...a man has more genes in common with a male chimpanzee than with a female human being...

-- Richard Posner, paraphrasing Larry Summers (the president of Harvard) in "Larry Summers and Women Scientists" - a rather interesting discussion of some controvserial comments made by Mr Summers.

Interesting, in light of a discussion a few of us had with the Producer of the C.K. TV pilot [which we shot over the weekend] while we were enjoying post-shoot, um, games [Connect 4 and Boku. (! Lame = us )]. Jimmy Fenton's [the 1st AC] girlfriend, Rachael, got into the Digital Media course at UNSW and is considering a career in either mograph or compositing. Antigone, the Producer, suggested that Rachael may have a good chance of getting into either field regardless of her abilities because posties might enjoy have a pretty girl working with them. I suggested that her prettiness would be secondary to her abilities cause in high level post skill is everything... if you make a mistake, then the whole team takes the blame ("You're fucking up my movie!").

Soon, a slightly heated (actually quite tepid) debate emerged about the overall male-dominated nature of the film industry, specifically (camera) crew, and the differences between male-dominated and female-oriented sets. Antigone 'put it out there' that it was due to a kind of subtle misogyny in the film industry and speficially in the camera department. Dave Sattout, the soundie, and I thought it may be due to the fact that being on a film set is somewhat like being on a building site. That the actual *work* of being on a set appeals to men more than it does to women, for whatever reason that may be. Being crew is a caveman thing but with cameras rather than clubs. Whether that's a chicken or egg thing is open to debate. I mean, thinking about it, few of the women I know 'in the industry' actually work on set. Maybe I just have a small circle of friends?

Curious to what others think.