Great points Moriel - thanks for contributing to the discussion.
When this mailing list was a hot bed of discussion a few years back a number of us tossed around the idea about media projects to tackle systemic bias. Such as photography competitions related to women, women subjects, whatever. I'm still sure exactly what that would comprise of yet, but, we did find it a fun idea to have something like "Wiki Loves Women" instead of Wiki Love Monuments - but again, no clue what that would entail and the name still needs tweaking :)
I really look forward to seeing how this works out for the LGBTQ events in June - where we have more than just photos of revelers at gay pride festivals :)
-Sarah
On Wed, May 14, 2014 at 3:05 PM, Moriel Schottlender moriel@gmail.comwrote:
My very brief contribution (in between exams) with something I think deserves emphasis: if we agree that women and non-heterosexual-men are already underrepresented, then having whatever representation we already have be sexualized produces the exact opposite result to the equal representation we aim for.
Isn't the entire point that we want to represent women, and not the heterosexual fantasy of women?
There are enough places that seem to insist women are only their bodies, for men's approval. If the goal of the community is to encourage more women to feel like they belong here, we don't need another picture to emphasize that overwhelming trend.
If all in all the representation was equal, then one such photo probably wouldn't have bothered us. And yet, it is, by far, not equal.
We might be there at some point in the future, where these discussions could be focused on whether or not sex in general has a place, but we're not there yet. On May 14, 2014 2:09 PM, "Ryan Kaldari" rkaldari@wikimedia.org wrote:
I believe it's a subject of much debate (even among feminists), but some of the basic ideas are covered at http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Sexualized_environment
Ryan
On Wed, May 14, 2014 at 10:43 AM, Nathan nawrich@gmail.com wrote:
On Wed, May 14, 2014 at 1:23 PM, Valerie Aurora < valerie@adainitiative.org> wrote:
Hi folks,
I'm going to point out that posting sexually objectifying photos of people of any gender or sexuality in a venue that is intended to be equally accessible to all is still inherently discriminatory towards women specifically. This is because the sexualized imagery occurs in the context of widespread misogyny and sexism which includes the sexual double standard for women, the objectification (in a very literal sense) of women in sexual situations, and a much higher prevalence of sexual violence against women than men (I don't know the stats for people who don't identify as either but I'm sure they aren't good either).
In other words, because the vast majority of humans alive today live in cultures where sexual attitudes about women are so negative, bringing up sex in a venue like this immediately creates a hostile environment for women. I am repeating some of what Sumana already wrote, just being very clear that pictures of male cheesecake or sexualized photos of homosexual men also create a hostile environment for women.
Other venues are a different matter. It is indeed possible to create a safer and more welcoming environment in which sex can be discussed or displayed with less or no harm to women, but Picture of the Day is not it.
This is something I have to explain constantly to tech startups here in the Bay Area, comprised often of mostly men who think there's nothing wrong with literally covering the office walls with penis jokes because "we're making fun of male genitalia, so that can't be sexist towards women." These attitudes have real and lasting harm, both for Wikimedia project participation and content, and for many other areas of society.
-VAL
This is something that I don't really understand, but I'd like to. However I won't ask you to explain, since it's probably not a great use of your time, but could you point me to some concise discussion of why sexual or sexualized imagery of any kind is inherently discriminatory against women? Is this a commonly accepted viewpoint in academic feminism? Is there an easy way to draw a line between discriminatory and non-discriminatory imagery? (i.e. is a beach selfie of a woman in a bikini posted to Instagram discriminatory, regardless of intent?).
Thanks for any references someone can provide where I might find answers to those questions.
~Nathan
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