When a college feminist decided, one cold night in 2014, to burn her personal copy of pseudofeminist Christina Hoff Sommers’ book The War Against Boys, the internet’s antifeminists responded as if Hitler himself had risen from the grave.
“Universities bring book-burning back, one page at a time,” declared a blogger at TheRebelMedia. After an extended comparison with the infamous book burning campaigns of the literal Nazis, he declared that “[t]he burning of Hoff Sommers’ book is a striking visual synecdoche for the malaise afflicting free expression across not only North American college campuses.” In a featured article, A Voice for Men described the burning as a “disturbing” example of “misandry in academia.”
On the Men’s Rights subreddit, meanwhile, one angry dude declared that
If you’re burning a book, you’re basically admitting to being not just a bigot, but one who doesn’t even have enough confidence in the strength of their own views to believe that they can stand up for themselves without needing to silence and censor those that oppose them.
If we set aside the fact that, unlike the Nazis, who confiscated the books they burned, a person burning their own copy of a book that is readily available to others is not actually censoring anything, he’s got a point.
So it’s interesting to see how many of the Internet’s antifeminsts and Anti-Social-Justice-Warrior-Warriors are embracing a proposal from one of their own to literally censor all academics who teach stuff they don’t like.
On Change.org, professional feminism-hater Carl Benjamin, known on YouTube as Sargon of Akkad, has started a petition demanding that “UNIVERSITIES” — presumably, every single one of them — immediately “Suspend Social Justice Courses” because he thinks that “social justice” professors are up to no good.
In vague but melodramatic language Benjamin proclaims that
Social justice has become scientifically illiterate, logically unsound, deeply bigoted and openly supremacist.
He doesn’t specify exactly what kind of supremacism he’s complaining about here; presumably not white.
Nor does he ever define exactly what courses count as “social justice courses.” There aren’t any departments of Social Justice that I’m aware of. [EDIT: Oops! Turns out there are.] Does Benjamin mean a tiny handful of, say, women’s studies courses taught by radical feminists? Or does he hope (at least in his wildest dreams) to take down the humanities and social sciences as a whole?
Social justice professors are indoctrinating young people into a pseudoscientific cult behind closed doors that is doing damage to their health, education and future.
Well, technically, I guess, virtually all college courses are taught “behind closed doors,” since the doors of lecture halls generally do get closed before class begins. Technically, I’m writing this post behind closed doors, because I don’t leave the doors of my apartment wide open. (People might wander in; the cats might wander out.) I suspect that Benjamin himself wrote up his petition behind closed doors!
Benjamin goes on to declare that
[s]ocial justice … has become another ideology fit only to pave the road to Hell, so it is time to turn around and choose another path that is concerned with reason, science and improving the lives of every human.
If only some evil Social Justice English professor has indoctrinated Benjamin in the devilish art of writing without resorting to hackneyed cliches.
But that’s pretty much all there is to Benjamin’s petition. Somehow, thought, the vagueness of Benjamin’s plan hasn’t stopped 9,878 people — so far — from signing the petition.
It is, however, possible that some of the signers are a little bit confused as to what exactly they’re signing.
Indeed, the top two most-liked comments on the petition, for example, were written by people who seem to think that Benjamin’s proposal to peremptorily censor all college courses that he thinks are excessively social-justicey is, somehow, a defense of free speech?
Benjamin has posted a video in which he explains his crusade in a little more detail. It’s possible that somewhere in it he answers the question of how exactly his plan to drive all professors he doesn’t like from all the college campuses in the world is actually a crusade for free speech.
Here’s the video in question:
Oops! Wrong video. Let me try again:
Huh. I don’t think that was it either.
No, that’s clearly not it.
Ok, ok. I found the real one here.
But it’s 40 minutes long. I sampled the first 2 seconds, and that was about all I could bring myself to watch. So I guess I’ll just have to resign myself to a life of servitude under the jackboots of the Social Justice warlords. Still, that’s a far better option than actually watching a Sargon of Akkad video all the way through.
@ Scildfreja
I hope you feel better soon!
@ weirwoodtreehugger
I suspect because videos have more of an impact on some people than text. It’s just my opinion but I would say that more conflict-oriented and authoritarian types would fall in there. They evoke emotions differently, some people can mentally “time point” and store information in that format. Some might choose it because it’s harder to do a refutation of a video because it often requires typing out what the person said and dealing with it so you have to do more work, but it’s hard to say how deliberate that is.
I prefer text myself since copying and pasting is an option in arguments, but if it’s short enough I’ve typed up a transcript and narrated visual portions in refutations.
@TheLaughingMan
You want to actually persuade people, right?
Your citations are useless unless you are responding to a point that David or someone else made here, cite the relevant portion and explain why they are wrong.
Citation needed.
Citation needed.
Citation needed.
If you have to try to change the subject with more uncited and demonstrated assertions that does not look very good for persuasion either.
@Poly Liker
I noticed that you simply link dropped and did not mention any specific problems. If you can’t name problems why should anyone take them seriously?
Citation needed.
College courses that are taught contain things like examples, events, people, cite literature and history…
I have no reason to believe that students simply absorb and don’t think about if the things being discussed are real, or the more likely situation some students are like that and you need to be able to talk about the proportion that are like that so you can measure the threat against students that are not like that (stereotyping students? That’s not helpful).
What part of the source, what example does it connect to and why is it a problem or why does it support your point?
Because it’s not my job when you are trying to convince people of things. A 14 minute video can contain many subject and many points. A 1-2 minute video is likely to be limited and is more reasonable, but you still seem like someone unable to argue anything and who wants others to do your work for you.
What you are trying to do is irrelevant, you are wasting our time.
Which parts, what do they pertain to and why do they support you?
Then cite what you are arguing for/against, cite the point and explain why it supports you.
Then do some work to show why.
Racism doesn’t exist, declares self-proclaimed liberal.
Brony,
I’m sure that’s a big part of it. I also think they’ve convinced themselves that if people just watched the videos, they’d be convinced.
How fucking far up your own ass do you have to be to think that preferential treatment of one race doesn’t equal disparagement of another, but that affirmative action DOES?
By that logic, white supremacy means everyone is tacitly admitting that white people are mediocre and shitty, and therefore need the help.
@Polyliker
You get one freebie.
One of the problems with the criminal justice system is that the presence of people with prejudices and who discriminate based on race make the statistics suspect in terms of what they mean.
(The following links are from the previous link)
If someone is black they are more likely to be arrested than white people (because they are more heavily policed),
(pg 20)
(pg 21)
…more likely to be convicted than white people,
Although the data in this backgrounder indicate that blacks represent about one-third of drug arrests, they constitute 46 percent of persons convicted of drug felonies in state courts.
…and more likely to be sentenced to incarceration than white people convicted of the same crime.
One study found that in a particular region blacks were incarcerated for convicted felony offenses 51% of the time while whites convicted of felonies were incarcerated 38% of the time.
(table on page 46)
This is why systemic racism is a thing, and a cycle that goes back in time.
@ littleknown
That is the thing where we will disagree. I do not think that the minorities have a substantial difference in weight just based on them being minorities but rather on their financial status as I have seen no evidence to suggest that minorities in poverty have had it harder than whites in poverty nor that minorities have a substantial disadvantage in this society based on them being minorities. I want to find the source of the problem and eradicate it instead of shouting ‘racism! sexism!’ every time as I do not see evidence to support that that is what is holding people back. (and maybe I am projecting here but I think more of society than to simply accuse people of things)
Racism and sexism are illegal in institutions and frowned upon by the vast majority of society so my question is ‘what is the actual problem?’.
You see I would call myself colorblind and I do not care about race and I disregard everything that happened in the past as being in the past, however I do deal with the effects of the past and see the results of what happened in the past. That I can try to change, I am not going to do that on basis of skin color nor on basis of gender. I work within the reality now. You see when I (and probably the majority of people) say ‘I do not care about race’ or ‘I am colorblind’ I am not saying that different people in certain ethnic groups cannot have a disadvantage and that that disadvantage cannot be prevalent in a certain ethnic group. But rather that my judgement of those people doesn’t rely on their skin color. I do not deal in ‘groups’ when dealing with people, I deal with an individual (statistical data is different story and only applies to the participants which on their turn draw a general trend for the rest of the population).
What I am saying is that rather than giving people things because they are from a certain ethnic group, find out the disadvantages of the group and try to solve those. Find the source of the problem instead of crying ‘racism! sexism!’ That is what I am advocating.
And actually I would call myself generally in the middle of the political spectrum but more on the left side.
In fact the the rape culture is a myth and has no good statistical data to back it up. But we do know a few things:
1. Rape is generally looked down upon and perceived to be almost as bad as murder.
2. Rape victims are generally believed before they have proven the case (it is often very hard to prove but the ‘innocent until proven guilty’ remains, we should just work on better methods to prove rape)
and
3. Lives are destroyed after someone cries rape, even after one has not been convicted it is much harder to find a job.
Based on this we can say that the US isn’t suffering from a rape culture. As a rape culture is described as:
‘rape culture is a setting in which rape is pervasive and normalized due to societal attitudes about gender and sexuality.’
You know what is an example of a rape culture? A culture with a rape-game. Which is what happened in cologne. The middle east is packed with rape-cultures.
The one in five figure, which blew new life to the idea of rape culture, is come to be by a very skewed method in which the interviewer decided if it was rape or not and not the interviewed.
(Rape included sexual contact while drunk, which is not rape per se)
But if you just think about the numbers you’d get an absurd number 323,694,185 total pop, 50.4% female=163,141,869 female, 20% raped in their lifetime(average 80 years) –>(163,141,869*0.2)/80= 407,854/year this number is almost twice the number of the estimate by SARSSM. This estimate is also not factual(hard data), they say that about 60% of rapes go unreported, while the exact number is unknown. I would argue that presenting the 250,000 figure(as done there) as factual is spreading misinformation as the actual number is unknown and we can only guess.
Thank you @Brony!
The whole “Videos as Sources” thing is sort of… well, sort of a giveaway, I suppose? Videos (especially Youtube videos) are a terrible way to present concrete, reliable data. Tables and statistics are poorly presented and difficult to reference throughout a video, and it’s almost impossible to go through the media in any way but front-to-back, forcing the audience to stick to the presentation timetable of the presenter.
The written word is the opposite – you can have a table, a graph, and an explanation on the same page, allowing for readers to jump back and forth as needed. Clearly marked sections and topics allow readers to jump around as well, investigating the presented material from different angles. (It’s been shown that effective, knowledgeable learners tend to read in piecemeal chunks, and not just front-to-back)
On the other hand, videos are excellent for providing metaphors and emotional arguments. The linear narration, combined with the audio and body-language cues, make it easy to create leading questions, unfounded implications, and other emotional appeals.
I think it breaks down to what someones’ background in science is. Most people who are pro-science get their enthusiasm from videos and pop-culture articles, and are used to learning and examining science in this way. NDT’s Cosmos was a wonderful series for presenting the majesty of the universe, as an example.
These videos are great – but also leave the impression that good science should have a good story, and be told by a good storyteller. This is not the case.
Anyways, I think that may be part of what’s going on. They seem like people who are used to “truth” feeling comfortable, and majestic, and narrated by a good storyteller, whereas actual truth is often awkward, pedestrian, and best transmitted by a table of figures.
For the curious, he’s ripped this “Argument” wholesale from South Park. Specifically, that one really shitty
half-hour-long excuse to use the n-wordepisode that highlighted their decline from satirising right-wingers to being right-wingers.Ah, yes, Brony, thank you – that’s what I was missing. The FBI table that @Polyliker linked only gave broad arrest rates; it didn’t give incarceration rates or background crime rates.
EDIT: I am trying to parse Polyliker’s reply, but i’m going a bit bleary reading it, so may leave it to you excellent people. I can already see some glaring issues, though. More of the same “I don’t think it’s valid, therefore it’s not valid” argument, really.
@scildfeja
Yes, that is indeed true. Again, my phrasing was bad. I had already given the percentages of poor african americans and poor caucasian americans. You got the idea though.
No, it really isn’t. The question is, why are they poor? My view on this is that due to the history and bad treatment of african americans in the past we’re still seeing the effects. This does not mean that there is systemic racism going on now. For example, someone could have broken your leg, and now you have to walk around on one leg while that leg is healing, this doesn’t mean that person is breaking your leg over and over again at the moment. This on it’s own doesn’t give us evidence of systemic racism, it just tells us that one ethnic group is generally less fortunate financially wise than another.
Yes, I forgot to add the word ‘possibly’. The numbers seem to match and logically it seems that due to higher poverty rates things like burglary, theft and robbery would be higher. This seems to match the numbers when looking at the percentage of african americans in poverty and whites in poverty but is no proof on it’s own.
Yes, I know that. I didn’t try to present it as evidence but more as a reason why I think this.
er, @Polyliker,
In your own linked report from SARSSM, it says at the bottom that
while you say
Note that the SARSSM doesn’t say “alleged rapists”, it says “rapists”.
How can you conclude the latter while acknowledging the former?
EDIT: Just saw your reply to me, please give me a little bit and I will give you your response! You seem very reasonable, and I’m glad that you’re actually engaging with the points being made.
I am not arguing that at all. I am saying: ‘It isn’t valid until proven, untill such time I will not see it as valid.’
Because these ‘rapists’ have either not been proven to have done it, therefore they are innocent untill proven guilty, or they have not been reported, which comes from an estimate.
Also actions like ‘matress girl’ who was exposed as a liar are still believed for months. Society believes, the justice court not, that is the difference.
@Poly Liker
If you’re denying the existence of biases towards or against certain races, then you’re not ‘for equality’, you’re ‘for the status quo’. I get it, it’s nice to live in a bubble of sunshine and rainbows where racism and sexism totally don’t exist and everyone starts life off on a level playing field. I use to believe it, until I interacted with people who’s race or gender was different from mine. They told me stories of injustices that – what a shock – I never experienced!
For example: My American friend who was born and raised in Cali constantly has people asking “no but where are you reaaaaaaaaaaaaally from?” because she is Asian. Her english is flawless, she’s a US citizen, yet she’s treated like a foreigner (and, by some people, a terrible ‘invader’ who’s here to steal jobs). Oh, and as an example of intersection: Sexist douchebags often criticize her for not acting sufficiently feminine and submissive like a ‘proper Asian woman’.
Strangely, I never get that question asked, even though I’ve spent more of my life outside of the united states. In fact, people typically assume that I’m American and lived here my whole life. Geez, I wonder why the fuck that is. Could it be because I’m white?
Simple. Women and people of color are discriminated against in certain fields. As proof of this assertion, I’ll quote the specific passage from the article Katz linked:
So what we have here is scientific evidence that proves the existence of sexism.
Now that we’ve established that sexism is a thing that exists, affirmative action provides incentives to cancel out the effect of discrimination. Without affirmative actions, ‘jennifer’ doesn’t get nearly the same opportunities as ‘john’ even though she’s just as competent.
You may disagree with affirmative action as a method, but if you do then may I ask, how do you propose to solve the problem of systemic sexism? That’s exactly the kind of question that a college class on Social Justice would discuss (after they finish explaining to the obnoxious concern trolls that racism and sexism do, in fact, exist)
That’s why we have initiatives that try to specifically encourage girls to learn tech. Why don’t we include the boys in these initiatives? Because they don’t need it: Employers are more likely to consider them ‘competent’, teachers are already giving them more encouragement, our rigid gender roles even tell them that they are ‘natrually good’ at STEM jobs. Creating an incentive program to get boys into tech would be giving an advantage to a group that already has an unfair advantage.
Privilege and discrimination are not about ‘the poor people’, they affect every person at all socioeconomic levels. Is it fair that women who want to be CEOs and PoC who want to be CEOs have to work harder than people who just happened to be white and male?
The existence of poor white people doesn’t disprove the notions of privilege and systemic racism. Poor white people still have an advantage over poor black people. Affirmative action is what levels the playing field. Without affirmative action, poor white people would have a distinct advantage over poor black people.
Cool, well lemme tell you a story that my friend told to me. He lived in a richer part of L.A. (you may be shocked to find out that non-poor black family also have to deal with racism). When he was growing up, he would regularly come home to find a note on his door telling his family that ‘you need to get out of our community, you are not welcome here’.
Note that his family’s income is no different from any other family’s income. The only difference was that he’s black. And for some strange reason, none of his white classmates would come home to find notes on their doors.
I am not saying that racism or sexism don’t exist, I am saying that I have doubts about the size of the problem.
Sure, I know there is discrimination based on gender in stem fields, that is no news, the question is, why is this discrimination there? The study you refer to says ‘because sexism’, which may be true, could also be something else.
But more criticism towards the study itself, the sample size is just 127 nationwide instances averaged out, not 500-1000 which would give a better representation. Now the margin of error is too high as we could have 10-20 professors which gave ridiculously low/high ratings who could mess with the numbers. I don’t say that the study is inherently inaccurate but the accuracy is doubt-able.
Proof for that please? Sure sexism in stem fields I will admit, but on a bigger, society wide scale, I don’t know.
Proof for that please?
What a great troll. First he says this:
And then like 2 comments later he says:
Amazing.
@Moocow, eeesh, that’s chilling :C I can’t imagine that sort of thing happening where I live. Thank you for sharing.
@Polyliker, I’ll try to be brief and split things up evenly! I’ll do this last one first, then get to your larger post.
http://www.radiomuseo.it/joomla/images/collector/collection/dischi/lilla%20vacabonda%20%2001.gif
The SARSSM report doesn’t say how it calculates its unreported data; I went looking at the NCPA site to follow up and find out, and it looks like the link is dead. The NCPS is a solid, reliable source, though – is there a reason you consider its results wrong in this case? Because there’s plenty of evidence to show that rape reporting is very low.
(and besides, estimates are good things! Most of our “facts” are really just estimates; the age of the earth and the universe are estimates. This doesn’t make them invalid, it just gives them confidence levels!)
Now, on to the larger of your responses;
It wasn’t your phrasing that was bad, sir, it was your math. You had already arrived at the proper percentages. But don’t feel bad about that – probability calculations are hard, even for us who work with them every day. There’s some sort of strange magic going on in probability calculations that resists human comprehension.
Your next paragraph is extremely important, so I’m going to leave it till last, if that’s okay! Moving on…
“Seem to” and “logically” are hints that you are using intuition. These are things that need to be demonstrated before you get to use the word “causation”. Sorry if I am being pedantic on that point, but I have been burned by it far too often! I think we can drop this thread of conversation, we’re probably in agreement – correlation != causation, etc, etc.
(Also, intuition and gut feelings are vital parts of any investigation, so please don’t think I mean otherwise! This is our creativity and problem-solving at work. The hard part is moving past our intuitions when reality contradicts us)
Fair enough! Do understand, though, that personal experience and observation are as often confounding to investigation than tehy are helpful.
Now, the meat of the argument. I think this is our sticking point, so I’d suggest we focus on this from now on:
Or, more specifically,
Mm, bayesian probability. Forgive me while I ramble a bit.
This question – why are they poor – is dependent on a huge number of variables. Technically an infinite set, but in reality we can clip it down to something calculable and still get a useful answer. The cofactors involved in this will include things like “local economy”, “education”, “job history”, “hiring / turnover rate”, and, yes, “racism”. The more precise question is whether the weight of racism as a factor in poverty is appreciable!
The frequentist view is to consider racism as a factor along with the others and then do an ANOVA analysis, or some similar technique (booo, ANOVA sux) capable of discerning the influence of cofactors.
The issue with this approach is that it doesn’t really acknowledge the fact that the cofactors can also influence one another!
Let’s say (for example) that education is a larger factor in poverty than racism according to the results of a simple frequentist calculation. You might be happy to conclude that this is the issue, and urge for more money in schools. A noble goal, for sure, but this calculation cannot tell whether racism is a factor in education as well. These sorts of entanglements crop up everywhere in complex systems.
Enter bayesian probability (or you can do other things if you want to stay frequentist, that’s okay too I guess!). A bayesian belief network can help discern how much weight racism has in all co-factors, instead of masking its influence to anything but the output variable.
Looking back, I realize that probably read as a lot of jargon’y gobbledygook. Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.
There are a lot of factors that go directly into whether a person is poor – education, local economy, and yes, race and gender. You claim that this is relatively small. Have you also considered the fact that racism and sexism also play a part in education, and in personal choices one makes? Racism and sexism have influence on every aspect of society. That you can’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not there – it just means you can’t see it. The best way to find out is to start digging. Others have provided excellent links to help you with just that.
I feel like this is the core of why you don’t agree with the “sexism” and “racism” arguments; you think it is being blown out of proportion. Does that sum it up correctly? Boiling the problem down to a single statement makes it easier to confront, sometimes.
@Poly Liker
Ok, as Visceria has pointed out, you’re being very hypocritical. If you want me to provide evidence for every point I make, you better do the same for every point you make. So far that has not been the case.
Also, you should probably avoid flip-flopping on issues, it makes you look like you have no idea what you’re talking about.
This next quote is from you, on page 4:
Your honor, there’s a contradiction in the witness’s testimony
http://rs248.pbsrc.com/albums/gg188/vipervamp/Phoenix/PhoenixProof.gif
Really? that’s not news? because last I checked you were convinced that:
When did you reach the shocking conclusion that such a stigma does, in fact, exist?
Ah “something else”. With no proof or evidence or even a theory to suggest what mysterious other force could possibly cause this to happen. What an incredible rebuttal.
I’ll leave it to someone who can actually do science to refute you on this one. But what if you don’t like that study, good news, there are plenty of others:
http://www.pnas.org/content/109/41/16474.full
I’ll show you mine if you show me yours. here’s an article that shows that investors will favor Male CEOs over Female CEOs:
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1556449
And try to leave the goalposts where they are this time, mkay?
Yes I am aware that there is plenty of evidence that rape reports are low, the meat of the matter is: how low? Until we can give a concrete answer, none should be given.
Sure, estimates are great, however a social statistical estimate does not hold as much ground as a geological estimate simply due to the fact that those statistical estimates mostly rely on surveys, which could be inaccurate simply because rape victims are more likely to respond to a survey about rape than non-rape victims which is quite often not accounted for, while geological estimates are more due to inaccuracy of dating methods.
I do have trouble with this statement, as I see racism and sexism as different treatment based on race or sex. I am certain that those do happen, but not so certain it happens on the level you’re talking about.
So, yes
this does exactly describe my position. I feel that most of the arguments saying ‘it is racism’ and/or ‘racism is everywhere’ are arguments from ignorance. I’d rather stay a simple frequentist as I have not seen compelling evidence that people are treated differently based on race at such a scale (but rather on economic status, or cultural differences or things the like).
@Polyliker,
Great! Thank you for replying, and I’m glad that we’ve got your issue refined down. You’ve got an issue with whether racism or sexism is as large a factor as is suggested by the literature. This is a fine issue to have; you’re arguing that there is no effect. You’re holding for the null hypothesis. Well and good.
I’m going to focus on this exclusively, if that’s alright – all of the other content of this thread stems from this position. With this in mind, I have to next ask:
What evidence would satisfy you that racism and sexism are significant elements within poverty, or other social justice issues?
Must … restrain … comment …
(Frequentist statistics are wrong when dealing with complex systems! Wrong wrong wrong! No linear regression! Bad X-Square! No biscuit!)
Ahem, sorry 🙂 You wound my bayesian heart.
So, Polyliker’s main evidence that the 1/5 women have been sexually assaulted is that it just seems too high? That’s feeling, not facts. He keeps saying he likes facts and evidence, yet he just keeps basing his opinions on feelings.
Oh, and the notion that black people are only discriminated against if they are also pool? Absurd.
President Obama has said that before he became famous, he had trouble getting a cab. He’s handsome, ivy league educated, never really had the appearance of someone who is really poor. Yet, he still got treated like a suspected criminal.
Polyliker recruited a not my shielder or made a sock puppet who showed up on the previous page, if anyone cares.
@WWTH, good eye on Z.E.N on the previous page! I always miss those sneaky people that come in to argue but get lost in moderation for awhile. Their arguments all seem to be “I don’t like this”, so can probably be ignored. Z.E.N, that you don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s invalid. I hope you can see that the goal is to help people, and that groups with negative bias affecting them deserve to have that bias countered directly!
Whoa there matey, having a stigma overlapping all education is very different than having a stigma in one branch. Like saying the tree is rotten is different than saying the branch is rotten.
Good news, I can actually do science. Having a study with a small sample size isn’t a really good study. it is equivalent to saying that 1000 people think this/are like this while you’ve only asked five, you’re not accurately representing a general trend.
And, you’ve given me the exact same study which had issues in accuracy.
The other study is nice as well but has similar issues as the other one, a small sample size. This is not to discredit the study in its entirety. But I am not convinced.
Just a quick interjection, sorry to interrupt this thread.
In this case, the null hypothesis is that STEM fields are the same as other fields of employment – that there is no difference. If you’re going to say that there is a difference that somehow between the STEM class and its superset, you need to point out what and why.
As for whether the sample size of 125 is appropriate – on its own, no. However, if taken in conjunction with other studies that show the same trends? Yes.
Other studies have concluded the same as this one. Google Scholar is your friend.