The people here that think this is striking a blow for equality are vastly overstating the significance of this gesture. The graphic artist did not even notice it until they wondered why the female glyph had a chip in it. Were folks previously upset by this icon? I see nothing to indicate as such.
Second, all the talk about ‘being in the shadows’ is someone’s interpretation - not fact. You are looking at a 2-D object and trying to determine how far back or how much smaller it is to fit a ‘in the shadow’ narrative that is in your mind. There are plenty of other people that just see two normally sized people standing close to each other. I don’t know about where everyone is from, but I generally see taller men than women. It just looks like two normal people (the height proportion looks about right) - there is no shadow cast anywhere and I don’t see the female glyph as far back from the other anyway. I would buy the ‘in the shadow argument’ if the torsos were offset (like the group icons) and not parallel on the same plane. This is almost always used to indicate different Z planes.
At the end of the day, I think the artist had good intentions. I don’t think anyone is denying that women often fall into the shadows of men. However, if the artist had done it and not blogged about it - a.) would anyone have noticed? and b.) if they did, would they have seen the same significance she did or simply thought it was a site redesign?
