Brad From Finance, I Am Speaking

The dichotomy between women and men in Zoom Meetings

“I think that—”

“Oh, go ahead. Sorry.”

As we adapt to life on Zoom, I’ve noticed persistent inequalities structured like a gender-based verbal tug-of-war.  The phenomenon is reminiscent of marital arguments or frightening political debates. 

If a male student and a female student attempt to speak at the same time, the woman will usually apologize, back down and mute herself. The man will continue to speak, not even giving her a second thought—much less an apology.  

These gendered discussion dynamics come down to a basic patriarchal structure. Women are trained to let men speak over them—we always take up less space. On trains and in conversation, we are taught to cross our legs and keep our mouths shut. It feels expected out of us, learned from years of growing up beneath our male counterparts.

According to an article in Psychological Science, women apologize more than men, most likely due to their low threshold for what constitutes apology-worthy behaviors. Women perceive offenses such as speaking out of turn or over someone else as a rude behavior, while men generally do not.

The habit to apologize is ingrained in women, but its continuation perpetuates the same structure that necessitates it. An apology is self-deprecating in nature, and belittles both the woman and the strength of her argument. Men, sans apology, are more authoritative in person and via Zoom. When women apologize after speaking at the same time as their male peers—as they almost always do—it devalues their point and their ability to speak later in the class.

In my experience, male students will even talk over female professors. It seems that the teacher-student power dynamic is nearly dissolved when the classroom is moved online. While an instructor should still hold authority over a student, even online, men are speaking their minds and talking over any and all women in Zoom meetings.

Many women speak with a purpose. Quicker and to the point, they often get through their pieces in a much shorter time span than men appear to. Oftentimes, I feel as though my male peers are speaking just to speak, taking up long stretches of time to say relatively nothing at all. I hear the reiteration and rephrasing of the same point over and over again, and think to myself how it could have been said succinctly.  Men are able to ramble about nothing in particular, both on and off the screen, but Zoom amplifies these gendered advantages and disadvantages.

Is it misogyny? Do men think that their female peers don’t have anything worthwhile to say? Or is it just that the male thought process is infinitely and inconceivably more meaningful?

Granted, digital communication is weird. In person, teachers can mediate class discussions more effectively by calling on students to speak. Zoom poses a unique challenge; students tend to speak unprompted, leaving ample room for interruptions and miscommunications. Even the technology which is intended to remedy these issues, like the hand-raising feature, could be useful in theory, but  aren’t widely used and feel awkward in practice.

Perhaps it depends on the personality of the student. Shyer people tend to let their voices be talked over or never talk at all, and the more gregarious ones have no issue speaking in class. However, from what I have noticed—in myself and others—male students tend to speak over female students in nearly every class.

Is this tendency innate? Is it learned? Can it be solved? I don’t know if 18-22 years of experience with patriarchal pedagogy can be undone by simply pointing out gender imbalances in online meetings, but I do know that women need to be heard on this new online platform. Even after the pandemic, it is likely that virtual meetings will be widely used. It is imperative that we educate ourselves on this issue to make vital digital spaces more equitable moving forward.