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Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

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Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#191

Post by niggler »

mitchty wrote: post #185
theorique wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Under her definition, "If you have 'booth babes' ..., I'm not going to buy your product" is essentially the same as saying "If you have women selling your product, I'm not going to buy it," which isn't exactly an enlightened position to take. It's almost as though you need to get ugly women - if the women are too attractive, then they are written off as "booth babes". Which is kind of sexist in its own way.

It is entirely sexist to see an attractive woman and assume that she isn't intelligent. It's one of the hidden sides of sexism in our society that annoy me. I try to catch myself whenever I find myself doing that, and have been pleasantly surprised. A side effect of this is that those women that are attractive and intelligent tend to begin to hide it. So you get self-reinforcing behavior from society. Things like guy…

"It is entirely sexist to see an attractive woman and assume that she isn't intelligent."

Case in point: Hedy Lamarr, who is probably more well known for her beauty than for her contributions to science (http://www.google.com/patents?vid=USPAT2292387)

Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#192

Post by mattsfrey »

JulianMorrison wrote: post #175
theorique wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that men pay attention to supermodel shaped women is (1) sexist (2) very mistaken. Do you know any men in real life? Unless you're just trolling, I find it hard to believe that you actually believe this.

Do you know how to distinguish attention from horndogging? Hint: attention is that which is paid to the subject of the conversation. If all you can remember afterwards is "bow chicka wow wow", you're doing it wrong.

Years ago I worked at a gas station, one night they sent down 2 Miller Lite girls to do promo. If you bought a case of miller light you got to take your picture with the girls and got a free magnet etc. They were there for one hour before moving on, we emptied our entire stock of Miller in that hour.Guys were coming in for weeks asking about when they'd be back. "Horndogging" or not, sex sells and it isn't going anywhere.

Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#193

Post by lotyrin »

JulianMorrison wrote: post #175
theorique wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that men pay attention to supermodel shaped women is (1) sexist (2) very mistaken. Do you know any men in real life? Unless you're just trolling, I find it hard to believe that you actually believe this.

Do you know how to distinguish attention from horndogging? Hint: attention is that which is paid to the subject of the conversation. If all you can remember afterwards is "bow chicka wow wow", you're doing it wrong.

If you think it's a black and white "HURR TITS" vs "Quite interesting, madam. Please tell me where I might subscribe to your newsletter." rather than a spectrum therebetween, you're sorely mistaken.

Marketers have (I can only assume) found that triggering the former to lead to the latter is a working strategy (they do tend to at least try to base their actions on observed results). Even if that's not the case the concept that there's a dual throw switch for power between the gonads and the brain seems pretty silly and needlessly underestimates men (though it sort of overestimates them at the same time I guess...).

Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#194

Post by cdtwigg »

rurounijones wrote: post #183
AJ007 wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me suggest that this is an impossible problem to solve. Here are our options: 1. Require a strict dress code for booth babes as to not offend anyone with scantily clad women. Result: we can't tell booth babes from technical females. 2. Require everyone working at the conference to be an active and knowledgable employee of the company which has purchase the booth space. Result: number of females on the show floor…

This might sound bad but... I cannot actually see a problem with #2, it would be my preferred solution. When I go to trade shows / conferences it is to talk to brains, not bodies, the sex of the brain is immaterial to me. To me, making sure the bodies are 50% equal in gender means nothing if 80% of the female bodies are only there to make up a body quota but have no interest / knowledge of what is going on. Maybe cha…

Why assume that anyone who isn't deeply expert in the technical details of a product isn't a full-time employee of the company? Many companies hire sales/marketing people of both genders that may have a relatively superficial understanding of the inner details but are more enthusiastic and outgoing than the engineering staff.

Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#195

Post by mkr-hn »

jiggy2011 wrote: post #134
JPKab wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a 31 year old male, here is my message to tech companies with products to sell: If you have "booth babes" (I think she did a great job in the article of defining what that term means), I'm not going to buy your product. I hate it and always have. Its trashy and demeaning, and I resent being grouped into the lowest common denominator when I go to view a product I actually care about. As demeaning as it is to women,…

Problem is, you see an attractive woman at a booth, assuming she is wearing regular business or casual attire. How do you know if she was hired because she was attractive or because of other skills/attributes or a mixture of both?

"Do you work here?"

I ask that at the grocery store when I have a question and I'm not sure if the person is an employee of the store or one of the store's suppliers.

Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#196

Post by jiggy2011 »

mkr-hn wrote: post #195
jiggy2011 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Problem is, you see an attractive woman at a booth, assuming she is wearing regular business or casual attire. How do you know if she was hired because she was attractive or because of other skills/attributes or a mixture of both?

"Do you work here?" I ask that at the grocery store when I have a question and I'm not sure if the person is an employee of the store or one of the store's suppliers.

If she's working the booth then she is working there in one way or another.

Saying "Do you know anything about this product, or are you tits for hire?" doesn't seem like a great question either..

Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#197

Post by mitchty »

niggler wrote: post #191
mitchty wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is entirely sexist to see an attractive woman and assume that she isn't intelligent. It's one of the hidden sides of sexism in our society that annoy me. I try to catch myself whenever I find myself doing that, and have been pleasantly surprised. A side effect of this is that those women that are attractive and intelligent tend to begin to hide it. So you get self-reinforcing behavior from society. Things like guy…

"It is entirely sexist to see an attractive woman and assume that she isn't intelligent." Case in point: Hedy Lamarr, who is probably more well known for her beauty than for her contributions to science ( http://www.google.com/patents?vid=USPAT2292387 )

Excellent example and case. How Stuff Works did a podcast on her a few years ago, http://castroller.com/podcasts/StuffYouMissed/2118275 she's a fascinating person to learn about.

Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#198

Post by jacalata »

PebblesRox wrote: post #188
ericssmith wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not sick of gender issues. I have recently been enlightened (mostly by Bob Martin's recent blog post) about language that I use at work (eg military analogies) that could be alienating to anyone (eg females) who didn't grow up idealizing warfare. This is an incredibly important point in history, and you are at the epicenter. Thanks for sharing your experience.

That Bob Martin post sounds interesting but I can't find it. Do you happen to have a link?

I assume it was this one: http://blog.8thlight.com/uncle-bob/2013/03/22/There-are-ladi...

Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#199

Post by mkr-hn »

jiggy2011 wrote: post #196
mkr-hn wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Do you work here?" I ask that at the grocery store when I have a question and I'm not sure if the person is an employee of the store or one of the store's suppliers.

If she's working the booth then she is working there in one way or another. Saying "Do you know anything about this product, or are you tits for hire?" doesn't seem like a great question either..

I misread and thought jiggy2011 was talking about not being sure if she worked there. I would assume someone hired to work a booth would know something about the product, and know who to point me to if they don't have an answer to my questions.

Re: Booth Babes, Street Clothes, and GDC: Thanks But You sort of Made It Worse

#200

Post by mkr-hn »

theorique wrote: post #158
JulianMorrison wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that men pay attention to supermodel shaped women is (1) sexist (2) very mistaken. Sexist men pay horny attention to them. Horniness is a distraction from a product pitch. "I'm sorry, what did you say again? I was staring at your chest."

The idea that men pay attention to supermodel shaped women is (1) sexist (2) very mistaken. Do you know any men in real life? Unless you're just trolling, I find it hard to believe that you actually believe this.

I believe it. I find supermodels completely unappealing.
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