On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 8:46 PM, Sarah Stierch sarah.stierch@gmail.comwrote:
Daniel, I totally <3 your use of denial and hostile work environment.
Chiming in right now. Been following it since it was posted on WP:Feminism and was sickened by the conversation, so had to move on..
-Sarah
Daniel pointed to the reply to his comments as of particular interest to this list... but I think Daniel's comments themselves are just as weighted with unintentional meaning. Describing a photo of a nude pregnant woman on the [[Pregnancy]] article as potentially gratuitous in its nudity, using a euphemism for nudity, and assuming that "most workplaces" have rules against nudity demonstrate that it is difficult, if not impossible, to separate cultural biases from editorial decisions.
Since we know that the gender gap exists in many cultures, and not just the U.S. or Europe, being aware of and sensitive to specific cultural biases takes on special merit here. Far more "gratuitous" nudity is not terribly uncommon throughout Western Europe, for example, in everything from general interest magazines and newspapers to street ads, movies, other media and even in personal interaction (see [[Love parade]]).
It seems like there must be lower hanging fruit than the image of a naked pregnant woman on the pregnancy article, or an image of a vagina on the vagina article. Using the principle of least surprise as a guide, these examples should be on the lower end of the spectrum of concern.
Nathan