Gender bias in photography analyzed (by some interesting empirical data) and an essay

DREW WILEY · Oct 30, 2015

I forgot to mention Hollywood and entertainment in general - remarkably big bucks, and actually active in several areas of the state, and then
defense and pharmaceuticals (including biotech) - just as big around here as Silicon Valley, maybe bigger overall, though software and defense are basically married. Consumer electronics are only part of a far bigger picture. And alas, illegal drugs are big business, even if socially parasitic.

CatLABS · Oct 30, 2015

DREW WILEY said:
being male and white puts you at a distinct disadvantage.

I would love to live in your world where whites receive minority treatment in the USA and where women have equal pay and rights.
Unfortunately, reality has other plans for me .

The female-to-male earnings ratio was 0.77 in 2012, meaning that, in 2012, female FTYR workers earned 77% as much as male FTYR workers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_pay_gap#United_States

CatLABS · Oct 30, 2015

Perhaps you should read this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_inequality_in_the_United_States
All about the world we all live in, which seems to be light yeas from Drew's place of residence.

Sirius Glass · Oct 30, 2015

Michael R 1974 said:
Isn't New Jersey the wealthiest state?

New Jersey is the Mafta's wealthiest state.

BrianShaw · Oct 30, 2015

And which is the Mafia's second wealthiest state: Chicago or Las Vegas?

Theo Sulphate · Oct 31, 2015

CatLABS said:
Museum's, especially publicly funded ones to not have buyers.

Why care about museums then? Among all the venues that photographs or other art can be sold, the buyers themselves decide what they value. For a photo or painting someone likes, whether the artist is male or female has little or nothing to do with it. If fewer women, as a percentage of those submitting works, are making sales, then other factors are causing this.

CatLABS said:
Often, in our sad state world, women, people of color and other marginalized groups have less access by way of default, in part, due to the long history of white male dominance and control. Its not a level playing field, and not everyone has the same starting position.

That is called begging the question: a fallacious argument form where you take as a premise the assumed truth of your conclusion. Here's a news flash: being a white male does not give you a golden passport to opportunities and success. There are plenty of white males that have had to work their tails off and sacrifice and suffer just to get out of a crap life and hope for something better. They're not starting ahead of others and their path is not smoother. You don't hear about it because they don't beat the drum of victimization. You don't see that and you won't ever believe it because your never ending mantra is:

1. Men have created a power structure to subjugate women.
2. White men have done this to control non-whites
3. Old white men are the worst of all.

You can find all the studies and statistics you want to "prove" this. That is not reality.

Here's a question: why do you suppose non-white people from a third world country can come to the U.S., from a vastly different culture and a different language, and then - within a generation - their family owns a business and their kids are at the top of the class at university? Why is that possible on a large scale when some people born here, knowing the culture and language, don't even graduate high school? Why? Because they come here and see the opportunities rather than feel they're owed something.

Sirius Glass · Oct 31, 2015

BrianShaw said:
And which is the Mafia's second wealthiest state: Chicago or Las Vegas?

Chicago, they were thrown out of Las Vegas.

pbromaghin · Oct 31, 2015

CatLABS said:
Perhaps you should read this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_inequality_in_the_United_States
All about the world we all live in, which seems to be light yeas from Drew's place of residence.

Omer, I would recommend that you pay attention to the first sentence in this cite. The world does not change immediately, as you wish it would. The United States, about which you complain so bitterly, is, and has been for the last 250 years, the fastest-evolving society on earth. Europe simply can not keep with us. Witness their completely fumbled reaction to the Mideast migrant crisis.

pbromaghin · Oct 31, 2015

There are plenty of white males that have had to work their tails off and sacrifice and suffer just to get out of a crap life and hope for something better. They're not starting ahead of others and their path is not smoother.[/QUOTE said:
Absolutely. Contrary to popular belief, the "Old Boys Network" was not designed to keep just the minorities and women out. It was meant to keep EVERYBODY out. Being a white male is not sufficient to guarantee success. The genetic lottery gave me my mother's intelligence and my father's good sense. But I had to listen my wife, WORK MY ASS OFF, and make a few, very key, decisions to get where I am today. Luck counts.

CatLABS · Oct 31, 2015

Theo Sulphate said:
Why care about museums then?

Museums are official (and in some cases public) institutes with an official standing, and which sets the tone, and often marks the position of the art world as a whole with regards to various trends.

Theo Sulphate said:
...and then - within a generation - their family owns a business and their kids are at the top of the class at university? Why is that possible on a large scale....

Upward mobility is a rarity, that should better be called a myth, even for most white people, especially when it comes to the arts but in general, in all walks of life. Anecdotal mentions here are not welcome, and you can keep the statistics and overt political tones to another thread, please.

blansky · Oct 31, 2015

CatLABS said:
I would love to live in your world where whites receive minority treatment in the USA and where women have equal pay and rights.
Unfortunately, reality has other plans for me .

The female-to-male earnings ratio was 0.77 in 2012, meaning that, in 2012, female FTYR workers earned 77% as much as male FTYR workers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_pay_gap#United_States

Hang in there.

The times they are a changin'.

BrianShaw · Oct 31, 2015

blansky said:
Hang in there.

The times they are a changin'.

I'm on the cutting edge of that evolution - there already and living that reality. It has taught me one thing: people of color and women are no less bigoted and racist than the old white men. Sometimes even moreso in the logic of "getting even" or getting compensated for past societal ills. that is no less of a societal ill however.

blansky · Oct 31, 2015

BrianShaw said:
I'm on the cutting edge of that evolution - there already and living that reality. It has taught me one thing: people of color and women are no less bigoted and racist than the old white men. Sometimes even moreso in the logic of "getting even" or getting compensated for past societal ills. that is no less of a societal ill however.

One has to factor human nature in every situation.

And it's not necessarily getting even. It can be new found power, and the exhilaration of exercising it.

The quest for power is one of human's primal urges. And very very few have the temperament or the enlightenment to handle it benevolently.

Civilization is merely a myth we deceive ourselves with, and we rarely behave in a truly civilized manner.

And our worst injustices always occur when we know we can get away with it.

Nodda Duma · Oct 31, 2015

Gender bias in photography analyzed (by some interesting empirical data) and ...

blansky said:
I love it when your inner redneck comes out.

And it doesn't have very far to travel.

What's wrong with rednecks? Stereotyping again?

Bias is bias, right?

blansky · Oct 31, 2015

Nodda Duma said:
What's wrong with rednecks? Stereotyping again?

Bias is bias, right?

And rednecks are rednecks.

Nodda Duma · Oct 31, 2015

Gender bias in photography analyzed (by some interesting empirical data) and ...

I'm sorry but if you insist on others avoiding bias then you should do the same.

If, as your statement implies, you can't avoid it then don't hold "rednecks" to a higher standard.

blansky · Oct 31, 2015

Nodda Duma said:
I'm sorry but if you insist on others avoiding bias then you should do the same.

If, as your statement implies, you can't avoid it then don't hold "rednecks" to a higher standard.

That's a statement that has been debated.

Are tolerant people somehow obligated to tolerate intolerant people.

Does tolerance mean that when confronted with people who do mean or spiteful things, they should be treated with tolerance.

My answer is no. They should be called out on it.

Because intolerance is generally a form of willful ignorance acted upon.

YMMD

Alan Klein · Oct 31, 2015

Getting back to the arts and photography, my daughter's wedding was photographed and filmed by a company owned by a women photographer. It cost a pretty penny. Sure women are prejudiced against. But who isn't today? Jews, blacks, Mormons, Catholics, Christians, white males, Muslims, invalids, fat people, Yankees in the south, southerners in the north, etc etc. This happens in every society. But America is so big and divergent and free that if you want to succeed and work hard at it, you will because there are always people willing to pay for good work and quality regardless of the background of person providing it. And don't negate the fact that there's lots of people of good will who are only too glad to lend a hand to someone who's decent and hard working and trying to move up.

blansky · Oct 31, 2015

Alan Klein said:
Getting back to the arts and photography, my daughter's wedding was photographed and filmed by a company owned by a women photographer. It cost a pretty penny. Sure women are prejudiced against. But who isn't today? Jews, blacks, Mormons, Catholics, Christians, white males, Muslims, invalids, fat people, Yankees in the south, southerners in the north, etc etc. This happens in every society. But America is so big and divergent and free that if you want to succeed and work hard at it, you will because there are always people willing to pay for good work and quality regardless of the background of person providing it. And don't negate the fact that there's lots of people of good will who are only too glad to lend a hand to someone who's decent and hard working and trying to move up.

Although I agree with your statement fully. That doesn't really mean we should disregard the statistics and realities of the past and the present.

But I do believe that things are slowly improving.

I think a lot of people, and surprisingly here, on a site with a fair amount of people over 50-60, forget the horrors of black life, the progress of women and other minorities and the advances that have happened since mid last century. If you were born in a white world in the 60s and on, you may be in a bit of denial.

Even today with the information coming out since Ferguson and other areas, not even related to the shootings, white people are starting to realize that living while black is not the same as living while white. From the constant harassment of police, to the use of traffic stops to help finance the city budgets, the use of courts to extort massive fines on top of small fines, to the "broken windows" campaigns etc etc. Add in the failed drug war, and the turning of an entire race into felons for possession of now legal (in some states) drugs. Add into the payday loans companies, extorting unbelievable interesting rates that make the Mafia look like a benevolent organization, which poor and minorities are the main targets, to just the basic impossibility to get ahead, white people are starting to open their eyes.

But I do agree with your statement.

Nodda Duma · Oct 31, 2015

Gender bias in photography analyzed (by some interesting empirical data) and ...

blansky said:
That's a statement that has been debated.

Are tolerant people somehow obligated to tolerate intolerant people.

Does tolerance mean that when confronted with people who do mean or spiteful things, they should be treated with tolerance.

My answer is no. They should be called out on it.

Because intolerance is generally a form of willful ignorance acted upon.

YMMD

I agree completely that intolerance should be called out. Hence why I responded to your comment. You sound extremely ignorant about what you think a "redneck" actually is. Substitute the word "women" for "rednecks" in your statements and repeat them to yourself...challenge your own perception of a people you are obviously unfamiliar with.

Don't be so close-minded. Don't be a hypocrite. Either accept everyone has a bias and that's ok, or work to eradicate it in your own thoughts before asking others to do the same.

Theo Sulphate · Oct 31, 2015

blansky said:
...
Civilization is merely a myth we deceive ourselves with, and we rarely behave in a truly civilized manner...

You write that from "the wine country of northern California" from the comfort of your home on an advanced electronic device, posting to an international discussion forum dedicated to a hobby participated in by those who have a fair bit of discretionary income. Without civilized behaviour, none of that would be possible.

If we treated each other horribly, the whole world would be like sections of the Middle East today. Everything would collapse into anarchy and chaos.

Barbarism indeed exists in the world, but we really have come a very long way since Homo Habilis, 2.8 million years ago.

blansky said:
Does tolerance mean that when confronted with people who do mean or spiteful things, they should be treated with tolerance.

Absolutely. Because you've made a subjective judgement call. Otherwise, I and those who think just like me could call any group "intolerant" and shut you down. That is what has been happening in universities (supposedly a place where highly diverse ideas should be presented and questioned). Rather than protest someone, or debate someone, they don't want that person to have a voice anywhere. Ironically, those people are the most intolerant of all.

blansky · Oct 31, 2015

OK.

As tolerant people should we tolerate, say, drunk drivers, or wife beaters, or child porn?

Obviously, of course not.

And just because we label ourselves a tolerant, which, by the way is a process that uses the brain, not the human reflex to dislike "the other", doesn't mean we have perfected it.

We are a work in progress. And societies worldwide are embracing that move towards tolerance.

But just by calling ourselves tolerant certainly doesn't mean that we should tolerate everything.

And the connotation of redneck is no longer really regional as it once was, but instead a word used to describe intolerant behavior that generally targets other people, and usually those that can't fight back.

So to say that it's intolerant to condemn the behavior of rednecks, is just the circular debate that I answered earlier.

Theo Sulphate · Oct 31, 2015

CatLABS said:
...

Upward mobility is a rarity, that should better be called a myth

Tell that to the millions of immigrants, including my family, who've come here since 1900 and who continue to come here and prosper. You are, quite simply, wrong.

CatLABS said:
Anecdotal mentions here are not welcome, and you can keep the statistics and overt political tones to another thread, please.

If you are going to posture as the arbiter of what's welcome here and also dislike anecdotal, statistical, or politically toned remarks, consider your own post #1 and #48.

Theo Sulphate · Oct 31, 2015

blansky said:
...
And the connotation of redneck is no longer really regional as it once was, but instead a word used to describe intolerant behavior that generally targets other people, and usually those that can't fight back.

Well, without using highly charged labels which definitely mean something vastly different to you than it does to me, I'll ask this: would you object to Condoleeza Rice speaking at a university?

Nodda Duma · Oct 31, 2015

Sorry blansky, but you just don't get it. Equating rednecks to wife-beaters, drunk drivers, and child porn is absolutely ridiculous. You basically just called most of rural America sub-human and you don't even realize it.

Gender bias in photography analyzed (by some interesting empirical data) and an essay

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