Nicholas Kristof: Straight Talk for White Men
Speaker: Nicholas Kristof; A well traveled, well educated, Oxford graduate.
Occasion: To explore unconscious biases we often have in light of recent events that have brought inequalities between genders and races in light of recent inequality tensions such as with the cases of Tamir Rice or Patricia Arquette's recent women's rights speech at the Oscars.
Audience: White men who believe that the playing field is now even for all races and genders.
Purpose: To provide support for the argument that all groups are not equal and we have certain unconscious biases whether we notice it or not.
Subject: Inequality in today's society
Tone: Solemn and reflective in regards to what he is discussing.
The purpose of this article was to provide support for the fact that there are certain unconscious biases in society that benefit both whites and men, therefore white men benefit highly from these biases. The author's goal in this peice is to show people, and more specifically white men, that the playing field is not entirely even when it comes to race and gender and to convince them of this. One way Kristof provides evidence to support his opinion is through the use of many statistics and the citation of many scholarly studies that have explored inequality. For example, Kristof cites a study in which two resumes which were basically the same were submitted to the same company with just one crucial difference: The name on the resume. One resume was given a typically white name such as John whereas the other was given a typically African-American name such as Jamal or Trayvon. The study found that typically white names received up to 50% more callbacks than resumes with typically African-American names. Another example of a study that Kristof cites in his article is a study in which Professors were asked to rate an application for a lab post on a 7 point scale. On some resumes there were male names and on others there were females. On average, the male names had a score of 4.0 whereas the female names had a score of 3.3. I think this is an important argument and I think his opinion on the topic is worth a lot as Kristof is well educated and backs up his claims with legitimate evidence.
Occasion: To explore unconscious biases we often have in light of recent events that have brought inequalities between genders and races in light of recent inequality tensions such as with the cases of Tamir Rice or Patricia Arquette's recent women's rights speech at the Oscars.
Audience: White men who believe that the playing field is now even for all races and genders.
Purpose: To provide support for the argument that all groups are not equal and we have certain unconscious biases whether we notice it or not.
Subject: Inequality in today's society
Tone: Solemn and reflective in regards to what he is discussing.
The purpose of this article was to provide support for the fact that there are certain unconscious biases in society that benefit both whites and men, therefore white men benefit highly from these biases. The author's goal in this peice is to show people, and more specifically white men, that the playing field is not entirely even when it comes to race and gender and to convince them of this. One way Kristof provides evidence to support his opinion is through the use of many statistics and the citation of many scholarly studies that have explored inequality. For example, Kristof cites a study in which two resumes which were basically the same were submitted to the same company with just one crucial difference: The name on the resume. One resume was given a typically white name such as John whereas the other was given a typically African-American name such as Jamal or Trayvon. The study found that typically white names received up to 50% more callbacks than resumes with typically African-American names. Another example of a study that Kristof cites in his article is a study in which Professors were asked to rate an application for a lab post on a 7 point scale. On some resumes there were male names and on others there were females. On average, the male names had a score of 4.0 whereas the female names had a score of 3.3. I think this is an important argument and I think his opinion on the topic is worth a lot as Kristof is well educated and backs up his claims with legitimate evidence.