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Skepchick Reader Census 2010

Hey there, Skepchick reader! We want to know all about you, and what you think of us. That way, we can strive to make the site a better, awesomer experience for everyone.

All the questions are optional, but the more you fill out the more you’ll help us. We won’t need anything to ID you, like your name or email address, so don’t worry about that. Also, note that you can choose more than one answer on a number of the questions.

Click here to take the survey, and thanks!

Let me know in the comments if you have any trouble with the survey. Oh, and thanks to @kearneykd for suggesting one of the super optional bonus questions!

Rebecca Watson

Rebecca is a writer, speaker, YouTube personality, and unrepentant science nerd. In addition to founding and continuing to run Skepchick, she hosts Quiz-o-Tron, a monthly science-themed quiz show and podcast that pits comedians against nerds. There is an asteroid named in her honor. Twitter @rebeccawatson Mastodon mstdn.social/@rebeccawatson Instagram @actuallyrebeccawatson TikTok @actuallyrebeccawatson YouTube @rebeccawatson BlueSky @rebeccawatson.bsky.social

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55 Comments

  1. When it got to the question about rating the community, I felt bad because I had never gotten involved so I had no idea what to say.

    So now, here I am, with an account, commenting. Hello!

  2. Confounding variable! Confounding variable!

    The site hosting it is called “survey monkey”, which may subconsciously prime people for their answer to the last question!

    I sure hope you’re not planning on submitting this to a peer-reviewed journal or anything…

  3. I’m always confused by a census that doesn’t ask whether I live in a household with a phone that is capable of making AND receiving calls. What other questions really matter?

  4. I was pleasantly surprised to find myself agonizing over the question “Who is the raddest living scientist?” So many to choose from.

  5. Its interesting to see the list of options for race in this census. Being from Blighty I’ve not seen a US based list before. Its very different from the sort of grouping we have over here.

    @coollike Welcome on board.

  6. @ianf: I had no idea what to put for that! Considering the international audience but heavy American influence plus the fact that race doesn’t really exist, yeesh. But I wanted to know anyway.

  7. Survey monkey is blocked at my work (research institution with an unhealthy dependency on that abomination). So, depending on the questions, my answers could be:

    a)
    c)
    a)
    a)
    b)
    Turkey
    c)
    42
    IDSPISPOPD
    4 and a third inches
    The Arrogant Worms

  8. @Rebecca: Lol – I was tempted to be picky and bring out the “race doesn’t exist” card :-). I can see your problem with making a small list. My nephew’s primary school had a survey with over 30 options for “ethnicity”. And that was mainly just covering northern europe.

  9. I study sociology, so I’ve studied/used all kinds of surveys, but it’s the first time I’ve seen one use the category “awesome”. plus the “monkeys or birds” question should be included in every survey on everything, I think.

  10. Will you be publishing weird, anonymized snippets from this? Because you should.

    (78% of transgender Pacific Islanders prefer Monkeys; there seems to be a strong link between reading JREF and finding Stephen Hawkings sexually arousing; Jedis like pictures of cats)

  11. @James Fox: “The only question that really gave me pause was monkey or bird. I choose but I’m still stewing.”

    I know what you mean, birds can’t be cheeky, but they are closely related to dinosaurs. On the other hand, monkeys cannot fly or provide omelet parts. Stewing indeed!

  12. @DataJack: A monkey omelet would certainly be possible. You would still need the bird contribution, but still. Or for that matter a monkey and squab stew.

  13. Monkeys are so overrated. Crows can kick the intellectual shit out of any monkey. Also they are related to DINOSAURS.

    Monkeys are just related to… us, vaguely.

  14. @ianf: I was picky and put human.

    I think this is the first survey I’ve filled in where I’ve been on the third category for age. Way to make me feel old!

    And it has to be birds over monkeys – birds evolved from dinosaurs (and may actually be dinosaurs, depending on who you talk to) and dinosaurs are always cool.

  15. @Rebecca: I hate the race/ethnicity question. I’ve had meetings run for hours just discussing which set of responses we would use and which is bad and which is good and which is blahblahblah. My vote is always in the same place. I don’t care we just need to tell our funders something so whatever list they want this week is I guess what we are going with.

    Although I raise my eyebrows at your other demographic options.

  16. @Jaz: Crows might be able to ‘intellectually’ kick the shit out of a monkey, but, as it has been famously pointed out time and again, monkeys ‘actually’ kick the shit out of birds. The dreaded Beakflip.

  17. haha! The race question rang alarm bells for me also. After the question about gender was so well put too!

    I live in New Zealand so our ethnicity options normally go:

    NZ European (Pakeha)
    NZ Maori
    Pacific Islander
    Asian
    Other

    I guess if you were an American doing a survey in NZ, it wouldn’t matter what colour you were. You’re all an other to us.

  18. @Elyse: Too true that. We have lots of blue herons around here. We refer to them as pterodactyls and they shit half a gallon of green slime on the fly.

    @Tracy King: And did they do Dorothy’s bidding after the witch melted?

  19. @James Fox: We have lots of blue herons around here. We refer to them as pterodactyls and they shit half a gallon of green slime on the fly.

    They will also throw up half-digested fish on you if they get upset. I’d like to forget how I know that.

  20. I want to fill out the survey but I’ve become overwhelmed with a desire to eat someone’s liver with fava beans and a nice Chianti. Not to mix cultural references, but is anyone’s liver particularly good because they have been force feeding themselves for weeks?

  21. No list of “race” is complete without “Martian”, “Klingon” and “Who-the-fuck-cares-just-keep-running”.

  22. Just to prove you can’t please everybody all the time, the gender question, although better than most, still isn’t right. Transgender is not a gender. My TS girlfriend’s gender is not transgender, her gender is female. I would much rather it be listed like race, including genderqueer and intersex in there as well as male and female.

  23. @Vene: To explain the gender options, I decided that for the sake of simplicity I would include the word that many people use to identify a range of identities. If your TS girlfriend identifies as female more than transgender, than I would expect her to choose the “female” box.

    No offense was meant!

    Same with the race option. I did the best I could for what I assumed the majority would need and purposely included “other” so that people could fill in what they want. If you don’t think race is important, that’s cool, you don’t even have to check anything. But, I was very interested to see how the numbers break down. I think it does matter, since the vast majority of you are white. It makes me wonder why.

    As for leaving Jewish off the list of religions, I don’t know WTF is wrong with me. Ha! I’ve added it now. Sorry!

  24. I’m technically of jewish irreligion. I mean, I’m atheist but that means that the jewish faith is the one that I don’t believe in and all the others are the ones that I wouldn’t believe in by default.

  25. If birds had prehensile tails they would win hands down!

    Thanks for having lesbian as a choice, I felt giddy when I picked it!

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