

Scientist's Gender Is Switched in Press Coverage - slvv
http://chronicle.com/article/That-Lab-Coat-Looks-Good-on/231445/

======
JadeNB
In case anyone reflexively thinks, as I did, "probably making a mountain out
of a typo molehill", the author says:

> To be fair, "Kelsey" can be an androgynous name, but female pronouns were
> used in the original news release, so these had to have been deliberately
> changed. One of the news organizations that changed my gender had actually
> interviewed me, in person.

and, heartbreakingly:

> … why does it matter? The women who set the path before I came along had to
> deal with much more egregious social norms and behaviors. By comparison,
> these "small" things hardly seem noteworthy. However, even small things add
> up over time to create an environment that makes it clear when you’re an
> outsider.

------
oconnor663
> If you do an image search of the word "scientist," you will likely get a
> flood of pictures of mostly white males wearing lab coats.

This appears to no longer be the case, at least for me in the US.

~~~
gus_massa
I agree, but most of the pictures look like stock photos or clipart. In my
opinion, the first genuine photo are #16 and #19 (in my personalized order
produced by Google image search, your numbers may vary). Anyway, the apparent
genuine photos also have a good variation.

My complain is that most of them use white coats, so they look like
Chemistry/Biology/Medical scientific. I never saw a Physics scientific with a
white coat.

~~~
DanBC
What should a physicist stock photo / clipart show?

That's probably a useful niche: stock photos and clip art that represent
actual science.

~~~
gus_massa
Stock photos of real science is hard, it's easier to put someone standing at
the side of the equipment they use in the real scientific work.

For experimental physics I like the photos of optical tables (
[https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=optical+tables+lase...](https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=optical+tables+laser)
) and the racks with a lot of electronic equipment (
[https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=physics+laboratory+...](https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=physics+laboratory+rack)
skip the first 10 images). They look like something you may find in a real
laboratory.

Theoretical physics is harder, they look like normal people (i.e.
mathematicians) until they start to talk about the real word. I prefer to
discuss writing in paper, but for a photograph the only sensible solution is
to write a bunch of slightly related equations in a blackboard.

(And there are many other science branches. For Geology you may put someone
with a bunch of rocks, but I don't know a real geologist so it may be not a
representative image.)

------
justonepost
I wish there was a law that all articles had to have an abstract at the
beginning.

~~~
JadeNB
To be fair, this is a blog post, not an article; and I think that the HN title
(which is not the blog post's title) is about as succinct an abstract as you
can get. (EDIT: I'm sorry, I'm wrong; it _is_ an article on The Chronicle of
Higher Education. I think that my second sentence still stands.)

