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men: that's my opinion, it's just fact 
men: that's my opinion, it's just fact
women: that's just your opinion
men: it's just fact, tho, sorry if you're offended by facts
women: but it's factually wrong
men: so I can't express my opinion?
women:
men: women, so temperamental and crazy
women: that's just your opinion
men: it's just fact, tho, sorry if you're offended by facts
women: but it's factually wrong
men: so I can't express my opinion?
women:
men: women, so temperamental and crazy
this brought to you by an actual conversation that went something like this
man: it's just fact, no woman will ever be as beautiful as she is at 16
a bunch of people: beauty is subjective and also you are a pedophile
man: it's just an opinion, jesus
man: it's just fact, no woman will ever be as beautiful as she is at 16
a bunch of people: beauty is subjective and also you are a pedophile
man: it's just an opinion, jesus
like there's a whole BODY of research to be done about why all sorts of Professional Advice For Women assumes that women always "hedge" ("I think that," "it's my opinion that") because of lack of confidence rather than to distinguish between what we know vs what we merely believe
and I recall that for a while there was a study going around that was like Women Are Magic!!!! if you have them on your team at work your team will do better because they bring their FEMININE MAGIC
and then someone (I think it was HBR) broke it down as to why:
and then someone (I think it was HBR) broke it down as to why:
and when they dug into it it turned out to be not because Women Are Magic (TM) but because we were more likely to be clear about what we knew vs believed and to try to get consensus from teams
On all-male teams, people were more likely to present their opinion as fact, and to assume that everyone agreed with them without actually checking to see whether that was true, which led to those teams acting on bad information or going forward with bad processes more often
And I swear, when I was working in games I thought about that like EVERY DAMN DAY as dudes around me just straight-up refused to distinguish between their opinions and facts
The older I get, the more that refusal to distinguish between opinion and fact feels like a kind of gaslighting, especially since A) if you push to clarify that distinction, you're bitchy and the man's ego is wounded, and B) he can avoid accountability by hiding in that ambiguity
