Other people's business



If we cut between them really fast, they look like the same thing!

Science, it's a girl thing! Photograph: Getty Images


The video continues, cutting between a fashion shoot and "science things" (which include a big letter H with the word 'hydrogen' next to it) really really fast. Look girls, they're basically the same thing!

Believe it or not, this is a video from the EU Commission which is trying to overcome stereotypes about women. It's trying to get women into science. The guy in the lab coat is actually supposed to be thinking "oh no, these women are going to take my job". He's supposed to be thinking "wow, I never thought of women being scientists before, but now I see them in the lab, doing catwalking, I can really visualise it".

The EU Commission may as well have put a lipstick on a string, and filmed 18 year old models doing a belly crawl after it  from the nail parlour (or wherever they would normally be) to the lab bench. But that's not what they think they're doing:

“We want to overturn clichés and show women and girls, and boys too, that science is not about old men in white coats," said Geoghegan-Quinn, European Research, Innovation and Science Commissioner speaking at the European Parliament in Brussels yesterday.

She said that the "Science, it's a girl thing!" video is a taster for a campaign to get more girls into science, and that the campaign will cover 27 EU member states for the next three years. Cover them with pink, sparkly, make-up related science.

To be fair to the EU Commission, flagrant hypocritical misogyny is something gender-targeted campaigns have always had to skirt around.



UPDATE: Great summary from James Monk:

UPDATE 23.06.2012 13.10: The original video has been made private on YouTube, but you can still watch it as part of (female) astronomer Dr Meghan Grey's reaction vlog here: