Being a woman in geek culture

[Recidiva]

It depends on who the trolls are. Primadonna, for example? I have on ignore and will never look at his posts or engage with him, but I will talk about him because he stalks me and it infuriates him that I can ignore him so easily but he is incapable of doing the same to me. And with as much of an incompetent misogynist dickhead as he is, he DESERVES to be made as angry as possible as often as possible. Think of me as karma incarnate.

I don't want trolls in here because this is a safe space for women and men that hate women do not fucking belong in here telling us that we're wrong and they're right. We get that everywhere everyday constantly. There needs to be a place we can go and be able to discuss and vent and share without being reminded that it's a man's world. Hence, do not engage misogynists. They will go away if we ignore them hard enough.

Side note: I also hope that EVERYONE on Lit eventually starts calling him Primadonna constantly because I think the fact that it's a gendered word and he's a sexist bastard will enrage him until his pants catch on fire.

Almost every other troll in the world, they can fuck off and die and I'll never talk to them, look at them or engage them in any way. Ignoring them completely will eventually make them go away and do something productive. I'll yell at an asshole until I deem them a troll for the same of trolling, then they are dead to me.

I'm of a different mind, but I respect your choices. I have varying levels of "confrontation" energy in reserves. Sometimes I want to argue, sometimes I don't. I can choose to be above it or I can choose to burst someone's bubble logically.

I can get in trouble for "playing" with an asshole and there's a fine line between logically disagreeing with someone, being funny, or inadvertently just giving them much more power or voice than they should have. It's an interesting puzzle, I don't have the answers.

In reality, I have to contend with all the assholes because they can all vote. On here it seems much less dire.

 

[satindesire]

I'm of a different mind, but I respect your choices. I have varying levels of "confrontation" energy in reserves. Sometimes I want to argue, sometimes I don't. I can choose to be above it or I can choose to burst someone's bubble logically.

I can get in trouble for "playing" with an asshole and there's a fine line between logically disagreeing with someone, being funny, or inadvertently just giving them much more power or voice than they should have. It's an interesting puzzle, I don't have the answers.

In reality, I have to contend with all the assholes because they can all vote. On here it seems much less dire.

I totally understand.

On here it is less dire. In other threads I wouldn't mind so much. But in this one, it's important to show trolls that trolling here is a bad idea in various ways. No one should ever comfortably think that it's okay to be a sexist prick.

 

[satindesire]

http://i-once-had-a-guy-tell-me.tumblr.com/

 

[satindesire]

Fetlife Thread: "How Prevalent is Sexism"

It took less than one page for a "But what about teh poor menz?" sexism apologist/denier to arrive.

Also, look on the second page for the classic "First World Feminist Problems!" cry.

 

[Recidiva]

I totally understand.

On here it is less dire. In other threads I wouldn't mind so much. But in this one, it's important to show trolls that trolling here is a bad idea in various ways. No one should ever comfortably think that it's okay to be a sexist prick.

Yeah, I get that. However, you may want that to be the case, but the problem with that is that in reality this is in a format of a free speech website where you have no actual right to set thread rules and where there is no moderation to enforce your interests in providing that space.

I know I couldn't provide safety for someone here. I'd have to go somewhere else where I could enforce standards, which would actually be censorship. This is not to say that that wouldn't be completely valuable to someone, because it would. This just isn't a place where I can do it. I can defend my borders, but I can't defend anybody else's borders, and if defending my borders disrupts someone else's borders...you get where I'm going here. You want it, but you don't have the actual authority to do it. You can try to change the social tone, but you can't provide safe space.

I've seen this attempted with several boards set up by like-minded people who meet at Lit and then break off and go elsewhere. The group gets boring pretty quickly because everybody has the same idea and agrees all the time and isn't challenged. I last there about a week. Other people last longer, but this is why free speech is where I choose to hang out. I appreciate it. For some people, and this probably includes me - "safe" can be very boring. Oddly enough some of the most vociferous advocates of safety have a fairly aggressive streak in them and are completely willing to fight it out tooth and nail. So it's worth a close look. Do you want to be safe, or do you really want to be right? Why is Lit what it is? Why would moderation ruin some of that? Why do you stay here year after year with no moderation insisting that people not argue with you, when you clearly want to argue? It's worth asking. Why wouldn't that aggression serve people in the wider world? Anyway, I don't really know the answers, but this thread does make me ask a lot of questions.

I think you and Stella and KoPilot are bristling with arms and armor and ready for a fight and I admire that. So go fight! Why insist on no fighting when you're so damned good at it? This is a world of geeky women who want safety and politically correct messages and welcoming smiles until you say something politically incorrect and then you are shot through with poison arrows. It is just one spot in the geek world that is just like other parts of the geek world with its own sets of taboos and choices. I like Girl Geek Island, but I can't live there all the time. I am politically incorrect and I kill things and I take their stuff and I kill fuzzy things and I laugh. Yeah, I like farming games, but I'm in my element with ethical choices and steel and guile.

This is the actual issue at hand and all the people who are disrupting the conversation are doing so and if your stated goal is "don't disrupt the conversation" you're going to draw trolls guaranteed.

As to this being about the wide, geeky world, women have the same options. Go in full bore in the free-speech zone and compete for attention and status and defend your borders, or create safe space where like-minded geeky women can geek out in peace. Only one of those things can be done on Lit.

I thoroughly support safer space for women. But wider geek acceptance is not going to happen in the "safe space" places. It's going to be established in the "anything goes" zone where people are out changing standards of behavior by setting examples and gaining admiration for the way they handle themselves. For being cool and effective and having people say "I want to be like that." However, "cool" for me means that being a woman isn't an actual issue. It means I kick ass and I happen to be a woman.

So I hope for diversity. I hope for enclaves of safe spaces where women clarify what it is they want and what they can do about it, where they buy things and say things despite the greater group of geeks being excluded from the conversation. I hope for people being empowered by either those safe spaces or the unsafe spaces and making it out into the wider geek world and having fun and kicking ass. I would actually be fairly bummed if only Girl Geek Island was what was left over when you guys are done. I'd be stuck doing simulations of sewing quilts and honoring people and never ever being mean or cruel in pretend ways.

In Civilization I'd be the Amish tribe and I'd last three rounds. Somebody else with clubs would find me and wipe me out and take my stuff. Thanks Political Correctness! Fuck. That'd suck.

 

[KoPilot]

Safe space is important, just as the infirmary is important for an army so they have someplace to go when they've been shelled. When they're feeling better, when their bodies are capable of fighting infection on their own again and healing their own small wounds for a while, then they can go back out and give hell and get hell. Someone whose had their leg blown off needs someplace clean and quiet to go otherwise they will die.

I shouldn't be expected to fight every single place I go for the rest of my days, and I hope that no one else would have to do that either.

Not everyplace should be a safe space (though there are far more safe spaces in life for certain kinds of people than others), but everyone should have access to one. We don't want "political correctness" from everyone, we want empathy. We want there to not be a desire to hurt people and micromanage their lives. And if misery and bigotry is part of your idea of a perfect world, then I don't really know what to say.

And I think the "free speech"/"censorship" thing is a tired one. First Amendment-style rights only exist for the government to abide by; private institutions and spaces can enforce whatever language they want, and if you don't like it, you can go someplace else. Or challenge it, whatever.

 

[Recidiva]

Safe space is important, just as the infirmary is important for an army so they have someplace to go when they've been shelled. When they're feeling better, when their bodies are capable of fighting infection on their own again and healing their own small wounds for a while, then they can go back out and give hell and get hell. Someone whose had their leg blown off needs someplace clean and quiet to go otherwise they will die.

I shouldn't be expected to fight every single place I go for the rest of my days, and I hope that no one else would have to do that either.

Not everyplace should be a safe space (though there are far more safe spaces in life for certain kinds of people than others), but everyone should have access to one.

Yeah, absolutely safe space is important. I want that for you. I want that for anybody who needs it. I need my own safe space, and I have it. This is a safe subject for me, so that's the difference. I can express myself and be vulnerable and punch anybody in the verbal face if I feel like it.

There are lots of "unsafe" subjects for me that I wouldn't discuss on Lit. Not many, but definitely some, where I wouldn't go anywhere the conversation. I'm still using safe space to think it out, to work it out.

If this is an unsafe subject for you in an unsafe space...yeah, you're the one with the courage here. This may not be a safe space, but I'm grateful to be able to meet you. As an unsafe space, this thread provides good examples of how to navigate it.

 

[Recidiva]

And I think the "free speech"/"censorship" thing is a tired one. First Amendment-style rights only exist for the government to abide by; private institutions and spaces can enforce whatever language they want, and if you don't like it, you can go someplace else. Or challenge it, whatever.

It's only valid here because you're not setting the rules, the site admin is. It's not about right or wrong, it's about what the framework is and how much you can modify that through attitude.

Here? You can't. Other than the ignore button, which I use all the time. But I also argue all the time.

 

[KoPilot]

Best.

Where can we get one of those?

 

[satindesire]

It's only valid here because you're not setting the rules, the site admin is. It's not about right or wrong, it's about what the framework is and how much you can modify that through attitude.

Here? You can't. Other than the ignore button, which I use all the time. But I also argue all the time.

I can't say I agree with that.

Rules can be enforced a lot of ways. A troll can be shouted down, ignored, or banned. Either way, enforcement comes in different forms.

Obviously I can't control what other people do in this thread but I can tell my people like you and Stella and KoP (I'm pronouncing that like Cope because that's hella cute) that I want certain things and you might agree with me and work to make that happen because it's a good idea.

I can't tell a troll "You have to leave" and make them leave with a ban but I can tell a troll "You have to leave" and get my people to ignore them to boredom or logic them to death. Either way they'll probably leave eventually.

 

[Recidiva]

I can't say I agree with that.

Rules can be enforced a lot of ways. A troll can be shouted down, ignored, or banned. Either way, enforcement comes in different forms.

Obviously I can't control what other people do in this thread but I can tell my people like you and Stella and KoP (I'm pronouncing that like Cope because that's hella cute) that I want certain things and you might agree with me and work to make that happen because it's a good idea.

I can't tell a troll "You have to leave" and make them leave with a ban but I can tell a troll "You have to leave" and get my people to ignore them to boredom or logic them to death. Either way they'll probably leave eventually.

I was thinking yesterday that Lit is probably a safe place for assholes to speak, because in reality they tend to get shut down...or form their own political party.

The "feed the trolls" concept is pretty complicated, I haven't worked it all out. I like seeing the different ways people deal with it.

 

[satindesire]

I was thinking yesterday that Lit is probably a safe place for assholes to speak, because in reality they tend to get shut down...or form their own political party.

The "feed the trolls" concept is pretty complicated, I haven't worked it all out. I like seeing the different ways people deal with it.

Yeah, I agree. Assholes are kind of celebrated here.

I don't think that's a good idea personally but it is what it is and I take long breaks from here when I need to.

EDIT: KoPilot: That was the best cartoon EVER.

 

[Recidiva]

Yeah, I agree. Assholes are kind of celebrated here.

I don't think that's a good idea personally but it is what it is and I take long breaks from here when I need to.

EDIT: KoPilot: That was the best cartoon EVER.

Anyway, it's got me thinking, seriously thinking about reviewing my talk to people policy. Started a thread about it and I think it's just helping me refine my thought process, so these sorts of conversations blossom out in all sorts of directions for me.

 

[satindesire]

Anyway, it's got me thinking, seriously thinking about reviewing my talk to people policy. Started a thread about it and I think it's just helping me refine my thought process, so these sorts of conversations blossom out in all sorts of directions for me.

I'm going to go visit that thread so I can see what your brain has been doing lately.

 

[KoPilot]

I can't say I agree with that.

Rules can be enforced a lot of ways. A troll can be shouted down, ignored, or banned. Either way, enforcement comes in different forms.

Out-free-speech them.

KoP (I'm pronouncing that like Cope because that's hella cute)

...I'm a sucker for nicknames that make me sound like a small furry animal. So yes, continue.

 

[satindesire]

Out-free-speech them.

I love the free speech argument that so many assholes like to shout about, but I enjoy most reminding them that I have free speech as well to tell them how much of an asshole they are.

...I'm a sucker for nicknames that make me sound like a small furry animal. So yes, continue.

I was under the impression you were a small furry animal.

 

[Primalex]

It depends on who the trolls are. Primadonna, for example? I have on ignore and will usually never look at his posts or engage with him, but I will talk about him because he stalks me and it infuriates him that I can ignore him so easily but he is incapable of doing the same to me. And with as much of an incompetent misogynist dickhead as he is, he DESERVES to be made as angry as possible as often as possible.

Yeah....I'm the one in here who is totally infuriated.

 

[satindesire]

http://www.viruscomix.com/page474.html

 

[KoPilot]

Dad: Hey, just saw your new website thing. Great name for it. Who came up with it? S?

Me: ...I did? Why wouldn't I have come up with my own [crowdfunding platform] name?

--

And there's also this: http://punishandenslavesuckers.tumb...s-it-always-the-woman-who-has-to-see-past-the

 

[Stella_Omega]

http://www.viruscomix.com/page474.html

That was impossible to read.

 

[Keroin]

Not really "geek" related but a worthy read and one full of blerg.

http://prospect.org/article/good-mens-rights-movement-hard-find

 

[satindesire]

Not really "geek" related but a worthy read and one full of blerg.

http://prospect.org/article/good-mens-rights-movement-hard-find

The comments section was difficult to read but worth it.

I've long seen the mainstream feminist movement to be a beautiful place full of encouragement and support for ALL people, not just women. But the mainstream Men's Rights movements seems to be wholly poisoned by toxic misogyny to a level that is genuinely frightening.

 

[Keroin]

The comments section was difficult to read but worth it.

I've long seen the mainstream feminist movement to be a beautiful place full of encouragement and support for ALL people, not just women. But the mainstream Men's Rights movements seems to be wholly poisoned by toxic misogyny to a level that is genuinely frightening.

Yeah. Sad. But at least I don't think they represent the majority of men. Whew.

Also, here you go, Satin.

http://www.upworthy.com/a-song-to-play-every-time-you-see-a-sexist-racist-or-homophobic-comment-online?c=ag

 

[Stella_Omega]

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Each issue is only 99¢.

 

[KoPilot]

Speaking of comics (and Marvel)... has anyone been keeping up with the Tess Fowler and Brian Wood stuff going on?

It's pretty appalling.

http://womenwriteaboutcomics.com/20...an-wood-and-harassment-in-the-comic-industry/

From Tess herself:

http://tessfowler.tumblr.com/post/67091692836/my-response

And this is supposedly from her, but I'm not sure:

http://iandsharman.tumblr.com/post/65515773268/holy-shit-youre-all-dialoguing-about-this-i-have