Interesting article about Sexism in Geek Communities

[Netzilla]

Yeah, awkward is being hesitant, shy and not knowing what to say.  Lewd sexual innuendo (never mind inappropriate physical contact) isn't even in the same ballpark and people claiming that they're just being 'awkward' when they do those things are flat out lying.

[Lucius]

https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?791786-Gender-Dice

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary thought this might be of interest, but what does a palindromedary know about it?

[Cancer]

Interesting concept, one I have to think about. But I have been real short on discretionary CPU cycles for the last month or two.

[Pattern Ghost]

Wonder Woman not welcome as UN Ambassador for the Empowerment of Women and Girls, Lynda Carter calls "Bull" 

[Cygnia]

 

Mockingbird Writer Chelsea Cain Quits Twitter Due to Harassment

 

[Cancer]

(Comment: this may be tl;dr, but it is relevant to the post above.)

 

I have never understood why Twitter ever became popular, except for infantile posturing and harassment. It's just electronic tagging for dicks.

 

Current Internet phenomena are wantonly ignorant of history (especially Internet history), but Twitter is very little more than the instant messaging capacity that the old BITNET had back in the 1980s. Limited to text posts with a limited character count (something like 60 IIRC), went out in real time. It was pretty intrusive (frequently just called "BITNET Bombs"), in that the message just blasted out onto your terminal when it arrived. It didn't change the state of what you were trying to do, but if you were, e.g., editing a file, your screen no longer showed you what your file/edits looked like. Some editors etc. had a "redraw" function that blanked and redrew the state of the work, but not all of them did; those you had to get out of insert mode, save, exit, clear the screen, reopen the file. Pretty disruptive. And it was, of course, on by default; turning it off for yourself required consultation of a manual, or use of VMS's execrable on-line documentation. Concerning the latter, as the latter-day expression goes, good luck with that.

 

I believe the most famous BITNET messaging ever came during the 1987 NCAA Men's Division I basketball championship game, ultimately won by Indiana over Syracuse. (I know this story because I was at Indiana, in my first postdoc, at the time.)

 

My memory is fuzzy, but either shortly before, during, or shortly after that game, some random idiot male student was on his machine at Syracuse. He was able to find some random person on a BITNET-enabled machine at Indiana U. And he proceeded to bombard that person with harassing BITNET Bombs. This went on for some time, IIRC something like 15 minutes or so; it wasn't a couple of messages.

 

Turns out the random person he was bombing was, quite by accident (there was no way to know this with the limited technology), a woman, AND, more deliciously, Indiana U's head of BACS ("Bloomington Academic Computer Services"), in effect, VP for IT.

 

This episode happened around game time, which was, of course, during prime time in the evening, so reckoning had to wait about 12 hours. But first thing in the morning, that VP for IT got hold of her opposite number at Syracuse. Must have been an interesting conversation. Idiot male student was expelled.

 

Anyway, by its nature, this kind of tech really isn't good for anything except posturing and harassment, and THIS HAS BEEN KNOWN FOR DECADES. There is no good purpose to which this tech can be used that isn't done better, and less obtrusively, by other (less invasive!) means. I don't believe any thinking human being should touch it, ever.

[BoloOfEarth]

(Comment: this may be tl;dr, but it is relevant to the post above.)

 

I have never understood why Twitter ever became popular, except for infantile posturing and harassment. It's just electronic tagging for dicks.

 

Well, it's right there in the name.  TWITter.  Probably would have been fitting to say "electronic tagging for twits."

[Cygnia]

In a similar vein (the writer is male)

 

Why I Left My Dream Job at Second City

[bigdamnhero]

“My day job is writing thrillers,” Cain said. “Bestsellers. Sold millions of copies. Never had to block people until I started writing comics.”

 

But to be fair, she never worked in video games either.

[bigdamnhero]

Wonder Woman not welcome as UN Ambassador for the Empowerment of Women and Girls, Lynda Carter calls "Bull" 

Also meant to comment on this after musing on it for a couple days. Seems there's several different factors going on here:

1. Folks who know the character know WW's whole shtick was originally to be an ambassador for women, so it makes sense to them. To those with only a casual familiarity with the character, it's just "Oh gawd not another damn superhero..."
2. There's a legitimate complaint in there about not doing enough to recognize actual, real-life women doing good stuff, rather than focusing on fictional characters. Seriously, the UN doesn't have better things to do?
3. And lastly, again for those only passingly familiar with the character, as one friend put it: "It's hard to take the character seriously as a strong female role model when the art screams Whack-Off Material For Dudes." (And yes, as a comics nerd I can go on at length about the historical context, and as a straight dude myself I don't exactly mind a little cheesecake. But let's not pretend it doesn't color other people's perceptions of the character, and of comics in general.)

[Sociotard]

The Gone Girl With The Dragon Tattoo On The Train

Why are there so many books with “girl” in the title?

 

It made an interesting observation: Women in "Girl" titled books by men are more likely to wind up dead than women in "Girl" titled books by women

[bigdamnhero]

Interesting. (And points for linking a fivethirtyeight article about something other than politics!) My first thought was to wonder is YA titles were disproportionately represented, but of course the statistics geeks at 538 would think of that and correct for it.

 

I found it interesting that books with Girl in the title were overwhelmingly written by women (79%-21%). But of course as the article also points out, most authors don't get final say on their titles, which could mean the G word is being inserted by male editors & publishers.

 

I still remember when Ms. Marvel joined the Avengers back in 1978(ish?) and the Wasp welcomed her with something like "Nice to have another girl on the team," and Carol replied with something like "I haven't been a girl in a long time, but I appreciate the sentiment." It wasn't portrayed as some big deal, just a recognition that some women see "girl" as acceptable and even empowering, while many others feel the opposite. Helped highlight the two characters' different personalities without making one of them "wrong." But it does sometimes seem odd that we're still having the same conversation today. See Supergirl's premiere episode, where Kara & Kat have a not-dissimilar exchange.

 

Forum ladies? I'm curious what your feelings are on the G word? Empowering, or belittling, or bit of both?

[Ranxerox]

Interesting. (And points for linking a fivethirtyeight article about something other than politics!) My first thought was to wonder is YA titles were disproportionately represented, but of course the statistics geeks at 538 would think of that and correct for it.

 

I found it interesting that books with Girl in the title were overwhelmingly written by women (79%-21%). But of course as the article also points out, most authors don't get final say on their titles, which could mean the G word is being inserted by male editors & publishers.

 

Why do you think that the editors and publishers are male?  I'm under the impression that the publishing business has no shortage of women in it.

[wcw43921]

While I cannot speak for any of the Forumites, I do think this exchange from Supergirl makes a good point--

 

Kara Danvers: [on discovering that Cat dubbed her "Supergirl"] "'Supergirl?' We can't name her that!"
Cat Grant: "We didn't."
Kara: "Right, I'm sorry. It's just, uh... A female superhero. Shouldn't she be called Super... woman?"
Cat: "I'm sorry, darling, I just can't hear you over the loud color of your cheap pants."
Kara: "If we call her 'Supergirl,' something less than what she is, doesn't that make us guilty of, of being anti-feminist? Didn't you say she's the hero?"
Cat: "I'm the hero. I stuck a label on the side of the girl. I branded her. She will forever be linked to CatCo, to the Tribune, to me. And what do you think is so bad about 'Girl?' Huh? I'm a girl. And your boss, and powerful, and rich, and hot and smart. So if you perceive 'Supergirl' as anything less than excellent, isn't the real problem you?"

 

Names and labels can be what a person makes of them.  Take Kara's cousin, for instance.  Before he came along, anyone calling himself--well, you know--would very likely be regarded as trying to set up up as "superior" to regular people, and therefore entitled to rule over them.  But Kal-El turned that on its head by using his powers and abilities not to rule over people, but to help them.  "Superman" became a term of respect and admiration--not a word of which to be wary.

 

Most of the time, anyway.

[bigdamnhero]

Why do you think that the editors and publishers are male?  I'm under the impression that the publishing business has no shortage of women in it.

I was under the impression it's still pretty male dominated, but I admit I have no actual data to back that up.

[Pattern Ghost]

I found this: Publishing Industry is Overwhelmingly White and Female.

 

 

A survey of American publishing has found that it is blindingly white and female, with 79% of staff white and 78% women.

 

A quick scan doesn't seem to show any editor specific data though.

[Ranxerox]

I was under the impression it's still pretty male dominated, but I admit I have no actual data to back that up.

 

My own impression wasn't based on me actually checking it out or anything.  I've just noticed over the years that whenever an author does a shout out to their wonderful editor in the acknowledgements the editor always seems to be female.  Of course this doesn't necessarily mean that most editors are female; just that most wonderful editors are female.

 

 

I found this: Publishing Industry is Overwhelmingly White and Female.

 

 

 

A quick scan doesn't seem to show any editor specific data though.

 

Thanks for taking time to actually google it. 

[bigdamnhero]

I found this: Publishing Industry is Overwhelmingly White and Female.

Nice - thanks for bothering to actually Look Stuff Up! The article does note that at the executive/board level "only" 60% are women, but that's still pretty good.

[Pattern Ghost]

I've always had the impression that there was at least decent representation of women in editing, but figured I'd check myself before commenting. The overall numbers did kind of surprise me.

[Nolgroth]

Well the publishing industry has the female part of the equation. Now they have to work on expanding their ethnic composition.

[Pattern Ghost]

Do they? Do the stats show a bias among the employers (say, white women hiring other white women, because they're in the same group) or a bias among the candidates (book publishing being a field more white women are attracted to compared to other groups)?

 

I'm not sure we can come to any conclusion just on the one study, but perhaps another study asking about the why's of it would be a good thing.

 

Where we could really use diversity is on the author and content side of things. I'm not sure where we stand there, tbh, but that's probably the greater area of impact, IMO.

[Nolgroth]

When you have to explain the joke...

[Pattern Ghost]

/woosh

 

Sorry, hard to tell these days. I mean, just look at the election. I thought they were kidding us, but I'm not sure now.

[Nolgroth]

/woosh

 

Sorry, hard to tell these days. I mean, just look at the election. I thought they were kidding us, but I'm not sure now.

 

No problem. It was pretty esoteric to begin with.

[Sociotard]

Okay, this article made me angry.

 

A new study shows how Star Trek jokes and geek culture make women feel unwelcome in computer science

 

The article explains how "masculine culture" drives women out of STEM majors. I started off expecting the standard explanation that men make sexist jokes or are more likely to be dismissive of women, etc.  Nope! It's Star Trek. Not even the sexist parts, like joking about Kirk and his endless conquests.  Just liking Star Trek. (it briefly mentioned the dearth of female role models and the existence of negative female stereotypes as well)

 

We've gone through a few years now where the big shame for nerds was excluding women by assuming they weren't 'real fans' of comic books or sci fi or video games. Now this is saying, no, those are for boys and you should put nice pictures of flowers in the computer science classroom so women feel welcome.

 

A few quotes:

 

 

as one undergraduate research participant in our lab put it, the current stereotypes of computer scientists is that they are “nerdy guys” who “stay up late coding and drinking energy drinks” and have “no social life.”

This geeky image is at odds with the way that many girls see themselves. Work from our lab shows that when high school girls see Star Trek posters and video games in a computer science classroom, they are less interested than boys in taking the course. When the classroom is devoid of décor, girls still opt out. It is only when an alternate image of computer science is presented by replacing geeky objects with art and nature posters that girls become as interested as boys.

. . .

Our research has also found that college women who have a two-minute interaction with a computer science major (played by student actors) who wear t-shirts that say “I code therefore I am” and identify Mystery Science Theater 3000 as their favorite show express less interest in majoring in computer science than college women who interact with the same students wearing regular t-shirts and watching The Office instead.

 

Okay, I get that they supported all these statements from data. I can say "it shouldn't be like that" all I want, but they can still point to data and say "but it is".

 

I also get that "Feminism" isn't a monolithic entity like Mormons or Catholics, but more like that many different kinds of Protestants. It isn't weird or inconsistent for one feminist to say "Women should be included in science fiction and comics and video games" while another feminist says "Women feel excluded when you openly enjoy science fiction and comics and video games".

 

It still feels like a disconnect, to say that I should never make assumptions about whether women like nerdy subjects, but also not enjoy nerdy subjects openly in school and other professional environments lest I alienate women.