flowers for the lost

I have a book to recommend:

Imagine a world where your phone is too big for your hand, where your doctor prescribes a drug that is wrong for your body, where in a car accident you are 47% more likely to be seriously injured, where every week the countless hours of work you do are not recognised or valued. If any of this sounds familiar, chances are that you’re a woman.

-Invisible Women, by Caroline Criado Perez.

I believe I first heard her interviewed on the 99% Invisible Podcast.

We landed ~~two~~ three rovers on Mars before medical science discovered the clitoris.

The Mars Exploration Rovers landed on Mars in January 2004. (See the reply below for the earlier one I forgot!)

An accurate anatomical model of the clitoris was not created until 2005.

When they did discover the clitoris, they immediately landed a rover on it
"Medical science" didn't only just discover the clitoris 20 years ago... Fairly accurate descriptions of the structure of the clitoris go back to the 1840s. It's the textbooks used for medical training that were omitting the already known structures to the detriment of medical professionals and healthcare.
Never mind that discovering and accurately mapping something are very different. That's like saying we hadn't discovered the moon until we saw the other side.
It's a funny meme that scientists couldn't find the clit, but it detracts from the actual sexism that was preventing the known science from being taught properly to doctors.
https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/anatomy-clitoris-2005-helen-e-oconnell-kalavampara-v-sanjeevan-and-john-m-hutson
- I yearn for the day that an astronaut finally sets foot on the far side of the clitoris
- My wording was for comedic affect. I agree with you, but it's still shocking how recently we mapped this organ in its entirety.
  There's a fun article about the history of the clitoris here, if anyone's after yet more reading on this.
Now this is some fake news
- Lmao, how is this 'fake news'?
  The Mars Exploration Rovers landed in 2004 and the earlier Mars mission I forgot, is helpfully linked in a comment by user atomicbocks below.
  In 2005 Australian urologist Helen O'Connell was the first to fully anatomically map the clitoris.
  Or is this accusation of 'fake news' just you objecting to my comedic language about the historically male dominated field of medical science 'discovering' the clit?
You forgot Sojourner.
- The robotic Sojourner rover reached Mars on July 4, 1997 as part of the Mars Pathfinder mission.
  Fuck me. That's ridiculous. That's 12 years before mankind found the clit.
FFS…

What does anatomically correct mean here? Should I switch to my alt account before searching?

Weight distribution and physical density.
- Height is a big factor too
- And also taking into account that women can get pregnant, and ride cars at various stages of said pregnancy, right?
  Right?
- Hey! Leave Otto's girlfriend out of this!
I'm guessing it has to do with interaction between seatbelt and boobs. And all previous tests just assumed a flat chest.
- Boobs squish at crash forces. The pressure with crash testing is keep every variable consistent so that results can be compared over time. I read an article years ago about the trouble of maintaining a supply of "tea rose" colored underwear for that reason.
  eta: http://www.lipkie.com/humor/1999/990430_36.htm
Test dummy with boobs, im guessing

Seems to satisfy the ask.

I mean, I knew medical research was misogynistic but this is still somehow shocking.

What’s with the pointing-at-camera thing?

She's trying to look inspirational but ends up looking like an overly-confident real estate agent.
- Yeah I can immediately tell she’s some business huckster, doing “motivational speaking” or some shit
- It's got "I can sell you this" energy for sure
She's going to crash test you, dummy.
That’s how you know who is the main character.
She wants you to join the United States army

Has an "anatomically correct female crash test dummy" actually helped? What even is an "anatomically correct female crash test dummy" and how does it encompass all women's body types in a way that the, assumedly anatomically correct male crash test dummy wouldn't accommodate?

I am absolutely uneducated on this but to my uneducated mind this sounds like getting riled up over a non-issue.

Previously what was used was a male crash test dummy but sized down. The word "dummy" makes it easy to overlook, but they're pretty technologically impressive bits of kit. They take into account the density of different tissues and their relative distribution in the body, and there are strategically placed sensors to measure the force distribution at different levels. It doesn't encompass all women's body types, in much the same way that the male dummy doesn't encompass all men's body types.
Lots of little differences between male and female bodies cumulatively result in the vehicle collision injury stats that others have quoted elsewhere in this thread. Things like the centre of mass being different, the outline of the pelvis/hips (which also affects the way one sits), women having a greater body fat percentage, that body fat being distributed differently to men's, women have less muscle. Then there's boobs, which aren't just something that can hinder seatbelt placement, but they can also be heavy, and bouncy, which means that the forces involved in a collision can be multiple times more than their weight, which contributes to whiplash and other injuries. On top of this, there's probably a bunch of other factors that we aren't aware of yet, but a more comprehensive testing process could help us to understand what differences between male and female bodies actually matter when it comes to vehicle safety. For example, on average, women tend to have longer hair than men, but I don't expect that would particularly impact injury rate in a vehicle collision. Women having larger breasts than men however, is most certainly a factor that contributed to the stats for women's injury rates being so much higher than men's.
On top of all this, before a dedicated female crash test dummy was designed, the downsized male dummy they were using was laughably small — the male one was designed to be the size of the average man at the time, whereas the downsized male one was so small that it only represented the smallest 5% of women at the time. That just seems absurd to me, but it's what you get when 50% of the population are treated as an afterthought, I suppose.
On the question of does an anatomically correct dummy help, it's a complex question because it takes time for the developments in car safety to actually make it out to the consumer, and even now we have a better crash test dummy for women, some manufacturers have been sluggish in implementing it into their testing — though now at least it's possible to apply pressure and say "hey, why are you not using this in your testing when women are at much higher risk when in one of your cars". Previously, manufacturers who were challenged on this could just shrug and blame the lack of an anatomically correct female crash test dummy, and development of one of those took a lot of time and research expertise, so wasn't something that could be done trivially. Now the resource exists and the industry has less of an excuse.
Crash test dummies test the impact of vehicle accidents on human bodies. While more men than women are injured in vehicle accidents, they are more frequently involved in them in the first place. Women are 17% more likely than men to die in the event of a car crash, based on university studies in the US, and 73% more likely to sustain serious injuries in a front-end collision (Invisible Women, p186). In the world of crash test dummies, ‘human body’ has really meant ‘male body’; the first anatomically correct female crash test dummy was only created in 2022.
https://www.theactuary.com/2023/02/02/when-human-isnt-female
Before intervention
17% more dead women than men
73% more injured women than men
When women are in fewer crashes overall
- I appreciate your effort to find that data but it doesn't really address any of my original questions.
  Also, from what you've quoted at least, there is no differentiation between drivers vs passengers.
  Your data absolutely shows there is a problem, it just doesn't show that the problem is the lack of an "anatomically correct female crash test dummy".
- One reason male crash test dummies are not representative of female vehicle occupants in an accident is that seatbelts do not sit in the correct position on female bodies, because of their breasts.
  This is the only reasoning provided in that entire article
First thing that springs to mind is the chest strap on a seatbelt interacting with boobs
Do those also account for pregnant people (masc, fem and enby)?
"An anatomically correct female crash test dummy is a test device designed to more accurately represent the body shape and dimensions of women, particularly in areas like the pelvis and upper chest, which are more vulnerable in car crashes. These dummies, unlike the older scaled-down male dummies, incorporate features like a female-shaped pelvis, breasts, and a lower center of gravity to better assess how different car safety features affect female occupants."
-Google AI Overview
- Ok, I hadn't considered the differently shaped pelvis and rib cage so I'll concede that it makes sense.
  Even still, to my mind (again, not educated in this area) the breasts themselves are not going to be a factor in terms of a car crash assuming seatbelts are correctly worn

Than their required use. Gendered crash test dummies have been a thing for a long time, but AFAIK prior to this there was no anatomical requirements at all, including children (?). Obviously it's huge to include this since IDK a single woman who doesn't have troubles with the extremely male-focused design of all modern cars (fucking seatbelts do not play well with tits (how is this still a thing) women can't adjust mirrors to be useful since they sit below the sight envelope, blind spots, etc), but this is a bit sensationaist of a headline...

fucking seatbelts do not play well with tits (how is this still a thing)
This sounds hard to solve, especially for women with fuller bosom. I'm assuming that the car has a mechanism that allows raising/lowering the seatbelt height, and that this didn't solve the issue...
The answer would probably be a harness, like they use for racing, but it's so inconvenient to use as to not actually being a solution to a boob-squashing neck-sawing strap.
- Speaking as somebody with a fuller bosom, as you mentioned, the problem is mostly the angle of the shoulder belt. There is an adjustable slide, but it only adjusts four or five inches, which simply isn't enough for the seven inches difference between my partner and I. The end of the belt is by my ear, not my shoulder. I'm constantly tugging the shoulder belt lower when I'm in the car, either passenger or driver, which is really not safe.
  In 2018, I was in a car crash. I was driving a 1998 minivan and got t-boned by a 2006 SUV going 55mph. It turned the van into a banana, pushed the driver's seat over to the center. I don't remember the accident itself, but it looks like my head bounced between the B pillar and the airbag/steering wheel, it broke my glasses, cracked my skull, and gave me a subarachnoid brain hemorrhage with a 50/50 survival rate. Literally knocked me cross-eyed, so I was seeing double for forever. It also broke my pelvis into 8 pieces, sliced up my spleen, and broke a few ribs. I still have a bolt holding my pelvis to my spine. Took over a year to recover, then COVID hit while I was trying to get back to work. fml, never doing that again.
  Maybe it would have been better if I had side curtain airbags, but the main problem really feels like the seatbelt just doesn't fit.

I feel like this probably isn't the preferred terminology.

Gonna be real, "crash test dummy" is getting me caught up here.

Flowers on my dick and bees all around