Someone Needs To Set An Example …
WRT "man made object' @JimBridenstine? Really? No women are involved in the Parker Solar Probe mission? @NASASun https://t.co/YhIZJ1ODra
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) October 30, 2018
Style Guide for NASA History Authors and Editors
“Gender-Specific Language (e.g., Manned Space Program vs. Human Space Program): In general, all references to the space program should be non-gender-specific (e.g., human, piloted, unpiloted, robotic, as opposed to manned or unmanned). The exception to the rule is when referring to the Manned Spaceflight Center (also known as the Manned Spacecraft Center), the predecessor of Johnson Space Center in Houston, or to any other historical program name or official title that included “manned” (e.g., Associate Administrator for Manned Spaceflight).”
https://www.merriam-webster…
Silly post.
https://www.merriam-webster…
Spot on, Keith! I’ve already submitted this obvious Misuse of Collective Nouns to the appropriate authorities.
http://gph.is/1I9VZMv
Let’s support the Ministry’s efforts on this and other important issues:
https://www.dailydot.com/ir…
/snark: It’s true that normalization of these terms is not helpful to the cause.
But we are saddled with so many social wrongs wrt to women: unfair labor practices, wage disparity, ‘glass ceiling’, and #metoo all come to mind. Much progress has been made — while much remains.
Redefinition of collective nouns trivializes these important issues.
24 hours after having posted the comments above, I feel some explanation is in order. That comment was just plain off the mark.
Having come of age when opportunities to actually make a difference abounded, my personal creds on activism are in order. The 70’s were a period of great social-conscience upheaval. The issues then were civil rights (as now, alas); the Vietnam war; and lastly the ERA.
And I’m listing these causes because the efforts left me with an important lesson, that effecting even modest social change requires taking positions that are very far from center. As an instance, in modern terms: if you feel that medical insurance is unfair, advocate for “single payer”; in the end the political compromise will be closer to what you actually seek.
My comment was meant to poke some (gentle) fun at the expense of our host, not to denigrate the point that prejudice in our culture runs far deeper than we know, so deep that the ordinary, day-to-day language of collective nouns – seemingly fair – are actually hurtful.
Our true selves are betrayed by our language.
I always though man-made was a general phrase for “humans”, I never realized it was such a literal statement and had such sexist connotations. Wait, have climate scientists been declaring all along that males are making all the climate change?
This is why I come to NasaWatch for all the hard hitting journalism. Your fight against injustice and wrongthink is to be admired. Very double plus good.
I use the term “manned” when referring to ANY spacecraft with a human crew, regardless of gender. (That’s what we used back in the day, and I’m too old to change!) When spoken, the term “crewed” could be misunderstood as “crude”! Wonder how the military refers to a table of organization instead of the term “manning document”? “Humaning document just sounds awkward.
Maybe someone should also let JPL know the term is no longer appropriate.
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/in…
The Fastest Man-Made Objects in the Universe
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/mi…
Natural or Manmade?
https://www.nasa.gov/missio…
NASA Releases Images of Man-Made Crater on Comet
I wonder how this sort of discussion plays out in Spanish, or any other language where nouns have gender (including inanimate objects) and that’s an inherent part of the grammar. I know in Spanish, mixed-gender groups always take the masculine form. (E.g. “they” is “ellas” if all of them are female, and “ellos” if all of them are male _or_ if “they” include both men and women.)
In fact, there are no women involved with the Parker Solar Probe mission; Matt Taylor wore a tacky shirt during a press conference a few years ago about Philae landing on a comet, and the resulting misogyny, ostracism, and negation did the ladies of space science in. Tragic.
Huh? There are quite a few women involved with Parker. Dr. Taylor’s infamous shirt didn’t drive women out of the field. If anything, it made women (and men) more determined to solve the gender problems in the field. And take a look at Keith’s post about Hubble being back on line. Half of the observations on the first day after resuming operations had female principle investigators. (And more than half for the pure science observations.) I’m not about to claim that we’re even close to gender equality. But one guy wearing a somewhat distasteful shirt certainly didn’t drive vast numbers of women out of the field. Where did you get that idea?
You…actually thought I was serious in suggesting every woman, without exception, abandoned her life’s work in space science over a shirt?
I’ll use the /s tag next time; I was simply alluding to a previous case of insulting women by treating them as though they’re too fragile to exist in the real world. They handled a tacky shirt, I bet they won’t faint at the sight of the term ‘man-made’, either.
“Human-made” doesn’t quite sound right either. I like “Human engineered” more.
since woman has the word man in it, then woperson?? This is the insanity that has the entire county chasing nonsense