Hi Mina,
I am sorry, but what gender transition of minors and Covid-19 lockdowns have to do with
Wikimania?
I don't have problems with people with alt-right views attending Wikimania. I have a
problem when a discussion of safety at Wikimania turns into a discussion about gender
transition of minors and Covid-19 lockdowns (both are extremely unlikely to happen at
Wikimania in Singapore but are very popular discussion topics within alt-right groups).
The truth is that bathroom harassment comes way more often not from the fact that trans
people can go to bathrooms matching their identities, but from people who decide to
control strangers' gender in bathrooms
:
https://www.vox.com/2016/5/18/11690234/women-bathrooms-harassment
If the problem is harassment, then it should not be tolerated no matter the gender in your
passport. And I very much hope nobody will have to show their passport to access a
bathroom because it will just make everybody unsafe.
Mykola (NickK)
29 червня 2023, 10:22:35, від "Mina Theofilatou" < saintfevrier(a)gmail.com
>:
Hi Lodewijk and Claudia and thanks for your replies.
Apologies if I used the wrong word in my original email: I agree with you that the
situations I am describing are not harassment per se, so I used the word
"discomfort" in the description of what I meant. Sincere apologies to any list
members who may feel offended, that was not my intention. I was merely relaying the
concerns of my friend, to the extent that they sounded reasonable to me.
As for your further comments, which go so far as to name me "transphobic", well
that is one of the reasons I have distanced myself from the Wikimedia Movement at this
stage. I had distanced myself in the past too, after an incident at Wikimania in 2016
which caused me severe discomfort (seems that "harassment" is a sensitive word
so I will avoid it, even though it was acknowledged by T&S that it was indeed that. I
got an apologetic email in private, even though I had specifically requested that any
communication be public as was the incident. Z, if you're reading, I'm all for
public communication when the issues being discussed have been initiated in public. To cut
a long story short, I'm certain that the "Code of Conduct" and
"friendly space policy" guidelines would command that shouting at and
intimidating a fellow Wikipedian in a public space in the presence of many Wikipedians and
a T&S staff member is not acceptable. Noone stepped in to stop the offender on the
spot, not even the T&S employee: they just watched while I was being shouted at. I
made a complaint and after months of investigation I managed to elicit a response from the
"investigating" team. I had no choice but to make it public so I uploaded a
screenshot of the email to Commons. I've linked to the screenshot below to help you
understand what I am talking about, and why I have little confidence in Trust and Safety).
I gradually gained back my confidence in the movement and participated for another four
years, i.e. 2017-2021, but when I realised in 2022 that NPOV has gone totally out the
window I'm through with the Movement.
Back to the "transphobic" name-calling: it seems that anyone who expresses the
slightest concern about gender policies is easily branded as transphobic. Some even go so
far as to brand them as "alt right". Blaire White, an extremely attractive and
happy trans woman who is calling out the pressure being exerted on minors to transition at
ages when the brain is still developing, is "transphobic". Scott Newgent is
"transphobic". "What is a Woman '' is a documentary for
"transphobics". Johanna Olson-Kennedy, who publicly addressed parents at a
conference saying that "the good thing about double mastectomies is that if the girl
regrets at a later point in her life, she can go ahead and get breasts" is a
"hero". Why am I going into such detail? Well because two of the participants in
this list encouraged me to write an article on Wikipedia about it. Have you any idea how
difficult it is to express so much as an inkling of "the other side of the
story" to a "contentious topic"? But isn't that what NPOV is supposed
to be about? Any attempts I have made to add this simple sentence in a neutral manner with
a reliable source to Johanna Olson-Kennedy's article was met with rapid reverts and
even a deletion discussion. The result was "keep", but do you really think I am
willing to expend more time and energy on edit-warring over edits that used to be
perfectly acceptable? Same for my efforts on John Ioannidis's page: one of the most
highly cited researchers in the world is being blatantly slandered for his objections to
lockdowns during the Covid-19 crisis. By whom? By a certain globally unimportant doctor
who goes by the name of David Gorski. Ever heard of him? Oh, but on Wikipedia his blog
"Science Based Medicine" seems to be the epitome of reliability in anything from
Covid to transgender procedures on underage girls.
I look at the history of articles. I also look at discussion pages, and quite frankly
these are currently the most effective ways of obtaining reliable information on
Wikipedia. So in one such session, when I looked at the history of "John
Ioannidis" and noticed that I was not the only one trying to "inject" some
NPOV into the Covid-19 paragraph of the article, I checked the contribs of the other
editor and saw that he had edited the page "Irreversible Damage". That's how
I learned about that book, which I ordered and read, along with TRANS by Helen Joyce (a
notable author with an article on Wikipedia). Interestingly, Gorski was involved in this
issue too: one of the co-founders of SBM had written a positive review for
"Irreversible Damage: the Transgender Craze Seducing our Daughters", and the
review remained on the website for seven months. Then, after seven months the article was
taken down and a slandering ensued. Are we supposed to believe that the science behind the
book changed 180 degrees in seven months?
Returning to the original issue, hmm. If everyone at Wikimania is so quick to be offended
by the slightest concern about gender policies, then perhaps it's better if we
"""transphobic"""",
""""conservative"""",
""""alt-right""" folks (lots of quotation marks) simply
not attend? I will relay this to my friend. It has been an enlightening discussion, thank
you.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/02/Resolution_for_report_o…
Χωρίς
ιούς.www.avast.com
On Thu, Jun 29, 2023 at 1:39 AM effe iets anders <effeietsanders(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Hi Mina,
It can always be appreciated when people engage in respectful conversations about complex
issues, and I can imagine this can be uncomfortable. I would not consider myself an expert
on this issue in any way, and I can't speak for the organizers. The possible
encounters that you're describing in your latest email feel of a different order than
the "incidients (sic) of harassment by males who identify as women" that you
referred to earlier. I think with those harassment incidents, the organizers have been
rather clear: harassment is unacceptable in any gender combination, in any situation. I
hope this is at least clear.
What you're describing in your more recent email sound like practices that are a bit
far-fetched (I cannot recall encountering these men performing such a "frequent and
non-offensive action in men's restrooms" over my many years of using men's
restrooms) but I can't be certain whether this is perhaps commonplace in other
settings. I'm not sure how constructive it would be to exchange references to reliable
sources supporting claims whether the behavior your friend fears, indeed is at all
commonplace - but I would invite you to at least reflect yourself how common these
incidents are compared to equally serious incidents that do not involve any
gender-identification concerns, and whether you would feel those sources are solid enough
that you would feel comfortable adding them to a Wikipedia article.
I hope you can appreciate that the organizers create a trans-inclusive environment where
people don't have to rely on other peoples' judgement in deciding whether their
gender is "correct" in respect to how they look. I am also assuming that any
attempt to spell out a detailed policy on what is acceptable in bathrooms will quickly be
met with exceptions and edge cases that will be uncomfortable to some. The more important
cornerstone to me is the general Friendly Space policy and code of conduct which applies
to this event:
https://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/2023:Friendly_space_policy
and
https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Policy:Code_of_conduct_policy . These provide
general principles that you could interpret in specific situations, rather than trying to
legislate every possible hypothetical. Important elements that I would consider in this
case: "Be respectful in all interactions and communications. Be aware of your impact
and how your contribution (messages, discussion, comments) may be affecting people. "
and "Treat other people with respect".
Finally, I find it interesting that you choose to apologize for explicit language and
perhaps mistaking the name of a department, but not for the possible feelings of rejection
that your email could invoke with community members that might fall under your description
of "AMAB individuals who self-identify as women". I hope you can imagine this is
likely an uncomfortable conversation to them at least, and acknowledging this may not be
enough, but is at least a small step towards this welcoming environment for everyone.
Best,
Lodewijk
On Wed, Jun 28, 2023 at 2:57 PM Mina Theofilatou <saintfevrier(a)gmail.com> wrote:
OK so I've finally found some time to sit at my computer and write a proper reply. I
will refrain from addressing Z.'s concerns on my eligibility as a scholarship
recipient (and all the related sarcasm) for Wikimania 2023 as I have already replied to
that on the renamed thread "selection criteria".
I read through the comments on gender policy in this thread and I'm afraid that I will
have to be somewhat explicit to get my point across.
I am 56 years old (my friend interested in attending Wikimania23 is several years older)
and I have been to many conferences on four continents, I'd say over a hundred (not
all Wikimedia-related of course). I am a cis-gender woman - apologies if I'm not using
the right terms, until recently "woman" or "female" was enough to
describe what I am - and naturally I have used dozens of women's restrooms (and locker
rooms occasionally). Not once have I experienced a disturbing incident involving a man or
male in a space designated for women because quite simply, I have never seen a man - a
male-presenting individual, that is - using the space (except for the occasional
"emergency", whereby the male uses the women's toilet and apologises for
doing so if he encounters a woman while "relieving" himself. I've had to do
the same on a few occasions in the men's toilets). Such was the situation in the
pre-self-identification era. It is very possible that throughout the years I have
encountered trans women in the women's restrooms without even being aware of it: a
female-presenting trans individual in a space designated for women is naturally, perfectly
acceptable and no cause for concern.
In the era of self-identification however, an individual who presents as a man - with a
beard etc. features of a male physique - can self-identify as a woman (female) and proceed
to use spaces designated for women. So, in the hypothetical case that this man who
identifies as a woman exits the bathroom stall with his penis in his hand, shaking off the
extra urine (apologies for being explicit) - a frequent and non-offensive action in
men's restrooms, especially those with urinals - encounters a woman and the woman is
offended, would she be entitled to express her discomfort to Trust and Safety? (apologies
if the name of the dept has changed, that's the name I remember). Or would she get a
reply along the lines of "we understand that you feel offended and that you
experienced discomfort from the encounter, but our gender policy is self-identification
and this man identifies as a woman so (s)he can use the women's restrooms and
there's nothing we can do about it".
Same goes for AFAB individuals who are female-presenting but identify as men. A man using
the men's toilets may feel discomfort at the sight of e.g. period blood and pads
(again, apologies for the explicitness!) in a stall.
I have tried to describe the issue as respectfully as possible. Again, apologies for being
explicit, it was inevitable. I do agree that *generally* Wikipedians are respectful of
others and would *generally* not intentionally cause discomfort to others using
gender-designated toilets - or worse yet, go so far as to harass - but if norms of common
decency were self-evident to everyone, there would be no need for a Trust and Safety dept
in the first place.
Best,
Mina
Χωρίς
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On Sat, Jun 24, 2023 at 8:25 AM Željko Blaće <zblace(a)mi2.hr> wrote:
Dear organizers - for the (self announced) transparency plan commitment of publishing list
of scholarship grantees in May - it would be useful to do it at least in June as we are
almost in July.
It would also likely reduce the number of repeating questions.
Best Z. Blace
On Sat, Jun 24, 2023 at 7:15 AM Mohd Sayeed <sayeed8545(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Did u get the scholarship?
On Sat, Jun 24, 2023, 12:05 AM Aryan Kumar Paswan <pradipguhilote(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
trip to singapore kindly share list of candidate and is it free of cost?
On Fri, Jun 23, 2023, 22:52 Wikimania <wikimania(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hi everyone,
Many of you are starting to plan your trips, and we’ve been receiving a lot of questions
related to travel to Singapore: visas, vaccines, hotels, weather… We invite you to take a
look at our Travel page on the Wikimania Wiki, with subpages for e-visas, attendee
information, and accommodations. Feel free to leave a message on any relevant talk pages
or reach out to us at wikimania(a)wikimedia.org if anything is unclear or incomplete.
To highlight one point–many countries are visa-free for Singapore, but everyone needs to
fill out a Singapore entry card before arrival. Also Singapore requires a yellow fever
vaccine from many countries–please see if yours is on the list!
Best,
Butch Bustria
On behalf of the Core Organizing Team
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