Good. Now we have a list and can discuss it.
Good. Now we have a list and can discuss it.
Posted Sep 30, 2007 11:46 UTC (Sun) by nix (subscriber, #2304)In reply to: Good. Now we have a list and can discuss it. by khim
Parent article: To Sir, with Love: How To Get More Women Involved in Open Source (O'ReillyNet)
Ah, right. So women are acceptable if and only if they hide the fact that
they're female, and if they don't hide it then they deserve to be attacked
on the basis of gender?
It's odd that this only seems to apply to *women*. I don't notice anyone
criticising `AnswerGuy', for instance, for daring to use a similarly
gender-indicative term as part of his nick: and nor should they. Using
`AnswerGuy' as a nick is not the same as yelling `all that matters is that
I am male; I am a hunky beefcake and all I'm good for is male-only
tasks'[1]; equally, using the nick `tuxchick' is not saying `all that
matters is that I am female; I am asking to be attacked on the basis of my
gender'.
We've seen this before: it's the `she was asking for it' `explanation' for
all kinds of attacks on women based on things like how they dress. This
time it's only being used to `explain' a nasty attitude, but it's still
logic as faulty as when it's used to `explain' assaults.
[1] among my relatives this is pretty much restricted to 'doing the
cooking' :)
(this really is a consciousness-raising thread. It's damn valuable for
that alone.)