The XX Factor: Slate women blog about politics, etc...

Re: Speaking of xx

Yes, Larry Summers should be able to speak at Davis. He's done his time (and lost his job). But I'm not ready to says he's a hero for telling it like it is about women and the sciences, which is what Sommers implies. During the fracas over his remarks in 2005, Meghan O'Rourke wrote this good piece for Slate. Her point was that when a university president--with all the cachet that job entails--talks about biological sex differences, he better do it with intellectual rigor and tact. Summers had neither really.

Of course, he's not alone. We all tend to degenerate into generalization and flippancy when we talk about sex differences. This morning one of my co-workers was worrying about a conversation he'd had with a mother at his daughter's school, who'd tried to talk to him about rearranging a playdate for his kid and hers. He hadn't known anything about the arrangement in the first place, and I said that most moms would know not to try to talk playdate with a dad. Which didn't exactly give him credit for trying to sort it all out, or encourage him to try again next time. This is why when my husband chides me for referring to "my kitchen," I say I'm sorry. At least I think I do.