"Music streaming platforms have sexism wired-in."

Jawad Iqbal writes in the London Times: 

Their algorithms, which recommend things you might like based on your listening habits, are basically sexist, generating playlist after playlist dominated by male musicians.

Isn't it like sexual preference — you really do respond to the sex of the singer? With no machine helping me at all, I can see in the music choices I am making that I prefer a male voice. 

Those damning findings...

Damning!!

... come from research conducted at Utrecht University in the Netherlands and Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona. Academics analysed the listening patterns of 330,000 users over nine years: only a quarter of the artists they listened to were women, because on average the first algorithm-recommended track was always by a man; listeners had to wait until the seventh or eighth song before hearing from a woman.

It's a problem only if you assume that the outcome should be equal. But isn't the algorithm attuned to what people have responded to?

Some of this bias is a reflection of historical failures in the music industry, which has always been dominated by male acts, save for occasional superstars such as Taylor Swift or Beyoncé.

Maybe we respond to what we respond to because it's familiar, and what is familiar is a consequence of sexist decision-making within the music industry. Why do we like what we like? Is it deep or is it shallow?

There's something called the "mere exposure" effect (Wikipedia):

The mere-exposure effect is a psychological phenomenon by which people tend to develop a preference for things merely because they are familiar with them. In social psychology, this effect is sometimes called the familiarity principle. The effect has been demonstrated with many kinds of things, including words, Chinese characters, paintings, pictures of faces, geometric figures, and sounds. In studies of interpersonal attraction, the more often someone sees a person, the more pleasing and likeable they find that person... 

In the 1960s, a series of Robert Zajonc's laboratory experiments demonstrated that simply exposing subjects to a familiar stimulus led them to rate it more positively than other, similar stimuli that had not been presented before....

In 1980, Zajonc proposed the affective primacy hypothesis: that affective reactions (such as liking) can be "elicited with minimal stimulus input." Through mere-exposure experiments, Zajonc sought to provide evidence for the affective-primacy hypothesis, namely that affective judgments are made without prior cognitive processes....

[One] experiment exposed Chinese characters for short times to two groups of people. They were then told that these symbols represented adjectives and were asked to rate whether the symbols held positive or negative connotations. The symbols the subjects had previously seen were consistently rated more positively than those they had not. In a similar experiment, people were not asked to rate the connotations of the symbols, but to describe their mood after the experiment. Members of the group with repeated exposure to certain characters reported being in better moods than those without....

Why do we like the pop songs we like, and what is Spotify doing to our brains refeeding us what we've been fed before? Is it evil — damnable? The question whether it's sexist is only a small part of the problem. That seems to focus on whether the singers are getting their due or are penalized by pernicious subordination. But the minds of the listeners are much more important. There are billions of us, and we're plugged into this system of endless feeding and refeeding. Within it, we have the feeling of being pleased. But neither the machine nor we understand why we are pleased.

***

There is no comments section anymore, but you can email me here. Unless you say otherwise, I will presume you'd enjoy an update to this post with a quote from your email.

FROM THE COMMENTS: Jen R writes: Hi Ann,

Hi Ann, 

This is the first time I've written in, as I never registered as a commenter.

A few months ago, I realized I'd stopped listening to Pandora, when I used to listen to it almost every day. I had grown irritated with the service, and it sounds like Spotify has the same problem. It's not what I would call sexism so much as what I think of as the algorithm whirlpool, which is the same reason I dropped my Netflix subscription and get exasperated with other feeds.

The algorithm whirlpool goes like this. I have a song stuck in my head, so I put the name of the artist into a channel. I click like on the song, then move on to other work. I never give other feedback, unless I skip one or two songs, other than continuing to listen while using other applications. Say the song in my head has a tenor in a rock band. The first few songs are more tenors, more rock bands. After a while, I feel quizzical -- why so many tenors, so much guitar, so much of the same beat? It gets monotonous, especially as the playlist moves away from the original artist, into songs that sound like weaker and weaker knockoffs. A DJ who did this kind of playlist would be fired. This soundtrack would never sell for a movie. I found myself increasingly annoyed that I would only hear female artists if I put a female artist first, or only male artists if I went with a song by a male artist, when I'd rather hear a mix of voices and variations on style. The whirlpool, at first a fun ride, has sucked me down into an inescapable stream of music that all sounds too much the same.

I'd rather the playlist built in some diversity while staying in the same era of music. I also like instrumental music, but if I select a piano concerto, I'll only get to hear piano music. No violins, no orchestra, no trumpet. Just ... more piano, all with the same approximate tempo and dynamics.

You might wonder, why not just pick "classic rock" or "classical music" for my station? My answer is that then, I tend to get the more (to me) blah, overplayed stuff that I already got sick of hearing on the radio.

I don't consider this "sexism," but bad programming that doesn't allow for a randomizer escape. On Netflix, it was even worse. I'd watch one comedy special from a favorite comedian of mine. Then I'd be offered even more comedians from the same demographic as the first. I'd try a couple out -- these would also be fairly funny. Then I'd be offered more, more, more, until I wasn't even smiling at their rambling non-jokes. Each time I'd open Netflix, I'd be faced with unrecognizable comedians. I'm not obsessed with stand-up, but the Netflix algorithm had pushed us both into a whirlpool. Their old interface was more indifferent to my prior choices, and therefore less annoying. I dropped my subscription and don't miss it.

Currently, everyone in my Youtube suggestions is from Australia or New Zealand. All after I liked one cupcake video. Go figure.

What ticks me off, besides the annoying algorithm design, is that now if people start hearing the female voices (or the non-comedy specials, or the non-Australians) pop up in their feeds, they'll assume this is a cloying "eat-your-vegetables" directive and resent women vocalists. The programmers created the problem by failing to understand how a lot of us engage with media & enjoy a little bit of surprise or variety. Then their solution will be something that supposedly looks like they are fighting sexism, but is just a distraction from how boring their algorithm-directed feeds are. So the conversation will be about whether female or male voices are more pleasant, instead of how wealthy computer programmers are treating us all like my toddler, bringing me every shoe in the house to try to get me to play outside.

AND: James emails: 

I listen to a lot of songs on Spotify and I had no idea that the recommended playlist algorithms could potentially be sexist. I merely thought that they were lame.

But I did decide to put it to the test and see how long I had to wait to hear something from a female artist. For today's Daily Mix #1 it's not a good start with the first female artist Janis Joplin appearing at number 24! Mix #2 is a little more promising with the first female artist is Sidney Gish at number 4. Back to sexism with Mix #3 that has Lana Del Rey at number 16, but Chrissy Hynde fronting the Pretenders takes the number 1 spot on Mix #4. With an unsurprising ZERO female artists appearing on Mix #5 due to its heavy German techno-metal content, Mix #6 comes back strong with a number 1 Irma Thomas.

My unscientific and completely personal experience verdict: not sexist.

That made me look at my Daily Mixes from Spotify. I don't see a Mix#1, but in Mix #2, I have Nico twice in the top 6 and Lana Del Rey and Yoko Ono.  In Mix #3, 7 or the top 10 are females — Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Dinah Washington, Etta James. The only males are Frank Sinatra and — doing "Whiter Shade of Pale" — King Curtis. Mix #4 is mostly male, and Mix #5 is all male. My unscientific and completely personal experience verdict: not sexist.

"Languishing is a sense of stagnation and emptiness. It feels as if you’re muddling through your days, looking at your life through a foggy windshield."

"And it might be the dominant emotion of 2021.... In the early, uncertain days of the pandemic, it’s likely that your brain’s threat detection system — called the amygdala — was on high alert for fight-or-flight. As you learned that masks helped protect us — but package-scrubbing didn’t — you probably developed routines that eased your sense of dread. But the pandemic has dragged on, and the acute state of anguish has given way to a chronic condition of languish. In psychology, we think about mental health on a spectrum from depression to flourishing.... [W]hen you’re languishing, you might not notice the dulling of delight or the dwindling of drive. You don’t catch yourself slipping slowly into solitude; you’re indifferent to your indifference.... When you add languishing to your lexicon, you start to notice it all around you...."

From "There’s a Name for the Blah You’re Feeling: It’s Called Languishing/The neglected middle child of mental health can dull your motivation and focus — and it may be the dominant emotion of 2021" by Adam Grant (NYT). 

According to the article, the antidote to languishing may be flow. But there's not much in the article about how to achieve flow, so I'm not going to make this post about flow. This post is just about noticing languishing. It's one thing to understand the concept of flow, another to get into that state. I think it requires doing things that you have some skill at and where you have good feedback that you're are operating with skill, and neither bored nor overly challenged. If you're sitting home enduring lockdown, do you have something to do that could work that way?

(To comment, you can email me here.)

Intrusive thoughts.

Have you thought about intrusive thoughts? Here's a brilliant TikTok on the subject:

@natsingssongs

intrusive thoughts but make it a jam? 💃🏻🕺🏻#memes #intrusivethoughts #songwriter #fyp

♬ original sound - Natalie Burdick

*** 

There is no comments section anymore, but you can email me here. Unless you say otherwise, I will presume you'd enjoy an update to this post with a quote from your email.

"The speech of rationalists is heavy on the vernacular, often derived from programming language: 'updating your priors' (keeping an open mind), 'steel-manning' (arguing with the strongest version of whatever point your opponent is making)..."

"... double-cruxing' (trying to get to the root of a disagreement).... In her book, Galef argues for what she calls 'scout mindset,' which she contrasts with 'soldier mindset.' The idea is that evolution has wired our minds to be soldiers (focused on winning) instead of scouts (focused on ensuring our mental maps accurately reflect the territory of reality). To adopt a scout mindset is to resist falling prey to 'motivated reasoning,' in which we distort our thoughts to achieve a desired outcome."

From "The Tech Elite’s Favorite Pop Intellectual Julia Galef on bringing the rationalist movement to the mainstream" (NY Magazine).

The book is "The Scout Mindset: Why Some People See Things Clearly and Others Don't Hardcover." My link goes to Amazon, where there's this graphic (click to enlarge and clarify_:

I'd love to see  more "scouts," but I'm afraid this clear picture may make some rational people chose to be "soldiers"! I believe I've always been on the scout side, but if I'd understood this division early on, I would have asked the "Is it true?" question about whether it's better in life to be a "scout," and I might have said no, taken a side, and fought. I have no idea if Galef discusses that problem!

FROM THE EMAIL: Tim writes:

Engineers are trained to have a scout mindset. Never mind what we want to be true, what IS true. Seek out the correct answer and then revise your assumptions. Which is why 2/5ths are conservative, 2/5ths are independent, and only 1/5 is leftist. Because there is a right (sometimes best, but always accurate) and wrong answer. And once you figure out the right answer, you stop believing in the false answers. It is why we have not built any more Tacoma Narrows bridges. There was a right answer, and it was found. It is how the Brooklyn Bridge was built starting 150 years ago. I may not be the engineer that Washington Roebling was, but if I get hit with a clue bat often enough, I figure out the correct answer.

Yes, if the scout mentality naturally appeals to you, there are some careers that will fit most comfortably. 

AND: Geoff emails:

If everyone were a scout, tens of thousands of people in Silicon Valley would stop getting up every morning to work 10 hour days to implement the visions of "thought leaders" like Steve Jobs and would do their own thing instead. This is why Silicon Valley likes H1Bs from countries where obedience to the hierarchy is a social value. It takes a special kind of self-regard to think of how lost your army would be without your scouting while blinding yourself to the fact that without your army's soldiering you would be dead. This is, of course, just another manifestation of the elite's self-separation from the world they presume to rule.

ALSO: I received email from 4 different readers who converged on the point that Galef is mischaracterizing soldiers:

1. A reader named Tytus writes: "There is a, quite famous, fight methodology developed by the military called OODA loop (Observe-Orient-Decide-Act).It is an approach of constantly updating your priors based on incoming information, resulting in increased agility, and, in effect, gaining advantage over even greater opposing forces. Such an approach seems very much scout-mindset-like. Sooo, I'm not sure about starting with the premise 'soldier' vs 'scout' and running with it, when the military was able to create such gems as OODA loop. 

2. A reader named John writs: "I was in the armed forces for seven years (four years navy, three in the army national guard). The military, as an institution, gave me more freedom to think for myself (and required it- they are big on individual initiative) than I ever have had since. It's the opposite of the closed-minded archetype depicted by Julia Galef. Soldiers, in my experience, are far more adaptable and flexible than your average office worker. They have to be because war requires it. If you can't adapt, the enemy will kill you. After every engagement or task, army units hold an after-action review, where soldiers and leaders describe in front of everyone what happened and what could have been done better. Everyone is included. It's not about criticism or blame. It's about learning from mistakes. I've never had another job where they did anything like that. There's a stereotype that soldiers are rigid and mindlessly follow orders. It's very far from the truth. I don't know what other word the author could have used. It's unfortunate she used soldiers as a foil for her pop psychology message. It's the opposite of what she is saying, which is to look at reality instead of a preconceived notion."

3. A reader named Eric wrote: "As a former soldier and S2 (intelligence staff officer) I am disturbed about the use of the words 'soldiers mindset.' Military intelligence is always aware of the possibility that any or all information may be false. The opposing forces are always trying to deceive you. Your own channels have misinformation due to stress or wishful, fearful, thinking from the provider. Every bit of information is evaluated as to the probablity of being true. And the are numerous decision points at which decisions must be made based on that best information available, knowing that it may be wrong. Soldiers use the Scouter mindset. I had trouble understanding those who felt that 'Bush lied.' Any politician should have known that the data on WMD may be wrong. And had the decency and courage to say that they made a mistake in believing the data, not 'Bush lied.' The congressional authorization for that war listed the 23 reasons-23 paragraphs in Part 1 beginning with 'Whereas.......' Vote based on the likelihood that the sum total of those 23 reasons are likely True.  "

4. A reader named Clyde wrote: "It's obvious that Ms. Galef has never been a soldier. Soldiers must be able to read the map correctly, and the sorts of things that she lists under the 'soldier mindset' (rationalizing, denial, self-deception, wishful thinking) are that exact sort of mistakes that will get people killed on a battlefield. I think that perhaps 'Politician Mindset' might be more accurate, since politicians are far more likely to ask themselves 'Can I believe this?' or 'Must I believe this?' They're also more likely to engage in the aforementioned rationalizing, denial, self deception and wishful thinking."

MORE: The commenter God of the Sea People writes: 

"It seems to me that soldier v. scout is a false dichotomy, and values are what differentiate the two. Some things are demonstrably, objectively true. It makes sense to have a scout mindset about quantifiable things. Values and opinions are not quantifiable, and are not necessarily less valid because of that. I'm willing to change my mind about something when there is sufficient evidence to warrant it, but I don't think evidence is typically sufficient to change what someone values, aside from direct life experience. Especially so, if the evidence comes in the form of a bunch of studies or articles written by people with obviously different values, and who are themselves in the soldier-posture of trying to 'win' over their adversaries. I can see how thinking of yourself as having a rational, scout mindset is appealing to people. However, after witnessing the way people weaponize scientific pronouncements (with little understanding or curiosity) solely to browbeat their friends and family in social media wrangling, I would be skeptical of anyone who uses this kind of framing in an attempt to convince me of anything." 

And Daniel wrote:

I have been a fan of Julia Galef for years. I love her careful demeanor and her extensive discussion on Bayesian reasoning. Her main idea is that the normal rational mindset only works in "one direction" in a series of unique choices. Her approach, and one I endorse, is that we actually make choices through a series of events. The Bayes Theorem essentially states that with each iteration, we add to our knowledge of the choice set and can use that information to revise (and resubmit) how we understand the choices before us. This means that the next set of choices will be informed by what we have learned a posteriori. 

As the research on decision making has shown, most of us are what Kahneman and Twerski called "naive statisticians," meaning that we actually do not make the necessary calculations to compute the best choice. We choose on our gut. The Bayes process is a bit more complicated and requires some basic computation; yet, the results reveal a topography of probability that is not apparent from a simple presentation of the initial choice set. 

For example, in the Wikipedia article on Bayes theorem, there is the classic case of Drug Testing. The Bayes process shows that the probability a person who tested positive for cannabis is actually a user is not very high (the solution given there is only 19-21 percent). Regardless of how Ms. Galef chooses to label it, the Bayes/Scout approach is a better model for rational process since it combines inductive and deductive models. Washington Blogger: I would guess that most people would consider themselves more scout than soldier. But I think, through my own anecdotals experiences most people are scouts about what they assume they don't know and soldiers about what they do, and the sad thing is, most people assume they know a whole lot more than they do. In this I am soldier. I have come to the conclusion that people are soldiers in action because they think they were scouts about the topic. 

In reality, we have a favored notion of what the terrain looks like and act under the assumption that we came by that knowledge through careful scouting. However, I have another thought on this. What if we are all looking at different maps? I wonder this because of the seemingly obvious problem with the idea that math is racist. (BTW, rationalism is racist under the current race paradigm.) One person is looking at a map of the streets and bus routes saying how could math be anything close to racist while another is looking at a map of the terrain and saying how could you totally miss the inherent racism of math? Is either map wrong? 

And Stuart wrote: 

Being a scout all sounds well and good, so why aren’t we all scouts? I have composed a short hymn to explain: 

Onward, Christian soldiers, transformed into scouts, 

With the loss of Jesus now beset by doubts! 

Christ, the royal Master, all but overthrown; 

Into ev’ry battle, each will go alone! 

Like a mighty army in a cul-de-sac; 

Brothers, we are trapped here helpless to attack; 

We are quite divided; frequently at odds, 

Arguing the doctrines, of out private gods. [Refrain]

"New research shows that daydreaming can inspire happiness if you purposefully engage with meaningful topics, such as... imagined scenes of triumph in the face of all odds...."

"When given a framework that guided them to imagine something positive, like a fantasy of having superpowers or the memory of their first kiss, [study participants] were 50 percent more likely to feel positive after the session. Why couldn’t they do that on their own? Erin Westgate, a psychology professor at the University of Florida and the study’s lead author, said that positive daydreaming is a heavier cognitive lift. So, our brains move toward effortless mind wandering, even when the results are negative.... Dr. Robinson-Mosley likens meaningful daydreaming to the practice of shadowboxing: 'Before you even get in the ring to face an actual opponent, you will spend thousands of hours shadowboxing, a form of visualization that’s designed for you to simulate a boxing match in your mind before you ever glove up.' Using daydreaming as mental rehearsal can do more than just hone job performance. Research has shown that imagining scenarios as visual scenes can provide a boost in mood to people suffering from major depression. Dwelling on personally meaningful but imaginary scenes... can increase creativity and spur inspiration."

From "Don’t Take Your Head Out of the Clouds!/Far from a waste of time, daydreaming might be one of the best things you can do with your free time" (NYT). 

Do you daydream like that? Or do you go over negative things, like errors you've made, the wrong things you've said, and the opportunities you've squandered? There's no way that going through all the negatives fixes anything in the past, but maybe you fantasize that by giving them attention, you can avoid future mistakes. Me, I'm much more likely to think through everything I've ever done wrong than to  fantasize about success, and I never daydream about superpowered success. Is it foolish to waste your daydream time thinking through problems and imagining realistic solutions? 

IN THE EMAIL: Carl writes: 

I can not read the entire NYT article but from your excerpt I wonder if anyone would consider the benefit of daydreaming odd if you substituted the word ‘meditation’ for daydreaming. I can not imagine surviving childhood without daydreaming. I suppose we are called to put aside all childhood things but if one discards daydreaming they risk being left without imagination itself. There in lies depression or worse. Now that I have become old, my daydreams are mostly fond memories but I can still crank out an occasional exciting imagination.

"Say f*** it, put on a your string bikini, and imagine that you're a golddigger who created your own happy ending and is now giving all the cash you scored to the resistance behind your conser[v]ative husband's back."

That's a photo caption by Lena Dunham that appears with a photo in "Lena Dunham's most body-positive photos on Instagram" (NY Post). 

It's an interesting collection of photos with captions straining at humorousness. Though the Post assumes it's all body positivity because Dunham is, we're told, a "vocal advocate of body positivity," the text and pictures don't show unalloyed positivity. Unalloyed positivity would be inane. And inconsistent with comedy.

If inane, uncomic expression of the experience of female embodiment is what you want, read this other NY Post article, "Khloé Kardashian breaks silence, talks body image struggles after unwanted photo saga." 

Kardashian has a problem with the publication of a photograph of her in a bikini looking like a reasonably nice, ordinary woman. It runs counter to her public image as a beautiful woman, part of a beautiful-women family. How can she fight that without expressing negativity about her body, making the ordinary women of the world feel bad about themselves, and looking like she's on the wrong side of the body-positivity movement? Here's the quote she (or her people) came up with:

"The photo that was posted this week is beautiful. But as someone who has struggled with body image her whole life, when someone takes a photo of you that isn’t flattering in bad lighting or doesn’t capture your body the way it is after working so hard to get it to this point — and then shares it to the world — you should have every right to ask for it to not be shared — regardless of who you are."

FROM THE EMAIL: A reader named Roz writes: 

Lena Dunham displays her unfortunately grotesque physique (nttawwt,) semi-humorously while one of the Kardashian girls asks for a photo to not be published because it is not a perfectly edited photo of her rather gorgeous looking body. Each woman has body positivity issues. Which one is more screwed up?

My vote is for Dunham. The Kardashian girl actually works out and takes care of her health so if I had to make a judgment I’d say she has more positivity towards her body and is in fact a healthier person, she’s a better role model.

Of course this could be due to genetics and she had a head start, but Dunham revels in her obesity which is not healthy. Even if you have a positive attitude towards your obesity you are more prone to diabetes and that’s not good.

Dunham suggests someone who is a golddigger give her money to the resistance? That’s kind of a twisted unrealistic mind imo it’s lame humor. The golddigger depends on “her man” for her income and her lifestyle so she’s the last person who is going to upset the system which keeps her in appointed in Gucci and LV. Dunham is actually insulting women who exploit the assets she doesn’t possess.

I don’t think that Dunham’s self deprecating humor and exhibitionism under the guise of being a body positivity activist is a sign of health either. Imo it’s a sad need for attention from someone who grew up in a household with famous parents. Maybe some women can get encouragement from the thought that if Dunham can look like that and feel good about herself then what am I complaining about?

I don't know which one is more screwed up, but I do think Dunham has done more with her mind. And I care more about how these 2 contributors to the pop culture have helped or hurt the consumers of the material they've created. Which one has screwed other people up the most? I think the Kardashians have done more harm, with so much shallowness, artificiality, and conformist beauty obsessions. Dunham isn't fooling anyone into thinking it's not unhealthy to be obese. She's showing herself as she is and as many people — not hiding herself away. 

I agree that the golddigger fantasy is inconsistent with feminism, but that does make it transgressive — for a feminist. It would be more transgressive if the rich husband wasn't conservative.

AND:

 

@catlady_37

#khloekardashian #kardashian #kimkardashian #bodyimage #facetune #photoshop #kyliejenner #jenner #bodydysphormia #mentalhealthmatters #fyp

♬ original sound - CatLady37 😸🐈🐈‍⬛🐈

ALSO: More from Roz:

I don't follow the pop culture very closely so while I agreed with you that Lena has done more with her mind, turns out that Lena and Khloe are actually friends and collaborators. Who knew?

She links to "Khloé Kardashian Discusses Her Spirituality in Lena Dunham’s Lenny Newsletter/'When you think Kardashian, devout probably isn’t the first thing that crosses your mind.'" 

[Khloe] details what it was like growing up with a Christian Armenian household, and the ways in which she has come to “believe with every fiber of [her] being that there is a higher power”.... “I’m very conversational with God and spirits,” she writes. “I talk to myself and to them but sometimes unconventionally. I’ll be lying in bed and just say out loud, ‘Lord, thank you so much for keeping my brother and sisters healthy!’ Every night I say my prayers, often with my nieces and nephews. I talk a lot to my dad if I’m feeling something where I wish he were here to guide me . . . I like to give praise and gratitude. I know how fortunate I am.”