Female Privilege or Femme Fatale?

[Toni]

Because 'ugly' and 'not sexually attractive' are linked, and 'not sexually attractive' is something average women are likely to become sooner than average looking men.

Women are more likely to be judged more harshly with regards to their looks compared with men. They should be attractive, well dressed and well groomed but if they are too sexually attractive, this undermines their image as competent, intelligent much less genius. Her manner of dress and grooming choices ( whose ever those choices were) seem to have been made to draw comparisons to such as Steve Jobs: note the dark turtlenecks, the pulled back hair. She’s supposed to look young and attractive —which would make her ideas seem ‘fresh’ and yet as though she is too disciplined and focused to care about being overtly sexy ( dumb, distracted/distracting) or anything so trivial. The real problem is that investors did not vet the science ( of which she had grossly inadequate background) and looked only at the words medical, tech and of course dollar signs. Who knows? Maybe some were smart enough to be skeptical of the ‘science’ and were looking at tax write offs or a way to capitalize on her ideas if not the fraudulent technology.

 

[Metaphor]

Well, I could go looking for the data on how harshly women are judged on their looks as compared to men. Is this a discussion we want to have?

Well, when you say 'how harshly judged', you are clearly begging the question before you've found any data. You are already convinced that the attractiveness privilege works out worse for women than for men. I think it would be an interesting question, though would deserve its own thread.

In terms of Holmes, she is an attractive woman (feminists would call her 'conventionally attractive', which is redundant), so Holmes will benefit from her good looks privilege in this trial.

 

[Metaphor]

Because 'ugly' and 'not sexually attractive' are linked, and 'not sexually attractive' is something average women are likely to become sooner than average looking men.

Women are more likely to be judged more harshly with regards to their looks compared with men. They should be attractive, well dressed and well groomed but if they are too sexually attractive, this undermines their image as competent, intelligent much less genius. Her manner of dress and grooming choices ( whose ever those choices were)

Good lord: shouldn't your assumption be that it was Holmes's choice to dress like Steve Jobs? I go around with the default assumption that women dress themselves in the morning. Why don't you?

The real problem is that investors did not vet the science

The real problem is that Holmes is a criminal conwoman, who had the charisma and connections to deceive large numbers of well-heeled people, and an ego that matched the size of her intended bank balance.

 

[Toni]

Because 'ugly' and 'not sexually attractive' are linked, and 'not sexually attractive' is something average women are likely to become sooner than average looking men.

Women are more likely to be judged more harshly with regards to their looks compared with men. They should be attractive, well dressed and well groomed but if they are too sexually attractive, this undermines their image as competent, intelligent much less genius. Her manner of dress and grooming choices ( whose ever those choices were)

Good lord: shouldn't your assumption be that it was Holmes's choice to dress like Steve Jobs? I go around with the default assumption that women dress themselves in the morning. Why don't you?

The real problem is that investors did not vet the science

The real problem is that Holmes is a criminal conwoman, who had the charisma and connections to deceive large numbers of well-heeled people, and an ego that matched the size of her intended bank balance.

Please note I wrote "whose ever those choices were." She could have made the choices herself, deliberately (or unconsciously) or she could have been groomed/controlled/forced into those choices as she has asserted. It doesn't actually matter to me. She was a con but she was hardly the only con in the game.

Cons don't work as often or as well if people, as investors are, at least nominally, do their homework.

When I first read of her proposals, I realized immediately that this 'technology' was a fraud. And I'm not that smart.

 

[Metaphor]

When I first read of her proposals, I realized immediately that this 'technology' was a fraud. And I'm not that smart.

Indeed. Holmes was selling a fraud, and she knew it.

 

[Arctish]

Well, I could go looking for the data on how harshly women are judged on their looks as compared to men. Is this a discussion we want to have?

Well, when you say 'how harshly judged', you are clearly begging the question before you've found any data.

I have seen the data many times. I was offering to go find some articles so you could see it. too.

Here's one for starters.: Looks Do Matter, Especially for Women, and Also at Work

Here's another: In 2018, Professional Women Are Still Judged by Their Appearances

I sent a member of my team on a hunt to find the facts about how a woman’s appearance might impact her career path. I would like to say the research shows that women are no longer judged by how they look – but, unfortunately, I can’t.

Moreover, I also had my researcher look at how a man’s appearance can affect their career. The answer seems to be “not in any significant way.” My researcher compiled more than three pages of statistics on women’s appearances and work, compared to just two bullets on men’s appearances.

​

 

[Metaphor]

Well, I could go looking for the data on how harshly women are judged on their looks as compared to men. Is this a discussion we want to have?

Well, when you say 'how harshly judged', you are clearly begging the question before you've found any data.

I have seen the data many times. I was offering to go find some articles so you could see it. too.

Here's one for starters.: Looks Do Matter, Especially for Women, and Also at Work

How does this conflict with anything I claimed? Attractive people gain an advantage compared to unattractive people.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/...ooks-do-matter-especially-women-and-also-work

Here's another: In 2018, Professional Women Are Still Judged by Their Appearances

This does not conflict with anything I have said either??

I sent a member of my team on a hunt to find the facts about how a woman’s appearance might impact her career path. I would like to say the research shows that women are no longer judged by how they look – but, unfortunately, I can’t.

Moreover, I also had my researcher look at how a man’s appearance can affect their career. The answer seems to be “not in any significant way.” My researcher compiled more than three pages of statistics on women’s appearances and work, compared to just two bullets on men’s appearances.

I'm not sure what conclusion you want me to make here. That psychological researchers often conduct research that focuses exclusively on women?

 

[Arctish]

Well, I could go looking for the data on how harshly women are judged on their looks as compared to men. Is this a discussion we want to have?

Well, when you say 'how harshly judged', you are clearly begging the question before you've found any data.

I have seen the data many times. I was offering to go find some articles so you could see it. too.

Here's one for starters.: Looks Do Matter, Especially for Women, and Also at Work

How does this conflict with anything I claimed? Attractive people gain an advantage compared to unattractive people.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/...ooks-do-matter-especially-women-and-also-work

Here's another: In 2018, Professional Women Are Still Judged by Their Appearances

This does not conflict with anything I have said either??

I sent a member of my team on a hunt to find the facts about how a woman’s appearance might impact her career path. I would like to say the research shows that women are no longer judged by how they look – but, unfortunately, I can’t.

Moreover, I also had my researcher look at how a man’s appearance can affect their career. The answer seems to be “not in any significant way.” My researcher compiled more than three pages of statistics on women’s appearances and work, compared to just two bullets on men’s appearances.

I'm not sure what conclusion you want me to make here. That psychological researchers often conduct research that focuses exclusively on women?

You said "Both attractive men and attractive women get a boost from their attractiveness, but attractive women get a bigger relative boost (or: ugliness is less a barrier to men than it is to women, if you like)."

I responded: "If ugliness is less a barrier to men than it is to women, wouldn't that be an example of male privilege? Men would do better than women overall if that's really the case."

You then appeared to disagree and wanted to see evidence.

The links I have provided are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to data on how women are disadvantaged when it comes to judgments based on attractiveness. Women are judged more harshly on their looks than men, and these judgments affect their opportunities and careers. The cumulative effect is that men on the whole are advantaged in that regard even if attractive women are more advantaged than attractive men.

 

[Metaphor]

Well, I could go looking for the data on how harshly women are judged on their looks as compared to men. Is this a discussion we want to have?

Well, when you say 'how harshly judged', you are clearly begging the question before you've found any data.

I have seen the data many times. I was offering to go find some articles so you could see it. too.

Here's one for starters.: Looks Do Matter, Especially for Women, and Also at Work

How does this conflict with anything I claimed? Attractive people gain an advantage compared to unattractive people.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/...ooks-do-matter-especially-women-and-also-work

Here's another: In 2018, Professional Women Are Still Judged by Their Appearances

This does not conflict with anything I have said either??

I sent a member of my team on a hunt to find the facts about how a woman’s appearance might impact her career path. I would like to say the research shows that women are no longer judged by how they look – but, unfortunately, I can’t.

Moreover, I also had my researcher look at how a man’s appearance can affect their career. The answer seems to be “not in any significant way.” My researcher compiled more than three pages of statistics on women’s appearances and work, compared to just two bullets on men’s appearances.

I'm not sure what conclusion you want me to make here. That psychological researchers often conduct research that focuses exclusively on women?

You said "Both attractive men and attractive women get a boost from their attractiveness, but attractive women get a bigger relative boost (or: ugliness is less a barrier to men than it is to women, if you like)."

I responded: "If ugliness is less a barrier to men than it is to women, wouldn't that be an example of male privilege? Men would do better than women overall if that's really the case."

The links I have provided are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to data on how women are disadvantaged when it comes to judgments based on attractiveness.

No, women are not disadvantaged or advantaged relative to men. Nor are women 'disadvantaged' in some overall sense. Attractive women are advantaged and unattractive women penalised.

Women are judged more harshly on their looks than men.

This sounds like a distributional argument: that more women (%) are judged as unattractive than men (%) who are judged as unattractive. Is that the argument you are making?

The cumulative effect is that men on the whole are advantaged in that regard even if attractive women are more advantaged than attractive men.

We are back to this. No, men are not advantaged on the whole, unless there is a distributional difference in the amount of people in each sex regarded as unattractive, and a greater percentage of women are regarded as unattractive.

 

[Swammerdami]

... Blue-chip investors included Rupert Murdoch, Larry Ellison, Carlos Slim, Walmart heirs, President Trump’s secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, ...

What happened to smart investors like Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, etc.? Holmes wasn't sexy enough for them?
Why were top right-wing billionaires (Murdoch, DeVos, even Ellison) especially gullible? If you can swallow Trump's jism, embracing Holmes is easy?

 

[Arctish]

There is a distributional difference in the amount of people in each sex regarded as unattractive, and a greater percentage of women regarded as unattractive, due to the difference in how men and women are judged on their looks, especially as they age and most especially if a woman lost her 'girlish figure' after she had a few kids.
This isn't anything new.

 

[Metaphor]

There is a distributional difference in the amount of people in each sex regarded as unattractive, and a greater percentage of women regarded as unattractive, due to the difference in how men and women are judged on their looks, especially as they age.

What evidence do you have of that, especially of the bolded part?

 

[Arctish]

There is a distributional difference in the amount of people in each sex regarded as unattractive, and a greater percentage of women regarded as unattractive, due to the difference in how men and women are judged on their looks, especially as they age.

What evidence do you have of that, especially of the bolded part?

Do you want to start a new thread?

I'm willing to discuss this with you but be prepared for a lot about Hillary Clinton vs. Ronald Reagan.

 

[Metaphor]

There is a distributional difference in the amount of people in each sex regarded as unattractive, and a greater percentage of women regarded as unattractive, due to the difference in how men and women are judged on their looks, especially as they age.

What evidence do you have of that, especially of the bolded part?

Do you want to start a new thread?

I'm not making the claim that a larger percentage of women are regarded as unattractive than the percentage of men regarded as unattractive. I have not seen a particular study that tried to quantify it.

Obviously, the 'attractiveness' depends on different things for the sexes. Ratings of attractiveness probably do not degrade as quickly for men as they age as they do for women as they age, but shortness in men negatively affects attractiveness in a way it doesn't for women.

 

[thebeave]

There is a distributional difference in the amount of people in each sex regarded as unattractive, and a greater percentage of women regarded as unattractive, due to the difference in how men and women are judged on their looks, especially as they age.

What evidence do you have of that, especially of the bolded part?

Do you want to start a new thread?

I'm willing to discuss this with you but be prepared for a lot about Hillary Clinton vs. Ronald Reagan.

I don't think this is true, at least as gauged by the the world of online dating. There was a study recently from some online dating site (OK Cupid, maybe?) that showed the distribution of attractiveness of men and women by the site users. Men rated women's attractiveness on a roughly normal distribution, but women rated the men's attractiveness on a heavily skewed scale, such that women found only, IIRC, the top 5-10% of men attractive...the rest were "meh" at best.

 

[Toni]

When I first read of her proposals, I realized immediately that this 'technology' was a fraud. And I'm not that smart.

Indeed. Holmes was selling a fraud, and she knew it.

I’m not entirely certain that she knew it was a fraud. She dropped out of college at 19 to pursue this start up. Her background was entirely insufficient for her to know it understand the science behind her idea. No doubt she is extremely bright but at 19, even and maybe especially very bright 19 year olds lack the maturity, in part because they lack experience but also because they lack brain maturity that allows for more sound judgement. It is very likely that Holmes was very bright, very easily flattered, naive, arrogant and totally 19. I can see how she could have become very easily caught up in this heady combination of a professor encouraging her and telling her how brilliant she was and how rich she would become. In the beginning, I don’t think she knew it was a fraud or a con. And I think as time went on, she didn’t know how to dial things back or deal with the pressure, including pressure from the man who was sleeping with her and who may or may not have been controlling her to a great extent. Yes, legally she was an adult but her brain wasn’t. At some point, though, she certainly was responsible for not coming clean about the success rate of her product. My opinions are offered as explanation, not justification.

Do I think her gender played a role? I don’t think her professor would have slept with her if she had been male. And I also think that girls are still more socialized to be nice, compliant, pleasant compared with boys. I’m sure some investors liked the idea of a pretty female wunderkind.

I think her gender was a factor but I don’t think it excuses her actions.

 

[Jarhyn]

Lots of well-to-do conservatives let greed overcome their good sense, and the OP wants to blame it on a woman? Wow.

Bernie Madoff did much worse and I'm pretty sure nobody here would misgender Bernie Madoff or blame it on his gender.

It's funny, everyone in the medical device business knows the Theranos story, and nobody in the industry blames it misogynistically on "it's cuz she was a woman".

Most of us look at it as a cautionary tale of letting a CEO leverage unethical activities from their employees, and you're crazy if you think I have not been front row to a male CEO asking much worse, and the existence of that book on a shelf in the lobby being the only reason it never got carried out.

 

[RVonse]

When I first read of her proposals, I realized immediately that this 'technology' was a fraud. And I'm not that smart.

Indeed. Holmes was selling a fraud, and she knew it.

In the beginning, I don’t think she knew it was a fraud or a con. And I think as time went on, she didn’t know how to dial things back or deal with the pressure, including pressure from the man who was sleeping with her and who may or may not have been controlling her to a great extent. Yes, legally she was an adult but her brain wasn't.

When I first read of her proposals, I realized immediately that this 'technology' was a fraud. And I'm not that smart.

Indeed. Holmes was selling a fraud, and she knew it.

I’m not entirely certain that she knew it was a fraud. She dropped out of college at 19 to pursue this start up. Her background was entirely insufficient for her to know it understand the science behind her idea. No doubt she is extremely bright but at 19, even and maybe especially very bright 19 year olds lack the maturity, in part because they lack experience but also because they lack brain maturity that allows for more sound judgement. It is very likely that Holmes was very bright, very easily flattered, naive, arrogant and totally 19. I can see how she could have become very easily caught up in this heady combination of a professor encouraging her and telling her how brilliant she was and how rich she would become. In the beginning, I don’t think she knew it was a fraud or a con. And I think as time went on, she didn’t know how to dial things back or deal with the pressure, including pressure from the man who was sleeping with her and who may or may not have been controlling her to a great extent. Yes, legally she was an adult but her brain wasn’t.

So your argument is telling us she is not mature enough to know better? A 19 year old man could be drafted and off fighting a war somewhere.

The feminists need to make up their minds how society is supposed to view women. OTOH, they will wholeheartedly agree with you Holmes is not responsible for her actions. And then when it suits their needs will then tell us out the other side of their mouth how we should not treat women like children.

Feminists want it both ways.

 

[RVonse]

Lots of well-to-do conservatives let greed overcome their good sense, and the OP wants to blame it on a woman? Wow.

Bernie Madoff did much worse and I'm pretty sure nobody here would misgender Bernie Madoff or blame it on his gender.

It's funny, everyone in the medical device business knows the Theranos story, and nobody in the industry blames it misogynistically on "it's cuz she was a woman".

That is not the argument I'm seeing here. No one is saying she is being labled unfairly as a women being a fraud.. The argument I am seeing is that she is likely to get off light because of her female privilege. No lawyer in their right mind would make such ridiculous arguments if she was a man.

 

[Jarhyn]

Lots of well-to-do conservatives let greed overcome their good sense, and the OP wants to blame it on a woman? Wow.

Bernie Madoff did much worse and I'm pretty sure nobody here would misgender Bernie Madoff or blame it on his gender.

It's funny, everyone in the medical device business knows the Theranos story, and nobody in the industry blames it misogynistically on "it's cuz she was a woman".

That is not the argument I'm seeing here. No one is saying she is being labled unfairly as a women being a fraud.. The argument I am seeing is that she is likely to get off light because of her female privilege. No lawyer in their right mind would make such ridiculous arguments if she was a man.

You must be completely spacing out about that one time a pedophile who abused his own daughter was given no sentence at all because "he would not do well in prison."

Bad arguments are advanced for all manner of persons of privilege.