Late last week, Emily Graslie of Brain Scoop posted a new video in which she explains exactly why it's so difficult to be a woman in a STEM field: While she gets a lot of support and positive feedback, many "fans" simply want to discuss her appearance and how fuckable she is.
All the way back in 1842, when humans still spent all their time huddled around in the dark, gnawing on potatoes and reveling in abject confusion (basically), brilliant genius Ada Lovelace penned the world's first computer program. Nowadays, Ada Lovelace is a women-in-STEM hero; annually, we honor her and celebrate…
To celebrate the first anniversary of Curiosity's landing on Mars, Mattel has issued a special Barbie doll. And yes, she's wearing pink.
Today's Google Doodle celebrates Maria Mitchell, the first female astronomer in the U.S. who discovered a comet in 1847. (Be sure and read about her fascinating life... dome parties?) Just last week, the Doodle honored molecular biologist Rosalind Franklin. Yay lady scientists!
Last year, Stanford engineering student Debbie Sterling founded GoldieBlox, a construction toy meant to "prove to the world that engineering for girls is a mainstream concept." The company strives to encourage little girls to remain interested in engineering by engaging them in story-oriented building (the way boys are …
High school, what a time! What was your favorite part? Passing notes? Giggling at handsome fellows and dames? Causing a small explosion in science class, being taken into police custody, and getting sent to the slammer? Wait, what the hell?
In the not-so-distant future, when humanities majors (the unskilled laborers of academia) become so commonplace that they make Falstaff’s birthday a national holiday on which people are only allowed to talk to each other in heroic couplets, anyone who studied a hard science (i.e. not sociology) will be treated like a…
I always assume, when strangers ask me extremely basic questions about objectification and entitlement and power differentials, that they're just bozo trolls looking to get a rise out of me for sport and waste the grumpy feminist's time. I mean, it's 2013. Everyone knows by now why we don't have a White History Month,…
Denigrating grandmothers for their supposed lack of technological prowess is bullshit because a) big fucking deal you can use a computer — your grandmother was probably old enough during the moon landing to roll her eyes when Neil Armstrong read his cheesy "one small step" line, and b) grandmothers are really crafty, so…
On Monday, a whopping four members of the Senate Judiciary Committee convened to hear testimony about the H-1B visa program, which helps U.S. employers temporarily employ foreign workers in highly-specialized occupations. These are usually STEM occupations, and, according to yesterday's stark testimony from engineer…
What happens when 80% of your customers are female, but your engineers behind-the-scenes are 87% male? If you're Etsy, you try to fix it.
Wikipedia, the collaborative encyclopedia that's edited by you (if you're a dude), me (if I were a dude), and all the dudes you know, launched in 2001 and quickly became the place to find quick info on pretty much any topic under the sun. Remember writing research papers before Wikipedia? Man, we were all such chumps…
Back in June, the European Commission rightfully came under fire after unleashing their horrible "Science: It's a Girl Thing
Of all the various schemes
Early this morning, astronaut and physicist Sally Ride passed away after a 61-year-long life of exploration, boundary breaking, and ass kicking. When she blasted into space in 1983, she became the youngest American and the first American woman to leave the earth's atmosphere, thus igniting space camp dreams in a…
One of the challenges in convincing little girls to want to be smart is that they've been indoctrinated by society and princess culture into thinking that being smart is a thing that ugly mustachioed chicks do because no one wanted to marry them and they're too allergic to hoard cats. Enter the Science Cheerleaders…
You might think that once you give birth to a child that they're no longer a part of you physically—except, of course, for the complete control they retain over your heart and mind. Well, think again, because it turns out that during pregnancy some of their cells scatter in your body and stay there for years, maybe…
Over the last two decades, women have made inroads into the male-dominated fields of science, technology, engineering, and medicine. But you wouldn't know it if you asked the men who tend to chair scientific awards committees, who award research-based science awards to men 95% of the time. If a glass ceiling breaks and …
A new study provides a sure-to-be-controversial explanation for why women are less likely than men to pursue careers in science and engineering: exposure to male sex hormones in utero appears linked to a later interest in "things" rather than people.
The lack of women in science, technology, engineering, and math is often lamented, but it's still unclear why a gender gap exists in those fields. Now researchers say the problem might be that when a woman's thoughts turn to romance, they also turn away from the sciences.
Are you middle-aged, cash-poor, and hate your face? Then you're perfect for some TV show for which ABC is casting right now about "stem-cell face lifts." The network is seeking guinea pigs to undergo an on-air procedure that involves having stem cells taken from one area of the body—via liposuction from a fatty site like …
On Sunday, Barack Obama railed against "iPods, iPads, Xboxes, and PlayStations" which make information "a distraction" but a new study finds a link between happiness and access to technology, particularly in developing nations. Why is there such a disconnect?
