So, today John Green posted a video about the gender pay gap, and this is an important video and an important conversation for several reasons. The big ones being, that 1- the gender pay gap exists and 2- some people (*cough* most of them men *cough*) seem to think that this pay gap...doesn't exist... And that makes solving this problem really, really difficult. But the thing is, when I see people (men) denying the existence of the gender pay gap, I see a very similar dynamic that one sees, for example, when anti-vaxxers are exposed to scientific evidence or when a young earth creationist has to confront evolution. And just like anti-vaxxers and creationists aren't intrinsically assholes, neither are the men that deny the gender pay gap. They're just living within their personal fantasy (as we all are), and the idea of a gender bias giving them a very real, empirical advantage in their lives is at odds with that fantasy. They, like all of us, want to believe that we've earned what we have. That if we make more money than our neighbours, it's because we are somehow, in a very real sense, more valuable. That we deserve the good things that come to us. Of course, this fantasy is very problematic. It leads to the idea that unsuccessful people (or less successful people) are that way because of the same very-real reasons. That they must be lazy or stupid -- or at least lazier and stupider than you. It leads to an unconscious bias against the poor, people of colour, women, and everyone else who has to struggle a little (or a lot) more than you do to succeed. People don't want to think that they got ahead while another person didn't because of the sheer dumb luck of being born to the right parents, in the right continent, as the right race or gender or sexuality. The people denying the gender gap are (for the most part) intelligent, mature adults. They're the kind of people that want to take responsibility for their actions. They want to see their successes as a result of those actions, and other’s failures as a result of their lack. It's asking a lot to have these people admit that maybe they didn't get by because they’re so much more clever than everyone else. Or so much more determined. That maybe they're average (like most of us are), and the reason they got that job or that promotion has less to do with hard work and more to do with a rigged system that put them at an advantage. This isn’t to lessen a person’s achievements. People who strived and studied and worked in order to get their engineering degrees or whatever achievement, did those things, and those things should be rewarded with success. But not everyone is rewarded. It's not their fault that they were placed on the winning side of a rigged game, and when they've never experienced playing on the losing side, maybe it's also not their fault that some of them struggle to understand or even believe that the rulebook is different for the other team at all. But it is different. And this is not a new problem. John Locke wrote about the same phenomena of being unable to perceive your own unreasonableness hundreds of years ago. He begins Of the Association of Ideas with: "There is scarce any one that does not observe something that seems odd to him, and is in itself really extravagant, in the opinions, reasonings, and actions of other men. The least flaw of this kind, if at all different from his own, every one is quick-sighted enough to espy in another, and will by the authority of reason forwardly condemn; though he be guilty of much greater unreasonableness in his own tenets and conduct, which he never perceives, and will very hardly, if at all, be convinced of. This proceeds not wholly from self-love, though that has often a great hand in it. Men of fair minds, and not given up to the overweening of self-flattery, are frequently guilty of it; and in many cases one with amazement hears the arguings, and is astonished at the obstinacy of a worthy man, who yields not to the evidence of reason, though laid before him as clear as daylight. This sort of unreasonableness is usually imputed to education and prejudice, and for the most part truly enough, though that reaches not the bottom of the disease, nor shows distinctly enough whence it rises, or wherein it lies. Education is often rightly assigned for the cause, and prejudice is a good general name for the thing itself: but yet, I think, he ought to look a little further, who would trace this sort of madness to the root it springs from, and so explain it, as to show whence this flaw has its original in very sober and rational minds, and wherein it consists." Basically, what Locke is saying in this quotation is that, everyone eventually comes across an observation that seems weird to them. Some that challenges how they think about the world and themselves. When confronted with this weirdness, that person will try to attack the weird observation. Often, they’ll attack it much more viciously than some of the silly things they believe personally. They’ll argue that, anyone with reason, must condemn this weirdness, without realizing (and even being unable to realize) that they themselves are the unreasonable party. That the person refuses to be convinced that the weirdness can possibly be true or that they are in fact being unreasonable. He argues that this doesn’t come wholly from arrogance (though it does often at least in part). He says reasonable people sometimes can’t come to terms with the evidence of reason even when it’s laid out before them. Like the anti-vaxxers, the climate change deniers, and the creationists, the gender-gap deniers are grappling with their fantasy and the facts. Admitting an advantage means having to reevaluate their successes and fortunes. But being privileged isn’t about giving up your success. It’s not about the under-privileged wanting you to admit you didn’t earn what you’ve got and demanding you stop prospering. Instead, it’s about reaching out to the under-privileged and saying, “You’re right. This is harder for you. Let me help.” So that maybe one day, we can all play using the same rules, and our successes truly will be a reflection of just our own volition rather than a mix of skill and luck.
