How men continue to interrupt even the most powerful women

[C C]

https://aeon.co/ideas/how-men-continue-t...rful-women

EXCERPT: [...] There is much reason to feel disheartened and disappointed by both our empirical evidence and the anecdotes shared with us. But there are ways to combat this issue. First, on an institutional level, there could be better enforcement by the chief justice by preventing an interrupter – even an interrupting justice – from continuing with his question and directing the advocate back to the interruptee. The chief justice could also enforce the existing rule that prohibits advocates from interrupting the justices, which would set an example for the advocates, the justices, and the public who watch or listen to the arguments. Second, on a societal level, raising awareness is essential. Men need to recognise that this occurs in order to change their behaviour, while women need to fight it or adapt. Therefore, research like ours has the potential to open the eyes of the justices, others in the legal profession, and society at large to this subtle but pervasive form of gender bias....

[Syne]

Men are naturally more competitive, and as a result, use to asserting themselves more. Until women learn to do the same, their disadvantage is simply that of directly competing with men. It is sexist to demand men change their natural, evolutionary psychology.

[Magical Realist]

Men are naturally more competitive, and as a result, use to asserting themselves more. Until women learn to do the same, their disadvantage is simply that of directly competing with men. It is sexist to demand men change their natural, evolutionary psychology.

Respecting someone else's turn to speak in a conversation has nothing to do with competitiveness. You make men sound like rash hyperactive assholes who always have to dominate other speakers. That's sexist in itself. Furthermore, what you're used to getting away with isn't an argument for it being the right thing. We still live in a society rampant with sexist and chauvinist mores. The fact that men comfortably enact them daily doesn't make it right. It's time to wake up.

[Syne]

Men are naturally more competitive, and as a result, use to asserting themselves more. Until women learn to do the same, their disadvantage is simply that of directly competing with men. It is sexist to demand men change their natural, evolutionary psychology.

Respecting someone else's turn to speak in a conversation has nothing to do with competitiveness. You make men sound like rash hyperactive assholes who always have to dominate other speakers. That's sexist in itself. Furthermore, what you're used to getting away with isn't an argument for it being the right thing. We still live in a society rampant with sexist and chauvinist mores. The fact that men comfortably enact them daily doesn't make it right. It's time to wake up.

This nonsense that the men are all to blame is an infantilization of the women, and is extremely demeaning and sexist. It's as if they are incapable of reasserting themselves...unless a man comes rushing to their aid. And where procedural rules and customs are lax or not enforced, it would take some assertiveness to reestablish.

Everyone has spontaneously started speaking a thought as it occurs to them, at one time or another. It's not especially disrespectful. Just happens, especially when your job is to be opinionated and seek to sway your colleagues. Men simply seem more accustom to dealing with such things. Any person, male or female, that is assertive would not allow themselves to be regularly interrupted, and that they do allow it is tacit permission.

[RainbowUnicorn]

Men are naturally more competitive, and as a result, use to asserting themselves more. Until women learn to do the same, their disadvantage is simply that of directly competing with men. It is sexist to demand men change their natural, evolutionary psychology.

Respecting someone else's turn to speak in a conversation has nothing to do with competitiveness. You make men sound like rash hyperactive assholes who always have to dominate other speakers. That's sexist in itself. Furthermore, what you're used to getting away with isn't an argument for it being the right thing. We still live in a society rampant with sexist and chauvinist mores. The fact that men comfortably enact them daily doesn't make it right. It's time to wake up.

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Men are naturally more competitive, and as a result, use to asserting themselves more. Until women learn to do the same, their disadvantage is simply that of directly competing with men. It is sexist to demand men change their natural, evolutionary psychology.

syne what expereince do you have with mixing with women socialising with them ?
have you ever had a female best friend whom there is no sexual interest ?

[Zinjanthropos]

His wife had been killed in an accident and the police were questioning Finnegan. “Did she say anything before she died?” asked the sergeant.
A. “She spoke without interruption for about forty years,” said Finnegan.

I've realized after being married for so long that it's not that I interrupt my wife on occasion but that I never say anything about it when she interrupts me. I would wager that over time we've probably interrupted each other an equal amount.

[C C]

[...] Male justices are not the only culprits. Despite strict rules that mandate advocates stop talking immediately when a justice begins speaking, the male advocates interrupt the female justices at extraordinary rates. Male advocates account for approximately 10 per cent of all interruptions; female advocates account for approximately 0 per cent. So the pattern we observe of female justices being systematically interrupted is not simply a product of an idiosyncratic handful of male justices – the same dominant behaviour is displayed among the hundreds of advocates appearing before the court.

If the female advocates started breaking the rules and interrupting the male justices, too, then that brand of affront would surely jar the system a bit toward becoming conscious again of the conventions and their violations. Once that happens or it becomes an "out there" issue, it's got to respect the enforcement in regard to both genders or all Gehenna boils over.

[...] justices O’Connor and Ginsburg were interrupted just under three times more often than the average male justice. [...] Republicans have dominated the court for the past half-century. If interruptions are a product of dominance, then we should expect that conservatives will interrupt liberals more than vice versa. And this is in fact exactly what we see: liberal justices are interrupted approximately 2.5 times as often as conservative justices. Also, advocates interrupt liberal justices more than three times as often as they interrupt conservative justices, and advocates arguing the conservative side of an issue interrupt justices more than advocates arguing the liberal side. This support for the theory of interruptions as a form of dominance suggests that male justices and male advocates view the female justices as people they can dominate.

Assuming that would still be 3 times more for Sandra Day O'Connor if the two were disentangled from that "lump together", I'm not sure her interruption rate completely makes it totally a matter of the patriarchal impulse picking on the women justices regardless of their ideological disposition (i.e., gender being the provocation / stimulus for the behavior more than politics, etc). Although she was typecast as conservative, the religious right activists of Reagan's era didn't approve of her nomination and accordingly some Republican senators opposed it as well. O'Connor became irregular after Clarence Thomas joined SCOTUS, joining the "liberal bloc of John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ginsburg, and Stephen Breyer" a lesser 28 times.

Also, when Ruth Bader Ginsburg is deemed by a survey to be the most recognized "force that kix arse", that might trivially skewer conclusions from the standpoint that she could have also been targeted occasionally for her public prominence.

[...] We found that women gradually learn to set aside such politeness. All four women who have served on the court show clear downward trends in their use of polite phrasing. Almost all the men enter the court using low levels of such polite language. [...]

Outside the justice system, in the arena abroad...

I recollect Eleanor Clift getting interrupted often on the now demised McLaughlin Group. In contrast, when they were either regulars or semi-regulars, conservatives like Monica Crowley and Susan Ferrechio seemed to be interrupted less -- although Clift and Crowley would heavily interrupt each other. Both were aggressive in that respect. Clift doubtless dropping the politeness and becoming assertive long before from all the years of battling with the opposite panel on the show. (The latter was at least slightly politically lopsided from the standpoint of McLauglin himself being the extra or third member that the traditionalist side got. But there were times when the interruptions got frequent or extreme enough that McLaughlin would have to finally intervene and declare: "Let Eleanor finish..." or "Let Eleanor speak...").

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[Syne]

Men are naturally more competitive, and as a result, use to asserting themselves more. Until women learn to do the same, their disadvantage is simply that of directly competing with men. It is sexist to demand men change their natural, evolutionary psychology.

syne what expereince do you have with mixing with women socialising with them ?
have you ever had a female best friend whom there is no sexual interest ?

Socializing is a very different setting than the one examined in the article...and that I'm commenting on.
I respect everyone the same, man or woman. I don't infantilize the women I know by giving them special deference, because I know they are fully capable of speaking up and commanding attention when they want to. I am, though, mindful that they are physically weaker and tend to be more emotional...due to their evolutionary psychology...just like men are generally more assertive due to their own.

[RainbowUnicorn]

Men are naturally more competitive, and as a result, use to asserting themselves more. Until women learn to do the same, their disadvantage is simply that of directly competing with men. It is sexist to demand men change their natural, evolutionary psychology.

syne what expereince do you have with mixing with women socialising with them ?
have you ever had a female best friend whom there is no sexual interest ?

Socializing is a very different setting than the one examined in the article...and that I'm commenting on.
I respect everyone the same, man or woman. I don't infantilize the women I know by giving them special deference, because I know they are fully capable of speaking up and commanding attention when they want to. I am, though, mindful that they are physically weaker and tend to be more emotional...due to their evolutionary psychology...just like men are generally more assertive due to their own.

hhmm.. i agree with your points here somewhat.
i would like to think that in a profesional setting as much as social women are given equal opportunity to speak.
one could equally argue that the savage beast called women has domesticated themselves by need due to centurys of war and conflict for a purpose of survival... maybe somewhat of a loftier goal one might speculate.
social conditioning from early nurture would tend to condition social interaction to be very pre determined.
it seems to me that if the learned intellectaul were to allow that social conditionign to maintain control then it is an act of de-evolution.
thus the allowing of women to remain repressed by an overtly masculine social culture is simply holding the entire species back.
and.. i have the same opinion when it comes to non binary relationships.
relationships by their very nature are intellectual and thus gender is of little regard to higher intellectual aspects like love.
if one is to beleive in love.
many dont, many do.
i personally beleive that love is a valid intellectual goal to better the species and so should be encouraged rather than de-evolutionised back to some type of caveman mentality of coupling purely for breeding.