Photo by Paul Cory

 I am lucky.

I look like 90% of the women on the big screen, the small screen, on the covers of novels and in the pages of comic books.

I am white, skinny and have learned how to use makeup (as well as a few laser surgeries) to cover the birthmark on my face with which genetics graced me.

That doesn’t make me a good cosplayer.

In fact, it means that I can be a little more lazy with my costumes than someone who doesn’t share the basic physical characteristics of a character.

Continue reading →

Rather than directly address the current discussion about sexism in skepticism I would like to tell a story.

Last year, I wasn’t involved in skepticism at all. It wasn’t that I wasn’t interested. I had all of the books. I read all of the blogs. I had been teaching critical thinking in various forms for over a decade. Heck, I was even already planning my Carl Sagan-inspired tattoo. I was a skeptic. I just wasn’t active in the movement.

There wasn’t really a place for me in that movement. Or at least not one that I could see. It was all strong-willed and brilliant people, all of whom had a tendency to shout very loudly when they disagreed with people.

I can thrive in that kind of community. I had worked around vertebrate paleontologists and museum curators for long enough to know that I can elbow my way up with the best of them. However, I didn’t have the energy to push myself into a group like that, not again, not then. Plus, did I really have anything that I could add to the conversation? I wasn’t sure.

A year before that (why do these things always blow up in June? I’m not sure), I had not been involved in the science communication community either. Again, I owned all of the books. I read all of the blogs. I was already doing science communication in person and professionally. I just wasn’t doing it online.

In this case, the reason was a little different, but not very. You see, the science communication community is also filled with brilliant people, some of them shouting. Their shouts weren’t quite as loud or quite as angry, unless you mentioned “framing”, but they were still a bit intimidating. I didn’t think I had anything to add to that conversation either.

In each case, something happened.

In the case of the science blogs, “pepsigate” happened.

In the case of skepticism, “elevatorgate” happened.

And suddenly I found I had opinions. I found that these communities that I had read in much the same ways one reads the newspaper were no longer an impersonal and one-way path of information. Suddenly there was something happening that I wanted to say something about.

During ‘pepsigate’, I was already struggling with the idea of where I wanted to go professionally. Whether I wanted to stay at the museum job I loved, but paid nothing, or if I wanted to find something where the salary fit my qualifications more, but where I may not have been as philosophically comfortable. I started, quietly, saying things on twitter. Suddenly this gentleman whose blog I had been loyally reading, @canislatrans of faultline.org, was responding to me, listening to my comments and giving interesting answers. Then he was retweeting me, and other people started commenting, some of whom agreed with me, some of whom didn’t, but both those sides made me realize I had a voice that I could use to contribute. I started commenting more, and getting drawn more and more into this community. Then Bora DMed me and told me I should think about going to ScienceOnline. Honestly, I hadn’t thought about it. While I was talking with all of these people on Twitter, I still felt like I was a bit of a poser. After all, I had stopped blogging a while ago, and I had ever only marginally blogged about science before that. But my answer was “yes”, I would go.

Because someone had asked me. Because someone had listened to my voice and let me know that my voice was welcome.

In ‘elevatorgate’, it was a little different. I had a bit of an audience by that point, even if I don’t blog often. I was very active on twitter and was beginning to get to know some of the Skeptics, mostly the feminist crew. So when other skeptics started yelling louder and louder about how Rebecca was wrong to voice her discomfort, I tweeted several posts and got quite a few nasty comments back. Then I was asked, rathe snarkily, why I was bothering to spread these posts if that was all I was going to do.

That was when I realized that being a little bit involved was no longer good enough. It was time to stand up and say “I am a member of this community, and I need to do something to sway it a little closer to a community I *want* to be a member of. So I wrote My Privileged World. This post was unspeakably hard for me to write. I had written more strongly worded things elsewhere, but they were all pseudonymous. This time I was standing up, as me, and saying “This is my experience, and I have the ability to voice it.” I was still worried about being shouted down, and even more scared about my coworkers and/or boss finding it. I was shaking when I pressed submit, and I’ll admit that I cried about it.

Then people started commenting. Some of them were mean. Some of them were inappropriate. Some of them were incredibly rude, threatening or downright disgusting. But some of them weren’t. Some of them were affirmations of my point. Some of them were retellings of problems that those women faced, or sympathetic posts from people I barely knew (but who would come to be good friends).

Then someone, I don’t know who (I’m guessing it was Josh Rosenau, actually), asked if I was going to The Amaz!ng Meeting.

Like ScienceOnline, I hadn’t thought about it. I knew by this point that I was going to, somehow, become more active in Skepticism. I just didn’t know how. I had guessed it would be by blogging, and by joining a group in my area. That big conference full of brilliant people and loud voices hadn’t occurred to me as a place I would fit in. So I said “maybe”, knowing full well that I couldn’t justify the price, and that the registration cost of the conference alone would have completely broke my budget.

Then something else happened. Surly Amy and the Women Thinking Free Foundation offered a grant to women who were interested in going to TAM (link to this year’s program). I decided to apply, thinking that I would never get it, but still hoping. Instead of writing the kind of grant application that one tends to assume one should write for a grant application, full of seriousness and grand ambition, I used honesty and probably a little too much humor. I’m pretty sure I referenced Firefly, or at least Nathan Fillion at some point in it. I also said that I wanted to teach young women to think critically, and that one of my favorite things to do was to teach Girl Scouts about volcanoes. I really didn’t think I would get it, so I decided to just be me.

When I received the email saying was a grant recipient I squealed. Outloud. In my office. My office mate probably thought I was posessed.

It meant more to me than just the registration fee. It meant that not only did I have a voice in my blog, but there were people who believed that I was worth encouraging. It might not have been the majority of the community who listened to my voice, or who donated to make my trip a possibility, but it was enough. It was amazing.

So, ladies and gentlemen of the skeptical movement, keep speaking up in favor of inclusion. Keep pointing out things when you think they’re wrong or you think they should be changed. It may feel like you’re fighting an endless uphill battle against an enemy who would like to see you not only defeated but humiliated. It may feel as if you can’t deal with it anymore.

But even when you feel like you’re drowning in a sea of hatred, you aren’t. There are other people here who have your back. And there are even more that you’ve never heard of or heard from. Women and men who are watching this fight and saying “now wait a minute….” Women and men who will finally hit that breaking point and add their voice to the chorus. Women who will say “Well, yes, this movement, like almost all movements, has a sexism problem. But I don’t need to suffer it in silence. They’re discussing it. There are people fighting for a more equal environment. And if I join maybe I can help too.”

Sometimes the best thing you can do to bring about a change you long for, whatever that change may be, is to not shut up about it. Yes, you might feel like a broken record, but at the end of the day, you’re not actually talking to the people you’re fighting with. You’re talking to those who remain silent. Those who may be learning, bit by bit, that they don’t have to be silent. They too can have a voice. One day your voice won’t be alone. It will be backed by a chorus of people who have raised theirs up, not just because they have something to say, which they do, but because they have learned they can say it out loud. You have taught them they can say it out loud.

You’re at the mall early Sunday afternoon, looking for ballet flats to replace your pair that is falling apart. It’s not your favorite place in the world, but it’s not horrible. You’re there early enough that it’s not crowded, and your fellow shoppers seem to be enjoying the day off work, so the atmosphere is pleasant enough. You’ve found your shoes and picked up a black and white polka dotted dress that you don’t need, but might look cute enough to take on your trip next weekend.

Then a woman walks up to you. She has that typical young suburban mom look: jean jacket, expensive jeans, dusty blonde hair with highlights, pretty, with just enough makeup to hide the first signs of age, but not too much that it’s not flattering. She says excuse me,  and you wonder if you dropped something. You smile.

She gives you a big grin, moves in a little too close to you and does that weird hoppy thing that high school girls do when they find out that their best friend has been asked out by a football player. Excited, happy and overly insincere. You mentally brace yourself for a question about where you got your jeans or advice that your shoes just aren’t quite right for your outfit (you knew this already, but that’s why you’re getting new shoes).

Instead she says “Can I pray for you and your disability?”

You freeze and stare at her, forgetting what your line is. Luckily your brain can do this on autopilot “No, you may not.” you say, then as she opens her mouth to respond you add “Please get away from me.” You’re not sure where the please came from, but file it away anyway. The woman responds “Well, God bless you” tosses her hair and walks off.

You’re still frozen. Suddenly, the years of building up your body and your psyche fall away and you’re that strange preteen on crutches, the one who has to hide before school because the bullies will knock her down if she ventures out into the hallway. The one who has every step from the front entrance to the band room memorized (300 of them. Step, hop, step, hop… you count because it’s easier to count how many steps you’ve taken than to look up and see what kind of pain you’re in for.) The director lets you sit in there and hide while he keeps out the bullies.

Now, you can barely see through the haze of your differences. You logically know that most of the people in the store don’t care enough to look, and if they do, you’re a momentary curiosity to them, but suddenly you’re other, in a way that feels very vulnerable, very exposed. All of these other people, they’re normal. You’re not one of them. How could you ever have thought that you were?

Fifteen seconds ago you were normal, just one of hundreds of shoppers out on a rainy morning. You were completely, comfortingly anonymous. You were whole with all of the traits you’ve worked so hard over the years. The pains, the insecurities, the things you’re embarrassed about, they were all hidden, inside a somewhat pretty girl shopping for dresses. You weren’t thinking about the way you walk because honestly, most of the time, you don’t. It’s not that bad. There’s no pain accompanying it, now that you’ve slowly worked up to the point that you can maintain a decent level of exercise. The only things that really remind you of it are the weakness running up the outside of your leg where there should be a muscle taking up the slack, and occasional questions from friends or small children who are curious.

These reminders don’t bother you. You’re always happy to explain the things that are different about you: an honest question is a chance for honest understanding. Plus, it entertains you how embarrassed parents are when their kids ask a question like that. The weakness only matters when you’re trying to pull two very specific moves when climbing, and you’ve learned to climb around most routes that require that move.

However, the request to pray for you does hurt, in a way that anyone who has never been abnormal can’t understand. The request hurts because it is not only a statement that you are different, which is okay, but a statement that you are different in a way that needs to be fixed. It is a presumption that removes all strength from you and puts it into the hands of this healthy, perky, privileged woman.

You’re not just hurt for yourself, because you know that at the end of the day your limp doesn’t impact your daily life in any way. You’re angry for your friends, who have much more difficult challenges they’ve overcome. You’re angry for the children of your friends, who have challenges that they will have to overcome. This woman, and the women like her who make this request of you every two months anger you because you know that she will ask these people you love, these wonderful, strong, able, whole people, if they mind if she tries to fix them.

Because none of you need fixing. When someone asks to pray for you, a stranger, they are saying “you are less than me” “you are not good enough to fix yourself, so you must need my condescension”. Make no mistake, that is what they’re saying. They have good intentions, yes, but you don’t say to someone who you think is on your level that you want to make them better. You don’t single them out as someone in need of charity. You ask them what their needs are. You ask them what their experience is. You  try to understand.

Please, let your child ask me questions. Let them say that I walk funny and ask why. Because then I can kneel down next to them, explain that because of a brilliant surgeon and supportive hospital, I have a body that works. I can direct them to look at the positives of my experience rather than the negatives. I can ask them to focus on who I am and who I’ve worked to be, as a woman, a scientist, an educator, rather than focusing on my hindrances.

Then, maybe, the next person they talk to, they might think “hey, this person is strong”, “this person is like me”, this person has worked hard to be where they are, and they don’t see their physical or mental limitations as things to be fixed by outsiders, but rather something that is part and parcel of who they are. And maybe, just maybe, they won’t be the kind of person who goes around trying to fix people who don’t want or need it.

Or maybe they’ll grow up to be an orthopedic surgeon and fix me in the way I do need it, when I come to them asking for help. Either outcome is worthwhile to me.