[hackerspaces] Women in Makerspaces

Fri Jan 18 01:47:46 CET 2013

Being told to "watch your tone/be nice" is text-book silencing
behavior, and something Feminists deal with regularly:
http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Tone_argument

On Thu, Jan 17, 2013 at 6:14 PM, Matt Joyce <matt at nycresistor.com> wrote:
> Madam please do not attribute anything I do to my "privileged social
> position".  It is both insulting to me, and my privileged social
> position.
>
> -openfly
>
>
>
> On Thu, Jan 17, 2013 at 4:12 PM, rachel lyra hospodar
> <rachelyra at gmail.com> wrote:
>> I do not wish to descend into trollish sniping.  This issue has been
>> recurrent lately on the Noisebridge mailing list as well, and I think it is
>> an important one. I feel strongly that this kind of bickering can be a
>> smokescreen to lead us away from important discussion.
>>
>> While it may be revolutionary for men like bilal, or ghandi, or mlk, to be
>> nice, or wooshy, (i think it is... and an important revolution too!!)....BUT
>> i assert that it is, in my place and time, equally revolutionary for me to
>> be firm.
>>
>> Further, Matt, my nuanced understanding of kyriarchy tells me of course that
>> you are oppressed.  We all are.  When your problems are the subject of
>> discussion, I will be happy to listen.  It is an artifact of your social
>> position that you expect to make them a focus here when we are actually
>> talking about something else.  I do not bring up your privileged social
>> position because we are now switching the focus to you.  I bring it up to
>> highlight the ways in which your experience, and thus your wisdom, are
>> limited.  That is why I don't value your opinion about this.
>>
>> R.
>>
>>
>> On 1/17/2013 3:55 PM, Matt Joyce wrote:
>>>
>>> Both ghandi and mlk got a hell of a lot done being nice.
>>>
>>> If you are going to run around pissing people off, don't mistake their
>>> dislike of you for any sort of gender or race based hatred of you.
>>>
>>> Also, the next time someone gives me shit for being white, male, and
>>> straight I am going to go out of my way to educate you on the heritage
>>> of irish hatred that plagued this nation in years past.
>>>
>>> For the record,  I have not oppressed anyone today.  You on the other hand
>>> have.
>>>
>>> -Matt
>>>
>>> On Thu, Jan 17, 2013 at 3:43 PM, Al Billings<albill at openbuddha.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Lyra++
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Al Billings
>>>> http://www.openbuddha.com
>>>> http://makehacklearn.org
>>>>
>>>> On Thursday, January 17, 2013 at 3:41 PM, rachel lyra hospodar wrote:
>>>>
>>>> It might be an artifact of your social position in Amerika, Mr. Joyce,
>>>> as a white cismale who presents heteronormatively, that you believe
>>>> 'being nice' carries no added cost.
>>>>
>>>> Or it's an artifact of my position that any dissent is automatically
>>>> regarded as socially unacceptable - since women are always supposed to
>>>> 'be nice' and in fact in professional settings are statistically more
>>>> frequently punished, reprimanded, and fired for displaying the same
>>>> 'assertive' behaviors which are rewarded in men.
>>>>
>>>> When I find myself surrounded by people who evidence an informed respect
>>>> and understanding for me, my people, and the enormity of our oppression,
>>>> i find it
>>>>
>>>> so
>>>>
>>>> much
>>>>
>>>> easier
>>>>
>>>> to be nice.
>>>>
>>>> Yes, in general, I think people should be nice. Should women who are
>>>> being spoken to condescendingly be nice? How nice? How about people of
>>>> color who are being spoken to in a racist manner? How about trans
>>>> people being subject to hate speech? Where is the line?
>>>>
>>>> I think *you* should be nice, because Amerika has heard plenty of your
>>>> flavor of truth. I think I should be honest.
>>>>
>>>> R.
>>>>
>>>> On 1/17/2013 2:51 PM, Matt Joyce wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Cost nothing to be nice to each other.
>>>>
>>>> On Thu, Jan 17, 2013 at 2:46 PM, rachel lyra hospodar
>>>> <rachelyra at gmail.com>  wrote:
>>>>
>>>> "It could be that she host a class about e-textiles or whatever it is
>>>> females like to talk about."
>>>>
>>>> *headdesk*
>>>>
>>>> protip - sometimes women focus on the textile stuff *because* then they
>>>> can
>>>> be in a group that is at least 15% women. The Feminist Hacker Hive that
>>>> meets up at noisebridge has found that there is a tipping point - if a
>>>> critical mass of women are present in conversation, they don't get
>>>> interrupted by clueless neanderthal types.
>>>>
>>>> I used to make a living as a carpenter, welder, and construction manager.
>>>> I
>>>> left that work because of gender and age based disrespect.
>>>>
>>>> I sniffed around the edges of Silicon Valley but didn't dive in for the
>>>> same
>>>> reasons. I do work in soft circuitry now, but it's not because rigid
>>>> circuits are too difficult. It's a brute-force solution designed to avoid
>>>> people as condescending as you, david.
>>>>
>>>> If the tech industry truly wants to innovate on things like interface we
>>>> could do with re-examining how people interact, and what we are really
>>>> seeking. To do that, though, we have to change the culture.
>>>>
>>>> R.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 1/17/2013 8:26 AM, David Powell wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> At Baltimore Hackerspace we have been 100% male until last month. We had
>>>> the occasional Female come through the door but for whatever reason they
>>>> never come back. We now have exactly 1 female member and about 20 male
>>>> members. The males ALWAYS go out of their way to make the place more
>>>> female friendly. For example we try hard not to use inappropriate
>>>> language around females. Whenever they show a desire to learn something
>>>> we stop what we are doing and teach them whatever it is they want to
>>>> know. At the end of the night when they are leaving we always have
>>>> someone walk them to their car so they feel safe.
>>>>
>>>> I highly encourage all members of our space no matter what their gender
>>>> is to make it their own. For example we have Programmers, Electronic
>>>> Engineers, Mechanical Engineers, Accountants, Students, etc. and you can
>>>> pick anyone person from any of those backgrounds and they could tell you
>>>> a subject that they just don't care about. So if a programmer wants more
>>>> programmers to talk to and hang out with I encourage them to send out a
>>>> few e-mails and become more active online in order to help find more
>>>> people interested in programming. I don't however expect the mechanical
>>>> engineers to go find programmers if they have no interest in learning to
>>>> program.
>>>>
>>>> I would say the same should be true with the female/male issue. If a
>>>> hackerspace has one female and she wants more females in the hackerspace
>>>> then she should start a campaign to find more females. It could be that
>>>> she host a class about e-textiles or whatever it is females like to talk
>>>> about.
>>>>
>>>> If a female in the hackerspace wants to be on our board I would gladly
>>>> accept them but I would hold them to the same standards as I hold
>>>> everyone. As a board member you are "Responsible" for the future of the
>>>> hackerspace. This means a lot of work that really sucks. For us it is
>>>> not just making decisions but actually getting the work done. For
>>>> example we need brochures made to hand out to people who are coming
>>>> through our door for the first time and at special events. Ok we voted
>>>> that we need those. Now what? Well, someone has to actually design and
>>>> make the things. But we don't have a budget to just pay a designer. So
>>>> the person in charge of making it happen has to find someone with the
>>>> talent to make it happen or figure out how to do it themselves. "But I
>>>> just want to hack" is usually what most people say. Nobody wants to
>>>> actually do anything the is important. They want to do what is fun at
>>>> the time.
>>>>
>>>> As the president I spend about 40 hours a week making sure the finances
>>>> are straight, making sure our social media is up to date, sending out
>>>> request to try and get us stuff that we can't afford, making sure the
>>>> place is clean for the next wave of new people who come through the
>>>> door, making sure the projector works for the classes we host, making
>>>> sure the refrigerator gets stocked with soda. I could keep going.
>>>>
>>>> My point is it does not matter what gender you are. It matters whether
>>>> or not you actually do work which contributes to the future of the
>>>> space. If you want more women then go find them. If you want more say in
>>>> what is going on then offer to help take care of some of the task that
>>>> need to be accomplished.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
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-- 
Chris Hardee
10BitWorks
San Antonio Hackerspace
10bitworks at gmail.com
http://10bitworks.com/