
I Don’t Care That Miss America Is a Scientist - smacktoward
https://slate.com/technology/2019/12/miss-america-scientist-i-do-not-care.html
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ravenstine
> This isn’t a win for science. It’s the science-washing of one of the most
> bullshit patriarchal rituals there is.

You seriously cannot ever please some people. Seems things can't just be
changed gradually over time to be better; they either have to be radically
changed or slashed and burned.

> It is upsetting to me that people still think a woman having interests
> outside of being poised and beautiful is a revelation worthy of a headline

With journalists and activists always bringing up the issue that there's a
disproportionately low number of women in STEM, I don't see how it's _not_
worthy of a headline. After all, you(the author) thought it was big enough of
a deal to write your own article complaining about it. I don't think you(the
author) actually believe what you're saying here because, if you did, you
wouldn't even be paying much attention to it and you'd just allow the issue to
die a quiet death.

> We’ve known for ages that women have interests!

And if it weren't the year 2019 your(the author) article could easily be
titled "Miss America: Women Have More Interests Than Just Beauty And Grace!"

Why does that even matter, anyway? People can't enter contests and show off
their interests?

I reread this article 3 times and I still don't get what exactly this author
has a beef with over Miss America besides that it's a "bullshit patriarchal
ritual".

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mdorazio
The author has a point. I feel like this is what happens when media machines
like Miss America get a hold of a Cause. You end up with a veneer of progress,
but the underlying core remains almost as bad as it always was.

~~~
varelse
Look no further than dredging up Steven Pinker to not only defend "Quantum
Supremacy" but to double-down and revisit the NIPS to NEURIPS name change
because we apparently have nothing better to talk about on Christmas...

[https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=4476](https://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=4476)

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sfaewrgfaegw
I don't understand people who are annoyed at Miss America for celebrating
beauty. I would understand them if they were upset at the gratuitous nudity
[0], but that doesn't even register today - we're saturated with scantly clad
people celebrating themselves in public.

Beauty if a gift. I'm a overjoyed if someone tells me my daughter is
beautiful, she really is, but I don't let people photograph her, never-mind
allow her to be in a pageant. But there's nothing wrong in being beautiful.
It's a gift.

Nor does being smart intrinsically make the person worthy. Intelligence is
also a gift, a good one, but it hardly makes the holder a good person. So I
don't celebrate someone for their academic achievements. Big deal.

Instead I celebrate people who, with their gifts, work for others. Yes, even
personal beauty and grace can be used for this purpose (see Audrey Hepburn). A
person with a 250 IQ and ten PhDs means nothing to me if they're the re-
incarnation of Robert McNamara.

[0] A "little black dress" like Audrey Hepburn's and with her grace is far
more revealing of beauty than a bikini. The bikini seems to be about detecting
"flaws" like you would a horse at a market.

~~~
mikestew
Could be generational. Odds are, I’ve got ten, twenty or more years on you. To
me, it has nothing to do with beauty other than: “this one of your few options
as a woman. Better look pretty. And dance or twirl a baton.” And we put it on
national TV. It was propaganda, IMO. (I’m probably way overreaching on that
one.)

Putting lipstick on that pig with a little “science” doesn’t fool me. The big
deal being made kinda drives my point home.

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gnicholas
Wow TIL that the actress who played Winnie on the Wonder Years has a PhD in
mathematics from the University of Chicago, and a mathematical proof bears her
name (and the name of her undergrad advisor at UCLA).

~~~
urmish
she doesn't. She has a bachelors from UCLA. The phd part is fake news:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danica_McKellar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danica_McKellar)

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drewcoo
Now that real scientists are being sexually objectified by the public what
does this mean for the Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists?
[https://www.improbable.com/hair/](https://www.improbable.com/hair/)

