arianna huffington on sleep deprivation awareness
Speaking from the perspective of a 25 year-old male, I agree that people use sleep deprivation as a bragging point quite often, especially when alcohol is involved. Men and women. A lot of times my own 'pride' is challenged, like,"come on, just come out for a few hours, I got four hours of sleep last night after getting blasted, and i worked all day today and i'm still going out." I'm not offended by it at the least, but I am aware of it when it happens.
And i've experienced it from both men and women, and they are equally malicious in their attempt to call into question my masculinity 'simply' because I would like a solid night of sleep.
I don't have a problem with Arianna using an anecdote to spread awareness about sleep deprivation. Actually, cool.
I take issue with this:
"[U]nfortunately, for men sleep deprivation has become a virility symbol."
For Arianna Huffington to turn this into a polarizing man vs woman issue is reprehensible and irresponsible. There is absolutely no correlation between sleep deprivation and men specifically. As human beings I see research supporting a person being less productive, less inspired, and less joyful with sleep deprivation but I see nothing showing that men actively seek out less sleep then lord it over women as proof of their masculinity. Why turn something into a gender battle when we are speaking of humans in general? This shouldn't have to be, and is not a gender issue.
How many women would be offended if we flipped this around and said "I have a feeling that if the Lehman Sisters were Lehman Sisters and Brothers they might still be around. While all the other sisters were busy being hyper-connected 24/7 maybe a brother would have noticed the iceberg because he would have woken up from a 7.5 or 8 hour sleep have and been able to see the big picture." [hypothetically, bare with the example].
I do regret that there were not women involved in the corporate heads of the company (or I assume there wasn't based on what Arianna is saying, if there were, then forgive my ignorance). So, what does this statement imply? She assumes that by having a woman there [at Lehman Bros.] it would necessarily follow that she was also getting enough sleep, and therefore would also have saved the company. Getting enough sleep, as she illustrated herself, is not an inherent quality of a woman! Faulty logic. It does not follow that because you are a woman, you get enough sleep. I would whistle-blow on a man making the same claims about women and accuse him of misogyny, it just isn't right!
Damn.
Forgive my rant. It is my attempt to draw some attention to the latent misandry embedded in her lecture.
