Being Geek Chic is a blog about one woman navigating the male-dominated industries of production and tech. It's written by Elizabeth Giorgi, Founder, CEO and Director of Mighteor - one of the world's first internet video production companies. Learn more about Mighteor here.
Yesterday morning I woke up to an email from a former boss, my most important mentor and dear friend letting me know that her name was about to be released as a woman involved in a sexual harassment scandal that had been brewing at my alma mater. She had decided to reveal herself, along with another victim, after the media had become unrelenting in figuring out her identity.
And my heart just ached about it all day yesterday.
I ached because whistleblowers become re-victimized by a culture that doesn’t believe women when they say something is wrong.
I ached because public figures, especially in sports, often don’t face the same level of scrutiny as their victims.
I ached because I knew coming forward was an impossible decision.
I ached because this woman’s career is brilliant and full of incredible accomplishments and now Google searches will associate her name with this awful story for a long, long time.
And I ached because I love her. And she didn’t deserve any of this.
However, my heart also swelled with pride.
I am proud because she did the right thing. She spoke up. She stood in her truth.
I am proud because she did not hide.
I am proud because doing the brave thing isn’t always fair. It subjects you to repeated reopenings of the wounds. But she did it anyway.
I am proud because she is setting an example for her daughters, the women that work for her (past and present) and women everywhere: silence is not the answer.
And I am proud because she is helping my alma mater do the right thing and take steps to protect victims of harassment.
When I talked about my experience last year reporting sexual harassment at a startup, I truly believed I did the right thing. But I didn’t face even 1/1,000th of what my friend is going through right now. And it’s a lesson to me that I will carry for a long while.
The larger the institution, the more challenging it is to take it on. The more powerful the person, the more bravery it will demand.
This woman has been my hero for years. I have always known she was a strong woman. I have always known that she was a badass. But no one wants to see their heroes go through this. It’s a helpful reminder: the only way this stops… the only way we get to a culture where people don’t have to pull these amazing fetes of bravery at their workplace… is if more people stand up and tell the truth. No matter how difficult. No matter how powerful the opposition. Standing in your truth is the only way forward.
Maybe I’m just feeling really proud, but the Genius Grant winners were announced today and I was reminded that University of Minnesota researcher Marla Spivak received one last year and I don’t think I’ve ever given her proper credit here.
Marla Spivak is a bee researcher trying to solve the colony collapse problem currently impacting bees across the globe. Here’s what we’re dealing with:
Beekeepers began to report unusually high losses of 30-90 percent of their hives. As many as 50 percent of all affected colonies demonstrated symptoms inconsistent with any known causes of honeybee death: sudden loss of a colony’s worker bee population with very few dead bees found near the colony. The queen and brood (young) remained, and the colonies had relatively abundant honey and pollen reserves. But hives cannot sustain themselves without worker bees and would eventually die.
So why care about the bees? Without bees, our food supply is at huge risk. Can you imagine a world with 50%, or even 90% by some estimate, less fruits and vegetables? And it’s not just about the carrots you pick up in the produce section. Without an answer, we face a frightening reality that there may not be enough food for livestock, decimating yet another food source.
Yes, I’m a University of Minnesota alum… but that’s not the only reason why people like Marla need to be heard. Bee colony collapse should be of serious concern to anyone that eats - and that’s all of us.
New research from the University of Minnesota (woot, my alma mater!) proves that there is a gender imbalance on Wikipedia. Not just in the number of editors (only 1 in 6, or roughly 16% identified as female), but in the content itself. The researchers believe that this is a direct trickle down effect, in particular because women that did edit reported not returning to perform more edits later.
I’m a proud graduate of the University of Minnesota - so when I get the chance to talk about my awesome alma mater, I will wave the flag high. When I heard about apparel professor Lucy Dunne’s work embedding technology into clothing, I knew it was something I had to see for myself.
Lucy’s got a really cool range of academic experience. She started with a computer science degree and combined that with an apparel design degree to get her PhD in functional clothing and apparel. Now, in her work at the U of M, she combines those two fields in three very diverse ways. The first is her effort to bring the spectacle of fashion to the next level.
Her second field of study involves making that same technology applicable to our everyday lives in ways that can improve medicine. Check out how she is using wearable sensors to track the movement of this running dummy.
Lucy also told me that her next research project involves cataloging clothing to try and help people fully utilize their wardrobe’s potential and cut down on the waste of the fast fashion world. I know I’m excited to see what this research does for the participants.
Between these three projects, Lucy is sure earning her crown as our Lady Geek of the Week.
