Remember Omar Hussain, the terrorist who was furious that other terrorists would use his phone charger without asking?
More recently, and on the other side of the playing field, a woman called Carolyn Stewart was coming to the end of a five-year stint analysing ISIS targets for the United States Central Command.
Stewart harboured a hunch that some of her reports were not being taken as seriously as they should, and that the rising jihadist threat was greater than was being made public. The army veteran spoke up.
Soon, related or not, though some say it most definitely is, this analyst in an extremely important job at a crucial time found herself in court.
The reason she was there – along with a two-star general, a military judge and the third-highest ranking person at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) – was to find out whether she had sworn while at work.
This was an outrageous accusation because no one in the military had ever sworn before.
Yet according to reports from the court room, at a time of great international conflict and when ISIS were taking over the town of Palmyra, Stewart was accused of taking issue with a colleague who refused to adjust a target order, and then swearing at them.
A government lawyer was there to go over all it all with a fine-tooth comb. The lawyer wanted to know precisely what Stewart had done with the papers she had been holding in her hands at the time, for example: ‘Did she toss the papers down, or place them down?’
She was also accused of using a swear word on another occasion, and just one short year after that, she allegedly swore at a subordinate when it turned out they hadn’t filled out an overtime report correctly.
Stewart herself admitted she ‘may’ have used naughty words at times at work. It’s easy to see how she may have felt stressed, what with ever such a lot to think about, but this, the government argued, had led to a toxic work environment.
The DIA chief of staff concluded that while Stewart’s behaviour did not, in fact, qualify as creating a hostile work environment, it was still rude and ‘unbecoming’. Stewart was reassigned to a job in cyber security.
Unbecoming.
It’s difficult for an outsider to see how that word might be used to describe a man charged with the same responsibilities.
Whether or not it had anything to do with Stewart’s reports, the fact that she was being singled out for swearing at work in this way is worth considering.
The writer and public relations coordinator Alayna Frankenberry recently made a rallying call for women at work everywhere.
‘We’re expected to water down our statements when we mean to assert ourselves,’ she wrote. ‘To do everything we can to avoid being called a bitch. And how have we been rewarded for playing nice? Of the Fortune 500 companies, women run 4%. Of the Fortune 1000, 4.1%. In short, it’s not working out.’30
Be a bitch! she is saying.
Be forthright! Assertive! Aggressive! Because it pays to be rude!
And we know it does. Remember, rude people do tend to earn more because they dare to ask for it. Buoyed by confidence and not bothered if they offend, they generally make bigger, bolder, ballsier demands during salary negotiations.
If you are a rude woman, however, and you’re sitting there all proud of yourself, arrogantly flicking the Vs at everybody as they walk past, know this: it doesn’t pay as well as it should.
Rude men? They’re having a grand old time.
A trio of American universities looked at the earnings of 10,000 workers over a period of 20 years. They found that rude women earn 5 per cent more than nice women.
Well done, rude women.
But a rude man will earn 18 per cent more than a nice woman.
Well done, rude man!
Hang on, though – because that still means that even if you are a rude woman, and you love being a rude woman, and you are the best rude woman at being a rude woman that any rude woman has ever been, being a rude woman will still earn you 13 per cent less than being a rude man.31
Rudeness works far better for bastards than bitches, but none of this means that men are actually deep down ruder than women. What it means is that women don’t act as rudely. Why?
Because the rest of us find them ‘unbecoming’ when they do.
Kieran Snyder – who is a woman even though she’s called Kieran – is a tech entrepreneur and Seattle business owner who had a hunch about all this.
She’s brilliant because, instead of just having that hunch and getting on with her day, she did something about it. She started gathering information. It’s something she’s done before. Once, she overheard a conversation at work in which one woman complained to another woman about a colleague’s habit of interrupting everyone in meetings. It was deeply annoying, very frustrating and, of course, rude. She said it was unfair, too: the women listen in meetings, the men interrupt. The idea fascinated her. And so she set to work. She defined an interruption as any ‘event where one person starts speaking before the other person has finished, whether or not the interrupter intended it’. She attended every meeting she could, finding rooms as evenly split according to gender as she could. And then she sat back, listened and kept track, over hours of conversation on the technology industry throughout a whole month.
What she found was that, generally, people interrupt a lot.
But men interrupt, cut off and take over approximately twice as much as women.fn1
Not just that, but men are almost three times more likely to interrupt a woman as they are a man.
Of the 102 interruptions from women that Snyder logged, an incredible 89 of them were women interrupting women. That’s 87 per cent of the time.
However, when the woman is the most senior person in the room, she will interrupt everyone, all the time.
‘And I fit that classification,’ Snyder tells me when we speak. ‘Lifelong interrupter. And I thought that was interesting: the women who manage to succeed in this male-dominated industry, all of them have fairly assertive styles of communication. And I wondered if there was a connection.’
Her results seem to suggest there is. But remember her use of the word ‘assertive’ there. We’ll get back to that.
What Snyder’s interruption study seems to show is that ‘women don’t advance in their careers beyond a certain point without learning to interrupt’.
And yet our attitude towards women who do is different from our attitude towards men who do.
You’ll hear it a million times about women who rise to senior levels in business.
She’s rude, she’s bossy, she’s ruthless, she’s a bitch.
But men are generally focused, determined, driven, aggressive.
An aggressive male boss is accepted and even considered positive, while an aggressive female boss may be scary and make others uncomfortable.
In the 1970s, the linguist Robin Lakoff argued that all this starts in childhood. If a little girl starts talking like a little boy, swearing or calling the dinner lady a poo-face, ‘she will normally be ostracized, scolded, made fun of’.32 But young women who learn to ‘talk like a lady’ are celebrated. Talking like a lady means not interrupting; it means listening to what’s being said, responding politely, not swearing or saying poo-face or using aggressive language; being deferential, using softening phrases like ‘would you mind?’ or ‘would it be possible?’ or ‘please may I?’ Women are allowed to complain, ‘but only a man may bellow in rage’.
(In fact, a 2015 study showed that when men went off on one, raising their voices and using strong language in a jury situation – a jury situation! – people were much more likely to be persuaded by their arguments. But if a woman did it, using the exact same opinions and language, people were far more likely to stick to their original verdict and brand the woman overly emotional and not to be trusted. It’s why Reginald Rose wrote a play called Twelve Angry Men and not Twelve Untrustworthy and Overemotional Women.33)
Women are screwed either way. Rude or polite. ‘If she refuses to talk like a lady, she is ridiculed and subjected to criticism as unfeminine,’ wrote Lakoff. ‘If she does learn, she is ridiculed as unable to think clearly, unable to take part in a serious discussion.’
But here’s what the very latest research shows.34 Women are behaving more rudely. At least when it comes to language. They haven’t just caught up with men; they’re starting to outdo them.
Researchers took 376 people and asked them to record up to three hours of their normal, everyday conversations. Conversations about colleagues. Tax bills. Where to get lunch.
At the time of writing, only around half of the 10 million words that were submitted have been transcribed – and had they been mine they would almost all have been about where to get lunch – but what the results show so far is striking.
In the 1990s, data from studies on language showed that for every million words they spoke, men would use the F-word around 1,000 times. Women, so pure and sheltered, would use an F-word only 167 times.
The fresh data shows a dramatic shift.
A new generation of politer men now use 540 of ‘fuck’ and its variants in every one million words.
Women? Five hundred and forty-fucking-six.
So gender differences between what men and women can say without people fainting are starting to fall away. Look at how their behaviour is judged, though, and the differences Lakoff was on about in the 1970s live on. It’s great to say that women should find their inner bitch, but generally they’ve been raised not to want to be forthright, aggressive, rude. Those that have risen to the top have done so despite their upbringing, not because of it. Even among the top-tier businesswomen in the world, there is still the fear of being seen as rude instead of direct.
This fascinated Kieran Snyder.
She’s been in the male-dominated technology industry since getting her PhD 15 years ago. ‘I was generally highly rewarded and quickly promoted. But my feedback in performance reviews generally always said, “You’re doing great work … but you’re kind of a bitch.” I was encouraged to tone it down, make room for other people … and then I heard a friend of mine discuss two candidates he was bringing in for promotion.’
One candidate was a man. Kieran’s friend wasn’t worried about the man. Everyone liked the man.
The woman, on the other hand, while a stronger candidate, was a huge concern.
‘Her peers didn’t like her.’
The woman was seen as a little too forthright. A little too assertive.
‘Abrasive.’
Snyder had heard that word before. A thought struck her. She began to collect real data. She gathered 250 separate performance reviews in which people’s performances at 30 different companies had been evaluated.
She found that while men were likely to be reviewed on their business results, women were more likely to be reviewed on their personality.
Almost 60 per cent of men received feedback you could call critical. But for women it was 90 per cent.
Men were given constructive suggestions, like ‘Take time to slow down and listen. You would achieve even more.’
But women were given constructive suggestions and told to shut up. ‘You can come across as abrasive sometimes. I know you don’t mean to but you need to pay attention to your tone.’
Negative personality criticism showed up in 71 of the 94 reviews received by women, along with words like bossy, strident, abrasive, emotional and irrational. ‘Aggressive’ was used for both men and women. For men, generally to say ‘be more aggressive’. For women, ‘don’t be so aggressive!’
And did you notice ‘abrasive’ popping up again?
‘“Abrasive” was interesting because it only turned up for women,’ says Snyder.
In fact, while not one man was apparently abrasive and were all as smooth and shiny as beautiful pebbles, the ‘A’ word showed up for women 17 times in 13 reviews alone.
For abrasive, by the way, read rude.
In fact, read pure rudeness. The word ‘rude’ comes from the Latin rudus, literally meaning unwrought, or jagged, or unpolished, or – you know – abrasive.
‘It’s an association word … it means not playing along nicely,’ Kieran says. ‘It means opinionated. Aggressive.’
‘More likely to contradict the men in the room?’ I ask.
‘Yeah. It means giving opinions when it would be much easier for everyone else if you did not. Women sharing opinions is … unlikeable. In an environment where women are so profoundly outnumbered, just speaking at all is read as abrasive.’
So in business, a woman speaking her mind is rude. For a military officer, it’s unbecoming. In a jury deliberation, it’s untrustworthy. As a child, it’s unladylike.
Let’s not even start on videogames journalism.
No wonder women don’t interrupt. They’re far too rude already. The fact is: we unfairly hold women to higher standards when it comes to rudeness.
‘I do think women in the workplace worry about negative characterisation of their personality,’ says Kieran. ‘A man has to go really far down the “bastard” path for there to be any repudiation. A woman only has to say she disagrees with you.’
For a woman, merely speaking up or standing out is enough to make people nervous and incite character assassinations. When the Tory MP Anna Soubry made an emotional address at a Westminster rally, fighting back tears as she spoke to a huge crowd of young people, saying that Britain’s decision to leave the European Union was a ‘terrible mistake’ and urging the public to report hate crimes, which had seen a nationwide upswing since the decision, The Times columnist Tim Montgomerie immediately tweeted her to tell her to ‘stop moaning’. Then fellow MP Nadine Dorries – also a woman – told her 30,000 followers that Soubry was drunk.
We patronise women for stating opinions, we tell them to stop moaning, and if they deign to persist, they’re rude or drunk.
To quote Sheryl Sandberg, the CEO of Facebook and one of only 172 female billionaires in the world, ‘When a woman speaks in a professional setting, she walks a tightrope. Either she’s barely heard or she’s judged as too aggressive.’35
I begin to wonder whether my judgement of Madam Hotdog that day – that she was so aggressive, so abrasive – could in some way have been informed by the fact that she was a woman. Would I have reacted differently if she’d been a man?
‘I don’t know,’ says Snyder. ‘I think it’s possible. Without knowing the details of the hotdog vendor, another thing to ask yourself is would you have been more surprised if she was older or younger than she was, or a different race? We are generally more tolerant of assertiveness in younger women than older women. Not by much, but generally we are. We are generally more tolerant of assertiveness in white women than women of colour. It’s an interesting lens. If it had been a man, ask yourself: would you have written a whole book about it?’
I think about Kieran’s question for a whole day.
And I conclude that yeah, I bloody would.
It was deeply unbecoming.
CASE STUDY: THE STORY TOPPER
I am at the party of a friend and it is important that I do well so that I reflect adequately on him. So I am telling a story to a man, and it is probably my Third Best Story.
The man is watching me, delighted and enthralled, and I imagine how delighted and enthralled he will be when I move to the story’s powerful conclusion, and all that that entails! How he will reel backwards at the twist in the tale, appreciating it as at once a punchline and as an entrée for further discussion. I imagine the supplementary questions he will have, with which I will deal one at a time until all avenues of relevant conversation have been exhausted and the man is a twitching, juddering mess, his mind blown, his appetite sated.
It’s a pretty good story.
And as I move into my final sentence, and I fix him straight in the eye, I go for the kill.
‘And that’s when he found out it was someone else’s.’
Boom! Thank you! You’re welcome! Your round!
And the man looks at me, and for a second I think he is too shocked to realise what has just happened here, and then he nods almost imperceptibly, and he says, ‘Yeah, that’s a bit like me, because …’
What? What does he mean, that’s a bit like him? What’s happening here? Why is he not a twitching, juddering mess? Why is his mind not blown? And then it hits me. The man is a story topper. He’s trying to beat my story! He wasn’t even listening! All the while I was talking – with my neat little turns-of-phrase and my tried-and-tested metaphors, developed and honed until I was satisfied I had a new Number 3 worth its place alongside the other children – he wasn’t even listening! He was just thinking about his own story! Where are his manners? How rude can you get, to not listen to another man’s story? This is the height of societal rudeness!
I watch his lips as he says whatever it is he is saying. Surely sometime soon this ‘story’ will be over. Then the art will be taking my cue and segueing somehow into my Second Best Story. That’ll teach him. It’ll be a bold and confident move, which will both scare and humble him. Why top a story? Why not just let the story be? Now my Third Best Story is tainted. I hate story-tainting story toppers.
And then it looks like he’s about to finish and I prepare to top his story.
‘So that’s why we went by coach!’ he says, and I nod ever so slightly and say, ‘Yeah’, and then say, ‘Talking of travel …’ and I’m in!
But what did I notice there? A flinch of pain behind the eyes? A momentary narrowing? A shock of thought across the brain as he realised the consequences of his actions? Yes, sir. The topper can be topped. You thought you were a topper. Well, here’s your toppee licence. For here is my Second Best Story, and oh, thou shalt feel thine humiliation, sir. This story has been tested. Road-tested. It’s been told across the globe, to prince and pauper alike. Just go with it. Don’t fight it. Head into the light …
‘Which is why that was the last time my wife ever said boo to a goose!’
And we’re done here. Nice one. Thank you. Mine’s a pint.
And yet nothing. Not a smile. Not a twitch. Nothing. And … my God … here it comes. I can see it coming …
‘Yeah, that’s a bit like us,’ he says, and I have never seen the like. He’s off again. He’s going to try and top the story with some old rubbish about him and his boring wife! He is incorrigible!
Well, he’s asking for it now. He’s asking for the big guns. He’s asking me to wheel out Machine Number 1, Guinevere. She’s not had an outing in quite some time. I’ve been resting that story. You have to do that with your number-one story. Your Best Story is for emergency use only. It needs to be untoppable and, once you start, unstoppable. You don’t half-tell your best story. You don’t start it unless you’re committed and have absolute commitment from those around you. Your best story must be respected, listened to, appreciated. Otherwise the whole system is meaningless and arbitrary and not even a proper system, and you could never accuse it of that. Surely this man respects this? Surely he will listen?
I’m pretty sure he’s nearly finished now. His arms have got involved. Hey, the people in my best story have arms. Maybe that’s my in. And as he stops talking, I nod, and twitch a quarter-smile, and say, ‘Did I ever tell you about the time I …’
And he stops me, there and then, and says, ‘Will you excuse me for just a minute?’ and I say, ‘Of course!’ and he backs away, through the party, and I have won, I have won, I have won!
Well done me. I topped his stories. I didn’t even listen to his.
I pat myself on the back, because I hate people like that.