New girl in my office

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I think you misunderstood what he meant. He wasn't stating his bias that women won't apply, he was simply describing his observations.

Let me give you an example. I spent 5 years during the postdoc in India. Even though I was a postdoc, I got to see the demographics of graduate students -- and it was split half and half between men and women. When it comes to the professors, they were mostly men, with male/female ratio roughly the same as in the US; but when it comes to the students then somehow there were as many women as men. This sounds surprising given that India is supposed to be more sexist than the US. Yet thats what I saw, so I am relaying what I saw. The point I am trying to make is that relaying what one sees has nothing to do with a bias, since I just relayed an observation that contradicts my bias

So with that man saying "there aren't any women" he might have been doing the same thing. He wasn't saying that there won't be that many women 10 years from now due to their supposed inferiority or whatever. Rather he was talking about what is in front of him right here right now. If the *current* application poll has 90% of men and 10% of women, its really hard to hire 20% of women without biasing a selection process. If next year he gets 20% of female applicants then next year he would hire 20% of women. But he has no control over who applies. I think thats what he meant.

Maybe something a bit closer would be your complaint about phrasing of a job description that makes it seem like something only for men. But still it is a bit hard to imagine that a woman who really wanted to apply would decide against it on the sole basis of seeing the word "he". Maybe a better thing for you to do is to talk to your female friends as to why don't "they" apply. On the one hand you might just get some of them to apply, which would increase their percentage. And, on the other hand, you might learn the "real" reasons why they don't apply as opposed to your guesses -- and bring those real reasons to your boss' attention.



Its interesting that you feel like you "lose", because I tend to feel the opposite: when the other person stops responding to me, then I am the one who loses (not them) since they convey the message that I am not even worth responding to. Maybe this goes back to our discussion on perceived superiority? You were telling me that others perceive me as superior and I was telling you no, I feel inferior.

Another disconnect we have is this. Up until your most recent posts, I didn't even realize that your concern was women's rights. I thought you were just trying to be clever with things like the word "girl". So when you said how you run out of words to say I was surprised: I thought you always have a lot to say and talking was like your piece of cake. I guess I misunderstood where you are coming from.

But then again, its good that you gave me an insight on what happens in the heads of other women who "lose their words". My instinct was that they were the opposite to you: you have all that energy to distinguish woman from girl, and they don't even have enough energy to say anything beyond "hi". But I just learned something new: maybe they think the same thing you do just don't say it?

This reminded me of something else. I am used to the fact that when I write to my professors (regardless of their gender -- although overall the professors are mostly male) they don't reply. My mom was shocked by it. She told me that if I let her edit my email they would reply. So she spent an hour editting a few short sentences I wrote. Guess what: I got reply within an hour. I was pissed, since I was led to believe that they don't have time but apparently they do. Furthermore, apparently they have A LOT of time, enough so as to catch all those things my mom spent an hour correcting. So if they have enough time to notice all those tiny little things my mom was noticing, why don't they have time to simply reply?!

I guess the way its similar is that just like those professors didn't reply because they caught some tiny spelling mistakes, in the same way the women avoid me because they caught me using the word "girl". But in both cases I had no idea that they caught any of those things: I was assuming they were "too busy" to pay attention -- or so was I led to assume from the lack of response.



I thought you are intimidated by power? But the person in opposition is usually "not" the one in power. So how do you reconcile this?

I was actually unaware of men thinking that. But now that you told me, it doesn't seem to make any difference: I simply won't take the opinions of those men seriously. Why? Because only "some" men think that, not all. I guess there has to be some "critical mass" of a number of people thinking certain thing in order for it to become hard to avoid. If the number of people holding certain view is relatively small, then the reaction is to view them as losers not worth listening to. But once their numbers become too large, then the reaction is to think maybe they all see something I don't see and it is me who is a loser.

I didn't mean to attack you, I meant to correct the information. I was thinking you might have mistakenly thought that people from different departments might share the same office -- and so I informed you that this doesn't happen. This has nothing to do with your willingness to help: this might be simply due to the fact that you haven't been to graduate school and haven't seen how it works.



I think its pretty sad. I, for one, would rather date a mathematician than someone in humanities -- and, for that matter, I would rather date a really great mathematician than mediocre mathematician. I guess my criteria is different. I heard of some guys who won't date successful women, and I never understood them. Its like they are shooting themselves on the foot! I mean, for me, part of my self esteem is derived by the woman I date -- and since my self esteem is also tied to math and physics, thats why dating a really famous mathematician or really famous physicist would be a huge self esteem boost, for me anyway.

I realize that you weren't talking about dating. But a bigger concept is that I have more respect for mathematicians than I do for humanity people. Since that respect is gender-neutral, it also implies that I have lots of respect for female mathematicians too. So its too bad others don't see it this way.



Thats really sad too. So an older woman will try to do all this catching up, when she knows full well she purposely wasted best years of her research life for some silly purpose. I can't help but put myself in her shoes and imagine just how much regret I would feel.

Yes we have coffee room. The only time they meet for a coffee that I am aware of is before the seminar (although its possible they meet other times and I just don't know since I don't use that room other than when there are seminars). In any case, I don't go to seminars that often -- usually I don't have time due to my own studies. But, at the same time, the few times I did go, nobody at the tea room approached me. So I am not sure whether going there more often would help. If they really wanted to talk to me, they would have talked to me during the times I came.



This reminded me of that one time when that woman in my office offered me a cookie and I refused. Since she offered it to me two days "after" what happened, I was thinking she didn't really want to talk to me and was only being polite (since she ate a cookie its polite to offer it). But, after that, I didn't see her either eating OR offering any more cookies. Yes, a few times she was drinking something from her own bottle -- so its impossible to offer that -- but she wasn't eating any cookies. I wish I could get another opportunity of her eating cookie and this time I would agree and take it. But there is no way I would offer her a cookie myself: why should I do it if she made it so clear through her behavior that she doesn't like me?

Yeah and that is what I find unfair. How can they KNOW what the person is like by just looking at them for a fraction of a second?! Like what is the logic behind it? Are they assuming that people are robots and so every single second they are exactly like every other second -- and then you can judge a robot based on how that robot is any given second? But I am not a robot, I am a human being. So I can have a bad day too.

Or could it be that NT-s "are" robots in some ways: as in, NT can have a bad day, an awful day in fact, but an NT would NEVER sit the way I was sitting that particular day? Is that what it is?!



That pisses me off too. Since she was scared -- this logically imply that she thought I would DO something -- and since I know for a fact I won't do anything, that totally pisses me off when people think I would.



Exactly. And I find it very insulting too. And then they say people with Asperger don't have empathy. Well, its hard to have empathy towards people I am INSULTED at. So since I am insulted at society-at-large, maybe thats the reason for my behavior (as opposed to any inherent lack of empathy).



And that pisses me off too. There is no need to help neurotypicals -- they have it made! -- but there is LOTS of reasons to help an aspie. Yet neurotypicals do just the opposite: they conspire to help each other and hurt an aspie.



So the phrase "as a young woman" insinuates that I am the type of guy that molests women -- AND I AM NOT -- which is why it pisses me off.

That's a healthy attitude, but it's not a small number from what I've seen. At school about 1/4 guys thought that way and it seems that among low educated men (and women, but men more) many think that way. I think it might be a "sour, said the fox" -type of thing.

But of course, it's probably different in different areas.

Thats probably the biggest reason I dismiss their opinion. If they are low educated, they lose my respect, so I don't care what they think.

But with other topics, where opinions are more spread among the education levels, I tend to care more.

There happen to be people who are "low-educated" but are smarter than people with PhDs.

If you are talking about emotional intelligence yes I believe it's important (although I still won't trade my PhD for that). But that's not what we are talking about here. What we talk about is someone telling me that -- all else being equal -- phd is a negative rather than positive. There is no way I would ever take that kind of opinion seriously.

Obviously, having a PhD is a positive. But to disavow people of "low education" is a negative thing to do.

I am talking about low educated people who ALSO say that having Ph.D. is a negative. Those two things put together makes me disavow them.

When low educated people have opinions on something else then no I don't disavow them. For example, I take it personally when they look down at me for my Asperger -- regardless of their education level.

A PhD isn't a negative, but it's only one aspect. This girl and your friend are able to assess that you're lacking in social skills. Yes, NTs turn on those who don't play by their rules. In a sense, we, as Aspies, are "low educated" or "low in intuition" on the social front, a social front which permeates all classes and environments.

Just as you look down on the less educated in academics, NTs (of all intellectual and academic levels) look down on the less-socially knowledgeable. So, be careful about being a hypocrite. You're condemning the less academically inclined the way NTs treat us Aspies for being less socially inclined.

That aside, I can totally relate to what happened and it sucks. Had you been wide awake and more socially knowledgeable (or incredibly attractive) the girl wouldn't have behaved the way she did. It's NOT your fault. In her mind she was thinking "Older man, not good looking, half asleep, I'm ALONE with him. HELP!" That doesn't mean you'd ever harm her. I know you wouldn't, you know you wouldn't, and its wrong of her to assume you would, but that's how she thinks (and her fellow NTs will all back her up in her feelings, regardless of their education level, including your colleague).

I think what made matters worse is the way you went about handling it. NOT SAYING YOU'RE WRONG, just saying you have to broach things differently when dealing with THEM (the NTs). It SUCKS, but if you're asking what went wrong in this situation, it was a combination of an unfair assessment on her part followed by your taking her words at face-value and then trying to build on that with every subsequent interaction.

As Aspies, we're notorious for this (taking words at face-value). This is NOT how NTs operate. It sucks, but it's true. They're not like us, and discovering we're living in a world populated by a majority who behave this way is very depressing. We are indeed on the wrong planet.

I can totally empathize with your plight, it could just have easily have been me in your shoes. I can relate.

But I am not assuming that less educated people are all rapists, yet she assumes that about less socially knowledgeable.



This leads to the following questions:

1. She was assuming the following things:

a) Older men are more likely to rape
b) Good looking men are less likely to rape
c) Half asleep men are more likely to rape

But why do those things have to be true?

2. Speaking of 1b, why are men with Asperger less good looking anyway? Does Asperger affect the way bones grow so that the shape of the face is different or what is it?

I guess the whole underlying logical principle behind ALL of this is positives go together and negatives go together. But the problem with this principle is:

I. It is simply not true, since it lumps together completely different phenomena that have nothing to do with each other (as statements 1a, 1b or 1c illustrate)

II. This assumption results in a character assocination. If "enough" things about me are bad, then every single thing about me is bad too. But then what the f**k am I supposed to do if every fucken aspect of my life from the time I am born to the time I die is fucken so awful (just like that girl assumes). Unlike her, I can't just fucken walk away from myself can I?!



Since, as you said, it is "regardless of education level", why doesn't their high level of education make them see those logical inconsistencies I just pointed out?!

Lets say, for the sake of argument, that we are not in a math department but rather we are in a psychology department. Why wouldn't a psychologist stop and question a correlation between a man being less attractive and a man being a rapist? Wouldn't a psychologist see the obvious contradiction between this and what they read in their psychology books?



The reason I took her words at a face value is because I was fucken desperate so I was grasping at the fucken straws. And this becomes unfair in yet another level. So, going back to your analogy with education, you are telling me that an uneducated student who is desperately trying to learn is "worse" than an uneducated student who just gives up on himself altogether. Well, thats NOT how I act -- as evident by the way I was tryign to push my uneducated ex-s to get education -- yet that it how NT-s act (as evident by how that girl looks down on me even more for the fact that I was trying).

And the other thing that pisses me off about this is that -- despite the fact that NTs are looking down at me for trying TOO hard, they won't admit it. My mom's advice to try HARDER with this girl is one example of it. I think the logic behind this advice is that

(i) Whoever gives me that advice knows full well that I will have enough sense not to try harder, since the rejection is so obvious. And, therefore, they can deny the rejection itself and say "oh no no, its just that you didn't try harder"

(ii) If I am desperate enough to follow their advice and try harder, then the rejection will continue to be non-verbal (as an example with this girl illustrates) so they would tell me "oh no, she didn't really reject you, you should just try even harder".

So if I get super-duper desperate by doing (ii) over and over, then eventually rejection will be obvious enough to make me do (i). But then they would blame it on my supposed paranoia and deny the fact that I was rejected by saying "oh it was your mistake you didn't do (ii) yet again". But wait a second, I did (ii) way too many times already. So why the f**k are they telling me I didn't do it enough? I guess because they think I am fucken stupid, so they lie to me in order to get me to stop complaining.

Now you see how ridiculous it is when -- in response to the question "why don't girls approach me" -- people are telling me "why don't you approach them yourself"? You agree that with this specific girl this advice is a complete nonesense. Well, the same is true with all the other girls too. The reason I don't approach girls myself is that girls are sending me non-verbal clues not to. But since non-verbal clues are easy to deny, thats why NT-s are lying to me and telling me its me who is being too shy.

QFT just a couple of things.

- Don't expect a girl with a PhD to be compatible with you just because she has a PhD. Hollywood might portray young professors sitting around their campus sipping coffee and discussing philosophy and the universe while staring into each other's eyes. The truth is everyone is too busy applying for scholarships, fellowships or grants, it's competitive and unless you offer some networking or collaborative opportunity for the girl they aren't going to waste their time.

- The second issue is that the pool of i) single ii) attractive iii) highly famous iv) physicists or mathematicians would amount to maybe 10 in the entire United States. I won't bother asking you to do the math but that's horrendous odds. You may be better off lowering your standards.

The fact that they would be applying for scholarships won't make us incompatible. We can be applying for scholarships together and helping each other.



People don't date *just* for the purpose of collaborative opportunities.

In fact, lets look at what you are telling me:

a) Despite the fact that I am in academia, I should consider dating someone completely outside the academia.
b) A girl who is in academia won't date anyone who won't offer her collaborative opportunities

That looks like a double standard, isn't it.



She doesn't have to hit every single box there. Of course box (i) is a must, but as far as the other three are concerned, two of those three would make me happy. Case in point: I used to date Miss Nebraska and she didn't have any education beyond high school (and she was homeschooled). But that was fine with me since she was famous. And, conversely, if I could date a mathematician or a physicist, she doesn't have to be famous since mathematician or physicist is already good enough.



I already DID lower my standards. Thats why with every single past relationship I had (except for Miss Nebraska one) I was settling. I wish I could actually date someone I am happy with for once.

I had three long term ex-s (Miss Nebraska was the third one). Every single one of them were overweight (Miss Nebraska gained weight between the time she won the contest and time she dated me). The first and third one never went to college. The second one was in grad school at the time we dated -- but she changed plans and got masters instead of getting ph.d. -- and besides she was in biochemistry, not math or physics. And if I look at the short term girls I dated, then its even worse. MOST of them didn't have college education, ALL of them were overweight, and NONE of them were even remotely famous. So you see where I am coming from? I don't even know what its like to date a girl of a normal weight, or what its like to date mathematician or a physicist. I wish I could find out what its like.

They’re not true. If you’re asking “Why do NT women behave that way instinctively and make those assumptions?,” you’d have to try to perceive the world like an NT woman.



That’s an interesting question, and there has been speculation if Aspies look different from NTs. Regardless, if you have looks OR social skills, either/or can be used to your advantage. NT “logic” is heavily judgmental and status-oriented. So, a not-so-good looking NT has the social skills. A good looking Aspie has the looks. If you have neither, you’re quickly put into that BAD category. (I’m not calling you ugly, but you’re not Brad Pitt, so you’d have to rely on social skills, in which you’re deficient.)



Yes, many people of varying education levels can understand these things intellectually. That doesn’t mean they put them into practice when dealing with people one-on-one. Many are oblivious to their own hypocrisy and think they’re doing nothing wrong. They think it’s YOU who is to blame and their response is totally appropriate. This is a big component to NT behavior.



Again, I’m not faulting your behavior in the field. If you’re trying to learn from this, I’m trying to tell you that NTs don’t abide by our logic. They also pick up on desperation better than we do, which is more of a turn-off. They also don’t like to be called out on their hypocrisy and will lie and dance around their transgressions and blame YOU. This is how they behave naturally.

Even the ones that are kindly toward you may behave this way to someone else that they deem weird, socially inapprorpriate. Never assume the way an NT behaves around you is their natural character. They alter their behavior on a person-to-person basis. They’ll also put the blame on YOU (even if they know it’s not your fault, they’ll find a way to dance themselves out of it).

As varied as we are, I do believe Aspies are more likely to “be themselves” around everyone equally, and may be naïve about just how diverse NT behavior is person-to-person.

I don’t agree with it, I’m just surprised you’re so shocked by all of this.