[bitops]

Imagine a scientific study that just said "Scientific justification for social oppression found." In a nutshell, I believe that's why.

It's not even that it's bad for there to be differences between the sexes; what's bad is that some people will inevitable take these studies as justification for their sexist views and attitudes.

[saraid216]

You don't have to imagine it:

http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/2766200?uid=3739696&ui...

"The Negro: Is he a biological inferior?" (1927)

That was from one crappy Google search. I can probably go home and break open books to get indirect references for a lot more studies.

[sltkr]

But that article concludes that “the Negro” is NOT inferior:

> I have tried to review briefly the important fields in which evidence of Negro inferiority is most likely to be found, if found at all. In no case is the proof conspicuous by its volume---rather the opposite appears true.

[saraid216]

I actually wondered how such an article got published as late as 1927. That would explain it. I can go find a better one tonight. More broadly, though, here's a Wikipedia page on the subject:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_racism

Glancing through the citations, #33 is "Tiedemann, Friedrich (1836). "On the Brain of the Negro, Compared with that of the European and the Orang-outang" (PDF). Phylosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London 126."

[jff]

That old HN favorite http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge's_law_of_headlines rears its head once again!

[reinhardt]

What's so horrible about a "sexist" view that manifests as buying different toys for boys and girls?