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Is it really any better than being a woman in the "real world?" I just read--or re-read, perhaps, as some of this sounded familiar, a paper on gender equality online by Susan C. Herring: Gender and Power in Online Communication.
Written in 2001, it's probably not news to most of us. Still, it's discouraging to note that all the problems she points out--women being stereotyped away from male-dominated sites, or girls portraying themselves in highly sexualized ways, or women receiving abuse from men--are either still around or have even been augmented in the seven years since she wrote the article.
I find it hard to articulate to some people just what the problem is with gender inequality. Why does it bug me so much when I hear a story about a woman who doesn't make as much as a man in the same job? Why is it such a big deal that there are hundred of "gag gifts" that use women's body parts as the whole joke? Why does it make me so angry when someone dismisses my opinions and feelings about something--even if it's something small? Even if I know I'm WRONG?
Each little incident seems small, unimportant, not worth getting worked up over. I just wish I could open people's eyes when they ask me that question. Then they'd see everything I see, put the pieces together. They'd know what it's like to break out into a sweat when I am walking alone and a man is walking toward me, or passes me in a car and yells at me, or pushes me against the wall in junior high to try to take something from me.
And they'd know that, even online, where I've created a space for myself, I am subject daily to ads that depict nearly-naked women, to seeing blatantly sexual and/or violent comments directed at other women, if not myself, that my opinion is not valued if it is known that I am a woman, unless I am in a female-dominated space, that I am subjected to an appallingly large number of shades of pink, that I know that at any moment, by saying the wrong thing and attracting the wrong kind of attention, I risk people coming to my "safe space" and making it unsafe--both for me and the people who, for whatever reason, like hanging out in that space.
For all that I have great hope for the future, especially knowing awesome people like you guys, I have to admit that I'm also a great skeptic.
I guess my question is--are things really better? Have the attitudes changed at all, or is it just that we've forced them into other terminology, covered them up? When a profession that was male-dominated now gets lower status because it's become associated with the feminine, is that a step forward or merely to the side?
Written in 2001, it's probably not news to most of us. Still, it's discouraging to note that all the problems she points out--women being stereotyped away from male-dominated sites, or girls portraying themselves in highly sexualized ways, or women receiving abuse from men--are either still around or have even been augmented in the seven years since she wrote the article.
I find it hard to articulate to some people just what the problem is with gender inequality. Why does it bug me so much when I hear a story about a woman who doesn't make as much as a man in the same job? Why is it such a big deal that there are hundred of "gag gifts" that use women's body parts as the whole joke? Why does it make me so angry when someone dismisses my opinions and feelings about something--even if it's something small? Even if I know I'm WRONG?
Each little incident seems small, unimportant, not worth getting worked up over. I just wish I could open people's eyes when they ask me that question. Then they'd see everything I see, put the pieces together. They'd know what it's like to break out into a sweat when I am walking alone and a man is walking toward me, or passes me in a car and yells at me, or pushes me against the wall in junior high to try to take something from me.
And they'd know that, even online, where I've created a space for myself, I am subject daily to ads that depict nearly-naked women, to seeing blatantly sexual and/or violent comments directed at other women, if not myself, that my opinion is not valued if it is known that I am a woman, unless I am in a female-dominated space, that I am subjected to an appallingly large number of shades of pink, that I know that at any moment, by saying the wrong thing and attracting the wrong kind of attention, I risk people coming to my "safe space" and making it unsafe--both for me and the people who, for whatever reason, like hanging out in that space.
For all that I have great hope for the future, especially knowing awesome people like you guys, I have to admit that I'm also a great skeptic.
I guess my question is--are things really better? Have the attitudes changed at all, or is it just that we've forced them into other terminology, covered them up? When a profession that was male-dominated now gets lower status because it's become associated with the feminine, is that a step forward or merely to the side?
