Misogyny, Entitlement, and Nerds 1198
PvtVoid writes: "Jeopardy champion Arthur Chu pens a heartfelt takedown of misogyny in nerd culture: 'I’ve heard and seen the stories that those of you who followed the #YesAllWomen hashtag on Twitter have seen—women getting groped at cons, women getting vicious insults flung at them online, women getting stalked by creeps in college and told they should be "flattered." I’ve heard Elliot Rodger’s voice before. I was expecting his manifesto to be incomprehensible madness—hoping for it to be—but it wasn’t. It’s a standard frustrated angry geeky guy manifesto, except for the part about mass murder. I've heard it from acquaintances, I've heard it from friends. I've heard it come out of my own mouth, in moments of anger and weakness.
What the f*$# is wrong with us? How much longer are we going to be in denial that there's a thing called "rape culture" and we ought to do something about it? ... To paraphrase the great John Oliver, listen up, fellow self-pitying nerd boys — we are not the victims here. We are not the underdogs. We are not the ones who have our ownership over our bodies and our emotions stepped on constantly by other people's entitlement. We're not the ones where one out of six of us will have someone violently attempt to take control of our bodies in our lifetimes.'"
What the f*$# is wrong with us? How much longer are we going to be in denial that there's a thing called "rape culture" and we ought to do something about it? ... To paraphrase the great John Oliver, listen up, fellow self-pitying nerd boys — we are not the victims here. We are not the underdogs. We are not the ones who have our ownership over our bodies and our emotions stepped on constantly by other people's entitlement. We're not the ones where one out of six of us will have someone violently attempt to take control of our bodies in our lifetimes.'"
Move along , nothing to see here. (Score:4, Informative)
This must be another of these fake outrage threads.
Re:yet another one of these stories? (Score:5, Informative)
>Men are not rapists. RAPISTS are rapists.
Even more relevant in light of that recent study showing that women are almost as likely to be rapists as men, but men are considerably less likely to report being assaulted.
Ground down (Score:5, Informative)
I haven't posted on Slashdot in years, but the response to this story made me want to come out of the woodwork.
So far In the comments I've seen:
--He isn't really a nerd! NOFP!
--Nerds don't hit on girls, so NOFP!
--He's using a stereotype! I'm not that guy, so NMFP!
I'm a woman working in a technical field and I've been at this game since 1996. In my current company, the men here outnumber me 9-1. When you add in a love of geeky pursuits (at one convention, I remember counting 3 women in a group of 500 men), I've spent a lot of time being one of the guys.
In the beginning, it was exciting -- thrilling!-- to be the only woman in a meeting. I was the exception! I was going to make it! I was better than those girly-girls with their silly pursuits. But, not only do I realize that was a stupid-ass position that reinforced the perceptions of women's interests being lesser than men, I'm just tired of it. Tired of little backhanded bullshit comments. Tired of having to laugh at stupid sexist shit to be one of the boys. And especially tired of being told there's no problem. And this is not just me. Again, it's necessarily a small data pool (see % above), but I've never met a woman who didn't have at least 3 stories about bullshit at work. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04... [nytimes.com]
Again, it's not that I can't hack it. I can. This isn't a poor me, come and save me post. At this point, my hide is tempered steel -- fucking bring it, world. It's that I shouldn't have to, and as I said above, it's fucking exhausting.
And it's more than just eating shit at work: We live in a world where literally yesterday a woman was stoned to death by her family for failing to live her life they way they wanted. (http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/28/world/asia/pakistan-pregnant-woman-killed/) . Our culture shames a woman for accepting sexual advances and blames her if she rejects them (http://nypost.com/cover/#covers-1401159702). There is literally no way to win as a woman.
Look, guys. Even if you've done a ton of soul searching, and you genuinely believe you're not part of the problem, go to the next step. The women around you are hurting. They're exhausted. They're being gaslighted (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaslighting) left, right and center. So if you genuinely think you're not making things works, figure out how to make it better. Find a woman to mentor. If you're in a meeting, and a woman's voice isn't getting heard, help her (although, please avoid mansplaining (i.e. "What Jane really means to say is...."). If someone say some bullshit about women in your workplace, call them out on it.
Sorry for this long cri de coeur, but you guys are my peeps and the responses broke my heart. You're my guys, my people, my tribe. Can't you back us up?
For some /. examples ... (Score:1, Informative)
Just read through the comments in Four Weeks Without Soap Or Shampoo, http://tech.slashdot.org/story... [slashdot.org]
Some examples, modded to 5 stars: "She sounds hideous." "A 4 week test on something related to skin and they used a female journalist? Could by chance her skin complexion improved because of her menstrual cycle? There's about a 75% chance that she wasn't coming off of her period right before application so of course she probably noticed improvements to her skin, especially her face, over a 4 week test."
OMG, she's ... the other! Her appearance and aroma are what make her of interest to me! Menstruation! Blaaaargh cooties!
Some of the comments that were modded less than 5 were ... ummm ... well, yeah. Worse.
Seriously, folks? Seriously? Aren't nerds supposed to smart? Educated? Sensitive towards bullying?
There's an obnoxious sense of entitlement and superiority in some parts of nerd culture that isn't worthy.
Re:What the f*$# is wrong with us? (Score:5, Informative)
Please back up your assertions with some facts.
Fair enough. Please see table 7: http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub... [bjs.gov]
A statistically significant higher percentage of victims of violent crime are male, consistently, across that survey's data.
Re:What the f*$# is wrong with us? (Score:5, Informative)
I don't buy for a second that men are more likely to be the victims of violence, intimidation and other physical threats.
It's absolutely true. Go to fbi.gov and look at the stats.
Men are more likely to do all of those, but they are more likely aimed at women.
Wrong. Women do not make up the majority of crime victims.
When was the last time you worried about being raped walking home at night?
Most rape occurs between acquaintances. The prototypical "rapist with a knife" makes up a rather small proportion of these crimes. Again, fbi.gov. Facts are your friends, they help you become educated and disregard biased propaganda promulgated by political groups with an agenda. It sounds like you've been a victim of their false narratives.
Re:#notallgeekyguys (Score:5, Informative)
I did all of the above. Not murderously violent, but violent enough that I acted out in inappropriate ways.
It is safest for such men to consider *any* sexual contact outside of marriage to be rape- because it's certain that unless you have put a ring on that finger, any consent you think you have received will be revoked retroactively, and you'll be charged with rape anyway.
You do know that there hasn't been a marital exception for rape in any state for about twenty years, right?
Re:What the f*$# is wrong with us? (Score:4, Informative)
digsbo already cited the relevant reference showing that men have more to fear from others than women do, but are you really so suprised that male on male violence is more prevalent than male on female? Who gets in more bar fights? Who is the more likely victim of gang violence? There's still a stigma around hitting women, so when tempers flare in any situation, who is more likely to receive a punch to the face?
That's not how insults work. Sure, the people who started using that insult probably believed that, but words have momentum and growing up in a culture that uses some words derogatorily means you're simply more likely to use them that way when conveying an intention. That doesn't mean the user has given even a moment's thought to what's actually been said. Trying to tie this to some mental attitude towards women as a whole is weak at best.
Re:What the f*$# is wrong with us? (Score:5, Informative)