Thursday, July 26, 2007

Welcome to the Future

Full article by Dinesh D'Souza here.

[At American colleges], the male-female ratio is approaching 40:60. That means that colleges are facing the scary prospect of having only 40 men for every 60 women. The men aren't complaining: even very ordinary guys now have a good chance of dating the attractive gals. But the women aren't happy at all. The Chronicle of Higher Education observes in its July 20 issue that "women are expected to fulfill a guy's sexual desire immediately or risk losing a prospective mate to the next girl in line."

So what are the colleges doing? The Chronicle reports that several colleges, both private and public, are making it easier for boys to get in, even though girls apply with comparable or better grades and standardized test scores. At William and Mary and the University of Richmond, for example, the acceptance rate for boys is around 13 percent higher than that for girls with matching credentials. The most surprising aspect of this gender discrimination is that no one seems to be objecting to it.

At first the feminist groups considered putting pressure on colleges to stop discriminating in favor of men. Then two things got in their way. The first was their own ideology of diversity. The feminists have been calling for gender balance for two decades now, and it's bit difficult to turn around and take the opposite line when the women outnumber the men. The second factor is women themselves, who have made it very clear that they want more men on campus...

12 Comments:

Blogger erp said...

Social engineering taking place without a scientific breakthrough. Jeepers. What next?

My own non-scientific observations: When something, anything, becomes a female dominated, it loses cache.

In this instance, when a college degree starts losing value in the public psyche, men will start looking for other ways to maintain their superior position. Since most women's degrees are in the soft, shall we say un-vigorous non-academic "disciplines," there perforce may be a line of demarcation between the types of degrees a college or university will offer. A degree in the traditional areas of learning like math or science might be designated differently than a degree in teacher training or the fill-in-the-blank PC studies du jour.

July 26, 2007 8:10 AM  
Blogger Harry Eagar said...

A friend who is a Caltech grad works hard to recruit girls for that school.

It's the Unsurf City: two boys for every girl.

Caltech's president has said that if the girl count cannot be raised, it threatens the existence of the school.

You've come a long way, baby.

July 26, 2007 10:21 AM  
Blogger Bret said...

I have two daughters and I think the lack of men on campus will be a problem for them. Fortunately, they won't spend their lives in college and will have opportunity to meet men after they graduate.

July 26, 2007 12:07 PM  
Blogger erp said...

Bret, tell them to get a degree in engineering. That's where the cool men are.

July 26, 2007 2:00 PM  
Blogger Bret said...

erp, I'd like it if they were engineers, even though it doesn't pay very well. They could work at my robot company then.

However, since I'm an enginerd, they'll accuse me of having an agenda if I encourage them to be engineers.

July 26, 2007 3:39 PM  
Blogger David said...

I want to make perfectly clear that this has nothing to do with my decision to go back to school.

July 26, 2007 4:20 PM  
Blogger Oroborous said...

LOL

Sure it doesn't.

July 26, 2007 6:10 PM  
Blogger Susan's Husband said...

Being an engineer doesn't pay well? You need to look for a better company.

P.S. Sorry, erp, I wrote a comment on a later post that basically echoes yours here. It was the first thing that came to mind, except I think the causation is the other way — the devaluation happened first, then the drop off in male attendance, which then creates a vicious cycle.

July 27, 2007 7:55 AM  
Blogger Bret said...

Being an engineer doesn't pay well compared to other profession of similar training. Salesmen make more, accountants make more, even plumbers have comparable incomes I think. In addition, engineers start to make more once they go into management, but at that point they're only sort of engineers. The ones who want to stay in engineering and not go into management are paid less.

These are my observations after hiring people for a few different small companies I've been involved with. The salesmen are by far the most expensive people on the payroll, but good ones are worth their weight in platinum.

July 27, 2007 12:44 PM  
Blogger erp said...

SH, yes the causation is as you say. I'm sorry if I wasn't clear.

Bret, we have an ongoing debate in our family. One son is a theoretical physicist who fies on "inventing" things or even thinking about practical uses for his ideas. The other can sell ice to Eskimos.

July 27, 2007 2:43 PM  
Blogger David said...

I went and looked at UMass's enrollment by gender since 1977. It's basically 50/50, but in getting their they had a few years of overshoot. The whole issue (to the extent that it is an issue) might just be overshoot.

Also, I note that there are still all-female schools but, in effect, no all-male schools.

July 30, 2007 7:43 AM  
Blogger Hey Skipper said...

Being an engineer doesn't pay well compared to other profession of similar training.

I'll bet that on average, though, engineers have much higher job satisfaction.

July 30, 2007 11:01 PM  

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