Thus Spake Zuska

Who is this Zuska, and how do you describe her blog?

Zuska, Goddess of Science, Empress of Engineering, and Avenging Angel of Angry Women, will tell you what everyone is thinking but is afraid to say.

I offer the web's most excellent and informative rants on the intransigent refusal of engineering and science to open their doors to anyone but white males.

I verbally bludgeon morons, celebrate the fabulousness of techie women, and encourage every female to release her Inner Pissed-Off Woman.

I have done hard time as an engineer and a scientist, in academia and industry, at the bench and in administration. I am a certified feminist.

I am chronically educated, with many engineering degrees from fancy universities. You can read all the exciting details here.

When not enraged by the morons of science and engineering, I occasionally like to talk about what Samuel Florman famously called the existential pleasures of engineering and science.

Also occasionally, I castigate and deride members of the Intelligent Design Schoolhouse Crusade for Christ movement.

You can learn much, much more about Zuska and answer the burning questions, "Why 'Thus Spake Zuska'? Why 'Zuska'? if you visit here for the intriguing 19 Questions With Zuska interview.

What do aspiring Zuskateers need to know?

The following information may enhance the effectiveness of your daily Zuska intake.

Advanced Zuskateers often cackle in delight when reading Thus Spake Zuska, experiencing vicarious vindication and obtaining tips for their Daily Moron Management activities. However, young and/or beginning Zuskateers may often be confused, upset, or even frightened.

They are not used to hearing powerful men bad-mouthed, especially when the powerful men have won Nobel prizes or are the heads of corporations, even though the powerful men are behaving like pigs and morons.

Zuska is not afraid to identify the morons and pigs among men, and to say that women should be angry at them.

Moronic piggery comes in endless varieties and forms, but at the end of the day, it's all the same: the unwillingness to let go of even a nanoparticle of power to anyone who does not look just like the moronic pigs.

Calling men out on their bad behavior is distressing for beginners, but it does get easier with time and practice.

In this, it is not unlike yoga: awkward and a bit painful in the beginning.

But with time, the practitioner feels stronger and more flexible, obtains more inner peace, and focuses more clearly upon her work.

I am fond of Twisty Faster and her FAQ on Patriarchy-Blaming the Twisty Way. Like Twisty, I insist that my readers acknowledge that I do not speak for all women, all women engineers, all women scientists, all feminists, or all feminist women engineers and scientists.

I heartily endorse her comments guidelines and her miscellaneous pronouncements.

I wish that I could also say, like Twisty, that this is not a feminist primer.

But Twisty has the luxury of dealing with the rest of the academy (and much of the workforce) that marched bravely forward starting in the seventies, entering the new millenium with at least a modest understanding of the fact that women are humans. Sadly for me and for all women, the majority of Science-and-Engineering-Land remains Groundhog Day-ishly rooted in the 1950's, where Title IX is just a dim dream.

(Ah, Title IX...I look forward to the day the Title IX earthquake rocks the toxic university departments and national laboratories that happily accept federal funding while committing the most egregious forms of sex discrimination. Title IX: it's not just for sports anymore! )

But I digress...I resign myself to occasionally, perhaps often, having to explain the most basic of concepts and principles illustrating that woman is not a separate species but is actually, like man, a human - and therefore deserving of respectful treatment and the absence of harassment in educational and work environments.

You would think these things are obvious.

You would think respectful treatment is not a difficult concept to master. You would think men would treat women the way they would hope to have other men treat their mothers, sisters, daughters, wives, or friends. Harboring such thoughts, you would, of course, never have spent much time in Science-and-Engineering Land.

Are there any other important tips I should keep in mind as I read this most excellent blog, O Goddess?

• Not all women are white.
• Not all men and women are heterosexual.
• Gender and race and class and sexual orientation all matter, all the time.
• International women students are also women, a handy tip that in my experience may be especially useful for physics professors.
• This blog exists to complain loudly about the hideous conditions women in science and engineering must routinely deal with. Therefore, you should refrain from leaving comments of the nature "maybe this isn't really about gender/race/class/sexual orientation". If I'm writing about it, it's about gender, race, class, sexual orientation, or all of the above. This is not up for discussion. Ever.
• I am a Goddess, an Empress, and an Avenging Angel. You are welcome to argue with me but it is unlikely you will win.

Some links on this page will take you to pages of the previous incarnation of Thus Spake Zuska on Radio Userland.