you are viewing a single comment's thread.

view the rest of the comments →

[–]_another_voice 11 insightful - 1 fun11 insightful - 0 fun12 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

One of my best friends--before we became friends, we were just coworkers--said, "I have a lot of opinions. I know you have opinions; you should speak them." To her, it was an expectation. She wanted discourse. We disagree on many topics, but we're still friends several years later because we expect and welcome disagreement: at minimum, it makes us think.

Another was never being called on for questions in grad school, strictly because I was female (all the men, a vast majority in the course, seemed to get theirs answered just fine) until the first test scores came back.

[–]vitunrotta[S] 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

A lot of times simply having an opinion - any opinion - as a woman, you'll be chastised and dismissed. Don't you know you should not be so loud? And heavens! Do not swear! Don't debate! Why are you so aggressive! (Usually comes up when you calmly explain your POW of something...)

Keep it up. Don't quiet yourself. We've been taught to do it, it's now our mission to unlearn this terrible lesson.