[WikiEN-l] Systemic bias wrt gender

Sat Nov 25 17:47:22 UTC 2006

Stan Shebs wrote

> It's an interesting phenomenon for the 
> sociologists - if you look at the subscriber list, you'll see that there 
> are plenty of male lurkers, but of course they don't give their reasons 
> for not speaking up. Once in a great while I've met one of these male 
> lurkers in person, and a couple (almost shamefacedly) admitted to 
> feeling intimidated by the risks of public posting. In any case, this is 
> not unique to WP mailing lists, and as far as I know it's never been 
> satisfactorily resolved for public lists - having a women-only or 
> approved-members-only list is the usual tactic, but then it's not really 
> a public list anymore. Any other ideas that have been tried?

Well, I'd certainly support using this multiply-unfortunate thread to do something about the etiquette and respect level.

But on the substantive, on-topic point, perhaps we do need to talk over having a dedicated email list for 'systemic bias', as a whole. It's a hazardous idea - anyone can think of drawbacks.

Charles

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