So Beria doesn't get in trouble, she was quoting an e-mail I sent some one off list that I forwarded to her. She had my permission to do so. :)
I adore Beria. I think she has done fantastic work. She helped Wikimedia Bangladesh get through the chapter process. She has done some really awesome projects with her chapter, including involvement with Wiki Loves Monuments. She's been there to support other women in the movement who are need help with developing networks to be effective leaders. She has done work with Indians on the gender gap related issue. She has helped make WikiWomenCamp possible, has invited other women, has participated in discussions in a way that made people feel inclusive. We don't always see eye to eye, but Beria has put aside her own ego for the good of the group and to assist everyone else in accomplishing goals.
Beria is fantastic. Is she rude sometimes? Yes. On the other hand, some times this is necessary because otherwise the voices of some won't be heard. We've seen it on this list several times: Members of the list have, while operating in good faith and for the greater good, accidentally said things that have a chilling effect and where this is ignored for the sake of keeping the peace with more vocal members. It sucks. It sucks worse when you realise the voices that are silenced are the very ones this list seeks to give voice to on Wikipedia and related projects.
Beria is just one of several women on this list I adore. I think Sarah generally does fantastic things. I think she'll do interesting things in terms of trying to help get women involved and I look forward to seeing her initiatives. She has done some truly fantastic and outstanding work with the Smithsonian that no one could fault her for. I know of a few other women on this list who are non-English speakers who have been heavily involved with educational projects , GLAM projects and projects like Wiki Loves Monuments. The secretary of WM-AU is on the list, and she's been tremendously supportive and wonderful. We're hoping to do some initiatives in the future to help improve Australian female representation on Wikimedia projects. I love Nicole from Wikihow, who also contributes to Wikipedia. She's done some great things in the primary school classroom in starting to get kids engaged with wikis and has been fantastic in helping us with WikiWomenCamp.
There are a lot of truly fantastic women on this list like Beria and Sarah. They do truly fantastic work and don't often get the credit for it. We need to assume more good faith on this list. We need to work harder to support the work these women do.
And we really need to cut out the stuff that silences women by invalidating their opinions and pitting them against each other. We need to remember that this is a GLOBAL list, with people of many different cultures, that this list is not just for one country, but everyone. We need to encourage people to come up with solutions and support those solutions.
Oh and yeah, Beria had permission to quote me. :)
Sincerely,
Laura Hale
On Tue, Dec 27, 2011 at 8:20 PM, Béria Lima
<beria.lima@wikimedia.pt> wrote:
Return food for thought:
Inferiority is not always something you feel because of a problem that
you have wrong inside you. Often times, there are systematic problems
that help reinforce this. Some people have categorically treated as
inferior. Having a male suggest this is all in the minds of female
contributors is not a useful contribution to the conversation because it
devalues the experiences of female contributors on this list, on a list
dedicated specifically to fixing these problems. We want to empower
female contributors and leaders. We want them to go back to their
communities and help work towards increasing overall participation to
Wikimedia projects and female participation to Wikimedia projects.
Dismissing real and valid concerns does not help: It hurts. A man
quoting a woman to dismiss valid concerns makes it worse. I know that
was probably not your intent. I know you probably did not intend to
cause additional hurt by dismissing valid concerns.
If we want to fix this problem, we need to remember this.
If we have women saying "I am having trouble connecting to this list.
I do not feel it represents my interests. The primary focus is on
articles of interest to a narrow audience," then we need to work to be
more inclusive. I'd love to know more about what is happening in
regards to women's related content on French Wikipedia, efforts being
made by the community to increase female participation on various
Wikimedia Foundation projects, the quality of women's related content on
French Wikipedia. We don't often have a chance to hear this narrative.
There are 115 million native speakers of the language and around 270
million people who can speak it. It is the official language in some 29
countries around the globe including France. France ranks ninth in the
amount of visitors to English Wikipedia. French Wikipedia accounts for
4.7% of traffic to ALL language Wikipedia. There is a huge potential to
grow the female participation rates and the general French speaking
participation rates on Wikimedia projects.
How can we support this? How
can we use the list to support contributors who do not speak English?
What steps can we take to make sure we are more inclusive? One of the
failings of the gender gap list is we so rarely do that. :(
_____
Béria Lima
Wikimedia Portugal
(351) 963 953 042
Imagine um mundo onde é dada a qualquer pessoa a possibilidade de ter livre acesso ao somatório de todo o conhecimento humano. Ajude-nos a construir esse sonho.
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