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Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

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Re: Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

#81
post #20

The only problem I have with feminism is that it's often a movement against men, and not for women. I think they would be a lot more successful doing things to encourage women rather than disparage men. Meredith would not have had to write this article. Of course, it's a lot harder to be positive rather than negative.

I am a man, and feminist, and have spoken with many other feminists over the years, and read a lot of feminist literature, philosophy, cultural criticism, etc. In my experience I'd say less than 1% of feminism/feminists have anything to do with being against men. I'm having a hard time thinking of anything, actually, I could reasonably describe as promoting this view. Maybe some radical stuff from the 70s, like Fires…

What about the Vagina Monologues?

Re: Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. she just disagrees with a specific article of Shanley and calls it "feminism".

I once got into a twitter fight with Shanley. She's a bit... un-nuanced. I'd say "immature" but that's ageism, I'm surely double her age. ;)

And hilariously/ironically/awesomely, it turns out that Meredith is according to her Facebook page:

   "Principle NLP engineer at Nuance Communications"
So although she says she struggled with fast communication and language and talking to people directly, she now works on speech processing software :)

Re: Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

#83

Her experience is certainly very interesting and unique. There's a bit of intersectionalism going on here, though. The experiences of a non-autistic woman in technology, I would imagine, are dramatically different from an autistic woman. Just by the very nature of social intelligence.

[deleted]

Re: Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

#84
I'm a big fan of Meredith. She's one of the few "women in tech" (yuck) that I feel like actually speaks my point of view and articulates how I feel about all of this. My impression is that most of the people that spend their time pontificating about women's issues in this industry are doing so from the outside, and I kinda resent that.

This article by Susan Sons is also good: http://www.linuxjournal.com/content/girls-and-software

Re: Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

#85
post #9

Interesting that she is autistic. Autism is apparently more common among boys than girls. Could this be one reason why tech attracts more men than women? Arguably, a slightly autistic personality is helpful for a programmer. Possibly it could also be a big reason for many future programmers to turn to tech in the first place, where you deal with strict, deterministic rules instead of emotions. This would obviously no…

Wanting to solve every problem and dismissing solutions that don't fit constraints is not an autistic behavior. It's an engineering behavior, as in "this is what all engineers do." It's socially awkward when you can't turn it off, but it's not autism.

No, but social anxiety, and a strong preference to communicate in non-realtime text does fit with autistic behavior.

Re: Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

#87
post #20

The only problem I have with feminism is that it's often a movement against men, and not for women. I think they would be a lot more successful doing things to encourage women rather than disparage men. Meredith would not have had to write this article. Of course, it's a lot harder to be positive rather than negative.

I am a man, and feminist, and have spoken with many other feminists over the years, and read a lot of feminist literature, philosophy, cultural criticism, etc. In my experience I'd say less than 1% of feminism/feminists have anything to do with being against men. I'm having a hard time thinking of anything, actually, I could reasonably describe as promoting this view. Maybe some radical stuff from the 70s, like Fires…

I'm a man and have spoken with many other feminists over the years, and read a lot of feminist literature, philosophy, cultural criticism, etc. In my experience I'd say that more than 99% of feminism/feminists have all to do with being against men. I'm having a hard time thinking of anything, actually, I could reasonably describe as not promoting this view. Maybe some radical stuff from the 70s, like Firestone, makes this hatred explicit, but these days the hatred is expressed more subtly, typically in legal initiatives that clearly disadvantage men, for example the insane rules around divorce and alimony.

Re: Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

#88
The author is a friend of mine. What I say below is something I've discussed with her.

I think the last great frontier for humanity's "waking up from history" is awareness of group psychology, particularly the psychology of the "other." Ironically, as noted by GCP Grey, widespread access to the Internet has actually made such group psychology worse.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc

One of the big problems with an awareness of what Noam Chomsky called "irrational jingoism," is that currently society is made out of it. Our organizations and social norms and structures actually use the natural jingoism built into Homo sapiens in order to increase group solidarity.

The cognitive distortions that come out of such group psychology are a big problem online. It's been noted that if you go far enough in either direction of the political spectrum, things start to look the same. Historically, both extremes become militaristic and convinced of a duty to righteous aggression. I would invite hardy and curious souls to plumb both more militant feminist and more militant Men's Rights groups online, and witness firsthand the degree to which both sides can be eerily reminiscent of each other in tone and self-righteous attitude. (For example: Intolerant "you're with us or against us" attitudes.)

As 21st century citizens, we should already be aware of "bait and switch" tactics. We should also be savvy about the psychology of online groups, and be able to read when a group has started to cross a threshold and becomes driven by positive feedback cycles of outrage to garner more attention. We should recognize when the ideology of whatever movement has been thus hijacked to become hateivism. (EDIT: To clarify, what I refer to as "groups" are small-granularity, as in a few person's social networks, not everyone who identifies with a particular label!)

To clarify: my issue is not with either side of any debate. There are a few ideas on both sides of the issue I would agree with. My chief concern is whether the groups in question are self-aware concerning their own group dynamics. Such an organizational awareness was perhaps the chief accomplishment of Martin Luther King Jr. and his compatriots, though there seems to be no awareness of this particular accomplishment in the culture at large.

EDIT: I should clarify what I meant by saying "made such group psychology worse." Creating virtual meeting spaces and virtual online groups is far easier and far cheaper than organizing face to face groups, and the same communication resources also make it easier to facilitate such meetings in person. Much good has come of this. However, it has also created far more opportunities for the incubation of distorted mob psychologies. Often these take the name of some cause or ideology but are distorted in a jingoistic direction.

As 21st century online citizens, we should be as aware of such "bait and switch" with the labels of ideologies as we are aware of the same tactics with regards to name brands. We should be as savvy about the intellectual provenance of an online group's teachings and its actual practices as we are savvy about online shopping or choosing which Kickstarter campaigns to support. If just about anyone can set up shop online as an "activist," doesn't this create the same situation that arises when just about anyone can set up a web store? (Isn't this the same economic situation as with travelling medicine shows?)

From what I have seen online, people are often remarkably unsophisticated about evaluating distortions in their particular group's interpretation of ideologies or activist programs, and largely blind to their own group dynamics. This is especially true when "othering," stereotyping, and group hatreds have taken hold. Most importantly: It is just as true online as it is in-person.

Re: Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

#89
post #23

I understand the author has strong feelings about her innate tactics for avoiding misery, but the ultimate thrust of her "amelioration patterns" are variants on "toughen up" or "don't feed the trolls", both of which assign responsibility for the problem to victims of misogyny, not perpetrators. The author got lucky and doesn't, or can't, feel bad about misogyny. This isn't true for everyone, nor should it be. I agree…

That's a tricky distinction between empower a victim and blaming a victim. If I teach you to call the police if someone breaks into your house, that's not the say as blaming you for someone breaking into your house. She is talking about strategies that she's learned that disarm aggressors, which is not victim blaming.

But calling the police is placing responsibility with the perpetrators, right? Sort of like going to a manager or project maintainer to report harassment. To me, this is closer to "try not to care so much about people breaking in; I don't, and it really works for me".

Re: Okay, Feminism, It’s Time We Had a Talk About Empathy (2013)

#90

This was awesome. Not because it dispels a meme that is negative in the industry, not because it is some sort of proof a woman can succeed in tech, or any other of this tropic nonsense. It was such an amazing message that was totally gender neutral: "I like building things because I am curious and I pursue knowledge for its own sake" With all the confirmation bias and name calling (which I am certainly guilty of from…

The "shut up and build things" position embodies the tacit assumption that the world naturally pushes itself to an equillibrium that is fair and just. The assumption that racism and sexism result in elastic deformation of society that will go away as soon as you remove whatever force is warping it.

I don't think history bears that out. Society is a soft ductile metal. If you bend it, it'll stay bent. You have to hammer it back into straightness. Talking (and browbeating and prosecuting when necessary) is how you do that.

PS: I don't disagree with the author that not everyone needs to be on the front line of every culture war. But I think someone needs to be.

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