The M Word

It was inevitable that they would say the M word.

Lt Gen Susan Coyle has been appointed Chief of Army in Australia, the first woman to lead the Australian army. And immediately people start to question if this was based on… Merit.

Nothing makes me want to Rant more than this. How deeply sexist it is, to watch and accept without question as men are given leadership roles without but to immediately query the legitimacy of a woman when she is. There is no way to avoid the assumption beneath this that men are superior to women and that if a woman gets a big job it can’t be because she has equal or greater ability.

The irony is it should be the other way round - given women are 50% of the world’s population, intelligence and capability and men get over 90% of the big jobs, it should in fact be the merit of half of those men we are questioning. Excuse me, Sir, but are you in the top 50% of men who should have that job, or are you in the other 40% that got it instead of a more competent women? But instead the assumption is that even in the tiny 10% of cases where the big jobs go to women, this must have been for a reason other than her talent and ability.

If we reach a point when women are getting significantly more than 50% of the world’s leadership, maybe then you can start asking questions about merit. In the meantime, if you want to use the M word, please direct it towards the gender that is seriously over-represented at the top versus its share of population and capability.