OK, I'll bite. Sides of this issue you might not be considering [LWN.net]

OK, I'll bite. Sides of this issue you might not be considering

Posted Aug 28, 2009 2:40 UTC (Fri) by njs (guest, #40338)
In reply to: OK, I'll bite. Sides of this issue you might not be considering by BrucePerens
Parent article: FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software

> I resent them too. Vendors trying to lure me in by my gonads

But you also realize that there's a difference between the resentment due to someone trying to lure you by your gonads, and resentment due to being told that -- roughly speaking -- those companies didn't consider you a real member of their audience, and implicitly "reminded" that your proper aspiration in life is to use your body to lure others by their gonads?

I hope so; it's just that I've heard a lot of men grumble about booth babes, but if they really *hated* the concept of booth babes the way that they might, then one way or another I'm pretty sure booth babes wouldn't still exist.

> The folks I don't believe are the troop of men here telling me what you think.

Speaking as part of that troop, that's why I've tried to provide logic, data, and links. I'm well aware that I may have gotten things wrong despite that, and if I become aware of any then I'll certainly apologize. Is there anything I've claimed that you still particularly disbelieve?

> I get [death threats] too.

For thinking about this issue, I highly recommend this comment by Kathy Sierra, especially the second half about what's happened since she talked about her threats in public: http://geekfeminism.org/2009/08/17/george-sodini-montreal...

On merit, that comment actually deserves front-page treatment. But I don't know what the consequences of that would be :-(

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OK, I'll bite. Sides of this issue you might not be considering

Posted Aug 28, 2009 12:35 UTC (Fri) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link]

> if [men] really *hated* the concept of booth babes ...
> booth babes wouldn't still exist.

My theory, which I'm pretty confident about, is that this is a general issue of conferences with mostly male attendees, nothing to do with the free software community.

Booth babes continue to exist at conferences because conferences are full of men with no interest in the topic but were sent there by their employer.

When I see booth babes at a free software conference (actually, I've only seen them at "Linux" conferences), then I know that that stall is a reputationless company selling something with no differentiating features. Red flag for "ignore this stall". Most other LWN readers would also ignore that stall at a free software conference, by my theory.

Then there's the separate category of attendees who can't tell the difference between the companies and who aren't interested in the details anyway - that separate category, which has almost nothing to do with us, is the target of booth babes.