Why do you think the services considered women more suitable for code-breaking work than men? There are still professions today where one sex is favored over the other. Do you think this will ever change?

Why do you think the services considered women more suitable for code-breaking work than men? There are still many professions today where one sex is favored over the other. Which ones come to your mind and do you think this will ever change?

I think they thought women would devote everything to code breaking if they didn't have a man in their lives. I don't think they valued women for anything other than having a family and if they didn't have a family, they could devote 100% to code breaking.

I think the belief was that the women would not face the distractions that men did. They were considered to be more patient and, it was probably believed, that the women would be grateful for the opportunity to prove themselves and would work harder.
There are still professions in which men are favored but in some cases this is because of physical capabilities. Women have to work much harder to prove themselves.

I wonder about another look at this. Maybe it wasn’t so much the women were more capable for the job (although of course we do know they were), but more that the men were needed to do man-things—like preparing for war and working at building heavy duty weapons, machinery, ships and planes?

Of course there was the man shortage. Women are better at the more tedious type of work and tend to be more patient and perfection driven.

In my opinion, one of the most important reasons for the consideration of having women as code-breakers, was relieving men to go to the "war front' and fight. Of course that could mean more deaths for men as they were fighting, but hopefully the women code break the codes and stop certain battles and save their lives.

I agree with those who said that women wound up in codebreaking jobs because there weren’t many men available to do them. Then it was a matter of which women would do the job the best. Also, intelligent women who had training in math and science were excited about this new profession because the teaching jobs open to them—in most cases, the only jobs open to them—meant staying at home (usually). WWII had opened the world to men, and women wanted a challenge, too.

Mundy wrote about it often that women were more suited as cod breakers because they were “dexterous and willing to do work that was boring and routine, and felt they would make fewer mistakes than men did.” But I also think employing women as code breakers rather than men allowed men to directly fight as soldiers. I don’t think that there are as many professions today that one sex is “favored” over the other, per se. I think opportunities exist in all professions, it is simply that some professions attract men over women and vice versa. It is simply that some professions are more attractive to women.

I think they thought the women were more suitable because the women were not allowed to serve on the front lines and on the battle grounds but the men were. So the men were sent overseas and into the war zone for more heavyweight jobs and to fight the war while the women took over the desk jobs and jobs on the homefront.