Abby C

Professor Meraz states that in 2008, 2% of men declared computer science their major and not even 1% of women did.  In my opinion, this shouldn’t even come to a surprise because we live in a society that has men doing “men’s work,” such as computer science, and women doing “women’s work,” such as cooking and cleaning.  Because women are not being taken seriously in occupations like computer science, we have what Professor Meraz calls the incredible shrinking pipeline: the decreasing percentages of a woman in those fields.  In my opinion, if you are constantly being told what is and is not acceptable; you eventually begin to believe it.  And those women who still choose to be in the computer science field do not get taken seriously nor do they receive equal pay. 

          With that said, Professor Meraz talks about Mena Trott and the Movable type.  Basically, she states that Mena “complained to her husband, Ben, that the available tools didn’t offer enough control over comments or archiving.”  Meraz continues by saying that the way the story is presented makes it seem as though Mena could not think of this type of software on her own; she needed to be rescued, in a sense, by her husband.  This is exactly what we talked about in class.  The story was framed to make it seem as though a woman would not be capable to create such a software.

            Professor Meraz also mentioned how op-ed blogs are viewed differently when written by a male or female.  It’s okay for a man to state his opinion, but when a woman does, she is considered a bitch.  Blogs aren’t the only place we see discrimination either.  Another example is that it’s normal for a guy to see more than one girl at a time; however, if a girl is seeing more than one guy, she’s considered a whore.  This is an excellent example of how people perceive things based on what society says is right.