After all, brilliant, kind, fantastic men have long surrounded me at home and at work. The therapist in question was himself a man, and one I didn’t think twice about confiding in. But if I’m being honest with myself, my therapist, and you?
I do have a problem with some men. And it started with WIRED. In 2009, I got my first job interning and later reporting for WIRED.com.
The publication in that era was enthusiastic about technology, and about the innovators and visionaries defining the future. For decades, WIRED eagerly reinforced the narrative that the vast majority of those geniuses were men: One 2010 analysis found that since its founding in 1993, WIRED had published 70 covers featuring at least one man. In that same span, the magazine published four covers—yes, four—that celebrate women for their professional accomplishments.
I can’t remember working with a single female editor during my first stint at WIRED. I do, however, remember a 40-something male editor asking “where’d the legs go?” when I opted to wear pants instead of a skirt to the office. It turned out to be just a preview.
Off the top of my head, and across a 17-year career: There was the boss who, upon learning that I wanted kids, said that I seemed “too cold” to be a parent. I held my tears long enough to make it to the bathroom. A few years later, I remember being visibly pregnant in another employer’s office, as he joked that a woman as intense as me would probably keep her baby locked in a closet.
One boss tried to pay me exponentially less than my male predecessor, because, he said, I was younger and less authoritative. A highly regarded media company enrolled me in its internal program for promising female leaders, which was being run by two male executives. I stood last year among a crowd of my peers at a packed event, listening to a prominent think-tank leader (male) credit WIRED’s previous editor in chief (also male) with the magazine’s successes during my tenure.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
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