How can we know what we deserve when toxicity is the norm?

Editorial note from MKL: This article was written for the Early Career Section of the Notices of the American Mathematical Society and it will appear in the February 2024 issue. I am sharing it early as a preprint in the hopes that it will be useful for incoming graduate students, postdocs, and other junior mathematicians who are attempting to navigate the norms of a new department this fall and winter. I initially intended to share this much earlier in the academic year, but delayed due to the ongoing genocide in Gaza which has taken much of my organizing energy and attention. Thank you to Krystal Taylor (an editor of the Early Career Section) for inviting me to write this piece and thank you to my fellow i/e editors for giving me the chance to share it early via this blog.

The author (Marissa Loving) would like to thank the organizers of the Hidden NORMS (Navigating Obstructive Rules in the Mathematical Sciences) webinar series for inviting her to lead a discussion on “pseudo norms” in the mathematical community out of which this article sprung. You can find the webinar recording here and an excerpt from the webinar below.

There’s this feeling that we should just be grateful. We should be grateful that we made it. We don’t deserve to ask for more. What I want us to walk away from this discussion with is the idea that we should always be willing to ask for more for ourselves and for the people around us until we are all being treated with humaneness [sic], with dignity, and with respect. That is what we deserve and anything less than that is toxic. And that is a hard and very difficult standard to hold for yourself in a space which is always degrading our value and the value of those around us. It is hard not to internalize that we deserve less. So if the only thing you take away from this is to say, “Whatever you say I deserve, I deserve more.” That’s good. Because it’s true.

Setting the scene

When I was an undergraduate student, I was sexually harassed by one of my computer science (CS) professors for well over a year. It started with small things, like him hanging out in the majors-only upper-division CS lab. Then he asked me to add him on Facebook and started messaging me often. Before I knew it, he was finding excuses to touch me. Eventually he told me he loved me (needless to say, I did not feel the same). I was only 19 at the time (I first met him at 16 and was 17 when I took my first class from him). I felt overwhelmed and out of my depth. Meanwhile, the men in my CS cohort started making snide jabs suggesting I was receiving preferential treatment from faculty (it didn’t help that I consistently outperformed my all male cohort on both homework and exams). I knew something wasn’t right, but I didn’t know what to do about it. I didn’t even know how to name what was happening. It wasn’t until I shared my experiences with several women in my summer REU program that I was given the words to describe my experience: sexual harassment and abuse of power. In retrospect, it all seems so obvious, but abuse thrives in isolation. Without those women in my REU listening to me and affirming my experience I don’t know how long it would have taken me to speak the truth of my situation.

Fast forward to my first year of graduate school. Once again I was quite isolated as one of the only women of color in my graduate program. I was consistently treated as less than by both my peers and my professors, from being excluded from departmental leadership roles that highlighted mathematical drive (like organizing the graduate student geometry and topology seminar) to never once receiving departmental recognition for any of my accomplishments (grants such as NSF postdocs are usually celebrated with an email to the department, but not mine) to being told to my face time and time again that I didn’t belong. Suffice it to say, my graduate school experience was less than ideal (you can read a little bit more about it here), but the experience nonetheless felt very different than the sexual harassment I had suffered in undergrad. My negative experiences in graduate school weren’t confined to a damaging relationship with one faculty member or consistently obscured by the power that faculty hold over their students; they happened all the time and right out in the open in front of everyone¹. At times it felt almost impossible to talk about these negative experiences, not because I felt like I had to keep quiet, but because it felt just too damn normal for anyone to care.

It’s been four years since I graduated with my PhD. Three (extremely terrible) years of postdoc and one (pretty good) year of tenure-track later, I’ve realized more and more how pervasive this culture of isolation, discrimination, and exclusion is in mathematical spaces, especially for Black mathematicians like me². In that time, I’ve also come to believe more strongly than ever in the power of organizing with the people around us to demand what’s ours: respect, dignity, and fair treatment. Unfortunately, what we consider to be fair is so often shaped by how the people around us are treated, and even more unfortunately, academia is a pyramid scheme in which exploitation is normalized especially for people at the base of the pyramid³. So how can we talk about what to expect, what we deserve, and what we can demand when toxicity and exploitation is the norm?

I certainly don’t have all the answers, but my hope is that this article can help some up-and-coming mathematicians– especially Black mathematicians, Indigenous mathematicians, disabled mathematicians, trans mathematicians, and those living in the intersections of any of these communities or who belong to other communities that continue to be marginalized within academic mathematics – decide to take up more space for themselves and for those around them. I hope that this article will help you (yes, you, dear reader) develop strategies for creating and maintaining high expectations for how you and those around you deserve to be treated even when you are surrounded by norms that tell you that you are lucky to even be in mathematics in the first place and you should just be happy with whatever you get. I want us all to find the strength to say, “This is how I deserve to be treated and I will not accept anything less.”

We can keep our expectations high even when toxicity is normalized.

Building some shared language

Not only do I not have all the answers, since my professional training is in research mathematics, I don’t even have all the language to describe the problems I want to find answers to (language which I’m sure exists in the wealth of social science literature on workplace culture and harassment). So in order to make this conversation more meaningful, I will do what every mathematician does: I’m going to offer some definitions that will give me enough structure to discuss the problems at hand in a meaningful way. In particular, I want to highlight two types of harmful norms that I have encountered within academic spaces.

Toxic norm: A negative experience that is widely shared within a community regardless of your individual background or identity.

Pseudo norm: A negative experience that you are expected to accept as normal but is not typical for other individuals in your community or those with different marginalized identities than your own.

Remember, I introduced these terms to help me articulate my experiences and to give us a framework for discussion. These are not distinct categories by any means and how you interpret your experiences as either stemming from toxic norms or pseudo norms will vary significantly especially depending on your own identities and on your local community!

For me the stories I described in the introduction very broadly illustrate the distinction between these two types of norms: the sexual harassment I experienced in college was a pseudo norm, the horrible experience I had in graduate school (especially during the first couple of years) was much closer to a toxic norm although many of the individual negative incidents of racism or sexism that I experienced were manifestations of pseudo norms. That is, having a bad experience during your first year of graduate school is very common and the community expectation that we should just accept that graduate school will be terrible at times (to the point of destroying our mental health and wellness) lends itself as cover to many specific instances of racism and discrimination. After all, everyone is having a hard time so why should your experience be any different? But having a hard time because of too high teaching loads, uncaring faculty, and a lack of healthcare or a living wage and having a hard time because you are experiencing racist microaggressions from your classmates and professors on top of all of those other problems are just not the same experiences. This brings me to my final observation about toxic norms vs pseudo norms: toxic norms are often specifically weaponized against marginalized students in a way that creates pseudo norms. Let’s consider the following case study to drive this point home.

Case study: Imposter syndrome

Wikipedia defines imposter syndrome as “a psychological occurrence in which people doubt their skills, talents, or accomplishments and have a persistent internalized fear of being exposed as frauds”. Academics love throwing around the term imposter syndrome, especially in the face of every marginalized scholar who gives voice to the fear that there isn’t a place for them in the academy. It’s the perfect way to make structural problems into personal failings. Because while imposter syndrome is a real experience for some people, for many marginalized scholars the fear of being an “imposter” isn’t just a “persistent internalized fear”. The reality is that many of us are told day in and day out that we do not belong, our accomplishments are undermined and diminished, and we can find ourselves on the receiving end of months of racist harassment for simply announcing that we accepted a job which other people don’t think we deserve⁴. So while imposter syndrome is aptly classified as a toxic norm to be expected in any pyramid scheme like academia, it often morphs into a pseudo norm used to silence marginalized people who dare to express their experiences of exclusion.

Strategies for success

Now that we have a way to articulate what we’re up against, it’s time to talk about how to challenge these harmful norms as you encounter them. If you find yourself having a negative experience in your department, research group, or any other mathematical space, here is a checklist that I hope you will find useful in deciding what to do next.

Step 1: Are you experiencing a toxic norm or a pseudo norm? If you’re not sure, think about the experiences of the people around you. Is what’s happening to you a common experience for people with a variety of different identities or does it seem to only be happening to you either because of your identity or because of the power that someone holds over you (like your advisor, department chair, or the chair of your tenure committee)? Remember, these norms aren’t completely distinct, but usually experiences tend to lean one way or the other.

Step 2: Regardless of your answer in Step 1, the way forward is never alone. Community is the antidote for any kind of harmful norm.

Toxic norms crumble in the face of supportive and care-based communities.
1. Because toxic norms are often widely experienced regardless of individual identity, they can be effectively tackled through collective action!
2. Organize with your peers⁵! Brainstorm solutions! Push for change!

Pseudo norms thrive in silence and isolation.
1. Find trusted friends and accomplices to share your experiences with. This can be scary and overwhelming. Take things at your own pace.
2. Pseudo norms are not as commonly experienced as toxic norms (although they are still pervasive!), which makes collective organizing more difficult. They are often imposed on you by people with direct power over you.
3. Each situation is different, but shining a light on the problem is crucial. Nevertheless, you don’t owe anyone your story.

Step 3: Document everything as a defense against gaslighting⁶.

One of the ways that toxic and pseudo norms persist is by convincing us that our experiences are not as terrible as we’ve experienced them to be or that they are a result of personal failings rather than external environmental causes.
An effective way to combat gaslighting is by documentation! This is especially important when dealing with pseudo norms that may not be widely experienced by your peers.

Step 4: Don’t become a toxic norm enforcer!

The “if I had to suffer, so should you”-mentality is VERY easy to fall into! And it’s a common way that toxic norms are perpetuated.
The “we’ve always done it this way”-mentality is probably the PRIMARY way that toxic norms survive because it gives us cover to not do the hard work of figuring out what needs to change and how. An unwillingness to disrupt the status quo keeps us perpetuating the same cycles of harm without even needing to actively recognize the damage we are doing.
Of course, norms can also be good! But they need to be set intentionally and revisited frequently. Good norms also need to be enforced (just like the toxic ones have been for so long)! Accountability is key.

Know your worth

At the end of the day, living in a world where people enrich themselves on the backs of our dehumanization is a constant assault on our sense of self. It is a truly revolutionary act to stay grounded in a deep understanding of our innate worth and the innate worth of the people around us. So I want to end with some affirmations. Read them. Say them. Share them. Believe them. And then go out and help build a mathematical community that realizes them.

I deserve to be treated with the utmost dignity and respect.
I deserve to have my mathematical talent acknowledged and supported⁷.
I deserve to be treated as an expert on my own experience.
I deserve to be recognized as a complete and complex human being with identities and experiences that materially impact the way I am treated in mathematical spaces.
I deserve to voice my experiences and concerns without suffering retaliation or professional harm.
I deserve justice and restorative care.

Footnotes

For example, before the end of my first semester multiple white men in my cohort told me that I only received the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship because I was a woman of color and they would have been awarded it if they weren’t both white and male. This is only the tip of the iceberg. ↩︎
And, let’s be real, this toxic culture and straight-up racism in mathematics is far harsher for Black mathematicians whose features (skin tone, hair texture, and facial features), unlike mine, read as unambiguously Black and often make them subject to even further discrimination rooted in colorism, texturism, and featurism. ↩︎
The examples of this are too numerous for me to enumerate them, but one very concrete example of this is the poor pay, benefits, and working conditions that so many graduate students, postdocs, and adjuncts experience. Yes, even in mathematics and other STEM fields! ↩︎
Yes, this is a real thing that has happened to me and other marginalized scholars. ↩︎
I’m talking about collective action here, not organizing a research seminar, just so we’re on the same page. This might look like getting involved with your local union, like forming a group to lobby the department chair/college dean to fulfill specific asks, or even forming an affinity group where people can share their experiences and realize they are not alone. ↩︎
Explanatory comma – Gaslighting refers to the act of undermining another person’s sense of knowing their own reality by denying facts, the environment around them, or their feelings. ↩︎
Sometimes this affirmation needs to be directed inward before we can direct it outward. We deserve to recognize our own mathematical talent and potential! Especially when those around us are working overtime to convince us we don’t have any. ↩︎

Inclusion/Exclusion