Article up at geekfeminism.org - really interested to get feedback on this one, there or here.
Two words: compulsory heterosexuality.
As so often with fannish wossnames, I have![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
randomling to thank for pushing me to this realisation/articulation. Spoilers for S1 follow.
( Spoilers for S1. )
As so often with fannish wossnames, I have
randomling to thank for pushing me to this realisation/articulation. Spoilers for S1 follow.( Spoilers for S1. )
(All of this via Chris - thanks!)
CONTENT NOTES: misogyny of all the kinds, rape culture.
First up, Adria Richards of But You're A Girl posts the eminently reasonable Forking and Dongle Jokes Don't Belong At Tech Conferences.
In summary: she was at PyCon, a technical conference on the Python programming language. Two men sitting behind her were making sexual (and sexist) jokes inappropriate for a professional setting. She tweeted photos & descriptions to the ConCom; they - to my surprise, and their credit - thanked her for bringing inappropriate comments to their attention and took immediate action.
Both gentlemen had a discussion with the ConCom, (eventually, reportedly) agreeing that their behaviour had been inappropriate - and one was eventually fired by his employer.
Sensible enough, I'd have thought, for behaviour bringing his company into disrepute in a professional setting.
Unfortunately, goes the story, 4chan disagreed... and decided an appropriate response was to launch DDoS attacks against Richards' personal website, and against her company's website.
Her company's response?
To fire her.
I suppose at least the people who thought it was a good idea to set up and sign a Change.org petition requesting that she be let go will be happy.
[Screenshot (taken ~22h15 GMT, 21/03/2013) of SendGrid's Facebook page containing an official statement, which reads: Effective immediately, SendGrid has terminated the employment of Adria Richards. While we generally are sensitive and confidential with respect to employee matters, the situation has taken on a public nature. We have taken action that we believe is in the overall best interests of SendGrid, its employees, and our customers. As we continue to process the vast amount of information, we will post something more comprehensive.]
Comments are predictably vile - in all the wrong ways. I'm sorry: I'm not wading through all 1500 comments to pull out the high- and lowlights.
SendGrid has issued a longer statement; I disagree with their position, particularly that Richards' actions in making public inappropriate behaviour were bad for the company image. Me? Well, I'd definitely have gone out of my way to recommend them - and quite probably looked for ways to give them money - if they, like PlayHaven, had acted in ways supportive of women and minorities in tech.
Unfortunately, the rest of the Internet also contains pushback. Most notably:
Ladies, gents, and everyone else: there is a reason for the Open Source Women Back Each Other Up Project and Gentlemen's Auxiliary. Actually, there are lots of reasons.
This is just one more example to add to the pile.
CONTENT NOTES: misogyny of all the kinds, rape culture.
First up, Adria Richards of But You're A Girl posts the eminently reasonable Forking and Dongle Jokes Don't Belong At Tech Conferences.
In summary: she was at PyCon, a technical conference on the Python programming language. Two men sitting behind her were making sexual (and sexist) jokes inappropriate for a professional setting. She tweeted photos & descriptions to the ConCom; they - to my surprise, and their credit - thanked her for bringing inappropriate comments to their attention and took immediate action.
Both gentlemen had a discussion with the ConCom, (eventually, reportedly) agreeing that their behaviour had been inappropriate - and one was eventually fired by his employer.
Sensible enough, I'd have thought, for behaviour bringing his company into disrepute in a professional setting.
Unfortunately, goes the story, 4chan disagreed... and decided an appropriate response was to launch DDoS attacks against Richards' personal website, and against her company's website.
Her company's response?
To fire her.
I suppose at least the people who thought it was a good idea to set up and sign a Change.org petition requesting that she be let go will be happy.
[Screenshot (taken ~22h15 GMT, 21/03/2013) of SendGrid's Facebook page containing an official statement, which reads: Effective immediately, SendGrid has terminated the employment of Adria Richards. While we generally are sensitive and confidential with respect to employee matters, the situation has taken on a public nature. We have taken action that we believe is in the overall best interests of SendGrid, its employees, and our customers. As we continue to process the vast amount of information, we will post something more comprehensive.]
Comments are predictably vile - in all the wrong ways. I'm sorry: I'm not wading through all 1500 comments to pull out the high- and lowlights.
SendGrid has issued a longer statement; I disagree with their position, particularly that Richards' actions in making public inappropriate behaviour were bad for the company image. Me? Well, I'd definitely have gone out of my way to recommend them - and quite probably looked for ways to give them money - if they, like PlayHaven, had acted in ways supportive of women and minorities in tech.
Unfortunately, the rest of the Internet also contains pushback. Most notably:
- The Pycon Code of Conduct has been edited: it now contains the line "Report the harassment incident (preferably in writing) to a conference staff member - all reports are confidential, please do not disclose public information about the incident until the staff have had sufficient time in which to address the situation." Because, of course, we have never heard of con committees who attempted to ignore or downplay reports of harassment until they were made public; and there is no value whatsoever in the grapevine that lets people know that, if at all possible, This Dude Is A Serial Harasser, Let Us Know If You Need Help Avoiding Being Alone In A Room With Him. (And then, of course, we are asked: well, why were you alone with him?!)
- Amanda Blum has decided an appropriate response is to attack Richards' decision to take the matter directly to the ConCom, rather than engaging with it personally - in the middle of a talk. Blum appears incredibly invested in a fantasy world in which sexist men behaving inappropriately, when challenged, will realise what they did and apologise. Spoiler alert: this has never, ever happened to me.
- I'm not clear why this account is hosted on pastebin (!), but it is: an awful lot of description of the poor, poor man who is suffering from a tarnished reputation because he was making a professional conference an unsafe environment for female members of his community.
- TechCrunch writes A Dongle Joke That Spiraled Way Out Of Control, again taking the attitude that Richards' reaction was an over-reaction. Spoiler: I disagree.
Ladies, gents, and everyone else: there is a reason for the Open Source Women Back Each Other Up Project and Gentlemen's Auxiliary. Actually, there are lots of reasons.
This is just one more example to add to the pile.
[meta: AtLA] Gender in The Promise
Dec. 20th, 2012 05:49 pmA noldo and kaberett production.
I watched Avatar: the Last Airbender for the first time in August 2011;noldo and mustela_nivalis were very encouraging, and very patient about my flailing.
At the beginning of season 2, I started writing fic for the first time in about eight years.
I got to the end and they pointed me at the Avatar: the Legend of Korra trailer, and I collapsed into a small puddle of hyperventilating squee.
So when The Promise was announced, I promptly put all of it on pre-order. Like, oh, pretty much every other fan with the finances to do so, I suspect.
And, d'you know, I was heartbroken. Sure, characters had the same names... but where's the Katara who, two minutes into the first episode of the first season of this mainstream USois kids' TV show, called a dude out for sexism and was taken seriously? Where's Toph interacting with Katara? Why is Mai relegated to ~the girlfriend~? Why is Sokka so bloody cissexist?
And that, boys and girls and everyone else, is when I got upset enough to go through the books and do a line-by-line count of who says what to whom.
By the power ofnoldo, I bring you the distressing results in the form of brightly-coloured graphics. So far I've only done counts for Books 1 & 2; Book 3 will follow on in the not-too-distant future. For these purposes, one "line" is approximately one speech bubble.
( Part 1 )
( Part 2 )
y so faily ;______________________________;
This show had such a great pattern of being incredibly feminist, and giving us actual complex developed - & developing! - female characters, who weren't defined solely by their interactions and relationships with the men of the series. Unfortunately - all my other issues with characterisation aside - as underlined by the statistics, that really, really doesn't carry across to the books.
Thoughts very welcome!
noldo and kaberett production.I watched Avatar: the Last Airbender for the first time in August 2011;
noldo and mustela_nivalis were very encouraging, and very patient about my flailing.At the beginning of season 2, I started writing fic for the first time in about eight years.
I got to the end and they pointed me at the Avatar: the Legend of Korra trailer, and I collapsed into a small puddle of hyperventilating squee.
So when The Promise was announced, I promptly put all of it on pre-order. Like, oh, pretty much every other fan with the finances to do so, I suspect.
And, d'you know, I was heartbroken. Sure, characters had the same names... but where's the Katara who, two minutes into the first episode of the first season of this mainstream USois kids' TV show, called a dude out for sexism and was taken seriously? Where's Toph interacting with Katara? Why is Mai relegated to ~the girlfriend~? Why is Sokka so bloody cissexist?
And that, boys and girls and everyone else, is when I got upset enough to go through the books and do a line-by-line count of who says what to whom.
By the power of
noldo, I bring you the distressing results in the form of brightly-coloured graphics. So far I've only done counts for Books 1 & 2; Book 3 will follow on in the not-too-distant future. For these purposes, one "line" is approximately one speech bubble.( Part 1 )
( Part 2 )
Summary
y so faily ;______________________________;
This show had such a great pattern of being incredibly feminist, and giving us actual complex developed - & developing! - female characters, who weren't defined solely by their interactions and relationships with the men of the series. Unfortunately - all my other issues with characterisation aside - as underlined by the statistics, that really, really doesn't carry across to the books.
Thoughts very welcome!
Avatar: the Legend of Korra, sequel series to Avatar: the Last Airbender, is now on episode 8. It's had its ups and downs, but I'm really enjoying it so far.
What I'm enjoying rather less is the fandom commentary. Unfortunately, people seem to have decided that one of the characters is trans* -- and a lot of the speculation and conversation around this topic seems to me ill-informed at best. (Obviously, I don't and can't speak for all trans* people.) Most of the points I'm making arise fromblab's essay on the topic (spoilers up to and including ep 8), but this is mostly because that's how I first became aware of the conversation, and I don't feel up to seeking out more examples.
To be clear: I'm queer and trans*, and specifically I'm non-binary (see icon!). I would love for Korra to contain trans* or queer characters. It would make my year. As a result, much of this mini-essay is deeply personal, which is why I've written it up in my own journal, rather than leaving at as a comment in a place that isn't "mine"; I'm happy for people to discuss the points I make in comments, but I ask you to respect the fact that I might not be able to engage in all threads myself.
There are two key areas I want to address in brief: the language being used in the discussion, and the actual details leading people to speculate.
Point the first: language/framing
This section is a general primer and contains no spoilers.
A lot of the language being used in this conversation is not language that trans* people tend to use about themselves. This is a pity; it would be awesome if the ongoing conversation were a little more sensitive. Particular examples include:
( Spoilers/speculation up to and including episode 8. )
Frankly, I would be absolutely astonished (though delightedly so) if even a show as generally non-faily as A:tLA/A:tLOK featured a trans* character without making it visible, as they did Toph and Teo's disabilities; and I think (again, speaking only for myself) that in order to remain respectful of and safe for trans* fans, any speculation in this area needs to remain aware of that context.
edit: I've been asked (out of band) why (or whether) I am reacting so differently to this suggestion vs queering canonically heterosexual characters. I don't inherently object to fic (or other media!) containing trans* characters (I've written some), because seeing representations of People Like Me is nice. What I do object to is the are-they-aren't-they that's going on regarding canon: this kind of speculation is used to undermine trans* people's expressed identities every day, directly and indirectly: among social circles when you're not there, as street harrassment -- if you can think of it, it happens. Consequently, seeing it done by my fandom? Makes me pretty uncomfortable.
What I'm enjoying rather less is the fandom commentary. Unfortunately, people seem to have decided that one of the characters is trans* -- and a lot of the speculation and conversation around this topic seems to me ill-informed at best. (Obviously, I don't and can't speak for all trans* people.) Most of the points I'm making arise from
blab's essay on the topic (spoilers up to and including ep 8), but this is mostly because that's how I first became aware of the conversation, and I don't feel up to seeking out more examples.To be clear: I'm queer and trans*, and specifically I'm non-binary (see icon!). I would love for Korra to contain trans* or queer characters. It would make my year. As a result, much of this mini-essay is deeply personal, which is why I've written it up in my own journal, rather than leaving at as a comment in a place that isn't "mine"; I'm happy for people to discuss the points I make in comments, but I ask you to respect the fact that I might not be able to engage in all threads myself.
There are two key areas I want to address in brief: the language being used in the discussion, and the actual details leading people to speculate.
Point the first: language/framing
This section is a general primer and contains no spoilers.
A lot of the language being used in this conversation is not language that trans* people tend to use about themselves. This is a pity; it would be awesome if the ongoing conversation were a little more sensitive. Particular examples include:
- "transman", "transpeople", "transwomen", etc. Preferred terms are generally "trans man", "trans people", "trans women", as discussed by Transkitten and recommended by Press for Change.
- speculating over whether or not someone is trans* full stop is generally considered disrespectful and in poor taste. Yes, it's different (sort of) if it's a fictional character, but some of the conversation feels to me like it's edging into skeevy Erika Moen-style fetishisation, and people need to watch that.
( Spoilers/speculation up to and including episode 8. )
Frankly, I would be absolutely astonished (though delightedly so) if even a show as generally non-faily as A:tLA/A:tLOK featured a trans* character without making it visible, as they did Toph and Teo's disabilities; and I think (again, speaking only for myself) that in order to remain respectful of and safe for trans* fans, any speculation in this area needs to remain aware of that context.
edit: I've been asked (out of band) why (or whether) I am reacting so differently to this suggestion vs queering canonically heterosexual characters. I don't inherently object to fic (or other media!) containing trans* characters (I've written some), because seeing representations of People Like Me is nice. What I do object to is the are-they-aren't-they that's going on regarding canon: this kind of speculation is used to undermine trans* people's expressed identities every day, directly and indirectly: among social circles when you're not there, as street harrassment -- if you can think of it, it happens. Consequently, seeing it done by my fandom? Makes me pretty uncomfortable.
