Feminism & Unconscious Bias

Statistics show that when women and men interview for the same job blindly and asked for extra compensation or bonuses; when the interviewers find out their gender “they were 28 percent less interested in hiring the female candidate. They also judged her as 27 percent less likable.”

The challenge when confronting these biases is that the more we know other people have them, the less likely we are to try to change them in ourselves. When we find out other people have biases too, changing ourselves doesn’t almost seem so important. We are seeing this response in children as they are watching abuse go mainstream in the election. (Like current concerns with kids as they watch Donald Trump.) Other studies show that these biases are so entrenched that as the number of women in a profession grows, the compensation goes down - after all, if a woman can do it, it can’t be that complicated or important, can it? 

Change begins with us...

In Episode 2 of the Brew Theology Podcast, Denver pub theologians, Liz Wolfert, Meghan Ramirez, Alex Mikulas and Janel Apps-Ramsey along with Ryan Miller dive into this relevant and hot topic. 

Resources:

Who You Hate - Showing how we are prejudiced.

How Vector Space Mathematics Reveals the Hidden Sexism in Language

The Hidden Brain - Book or Podcast

Trump and the Effect on Kids (long but worth the read)

As Women Take Over a Male-Dominated Field, the Pay Drops

Things Women Are Expected To Do to Smooth Over Bias (Not funny)

Gender-Career Bias Test - Take the Gender-Career Bias Test

Why Being a Woman Isn’t Hillary’s Trump Card