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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)

#181

Post by tptacek »

cousin_it wrote: post #159
justizin wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most countries around the world abolished slavery peacefully. [citation needed]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abolition_of_slavery_timeline From a quick skim, the US and Haiti seem to be the only non-peaceful abolitions out of hundreds.

This is a weird lens to look at slavery through. The circumstances in the US were unique: intense economic coupling to slavery, very large regional identity defined by slavery, &c.

More importantly, I'm not sure what this has to do with Rayiner's point. The realization that many plantation slaves would be better utilized as doctors and lawyers did not free the slaves, nor did economic competition from non-slaveholding plantations. It did, in fact, require coercion.

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

#182

Post by danielweber »

Nrsolis wrote: post #174
onion2k wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it’s true that only 20 – 23% of tech workers are women. But less than twenty percent of high school students who choose to the AP Computer Science test are women. Perhaps women choose not to study computer science because they feel it'd be overly difficult to get in to an industry made up of 80% men. What if the fact there are relatively few women tech workers is the reason few women study it, and not the revers…

I think you're supposing that young women have any inkling of what the tech industry is like. The overwhelming evidence is that they don't. What is abundantly clear is that young women and men are influenced by cultural norms and act accordingly when choosing a path through life. Most servers/flight attendants/nurses are women. At my sister's nursing school graduation, there was only a single man on stage to receive…

I think you're supposing that young women have any inkling of what the tech industry is like. The overwhelming evidence is that they don't.

Maybe at one point they didn't, but thanks to Twitter they are now told how horrible it is.

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

#183

Post by tptacek »

justizin wrote: post #150
jimbokun wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"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." It does not. It embodies the tacit assumption that some people prefer to spend their time building something tangible rather than devoting their lives tilting at the windmills of eradicating racism, sexism, and all the other bigotries endemic to our society. Tilting…

> Tilting at those windmills is important, and might be a cause worthy of devoting your life to it, but it's not everyone's calling. "Tilting at windmills" means attacking imaginary enemies, you really can't have it both ways of calling work on eradicating racism, sexism, and other bigotries "Tilting at windmills" and then say it's important. Further, eradicating racism, sexism, etc.. IS EVERYONE'S CALLING. If you do…

I think this was a fine comment until you decided to call people (and, by pretty direct implication, the commenter you replied to) "part of the problem". I'm closer to your side of this debate than 'jimbokuns and I winced when I read this.

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

#184

Post by exstudent2 »

ericmo wrote: post #104
et1337 wrote: 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.

Feminism isn't a monolith, there are lots of flavors in feminism. Only the most radical feminists are "against" men, but they are far from being a majority. Many feminists actually do talk about "sorority" in that sense of women helping each other, however, many other feminists don't agree with that. First reason is that this would block criticism within feminism, such as the one made in the post. Second reason is th…

I think that the problem is that the extreme feminists are being taken seriously.

Journalism in particular seems to be very radicalized. What you end up with is an outsized voice for an extreme minority opinion. I think a lot of the backlash against feminism is about the traction some of the more radical ideas have made.

Examples: #killallmen, male tears...

There are other extreme examples that have been codified in academia, but the media issues seem more cut and dry.

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

#185

Post by justizin »

mafribe wrote: post #87
lukeasrodgers wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Neither of you have possibly lived long enough to have a reasonable sample size.

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

#186

Post by babygoat »

zo1 wrote: post #68
kohanz wrote: post #6

> There had been interest, but one of the committers had dismissed the idea out of hand because a woman had proposed it. It blows my mind that this stuff still happens. In the OSS world of all places. I can't even compute how someone can apply such "logic".

Why? I have seen ideas/suggestions blown off for equally vapid reasons. Sometimes they just don't like me, and don't like that I suggested it, for whatever reason that is. Why should a reason of "female" be special?

Are you seriously suggesting that since you didn't understand the reasons some of your ideas have been rejected, that it's fine to reject other people's ideas for any reason you like?

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

#187

Post by GFK_of_xmaspast »

cpncrunch wrote: post #81
lukeasrodgers wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

What about them?

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

#188

Post by irishcoffee »

acabrahams wrote: post #142
[deleted] wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

> Nothing that happens between twelfth grade and death decreases the percent of women interested in computer science one whit. Statistics [1]: 56% of women in technology leave their employer mid-career, and 24% of these women take a non-technical job with a different employer. "This is double the turnover rate of men." It would appear, then, that actually something does happen between high school and death which decr…

> It is not due to women leaving their career for family either, since many of this 56% decide to continue working, but in a non-technical role.

I'm not sure how you jumped from A to B there? Yes, this is an anecdote, but I know more than a handful of women who were in non-technical roles to begin with, started a family, and then entered a completely different industry when they went back to work. Most of them just didn't like what they were doing in their old job.

You quite possibly have a valid and correct point, I'm just having a hard time justifying it based on my own experiences.

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

#189

Post by [deleted] »

savanaly wrote: post #102
kohanz wrote: post #6

> There had been interest, but one of the committers had dismissed the idea out of hand because a woman had proposed it. It blows my mind that this stuff still happens. In the OSS world of all places. I can't even compute how someone can apply such "logic".

> There had been interest, but one of the committers had dismissed the idea out of hand because a woman had proposed it. This also blows my mind. 100% of my colleagues and friends who work in programming would suffer severe whiplash from the double take they would take after reading a statement like that from someone we were working with. How would someone who says something like that in a non-joking way not be immed…

[deleted]

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

#190

Post by krstck »

geofft wrote: post #145
afarrell wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it wrong to object to Shanley for the same reason I object to Tourvalds?

I think there's an interesting thought about intersectionality there. I am assuming your common objection is rudeness (that is, at least, mine). But there's some subtlety. Linus is, by all reasonable measures, completely powerful at (I think) everything he wants to be doing. He's the only person with commit access to the Linux kernel. He works for a foundation named after himself whose primary goal is to employ him.…

> I actually think, if you read her tweets carefully, that she's very intentional in pushing the Overton window and making space for less-rude people to push their point. It's certainly possible she could accomplish her goals without rudeness, but she couldn't simply drop the rudeness the way Linus does.

That's an extremely interesting and helpful point, and makes me actually more sympathetic to her. Thanks for that.

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