[cfrizz]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

We have one person saying that women are discriminated against because male authors are more nominated more often for Hugos, and another person saying men are not discriminated against because even though they're told OTW is an organization of and for women, they're not legally prohibited from submitting stories to the archive. Which is it?


So it's okay to make the whole world comfortable for men, and if women find it useful, they can use it too? You're in favor of that idea?

I simply don't agree with defining who something is "for" in terms of what kind of chromosomes or organs someone has. Kind of funny, I suppose, in these days of identity politics, but that's how I roll.

When various businesses said that women could only hold menial or dead-end jobs, such as Home Depot in California back in 1994, I didn't agree with it.

When an OTW board members said "The OTW is an organization created to advocate for female-dominated transformative media fandom and its artworks. That is its purpose," I didn't agree with it.

And the only difference I see between them is one of quantity, not quality. Neither one is looking at the person, only at the chromosomes. They're both judging someone on who they are, not on what they can do or how well they can do it. Home Depot will now hire women (thanks to getting their asses sued off) and OTW will accept works by men (so long as they remember what OTW's purpose is). I can't see either one being a comfortable thing: knowing you are accepted only grudgingly and it's really for someone else, someone who differs from you not in their experience or ability but in their chromosomes.

Online, I don't have an identity as a man. I don't have an identity as a woman. I don't have an identity as transgendered. I have an identity as Worldwalker. Why do people keep trying to ignore Worldwalker and figure out who Worldwalker's poster is and what pronoun they should use for me? Do you agree with my ideas? Then you agree with Worldwalker. Do you disagree with my ideas? Then you disagree with Worldwalker. You're not agreeing or disagreeing with what bathroom the person sitting between my keyboard and my chair uses -- you're agreeing or disagreeing with me. I'm not what anyone expects of whoever I am; I'm Worldwalker. Look at what I say, not what you think I should say based on who I am (and if you're deciding what I'm really saying based on who you think I am, let me remind you that the possibility exists that you may have guessed wrong).

I've many seen people in many places say that the answer to them being on the bottom is for them to now be on the top (if you don't believe me, consider the public statements of your least-favorite political group). But that's not the answer. Our mothers weren't as dumb as we thought when they told us two wrongs don't make a right. They don't; they just make two wrongs where there was one before. If there is a history of discrimination against women in a given field, the answer is not to codify some different discrimination. The answer is to eliminate discrimination, so that nobody is judged by anything but what really matters: who they are, not what they are.

That's where I disagree with OTW. This is 2010, almost 2011. Nothing should be for men, or for women, or anyone else. Things should be for people, and we should be able to say that what happened decades ago -- or days ago -- is in the past, and we're not going to repeat the mistakes of the past going into the future. A just and fair evaluation of the past of fanfic will show who the people involved were. People that matters to will know. But the future should be based, not on men or women, young or old, any religion or none at all, or anything else -- the future should be based on writing. That is, after all, what fanfic is about.

(and I will get some links up when I've had something more closely resembling sleep; my current level of consciousness is bordering on "un-")

Originally Posted by Pandarus

Worldwalker, like it or not fanfiction is a predominantly female space. The interlocking fanfiction communities do not marginalise women's voices, or punish women for expressing themselves openly about their identities, their fears or their desires in their writing. Women get to be fannish together, and to discuss the serial comma together, and to have conversations in which gender is irrelevant - but they also get to have conversations, and write stories, that they WOULD NOT HAVE if they weren't in a safe space, where they are not the minority.

Now, fanfiction is certainly not all about sex - but a lot of it DOES deal with sex and desire. That business of women (of all ages, ethnicities and orientations) exploring intimacy and desire is a major component of fanfic, and it's the bit that tends to freak out archives. The AO3 are not going to freak out about it, and are not embarrassed or ashamed of it. They're certainly not saying everyone has to write hot Snape-on-squid porn, but they're saying that if you want to do that, they've got your back.

Men don't need a safe space in which to talk about sex and sexuality without fear of being stigmatised, because THE WHOLE WORLD is already set up to prioritise the male perspective on desire.

... I think that perhaps what the AO3 team are saying, and what you're hearing, aren't quite the same thing.

You seem to be hearing: "GIRLS' CLUBHOUSE! NO BOYS ALLOWED! BOYS SUCK!"

Whereas they seem to me to be saying: "Girls built this clubhouse, and girls are definitely welcome here."

It's a little bit like someone in the middle of a predominantly Jewish area building a Kosher deli & coffee shop, and making it clear on the sign that they keep kosher. That isn't a secret code for "Fuck off, all non-Jews!" That's just telling me that they keep kosher, and that their coffee shop is a safe place for people who keep kosher to come and hang out. But I am still totally welcome to go and buy a coffee and a bagel, and sit and chat, and play chess, and become a regular, even if I'm an Atheist or Catholic or Hindu or Muslim or whatever - so long as I'm not going to go around insulting kosher food and grumbling that Hitler had the right idea, and telling the owners that obviously Jews don't know the first thing about how to run a proper coffee shop. 'Cause they already told me on the door that they built this particular coffee shop, and that keeping kosher is of fundamental importance to them, and so they won't be changing that to pander to me, when there are already several million other places out there where I can happily consume non-kosher food.

Outstanding posts from both of you, Thank you!

Both of you have summed up the facts of how life is for men and women in our current society. We have come a long way, and still have a long way to go before we reach a truly impartial genderless specific non-assumption making society.

I try not to get too caught up in these types of things since, there is very little I can do about it. Nor will I deny myself the use of the board mentioned above since one fanatical view doesn't represent the views of everyone else on the board.

All I can do is try my best to not make assumptions and give everyone the benefit of the doubt until they prove themselves not worthy of having it.