[Gendergap] Hello and a (small!) manifesto

[Andreas Kolbe]

> On Wednesday, February 02, 2011, jidanni at jidanni.org wrote:
> > K> our "mascot"? An overtly sexualized, large-breasted woman who people
> > K> regularly draw in bikinis and maid costumes? I mean, I know
> > K> Wikipe-tan is not actually The Problem. But she's the most egregious
> > K> example I think we have of the sort of unconscious "boyzone" culture
> > 
> > Ah, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipe-tan .

> I had never seen that, and now that I have I find it embarrassing for Wikipedia.

I agree; my wife's reaction was "Urrgh", and she points out that if you go 
to the youtube channels of our 14-year-old son's mates, you find that sort 
of image there. ;)

But first things first: I am Andreas, self-employed, living in the UK; have 
been editing WP since 2006 (I think), as User:Jayen466. I mostly edit in the 
area of new religious movements, with a bit of German history and popular 
music on the side.

My wife is my business partner and, frankly, sometimes resents the degree 
to which I get sucked into Wikipedia (as I do myself); it's not something
she'd ever want for herself.

However, she has written a couple of music articles. She is a former music 
journalist and says the thing that turned her off most about trying to 
contribute here was that her first article was deleted within hours, because 
it had a key word that set off a bot (the article cited three mainstream 
press sources that had in-depth coverage of the subject). The comments by 
the new-page patroller made it clear to her that he hadn't even read the 
article. Her second article was speedied by a new page patroller within 
minutes of her first clicking Save, while she was still in the process of 
expanding the article and adding sources. This patroller is a chap who, 
somewhat unusually, has awarded himself eight barnstars on his user page – 
one of them patting himself on the back for the fact that "You play whack-a-
mole with terrible new pages like no one I've ever seen! Awesome!" He made 
himself look ridiculous in her eyes, and she resented having to discuss 
music with someone who clearly had none of the prerequisites required to
judge the notability of the topic concerned, and just seemed keen to get 
another deletion under his belt in his private whack-a-mole fantasy. 

I helped her out, and both articles eventually made DYK, but my wife's 
enthusiasm was permanently dimmed. While she can live with the clunky mark-
up language, she would have welcomed a different attitude towards new 
contributors. 

I think women react differently to incidents like this. A bloke will dig his 
heels in and on some level relish the pissing contest, and if need be waste 
three hours online on it. 

A woman will think, "I can't be bothered to waste my time arguing with that 
ignorant twerp", and go and do something else – and remember that WP ain't 
worth her time. In this way, enthusiasm is killed very quickly.

This is just anecdotal evidence, but it may mirror the experience of many
other people.

Best,
Andreas