How We Fail to Count Women: The Female Information Gap | FEMINISM 

WATCH MORE: With women being left out of academic/design research and even erased from our history books--what kind of climate has this created today? Here's our Take on the global war on women that rages on all over the world: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-PL64n7CmHNk.html

It's actually shocking how there is a lot lacking in research in women's bodies in medicine. This is why healthcare is still a big problem.

My mother had a 98% blockage in her heart in the early 1990s. She was asked to participate in the first longitudinal study on how well angioplasties work for women. There was no good data on heart conditions in women because "women's hormones skew the data" per Mom's cardiologist.

Whenever I watch a historical drama where the only pregnancy sign is a missed period and that causes all hell to break loose, I wonder what happened with my fellow PCOS suffers. Did people just assume they were promiscuous? And we all know the social issues with that through history....

I am a female neurodivergent, and I wasnt diagnosed until I was 35, specifically with complex, atypical ADHD. And I am so sorry to say that it is a common story that while many males can get diagnosed very young, many females get diagnosed way later in life, if at all. One of the reasons why my diagnosis took so long was because I GENUINELY didnt believe that women got ADHD, because I only ever heard about it in males, specifically little boys. And the symptoms we associate with ADHD---- loudness, inability to sit still, fidgeting, etc.---- is not the full picture. Things like hyperfixation, sensory issues and overwhelm, migraines, extreme anxiety, etc. etc. etc. are all things I experience, and is the experience of many ADHDers, but I was never taught about it. It always seemed like ADHD was an outer behavioural problem, not an inner, neurological one. So the issues Ive experienced all of my life were put down to me being wierd, irresponsible, flighty, or just plain stupid. And this in turn had massive effect on my confidence and mental health. Once I got a proper diagnosis, did research, and connected with many people---- especially other ADHD women---- I cannot express enough how much my life changed for the better.

So ON POINT. I have honestly no idea what gynecologists learn in college since any condition is almost always answered with a "we don't know, that could be due to many reasons". And it blows my mind that there is no permanent and strong side-effects-free treatment for period pains, contraception, and menopause.

I remember reading an article in an IT industry journal recently, about how the female pioneers of the industry are almost universally unknown and we should focus more on including them in the discourse. The article did not name a single woman in IT. It did name drop Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos though. 😐

Being infected by covid and taking the covid vaccine has affected my periods, resulted in heavier bleeding and irregular and more painful period cycles. It was already a scary time due to the pandemic and added to that, I didn't know what was happening to my body, why the infection and vaccine were reacting to my body that way. I had no way to tell if this was harmless or a serious side effect I should be concerned about. I've talked to many women who have experienced the same. Only recently, I've seen some data regarding the topic. It's messed up how the world of medicine doesn't consider and thereby excludes HALF of the world's population.

2:20 Not even in STEM but also in Fiction Writing: The Brontë Sisters (among other authors) had to concoct an alias to be taken seriously and when they were recognised as authors, their works were terribly critiqued.

I think it was Nicole Kidman who once did a play on Rosalind Franklin who was the missing link to the discovery of the Double Helix structure of DNA.

Not only do human medical studies include MORE men, but often the women they include are exclusively post-menopausal. Also, animal research, when possible is typically done on only male animals. Researchers don’t want cycling hormones to get in the way of their data. So pre-menopausal women who have cycling hormones were almost entirely unstudied until the last 10-15 years. I recommend the book “do no harm” by maya dusenbery.

About leaving women's stories untold: I have noticed that unfortunately many newspapers in Italy tend to include only the first name of the women they write about, in the title. Of men, on the contrary, newspapers say first name and surname, and they write it more frequently throughout the article, making it easier to remember. Also, when they talk about women who happen to be mothers as well, newspapers tend to focus on how good of a mother that woman is, how she manages to have a successful career while also caring for her children, and that is never the case for men.

I bought Invisible Women a few months ago and I'm honestly too scared to read it. Like, I'm already filled with injustice-fueled rage up to here, I feel like if I read it I might just pop 😱

YES to the seatbelt issue!!! No matter how I adjust mine, one end is digging into my neck, and the other is going across a boob. So everytime I buckle in, I just think "this is NOT going to end well if something goes wrong...."

Let's talk about how women aren't even taught about perimenopause at all. I didn't even know it was a thing when I started going through it and was suffering from debilitating anxiety, insomnia and panic attacks. And doctors do absolutely nothing to help you.

This is unbelievably sad. 130 odd years to close the gap. Incredible

Ugh! This makes it so difficult to interact with some medical professionals, especially with medical gaslighting. My anxiety makes it hard enough to interact socially let alone having to constantly self advocate

And people say feminist's are simply histerical😒.

As a lady with a female body, I am so freakin tired of there being a lack of research into our hormones and menstrual cycle. There's soooo much that our cycles can effect that like we KNOW nothing about. Like our cycle can affect our endurance and physical strength even??? It's so crazy how much is unknown. Nevermind the sheer lack of info on menopause too. And yeah I'm 115lbs and 5'3", an airbag is gonna probably kill me or severely injure me if I'm driving a car.

Samantha Bee did a pair of videos where she tackled a specific aspect of the female data gap; a severe lack of in-depth menopause research.

I love Taraji as much as (maybe more than?) most people, but the thumbnail would have been an excellent opportunity to use an actual photo of Katharine G Johnson, maybe even with a photo of Taraji for context, as an active example of how to correct erasure of yes all but women but specifically Black women in STEM. All love!!

When I got my IUD in the procedure was so painful, I had to be held down by two PAs. I noticed in the notes they said that I had tolerated the procedure well. As a whole most women have no idea going into it how painful this small procedure can be if you've never had children or been dilated before and it's shocking, just for the sake of inserting birth control. And as a result pain prevention options aren't generally offered.

As someone living with endometriosis, I experienced first hand how the medical community ignores women’s health. I had to advocate for myself constantly before getting the treatment I needed.

Anyone who knows the term "statistics" should know about the myriad of errors each type of studies and it's a long list of "potential flaws" like "bias" which you clearly mentioned.

This is such a prevalent issue. Thank you for discussing it!! In college, I got into it with two of my (male) bio profs because they said it was totally fine Rosalind Franklin got zero credit for her contributions to the discovery of DNA's structure. They claimed she was not credited along with Wilkins, Watson, and Crick because she had passed away before they were awarded the Nobel Prize, but the Nobel Foundation didn't HAVE that rule about not giving the prize posthumously until 1974. Watkins, Crick, and Wilkins were awarded the Nobel in 1962.... 😑

Still haven't seen that Elizabeth Friedman movie about how she took down Capone's smuggling operations, tracked and hindered the Axis in WWII in South America, and then had to go back in and fix what a man (Hoover) screwed up abusing her work. As someone who worked in cryptology, not hearing about her even with a TS clearance is insulting and degrading. She was amazing. AND she raised her kids.

My mom had a hysterectomy at age 27 because no one believed her periods were actually painful. One male doctor finally listened and wanted to do a scope to see what was wrong. She ended up losing everything, including her ovaries which were physically attached to her intestines by the endometrial tissue. That book, Invisible Women, is amazing and highlights so many issues we have in society.

Not only do doctors not know what different ailments look like in women’s bodies or know how to treat them, you need to add being women of color to the equation because doctors often cannot tell what certain types of skins diseases look like on brown or dark brown skin. We’ve only begun documenting what different skin problems look like on brown skin in the last five years or so.

I support equality.for women. I support equality for women. Women should be free from abuse, hatred and inequality. Women and men should never be bullied. Women can be leaders and great thinkers. Women deserve the vote. Women can lead countries.

I remember I lost my period and went to 4 different gynecologist. Every one of them gave me a different diagnosis (PCOS, "lazy ovaries"), and three of them did not give me a solution aside from taking the pill, or did not consider it a problem. Only one gave me the correct diagnosis which was hypothalamic amenhorrea and gave me a partial solution. Only other female athletes in the internet that had went through the same issue gave me actual advice that worked and recovered. It is honestly a shame that doctors are not well informed about this and that there is not enough scientific data available

I saw a "funny" video online yesterday in which a boy, who couldn't have been more than 8 or 9, called a video soccer game "not believable" because at the women's games the stands were full. And a bunch of grown men laughed 🤬

I love you guys. Never stop doing these. Makes me feel so seen and safe as a woman!

My mother has early menopause (in her 30s) and when she went to a male doctor to take synthetic hormone pills, she was able to menstruate again; it stopped working after a while, though. But the male doctor kept telling her that she is not menopausal, even though she went to another doctor-female this time-and the new doctor had tests done on her, proving that she is in fact, went through menopause for a good decade now.

4:10 Yay! Jessica Kellgren-Fozard! Her youtube channel is excellent!

I'm in the middle of researching the history of women authors in science fiction and fantasy, it's amazing how rich of history there is that's just been ignored because it doesn't fit the "proper" sociatial narrative (ie sci-fi is a "boys club")

It's insane how little American doctors know about women

I think it would be pretty powerful if this channel did a grand tour of blindspots in the feminist movement in one video, i.e. disability, race, caste, non-binary, trans, income, (and more) inclusion. And the feminist counterpoints that have always existed in our literature and stories. It's what you're doing already, but it would be cool to see it wrapped up and perhaps... distributable. Love what you do, it's praxis and it's beautiful. Cheering for you from Canada :))))

The take at it's best! Such a good resource for women's sociology! The celebrity videos aren't my cup of tea so so excited to see this great video on the chanel 😀

This past year I had a concussion, when I visited a doctor to find out why it wasn’t healing at the rate I was supposed to I found out that periods can cause delays in healing.

Great video. Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men is a great book.

Thanks for covering this, love this subject, do you recommend other youtube channels

Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men by: Caroline Criado Perez was such an eye opening book always recommending it

I saw somewhere that even the work day is designed for men. While men’s hormone cycle is 24 hours, women’s cycle is 28 DAYS! Hope the system breaks some day

Also, there is a factor. That many otherwise perfectly healthy women can experience debilitating pain from their menstrual cycles, especially at early puberty or closer to monopause. Also, I do not think this data gap is solvable, because social trends evolve, and egalitarian values rarely stick around for the number of years presented. Also, from the data I could collect, societies tend to favor sticking to their anthropological roots whenever they are left unbothered. Also, if you check in countries where gender equality happened earlier, they are actually backtracking.

This is why I am 44 and just now being diagnosed with adhd and autism 💔

Brilliant! Been on this train of thought for almost a year and half. Just recording my thoughts. This validates my observations. Because at time am just not too sure. So thank you.

I self diagnosed myself with ADHD a couple years ago at 33 almost a year after my sister (46 at time) found out she had it after her 3 sons (8-13) were diagnosed. That year she kept telling me I had it and I kept denying it until I couldn't anymore. I learned a lot about how to handle/deal with it on my own. But recently it's been such a handicap that I finally got medically diagnosed and am starting on meds. Fingers crossed they help! I had such a problem in school and just think I could have done better if they even looked for it in girls.

A perfect example: The father of gynecology is still today being praised for his discoveries. Yet, people never mention how he used black women slaves to do experiments. And he would never givr them painkillers.

Very interesting to think about

I think part of the reason is that famous and important women in history were told, but not as WOMEN. That's part of of the problem. The history of women has be told, as a specific part of human history, and then written back into the mainstream of history. ♀️

I've been on the extreme on this thing, where i explicitly dismissed other guy's ideas. It backfired on me when i defended my thesis and in my RRL there are a lot of recent counter thesis

Fun fact: Matilda Joclyn Gage was the mother-in-law of L. Frank Baum.

1 in 3 women were hunter gatheres alongside men (reason y women were told to stay at home while men went outside to hunt, this reason was used to justify misagnoy for centuries), yet they were earned from history

I became more fascinated with information and data equality equity during a computer science class in Uni.

There is nothing worse than having a physical condition be put on just your anxiety. I became depressed and anxious because of the illness and it not going away yet I am offered no treatment except talk therapy. Doctors simply cannot find the illness because there is not enough information on what it is.

The Covid vaccine wasn’t adequately studied on women. That is why back in 2020 women said they had period issues and Pfizer and docs said Huh shouldn’t be a problem. Even though was a huge issue

Thank you for this.

A fun yet deep commentary on inequality is ‘I Don’t Know How She Does It’ where Sarah Jessica Parker’s character is competing with both the ‘perfect’ moms and the at ease coworker (Seth Meyers was just brilliant).

great video

About the snow clearing thing, just build good public transport, I know very few people that commute by car because public transport is so good, we fall on our asses equally.

This is changing. *Pluto in Aquarius* (next 20 years) ☆ more equality & emphasis on universal human rights. Yay!

The fact that Libyan flag showed up her ❤🇱🇾

I think its based in education on knowing who these women were, information is out there but who is doing the work to find out what women did in history. Women who were leaders, inventors, writers, etc, should be taught and talked about in history, but we should know and reveal all we know of both man in women in history. For instance if someone is making a movie about a queen in history we need to know everything of what they went through and what they did, such as what mafe them the way they are even if its bad like genocide, coups, war, and others all things of someone in history should be revealed. Like I said I believe women should be represented in history from books to the big screen and shows, but properly and fully.

Henrietta Lacks. The lack of discussion around her is a problem.

Last December, I went to the emergency in pain. I described to the male doctor that it was like a knife was piercing through my belly. He administered some medication for the pain, prescribed some others for me to take at home and told me to go back in a week if the pain weren't gone. The prescribed medication wasn't working, and I was sure it was something serious. I went back the next day, in the hopes a female would see me, and so it was. She actually listened to me, I was examinated. In the end, I had to go through an emergency operation - my uterine tube was injured by a 20 cm cyst that also start damaging other organs. Both tube and cyst were removed and I'm fine now, but I would never forget how I heard other male doctor at that same place saying that women make their pain greater than it actually is - the same misogynistic thought that almost had me killed. Male doctors always made me feel uncomfortable, but now it's official: I prefer female doctors - ever.

I'm every woman 🫶🏼

Everyone should read Dale Spender's *Women of Ideas (and What Men Have Done to Them)* - 800 pages of documentation of how women get erased from history.

Of course some people in the comments gave their takes without actually watching the video 😴😴

This was so eye-opening and very important to know. Can you do something similar for neurodivergent persons, namely autistic and attention hyperactive? Is there enough research to present?

This video should be shown in all schools by mandatory

I've had pelvic floor pain for a decade because they can't figure out what's wrong with me :(

and sadly when many people try to speak up about these issues there are people trying to shut any progress for women down.

I am not shocked. There are a lot of these women who created massive inventions but never got credit for them because before feminism women didn't have a legal right to even own their property or achievements. The achievement was either credited to her husband or her father. No wonder why men hate feminism. Even to this day after carrying a child for 9 months, kids get their father's name by law. It's like creating a project and your boss takes credit for your hard work. There are a lot of things women invented such wifi, computer programming, laser surgery, computer algorithm, computer software, water and the car heater, train tracks, solar heater, home security systems, fire escape, rocket fuel, etc. But whenever scientists are celebrated worldwide, they only show male scientist faces lol. It's the same thing as healthcare. Male birth control release was stopped because it has the same side effects as women's pills lol. Says a lot about our society.

Me watching this about the Matilda effect after listening to Matilda by Harry Styles cause I was told I have no reason to be tired by my white neurotypical(?) het cis father, whilst I'm on my period and have accumulated all the fatigue of having classes from 9 to 7pm on every other weekday ("but uni is not work") and then going to carnival, all while I never sleep enough and always have an assignment to work on. Yeah that's a rant but I don't care to apologize, bottomline :guess I'm your target audience.

This feels manifest in the media debate now. There are people out there pointing out the new trend of women just being visible in media and feeling like this is an unnatural change to the media they enjoy. And it would be wrong. Just because media up until recently didn't feature as many women in prominent roles either on of off screen doesn't mean they weren't there. We just weren't seeing them before.

How on earth is this the first result when I type in "who invented the dishwasher?" Oh, Oh!

My mom died when she was 37. Ovation cancer... Roughly 1,5 years after she gave birth to my youngest brother. So when she and my dad went to the doctors, since she had serious aches, they recommended painkillers instead of actually looking it up. They kinda landed on menstruation's for her pain. At the 7th Doctor she kinda got the message that they should recognized it an the birth of my brother the year before and that she was kinda going.

Thank you for covering this topic. Love @TheTake !

jessica kellgren fozard! was not expecting to see her I love it

How are you churning out videos every day?

I literally paused the movie On The Basis Of Sex about Ruth Bader Ginsburg to watch this video.

now do how history erased lgbt people

5:00

As soon as women achieve these through hard work, courageous acts, imprisonment and death "let's abolish gender" and "people with XY chromosome can be women" enters the chat. I see direct correlation, do you?

How can I help bring more awareness to the female information gap (as a regular person)? Donations, voting, etc?

I hope that you do the "Heartbreak and Ice Cream" trope, where a heartbroken woman indulges in sweets to make herself feel better following a break up. It's typically found in romantic comedies.

3:34

correction: men and women do not have different numbers of muscles in their necks. Its the size of the muscles which are different.

Men and women should get equal opportunity imo

I wish there was a shoe like this for black men

Please cover the trope of girls loving to eat chocolate, while males seemingly abhor anything even remotely sweet.

The take has to be a fan of lily orchard

Good message.

no lie I have had men tell me that there is no male bias in science, despite studies constantly showing that there is. they could not fathom that their experiences aren't the default for everyone in society.

Jeez!!! I knew about this but, now I understand why I'm always cold at job's offices!!!!

Amen. It’s disgusting and I’m sick of it.

I just want to thank all of the Female Construction workers, All of the females that are brave enough to volunteer to take over labour jobs from men

Women have always been better seen not heard.

With a coat hangar attachment?

Another 132 years...