Woman inventors and other inspiring and influential women
No matter how well intentioned articles like this one are, they make a disservice to the cause of women's equality. The truth of the matter is that, with very few exceptions, most human beings of importance are male and white. Also, there are a lot more exceptions to this rule involving race than gender. Think Obama vs. Clinton (not that Clinton, his other half).
This is, of course, the reason why one of the biggest challenges of feminism is to establish beyond any possible fallacious argument that the main cause for this huge discrepancy is not women's "proved-by-the-facts" biologic inferiority, but men's proved-by-the-facts social privilege. This is only a first step to accept that this privilege is a gross injustice in society and we have a moral imperative to revert it by allowing women to realize their potential. Something that is beneficial not only to women but to the entire society. Once women are indeed given this opportunity, then Google engineers can go about and argue about biological differences as the cause for the gender gap. Before that, just shut up and let women do their work and pay them a fair salary, please.
To try to suggest that there are women of worth that have been neglected or forgotten because they were women, which I see so many feminists doing, leads to pathetic results that only serve to "prove" women's inferiority. Let me quote from the aforementioned article to illustrate my point:
I said above that the purpose of such articles is to prove that there are women of worth that have been neglected or forgotten. I am not so stupid that I cannot understand that lists of exceptional women like this one, often have another purpose, that of proving that women can, if allowed, make relevant contributions to human progress. The problem is that, even when this is true, the difference between the former and the latter is not always clearly made, as the above quote shows. And this is only a example of how feminist material can turn out to be highly offensive to women.
This is, of course, the reason why one of the biggest challenges of feminism is to establish beyond any possible fallacious argument that the main cause for this huge discrepancy is not women's "proved-by-the-facts" biologic inferiority, but men's proved-by-the-facts social privilege. This is only a first step to accept that this privilege is a gross injustice in society and we have a moral imperative to revert it by allowing women to realize their potential. Something that is beneficial not only to women but to the entire society. Once women are indeed given this opportunity, then Google engineers can go about and argue about biological differences as the cause for the gender gap. Before that, just shut up and let women do their work and pay them a fair salary, please.
To try to suggest that there are women of worth that have been neglected or forgotten because they were women, which I see so many feminists doing, leads to pathetic results that only serve to "prove" women's inferiority. Let me quote from the aforementioned article to illustrate my point:
Asked to name important inventors and you might start with Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell or Leonardo da Vinci.What about them indeed? Is this a joke?! Thomas Edison: invented the light bulb and the electric guitar, Bell: the telephone, da Vinci: not only was one of the greatest painters of all times, but also a notable inventor and scientist. The latter lived in the 15th Century, the reason why his inventions are now obsolete and I am not able to name any by heart (which is the way this list was written). As for Mary Anderson, I did not know but she invented the windscreen wiper. Yep. How unforgivably ignorant of me not to know who made that particularly ground-breaking invention. As for Tsukamoto, she invented stem cell isolation. A bit more relevant that any sort of wiper, but, truth be told, only experts can name male inventors of similar importance. Oh, but let us not forget to mention the last inventor in this list of grandees of the humankind: Elizabeth Magie. She invented the rules of the game of Monopoly. The world as we know it will not be the world as we know it without this greatest of all great inventions. I must repeat: Is this a joke?! In addition, I am left wondering why are all of the women in this article American, which partly explains why the list is so pathetic. But that is another subject.
But what about Mary Anderson? Or Ann Tsukamoto?
I said above that the purpose of such articles is to prove that there are women of worth that have been neglected or forgotten. I am not so stupid that I cannot understand that lists of exceptional women like this one, often have another purpose, that of proving that women can, if allowed, make relevant contributions to human progress. The problem is that, even when this is true, the difference between the former and the latter is not always clearly made, as the above quote shows. And this is only a example of how feminist material can turn out to be highly offensive to women.
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