Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men

“In short: because men go without saying, it matters when women literally can’t get said at all.”

Since men are assumed to be the default standard, words matter. Countries with languages that are not gendered but allow gender to be stipulated have more equality than those with genderless languages. Perez is emphasizing that the male default is embedded in language itself.

“The result of this deeply male-dominated culture is that the male experience, the male perspective, has come to be seen as universal, while the female experience—that of half the global population, after all—is seen as, well, niche.”

Perez uses a bit of sarcasm here to emphasize the absurdity of considering the female experience a narrow specialty. In courses, the male is the default. It is therefore acceptable to base a course around female authors but not white male authors.

“They didn’t deliberately set out to exclude women. They just didn’t think about them. They didn’t think to consider if women’s needs might be different. And so this data gap was a result of not involving women in planning.”

The biases in many designs and systems are not the result of malice. There are differences in male and female perspectives, however. When women are excluded, their interests are not as likely to be taken into account. The absence of data is tied to the absence of women in positions of power.