To be disappointed about this?

[imamearcat]

We had to do a bit of a fluffy exercise at work.

To pick a celeb/character/person who you admire who has the qualities that are aspirational to our team.

I did a bit of a fun one with my daughter on Elsa from frozen. All the others were men. Mostly ones in suits.

First time ever I've really felt sexism. AIBU?

But she is, she’s horrified all the women chose men and that none of the men chose women while not even bothering to do it properly herself and maybe everyone else didn’t either and phoned it in. Or they did and thought about the question and answered honestly.

I completely agree that sexism is ingrained, like PP mentioning the image of a scientist, but I think when you let you daughter choose a cartoon character and then say you felt everyone else’s choices were the first time you’ve experienced sexism ridiculous.

@imamearcat Maybe they all did the same with their sons?

Why wouldn’t you have picked Germaine Greer with your daughter as you’re so hot on everyone else being influenced by sexism?

Maybe that's it @user1473878824. They all did it with their sons.

And I'm not that hot on everyone being influenced by sexism. I'm just sad that this group clear aspire towards men and not so much women, I doubt it's an isolated incident.

Am I speaking in a different language here?

That was tongue in cheek.

As was my GG comment.

@user1473878824

But she is, she’s horrified all the women chose men and that none of the men chose women while not even bothering to do it properly herself and maybe everyone else didn’t either and phoned it in. Or they did and thought about the question and answered honestly.

I completely agree that sexism is ingrained, like PP mentioning the image of a scientist, but I think when you let you daughter choose a cartoon character and then say you felt everyone else’s choices were the first time you’ve experienced sexism ridiculous.

I think it's pretty obtuse to have not seen or felt sexism in society before you get to the stage you're doing fluffy exercises at work too. But society provides dozens of excuses for each individual instance of a woman not achieving and often for the statistical reality of discrimination - as we're seeing on this thread. Sometimes it's only when you see the ubiquity of it that it strikes home.

It doesn't matter whether people did the exercise properly or phoned it in. It doesn't matter whether the OP was just as biased as everyone else - it's still a been a wake up call for her.

I never said I was horrified I said I was disappointed and sad.

It doesn't really matter if I picked Elsa, GG, a man is a suit or Father Christmas really does it? The truth still stand that everyone (else) picked men. I'm not saying I'm any better than anyone else, but as PP said it has been a realisation for me. I didn't think things were still so bad.

I’m genuinely not trying to be goady but managing by accident. I do think it mattered who you picked if you’re going to worry about who other’s did. Especially when you then say men NEVER admire women and also all the other women picked men (but you didn’t). My DP admires loads of women and thinks they’re amazing. I wouldn’t criticise him for picking a man in this situation though. And maybe the other women answering didn’t go it’s fluff I’ll get a child to decide and they’re answers were men. It doesn’t make them misogynistic sexists or sheep who didn’t pick a woman because they felt they couldn’t. Saying this made you “feel” sexism for the first time just seems mind boggling to me.

And in the nicest possible way I don’t think you can get upset or bothered by women choosing men when you got your daughter to pick one and the only woman in the answers is a Disney character.

You are absolutely right to be dismayed that men never pick women in these exercises, OP. YANBU.

YANBU
DS did important people of the 20th Century at school last year and they were all men. Winston Churchill, Stephen Hawking, Richard Branson. His teacher was a woman as well!

I know you feel picked on in this thread OP but I'm kind of mortified on your behalf that when you had to do a work exercise, for work (even a fluffy one), you couldn't just do it yourself and get it done and understand that it was a work exercise - you had to involve your child in it. As a result of that, you picked a cartoon princess character, which like it or not is probably not going to reflect too well on you, a grown woman with a job/career.

Unless of course there's a massive drip feed and we're to find out that your job is with children/at a preschool/marketing toys to toddlers, that's what disappointed me from your post. (The thing about everyone else choosing men also did, but to a much lesser extent, unless I've missed something and several of them chose Bart Simpson or whatever.)

Yanbu.

It's about the fact that 20 other people all picked men or male characters.

No, this is wrong. It's about the fact that of 21 people NOT ONE chose a strong female role model, yourself included OP.

I get that you're having a lightbulb moment but it's only flickering at the moment.

YANBU. I don't understand most of the comments here, going to assume it's down to middle of the night posters, or perhaps one too many gins.

I agree it's noticeable and worth discussing that a group of 20 people all chose male examples. It probably says something about how we tend to give more attention and focus to make leaders and heroes in media, literature, schools and movies/books. Or that the subconcious expectation around strong leadership is that it's a man.

But you didn’t actually take the exercise seriously, but now you’re complaining that everyone else didn’t do it in a way you would have liked?

Elsa isn’t even real. If you’re looking up to anyone it should be to a real person, not some fictional character, cartoon or otherwise.

You lost the high ground as soon as you turned this into a Disney exercise, or do you really think that a fictional cartoon character is the best we can do when looking at positive role models?

Would you have felt it was wrong if someone had used Simba as an example because he was male rather than because he was a Disney character?

I get what you're saying op but I still don't get how your daughter comes into it.
Was she at work with you? Or did you have to do it as 'homework'?

What job do you do? I'd love a job where I had time to think about such things. (That is not sarcasm btw)

YANBU to recognise that people (male and female) are conditioned to associate business success, leadership, motivation etc with men.

Part of the issue here is the way the exercise was set up. An actual useful thing to do now is to flag the choices to the organiser and suggest that in future people are asked to choose one man and one woman, and identify the desirable characteristics in both. People and businesses often need structure and scaffolding to tackle the root of inequality.

I'm sorry but you're moaning about people choosing men and you chose a Disney character. Next time you choose an actual woman and then you can make a point at work.

Men definitly admire women..my husband and I both absolutely love the character Lagartha on Vikings. Shes one hell of a strong woman.
I'm just discussing this with him and hes said he admires his mother. She brought up 5 children as a single mother. Was 5 under 6 at one point.

Personally I see no issue with admiring Elsa. I could say the same about Moana. I love her adventurous spirit and rebellious nature. She saved her people from starvation.

I hate this kind of thing and I would never pick anything/one that reflects on me personally. I try to do what I think they want me to do or that reflects the values of the business.

Out of interest, who would people choose? Off the top of my head theres:

Politicians
Kamala Harris
Caroline Lucas
Hilary Clinton

Actors
Blake Lively

Athletes
Alyson Felix

Fictional
Moana I agree is a good role model