

Thoughts on being sexism neutral: "I Don't Know: Is There Anything You Can Do?"  - Mz
http://www.novemberwest.com/blog/2011/07/12/i-dont-know-is-there-anything-you-can-do/

======
cantastoria
_Much to my annoyance, the men who most often play this sexism-neutral role
tend to be polite enemies rather than allies: Men who don’t much like me or
who are subtly trying to keep women out of a male-dominated area or some such
but who are basically decent, professional people who don’t stoop to personal
attacks and ugliness._

Do you think they actually are sexist but are just acting indifferent? What
makes you think they are trying to keep you out because of your sex? Wouldn't
the fact they play a sexism-netural role make that less of a possibility?

~~~
Mz
I offered two possibilities there, one of which was that they don't much like
me personally, which may have nothing whatsoever to do with my gender. So I am
not suggesting that such men are necessarily sexist. But there are definitely
cases where my read of a particular situation is that it is a subtle form of
sexism, sometimes probably not consciously intentional but there nonetheless.

Thanks.

~~~
cantastoria
_...where my read of a particular situation is that it is a subtle form of
sexism, sometimes probably not consciously intentional but there nonetheless._

Can you give an example of this?

~~~
Mz
Some years ago, I belonged to a forum where two of the top dogs in the forum
basically challenged me to post a nude photo of myself. I do not think either
man was intentionally trying to be sexist but I read the situation as a group
attempt to say "You cannot run with the big dogs. You are just a girl." It was
a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation -- a put up or shut up
challenge where I should have "lost" no matter how I responded.

~~~
oh_sigh
The best example you can come up with is something which happened in an online
forum? A fabricated, but relevant "real life" story would have been much more
appropriate. Heck, a less-relevant, but real "real life" story would have been
more appropriate. My issue is that, if this is the best example you can think
of, it makes me think you have not encountered these situations in "real life"

~~~
Mz
It happens to be the first thing that comes to mind for me because it happens
to be an anecdote I reread moments before submitting this piece.

Real life example: In a college class, my Egyptian professor would ask me
three or four times "How do you know that?" every single time I answered a
math question. It became blatant enough that he was being obtuse that a male
class member blurted at some point "She has obviously already worked it out in
her head."

Best I can do for now as I have to go.

Catch you later.

Thanks.

------
ThariqS
You may just be likable as person.

I find often times, regardless of gender, when I like someone as a person
before I get an understanding of their skills as a programmer or engineer I'm
less critical of their work. When I don't know someone, or even better don't
like them, I challenge them to show me their best work.

Of course, well structured criticism is important to grow as a person, the
sweet-spot is finding someone you likes you, but is comfortable criticizing
you. A really good manager should be this person, they should feel like you
fit into their culture when they hire you and they should have a lot to gain
from pushing you to do your best work. Of course that's in an ideal world.

------
opminion
Interesting that the proposed question is almost exactly what a nice guy would
ask himself, but applied to her:

Mr. Nice: "Is there anything _I_ can do"

Empowering guy: "Is there anything _you_ can do"

------
petercooper
_well-meaning nice guys often deprive women of the chance to struggle, to
prove themselves and so on. It is often heartbreaking to watch well meaning
men make such mistakes._

I can usually tell, so this is confusing me.. is this post satirical? (Update:
Seems not!) I'm a "well-meaning nice guy" to anyone, male, female or
otherwise, who's not antagonizing me; I haven't appreciated that this may
cause people problems, but different strokes, etc :-)

~~~
Mz
It is not intended as satire.

Not all well-meaning nice guys make such mistakes. But I have seen it. Maybe
you are both well meaning and reasonably socially savvy?

Thanks.

~~~
petercooper
I'm not socially savvy but I try to apply the 'golden rule' as much as I can
to make up for it ;-) (I've found the key is _knowing_ about one's flaws and
working out techniques to get around or diminish them - I have enough!)

The key reason, however, is I've found being polite and well-meaning produces
the best outcome for my pursuits. I used to be quite argumentative but
empathizing with people's positions has led to less anxiety, helped my
business, and has given me a better rapport with partners and customers. These
are selfish reasons to be nice on the surface, but I've found it eventually
becomes a default, natural position to approach people and problems with.

(Oh, and being British seems to help. For some reason people often assume
we're going to be polite so it doesn't seem so odd ;-))

~~~
Mz
Some people are more prone to foot in mouth disease than others. Given my
medical condition and the amount of medication I was on at one time, I have
spent plenty of time with both feet in my mouth. I try to be understanding
even when it just so happens that I am the person being killed with kindness.

Take care.

------
Mz
Disclaimer/confession: I happen to be the author. That may not be obvious but
it is also no secret. I posted it as my contribution to the general ongoing HN
discussion of issues like women in tech and related stuff that shows up here.

Enjoy. Or not.

Thanks.

~~~
jerrya
I enjoyed it, and I try to stay away from the gender stuff at HN because it is
often trite in part due to the issue you are talking about.

First though, I do think in Aliens, that part of the mens' and the audience's
enjoyment and celebration with Ripley that she ran that loader so well is
because she is a woman, so in that respect, it is sexist (woman shows
disbelieving men and audience). (It might also otherwise be because she's been
in cryosleep for decades and unused to loaders, or just that she does her job
so well.) (Also, there are times I really hate Chekhov's gun, but that scene
has never been one of them.)

And one of the aspects of gender discussions on the web I find annoying is in
fact that at many such discussions the male commenters getting the most
applause are actually often very sexist, condescending, white knighting,
patronizing, cheerleading, and fact free commenters (and that are probably
clueless as to their own actual behaviors. (cf. Hugo Schwyzer)

For the sake of your essay you categorize men in two groups:

 _Men who don’t much like me or who are subtly trying to keep women out of a
male-dominated area or some such but who are basically decent, professional
people who don’t stoop to personal attacks and ugliness._

 _In contrast, well-meaning, supportive nice guys are frequently maddening in
their boundless ability to pave a road to hell with good intentions._

My fear is that you and others default to perceiving the men from Aliens, and
in fact, many men, as belonging to the first group. But you can see that Apone
and Hicks aren't in either of those groups.

One take away from your discoveries is that maybe you should reconsider the
nature of the word "enemy" and what it means to be an enemy or friend, because
Apone and Hicks, and people that take you seriously and engage in an
intellectual argument with you (and fight with you) are probably your friends
in ways that the trite cheerleaders rah rahing you for your gender are not.

I am not sure what the relationship of your essay is to "Hacker News". Written
as is, I think it would be better suited to a variety of feminist and men's
blogs, including the Good Men Project.

Best wishes,

~~~
jerf
"First though, I do think in Aliens, that part of the mens' and the audience's
enjoyment and celebration with Ripley that she ran that loader so well is
because she is a woman, so in that respect, it is sexist (woman shows
disbelieving men and audience)."

While I broadly agree with that analysis, I would point out that's a
metanarrative analysis. In the context of the narrative itself I believe Mz's
analysis is accurate. And you gotta start there. The metanarrative unavoidably
has elements of the real world in it and the way it changes is with people
choosing and accepting other narratives over time.

I say this because I think in general sometimes people can overanalyze things
like this, and the danger there is that sufficient "analysis" can turn
anything into anything else. (Which is the core fallacy of postmodernism in an
information theory nutshell.) It is unavoidably a product of its time and
culture, but irreducibly, it is merely what it is, as well. Too many people
get so caught up in the former they forget the latter.

~~~
jerrya
_In the context of the narrative itself ... And you gotta start there._

See, I disagree that it has to start there.

I love the movie, but I analyze it that Dan O'Bannon wrote a script in the 80s
for an 80s crowd, and he knew that the audience and the purchasers of his
script would love seeing a shapely Ellen Ripley in her feminine white panties
one moment and in a masculine yellow loader the next showing all the military
men she was their equal or better. It was a rah rah feminism moment, one of
many you go grrl moments in cinema. (And O'Bannon also knew about Chekhov's
gun and knew it would be good for the audience to introduce her talents with
the loader early in the movie.)

So I see the internal narrative as a function of what scripts could be
expected to sold and be successful in the 80s.

Similarly, Aliens can also be analyzed outside the narrative of the movie as a
Vietnam War movie, and in the early 80s when it came out, that was a pretty
big deal, especially since the movie was a science fiction movie, set in the
future, about the Vietnam War.

~~~
jerf
The problem with your analysis is that it has no information content, in the
sense of information theory where "information" has the ability to distinguish
between two outcomes. A movie made in the eighties is unavoidably a movie made
in the 80s. There is no distinguishing power between 80s movies if you insist
on their metanarrative being "correct", for any value of correct other than
"comes from the 80s". They all fail equally.

I've seen attempts to make movies or write books that somehow avoid the
context of the time they were made in for a variety of reasons (political
correctness, avante garde art attempts, etc), but when I look at them decades
later it's clear to see that they merely demonstrate _different aspects_ of
the prejudices and context of their time, not that they even remotely
succeeded at being a product of another time.

If what you say is true, then there is _nowhere_ to start changing attitudes,
because the metanarrative, while interesting and important to consider when
analyzing a work, can not be modified, can not be chosen, can not be
rewritten. You're stuck with it.

You can not write or watch movies from the metanarrative of the 2050s. And if
you could, it would surprise you. I guarantee you nobody actually knows what
the 2050 metanarrative will be. Any attempts to guess would themselves only be
prejudices of the 2010s.

