Gender discrimination among playwrights.

Have I mentioned how much I love reading feminist critiques of science journalism?

Echidne of the Snakes opens a can of science whoopass on journalists who cannot read the studies about which they report.

To make a long story short, it had been reported in several news outlets that a recent study showed that female directors and managers give worse ratings to female-authored plays, thus women are really the cause of discrimination against female playwrights.

The reporting was very, very wrong.

The study design was:
1) Send out identical plays to many such directors/managers, all of which were actually written by women, but put male names on half of them.
2) Have such directors/managers fill out long questionnaires that asked both about how the director thought the play would be received and also about what the director thought about the actual quality of the play.

The results?

Male directors rated the "male" and "female" authored plays equally on both personal ratings and how they thought it would be recieved.

Female directors rated the "male" and "female" authored plays equally on personal ratings, but they responded that "female" authored plays would be received less-well by others, likely because they were more aware of how gender-based discrimination plays out in these situations.

Apparently in the eyes of science journalists, as Echidne says, "To notice discrimination is to be guilty of it."

A brief lesson for any whackjob libertarians reading this:

The data does not support your contention that a strictly private healthcare system is more efficient or cheaper than a public one. No, you will not even have to wait longer for a doctor's appointment.

I know, I know, that's not what you've been led to expect. Just read this.

Marvel at its reliance on actual data.

That sensation you're feeling? It's cognitive dissonance.

Sometimes, people come up with theoretical systems that seem very likely to work out, but those systems end up not working out as well as theorized. Right now might be a good time to reevaluate whether or not your system is as ideal in practice as it is in theory.

Take as long as you need.

When you're done with that, repeat after me:
A public health insurance option is not the same as a single-payer system.
A public health insurance option will create more competition, not less.
Sometimes a public project is more effective than a private industry.
Taxation is not equivalent to theft, slavery, or initiation of force.

Now get over yourselves.

On a slightly unrelated note, I read my President's speech about his plans for healthcare reform to the AMA, and I squeed a little. Yay for having a reasonable! person! in the White House.

Here's a link to the post that got my boxer-briefs all in a twist.

And here's a link to my craaaaaaaaazy suggestion that people who use the apparatus of society the most and draw the most benefit from said apparatus should be expected to contribute more to it.

A brief note about Pharyngulan commenters.

Commenters like Troy are seriously idiotic fucked up monsters, and they make me want to find the servers that host Pharyngula's comment threads and burn them to the ground. Or at the very least, to never ever ever read said threads again.

Commenters like Rev. BigDumbChimp give me hope for humanity. Don't ever stop "feeding the trolls" by correcting their asshattery; if no one speaks up and says that bigoted shit is wrong, it seems like there's some implicit condoning going on. I hope you get a Molly, and I'm planning on voting for you the next chance I get. Reading your responses has helped preserve my sanity today, and for that I thank you.

Good day.

...

I SAID GOOD DAY.

WANT

I am an unbelievable sucker for silly books that attempt to proselytize to me.

I've been hooked

The Sims 3 is the reason why I haven't been posting... or doing laundry.. or doing much of anything, actually. It is a fantabulous game.

Here is a small example of why.

Now I'm going back to my Sims family!

BTW: BUY THIS GAME.

For encouragement.

And He saw the light was good, because now He could see what He was doing