[TriLUG] Work Meeting on Diversity, Jan 22nd 1:00pm

[MG Monza via TriLUG]

Good lord!

Thank you for this and for all the permutations.  Dostoevsky could not
have delineated more how that stupid term "diversity" works it way
down through a human consciousness.

Why stupid, you ask?  Because all the connotations, all the emotive
aspects of that word point exclusively towards making the resident
group feel comfortable, making them feel their background checks out
with whatever liberal tendrils they choose to let fly (or not).

For those of us with an immutable stake in this issue, that concept is
absurd. It's an up-and-down issue of citizenship rights. The vital
right to support ourselves, to earn our own living on an open market,
for whatever our talents will bring. So much so that, as some of you
may know and some of you may recall, there were laws enacted because
the majority of American citizens were being deprived of these rights.
The reason the laws were even considered and passed (women were and
are still excluded for the most part, but that's a whole 'noter story)
were because the enfranchised part of America knew its rights were
worthless if selectively enforced.

That was when jobs were plentiful and employers running scared.  Fast
forward forty years and two generations of wholly-owned media, two
generations of intentionally created job shortages and that concept's
been lost.  A few men realize the injustice and sheer waste of the
exclusion of the talents and brains of over half the human race, but
most reflexively claim the higher salaries and prestige that exclusion
gives them.

For women, that exclusion takes the form of always reminding us of our
place as capable of being defined as things, not people.  The
psychological term for that is objectification.  In this still very
unequal society, men can objectify women but women cannot objectify
men.  The way that's done is through sexuality.  All of the one-way
words to degrade a person sexually are male-to-female;  it's the use
that men make of women sexually that defines them and never the other
way around.  One pivotal court case, Ellison v. Brady, recognized this
decades ago, but that's been set aside by conservative judges in the
decades since it was decided.

One very human joy I got from my work in IT was simply being
recognized as smart, as capable.  It's incredibly energizing.  In most
workplaces, as soon as that started happening, almost immediately some
male coworker would come up with something sexual to put me in my
place.

It's a huge and increasingly uphill fight.  Most women now keep their
heads down and their mouths shut and hope not to be noticed.  Most men
don't know what the fuss is about.  Thank you for your post.

MG

On 2/14/15, John Brier via TriLUG <trilug at trilug.org> wrote:
> On Fri, Feb 13, 2015 at 6:31 PM, Jack Hill via TriLUG <trilug at trilug.org>
> wrote:
>> Greetings,
>>
>> TriLUG will have an open meeting to discuss our efforts and future plans
>> to
>> increase member diversity on Sunday, February 22nd at 1:00pm EST. The
>> location will be at Bostock Library room 039 on Duke University's West
>> Campus.
>>
>> We will start of by reviewing the actions we have taken to date to promote
>> diversity (adopting an anti-harassment policy, a panel about women in
>> FOSS).
>> Now that we've taken these first steps, it is time to asses them and plan
>> for what more we can do. This will take the bulk of the meeting with the
>> goal of assigning concrete tasks for the next steps.
>>
>> Parking will be available at the Bryan Center lot and garage for
>> $2.00/hour:
>> http://parking.duke.edu/parking/visitor_parking/index.php There are also
>> four accessible spaces on Telcom Drive outside of the library (note: long
>> ramp up to library).
>>
>> Room 039 is in the basement of Bostock library below The Edge. See
>> http://www.openstreetmap.org/?mlat=36.00289&mlon=-78.93833#map=18/36.00219/-78.94026
>> for a map. The red dotted lines are walking paths.
>>
>> For those who are unable to join us in person, there will be a video
>> conference (details to be sent out day-of, but it will require Chromium).
>>
>> Best,
>> Jack
>
> I went to the women in FOSS panel and thought it was great. It was
> interesting to hear not only the panel's experiences but the
> audience's experiences too, and to see the enthusiasm from people
> (both male and female) for increasing diversity. Unfortunately, I
> won't be able to come to this because I work weekends, but I want to
> throw out some topics to consider for discussion regardless.
>
> In addition to being into Linux I am also a cyclist, and while I'm not
> currently a member of The League of American Bicyclists like I used to
> be, I still get their emails and follow them on social media, and let
> me tell you, if you want to be inspired by an organization who has
> really flown with increasing diversity, look no further than the Bike
> League. They have done research, social media campaigns, and even
> hosted women specific conventions. Now, they are a big national bike
> advocacy group, which is very different from a local/regional club
> like TriLUG, but there is enough similarity to really take guidance
> from, and they have been officially taking up diversity as an issue
> since 2009 [1], so they have produced a lot of stuff to guide you. The
> first thing it seems they did is something TriLUG is beginning to do
> too, which is to take the issue seriously. That is evident by the
> anti-harrassment policy that leadership and members have agreed upon,
> the Women in FOSS panel, and the work group you're having tomorrow. I
> can't imagine that would have happened if members and leaders ignored
> the homogenous demographics of most of the gatherings. Which brings me
> to my first suggestion:
>
> Census and/or research
> Years ago one of the first things that alerted me to the Bike League's
> seriousness about increasing diversity (they now refer to equity more
> often which is about "not just making sure everyone has shoes, but
> making sure everyone has shoes that fit") was that they described the
> statistically average member of their organization, he was a
> fourty-something year old white man, AND I think they knew that that
> wasn't representative of the average cyclist. They may have even had
> data to back that up. Now, I'm quite sure they do. They did a "Women
> Bike" campaign last year where they mentioned data that showed *more*
> women bike than men! Can you believe that? I still have a hard time
> believing it and I'm sure I'm not the only one. They connected this
> with how little the bike industry caters to women (Women's clothing,
> bike designs, etc. - it's minimal) with the obvious suggestion that if
> more women bike than men, industry focus should be on par if not more
> attuned to women. So the point is, you gotta know who your members
> are, what race, nationality, gender, sexuality, ability, etc. that
> people identify as. Then it helps to know who the Linux/FOSS users are
> in general. I wonder if there is a similar discrepancy in minority
> users versus members. Second suggestion:
>
> In the discussion after the Women in FOSS panel I really, really,
> wanted to bring this point up, but I was too nervous to do it, so even
> though I'm not going to be at the work group tomorrow, I'm glad I'm
> getting an opportunity to express what I didn't then. This is a
> suggestion mostly for people like me, the white cis-gendered males. I
> think the leaders and whoever else is involved with the
> anti-harassment policy, the Women in FOSS panel, and this upcoming
> event will understand this because to some extent, if you're already
> pushing for diversity you've already had do some of what I'm going to
> suggest.
>
> So, without further ado, I suggest you guys (and I mean the guys!) do
> inner work. Inner work is work related to your experience of life.
> It's learning about that through meditation, journaling, prayer,
> psychotherapy, contemplation, or philosophy, considering other's life
> stories and differing ideologies. Now at this point I've probably lost
> you, so let me bring it back home. You should do inner work because
> it's rewarding in and of itself, but to do it with the focus on
> increasing diversity and equity you should be analyzing how you
> interact with women and people that are different from you to see how
> you could be unintentionally and subtly reinforcing stereotypes or
> otherwise making people different from you feel uncomfortable.
>
> That's one of the confusing things about diversity. Everyone wonders
> how we can bring more people into homogenous (read white, and/or male)
> environments but the problem isn't that people that aren't male or
> white aren't being invited, it's that they are being made to feel
> unwelcome. Of course almost no one does this on purpose, and the few
> people that do are easy to spot and call out (which allows the rest of
> us to wash our hands of it and pat our selves on the back), but it's
> hard to see something you literally never have to personally consider,
> so that's why it's so important to do inner work - which allows you to
> personally consider another person's perspective - in order to combat
> this problem.
>
> Let me give you an example of some unintentionally unwelcoming
> behavior I have seen^H^H^H^Hheard in an even less diverse community:
> ham radio. Ham radio in the US is even more white and male than IT
> circles. There are even frequencies where people hang out and say
> overtly racist, sexist, and homophobic things all day long. Probably
> they feel safe doing that because they're behind a microphone, but
> still.
>
> In the Triangle we have several wide coverage repeaters, which are
> radio systems with antennas mounted very high (on TV towers) that take
> as input a VHF FM transmission on one frequency and simultaneously
> retransmit on another frequency. With repeaters we can have round
> table discussions over 60-100 miles, basically the whole triangle and
> then some. Ham radio also has what are called nets where one person
> will be a net operator and usually they will take checkins and then
> get a "rag chew" from each person about whatever has happened to them
> that day. You can recheck at later times to respond to someone else's
> ragchew, or say something entirely new.
>
> Well one day as I was driving back home from out of town while
> listening to one of these wide coverage repeaters right before the
> nightly net was about to start. There were already a group of guys
> "chewing the rag" (talking in a long winded way) so the net controller
> put out her call sign to let them know the net was going to start in a
> few minutes so they could finish up their conversation. They gladly
> did but there was one comment that caught my attention. I think it was
> after they agreed to finish up soon, after she thanked them and signed
> off with her call sign as is required by FCC regulation, one of the
> men said something like "boy she has a nice voice." I cannot convey
> the tone or remember the words exactly but let me tell you he wasn't
> talking about the quality of her modulated signal. He said "her
> voice." He was talking about what made her different from everyone
> else on the radio that night. She was literally the only woman among
> the probably twenty to thirty people who would eventually check in.
>
> That he said that surprised me and it upset me. It upset me because I
> felt it was something he would never say about a fellow male ham radio
> operator but mostly it upset me because I was nervous about saying
> something to all these men (and this one woman) who didn't seem to
> think anything of it. I knew (or at least feared) that this sort of
> "call out" or criticism would not be welcomed. I was so nervous I
> literally drove almost all the way home before I finally got up the
> nerve to say something.
>
> I had actually already checked in and gave a general rag chew and not
> said anything, but within a quarter of a mile from my house I
> "rechecked."
>
> After describing what I heard I told them basically what I've already
> told you: because he described her voice as nice, and that he would
> likely not do that to a male operator it was sexist. When I let off
> the Push-To-Talk key on my microphone I immediately heard my worst
> fears come true. I heard actual jeers and boos and other intentional
> interference. I felt good though, because I had said it, even though I
> was jittery and nervous as I was speaking the words I had to say to
> convey my message. The net control operator, (the woman who was
> described as having a nice voice, and remember, that man didn't say it
> to her, he said it to his friends who he was previously talking to,
> while she was presumably listening) said she didn't think anything of
> it. That's fine. I'm not going to tell her she's wrong. I could be
> wrong. But by the reaction I got I'd say there is definitely something
> there worth talking about.
>
> People's "inner" selves were "triggered." The man who made the
> original comment rechecked himself and tried to tell me he was talking
> about her audio quality, which is common in ham radio (signal
> reports), but I repeated to him that he didn't say anything about that
> at the time and was specific in referencing her voice, but like what I
> alluded to earlier I didn't remember to say, and really am only
> thinking about now as I write this, it was not just his reference to
> her voice that bothered me, it was his tone.
>
> Oh my God, I could almost see the squinted eyes and dirty desire of
> his face through the communications speaker on my car's dashboard. I
> don't know if it was that bad but it leads me to another revelation.
> The real reason I was nervous about calling out this sexism, and also
> the reason I was too nervous to make these points at the Women in FOSS
> panel is because talking about this stuff forces me to further
> acknowledge it in myself.
>
> I am sexist. I am racist. I am even homophobic despite having recently
> started identifying as bisexual in the past six months. I am 31 now
> and have been doing inner work for around three years, including
> taking up the mantle of Social Justice Warrior (SJW) and it's
> incumbent requirements of being anti-homophobic, amongst other causes,
> yet it took me this long to realize I was bi. That's an aside, but the
> statements I made about being racist, sexist and homophobic aren't,
> even though they're cliche amongst SJW's. Honestly sometimes I see a
> male feminist or male pro-feminist (a new delineation I don't fully
> understand, something about how Men shouldn't ID as feminist) say he
> is sexist and I want to throw up. I reluctantly identify as feminist
> right now only because I don't know what else to ID as to convey that
> I think sexism is real and needs to be addressed.
>
> The reason I'm reluctant to ID that way is not about the pro-feminist
> issue (which I don't know enough about to decide either way) it's
> because I think feminism and social justice advocates can be
> unintentionally shaming. If you have ever seen Brene Brown's TED Talk
> on shame you can begin to get an idea of why I might take issue with
> that. In summary, she says guilt is the feeling "I made a mistake"
> while shame is the feeling "I am a mistake," and with that feeling
> shame can paralyze." But it's worse.
>
> I recently read a book by a psychologist called "Real Boys" where I
> learned that boys are traumatized twice in their upbringing. First
> they are traumatized around the Kindergarten time frame when they are
> forced to disconnect from their Mothers too soon. To explain this the
> author provided an actual heartbreaking account:
>
> In the story a Mother is taking her son to his first day of
> Kindergarten. At the encouragement of the unpracticed teacher, who had
> been mentored by other teachers to do this, she told the Mother not to
> hang around even though the boy didn't want his Mom to leave yet.
> After the teacher justified enough such that the Mother finally left -
> kicking him off her leg which he was wrapped around in order to keep
> her - the boy eventually went in a corner and cried by himself. This
> process repeated for days while the boy got number each day. In the
> book there is a reversal and happy ending, but that's not common. The
> justification for this is that if boys are allowed to stay too
> attached to their Mothers they will become over-feminized. This is the
> first trauma, and from it comes sadness and grief that is not allowed
> to be felt due to the well known mantra "boys don't cry" which itself
> is a teaching that leads to the second "teaching" of a boy's life, or
> what is better called, again, a trauma. When a boy is in adolescence,
> in his teenage years the real toughening-up happens. Because of
> puberty, he looks like a man to adults and with that image come
> "manly" requirements. Hyper-masculinity is a term you may have heard
> which includes an almost narcissistic stoicism, even-keeled-ness in
> the most stormy weather, even a hurricane, impossible to maintain even
> as an adult male, much less a boy. This hardening up is traumatic
> because it is the further loss of the boys' self. He isn't losing a
> complete connection to his Mother this time but a complete connection
> to his whole emotional self and it produces an equally depressing
> sadness and grief, which, because boys don't cry, certainly
> manly-looking boys can't cry either. Or they get to cry even less. Now
> I'm really going to have to bring this back. Is anyone still reading?
>
> These two traumas produce incredible sadness and grief, and ironically
> they are produced as a side effect of what feminists would call The
> Patriarchy, which requires the narcissistic level of stoicism so that
> the man can be more powerful and controlling, and to do that he must
> sacrifice an emotional connection to women (because if he didn't, he
> couldn't subjugate them) and even to himself (if he didn't, he
> couldn't subjugate himself, and he must do that before he can
> subjugate anyone else). So he ignores emotions or pain and rides the
> hurricane while pretending hurricanes don't even exist.
>
> When feminists talk to men about why feminism is not just about hating
> on men - which is what it seems like at first - they love to point out
> how the Patriarchy hurts men in the ways I just outlined. But I've
> never heard a feminist talk about boyhood trauma, or the shame that is
> used to enforce hyper-masculinity (which is another central point of
> the book "Real Boys"). And that is part of the connection that's going
> to bring this back. If you find the idea of acknowledging your own
> sexism difficult, the idea that you could even be sexist at all, and
> more than just in an abstract "ya I can't rule anything out for the
> sake of the argument," but rather in a, "ya I probably hold some
> pretty strong sexist feelings due to societial influence that are not
> my fault but important to acknowledge nonetheless" way, then know,
> this is why. Because not only were you traumatized so badly you might
> not even know it because you were never allowed to feel or talk about
> it, but... that's life. That's the way it is. That's normal. To
> confront your own sexism is to confront not only yourself but the
> world, and yes the world is fucked up but so are you. Wait, which is
> worse? I kind of got the flow of those last few ideas mixed up. I
> really don't know which is worse. It's just. fucked. up. And this is
> why "the patriarchy" is inadequate. Even the Kyriarchy, which includes
> the intersection of all oppressions acting at the same time, is an
> inadequate term for this. This is really about the whole human
> experience, to me anyway.
>
> Individual psychology, group, class, and societal psychology are at
> play here too, because even whole nations can be traumatized in ways
> they don't know causing them to act out in harmful ways they will
> inevitably justify.
>
> Much of the contention around feminism seems to be about "who started
> it" and the finger is squarely on the head of men but I'll just say
> some men don't agree. Look up the philosopher Ken Wilber if you want
> one divergent perspective on that. I am not sure where I sit in that
> argument but I know I feel we can't fully deal with issues of
> diversity that are seemingly caused by sexism of a traumatized group
> if we don't acknowledge the trauma. Oh yea, I never connected this all
> the way back. Do Inner Work. If you don't heal your sadness and grief
> you'll just resent yourself and project grievances onto women, or
> maybe they will be based in legitimate grievances against the mother
> who disconnected from you too early, or the society which didn't and
> still doesn't acknowledge your full self. These things are likely to
> come out especially when women feminists and society in general start
> criticizing you for your gender expression if it includes any seeming
> sexism, especially if they are off base on your intentions. And women
> are of course traumatized and rightly upset too, so they can't easily
> see how sensitive you are. They're reacting. you're reacting! We're
> all reacting and you'll just feel like you're getting shamed for
> crying all over again. It will be different, but it will be the same
> too.
>
> After writing the above content a few hours ago, I realized I think I
> am still struggling to further acknowledge my own sexism and other
> isms. I do think women and other minorities can non-ideally respond to
> their "oppressors," triggering their shame, which converse to their
> intentions, entrenches them from correcting any problematic behavior -
> but so can anyone. It doesn't make it their fault that it happens.
>
> I don't know, though. I still want to be able to say who or what or
> when caused this and then with my "root cause analysis" complete say
> we should go from step one, to step two, to step three to correct it.
> And that might be the hardest things about all of this. I have to
> admit I don't know what caused it exactly, and may never know exactly
> how to fix it. If I'm wise I have to admit that because "the traits of
> the wise...include compassion and empathy, good social reasoning and
> decision making, equanimity, tolerance of divergent values," and
> "comfort with uncertainty and ambiguity." [2]
>
> "Comfort with uncertainty and ambiguity."
>
> "Comfort with uncertainty and ambiguity."
>
> Things like that are very hard for someone who is an expert at
> manipulating and configuring certain and unambiguous computers.
>
>
> 1) http://bikeleague.org/womenbike
> 2)
> http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/12/the-real-roots-of-midlife-crisis/382235/?single_page=true
> --
> This message was sent to: MG <mgmonza at gmail.com>
> To unsubscribe, send a blank message to trilug-leave at trilug.org from that
> address.
> TriLUG mailing list : http://www.trilug.org/mailman/listinfo/trilug
> Unsubscribe or edit options on the web	:
> http://www.trilug.org/mailman/options/trilug/mgmonza%40gmail.com
> Welcome to TriLUG: http://trilug.org/welcome