Quote from: CRKrueger;956789Not to mention short order cooks.

More proof they've always been sharper than I am.:-)

Quote from: CRKrueger;956789Not to mention short order cooks.

At the restaurant I manage, it's a 50/50 split on cooks, but our cashiers have been overwhelmingly female, and most of the managers are currently men.  Mainly due to the fact that most of the female management went on to other jobs because the restaurant was to stressful, and one got fired for trying to sabotage the place.

Quote from: jhkim;956787I agree that there are some professions where women make more. I've seen studies that female models generally make more than male models, for example. However, those are far from the norm.

Having taught at HS, middle school (aka Hell) and, this year, primary, at six different campuses, over 20 years, I can tell you this: Elementary teachers are overwhelmingly female, and most secondary English departments have more females than males. Just my wee sample there. Not sure it means anything, since pay is standardized by tenure. I'll just add that my best 3 bosses have been women. Again, my experiences only (and I'm not done teaching).

Quote from: jhkim;956787However, the same discrimination that is in many publishers may also exist in some backers and readers.

Maybe? I kind of doubt it, however. Without any evidence my assumption is that readers who care about the gender of a creator would be a tiny, tiny percentage in this day and age, the same type that would boycott Star Wars for having an African American lead (no economic impact whatsoever). I think product quality, premise, presentation, and marketing trumps any concerns regarding prejudice.

QuoteAs for cherry picking, I don't think it is. Those are only two examples, of course, but I think they are representative of most gender gap studies that I've seen. For example, nursing is a female dominated profession in some senses, but the studies that I've seen are that male nurses are still paid better than their female counterparts. cf.

https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2015/03/124266/male-registered-nurses-make-thousands-more-salary-female-counterparts

I agree that there are some professions where women make more. I've seen studies that female models generally make more than male models, for example. However, those are far from the norm.

Wage gap is a separate issue to work opportunities based on gender, though. I don't think conflating those two issues will lead anywhere good, the wage gap is a hot button issue thats inspired hundreds of thousands of blogposts, critical and statistical studies, and youtube flamewars over the last couple of years. And I don't even know what statistics to trust, because they tend to be wildly different depending on the source and conveniently support the position of the person using the study.

Regarding gender gap issues -

Quote from: Ratman_tf;956782http://www.pnas.org/content/112/17/5360.full.pdf

"National hiring experiments reveal 2:1 faculty preference for women on STEM tenure track"

Fair enough. Note that this is a more narrow case than general academic hiring, and doesn't contradict the other finding - which the paper itself acknowledges. From the paper you link -

QuotePast studies have used ratings of students' hirability for a range of posts that do not include tenure-track jobs, such as managing laboratories or performing math assignments
for a company. However, hiring tenure-track faculty differs from hiring lower-level staff: it entails selecting among highly accomplished candidates, all of whom have completed Ph.D.s and amassed publications and strong letters of support. Hiring bias may occur when applicants' records are ambiguous, as was true in studies of hiring bias for lower-level staff posts, but such bias may not occur when records are clearly strong, as is the case with tenure-track hiring.

This implies that within science academia, women are rated lower and paid less for lower-level posts, and may have more hurdles to getting their PhD, but once at the point of applying for tenure track position, they are favored. So the barriers to entry are earlier, and women are judged well if they have made it past those barriers.

Quote from: Warboss Squee;956784I never hear anyone crowing to get women into high steel work or sanitation. Wonder why.

I've regularly seen reports about discrimination within construction and other factory work, where apparently sexual harassment is rampant. Here is one sample -

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2014/06/11/report-women-still-face-barriers-in-construction-trades/?utm_term=.f6d7f3e7ded5

Admittedly, I haven't seen similar over sanitation work. :-)

Quote from: cranebump;956794Having taught at HS, middle school (aka Hell) and, this year, primary, at six different campuses, over 20 years, I can tell you this: Elementary teachers are overwhelmingly female, and most secondary English departments have more females than males. Just my wee sample there. Not sure it means anything, since pay is standardized by tenure. I'll just add that my best 3 bosses have been women. Again, my experiences only (and I'm not done teaching).

I don't think we're disagreeing. (Also, kudos to you for teaching. I taught high school for a time, and am now in educational technology.) Both primary teaching and nursing are female dominated in that most people in the profession are women. However, I have not seen evidence that men in those professions are judged worse or are given less pay. For nursing, it seems rather that men are paid more.

OK, this is totally off-topic, but it is bugging me.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;956742Did you know that the West, in fact, pioneered by America, is the first group of nations that have outlawed slavery?  And that it's still practiced in places like Asia and Africa?

There's a lot of misinformation flying about, and what's even worse is that we have people who believe it, no proof necessary.  But then, that would require doing research and thinking for ourselves, wouldn't it?

I know that in Korea, emancipation began in 1775, and in 1801 nearly all government slaves were freed, although full abolition was not until 1886 - 1891. The origins of the abolition movement there have nothing to do with abolition in the West.

In the West, the pioneer in modern abolition was Haiti, which completely outlawed slavery as part of their war for independence 1791 to 1804. That thoroughly shook all of the colonial powers with its success. Britain outlawed the slave trade in 1807, and outlawed slavery in 1833 - long before the U.S.

I'd suggest doing a little research yourself.

Quote from: jhkim;956797I don't think we're disagreeing. (Also, kudos to you for teaching. I taught high school for a time, and am now in educational technology.) Both primary teaching and nursing are female dominated in that most people in the profession are women. However, I have not seen evidence that men in those professions are judged worse or are given less pay. For nursing, it seems rather that men are paid more.

You're correct. We're not disagreeing. And I did not intend my post as anything more than an observation brought on by the discussion. Sorry If it seemed anything other than that.

Quote from: Tristram Evans;956795Maybe? I kind of doubt it, however. Without any evidence my assumption is that readers who care about the gender of a creator would be a tiny, tiny percentage in this day and age, the same type that would boycott Star Wars for having an African American lead (no economic impact whatsoever). I think product quality, premise, presentation, and marketing trumps any concerns regarding prejudice.

There is a sizeable percentage of people for whom gender and race are part of subtle prejudice - as opposed to an outright political stance. The finding of many studies is that people who claim to be impartial to men and women nevertheless have different responses on average to the exact same resume or work if there is a man's or woman's name attached. In some cases, this favors women - such as apparently in romance novels where male authors are more successful using a female pen name. But in most of the studies that I've seen, it favors men.

Quote from: Tristram Evans;956795Wage gap is a separate issue to work opportunities based on gender, though. I don't think conflating those two issues will lead anywhere good, the wage gap is a hot button issue thats inspired hundreds of thousands of blogposts, critical and statistical studies, and youtube flamewars over the last couple of years. And I don't even know what statistics to trust, because they tend to be wildly different depending on the source and conveniently support the position of the person using the study.

I don't think it is that easy to separate them, though. Getting paid is a crucial part of work, and if you ignore it, then you're overlooking a key part of the picture. For example, say there is an industry where women were 1.5x more likely to get hired, but at average 25% less pay than men. By ignoring pay, you'd hold that industry up as a shining example of progress.

Quote from: jhkim;956797Regarding gender gap issues -


Fair enough. Note that this is a more narrow case than general academic hiring, and doesn't contradict the other finding - which the paper itself acknowledges. From the paper you link -


This implies that within science academia, women are rated lower and paid less for lower-level posts, and may have more hurdles to getting their PhD, but once at the point of applying for tenure track position, they are favored. So the barriers to entry are earlier, and women are judged well if they have made it past those barriers.

I think it depends on which narrative you choose to believe. And results can be interpreted many different ways.

Quote from: jhkim;956800There is a sizeable percentage of people for whom gender and race are part of subtle prejudice - as opposed to an outright political stance. The finding of many studies is that people who claim to be impartial to men and women nevertheless have different responses on average to the exact same resume or work if there is a man's or woman's name attached. In some cases, this favors women - such as apparently in romance novels where male authors are more successful using a female pen name. But in most of the studies that I've seen, it favors men.

Okay, but even assuming that's true, how much does it practically create a barrier of entry for women to create and promote a gaming product? Meaning, I know there are studies that show slight gender biases in many people, but has this been shown to have a demonstrable effect on the consumption of media?

Its contended that there is a large female audience for RPGs that is untapped simply because women aren't creating as many products as men. If that is the point of this Talent Search, then surely any bias actually works in their favour? Apparently the idea is that there are tons of women who really want to be roleplaying, but wont because of the omnipresence of male creators.

QuoteI don't think it is that easy to separate them, though. Getting paid is a crucial part of work, and if you ignore it, then you're overlooking a key part of the picture. For example, say there is an industry where women were 1.5x more likely to get hired, but at average 25% less pay than men. By ignoring pay, you'd hold that industry up as a shining example of progress.

If the conversation was more general, I could see your point. But the reaction here is to a talent contest to ostensibly hire women creators, with the implication that will address a gender imbalance. I doubt, of course, that a press release by Green Ronin simply stating "hey, we plan to pay our female employees equal wages to male employees" would be as effective an advertising campaign. But I think that despite any connections that might be made, that the opportunity for work is distinct enough from the wage gap that it can at least be addressed on its own, or that addressing one by implication will eventually effect the other.

Quote from: jhkim;956800I don't think it is that easy to separate them, though. Getting paid is a crucial part of work, and if you ignore it, then you're overlooking a key part of the picture. For example, say there is an industry where women were 1.5x more likely to get hired, but at average 25% less pay than men. By ignoring pay, you'd hold that industry up as a shining example of progress.

For an example of narratives-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRgQJFbaLLo&t=9s

5:23 is the big reveal, and I won't spoil it because it's

Spoiler

hilarious

, but note that the rest of the video

Spoiler

is the two participants talking about the wage gap, when their big example was a black woman earning 20k a year more than a white man.

Yes, it's just one example. But it's there. And the denial is astounding.

Quote from: CRKrueger;956745So you honestly consider the role-playing hobby today to be in the same place that the Science Fiction Literature industry was in over FORTY YEARS ago?

Bullshit me all you want for whatever your reason is, but you can't lie to Indy.

I worked briefly with Donna Barr many a year ago and have never heard of her "hiding" her identity. She used to be, and may still be a major con presence so its pretty hard to hide that. Ive never heard of her using her initials only. If she did it must have been really early and/or brief. Or someones spindoctoring what happened.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;956805Yes, it's just one example.

Which unfortunately, kind of makes it meaningless.

Spoiler

Except as an example of how a minority woman can still feel this vast sense of entitlement and persecution complex after finding out her white male peer makes 20k less than her for the same job

.

There is no wage gap.  There is an EARNINGS gap.  It's looking at the total earnings for a life time.  And women do earn less, but there are major factors.  Namely marriage, women tend to work less when they get married, whether or not they have children, for example.

/off topic.

This advert is still running afoul of the Title VII of the Civil Right Act of 1964.

Quote from: Simlasa;956685This is a point I often raise when this stuff comes up. There are plenty of female-dominated hobbies, some of them I participate in. I've never seen any women wringing their hands over how to get more men involved. Sometimes I suspect that a portion of this energy is lonely maladroids looking for 'dates'.

That would be the 'white knights' many people talk about. I'm sure there are some of those out there. I prefer old-fashioned knights.

There are also some people who hate any talk about what is 'typical' for men or women. As if the moment someone realizes that they are atypical in some way, then that makes them less worthy or something. I am not anywhere near the norm in some ways, so I never saw what the problem was with being 'atypical' or against the run of the mill*.

*For instance, I have always known that men tend to fall for slightly younger women, while women tend to fall for slightly older men, statistically speaking. I have no problem accepting that this general observation is true, even though I myself have sometimes had a tendency to fall for women who were a couple of years older, for whatever reason.