BethAnn McLaughlin: ‘Too many women in science have to run the gauntlet of abuse and leave’
Neuroscientist BethAnn McLaughlin is a leading campaigner in the US fight against sexual assault and harassment of women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (Stem). Assistant professor of neurology and pharmacology at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, she launched the #MeTooSTEM website in 2018 so women had a place to tell their stories. Her work was recently recognised with an MIT Media Lab Disobedience award, which she shared with two other prominent #MeToo activists.
You began campaigning against sexual misconduct in science following an incident in 2015 in which you say you witnessed another faculty member at your university issue threats against a student who had filed a lawsuit against him and the institution (though the faculty member has denied any misconduct and was never found guilty of sexual harassment or retaliation). What clicked inside? Like most women in science, I had witnessed gender discrimination and seen sexual harassment – but I’m embarrassed to say I laughed it off [before the incident]. The way we treat cases of sexual misconduct on university campuses is an enormous problem. People found guilty can maintain their positions, keep their funding, get promoted, train students and go to off-campus meetings. It’s totally unacceptable and unsafe.
Does science have a particular problem?A National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report on sexual harassment released last year tells us that more than half of women have been sexually harassed by their colleagues in their science careers. Harassment of women in Stem is the worst of any sector outside of the military. We can’t have these conversations – why are there no women in tech, why are there not enough female professors? – and pretend we don’t understand that sexual harassment happens to most of them. Too many women have to run the gauntlet of abuse and leave.
Why is it important to give people a place to tell their stories about sexual harassment in science?It is important for people to get a sense of their own narrative. University administrators have had them questioning their truth and sanity for so long. Sharing our stories also helps others understand the pervasiveness and insidiousness of these issues. Usually, aside from supportive friends or family, no one has recognised the wrong that has been done to these people. The biggest success of the #MeTooSTEM site is in us actually finding each other. Because universities want us to be silent and there’s no situation where that is part of anyone’s healing.
You have coined “harassholes” to describe men who sexually harass women. Why do we need a new word? One reason is because some publications don’t let me swear, but they will publish “harasshole”. My family is from Massachusetts and they have Massholes, which are obnoxious drivers. It wasn’t a stretch to come up with harassholes. But I also think it’s important that we do have language to help us understand who these folks are. We have phrases like “sexual misconduct”, “sexual harassment” and “gender discrimination” and those are important terms, but they don’t sum up our lived experience, which is “he’s a harasshole”. We all know these guys. Let’s humanise it.
Last year, you spurred the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) to adopt a policy allowing honours to be stripped from scientists proved to be sexual harassers. You’ve also met Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the largest funder of biomedical research in the US; shortly after, he released a statement apologising to victims of sexual harassment and recognising that the NIH must do better. How have you got these organisations to budge?I have a problem with people who call themselves leaders and refuse to lead in a way that is reflective of societal values. What was unique about these campaigns was they weren’t: “Hey NIH, please stop funding proved sexual harassers.” They were: “Hey, Francis Collins, I see you on Twitter. Why are you not doing anything about this?” That poking has moved things forward in ways people didn’t imagine possible.
You are active on Twitter through @McLNeuro and blog under the name Fighty Squirrel. Are social media helping move the needle? I think we are getting traction in real time… things that used to take years now seem to be moving much faster. Tweets are calling people out for decades of bad behaviour. Some people are crashing wildly and publicly in ways that are necessary for progress.
Last summer, you ran a Twitter campaign to get the Rate My Professors site to drop its red chilli pepper “hotness” ratings for academics. Was it difficult to get action?Rate My Professors, to its credit, responded within two days and it was gone. I did it because many of my female colleagues found the chilli pepper rating offensive… like it has anything to do with your teaching or your mentorship. My male colleagues also thought it was super-creepy to be looked at as “fair game”.
Last year you launched a petitioning calling on the NAS to eject sexual harassers from its ranks, and the NAS recently announced it will ask members to approve a change to its bylaws to enable proven sexual harassers to be ejected. But you say this isn’t going far enough – how so? The NAS is essentially proposing to put the onus on victims to start the process – the victim would have to make the claim to the NAS, even in cases where universities or court cases have already concluded that either the NAS member was guilty of sexual misconduct or they would be found guilty so they paid money to silence victims. Marcia McNutt [the NAS president] is asking victims to be retraumatised and revictimised by filing a complaint. Election to the NAS is one of the highest privi
leges in science and engineering and medicine. It is abhorrent that the NAS keeps putting their stamp of approval on men who have grabbed and groped and assaulted women and victims have to keep proving the cases again and again.
Who’s next?I’m just marching through the scientific societies and funders, starting with the largest. We also need more apologies, more safe spaces at scientific meetings, more conversation and more data. We want universities to start investing in #MeTooSTEM chapters on campuses to help us give professional advice, provide resources and advocate for people.
Aside from not harassing women, what should male scientists be doing to make things better?Don’t enable harassholes by collaborating with them – don’t publish papers with them, put in grants with them, put them on student committees or invite them for talks. And call out harassing and diminishing words and behaviours when you see it.
What does redemption look like? Is there a way back for any of these harassers? It’s not my problem. My problem is: is there a way back for these women who’ve been diminished.
Anita Hill, who testified to Congress in 1991 that she was harassed by then supreme court nominee Clarence Thomas, wrote to you thanking you for your work. She also said: “The impact on you and your career are not to be underestimated.” How has your scientific career been affected?I don’t have a lot of confidence that I can send in my scientific work for review and it will be treated impartially; that there won’t be someone who has a finding of sexual misconduct who will see it as being in their best interests that I get knocked. And my research group has got a lot smaller; when your tenure is held up, you are not going to take on other graduate students.
You testified against your colleague, which you believe led to an investigation of you which, while it closed without any formal discipline, has been used to scupper your bid for tenure, and you are likely to lose your job. The matter is now with the Vanderbilt University chancellor. Your supporters have an online petition urging him to let you keep your position, and Vanderbilt students have staged sit-ins at his office. Is this a cautionary lesson in the price women pay for speaking up?Right now, I worry a lot that anybody who looks at a profile of me and sees my current circumstance will say they never want to go through what I’ve gone through. The takeaway message from my story can’t be: “Now she’s taking coffee orders in Starbucks.”
You have been described as profane and confrontational. Is that fair? I am definitely profane. I will take that one. There are a lot of people who have positions of power who have been way too comfortable for way too long. Women are losing their jobs. And fuck you – yeah it is personal.