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The Lash Back

I knew it would happen sooner or later. And it finally has. After posting my article on Female Engineering Syndrome (FES), I had a couple of angry females who were quite displeased with my conjecture. In fact, two of my female engineer friends colloborated with each other and conducted a response to the article. Since we promote an objective and nurturing environment wherein anyone can voice their thoughts and opinions here at blinkdagger, I have posted their response below.

The Response

Here is what Janet and Daphne had to say:

Quan wrote a post regarding the infamous Female Engineering Syndrome (FES), where a “female engineer looks like a 6, acts like a 10, but thinks she’s a 12.” As a female engineer, I think it’s time to debunk FES as a geek urban legend! Here is the truth: FES is nothing more than the product of analytical male engineer minds needing something to explain the (to them) inexplicably elevated confidence levels among average-looking female engineers. As it is often acknowledged that male engineers are less skilled at interpreting female social behaviors than their non-technical peers, perhaps it is not surprising that they have failed here again.

First of all, while I will admit that there are some females who are overly-confident or b*tchy and mean, that is a universal condition that exists outside of the field of engineering. There’s really nothing more to say about it than that.

Second, male engineers are responsible for turning a 6 into a 10, partially because of Engineering Vision (EV). Almost all of my male engineering friends have experienced it. Similar to Beer Goggles, the lack of higher-ranked attractiveness females in the engineering environment make the average female engineer appear to be more attractive. I’ve heard so many male engineers gush about how hot this one female engineer is, and all I can say is “are you kidding me? She’s maybe kind of cute, but I wouldn’t call her hot.” Maybe she’s hot… for an engineer. And yes – girls do check-out other girls!

What is the saying? “You have to kiss a lot of frogs before you can find a prince”? Well, due to the “supply and demand” phenomenon that Quan wrote about, this “6″ suddenly has a bigger pool of frogs to choose from and a lot less competition. But here is FES’s flaw – this actually makes her a real 10. Why? Because the ranking scale is relative to the sampling group. Male engineers treat this “6″ like a “10″ because she IS a 10, relative to the others closest to her. There are more opportunities for this “6″ to explore and, in the course of exploring, reject. It is important to remember here that she is not being mean here, she just has other options than you. What’s so wrong about that? In a pool of dance majors, you’d throw her over in a heartbeat. Of course, this results in the male engineer mistakenly interpreting this selectiveness as the female engineer’s inflated sense of attractiveness, or the female acting like a 12…

FES is just something male engineers created to explain why female engineers rejected their advances while simultaneously placing the females out of their reach. Women know how they rank on the attractiveness scale and they act it. As for why these female engineers keep rejecting the male engineers – that’s another post altogether!

A Male Engineer’s Response to Janet & Daphne

In an anonymous e-mail that I received through the contact form:

Anonymous Engineer writes, “I am a male engineer, and Janet & Daphne is 100% wrong!! .”

Quite the compelling argument, don’t you think?