It was with a feeling of pride in the calibre of Australian scientists, and in particular our fearless women scientists, that I began to read your article in today’s Age. Though slightly condescending in tone, I felt that the headline What’s a nice girl like you doing with a Nobel Prize embraced the antiquated and, what ought to be decades old, attitude towards successful career women and women in non-traditional fields.
Dr Blackburn’s career has been highly successful and she (quite rightly) has won prizes that acknowledge the quality and importance of her work. And now, a Nobel.
Our country’s first female Nobel Laureate.
I read your article with some interest and cheered her success.
Until you capped off her life’s achievements with Dr Blackburn is married to biochemist John Sedat, and they have a son, Benjamin.
May I ask how this is relevant in any way, shape or form to her career? Or was it just that you felt you needed to tell the world that she is actually a real (read non-threatening) woman because she has a family? May I ask whether you would have included this snippet of personal information has she been male? I say you wouldn’t. Articles on our previous Nobel Laureates don’t mention that they have families.
And neither should they.
It is articles like yours about our successful women that patronise us and send messages that a woman’s true worth lies in her ability to mate and breed. We can win Nobel Prizes and yet the parting message about us is that we are not freaks, that we still tend to husband and hearth and children.
Your article is no better than a tabloid article about an A-list actress that says she’s a box-office success in passing and spends the rest of the time talking about her broken marriage.
You ought to be ashamed of yourself.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
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