The older we get, the more we care about our place in the world and hence how the world sees us.

It's interesting to hear her analyse how she has been and still is being treated because of her gender and her ethnicity in a profession known for its notorious lack of diversity and its few women in the top positions. If it were anyone else less successful who speaks about encounters with male contractors or white men in business this way, I would be inclined to think that it's some kind of internalised, possibly slightly irrational bias. Coming from her, at least I try to put myself in her shoes, and it make a little bit of sense when I think about this country and this profession as she knew it as a young adult. But it still doesn't sit well with me.

Gender, ethnicity and sexuality. There is no doubt that these identities are sources of inequalities, explicit and implicit discrimination. No matter how far the law goes to uphold equality and to artificially adjusts the imbalance, it will always be there because putting things and people in categories (and hence stereotypes) help us make sense of the world. That's not a problem in itself. The problem is that I can confidently say that most people lack the awareness of how such categorisation influences their judgment. Except for when I voted for Labour in the Federal election in 2008 and when I passed exams, I don't think I was ever in the majority. My readiness to disregard minority status as a factor affecting how the world sees us can easily translates to ignorance. That said, I would much rather attribute my failures to things that I did or didn't do and kick myself many times over. At least there is some hope of improvement.

I think I'm starting to be set in my ways (it's about time anyway) because I'm just recycling ideas in my head, over and over again.