Friday, March 28, 2008

Knuckleheads And Energy And Time

The following paragraph is from Advice From "Becoming a Writer" by Zuska:

Time and energy spent in efforts to educate knuckleheads about women's abilities and the barriers they face is time and energy that can't be spent for some other creative endeavor. And yet, the knuckleheads and the barriers must be dealt with. For even the energy required just to manage one's reactions to the endless series of knuckleheads and institutional barriers, without actually trying to do anything to educate the knuckleheads or remove the barriers, is energy no longer available for science. Possibly one of the most aggravating aspects of this work is that those dishing out the harassment and discrimination, those engaged in behavior that supports and enables institutional barriers, are the very ones who will tell you there is nothing for you to be so upset about. You are: overreacting, taking things out of context, lacking a sense of humor, misunderstanding, complaining about things that are just "normal", magnifying the significance of a possibly regrettable, but singular, slip-up. You are accused of seeing sexism everywhere, because you dare to point it out somewhere.
I admit to knowing pretty much nothing about sexism in the field of science. When I read the paragraph that I have borrowed from Zuska I think of two things. First, how much time and energy is wasted by scientists, and other rational people, because of creationists and intelligent designers (the knuckleheads). Second, I think of how much time and energy is wasted by people going to various religious ceremonies and praying. Time and energy spent saying and hearing the same thing over and over again must certainly dull the creative mind into some sort of unthinking rote-loving slush. I feel especially angry and sad when I think of children being forced to go through all of the propaganda of organized religion. I realize that people do all of this because they think it is the right thing to do. I simply disagree. It would take a much longer post to go into why I disagree. For now, I just wanted to express what the paragraph by Zuska made me think of.

0 comments - Post a comment :

Post a Comment