An Open Letter to the Open Source Community (Melissa Draper)

[Eric Dunbar]

On 23/05/07, Matt Zimmerman <mdz at ubuntu.com> wrote:
> On Tue, May 22, 2007 at 04:01:32PM +0100, Robert McWilliam wrote:
> > This was one of the examples Melissa gave as well (though indirectly).
> > I don't want to prove your point about how terrible this community is
> > in defending sexism, but: Can someone tell me what is offensive about
> > that joke? It relies on there being differences between males and
> > females which can make dealings between them hard, but I don't get how
> > that can be offensive since that is also (partly) what Melissa is
> > saying.
>
> The punchline of the joke is "for men, relating to women is so difficult as
> to be impractical---even for an omnipotent deity".
>
> The message is "don't bother trying".
>
> It's easy to overlook bias when you aren't on the receiving end.  As an
> exercise, rewrite the joke using roles to which you've been sensitized
> yourself.  For example, to say that your best friend's age, ethnic
> background, religion, income level, sexual preference, etc. is
> incomprehensible to someone of your own persuasion.

My take on the joke (which I found humorous) is that its
appropriateness all context dependent. In a public forum NOT dedicated
to personal relationships it's inappropriate, especially in the way
the joke was titled. Even in sounder it would be completely out of
line. However, in a bar or entertainment venue it would be perfectly
acceptable (the title is disparaging, regardless though).