Echoes in a Hollow Space

From “Why Are We So Afraid of Creativity?” by Maria Konnikova, Scientific American Blogs, February 26, 2012:

 

“The Implicit Association Test (IAT) is a tool that was created to look for discrepancies between consciously held beliefs (i.e., a belief in racial equality) and unconscious biases (i.e., a faster reaction time when pairing white with positive concepts and black with negative ones than vice versa). The measure can test for implicit bias toward any number of groups (though the most common one tests racial biases) by looking at reaction times for associations between positive and negative attributes and pictures of group representatives. Sometimes, the stereotypical positives are represented by the same key; sometimes, by different ones. Ditto the negatives. And your speed of categorization in each of these circumstances determines your implicit bias. To take the racial example, if you are faster to categorize when “European American” and “good” share a key and “African American” and “bad” share a key, it is taken as evidence of an implicit race bias.

“Over the years, the IAT has shown a prevalence of unconscious biases in areas such as race, gender, sexual orientation, age, mental disease, and disability. Now, it has been expanded to something that had never appeared in need of testing: creativity.

“In a series of studies, participants had to complete the same good-bad category pairing as in the standard IAT, only this time, with two words that expressed an attitude that was either practical (such as functional, constructive, or useful) or creative (novel, inventive, original, etc.). The result: even those people who had explicitly ranked creativity as high on their list of positive attributes showed an implicit bias against it relative to practicality under conditions of uncertainty.”

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

Let me just state for the record: I don't care who you're voting for. I honestly don't—Obama, McCain, Huckabee, Clinton. Okay, maybe if you were voting for Der Mitt, I might have some issues...just kidding. No matter who you support, if you're doing it from your heart and your mind, I'm all for that. We actually have some good options this year.

Having placed that disclaimer up front, I wanted to link to this essay, which you may or may not have seen already. An African-American friend originally sent this to me. He was horrified by what was happening. And yes, he too was called a race traitor by some people in the black community because he said he was voting for Clinton.

I don't always agree with the way Robin Morgan states her case. I think she plays into the hands of some of the same divisiveness she protests. But the bedrock of what she's saying is—unfortunately, and in my experience—true. Misogyny is apparently okay in this campaign. I personally have seen it over and over in the punditry and political satire, and it sickens me. The nudge-nudge-wink-wink quality to a lot of the digs being leveled at Hillary Clinton would never, ever wash if they were racially tinged and directed at Obama. The commentators would be fired a la Don Imus in a Dixie minute. Apparently, woman-baiting is so deeply entrenched in this country, so much taken for granted, that no one even thinks twice about it. If a woman dares protest, she is called an emasculating old school feminist.

I don't think a woman should be called an emasculating bitch for sticking up for herself any more than I think an African-American should be called a traitor to his race for deciding not to vote for Obama. Race and gender should not be a part of this campaign, nor should ageism. But the entrenched interests want to divide us, those of us who want a real change, along these lines by playing our fears and prejudices (sometimes subtlely, sometimes not), and by emphasizing generational splits. Classic divide and conquer tactics. The Powers That Be do not want to see change happening in this country. Whether Obama or Hillary eventually get the nomination (and praise be to either one!), the change is already in motion. But not if they successfully frame the election as "putting down the bitch."

This isn't just about the presidential campaign, this is about the board room. This is about keeping the glass ceiling in place. Because if a woman became president of the United States, how could the Old Boy Network possibly justify keeping women out of the board room? They couldn't. So they get their lackeys, a la Carl Bernstein and Chris Matthews and their ilk, to make this about "bitches" rather than about candidates.

All I'm asking for is a fair playing field. We won't stand for race being an issue in this campaign. Let's stand up and say that—really, truly, and beyond the "make nice" rhetoric—gender has no place in this campaign, either.