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The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

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Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#101

Post by semanticist »

follower wrote: post #46
theophani wrote: post #18

I've [only] been to three tech conferences. The only "sexism" I observed was excessive delight: "Oh wow, a woman!" which I hardly consider harassing. No one meant disrespect; rather the opposite. Possibly offensive is the notion that it would be a surprise to find me there at all. I might say something similar to a man at a needlepoint conference. Yes, I got sexual attention, but only in a social context, and nothing…

> The only "sexism" I observed was excessive delight: "Oh wow, a woman!" which I hardly consider harassing. FWIW some people would consider that unwelcoming/harassing--I think the term is "othering". i.e. what's treated as important is not the person or their skill but their gender. And, yes, it can be annoying for guy in a "traditionally female" domain as well.

I've seen some responses to women in our community that were bordering on sycophantic - and slightly creepy.

I think sometimes in an attempt to be enthusiastic about women attending events, it can go a bit too far. Tokenism and othering as, in the long term, just as damaging to gender relations.

Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#102

Post by semanticist »

wyclif wrote: post #68
follower wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[Citation needed.]

http://blog.nerdchic.net/archives/418/

I don't see anything in her blog post that supports what you've said. If it's in the comments you might want to quote it.

Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#103

Post by pbhjpbhj »

follower wrote: post #46
theophani wrote: post #18

I've [only] been to three tech conferences. The only "sexism" I observed was excessive delight: "Oh wow, a woman!" which I hardly consider harassing. No one meant disrespect; rather the opposite. Possibly offensive is the notion that it would be a surprise to find me there at all. I might say something similar to a man at a needlepoint conference. Yes, I got sexual attention, but only in a social context, and nothing…

> The only "sexism" I observed was excessive delight: "Oh wow, a woman!" which I hardly consider harassing. FWIW some people would consider that unwelcoming/harassing--I think the term is "othering". i.e. what's treated as important is not the person or their skill but their gender. And, yes, it can be annoying for guy in a "traditionally female" domain as well.

>FWIW some people would consider that unwelcoming/harassing--I think the term is "othering". i.e. what's treated as important is not the person or their skill but their gender.

>And, yes, it can be annoying for guy in a "traditionally female" domain as well.

I think I'd prefer to have people pay attention to me for a particular characteristic if that meant that you could then demonstrate you're more than just that characteristic once interacting.

I'm dad to an 18month old. We use a sling rather than a buggy. No one ever holds a door for me or steps aside, stepping into the road with a baby because jerks won't let you past on the pavement ... anyway, I'm coming to a point here somewhere ... I've been to a few meetings where I'm the only man and I just get ignored. I find group social situations pretty hard anyway but I only get included if I break the ice and usually the only interaction I get is scowls for playing with their kids.

I think I'm ranting, hang on, yup ranting, I'll just sit over here.

Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#104

Post by Benjo »

lhnn wrote: post #31
cturner wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's interesting that you agree with the points, but put your tiredness down to the complaints of the affected women. Of the things on offer, that's an odd thing to put your frustration down to. I think it would be better to be tired of the guys who act like jerks and ruin things for everyone else.

I was commenting as much on the recent deluge of 'sexism in tech is rampant' threads on HN as I was commenting on the article. I was emphasizing that even as someone now jaded by such complaints, I find this to be a valid article. I also comment on how inappropriate groping a woman is; I would consider my entire 3rd and 4th lines to be expressing frustration at immature male actions. I consider all sides of an argume…

I was emphasizing that even as someone now jaded by such complaints, I find this to be a valid article.

Then your original post was unclear, as you said nothing positive about the article. Because you were negative about the trend of complaints, it implied that you felt this way about the article itself. By proceeding to agree with the points themselves, it implied that these are self evident truths that should just be accepted and not complained about.

Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#105

Post by mahmud »

iwr wrote: post #29
mahmud wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretension and grammar-Nazism are the virii of online communication.

You must mean pretentiousness, surely.

"Pretension and grammar-Nazism": in this phrase, the first part is honeycomb, and the second is a bear-trap.

Have a nice day.

Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#106

Post by orangecat »

follower wrote: post #46
theophani wrote: post #18

I've [only] been to three tech conferences. The only "sexism" I observed was excessive delight: "Oh wow, a woman!" which I hardly consider harassing. No one meant disrespect; rather the opposite. Possibly offensive is the notion that it would be a surprise to find me there at all. I might say something similar to a man at a needlepoint conference. Yes, I got sexual attention, but only in a social context, and nothing…

> The only "sexism" I observed was excessive delight: "Oh wow, a woman!" which I hardly consider harassing. FWIW some people would consider that unwelcoming/harassing--I think the term is "othering". i.e. what's treated as important is not the person or their skill but their gender. And, yes, it can be annoying for guy in a "traditionally female" domain as well.

And this is where harder-core feminism can devolve into "everything men do is wrong". Notice that a woman is a woman and you're patronizing/harassing/"othering". Treat her as one of the guys and you're being deliberately exclusive and maintaining a boys club.

Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#107

Post by JonnieCache »

jdp23 wrote: post #85
JonnieCache wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Potentially "being different" in addition to standing up and out can be a daunting prospect. This is laughable considering how much talk there is in the hacker world of defying convention, challenging conventional wisdom, standing out from the crowd, changing the world and associated platitudes.

There's a lot of talk about this in the hacker world. The reality is that some kinds of "different" are seen as just fine, and others have major social consequences. If you're a guy, try wearing hot pink jeans and shoes, a lavender femme-looking unisex top, and nail polish to a tech conference and see how the other guys react. It's eye-opening.

Nobody is going to react well to hot pink jeans, regardless of their genital category.

Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#108

Post by idm »

acangiano wrote: post #94

A few thoughts: * This is one of the most factual, well written articles that I've encountered on the subject. * It's just sad to see socially awkward people manifest their sexual frustration in this manner. And it's even sadder to see that the few women we have in our profession feel threatened at conferences. The overwhelming majority of good people need to intervene to interrupt any form of harassment towards anyo…

"It may not be PC to say this, but it's important to distinguish unpleasant, but fundamentally innocuos flirting from awkward people, from bona fide sexual harassment like groping or inappropriate touching."

Sexual harassment includes the comments like the "how much for a sexual favor?" example. That constitutes bona fide harassment.

Here's my example from the last 2 years. I'm blanking on the conference now, but there was a live IRC session running on the overhead, and each time a question was asked by a woman, IRC would be filled with lude and aggressively sexual remarks. It was totally uncomfortable! I think this situation qualifies as bona fide sexual harassment.

Touching or groping someone in a sexual manner is assault (at least it can be in the US.) It's so far beyond mere harassment that it's not the point of the article...

EDIT: for clarity...

Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#109

Post by rmc »

follower wrote: post #56
rmc wrote: post #39

A lot of complaints about sexism in FLOSS conference mainly refer to sexual references, or (semi-)pornography. If you want to have a professional conference, then yes you should have a 'no sex' policy. However, are women really that anti-sex?

In short, no. You might be interested in reading: http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Sex_is_beautiful Also, don't assume that it's only women who object to sexual content in technical contexts.

I read that article. It seems quite biased against the 'sex is beautiful' idea.

Re: The dark side of open source conferences [about women being harassed]

#110

Post by rue »

guylhem wrote: post #88
robg wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A small minority of men cause the vast majority of the problem. Unfortunately it doesn't take many to create a real problem. This seems like the most important point. Moreover, it's critical that all men who see and hear of such things work to stomp them out. If individuals don't have the social skills on how to woo, it's a topic for personal discussion. Dating isn't hard if basic respect is the first item to be debu…

here a copy of an email I sent after reading that article. It's not only guys hitting girl, it can take may other forms. The problem is, being mostly outcasts, we lean to tolerate untolerable behaviour. -- Following an HN link, I read your article today on LWN http://lwn.net/SubscriberLink/417952/bf6a55b67170ff0e/ and it rang a bell. There's an event I remember from a conference in LSM around 2002 IIRC in Bordeaux, F…

You realise that your actions, as described, can be construed as rather creepy and that maybe you should have apologised?
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