[UbuntuWomen] on names, language and a request for advice

[Emma Jane Hogbin]

Thank you for all of your responses to my initial email. I appreciate
the time you took to think about and respond to this issue.

Your responses indicated that indeed we are affected by language. The
way we are affected and how we choose to address the issue varied
tremendously. I've spent some more time thinking about the issue and
getting input from lots of other folks (including staff from a women's
crisis counselors that I contract computer services to). Through these
conversations I've been able to find some words which I think better
articulate my initial reaction to the name...

This is very selfish of me to say, but.... I didn't really care if
"stupidgirl" was having a stupid moment. I cared that I was having to
read "stupidgirl" repeatedly in my home while I was trying to provide
voluntary tech support. I found it invasive. For many people the
Internet is something that happens in a fairly pristine office
environment. Callous remarks can be a release from the otherwise tedious
work environment. But for me the Internet is something that I engage in
from approximately 9AM-2AM with breaks for meetings and out of my own
home office. For me the Internet can sometimes feel like an extension of
my living room and sometimes an extension of my office. Language that I
would not tolerate while providing tech support to
family/students/clients I tend not to be comfortable with while
providing tech support on-line.

If "stupidgirl" had been inactive in the channel I wouldn't have noticed
the name, and I wouldn't commented on it. But to see it repeated over
and over and over in the channel made me not want to be in the channel.
It made me uncomfortable.

For the ops to dismiss my original question as "emotional issues" drives
down to the very core of the problem. I do not believe that is my
responsibility to have a thicker skin when it comes to my gender. I will
take any amount of beating on my intelligence based on my demonstrated
abilities--but it is not ever acceptable for me to ever feel
uncomfortable because I have a vagina.

Many women choose to have a gender-neutral on-line handle. I choose to
be the same person on-line as off-line: emmajane. For those who can
distinguish between self-deprecating humour and broad strokes across an
entire community: bravo! This is something I cannot do. "stupidjew",
"stupidnigger" and "stupidgirl" all strike me equally. If they do not
strike you equally it is probably because you have been appropriately
sensitized to the issues of racial discrimination, but you have not
received the same cultural support to be equally sensitized to the
issues of gender discrimination. Perhaps it was my brief stint in an
office where racist jokes flowed into misogynistic comments about
spouses and back again that have especially sensitized me to these issues.

Having to read the words over and over again are akin to sitting in a
hostile work environment [1]. By self-identifying with derogatory
language, Aparna was unwittingly giving permission to others to use the
same language. (Homosexuals may have reclaimed the term "fag" but
"stupidgirl" is definitely not a term I am interested in reclaiming.)

I appreciate that there are members of the group who feel strongly about
freedom of speech. Which is awesome!! I am concerned, however, that it
seems to override the UW vision of a positive space for women. We agree
that language is powerful. We agree that the culture needs to be changed
to make the environment more hospitable to women. And yet we disagree
when it comes down to a specific example of derogatory language being used.


My next question to the group is this:
If it is not through the promotion of positive language, how do you
create and enhance a positive space for boys and girls and women and men
to interact within the Ubuntu software community?



regards,
emma
PS to James: I tend to go by "Emma" in person (my closest friends and
family shorten this to Em, M, EJ or MJ but never Emily, which is not my
name). The original eight letter limit of a unix account name is what
prompted me to first use "emmajane" many moons ago.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hostile_work_environment

-- 
Emma Jane Hogbin, B.Sc.
Founder, xtrinsic
phone: (519) 371-2665
web: www.xtrinsic.com

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