Google Sexist; Did You Mean He?
Apparently Google still thinks this is a man’s world and a woman’s place is in the home. Maybe someone should tell them that women were given the right to vote in 1920.
Search for anything starting with any of these terms, like ’she voted to invade iraq’, and Google will ask if you meant he.
she composed
she produced
she elected
she invented
she created
she developed
she investigated
she graduated
she presided
Go ahead, give it a try. If you find any particularly funny ones, post them in the comments.
Here are some things that Google thinks a woman is capable of doing.
she made
she cooked
she cleaned
she talked
she shopped
she washed
Posted: May 17th, 2007 under Seriously, Commentary.
Comments: 5
Comments
Comment from sean
Time: May 17, 2007, 10:58 am
get over it. nobody likes a word nazi
Comment from Erin
Time: December 3, 2007, 10:21 pm
No, we won’t get over it. Our language is inherently sexist. How can I be free if the very language I use tells me I am not?
Don’t tell me to get over what you never experienced.
Comment from Jordan
Time: April 12, 2008, 5:19 am
Put your bra back on, shave your pits, and get over it. They are just words from a computerised system.
Comment from Miss Dipsy
Time: August 6, 2008, 5:01 pm
It’s not Google that is sexist, it’s society - Google merely reflects that. Search engines objectively report back what is “out there” on the internet, and it seems that phrases like “he voted” & “he invented” are more commonly found than the female versions. That is a reflection of the world we live in rather than a reflection of any sexist attitude in Google’s programmers!
Also, some of this may reflect the historical status quo more than the current state of affairs (although I don’t by any means doubt that sexism and gender inequality are still very real phenomena), as men have, for most of history, been the inventors, voters, composers, presidents etc. Women, on the other hand, have spent most of history cooking, cleaning & caring for children, so more documents on the internet will report women doing these activities.
I believe that the world is slowly becoming a more equal place, but there is still a lot of room for improvement. I never once felt, as a child and young adult, that I wasn’t capable of doing anything a man could do (apart from perhaps urinating standing up!!), however when I became a parent, and especially a single parent, I realised that the main barrier to women’s progress was the fact that we almost always end up as the main caregivers for children, particularly in cases of parental separation. It’s not a simple problem to solve, since I wouldn’t have even considered giving up my kids and only seeing them once a week or whatever, but I know I’m always going to be behind my male counterparts because of my status as the main carer for my children. But when it comes down to it I have to put my kids ahead of my own career ambitions, and I think this is the situation that many women find themselves in.
Comment from bill
Time: May 20, 2010, 6:46 am
I’ve tried to do it with Google and got embarrassed to see you are right. This is quite a sexist search engine. How can it be?
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