Deviation from the Norm

[swan_tower]

Tonight I read an article in the New York Times about how lots of business set their thermostats according to a formula devised in the 1960s, which assumed the average office worker was a 40-year-old, 154-pound man. Because of the differences in base metabolic rate between men and women, not to mention different standards of seasonal clothing, this results in countless women bundling up every summer to avoid freezing at work.

What struck me about the article was the way it framed its topic. “Women get cold more easily,” it tells us. It could just have well said “Men overheat more easily.” A small linguistic difference — but not an insignificant one. Saying that women get cold more easily defines the male average as the norm, and women as deficient in their ability to warm themselves. Phrasing it the other way around defines the female average as the norm, and men as deficient in their ability to cool themselves.

I get a lot of this in my daily life, because I am definitely at the warm end of the spectrum. In fact, a little while ago one of my friends made a comment about how I have a very narrow range of temperatures at which I can be comfortable. I retorted that this was not true: it’s just that half of my range is considered completely unacceptable by society at large, so nobody ever sees it. Long before we get anywhere near my upper limit, everybody else is pleading for a window to be opened because they’re dying of heat. (They should try working in my office. It’s upstairs, with a western facing, in a townhouse with no air-conditioning and three skylights. On a warm summer day, it isn’t uncommon for the temperature at my desk to approach ninety degrees Fahrenheit. I don’t claim to enjoy that temperature — but almost every person of my acquaintance would flee for their life.)

The article was mostly even-handed, pointing out that it would be more energy-efficient in summer to raise the temperature a little, not to mention more considerate of female employees, and that a lot of offices have setups that completely warp temperature control anyway, with cubicles and partitions stopping airflow and thermostats in different rooms from the areas they regulate. But still, the bias was ingrained in the language, even as it was pointing out how bias is ingrained in the culture. If we want to avoid the latter, we need to notice the former.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[maladaptive.livejournal.com]

I'll never forget the time I lamented that despite living in Miami, I could never wear shorts or skirts unless I planned to be outside most of the time because all the buildings are too cold, and some putz snarked about how "well, guys can't wear shorts and skirts to work." I sat there thinking, who said anything about work? I mean anywhere. Nothing is stopping a guy from wearing shorts and skirts to the movies or Starbucks. To me, pants at work are a foregone conclusion because it's usually cold. And I'm also the person in the office going "is it hot? Is it cold? Don't ask me. I'm comfy enough," so when I say I feel cold, other people have broken out the space heaters already.

What I always find strange about these conversations is how much rancor people feel, and how the two camps usually go....

Camp Cold: omg yes the office is too cold!
Camp Hot: Just put on another sweater omg hdu I will rub my sweaty body all over you if you turn the air up just a little.

Which seems to fall in with the idea that the "get cold easily" camp is seen as the one outside the norm. Of course, I also noticed that everyone in these discussions is talking about temperatures well below what virtually anyone in Miami would find acceptable and I'm reminded of my time working in a lab people called "the freezer" for a reason.....

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Actually I was just about to say something about work. Specifically I was about to say that while fashion websites decry the "formal short" on women, adjusting formal norms so that men can wear shorts and skirts (or kilts, if people are skittish about men wearing something called a skirt) in the office. Add pinstripes or something to make them feel more formal, if we need to, but we're already perfectly adequately able to distinguish between formal pants and workout pants (albeit with, of course, a blurry grey area in the middle, because monkeys), so setting up a standard for being able to do that with shorts seems humane for all parties.

[kurayami-hime.livejournal.com]

Japan has done exactly this with the "Cool Biz" campaign. Summer is hot! We need to not run the A/C so much! It's OK to wear short sleeve shirts and no jacket in the office! The program started in 2005, but it really took off after the Tohoku earthquake and the resulting energy crunch.

This isn't at the level of OK'ing shorts or skirts for all parties, but if Japan can manage to loosen its metaphorical tie about business dress, anyone can.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

This is awesome! I'm so glad to know about this.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

I've decided that if I end up going ahead with this one secondary-world fantasy I have in mind, men's clothing will be cut to display their bare arms and shoulders and backs and so forth, while women enjoy more coverage. Because that would actually make sense for the general metabolic difference between the sexes . . . .

[gelsey.livejournal.com]

I always freeze in the office part of my work place, and this is the reason I wear at least Capris and always have a sweatshirt with me. I also run the electric heater on my feet most days. I always get teased about being cold.

I don't mind being warmer than is comfortable for most people. While I wouldn't want it to be 90, necessarily, if I can pull my hair up and have some air movement, I'm good.

It always gets me that I have to cater to others with temp especially when it's all "well you can put more on." Excuse me, there is only so much I can put on especially in winter when 10-15 minutes to put on 3 or more layers is more than enough for me thank you very much

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

The way I see it, I should not have to wear winter gear indoors unless the heater is broken. :-P

[tiamat360.livejournal.com]

It always gets me that I have to cater to others with temp especially when it's all "well you can put more on."

yes! i hate this argument with a burning (hah!) passion. living in MN and walking to work, i can attest that there is a limit to how much on i can put on to stay warm in winter. also when i spend so much of the year freezing due to the weather, i would like to not also be freezing during the one season it's nice outside :P.

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

You would think that they would welcome a chance to save on the air conditioning

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Especially in places like Texas, where it's 105 outside and 60 inside.

[silme.livejournal.com]

I would be melting in your office. :) I think that England is a warm country and haven't turned on my home's central heating in years because it's not necessary. I think that buildings here, especially the classrooms in which I teach, are overheated in the winter, but then I don't think that 0 C is cold. It's not cold until 0 F. :) I wish I had a/c most summer days, especially as work, if only to lower the humidity. Today is a gorgeous day in my mind. It's sunny, 19 C (66 F) and breezy, with relatively low humidity for this country. I'm in shorts, sandals and a t-shirt, thinking it's perfect outside, but other people are walking around wearing jackets.

If I'm cold, other people are freezing to death or I'm running a fever. And I'm a female without a thyroid, which is supposed to be make me feel cold all of the time. Nope. I'm still warm all of the time -- just as I've always been. Women get cold more easily? Not the women in my family!

[aulus-poliutos.livejournal.com]

I'm totally like that, too. My - mostly female - colleagues tell me they start shivering merely looking at me wearing a tank top and a flowy chiffon skirt when there's only 18°C and a storm outside. I also swim in water that's barely still liqid. :-D

Since most of this summer the temperature is higher than 25°C I HATE it and want to emigrate to Greenland or the Antartic.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Dude, in my book it gets cold before we reach the freezing point of water. <g> You're right about A/C to lower humidity, though. It makes a big difference.

Women get cold more easily? Not the women in my family!

That's why I tried to phrase it as "average woman." Mileage varies in both genders; I knew a guy built like a brick wall who nonetheless shared my opinion about cold.

[wshaffer.livejournal.com]

Oddly enough, I just had a conversation with two coworkers (one male, one female) who claim that the office is freezing today. I'm feeling perfectly comfortable in pants and T-shirt, but I told them to go ahead and have the facilities guy bump the thermostat up a bit.

I am glad that I work in an office with fairly loose and flexible standards of dress. Plenty of guys do wear shorts to work, and very few of them are wearing suits, which probably reduces the need to crank the air conditioning.

The other thing about heat tolerance is that people vary a lot in how much they sweat. If it were just a matter of being overly warm, I could probably suck it up and deal, but having to sit around in clothing that is damp from my own sweat is really uncomfortable.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Yes, I know one of the things that makes me more psychologically tolerant of heat is that I don't sweat all that much.

[wshaffer.livejournal.com]

I used to not sweat all that much, but that changed when I started exercising more frequently and intensely. If what I've read can be believed*, some people get a pronounced training effect on their sweating response. Lucky me.

Even the discomfort associated with sweating can be mitigated quite a bit by wearing the right clothing. Moisture-wicking fabrics are amazing - if I could bring myself to give up denim and cotton t-shirts on the warmest days, I'd probably be fine.

*At least half of what I've read about fitness can't be believed - the trick is figuring out which half.

[klwilliams.livejournal.com]

My stepmother weighs 80 pounds sopping wet and comes from Thailand, so her idea of a comfortable temperature falls on the (very) high side of just about any U.S. norm. Now that I've reached a certain age, my body heat has risen and I find most places way too warm. I moved to California from Wisconsin, and what I consider a normal temperature range has changed dramatically over the last two decades. I've also lived all over the U.S., and know what the norm is in most U.S. climates, and I agree, stores and movie theaters are way too cold in the summer. Office buildings err in the wrong direction no matter what the season. And, nobody should be announcing that anybody is wrong when it comes to what temperature is comfortable. It's their body. Hmph.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Movie theatres especially. Growing up in Texas, I would regularly carry a sweater with me to the movies when it was over a hundred outside.