I am still traumatized by the utter lack of self-respect demonstrated by a female academic that I discussed in my previous post.
We cannot expect others to bear a greater responsibility for our comfort than we do ourselves. If I choose to sit there and giggle at anti-Semitic comments that insult me as a Jew, I have no right to complain in the privacy of my anonymous blog about the anti-Semitism of others. If I tolerate anti-women comments from my male colleagues, I am not entitled to criticize them for those comments behind their backs. If I put up with being treated like crap, it means that I have consented to such treatment.
We can talk ad nauseam about how male chauvinists, racists, xenophobes, homophobes and anti-Semites should know which of their comments are wrong and unacceptable. However, we cannot hold others to a higher standard of accountability than the one to which we hold ourselves. Unless you call bigots on their bigotry in no uncertain terms whenever they express it, you are just as much to blame for the existence of hatred, discrimination and inequality as they are.
As academics, we also have a responsibility to our female students. Female Science Professor must know very well how hostile academia is to female students in the sciences. The male colleague who insulted her is, without a doubt, very likely to act in a condescending, disparaging way towards his female students. Students are powerless in their relationship with a professor, while female scholars are not. A female academic who allows herself to be spit on by male colleagues betrays her female students who will receive a much worse treatment at the hands of a chauvinistic jerk they have for a professor.
In this situation, I despise the female academic who puts up meekly with a disrespectful treatment a lot more than I do her male colleagues. They, at least, defend their own interests consistently. She sells out herself and every other female academic at her institution because she is not woman enough to stand up to jerks.
Stopping the discrimination of women is not the task of men, people. It falls to us, the women, to stop being eternal and consenting victims of every kind of abuse. You, my female reader, have to shut up the jerks who denigrate and dismiss you to your face. Nobody else will do it for you.
kind. They have bought into the myth that you need to demonstrate to people how doing what you want them to do will ultimately benefit them. These well-meaning folks have no idea how condescending their Dale Carnegie-inspired fake concern for others actually is. To give an example, I've been recently contacted by a colleague who said, "Look, I want to do you a huge favor. Let's do what I propose, and it will benefit you a lot." As a grown-up, intelligent individual who is more than capable of looking out for her own needs, I did not appreciate this manner of framing the request and refused it. Had the person honestly told me, "Look, I need a huge favor from you. It would be great if you could do this for me, but I'll totally understand it if you refuse. In return, I'd be willing to do X, Y, or Z for you, in case you ever need it", I would have been a lot more receptive to the request.
to 
. One thing, however, that it's consistently difficult to get them to do well is to write an essay. I'm not talking about their linguistic limitations here, just the actual knowledge of how to construct a good piece of writing. 
and Ruth Rendell's 
**. In The Moving Finger, Christie attempts to prevent the readers from guessing the identity of the criminal by relying on their misogynistic vision of what constitutes "male" and "female" kinds of crime. This particular gender stereotype has lost its currency completely in the decades that elapsed since the novel was published. As a result, The Moving Finger is one of the lesser known of Christie's novels. A modern-day reader will have no trouble guessing what really happened since the gender stereotype is the only thing standing between the reader and the realization of the criminal's identity.