Thanks for excellent comments. I should have been more specific than saying "trashed" and said the flyers were torn down, per article: "The DAAP edit-a-thon was not met without opposition on campus, as promotional fliers for the event were repeatedly torn down and replaced with a satirical “Wiki Dudes” poster featuring Martin Luther King Jr., Jesus, Albert Einstein and Abraham Lincoln."

The good news is that on so many fronts and issues, not just Wikipedia, women are fighting back and that's the important thing... So overall I'm an optimist! :-)

On 5/4/2015 6:10 PM, Ellie K wrote:
1. Thank you, Carol Moore dc, for writing an excellent response to what (I agree) was a very silly and irritating comment at the  http://blog.wikimedia.org/2015/05/01/meet-the-inspire-grantees/ post.

2. Regarding the edit-a-thons, you said:
> Hmmm, looks like some guys even object to edit-a-thons, trashing their posters on campus... http://www.newsrecord.org/news/students-combat-gender-imbalance-online/article_fd100a5c-e13c-11e4-9d73-d3ef3275ba46.html

Actually, the male students didn't trash the wiki women posters, but made and posted separate "wiki dudes" posters of their own.  The NewsRecord post said that doing so didn't constitute a Title IX violation, yet.  

I find it kind of disturbing that male students would feel the need to react that way, by making the wiki dudes posters. It is obvious that there is less coverage of women in Wikipedia than of men, and that most notable figures in American and European (in fact, global) arts, history and science have been men, who have received plenty of attention and biographical scholarship already!  

The fact that the anonymous male students went to the trouble of creating separate posters, rather than vandalizing the existing wiki women posters, indicates a level of forethought that is beyond mere impulse trolling.  If I were to wear my politically correct hat, I would say that even members of the patriarchy realize and acknowledge that there is more scholarship devoted to notable men than notable women. The truly oppressive patriarchy would believe that that is appropriate, and go about their business. Do the wiki dudes guys truly believe that men are being overshadowed and under-represented on Wikipedia and elsewhere, I wonder? If so, that demonstrates a troubling lack of awareness of reality, especially on a college campus. 

I don't have any suggestions for remedying the situation, nor am I condemning anyone's actions e.g. for "making men feel marginalized"; I suspect that these men are deliberately choosing to marginalize themselves. It is just a remarkably peculiar reaction to wiki women edit-a-thon's, and I hope we don't see more of it.

~Ellie Kesselman a.k.a FeralOink


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