The SeedSing (half) year in Politics and Society

What is the opposite of progress?

SeedSing was launched on May 1st (National Workers Day) so we could look at politics and pop culture from the common person. We are not interested in influence or telling stories that will protect the egos of the well connected. What started out as one man's personal political philosophy has grown into a discussion covering a variety of topics. Join us for a look back at the year in politics and society.

The first article posted on our Politics/Society section was about The Ohio Problem. Every presidential election states like Ohio become very important to the national Democratic Party. Out of state consultants are brought in to fund raise and create a massive voter outreach program for the presidential nominee. In their effort to secure the state, the Democratic Party forgets about the local candidates. The lack of voter turnout during non-presidential elections is a direct consequence of the Ohio problem. There was another election in November of 2015, and the Commonwealth of Kentucky saw the election of a Tea Party zealot for Governor, large in part because voter turnout was so low. This is directly related to the Republican Party taking over the majority of local offices in many blue states. We identified the The Ohio Problem, and then tried to find out how to solve this issue. Technology and an emphasis on local messaging are two solutions we put forward. In 2016 SeedSing is looking forward to many other solution oriented ideas on how to fix a problem like Ohio.

The how and why of the modern Republican Party was featured many times on SeedSing. The hypocrisy, lack of global leadership, the need to be hateful, the absence of vision, and the celebration of failure, were all on display for the Republican Party this year. The only glimmer of hope in their dreary future seems to be Senator Rand Paul, but the Republican Party does not seem to care about a candidate who can grow the parties voter base. The parties faithful base would rather rally behind a loudmouthed bigot idiot that has never heard of Muhammad Ali or Kareem Abdul Jabbar.

The traditional press and the original internet taste makers were beginning to show their incompetence in 2015. The rise of Donald Trump is upon us because the news people on television love to have a good story. It is time to ignore the press before they really bring disaster to our society. The old icons of the internet were not behaving any better than their television counterparts. Reddit and Gawker may be letting out their final breaths. At SeedSing we believe it is time for the old walled ways of the internet to die, and it is time to make way for a new open discussion.

How we live and the way we define people became a topic of discussion all over the internet. Tina S shared her views on what #ILookLikeAnEngineer really means. The saga of Rachel Dolezal briefly made us talk about how we identify race. Kirk Aug recommended books on  the failure that is the war on drugs, and the policy side of death. We took a look at the legalization of marijuana, and it's eventual failure at the Ohio ballot box.  Who we are and how we live will determine the type of society we will die in.

Gun violence became a larger problem with a solution falling farther away. Guns were used as tools of destruction for a racist. Guns were used to kill two people trying to do their jobs. Guns were used to cause terror at rural community college. Guns were used by crazy people to insight terror in Paris. Predictable we decided to fight this terror with more destruction. Each event was covered by the news, and as a society we tried to find meaning. The public was never able to discuss the gun as being part of the problem, and the violence continues. 

We had many challenging discussions at SeedSing about the state of our politics and our society. 2016 looks to be an even more exciting year. We have a Presidential election to look forward to. Will Hillary win it all (probably)? Have something to say about the state of politics and society? Come join our conversation.

Thank you for 2015. On to 2016

RD Kulik (and all the SeedSing contributors)

RD is the Head Editor for SeedSing. Do you love SeedSing, but do not want to write? Money is always welcome around here.

#ILookLikeAnEngineer needs to have meaning

Do the people who drive the trains look like an engineer?

I am conflicted about this one.  This #ilooklikeanengineer movement.  I’m a woman.  I have a BS in Mechanical Engineering, and a couple decades of “hard” technical experience.  I self-identify as an engineer, even though a big chunk of my current work is paper-push..., I mean management.  I’m also really glad that people like Mary Barra (BSEE) and Ursula Burns (MSME) have thrown in with the movement, not just because they’re major CEO’s, but because they are actually ENGINEERS.  And actual engineers seem to be only half of the #ilooklikeanengineer movement.

In principle, this hashtag is great.  Engineers aren’t just dorky white or Asian boys who are good at math.  I bet in a lot of places, boys with average aptitude in math and science are tracked for engineering, and yet their schools/parents don’t do the same for girls with equivalent or even better aptitude.  That happens.  I graduated from Purdue University’s College of Engineering in the 90’s.  Purdue has a history of actively recruiting and supporting women engineers, and prides itself on having started the first Women in Engineering program.  For all their efforts, female enrollment there is currently about 20% right now, per their own website.  (I can’t speak to black and Latino enrollment, but I’m guessing they’re similarly underrepresented.)  So I’m all for anything that encourages a more expansive view of what an engineer can look like.

But the problem with this hashtag is while it expands the view of what an engineer looks like, it’s also trying to expand the definition of what an engineer actually IS.   Engineering is a specific field of study.  And one of my pet peeves is the conflation of “engineer” with “person who works with any kind of technology.”  Words have meaning.  And, despite recent abuse of the language, web developers, coders, and network architects are not engineers.  The noun “engineer” implies engagement with the PHYSICAL sciences; the application of chemistry and/or physics to solve a physical problem.  It implies grappling with scientific unknowns, and imperfectly modeling the physical world.  Well, either that, or a person who drives a train.  (My alma mater’s website backs me up on this:  computer science is not listed under the College of Engineering.)

I’m not suggesting that other STEM professionals are lesser or greater.  My mom had a long career in IT working on mainframe software.  My dad is PhD chemist.  But they don’t call themselves engineers.  And frankly, even though he’s certainly earned the right to be called Dr. S as an honorific, it would be pretty misleading for me to say “my dad’s a doctor” without some kind of qualifier.  Look, dentists and CPA’s are both highly trained and respected professionals.  But my dentist doesn’t call herself an accountant, because she’s NOT one.  Words have meaning.  And if your education and work don’t involve the application of physical engineering principles, you aren’t an engineer.   The team that designed the Wii U hardware?  Engineers.  The team that designed Mario Kart 8?  Not.  (I intend no disrespect, quite the opposite.  Mario Kart 8 is awesome.)

All these web designers, software developers, etc. who are jumping on the #ilooklikeanengineer hashtag (including the woman who started it) are undermining their own point.  Because all the sexist guys who are real engineers can point to these women and say, “Well, I don’t have to listen, because what you do is programming/web design/etc.  You don’t even know what an engineer is.”  

The set of engineers is a subset of the set of STEM professionals.  (It’s the E part!)  But there are also the S, T, and M parts.  They are disciplines and fields of study in their own right, and deserve recognition and respect.  And once they get it, maybe people can stop gussying up their job titles by adding “engineer” as some kind of professionalizing suffix.  All girls should be encouraged to take calculus and physics in high school, and know that they can have any career they want, in either software development, cell biology, applied math, nuclear engineering or whatever.  So I really respect the intent behind the hashtag.  But please, stop diluting my profession.  Pick a different word.  And I’ll tweet the hell out of #ILookLikeaSTEMprofessional!

I welcome any and all rebuttals. 

It’s a bit old, but for an excellent piece on why STEM training is great for women in particular: Check this out.

Tina S.

Tina does not look dorky or like a boy. That does not stop her from engineering (or paper pushing) like a boss. Join the debate by writing for SeedSing.