I agree that discussion is a good starting point. It sometimes happens that when people bring up issues like this (related to gender, race, class or whatever) they might actually have a point. It might require us to behave differently in the future.
[quote=“branko, post:20, topic:965”]
if you don’t like whatever you think is ‘partriarchal’ about this place, feel free to suggest changes. If you need a moderator badge, let me know. [/quote]
I don’t think it’s any more patriarchal here than in any other geeky/ techie forum. I do recognise that in general women & men are treated differently in the world. Most countries are deeply patriarchal
Even if we are all super enlightened post-feminists here, luxuriating in our liberal democracies, with this particular project I think there is a certain responsibility to make sure the content is as helpful to women as it is for men. Particularly in North/West Africa & the Middle east
It would be good to hear from Rachel on this thread too. It sounds like it’s her area of responsibility…
I’m more interested in what you believe is partriarchal about this forum, rather than a generic treatment on Wikipedia. When I say what you believe, I don’t mean “provide evidence or it didn’t happen”. General thoughts and opinions are just fine.
This seems unnecessary. A description of what mensa does is sufficient.I would also loke to pick at your tone, but have recently learned there is no place for that in discussion.
I disagree as outernet has started. Also gender equality in the content is a valid concern.
Discussion is what moves"this type of thing" from being “this type of thing” to something useful. This is the place for opinions in general.
This seems unnecessary regardless of if its true.
The act of suppressing views contrary to ones own is not an exclusive attribute of patriarchal societies. The literal term patriarchy has little to do with the actions taken by the society. The feeling behind your point is valid but you havent expressed it well.
Agreed.
Agreed about labels. I got a mod badge!
Discussion is absolutely essential to groups of individuals growimg as a community.
Agreed about this in general, but curious about specifics. For instance, what changes can the company make to be more accomodating towards that? As far as I see its about the content that gets broadcast more than the individuals who comprise the outernet team.
It’s absolutely about the content for me & the content is dependent on the content selection process.
@almabella is the first (obviously) female person I have spoken to on this forum, so I think it’s fair to assume the voting mechanism will have a similarly high proportions of men.
I’d suggest investigating alternative decision making systems to simple voting, some variant of deliberative democracy
https://www.loomio.org/ which I have mentioned before would be an off the shelf, free platform that would probably make better & more inclusive decisions about content. You could say that ‘blocks’ were only valid for 7 days if people started holding things up too much.
So if you are the only woman voting in our overwhelmingly male online community you at least get a chance to have a say. We might still ignore you, but at least it would be a bit more transparent
Definitely a fair assumption. I like to think that the comtent selection process will be more accessible to the average person. If this were 5he case people with all types of experience could contribute.[quote=“sam_uk, post:24, topic:965”]
I’d suggest investigating alternative decision making systems to simple voting, some variant of deliberative democracy
https://www.loomio.org/ which I have mentioned before would be an off the shelf, free platform that would probably make better & more inclusive decisions about content. You could say that ‘blocks’ were only valid for 7 days if people started holding things up too much.
So if you are the only woman voting in our overwhelmingly male online community you at least get a chance to have a say. We might still ignore you, but at least it would be a bit more transparent
I stuck an example one up here so people could see how it works: Outernet should use Loomio for selecting content
[/quote]
I must have missed when you mentioned this before. I definitely like it. @branko this is the sort of thing I was thinking of when I said ‘forum-based’. Obviously this would be a piece of the system. Also @branko does Rachel have a presense on the forum?
Which is indeed on my short list. You are welcome to get started with it without watiing for me, though. You can alwasy get ahold of me here if you need me for something (e.g., official endorsement or some other form of assistance).
Which brings us back to the topic of anonymity which I still believe is highly relevant.
Yeah, that part generates the data. However, we still need to crack open one more piece and that’s the actual broadcasting, which I’ll talk about in a different thread soonish.
In short, it shifts the focus from who to what. Downside is, of course, that some people tend to act in a funny way when they know their identify is not exposed, but yeah… it’s a matter of weighing the benefits against possible issues. For now, one thing I know for sure is that a voting system is not a very good fit for completely anonymous site.
Hello everyone! I apologize for my earlier absence in the conversation. First, let me thank you for all of your input. I just jumped in, so please allow me to carefully read everything before I address the topics raised. I take feedback very seriously, so I want to give your comments proper attention.
I decided my response would be a good opportunity to open the floor to suggestions for content related to this topic, so I made my response a new discussion thread: We Moved!. I did my best to answer your questions and address your concerns, and I’d like to continue our conversation and hear your thoughts.
