On some more sadness

My posts lately all tend to be things that make me sad. Add this to the heap.

The other day, Angry Prof pointed out that a woman whose baby died garnered less support from her faculty colleagues than a man who had a problem with faulty lab equipment. I read that after reading Female Science Professor point out that the men on a committee in her department were meeting in secret without her.

Why do women go into academia? Why does anyone?

There was a male scientist I knew who, whether he knew it or not or did it deliberately or not, was responsible for driving several women out of the graduate program in which he was the graduate advisor. He was also well known for looking down on anyone who left academia to go into industry.

It's sad that folks like him still seem to be the exception rather than the rule.