Invisible Women

Data Bias in a World Designed for Men

De: Caroline Criado Perez

Narrado por: Caroline Criado Perez

Data is fundamental to the modern world. From economic development, to healthcare, to education and public policy, we rely on numbers to allocate resources and make crucial decisions. But because so much data fails to take into account gender, because it treats men as the default and women as atypical, bias and discrimination are baked into our systems. And women pay tremendous costs for this bias in time, money, and often with their lives.

Celebrated feminist advocate Caroline Criado Perez investigates the shocking root cause of gender inequality and research in Invisible Women, diving into women's lives at home, the workplace, the public square, the doctor's office, and more. Built on hundreds of studies in the US, the UK, and around the world, and written with energy, wit, and sparkling intelligence, this is a groundbreaking, unforgettable expose that will change the way you look at the world.

©2019 Caroline Criado Perez (P)2019 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Very insightful

The author describes data bias in a very clear and interesting way. She gives eye opening examples and facts. Would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in data or technology.

One of the most important books you can read.

As a man I am sorry to say that all the lack of awareness Perez weird about totally applies to me. An eye opening and important book.

awesome!

a litany of PhD and VC opportunities. all high school boys and girls should read this.

Good stuff to Understand

A breadth of great examples. Women need more than one seat and one voice at the table. They need to be collaborators and leaders to solving our challenges. Delivered with a bit of a chip, it is clear the problem is as wide as it is deep and needs to improve.

Thank you for sharing.

A must read for women AND men

This book is great in so many ways. I have recommended it to so many people and hope to use it as part of a new curriculum around male leadership... Leaders who Ally!

This book provides empirical evidence on sexism at inception in all walks of life. It provides evidence of what happens when women aren't counted in planningand securing our world. I plan to use this in my diversity and inclusion work and as required reading for any men who claim allyship.

Incredibly important read

This book was eye opening, and has sparked a lot of conversations between myself and my partner, friends, family, etc. It’s also made me want to read more about these things. I hope men read this!

Half the humans are not represented properly

Clearly a must read. This presents facts and ideas which get at the center of problems affecting all humans. We are all better off by including women.

Listen with an open mind

As a man, it’s hard to avoid feeling defensive and skeptical at first. But keep listening and get past that feeling! This is a great book outlining serious problems with the way society works (or doesn’t) for men vs women. I didn’t know about a lot of these issues and inherent inequalities because everything was built and designed with my needs and size in mind, but that isn’t the case for women and this book points out a lot of bad results! The book is focused on that point and the author is very passionate, and as a result there are some obviously biased and poorly thought out conclusions for some minor things. But overall it was great to listen to and think about, and will help me be more conscious of these problems in society.

Wow

What a incredibly brilliant book. Talked about everything I’ve felt as a woman and more that I never had even begun to think about. Will be thinking about this book for the rest of my life.

Mostly informative; Disheartening & Overwrought

After taking a series of classes based on meeting the needs of female consumers, this book was one of the recommended titles. It seemed to be most challenging and interesting. I would say this book fit that assessment.

The author reads the audiobook so she is very familiar with the research and the themes. She has a good voice, and therefore has all the right inflection points. I normally listen at a higher speed, but had to slow it down because the way she was sharing the information and her voice was making listening to it unbearable as she was just coming off as shrill and unrelenting.

Once I slowed down the reading speed so I could focus on the material and not on her voice, the book improved. So I would think the written version of this would be worth the time spent.

Ultimately, she is able to point out numerous instances of how the world is built for men and not for women. And how this is problematic for women. I am married and have two daughters so I recognize many of these things (especially safety concerns), but certainly didn’t recognize all of them. Or hadn’t put much thought into them. She obviously has very very very -and I mean VERY- passionate about this subject. But at a certain point, this begins to work against her as the book drags on. Everywhere she looks there is something that’s wrong and that men are to blame for this. That may be entirely true. But then again it may not be entirely true.

A couple of instances of things that I thought were undercutting her message and research were complaining that the construction industry was biased towards men. In particular, the size of bricks are too big for women to hold in their hand. And therefore we should make the size of bricks much smaller to accommodate female construction workers and masons. Since she is bitingly sarcastic throughout the book I will return the childish behavior and say “yes we should completely change the size of bricks by making them 2/3 their current size so that less than 5000 women worldwide can’t participate in the construction industry. Because of course there will be no cost to retooling machinery and no additional expense to needing twice as many bricks to complete a project. This of course has no impact on “the environment” (which she also weaves into her examples about how the climate is more terrible for women than it is for men).”

Another example which might be even more ridiculous as her explanation of the US tax code and how it is only favorable to men and not to women. She takes a very circuitous route to prove her point. And because it arrives later in the book it began to erode my empathy for what she was writing. A good editor would have corrected these errors or shorten the book by one chapter. This is just a bad take on economics and tax policy from somebody who should know better as an academic researcher.

Ultimately, I think this is a book worth reading or listening to. And I agree with the premise that men like myself, be aware of the problems and limitations women face in their everyday lives. And perhaps it’s because I’m a man that I think this way, but I see no reason to completely remake Society to accommodate outliers. This is a especially important because the author relishes heckling Western Civilization throughout the book for not embracing and adapting to women and their every need and wish, but she does not go to any great lengths to admonish Islam or the Middle East or the Far East for patriarchal and sexist views of women and their ownership as property. Yes, she does touch on some during the book but Western Civilization continues to get a rap from people like this. People who love to complain about their lot in life and have difficulty reconciling that things have changed for the better overtime at least in this culture. And since she’s British, she’s likely going to need to move to America soon because of their lax immigration policy is modifying the country where she is going to have less ability to speak out and lobby for improvements or even bring attention to the wrongs she believes needs to be righted. Sharia Law, nor Socialism is kind to women.

In closing, I do want to give the author full credit for researching the data. She points to it throughout the book and I think that is a very important aspect of bolstering her criticisms of a male dominated world. It also helps to soften some of the sarcasm and shrillness in which she presents some of her findings. I can’t blame her for being frustrated or mad, but as she went to great length to explain in the book “men don’t like uppity women”. So it would be a lot easier for her to get men to see things her way if she didn’t act so petulantly. Using her data and a winsome tone with me would improve her odds of success. Is that a double standard? Absolutely! But that is reality. And if she wants to change reality, she may have to change the way she presents her ideas to get people like me who are standing in the way of her Utopia to come around to her way of thinking.

All and all a worthwhile endeavor to read or listen to it.