Sex and Gender? The debate continues

Just wanted to point you all to an article (and my subsequent comments) posted on FLiP (Future Leaders in Philanthropy). I'd love to hear your thoughts on the piece as well!

Naomi Wolf in a burka...

Naomi Wolf in a burka? That's what she came back with?

Harrasment of Women & Children Gamers Now Common Place

Following on with the whole "women shouldn't use technology because it takes time away from all the ironing and cooking" debate, I came across a great article on WomenGamers.com about one mother's experience of harassment on XBox Live. The GR8 clan is a group of children, between the ages of 8 and 16, and their mothers who are involved in a sort of 'after-school program'. Being a XBox geek myself, I thought this sounded like a good idea, especially if you have the sort of kid who isn't taken by more traditional after-school activities. If they refuse to leave their computers, join them! That's a great attitude.

The article explains the sort of harassment they (mothers & kids!) receive from other gamers, even when they are aware they are playing with children. The harassers argue that it's not for children and they should get out of the game. However, the M (mature) rating that allot of games are given is a recommendation and GR8 Jen explains why this shouldn't matter in a WomenGamers.com forum:

"...I just wanted to add that we do not encourage young kids to buy and play M rated games. Most of the kids in the GR8 Clan we met on games like GRAW, RB6 Vegas, and others. These kids would pop in and out of our rooms and the GR8 Clan just came to be what it is today and that is a clan that consists of some adults that watch out for these kids online. It is like a big brother big sister relationship. We have never gone out and looked for kids to join this clan, somehow they just find us.

Whether a game is rated E, T, or M no one should have to put up with some of the abuse that goes on online. I am not talking about the occasional competitive smack talk. I am talking about statements that are so disgusting and horrible I will not and cannot repeat them.

We always make are own rooms when online and when an individual comes into our room they are expected to be respectful of everyone. We do not tolerate discrimination or racism. If they can't deal with these rules then they get the boot.

The GR8 Clan has been around since 2003, and hope to be around for the kids for years to come."

Well said. It's now becoming so common place for harassment that involves sexual violence and derogatory female insults that we're just supposed to assume that this is how adults interact online. Just put up with it? I don't think so.

Treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen

Why do men insult their intimate partners? This is the title of a recent paper published in the Journal of Personal Differences. I love that there is work being done like this and that there are blogs like Freakonomics (yes, after the book) , which tell me about it.

The research found that some men who insulted their partners did so as a part of larger strategy in mate retention. I.e. as way to keep them, they insulted them. Hmm, yes, well that seems fairly strange....or does it?

It would be interesting to further look at the research and see how and when such behaviour crosses the line into abuse. Degradation and attacking self-confidence is classic abusive behaviour. But they are tactics that we all pick up casually throughout our lives, some of us just take it too far.

Also I would love to see how men learn that insulting behaviour works for mate-retention. For instance, the boy who pulls your pigtails at school because he really likes you...Does it start that young? And how do women learn to respond to it? You go home and tell your mom that so and so is teasing us and she tells you that it's really because he has a crush on you. Don't you remember feeling like your mom was full of it because it didn't make any sense that someone would be mean to you if they liked you?

More stalking of women bloggers

So apparently all us women bloggers didn't get the point with Kathy Sierra, we obviously missed the message.

A whole other round of site crashing, stalking and sexual violent threats has occurred over at Women's Space. The site's down at the moment. Heart's blog is still up though so go and take a look.

Meat? Is this supposed to be ironic?

I've recently increased my linking towards the New York Times because I only just got around to putting some key words into my Google Reader. However, this morning I was tempted to delete the feed because of this article: Be Yourselves, Girls, Order the Rib-Eye.

Now, I am aware that I'm no longer having to deal with the dangerous world of dating, so I might be slightly unsympathetic to how extreme it has become in terms of which signals you are giving out, and actually a gendered analysis of modern eating habits would have been interesting, to certain extent, but the most in depth sociological commentary we get is this:

In an earlier era, conventional dating wisdom for women was to eat something at home alone before a date, and then in company order a light dinner to portray oneself as dainty and ladylike. For some women, that is still the practice. “It’s better not to have a jalapeño fajita plate, especially on the first date,” said Andrea Bey, 28, who sells video surveillance equipment in Irving, Tex., and describes herself as “curvy.” “You don’t want to be labeled as ‘princess gassy’ on the first date.”

Is 'princess gassy' a term I should be familiar with? Are these the new insults that I don't know about because I am now the epitome of uncool? Is the New York Times in dire need of some interesting articles about the ins and outs between the two sexes? Yes.

Tags: New York Times

How Feminist Are You?

Sorry for the exceedingly long hiatus. These days I feel like more of a materialist than a feminist - wedding planning, as fun as it can be, can leave you with a bad taste in your mouth (once you've spent LITERALLY hours pondering the implications of taffeta v. chiffon).

However, as the wedding planning winds down and the ACTUAL wedding approaches, I'm excited to get back to blogging - and feministing.

My new favorite blog, Jezebel (v. post-feminist and tongue in cheek humor) just posted a link to a feminist quiz. While this quiz is, as Jezebel says, "stupid" it's nice to be reminded that feminists are people who believe in equality - EVERYONE should be a feminist (see my very first blog post).

My result is below. It's nice to be back.

You Are 98% Feminist

You are a total feminist. This doesn't mean you're a man hater (in fact, you may be a man). You just think that men and women should be treated equally. It's a simple idea but somehow complicated for the world to put into action.

Are You a Feminist?

Cultural Barriers for Women in Japan

I found this article, Career Women in Japan Find a Blocked Path, interesting in terms of how culture was referenced so many times as a reason women are finding it hard to make it up the career ladder or through the glass ceiling, pick your metaphor. Culture isn't a reason/excuse that it used very much anymore when we are discussing Western capitalist systems and how they don't fit women in.

“Japanese work customs make it almost impossible for women to have both a family and a career,” said Ms. Kurose, 45, who now works for a polyester company.

***

Experts on women’s issues say outright prejudice is only part of Japan’s problem. An even bigger barrier to the advancement of women is the nation’s notoriously demanding corporate culture, particularly its expectation of morning-to-midnight work hours.

***

Even with cases of blatant discrimination, lawsuits remain rare because of a cultural aversion to litigation.

When is the last time you heard someone talk about how American culture is what's keeping women out of management? It's the cultural aspect of women in high positions that make Wal-Mart not promote them?

It's just not a notion that is associated anymore with certain issues that are predominantly approached either from an intensely personal point of view or a legal perspective. I think it's a matter of semantics though. We might replace 'culture' with 'ethics' or 'beliefs' but the notion of culture doesn't hold strong. Perhaps 'tradition' is a more comparable word. In a sense, the notion of culture has now become alien to us. Thus how much 'culturalism' is bantered around when discussing things like international women's rights.

Autism in Girls

Very interesting article about autism and girls in the New York Time magazine

Because there are so many fewer females with autism, they are “research orphans,” as Ami Klin, a psychology and psychiatry professor who directs Yale’s autism program, puts it. Scientists have tended to cull girls from studies because it is difficult to find sufficiently large numbers of them. Some of the drugs, for example, commonly used to treat symptoms of autism like anxiety and hyperactivity have rarely been tested on autistic girls.

Read the full article here.

Thinking Blogger Award

The lovely Valiens over at A Brain Like Mine (and Big (healthy) Lunch) has bestowed on me the Thinking Blogger Award!

This has done two things: made me realize that I have to get blogging more on Figure as it has become slightly neglected in the past months AND made me realize that I need to catch up on some of my favorite blogs. It's taken me a couple days to figure out which ones really make me think and hence I haven't been reading lately because I've been too busy doing other things.

Needless to say here are my five:
Adonis Mirror - came across him while looking for posts about feminism and language.
Feminist Law Professors - I challenge anyone who isn't provoked in some way by them.
A Blog Without A Bicycle - she finally finished her thesis!

Can't think of two others at the moment, so will have to add to the list later.

Tags: Thinking Blogger Award