Is there any consensus on the best method for asking gender information on surveys? I’m reviewing a proposal for a research committee, and their approach is “A. Male B. Female C. Other”. On the one hand, hooray for having more than 2 options. On the other hand, “Other” is kind of, well, ‘othering’.My suggestion would be to leave a blank that participants can fill in as they wish, but don’t know if there are other approaches.
too many of our profession’s big shots continue to show indifference or, worse, cover for philosophically talented peers about which there are plenty of “open secrets.”
Philosopher Janet Stemwedel has written an excellent piece for Forbes on the Marcy sexual harassment case. She explores the interesting fact that the astronomy community seems more responsive to victims’ needs than his university is.
You might think a university would recognize itself as something like a community, and that it would prioritize protecting vulnerable individuals within the community (like students) from harm. Maybe a university’s institutional policies are even intended to protect students, but in their operation they seem not to work that way. In this case, a professor found to have violated a university policy is essentially told not to do it again — because if he does, maybe the university will suspend or fire him.
This doesn’t seem to do a lot to protect current and future students from the same kind of harm from the same professor.
Feminist Philosophers 