Yeah, it has that cool stuff, but I'm talking specifically about people who aren't scientists (or weren't) or didn't have that much money but did want the geek cred.
I've bought my share of cool stuff from there also. But I've also found that I could get it cheaper elsewhere.
What I did like was that they used to have bags of air for padding with a print of Timmy the Monkey holding his breath on it, and the caption was "Free Monkey Breath". That was a cute touch.
"Safe" is relative. I don't feel threatened by anyone on Slashdot, whether or not they ask about my tits.
And as I've shown here, I'm perfectly capable of standing up for myself. More women would do well to do the same rather than crying to everyone about how men hate them.
No, trolls are trying to get a rise out of you. Most men are perfectly okay with your presence for the same reason that they're okay with most women: because both sexes aren't dominated by assholes.
Misogyny? Maybe. It was directed at me, not all women.
There's a difference between "gendered insults" and "insults directed at one because of her gender". The former exists to knock at any insecurities a person might have. The latter is sexism.
I prefer to think it's the former and not the latter.
I'm not sure which feminist talking point to espouse to combat your lack of belief in my chromosomal configuration. Maybe that Slashdot isn't a safe space for women? Maybe an old boys club mentality that keeps women out?
Would it please the court if I just took the easy way out and called you a shitlord?/sorry if my sarcasm isn't evident
I remember when I was in college over 15 years ago, I was a sometime-goth and would buy dresses from Hot Topic because it annoyed most of the student body (where I went, the population was mostly black, or white kids trying to act that way).
I was at one point I was gossiped about, and was called a witch, Satan-worshiper, that sort of thing. Which was a rumor I loved so very much because it kept the Jesus freaks just far enough away that they didn't try to convert me.
Even after I outgrew the whole goth thing, I started finding it disappointing that Hot Topic was turning more into Spencer's. Not that I think being "goth" is any less eye-roll-worthy (I was as pretentious a kid as anyone, and I'll gladly take shit for it) as "stoner", "hipster", "preppie", "geek chic" or whatever, though it's disappointing to see that kind of outlet for kids who want to do that sort of thing devolve and go away.
Of course, I went through a "Think Geek" phase as well, which is more or less the same thing: "Look at the nerdy toy/t-shirt I bought from Think Geek! I am SO a nerd!" Nowadays, I roll my eyes at the two-years-post-college-age kids I know because they're trying just as hard as I did back then to make damn sure the world sees them that way.
I wouldn't interrupt it for anything, because it wouldn't do me or them any good anyway. I simply tell them that I'm going to be archiving their posts from Facebook and showing the feed to them ten years from now, because it's going to be fun watching them realize how right I was when I kept referring to them as "kids".
On top of this, practicing writing is GOOD for children. It keeps their hands able to communicate with writing when the battery runs out of whatever device they have handy.
I'm tired of MRAs being the boogeyman of feminists looking for someone to blame everytime a tampon slips out of joint.
Oh, was that sexist?
Or did I get to say that because I'm a woman and not "punching down"?
Feminists are allowed to "disown" or "hide" any of their own rank that doesn't play along with the narrative (such as: #killallmen or the SCUM manifesto). Do MRAs (the quiet, non-extremist variety) not get the same benefit of the doubt? Is that really equality, women?
When was the last time you actually talked to someone claiming to be an MRA, rather than just shouting them into silence before actually listening to their points of view? Or do you just blindly listen to The Mary Sue and Jezebel, because they've never shown any biased reporting, right?
This isn't because I'm an MRA (I'm an egalitarian; there's room at the table for everyone with a gender-based axe to grind). I'm just annoyed with feminism needing any enemy to latch the hate onto every time someone dare criticize a woman for anything, instead of, you know, dealing with it like grownups do.
Especially since Eve Ensler wrote a piece that is supposed to be empowering to women that condones not only rape, but statutory rape.
So, feminism, can I broad-brush blame you for that? Is that okay?
Even worse, when it's a man saying it, it's "mansplaining", but when a woman says it, it may carry some authority, or some may even claim it's "internalized misogyny".
Apologies for length but this issue is sorely getting on my nerves.
I realize that the goal of a lot of these campaigns and whatnot is so that we develop gender-blindness so that women can succeed, yada-yada, but when was the last time that the submitters actually asked any women who frequent this site how they feel.
The alarming frequency of how much I hear about how women in tech need to be helped because OMG sexism!!! is really standing on my very last nerve (and this isn't just in tech, it's in a lot of areas...in the past two weeks, on my Facebook feed alone, I saw a semi-famous internet guy shilling the "poverty is sexist" hashtag and coordinating charity because "women are affected more by poverty than men", the church I just quit put out a fact sheet that men were 95% of perpetrators of domestic abuse, and in addition to Hack Reactor's generous need-blind deferment of tuition, they're now offering scholarships to women...all of which I find to be dubious, or at best moderately short-sighted, to say nothing of the fact that anyone who would question the goodness and purity of the intentions behind any of these MUST be an MRA, which is a group I find to be wildly misunderstood anyway). Never mind all the pro-woman people I know who aren't even in tech pushing the wage gap myth.
It's almost like there's a concerted campaign out there to get people tilting at windmills or something.
Okay, I'm not a typical woman, bear in mind - a number of my "guy friends" like to point out I come across as more male than female, sometimes even more they themselves do. But hear me out for a little bit.
The issue as I see it is not that there isn't sexism - there most certainly is, and yes, I've experienced it. The issue is that all of this fear-mongering is wildly and substantially overblown.
I will say it again. YES, there are sexist men out there. YES, not enough people call it out. YES, there is real injustice out there.
BUT:
YES, women can be sexist too, and I find all of these alarmist cries of sexism to be making it all worse, not better. Women become suspicious of men, and start to believe that 10% of M&Ms are poisonous garbage. Suddenly all men are suspect, and what's that called? SEXISM. But either way, there isn't nearly as much sexism or even as many bad-actors as you might think out there, and if you think so, stop watching so much television.
YES, not enough people call it out, but what do you really think people are supposed to do about it? Most people don't want to get caught up in other people's drama, because if they do, they don't know how to handle it. If we all knew how to tackle all the world's problems, we wouldn't HAVE problems.
YES, there is plenty of injustice in the world, but if we keep drawing arbitrary lines, like male vs. female, then what's going to happen is we're always going to look for those dividing lines everywhere. If all you're looking for is faults, eventually that's all you're EVER going to see. More than that, it doesn't help with equality or gender-blindness. It fact, it's counter-productive. It makes one side suspicious of the other. It creates warring factions.
You can have equality - a notion that assumes women are capable of all the things that men are, including handling their own problems - or you can have the notion that women are somehow handicapped and need gentler handling. Pick one. Pick only one. You can't have both. Not yours.
Women, if you want to be respected in tech, show up, do good work, be reliable and dependable, and for the love of Christ, stop pointing out that you're a woman. Far fewer people care that you're a woman than you think, they just want to make sure deadlines are met and profits are made. Making it about sexism doesn't make a conducive working environment and you're not helping ANY other women at all. And if sexism is so pervasive that you can't succeed, leave. Sometimes the best thing you can do is admit that the problem is much bigger than you. There ar
I have a slightly more, shall we say, nuanced but generally agreeing position, in that much in the way I associate with people that are referred to as "hackers", are really people that are simply curious and want to learn how to do things, but in general aren't interested in doing anything criminal with that information.
And that's a GOOD THING.
I've had to explain to a few people why knowing about things like Trojans and rootkits, and lockpicking and social engineering is GOOD in the hands of good people who can use it to defend against people who aren't nearly as good.
It's better than sticking your fingers in your ears and saying "lalalalalala bad things won't get me if I just ignore them".
I'm a neurotic workout fiend. I have been since I was in my late 20s.
Bear in mind, I wasn't an athletic kid. Not because I had no inclinations, I just lacked confidence and being an introvert didn't help matters much.
So I took up martial arts - any kind anyone would teach me - and my husband would tell me the difference was unbelievable. Much better than just trying to run alone or work out in my basement. Apparently, it wasn't just being in shape that was affecting me: it was also the fact that I would interact with people, and once I knew what I was doing, I'd be able to teach newcomers as well. I also slept better at night and lost weight. It's physical AND mental.
I'm not saying all introverts have to do this, but I become intolerable if I spend too long coming home at night just to sit and watch TV until bedtime. Hubby's come to accept that I have to work out at least five days a week, at least two hours a night, in order to maintain this. And that's fine with both of us, but for anyone to assert that I might be a special case hasn't ever taken part in an athletic activity which promotes interaction with other people.
You'd find that people who aren't training to be pros, but work out that much, are probably more common than you think.
Can the women who never asked for a ring join as well?
I mean, I asked him, too, so I was never entitled to one, but still, I'd very much like to befriend your wives so we can high-five each other for being awesome.
Slashdot Mirror
*takes a bow* I'm not on my game often with internet sarcasm. So glad to see it appreciated.
Agreed, life is interesting. Cheers, mate. :-)
Yeah, it has that cool stuff, but I'm talking specifically about people who aren't scientists (or weren't) or didn't have that much money but did want the geek cred.
I've bought my share of cool stuff from there also. But I've also found that I could get it cheaper elsewhere.
What I did like was that they used to have bags of air for padding with a print of Timmy the Monkey holding his breath on it, and the caption was "Free Monkey Breath". That was a cute touch.
Nothing like an AC calling me a retard.
So tell me, when you piss your pants, do you have your mommy change them for you, or are you a big boy now with your pull-ups?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Yeah, I know, I think it was okay that I went through pretentious phases, and even that my younger friends do too.
It's sometimes necessary to figure out who you are.
Me? I like being cheap nowadays. Irregular? Plain? Unprinted? SOLD!
"Safe" is relative. I don't feel threatened by anyone on Slashdot, whether or not they ask about my tits.
And as I've shown here, I'm perfectly capable of standing up for myself. More women would do well to do the same rather than crying to everyone about how men hate them.
No, trolls are trying to get a rise out of you. Most men are perfectly okay with your presence for the same reason that they're okay with most women: because both sexes aren't dominated by assholes.
Misogyny? Maybe. It was directed at me, not all women.
There's a difference between "gendered insults" and "insults directed at one because of her gender". The former exists to knock at any insecurities a person might have. The latter is sexism.
I prefer to think it's the former and not the latter.
Whatever. I'm hard to offend.
I'm not sure which feminist talking point to espouse to combat your lack of belief in my chromosomal configuration. Maybe that Slashdot isn't a safe space for women? Maybe an old boys club mentality that keeps women out?
Would it please the court if I just took the easy way out and called you a shitlord? /sorry if my sarcasm isn't evident
Demands like that from an AC are exactly the kind of turn on that makes a girl want to do naked camera stuff, but I think I might pass today.
But thanks for the vote of confidence. I'm sure you're dashing and suave yourself, honey-child.
I remember when I was in college over 15 years ago, I was a sometime-goth and would buy dresses from Hot Topic because it annoyed most of the student body (where I went, the population was mostly black, or white kids trying to act that way).
I was at one point I was gossiped about, and was called a witch, Satan-worshiper, that sort of thing. Which was a rumor I loved so very much because it kept the Jesus freaks just far enough away that they didn't try to convert me.
Even after I outgrew the whole goth thing, I started finding it disappointing that Hot Topic was turning more into Spencer's. Not that I think being "goth" is any less eye-roll-worthy (I was as pretentious a kid as anyone, and I'll gladly take shit for it) as "stoner", "hipster", "preppie", "geek chic" or whatever, though it's disappointing to see that kind of outlet for kids who want to do that sort of thing devolve and go away.
Of course, I went through a "Think Geek" phase as well, which is more or less the same thing: "Look at the nerdy toy/t-shirt I bought from Think Geek! I am SO a nerd!" Nowadays, I roll my eyes at the two-years-post-college-age kids I know because they're trying just as hard as I did back then to make damn sure the world sees them that way.
I wouldn't interrupt it for anything, because it wouldn't do me or them any good anyway. I simply tell them that I'm going to be archiving their posts from Facebook and showing the feed to them ten years from now, because it's going to be fun watching them realize how right I was when I kept referring to them as "kids".
Yeah, see, it's easier to deal with something that's wider-spread and more innocuous than a concentrated real problem.
Lack of perspective FTW!
Now where'd I keep that Sub-Etha Thumb?
Don't have mod points, but if I did, I'd call this post "Interesting".
Seconded.
On top of this, practicing writing is GOOD for children. It keeps their hands able to communicate with writing when the battery runs out of whatever device they have handy.
So, he's not allowed to say he's not, but because everyone says he is, then that's good enough for you?
Good to know that mob mentality is the source of all truth.
For fuck's sake.
First of all, Aaron Clarey himself says he's not an MRA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Second of all, so what if he was?
I'm tired of MRAs being the boogeyman of feminists looking for someone to blame everytime a tampon slips out of joint.
Oh, was that sexist?
Or did I get to say that because I'm a woman and not "punching down"?
Feminists are allowed to "disown" or "hide" any of their own rank that doesn't play along with the narrative (such as: #killallmen or the SCUM manifesto). Do MRAs (the quiet, non-extremist variety) not get the same benefit of the doubt? Is that really equality, women?
When was the last time you actually talked to someone claiming to be an MRA, rather than just shouting them into silence before actually listening to their points of view? Or do you just blindly listen to The Mary Sue and Jezebel, because they've never shown any biased reporting, right?
This isn't because I'm an MRA (I'm an egalitarian; there's room at the table for everyone with a gender-based axe to grind). I'm just annoyed with feminism needing any enemy to latch the hate onto every time someone dare criticize a woman for anything, instead of, you know, dealing with it like grownups do.
Especially since Eve Ensler wrote a piece that is supposed to be empowering to women that condones not only rape, but statutory rape.
So, feminism, can I broad-brush blame you for that? Is that okay?
Even worse, when it's a man saying it, it's "mansplaining", but when a woman says it, it may carry some authority, or some may even claim it's "internalized misogyny".
Apologies for length but this issue is sorely getting on my nerves.
I realize that the goal of a lot of these campaigns and whatnot is so that we develop gender-blindness so that women can succeed, yada-yada, but when was the last time that the submitters actually asked any women who frequent this site how they feel.
The alarming frequency of how much I hear about how women in tech need to be helped because OMG sexism!!! is really standing on my very last nerve (and this isn't just in tech, it's in a lot of areas...in the past two weeks, on my Facebook feed alone, I saw a semi-famous internet guy shilling the "poverty is sexist" hashtag and coordinating charity because "women are affected more by poverty than men", the church I just quit put out a fact sheet that men were 95% of perpetrators of domestic abuse, and in addition to Hack Reactor's generous need-blind deferment of tuition, they're now offering scholarships to women...all of which I find to be dubious, or at best moderately short-sighted, to say nothing of the fact that anyone who would question the goodness and purity of the intentions behind any of these MUST be an MRA, which is a group I find to be wildly misunderstood anyway). Never mind all the pro-woman people I know who aren't even in tech pushing the wage gap myth.
It's almost like there's a concerted campaign out there to get people tilting at windmills or something.
Okay, I'm not a typical woman, bear in mind - a number of my "guy friends" like to point out I come across as more male than female, sometimes even more they themselves do. But hear me out for a little bit.
The issue as I see it is not that there isn't sexism - there most certainly is, and yes, I've experienced it. The issue is that all of this fear-mongering is wildly and substantially overblown.
I will say it again. YES, there are sexist men out there. YES, not enough people call it out. YES, there is real injustice out there.
BUT:
YES, women can be sexist too, and I find all of these alarmist cries of sexism to be making it all worse, not better. Women become suspicious of men, and start to believe that 10% of M&Ms are poisonous garbage. Suddenly all men are suspect, and what's that called? SEXISM. But either way, there isn't nearly as much sexism or even as many bad-actors as you might think out there, and if you think so, stop watching so much television.
YES, not enough people call it out, but what do you really think people are supposed to do about it? Most people don't want to get caught up in other people's drama, because if they do, they don't know how to handle it. If we all knew how to tackle all the world's problems, we wouldn't HAVE problems.
YES, there is plenty of injustice in the world, but if we keep drawing arbitrary lines, like male vs. female, then what's going to happen is we're always going to look for those dividing lines everywhere. If all you're looking for is faults, eventually that's all you're EVER going to see. More than that, it doesn't help with equality or gender-blindness. It fact, it's counter-productive. It makes one side suspicious of the other. It creates warring factions.
You can have equality - a notion that assumes women are capable of all the things that men are, including handling their own problems - or you can have the notion that women are somehow handicapped and need gentler handling. Pick one. Pick only one. You can't have both. Not yours.
Women, if you want to be respected in tech, show up, do good work, be reliable and dependable, and for the love of Christ, stop pointing out that you're a woman. Far fewer people care that you're a woman than you think, they just want to make sure deadlines are met and profits are made. Making it about sexism doesn't make a conducive working environment and you're not helping ANY other women at all. And if sexism is so pervasive that you can't succeed, leave. Sometimes the best thing you can do is admit that the problem is much bigger than you. There ar
I have a slightly more, shall we say, nuanced but generally agreeing position, in that much in the way I associate with people that are referred to as "hackers", are really people that are simply curious and want to learn how to do things, but in general aren't interested in doing anything criminal with that information.
And that's a GOOD THING.
I've had to explain to a few people why knowing about things like Trojans and rootkits, and lockpicking and social engineering is GOOD in the hands of good people who can use it to defend against people who aren't nearly as good.
It's better than sticking your fingers in your ears and saying "lalalalalala bad things won't get me if I just ignore them".
Eh, if you're on an internet forum and you're really that concerned about people who downmod you, maybe you should take up martial arts yourself.
Maybe because one is more satisfying than the other.
I'm a neurotic workout fiend. I have been since I was in my late 20s.
Bear in mind, I wasn't an athletic kid. Not because I had no inclinations, I just lacked confidence and being an introvert didn't help matters much.
So I took up martial arts - any kind anyone would teach me - and my husband would tell me the difference was unbelievable. Much better than just trying to run alone or work out in my basement. Apparently, it wasn't just being in shape that was affecting me: it was also the fact that I would interact with people, and once I knew what I was doing, I'd be able to teach newcomers as well. I also slept better at night and lost weight. It's physical AND mental.
I'm not saying all introverts have to do this, but I become intolerable if I spend too long coming home at night just to sit and watch TV until bedtime. Hubby's come to accept that I have to work out at least five days a week, at least two hours a night, in order to maintain this. And that's fine with both of us, but for anyone to assert that I might be a special case hasn't ever taken part in an athletic activity which promotes interaction with other people.
You'd find that people who aren't training to be pros, but work out that much, are probably more common than you think.
True, but then again, we wouldn't want those un-American heathen atheists to go unchecked, would we?
Can the women who never asked for a ring join as well?
I mean, I asked him, too, so I was never entitled to one, but still, I'd very much like to befriend your wives so we can high-five each other for being awesome.
I'm not sure I'd call it a biological imperative. Only because I'm not sure what you mean by "biological", or for that matter "imperative".
"Compulsion" work better here.
Were I feeling a trifle sinister, I'd say AC was justifying 2 using 3.
As it stands, I'm calling it a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Here's to the soft bigotry of low expectations!