Reviewed a revised/resubmitted manuscript for a journal today. In the response to reviewers, the authors consistently referred to all three reviewers as being male. Him. His. He.
WTF?
Surely they could have used he/she, the neutral, albeit maddening plural, they/them, or just referred to the reviewers as ... reviewers.
This made me a little cranky. Why would one automatically assume that, not just one, but ALL reviewers were male?
Ironically, the first and senior authors of the paper were both female.
Sigh.
Thus endeth the rant. Bring forth the pre-dinner chips.
bye bye week
10 hours ago
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteWere, by any chance, ALL three reviewers mean? So mean that these reviews could have only be written by menz?
ReplyDeleteI was one of the original reviewers. Two reviewers (of which I was one) gave very favorable comments.
ReplyDeleteI am a 'she' and I have less of a problem with referring to or being referred to as a generic 'he' than (s)he. Overly political correctness makes me itchy. On the other hand, I was always mistaken for a boy growing up (looks and name), so maybe I've just become numb. For reviewers I always use "reviewer", though. Makes it less personal as well.
ReplyDeleteThe best recourse is to use 'the reviewer' wherever 'he' or 'she' is required.
ReplyDeleteI wonder how it would be if, when you are writing a response to reviewers, you refer to all reviewers as 'She'. My guess is that no one would try this, for fear of pissing off one of the reviewers. Probably REVIEWER #3.
PiT,
ReplyDeleteI get your point here...for sure. But can I please please please beg with you not to degenerate into one of those whiny female scientist bloggers obsessed with their gender? You're like the ONLY female scientist blogger who has a gender neutral id: the name "PiT"...gives no gender clues! Love you! I know this one post is probably not going to set the tone for your blog, but I am scared I am going to see my favourite blogger descend into the dark side....where paranoid...9/11 truther type women scientist bloggers complain about things like the absence of a student lounge preventing women from coming into science... I am not kidding, unfortunately.
As for the event you refer to, its obviously a faux pas on the part of the authors.
AB
The "only"? Hahahhahaha! You need to get out more...
ReplyDeleteAB - STFU
ReplyDeleteGood, PiT. I can feel your anger...Take your weapon. Your journey towards the dark side will be complete. Join me in my efforts to make the world full of gender neutral language, mulitcultural student lounges, and devoid of sexist and racist jokes! Together, we can lay waste to all that is dear to white d00ds! Ultimately with this Death Star I am building, we can no doubt destroy western science completely merely by refusing to smile on command! Ahahahahahahahahahaha! AB can suck it!
ReplyDeleteObviously, we femi-scientists, when not whining or menstruating, hide light sabers in our scarves just for this purpose, Darth. I guess that is what TSA fears, and why they xray my accessory and not my husband's tie...
ReplyDeleteI am sorry for my comment. I should have known it would make the crazies come for you. I would request you to please delete my comment.
ReplyDeleteAB
I would request that you leave it. I find it enlightening.
ReplyDeletePoor PiT, the crazies have come for you! Your mortal soul is in danger.
ReplyDeleteOh good. The crazies came for me a long time ago. Now we can all have a crazies party! WOOO!
ReplyDeleteMaybe it's because I'm male, but I think there is nothing wrong with a generic "he". In this case it's weird that they didn't choose a neutral "the reviewers", but is it really a drama?
ReplyDeleteI find it quite annoying that every document now has to be gender sensitive giving always the male and female form/title/profession... Increases each document by 30% in size and makes them less readable.
just my thoughts
Is this dood a dipshit, an asswipe, a douche or a dickweed?
ReplyDeleteJust my thoughts.
It's a 30% turn for the douche, with a generic "asswipe" for drama.
ReplyDeleteJust some shoe puke.
jc
FYI, I am not white. But, I am curious why so many of these good liberal outraged commenters would assume that I am. Is it that just because I hold a certain view I must belong to a certain race? Hmmm.... surely that's not racist.
ReplyDeleteAB
I agree with AB most of the science blogs I read by women complain about how hard it is to be a women and how people don't say "she" enough. My SO is a female and she is very successful and SHE has never had to scratch her way through the hidden bigotry in science. The female post-doc in the lab I work says everyone treats her "too nice". I have never met a woman scientist in person who has ever complained to me about discrimination and I HAVE ASKED ABOUT IT, so how come all the fucking blogs do? There are plenty of successful women scientists that I know and I have asked them about discrimination and they said they have never felt significantly discriminated against. I am not saying there is no discrimination against people of course there is but it is not just women and honestly scientists seem to be the least discriminatory people I have ever met. Get over yourselves already....
ReplyDeleteJZ,
ReplyDeleteHave you read this:
http://bluelabcoats.wordpress.com/2010/05/17/there-is-no-gender-descrimination-in-science/
Have to agree with JZ and AB -- am freshly tenured Associate Professor and I haven't run into that many problems at all. Most responses to reviews I have seen always refer to the reviewer as he/she....I am not only female, but am also gay and bi-racial. So I guess I'm a walking target but still made it over the tenure fence :-)
ReplyDeleteKeep going, PiT -- you're doing well. Secure that RO1, pick your battles carefully and keep cranking out your kick ass data.
wow, I didn't think this was going to turn anecdotal this quick.
ReplyDelete"I've never been told anything bad, therefore no one is really being hurt". can you spell science?
And for the anon who said "Maybe it's because I'm male, but I think there is nothing wrong with a generic "he". In this case it's weird that they didn't choose a neutral "the reviewers", but is it really a drama?" - why don't we just call everyone he all the time, since we really don't need to feel that upset about it.
I wouldn't care half as much if I didn't see and hear all these men who are clearly offended when someone calls them SHE. I mean, is it really that much of an issue?!?!?!
(irony is in here. promise.)
PiT> No, not insensitive. Reviewer are a common word would be more appropriate. Although, I have to say after reading this I'd be very tempted to respond to my own letter with "Reviewer 1. She asked this and that" since we don't care about gender titles.... right...
I try to use "Reviewer 1" but you can only do so much without using a pronoun. I too have been guilty of using "he" simply because I figured "chances of this getting to a guy in my field are very high" (extremely true in my field) and I must say I don't mind too much when I see a "he" because reviewers are not known... I review so many papers that I really don't think about this issue much. I recently reviewed a paper slightly outside of my specialty, written by two women, and they referred to the referee as "he". A lot of foreign authors have different sensibilities and decorum and are not in tune with using "s/he" or "they" as gender nonspecific pronoun equivalents. When you are reviewing people's paper, trust me, the last thing they want to do is to piss you (the reviewer) off; they just want the paper published and would address you however you wish if that would ensure no ill will against the paper (and if they knew how you wanted to be addressed). So I try not to read too much into it...
ReplyDeleteI find the use of "they, them" etc when referred to a single individual, all in the name of gender balance, utterly ridiculous (besides resulting in bad English and being against the most elementary rules of grammar -- "if anyone needs information, send them to the front desk"). I also find he/she awkward. Me, personally, I pick one.
ReplyDeleteWow. I am shocked to see how many commenters think it's okay to use "he" because the alternatives seem awkward or inconvenient. I would be quite offended to see a response worded that way.
ReplyDelete@ Massimo: while "they" is certainly a plural pronoun, a lot of people use it as a singular-pronoun equivalent in cases where gender ambiguity is needed. The use of "they/them" is fairly frequent in spoken English and while not permitted in written English, some people believe it will eventually become permissible.
ReplyDeleteTake a look at Grammar Girl's take on what one should do when wanting to be gender-neutral (link below). See the poll near the end: about 40% are pedantic about "his/her" and a similar percentage are fine about using "their".
Grammar Girl's post on generic personal pronoun
Anyway, I am sure some people would argue that Grammar Girl is not a supreme authority on grammar, but she does give clear advice in a straighforward fashion, which I appreciate.
I'm late to the party here, sorry. I think it is ridiculous to complain about using gender neutral pronouns as being "inconvenient". I find it insidious and insulting. I've never had difficulty writing a response to a reviewer (even dreaded #3) and maintaining gender-neutrality. It really isn't THAT hard. And, for all you folks that are convinced that women aren't discriminated against in science-isn't the fact that you can "assume" all the reviewers are male an argument against this view?
ReplyDelete"And, for all you folks that are convinced that women aren't discriminated against in science-isn't the fact that you can "assume" all the reviewers are male an argument against this view?"
ReplyDeleteStandard bullcrap! You can typically safely assume that the reviewers are all male because of the gender ratio in science. These days women earn a lot more college degrees than men, does that prove that colleges are discriminating against men?
An observation needs to be backed up by a mechanism to be usable for making conclusions. You have to EXPLAIN how the discrimination happens, you have to EXPLAIN why the discrimination does not affect women at school and college levels, you have to EXPLAIN why the discrimination shows up only in sciences (and seems to increase as the branch of science becomes more and more theoretical and strictly logical), as opposed to fields like law and medicine where there is a lot of public contact (and hence more room for prejudices to play havoc)
Without plausible mechanisms to explain these differences and answer the obvious questions, the theory of gender discrimination in science has the same intellectual credibility as the theory of intelligent design.
You can typically safely assume that the reviewers are all male because of the gender ratio in science. (in america)
ReplyDeleteFunny, I said "I pick one", I did not say "I pick the male one"... was there an assumption made somewhere about what my choice would have to be, given that I am male ?
ReplyDeleteI happen to say "she" most of the time. Am I discriminating ? Well, maybe, but to me to jump from singular to plural in mid sentence is an obscenity (sorry GMP, I am sure it will be regarded as officially acceptable soon because language is not static and immutable, but I shall continue to be disturbed by it nonetheless ;-)
I recommend that anyone who thinks there's nothing wrong with a generic 'he' should read Douglas Hofstadter's clever take on how the issue would look if our language had a default racist bias:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/purity.html
I agree with AB most of the science blogs I read by women complain about how hard it is to be a women and how people don't say "she" enough. My SO is a female and she is very successful and SHE has never had to scratch her way through the hidden bigotry in science. The female post-doc in the lab I work says everyone treats her "too nice". I have never met a woman scientist in person who has ever complained to me about discrimination and I HAVE ASKED ABOUT IT, so how come all the fucking blogs do? There are plenty of successful women scientists that I know and I have asked them about discrimination and they said they have never felt significantly discriminated against. I am not saying there is no discrimination against people of course there is but it is not just women and honestly scientists seem to be the least discriminatory people I have ever met. Get over yourselves already....
ReplyDeleteUuhhhhh... you say this and then you wonder why none of the women you know personally talk to you about it? Maybe because they know you'd be a douchebag and just make them feel shittier.