summers was attempting to engage people in a discussion about, it strikes me that we have a long way to go before we can accept the fairly straightforward idea that while biology plays a huge role in influencing the statistical mainstreams of human behaviour (including the idea that, yes, males tend to be more left-brained/science & tool-happy), there is enough variation in the species that we should expect people to deviate from those trends all over the place. As a society, we should carefully protect and even in some cases encourage this "deviance", but to pretend that we can social engineer our way out of all biological determination is stupid and even potentially dangerous.
Quote found on AndrewSullivan.com ->
"It takes one's breath away to watch feminist women at work. At the same time that they denounce traditional stereotypes they conform to them. If at the back of your sexist mind you think that women are emotional, you listen agape as professor Nancy Hopkins of MIT comes out with the threat that she will be sick if she has to hear too much of what she doesn't agree with. If you think women are suggestible, you hear it said that the mere suggestion of an innate inequality in women will keep them from stirring themselves to excel. While denouncing the feminine mystique, feminists behave as if they were devoted to it. They are women who assert their independence but still depend on men to keep women secure and comfortable while admiring their independence. Even in the gender-neutral society, men are expected by feminists to open doors for women. If men do not, they are intimidating women." - the inimitable Harvey Mansfield, in the Weekly Standard.
congrats tobin, judging from the feedback your essay has discouraged a bunch of female scientists, and heartened a bunch of woman-hating chauvanists.
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