[WikiEN-l] Systemic bias wrt gender

Wed Nov 22 11:06:38 UTC 2006

Sarah wrote:
> On 11/21/06, niht-hræfn <nihthraefn at gmail.com> wrote:
>   
>> Most of the
>> women I know spend one or two hours in the morning with a
>> straightening iron and a blow dryer. Wikipedia has http://
>> en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowdryer and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
>> Hair_iron . These two articles are considerably out of date and do
>> not begin to encompass the complexities of these appliances (and
>> there is not even separate articles for straightening irons and
>> curling irons!). Compare to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer and
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television , the two appliances I have
>> known men to use most.
>>     
>
> Keitel, your e-mail is itself a good example of bias. The women you
> know who spend two hours every morning with a straightening iron and a
> blowdryer need to find a good hairdresser. The cut is everything. :-)
>
> Seriously, it's kind of disturbing to see that women should be editing
> [[Blowdryer]] while the men get to grips with [[Arab-Israeli
> conflict]].
>
> Sarah
> _______________________________________________
>
>   
Speaking as a woman who does not even own a blowdryer or curling iron, I 
concur with Sarah - the cut is everything. I also am closer to losing my 
temper than at any other time ever on Wikipedia. Keitel, your entire 
email is insulting in the extreme. No one is claiming women handle all 
the "serious" articles and men edit only Beer and NASCAR articles. You 
are taking one tiny stereotype and applying it across the board. I 
personally use a computer, I am a programmer by trade, and have not 
touched a curling iron in 30 years. I know men who won't touch a 
computer. If "most of the women" you know actually have more interest in 
their hair than in current events, history, the rise and fall of 
nations, influential novels, paradigms which have reshaped society, etc, 
all I can say to you is that you need to meet some new women.

--pissed puppy, who doesn't care for stereotypes