quote:Of course, when I went to the state finals for one of the nerd competitions I was on in high school, I was the only girl on the 10-person team, and was completely snubbed by the guys while the teacher cracked jokes about how any woman who wears comfortable shoes is a... well, I guess I won't post it here, a crude term for a lesbian. So... damned if you do, damned if you don't.
posted
Squick it *is* about being denied resources. As a female, in a technical field if you aren't being taken seriously you are often denied opportunities. You could easily be judged against for *not* going to the party, even if you didn't feel comfortable attending.
Yeah you have to live with the inequities and get on with life regardless, but are you telling me that someone shouldn't be aware that the inequities exist and figure out the appropriate actions that one should take to get the most optimum result?
quote: I agree, but bitching about it isn't going to achieve anything.
If it brings it to the attention of those who perpetuate these inequalities, I'd say it is a good way to acheive something. If you are preaching to the choir, then it doesn't acheive much except sympathy--which does have some value.
Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Way back when I was a freshman engineering student my project group was meeting in one of the guy’s dorm room. When the question of what we should wear for our presentation came up, one of the guys leered at me and indicated a lace-lingerie clad model on a poster under his loft.
I told him I thought he’d look great in it, but suggested that the rest of us wear business attire.
Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
Yep, Banna, I'm with you on this. When it comes down to it, I'm motivated and independent enough to put up with a lot of crap if it means achieving my goals.
Doesn't mean I have to like the crap, though.
I am glad to see that it doesn't look like I was overreacting, plenty of people here seem to think there's something wrong with the policy, too.
Posts: 1681 | Registered: Jun 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Oh my, and then, especially in engineering, there is the question of exactly how short or long your skirt should be for a business suit, and what color. Anything innovative is bad,because engineering is a traditional institution. It should only be black, grey, or navy. Colored blouses can be bad. Showing some leg can be good, because it will get you the job you want if some of them are dirty old men A@@holes. But the conservative married fuddyduddies, will worry about what their wives will say, because you are remotely attractive. And pants can be bad because they mean you aren't traditional or feminine enough. (Though these days I'd say to heck with it and wear pants anyway.)
posted
Wow, yeah, that would be tough for me. I can't remember the last time I wore a skirt.
With the places I'd like to work at, I'd be worrying more about what neon color I should dye my hair to fit in. Posts: 1681 | Registered: Jun 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
This specific instance is not about dnying resources. As I said, the party itself and the "bring three chicks - get in free" policy isn't intrinsically sexist. It takes on that character because of the background context that it's occuring in.
I agree that, overall, women not being treated seriously is a problem. In this specific instance, I can easily see the side of the people throwing the party and I don't think there's anything to be achieved.
If you can come up with something productive than can be done in this particular case, I'd be both amazed and supportive, but the thing is, they're geeks and they're guys. There's just not that much to be done about that.
I'm a single man. I enjoy attractive female company. When I go to a party, regardless of the background, I'm looking to enjoy myself and will do so more if there are attractive women around. I'm not going to appologize for that. I also try to judge people on the abilities that are revelant to what I'm judging them on. Most of the world doesn't. I'm sorry that this is the way things are and I'm board if you've got a way to change it, but I'm not going to blame people who are throwing a party for trying to make it a fun party, just like I don't get upset when bars have ladies' nights. They're taking advantage of fundamental social imbalances in order to further their goals. I'm not going to be the one to say that they should shoot themselves in the foot by avoiding to do so.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote: If tech geeks weren't horny, there wouldn't be internet porn. Let's face it, in the most sweeping, demeaning, but often too true, generalization, most of the heterosexual tech geeks out there are attracted to anything remotely resembling the female form cause they don't get any very often, they are two busy with their code.
Yes, I would expect them to be checking out my T&A. (I guess that's what I mean by objectifying, checking me out and sizing up my physical attractiveness and assets and detriments.) And yes, I *would* use them checking me out to my advantage, to start up a conversation if it was someone I knew had technical expertise that I was interested in knowing more about. I would also expect that I would be resented by a non technical companion to said geek because once you get a geek talking tech talk they won't stop.
So, basically, objectification is when someone sees someone else as sexually attractive for their physical attributes.
Let me be honest and upfront and say that I totally loathe the term 'objectification'. To me, it's a totally sexist description of male sexual attraction. You can say that it applies equally to men and women, but let's face it, it's almost exclusively applied to when men find women's bodies beautiful. It connotes men somehow being unable to see women for anything other than as sexual creatures and connotes that doing so is, a priori, 'bad'.
I get really annoyed with members on this forum because it seems like the same flippin' things are said sixty million times and no one listens. To repeat a point that's been made repeatedly on this forum many times, just because men can see women as sexual beings doesn't mean that they can't see them for their other attributes. Men seeing women as physcially beautiful doesn't, as one poster commented upthread, mean that we're going to assault women and rape. As has been noted a billion times, rape/assault is an action of power that is done regardless of how someone looks, k?
But let's leave that aside and assume that I don't know what I'm talking about. I put to you that the basic question at the root of 'objectification' is whether or not men have control over their desire. If men do have control over their desire, then this renders the problem of 'objectification' inert because if men can desire a woman and then stop that desire and speak to her in a non-sexual fashion, there is no problem. On the other hand, if men can't control their desire, then this renders the problem of objectification inert since it's just descriptive of a force of nature. Why get angry at a dog for being a dog?
To speak to the thread subject, I don't think the party is going to cause men to look at women in general, or zeugma in particular, any differently. I think the request for more women is a recognition that many men in CG are lonely than that they can't see women for qualities other than sexual. I agree with AJ that all zeugma has to do is open her mouth and make it clear to those men that are slow on the uptake that she's more than just a body and everything will be cool.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
| IP: Logged |
quote:So, basically, objectification is when someone sees someone else as sexually attractive for their physical attributes.
This isn't the problem. The problem comes when women are given advantages because of their looks that should have nothing to do with sex. Like choosing a more attractive woman over a more qualified woman. Though, honestly, I don't know to what extent this actually happens.
quote:Why get angry at a dog for being a dog? [Wink]
Because we expect them to be human.
Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote:Though, honestly, I don't know to what extent this actually happens.
There are a hundred studies that show that tall, attractive people of both sexes earn more, get hired more often, and are better served than their counterparts.
For the party, any party you have to pay to attend sounds lame. If they have to beg for people, why are they having it? I HATE the forced parties at conferences, which I why I don't like attending conferences with co-workers. When I go by myself, I can duck out and find the guy playing the piano in the empty room down the hall. Much better.
[ March 03, 2005, 04:08 PM: Message edited by: Lady Jane ]
Posts: 1163 | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged |
And kat, the tickets don't cost money, they're just to control the number of people there. They get some big-name music acts, so they have to regulate it.
Posts: 1681 | Registered: Jun 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Are you even going to bother responding to what I posted or just ignore everything?
quote: quote:So, basically, objectification is when someone sees someone else as sexually attractive for their physical attributes.
This isn't the problem. The problem comes when women are given advantages because of their looks that should have nothing to do with sex. Like choosing a more attractive woman over a more qualified woman. Though, honestly, I don't know to what extent this actually happens.
Correct. If bias is shown, THAT is the problem. Desire does NOT mean that bias will be shown. Appreciation for the physical form does NOT mean bias will be shown.
posted
Stormy, I don't like the word "objectification" either. But there are those out there who believe it is inherently bad which is why I used it, because it *would* be happening at the party. I am not necessarily one of them. I'm not opposed to the sex industry, and believe prostitution should be legalized, regulated for safety and taxed. I love nudes, both male and female. Lol, my friends even have pictures of me looking at Playboy centerfolds. My favorite nudes are athletes though. There is a reason why I like watching the Tour de France on TV. <grin>
But, in another time and place, the majority of the guys in CG would have been in monastaries, and the women would have been in convents. I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing either. With sex mostly out of the equation, then they can have healthy friendships without all of the social/sexual complications and it makes relationships with either sex much simpler. Look at the rise in Aspergers' and Autism in Silicon Valley because geeks are reproducing. While I enjoy sex as much as anyone, I have serious reservations about reproducing myself, especially since both my significant other and I score extremely high into Asperger's ranges on self-tests.
Loneliness is a personal problem even if it may apply across a group. While good for the sake of the party itself, bringing more women to a party is an extremely shallow, temporary fix, and in the long run can cause more harm than good. It allows them to *not* deal with their personal social problems and pretend that they don't exist. It isn't that they can't control their sexual appetites. I would expect them to be able to. It's that the entire party is so artificial and that it perpetuates skewed notions of intelligence and sexuality across the board, with both sexes that is the real problem.
(A friend of mine went last year to present a paper, actually)
One of my friends is attempting (somewhat devil's advocate) to defend possible reasons for the industry's policy.
Posts: 1261 | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote: Are you even going to bother responding to what I posted or just ignore everything?
I didn't ignore what you said. I only responded to the things I had something to say about. My point is that if objectification is nothing more than finding someone attractive, I agree with you that there is no problem. If there is bias, there is a problem. We apparently agree.
Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Neat, Siggraph is in Boston next year, on my side of the country. I am SO there.
Of course, what'll happen, once again, is I'll get an internship in San Francisco next summer, leaving me on the wrong coast.
Well, if I do get to go, I'll be sure to record my party experiences here. I could make a whole experiment out of it, vary my clothing and such... Posts: 1681 | Registered: Jun 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote: Loneliness is a personal problem even if it may apply across a group. While good for the sake of the party itself, bringing more women to a party is an extremely shallow, temporary fix, and in the long run can cause more harm than good. It allows them to *not* deal with their personal social problems and pretend that they don't exist. It isn't that they can't control their sexual appetites. I would expect them to be able to. It's that the entire party is so artificial and that it perpetuates skewed notions of intelligence and sexuality across the board, with both sexes that is the real problem.
I do not understand why trying to get more women to come to a party perpetuates 'skewed notions'. I'm sure the geeks at the party would be overjoyed to have intelligent geek girls there. Honestly, every geek I know loves geeky, intelligent girls.
Again, my whole point is that just because men like women sexually doesn't mean that they can't percieve women's minds, and like them, too. Really, ladies. Our drool cups do not runneth over.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
| IP: Logged |
quote: Again, my whole point is that just because men like women sexually doesn't mean that they can't percieve women's minds, and like them, too.
I agree... to a point. I don't think the party situation indicated, by its very nature, gives much credence to a woman's mind and could cause situations where drool cups *do* run over. I don't think it is the "geeky" girls that are being encouraged to attend by this policy. I think it is the vapid eye candy types that would show up, because they are so clueless that they wouldn't care that every third word would be over their heads. And some tech people can be happy ending up with these types. (But, I have seen drool cups run over, before so it does happen. Every single guy in my engineering class drooled over a particular, smart beautiful girl in it and watched every move she made. The rest of us girls got to hear all about how wonderful she was and how perfect her body was... And if I was a guy, I would have been drooling too, she was beautiful by any standard.)
And ask every single geeky woman on this forum. While many of us have found stable relationships, it is a very arduous road to tread to find one. Yeah decent geek guys will like you and respect you, but it is nearly always in a sisterly fashion. If someone is in awe of your mind they are nearly always too intimidated to ask you out, due to the usual geek lack of self-confidence about anything social. Then there are the sleazy geek guys, the ones you have to watch out for, and they don't wear name tags.
posted
"Yeah decent geek guys will like you and respect you, but it is nearly always in a sisterly fashion. If someone is in awe of your mind they are nearly always too intimidated to ask you out, due to the usual geek lack of self-confidence about anything social."
If it's any consolation, this applies in reverse, too.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Lol, Tom, you are right. One of my major regrets from college is that there are a couple of guys I didn't ask out. But with the one guy that I did, it created a bit of awkwardness later when we attempted to define the relationship. He had enough masculine pride that while we are still friends, I think part of the reason why the relationship never worked out was because it wasn't the old fashioned way.
posted
Not to mention it applies to things other than intelligence - looks, money, position, status, etc.
How many men are comfortable with the idea of their wives making six figure salaries while they stay at home?
How many men would be comfortable approaching a mind-blowingly beautiful woman without wondering "yeah, what could she see in a freak like me?"
The short, sad story is men (for the most part) are not emotionally mature adults and we will continue to define ourselves by social convention and our own biases.
And lest we wander too far down one side of the gene pool - women can be every bit as shallow and narrow-minded as the men.
quote: I agree... to a point. I don't think the party situation indicated, by its very nature, gives much credence to a woman's mind and could cause situations where drool cups *do* run over. I don't think it is the "geeky" girls that are being encouraged to attend by this policy.
All that was said was, what, three women and you get in free? I don't recall the specification be that they be good looking or dumb. This does not say anything at all about women's minds. Zero. Nada. Nothing. This is my point. I think it is an assumption that because men are acting on their sexual impulses in wanting women to come that they would not, or cannot, or fosters their inability to see women for anything else or render them blind to a woman's other abilities> And why wouldn"t geek girls come to meet geek guys or just to talk shop or whatever and get a foot in the door?
quote: And ask every single geeky woman on this forum. While many of us have found stable relationships, it is a very arduous road to tread to find one. Yeah decent geek guys will like you and respect you, but it is nearly always in a sisterly fashion. If someone is in awe of your mind they are nearly always too intimidated to ask you out, due to the usual geek lack of self-confidence about anything social. Then there are the sleazy geek guys, the ones you have to watch out for, and they don't wear name tags.
I don't know what to say to this. Speaking as a geek guy, I have never, ever seen this. Any woman that shows even the vaguest interest in comic books or RPGs or science fiction is snatched up by their fellow geeks so quick they get whiplash. The only thing I can think of is that you're speaking of non-geek guys and you just thought they were geeks. Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
| IP: Logged |
quote: And ask every single geeky woman on this forum. While many of us have found stable relationships, it is a very arduous road to tread to find one. Yeah decent geek guys will like you and respect you, but it is nearly always in a sisterly fashion.
I never had much trouble finding a guy willing to think I was teh awesome. But he was usually geeky in some way. I might have had a lot of trouble finding a *non* geeky guy to think the same of me, but then, that never interested me much. I likes my geeks. Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Stormy, I think we agree more than we disagree here. I think we agree in general, but are just applying different criteria to this situation. I'm not a man-hater by any stretch, nor am I trying to knock men in general. I just believe this situation would bring out more unhealthy negatives than positives for everyone concerned.
As far as my situation in particular and several of my friends, I think it is because we are/were UberGeeks. If guys are coming to you for help with class homework problems, they are far less likely to ask you out. I had to have a guy who was *extremely* secure in his own identity so that he wasn't threatened or intimidated by me. Which indeed I ended up with, but not easily.
I also do think that the situation improves and people become more secure in themselves as they age. So perhaps the same guys that wouldn't ask me out at age 22 because they thought I was too far above them, and had me on a pedestal that I never asked to be on, would ask me out at age 30, when they realized that I didn't deserve to be on a pedestal any more than anyone else. It happened to me once already, with a guy I knew in CA. But, although it was basically gratifying to hear that he told me he'd made a mistake back then in not pursuing a relationship with me, it was too little, too late, now. I have a companion I'm extremely happy with and I'm not going to throw that away!
posted
Storm, I think the difference is that even geeks have their standards. (Not speaking of you specifically, AJ. You're hot. ) We're as attracted to eye candy as any jock; we just can't usually get it. If a female geek is also moderately physically attractive, then yes--she'll be snapped up immediately. If she's not, then at least some of the guys will hang back hoping for someone better. Conversely, some geeky guys assume that anyone good-looking is taken, and ignore really attractive women (except to secretly ogle) on that basis.
Oh, and it may make me a geek to say it, AJ, but it looks to me like most of the traits of Asperger's are positive rather than negative. To heck with social interaction! Give me people who can think straight!
Posts: 1114 | Registered: Mar 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
"it looks to me like most of the traits of Asperger's are positive rather than negative"
Hm. To me, they seem positively crippling. Not being able to sense and respond to the emotions of other people in an appropriate way seems to me like a cruel and debilitating disease. Then again, I'm so extroverted that my sense of self extends fully twenty feet from my body; it's been known to knock over houseplants.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
quote: Then again, I'm so extroverted that my sense of self extends fully twenty feet from my body; it's been known to knock over houseplants.
Tom, I love you!
See I'm extroverted, in that I like interacting with people. But part of the reason I enjoy it, is because they are so mysterious to me. I don't *get* many of the visual clues. I score horribly on those faces/emotions tests. But I like a challenge so I enjoy it. I very much go off verbal cues, more so than physical cues. I have to consciously apply logic to the physical cues so that I intepret them correctly.
posted
I know you're not a manhater or anything like that, AJ. Unfortunately, you're getting some of the discharge that should be going to other people, I think. Pardon.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
Tom, I don't pay a lot of attention to other people, especially emotionally. I find having to deal with their emotions draining. If we could interact with each other on a more rational level--if I didn't have to constantly worry about people taking offense or not listening because they're depressed or whatever--I'd have a lot fewer problems and be a lot less introverted.
Yeah, I know--I wouldn't care about having fun then anyway. But it's a nice theory.
Posts: 1114 | Registered: Mar 2004
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Taunt]](graemlins/taunt.gif)
![[ROFL]](graemlins/rofl.gif)
Tom, I love you!![[Grumble]](graemlins/grumble.gif)
But it's a nice theory.
