“A man will take care of you”

While obtaining my BA in Philosophy, I realized immediately the vastness in the gender gap. It was madly intimidating the first few weeks when you realize that in most of the higher level philosophy classes, you are indeed the ONLY female. I quickly came in embrace my place outside of the boys club. In a positive light, it drove me to become a better writer and harder worker. I cannot tell you how may times I got the under the breath “She’s too pretty to have anything good to say” whispers. Or the slack jawed expression that I would receive when I would have to confirm time and time again to my fellow male students that YES this is my major and YES I am sure. The one that really takes the cake was a sentence from a professor that goes as follows, “It’s really not worth me explaining because you’re attractive and attractive females do not need to be overly educated to get what they want. A man will take care of you.”

So to all of my female philosophers out there, STAY, do not apologize for being yourself, we need you!

You can be a supportive wife of a philosopher

I did my M.A in philosophy in east Asia, which is more of a Confucian Tradition. When I was interviewed for admission, one of the Confucian professors said that girls are simply not fit for higher education. When I took a Confucian course taught by another professor, I heard him say something like “the contribution females can make to philosophy is to become a supportive wife of a great philosopher.”

Whose girlfriend are you?

Five or six years back I attended a philosophy party hosted by one of male grad student cohorts- the party goers where almost exclusively either members of my department (past and current graduate students, and assistant professors) or their partners. As a conversation starter, an assistant professor (who I had met at least five or six times before) turned to me and asked “So, whose girlfriend are you?” I guess my gender had rendered it inconceivable that I might have been one of the new grad students.

An Open Call for Reasons to Stay

I am about to start my PhD at an excellent Leiter ranked program. I have a BA and and MA from excellent schools. I have worked closely with ground breaking philosophers in my field. I have published, I have an excellent teaching resume, phenomenal letters of recommendation, and moreover I love my job. I am a good philosopher, and I am thinking about leaving philosophy.

I have been a secretary and a chauffeur. I have been disingenuously promised research assistantships and letters of recommendation, in return for dinner dates and car rides. I have been asked if I was married while my colleagues have been asked what they think. I have been told that I’m both cute and idiotic. I have passed on professional opportunities because I am a woman, and no one would believe that I deserved those opportunities — accepting would make me seem like a slut, since men make it on merit, and women make it in bed. So, ironically, I have been praised as professional for having passed on professional opportunities. I have been the lone woman presenting at the conference, and I have been the woman called a bitch for declining sexual relations with one of the institutions of hosts. I think I have just about covered the gamut of truly egregiously atrocious sexist behaviour. So I just have this one question that I think I need answered: Is the choice between doing philosophy, and living under these conditions, or saving yourself, and leaving the discipline?

This is an open call for reasons to stay.

Because this blog does not allow comments, I’m cross-posting to Feminist Philosophers, where you can reply.

Whose wife are you?

I’m a female grad student now several years into my program. At the beginning of every academic year my department has a potluck-style party to welcome the new grad students. In my first year when I walked into the party holding a bowl of pasta salad, I was terrified and barely knew anyone there. I did, however, recognize the female prof standing in the entryway, one of the most prominent philosophers in our department. She looked at me, and the bowl of food I was holding, and said: “You can go put that on the table. By the way, who’s wife are you?”