In this day and age! A thread for unbelievably obvious examples of sexism.

Good example with the profession of midwife. I, too, would assume a midwife is female, but wouldn't be shocked if he were male. Statistically, the midwife will be female. From a statistical point of view, I am correct. From a sexist point of view, am I wrong?

Stealth - Wow, great comment! I don't think it is black and white. There are certain professions which are male or female dominated and I am using a mixture of personal experience and statistics when I imagine the gender of the person performing that particular role. I cannot however think of a single profession which I would automatically assume is not open to a woman. Times are changing and as things change, so do my personal experiences. I cannot default something which is not true, IYKWIM. It's not that I don't think women can be, for example, firefighters. It's that I know that it is a male dominated profession, at the moment.

Interestingly, I have met Dr Sally Ride, the astronaut, and this is a profession which, were the word 'astronaut' used, I wouldn't assume said astronaut to be male.

Florencejon, ok, I agree that I would probably refer to a midwife as "she" (because less than 1% of midwives are men), and a firefighter as "he" (because only 3% of firefighters are women). But by that logic, the delivery driver should not have assumed that Dr Smith was a man because women are 40% of all doctors!

but making assumptions about someone's sex based on information that is not related to their sex is, by definition, sexism, surely?! We all do it to some degree but it doesn't mean it's not sexist.

Wigeon - It is often difficult to say whether something is deliberately sexist or just down to someone's personal life experiences. I know that there are female fire fighters, for example, but I will automatically use, 'he' if referring to a fire fighter. I'm not being sexist but I am sure as hell making a generalisation based on my own personal experience. I would like to be corrected if the fire fighter was, in fact, female. I would be offended if this was done aggressively followed by a lecture about being sexist though.

Yes, I generalise. No, there is no intended malice behind it.

sashh - how is is not sexist to assume that Dr Smith is a man? And when a high proportion of medical students (and doctors of my friend's age) are women these days, it's also just plain silly.

Blamers

Btw for the blames - I introduced myself and said that I would be buying the bike for me. They still talked to my partner.

To Emmeline, Uppercut and LastMango about the delivery driver for my friend Dr Smith: I wasn't actually there. I was guessing the exact words both of them used. But my friend reported the story to me along the lines of "A delivery driver came to my door with a parcel for me, but he got all confused because he assumed that Dr Smith was DH, but it's actually me of course, ha ha". But I thought it would read better on this thread if I guessed how the conversation might have gone! So please don't get tied up in knots about whether or not she said "I'm Dr Smith" at any point!

Got another one, just last night: talking to woman from a market research company on the phone. She was asking me various questions like my age etc. I had mentioned that I had a DH (in the context of whether I own my home jointly or solely).

She asked "What's the occupation of the main wage earner in your household?". I answered "Civil servant". She said "And does he manage any staff?". I said "Er, that's me that's the main wage earner...".

I suppose I could have answered "civil servant, and by the way that's me, not my husband", but I didn't think that was necessary. Apparently it was.

When I was looking to buy a mountain bike - I know that the difference between men's and women's bikes is diddly squat but related to average height differences. I am the height of an average male and they were trying to fit me on small women's bikes. And they ignored me and talked to my then bf.

Sashh - exactly. Unexpected situations happen on a daily basis. How we deal with them is what is important.

I think the answering the door thing is not necessarily sexist, just what people are expecting.

I answered my door in a shared flat to a delivery and the driver was a bit because the deliver was for my chinese housemate who had a very Chinese sounding name.

lastmango - But Uppercut - what's really the point of your contribution to this thread? Are you trying to say that if women aren't extra vigilant all the time to second guess and compensate for other people's stupidity then they've got only themselves to blame for sexist slights, insults, etc?

We are all continually challenging stereotypes. If we do this rudely, then the people that chose to fight sexist comments are in danger of being stereotyped.

If the car is for you, then why not go and buy it on your own? If you chose to take your DP with you, then when first encountering the salesperson, why didn't YOU open the conversation with, 'I am interested in......." If the salesperson then continues addressing the conversation to your DP, then yes, I can understand your feeling insulted and walking away.

As for the parcel, as another poster said, it would have been easy to just say that you were Doctor Smith.

My carer is male.

We booked into a hotel that I'd booked, in my name.

After I was in bed he went to the bar for a drink and was addressed as "Mr Sashh".

Greythorne Tue 18-Sep-12 18:05:43
Sadly, the description of one of the police officers brutally murdered today. Can you imagine a male PC being described as "a real chatterbox" as one of these women was?

Talk about undermining her, defining her with "female" attributes. How about lively, articulate, a good communicator? But now, she's a woman, so a chatterbox.

whats wrong with female attributes? why is it undermining being defined by female attributes?

I doubt that after someone had just died whoever was being interviewed was going through a list of synonyms, just describing the woman as they felt she was.

on the Asda/tesco? bog rolls it says something like "90% of mums say it is as good as the leading brand" Dont dad's and non parents wipe their arse?

Also those free books in the bookstart packs, the touchy feely "thats not my..." series, they have "thats not my baby" in two versions, a pink one with girl babies in and a blue one with boy babies in!

Yikes spaniel that's awful.

This:

9gag.com/gag/37786

But when I bought my last car, my ex P was present yet the salesman only spoke to me. I guess it is my demeanour (sp?! tired) or something, but he knew I was the more knowledgeable one (and the final decision maker). No point in taking cloak-and-dagger offence at the ignorant people who perpetuate sexism: if it affects you, politely challenge it there and then. And tell them in no uncertain terms that their ingrained behaviour towards a female equal has lost them a sale. Might not change anything there and then, but it puts the concept firmly into their twattish mind for the future

Sexism exists in the primary classroom too My DD1 came home today, she has been learning about fire safety at school.

She told me they had to identify hazards on a large drawing of a house layout. "Mummies have to always stay in the kitchen when they are cooking tea so the oven doesn't set on fire, MRS 'ddsTeacher' said so" ............. So not only do daddies apparently never cook, there wasn't even the option to put a daddy model on that part of the house drawing...

I've done 2 extensions now, and interveiwed about 3 builders each time. The ones who got to quote are the ones who talked to me not to my clueless and disinterested dh.

Blackcurrants - when we went to look at a volvo showroom, the salesman would not talk to me. I asked questions, and he would leave such a long time before he spoke, to make it clear that he was not replying to my question, just musing on a 'related' subject. DH's questions were answered straight away.

Still, when someone says something like that, you do tend to think "well, you're not getting a refund NOW, you shit"