THE undisguised glee with which University College London broadcast the resignation of Nobel laureate Sir Tim Hunt as an honorary professor was a callous insult to a great man of science.
No thanks or praise for his work, no regret, just a priggish piece of jargon - ‘this outcome is compatible with our commitment to gender equality’.
True, Sir Tim’s light-hearted remarks about the difficulties male scientists have working with women were poorly judged, but they were free of malice and from someone born into a generation before political correctness became a religion.
UCL was alma mater to three notorious terrorists, including underwear bomber Umar Abdulmutallab, who ran its Islamic society. How lamentable that these fanatics and their radical friends were nurtured and indulged, but an elderly scientist is hounded out for nothing more than a clumsy attempt at a joke.
The task is clear. People should be on the lookout for female sexism and make sure that commensurate penalties are enforced.
When decent, talented males are put off careers in STEM because of prejudice against their gender then I'll join you.
I was deliberately passed over for a full time job with a trade union in 1987 because the meeting that was supposed to rubber stamp my appointment demanded that a woman be given the job instead. I had been an elected lay official for eight years, the successful candidate had been a lay official for four months.
Sounds like you felt entitled - why was there a meeting merely to 'rubber stamp' you. Surely that meeting should be there to determine who gets the position. And a job should never be based automatically on time served. Perhaps the other candidate, although less experiences as a lay official had other experience that you lacked - perhaps she was more credible at interview etc etc.
But perhaps you should show some empathy - your level of frustration at seemingly being passed over because of gender despite (as you claim) being demonstrably the best candidate is the sort of thing women have been faced with for decades.
Turn your ire on discrimination, where ever it may be not on women because of one incident.
That reads like an argument for positive discrimination.
On the contrary.
If you actually bothered to read what I said I implied that the best person should get the job. Not a default based on time served, merely rubber stamped with an assumption that the job 'was yours'.
And that the recruitment process should be sophisticated to allow a range of relevant experience to be evidenced within the process, because making the process too mechanistic can install indirect bias. An obvious one being 'length' of experience, rather than quality of experience. Processes that place undue emphasis on length of experience (candidate must have 10 years experience as a junior widget maker) can bias in a number of ways, including of course against those that take career breaks or change careers. And actually are often very poor recruitment practice because a person with 11 years as a junior widget maker might not be as good as a junior widget maker compared to someone else with 2 years experience. And even if they were that doesn't mean they would necessarily be any good as a senior widget maker because that role requires different skills.
FTR this was a full time regional post, there was no interview, the regional officer was elected by the regional committee comprised of fifteen branches. Since this post would involve a relocation (unless the successful applicant lived in London), it was usual for the Chair & Secretary to make some enquiries beforehand as to whom was being nominated. The Chairman informed me that I had received nominations from the majority of branches, and the only other nominee was somebody unknown to most, who had been in the job only a short time. That is why I could reasonably expect the committee meeting to rubberstamp my application, I had not reckoned on delegates breaking their mandate following a last minuite interjection at what was supposed to be a formality.
Bit of a strange process, but none the less you have made it clear that the job of the committee was to elected by the committee with relevant candidates having received nominations from branches. There might have been a convention of rubber stamping on the basis of nominations, but that doesn't appear to be either required or sensible.
Presumably when the committee looked at the applicants and made their enquiries they became convinced that the other candidate was the better person for the job and used their authority as an electing committee to take that decision.
The presumption that you bring across - that because you had served a lot of time and was known to enough branches to get loads of nominations meant you should get the job worries me. A senior role is not a reward for long service, nor is it a popularity contest (unless directly elected), it is for the committee to decide the best person for the role taking account of a range of evidence and information.
Clearly you are sore about this, and this rankles even after nearly 30 years, but from what you have told us here I would have thought you'd been better reflecting on the reasons the committee chose not to select you, and your presumption that it was a foregone conclusion (which might have indeed been one of the reasons) rather than having a pop at others.
