Comment by ryanobjc | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ryanobjc | Hacker News Reader

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Sexism is more than "safer to talk shit to a woman compared to a man" as you say in your article.

Sexism comes out in target choice, and the strength of which ones chases their prey, and the vehemence of attacks.

I do strongly believe that Cuddy was overly punished for being a woman, and being prominent in the field. Everyone loves when the "high and might" come "crashing down" -> the underdog stories and the desire for retribution are sought after more powerfully than (a) justified and (b) end worthiness of the goal.

I don't think anyone can honestly say that this has improved the field and made science better. It just means now that there is money and recognition to be made being attack dogs. That's hardly better.

As for Gelman, he wasn't portrayed in a great light, but I think it is fair. He's willing to encourage incivility and outright sexism and hostility as long as he doesnt have to talk to someone he disagrees with. That's the baseline definition of a coward there. And yes, I would discuss that with him in person and call him such a thing to his face.

> Sexism comes out in target choice, and the strength of which ones chases their prey, and the vehemence of attacks.

Gelman regularly eviscerates the research of Brian Wansink on his blog, in the exact same way that he did to Cuddy.

He's considerably harder on Wansink than he was on Cuddy, actually.

> I do strongly believe that Cuddy was overly punished for being a woman, and being prominent in the field.

Theres a pattern of successful women receiving extreme levels of hate (Kathy Sierra et al). I'm not aware of this happening to guys.

>I'm not aware of this happening to guys.

Can you be more specific? Or do you mean this in a general sense? Because isn't this obvious ignorance if so?

Apologies, I could have been more clear.

What I mean is that I haven't heard of guys receiving death, rape etc threats accompanied by doxxing (ie 'this is his address, let's go get him') at the levels I've heard about with women[0].

[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamergate_controversy

What does this have to do with gamergate? If you've never seen guy/gal on guy death threats/doxxing, then I'd say you're just being will fully ignorant.

I can be ignorant without being wilful about it :) TBH, I avoid forums where that kind of thing goes on.

But what I'm doing here is drawing parallels between large groups of people self-organizing against a prominent, successful person.

A few examples come immediately to mind: Adam Orth, Tim Hunt, donglegate, and shirtgate.

It's interesting that (except for Adam Orth) the men involved, who were factually the victims of massive harassment, were portrayed as the villains by most of the media for minor infractions of progressive political values.

Edit: Just found another, an electoral college member who received death threats for voting for Trump (as he was required to).

http://thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/in-the-know/308226-elec...

You haven't heard of it because the reporting and coverage is biased, not because it doesn't happen.

That's similar to the situation with sexual harassment, sexual assault, and domestic violence.

It's not that men aren't often the victims of these things (studies report that they are, at nearly the same rate as women[1, 2]). It's that men rarely report these things, and when they do, receive little sympathy, coverage, or justice.

1: http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2014/04/male_...

2: http://domesticviolencestatistics.org/men-the-overlooked-vic...

Thanks. Amazing stats in the Slate article. And the Adam Orth example in particular has strong parallels with high-profile examples of attacks on women.

Given the level of heat these discussions arouse, I understand the comments re modding in the item earlier today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15507821

Online discussion certainly does inspire bad behavior. Hacker News is the only place I know of where people who disagree can still have civil discussions.

I'm in an adjacent academic field and know some of the principals in the story.

Based on private conversations with mutual friends, the reason Cuddy received so much heat is that she continues to profit off the mistaken findings and refuses to disavow them, despite overwhelming evidence.

She embodies everything wrong with the popular discussion of science.

The only analogue I can think of is Brian Wansink, whose scandal is much newer; who did not go nearly so far to profit from his own results; and who has received plenty of heat so far.

"Although 11 new papers have recently been published that do not show the downstream effects of power posing on behaviors, Cuddy is still fighting for power posing."

That's enlightening, and Brian Wansink is a great example, thank you.

I'd disagree with your position - After looking at the larger body of the article, your finding is not replicated.

> She mentioned, at a psychology conference where she was presenting her work, that a study had recently been conducted on power posing. “They found no hormonal effects,” she said before taking a breath. “That study is done very well, and I trust those results.” Although 11 new papers have recently been published that do not show the downstream effects of power posing on behaviors, Cuddy is still fighting for power posing. The research, she says, still shows its effect on feelings of power: At the conference, she presented a comprehensive meta-analysis, a version of which, she says, she will soon publish, with a strong P-curve supporting that, and she also presented a P-curve suggesting that power posing had a robust effect on self-evaluations, emotions and moods.

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