On 06/27/10 at 03:04am, Sven-Hendrik Haase wrote: > On 26.06.2010 19:10, Xyne wrote: > >>>>> I suspect of all the places a girl could stumble upon in the net, > >>>>> this > >>>>> one is the least likely to be it. > >>>> Well, when they do, they'll be able to confirm the stereotype of male > >>>> computer geeks and their attitudes towards them. > >> What stereotype? I'm a computer geek, and I'm fine with women, in > >> general and in computing. Stereotyping is bullshit generalization that > >> doesn't actually apply to anyone in particular. > > [/snip] > > > >> On Sat, Jun 26, 2010 at 6:13 AM, Peter Lewis <[email protected]> wrote: > >>> But please don't assume you know my motivation for mentioning these > >>> projects. > >>> I'm not "trying to make myself feel better", > >> I'm sorry; was I "stereotyping" you? Sucks, doesn't it? :) > >> -- > >> Andrew > > > > I think you misunderstood my message. My point was that a conversation > > among TUs, i.e. people officially associated with the distro, about > > keeping women in towers etc. conforms to a stereotype that people have > > of male geeks acting disparagingly towards women. A harmless comment > > here or there isn't really an issue, but diverting a TU application > > into a conversation that ostensibly objectifies women on a public > > mailing list will be seen as inappropriate and possibly offensive by > > others. If you don't see how that might be offensive then I would say > > that you're part of the problem. > > > > This is relevant: http://xkcd.com/322/ > > > > Stereotypes are indeed stupid and so is acting in accordance with them. > > > > I'm really not up in arms about this. I only made a fleeting remark > > about it and had intended to avoid replying to your message when I saw > > it, but that second remark to Peter above clearly shows that you > > misunderstood my point so I felt the need to explain myself. Call me > > "pseudo-politically correct" all you want, but somehow I don't think a > > conversation about women locked up in secret tower belongs on this > > list. At the very least it has nothing to do with the AUR. > > > > > > > > > > Peter Lewis <[email protected]> wrote: > >> On Saturday 26 Jun 2010 at 01:42 Ng Oon-Ee wrote: > >>> On Fri, 2010-06-25 at 17:47 -0400, Andrew Antle wrote: > >>>>> I've always been quite proud that the free / open source software > >>>>> world has > >>>>> projects like these: > >>>>> > >>>>> http://women.debian.org/home/ > >>>>> http://community.kde.org/KDE_Women > >>>>> http://live.gnome.org/GnomeWomen > >>>>> > >>>>> I know the comments were just supposed to be a bit of fun, but > >>>>> perhaps they > >>>>> highlight that something like wouldn't be a bad idea in Arch too. > >>>>> > >>>> Patches welcome :) , preferably from women actually involved in Arch, > >>>> not pseudo-politically-correct males trying to make themselves feel > >>>> better. > >> Absolutely, it would be rather odd and pointless if an Arch-women project > >> were > >> to be started by men. In the absence of any women (really are there > >> none?), of > >> course no patches will be forthcoming. > > I think the best approach is to simply stop focusing on gender. What > > difference do gender, ethnicity, age, etc make on the internet? > > Obviously if you bring it up yourself and make it a part of the > > interaction then it matters, but if not then it shouldn't even need to > > be mentioned. > > > > As for project and groups targeted at women, I would expect them to run > > the risk of leading to some level of seclusion within the community. > > It's like saying "well, they don't seem to be integrating, so let's > > provide them with a little niche over there". > > > > I could easily go on, but it would veer too far into politics and is, > > once again, not appropriate for this list. > > > Woah, I did not suspect that the closing question of my application > would spawn such a discussion. If anything, I was subconsciously > expressing my resentment towards the lack of at least partly female > people in my areas of interest, packaged in a humorous remark. That's > about it. I wasn't trying to make this another heated discussion in the > epic proportions of a cdrtools vs. cdrkit debate.
I imagine most ppl took your comments at face value with NO derogarory attitude toward anyone at all. I think most of this (unneed) banter was brought on by subsiquent posts. As far as matching the epic cdrtools vs. cdrkit I don't you have much to worry about. > > I don't know whether I was actually being criticized here for those > closing words of mine and I hope nobody actually thinks that I objectify > girls like that. Believe me, I'd *much* rather have a more balanced > gender ratio in my areas of interest. I CERTAINLY don't see anything here as a neg. criticism of you. > > This uneven gender ratio likely is the result of the current > expectations of society and the fact that boys and girls are genetically > wired to like different things. It is certainly not something we can > change by alienating women and putting them into a special place like > Arch Women. I think that we are probably the ones *least* at fault, or > would anybody here NOT encourage a girl to try to do technical stuff? At > any rate, we are too few fix this and we are probably not experienced > enough in genetic engineering either. > > I apologize if anybody here was actually offended by my words. > > We should probably stop this here and now. Can we get back to my awesome > application? > If any more people want to escalate this, it should probably at least go > to arch-general in the next mail. > > -- Sven-Hendrik God that would be nice. The no more or else where part. Good luck on your Voting period.
