I’m sure that y’all are aware of the phenomenon of women being infantilized until they become invisible, so I’m not going to describe it here. I just want to ask a question about this phenomenon: At what age did you stop being treated like a child?
I’ll be 27 in a few months, and I’m still constantly mistaken for and treated as much younger. I’m asked by almost every single Uber driver I get what my major is, even though I finished graduate school two years ago. I’m also mistaken for a student assistant every single day that I’m customer-facing at work. (I work in a university.) My boss directly told me that she will not be recommending me for promotion to a higher rank within the office for the sole reason that I’m “too young,” even though I meet all of the leadership team’s written criteria for the new position and even though I have years more experience in this field than the coworker (34M) who was just promoted to the position. (All of our resumes are publicly available.) In addition, while on vacation recently, I got asked twice whether I was old enough to be attending 18+-only events, and I was given little ducks by an older woman who thought that I was a “little girl.”
I can kind of get it—I’m short, I’m in great shape, and I have a naturally high voice—but I do not act or look like a literal teenager. I’ve been fully independent from my parents for a decade. I’ve lived and studied (including at some of the best-ranking schools in the world) in three different countries, and I have years of experience in my field. It’s frustrating to be constantly mistaken (and, let’s be honest, dismissed) as a teenager, and it’s downright infuriating to be told that I’m “too young” to be promoted when I’m almost 30 and planning to get married and buy a house within the next few years.
How much longer is this nonsense going to continue? When can I expect to finally be seen as an adult and taken seriously?
Comments
I wasn’t taken seriously until I finished my masters degree in 2009. Also, carefully curating a perfect resting bitch face over the years has helped tremendously.
I feel like I seperate being seen as younger by strangers from what you’ve described with your boss. I also work on a college so I can ignore people thinking I’m a student but if my work product merits a promotion imma need my promotion
If you haven’t already, I’d send an email to your boss and see if you can get it in writing that you were passed over for a promotion because of your age. Age is a protected class in some areas, though laws vary. Something to the effect of asking why your coworker was promoted despite the difference in experience, and what you can do differently or improve on to be an option in the future.
My experience has been very different from yours, and unfortunately I know that’s because I’m tall (5’10”), have a deeper voice, and am larger/muscular compared to most women. I’ve experienced plenty of sexism and dismissal, but nothing on this level. I was taken seriously basically from the get go when I graduated from college.
Unfortunately if your job isn’t going to take you seriously it may be time to start looking for a new one with a better supervisor. I think the longer people work with you and know you the more seriously they should take you, but it is hard with strangers and the like when you look young and are shorter/petite.
I’ll let you know when I get there.
I think around the time I started taking myself seriously, like 29 maybe.
Lol honestly never. I just learned to disregard those types of people. It seems like when you’re younger, you’re too young to be taken seriously until one day, you’re too old to know what’s going on. I think it’s another double-bind where the actual problem is that you’re a woman in the first place. It seems like all these misogynistic double-binds are designed to make us doubt ourselves and our worth.
I’m 39 and still waiting.
When I took myself seriously