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| Rail delay scarf |
There have been plenty of examples of knitting being used for data representation - the Sky Scarf for looking to the sky and knitting the weather, Temperature Scarf for documenting the daily temperature during a given time period, Mood Scarf for knitting your mood, Scoreboard for recording points scored by your favorite football team, and even a rail delay scarf knit by a German commuter. This one seems especially helpful, as it helped the knitter deal with her frustration, and she also sold the scarf and raised $8650 for a German charity that provides assistance to people at train stations.
But here is a new one - a shawl being knit by Côte-des-Neiges—Notre-Dame-de-Grâce Mayor Sue Montgomery that shows how often women and men speak at city council meetings.
Even though city council is made up of 31 females and 34 males, Ms. Montgomery estimates that so far her shawl is 75% red for males with just a few bits of green for women. She explains this by saying "The women are much more efficient, stand up, make their point, sit down. Men like to hear themselves talk. What can I say?"
The mayor knits because it helps her concentrate, but said that long speeches where points are repeated decrease the efficiency of council meetings, and make them less accessible to the public. "Frankly, it's quite boring," she said.
Sue Montgomery says that she is aware this is a generalization, and that not all men on council tend to use up blocks of time pontificating, but "There's a handful of men who take up a lot of space." I think we have all run into those men; congratulations to Sue Montgomery for calling attention to this gender disparity (and good luck weaving in her ends and blocking).
I saw this and I love it, even though it makes me a bit sad.
ReplyDeleteThat's pretty cool. And I suspect that men speak more because they are more aggressive. (Ask me how I know!)
ReplyDeleteI love this! I would never have thought of that, but I am sure it would have helped my mood while sitting in long, exhausting, pontificating meetings when I still worked. I did knit when it seemed that I could get away with it, but those instances were few and far between.
ReplyDeleteWhat a GREAT story! Thanks for sharing, Bonny.
ReplyDeleteOne thing I thought of right away (because I'm super sensitive to certain color-combinations) . . . Having a color-blind husband, I know that he wouldn't be able to see the contrast in that scarf at all. He doesn't see red; he doesn't see green. He'd just see brownish-grayish. I think that may be how men see they way they talk in mixed-gender meetings -- shades of brownish-grayish with not much contrast. A pity.
Brilliant! You made my day Bonny!
ReplyDeleteWe all know this is true! Thanks to Sue for making this "problem" visible!
ReplyDeleteI don't know - I think I need someone to mansplain this scarf to me ... ;-)
ReplyDeleteAmen. I wonder if our newly elected woman mayor knits. She is gracious, articulate, and progressive in the face of some of the males on the City Council.
ReplyDeleteinteresting, Bonny - and I love the comment thread, too. I just read an interesting article about knitting in the NYT https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/17/science/math-physics-knitting-matsumoto.html ... it made me think of you!
ReplyDeleteFirst, a knitting mayor is awesome! Second - wordy men just make me shake my head, but go concise speaking women! (and maybe that is the cause of the male wordy-ness!)
ReplyDeleteThis is even more profound when you take in the questioning of Ben Carson yesterday (the highlight clips are brilliant!) Anyways - again a case of women asking concise, clear questions - even explaining when needed - yet Mr. Carson just babbled.