Where are all the women?

[StuartMoxham]

<p>I disagree with you Rebecca. I feel that many of these comments are made because many feel that they are hanging out with the lads. Not saying it's right or wrong just thats why I feel many of the comments are made.</p>

[tonmestrom]

<p>if you quote me out of context you can conclude anything you like but that doesn't make it right does it? You should really have read more carefully. As I clearly stated up front it has <strong>nothing</strong> to do with gender and yet you reach the following conclusion:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>That means you think the offense caused is the woman's fault</p>

</blockquote>

<p>it's not even a question but a bold statement.<br>

My point was and still is that more misunderstandings happen because of that than on the basis of gender difference.</p>

<p>Another thing that is obvious on the internet and that I have noticed long since is how people (men and women alike) tend to react to what has never been said or implied to begin with.</p>

[rebecca_l]

<p><em>I feel that many of these comments are made because many feel that they are hanging out with the lads.</em></p>

<p>If they were only among white people would they say racist things? Only if they're racist, right? </p>

<p>Tom, you're saying the offense is caused because of something the offended party (women) has misunderstood. Not because what is being said is offensive. Women wouldn't mind hearing that kind of misogynistic nonsense if only they had bothered to work a little harder at understanding the rube's personality and intent. The intent being, of course, to laugh uproariously at a woman's owning a camera for anything other than as an accessory for her shoes. This is ridiculous and no matter where we stand on the globe it will always be ridiculous. </p>

[StuartMoxham]

<p>Many of the comments are probably meant as light hearted humour that tends to get taken the wrong way it's the boys club mentality. Women do it too when they are in a group. They like to have a good laugh about men not knowing what a washing machine is for or that men don't know how to use it. It goes both ways really.</p>

[wogears]

<p>I confess to being a bit unreconstructed myself, and I will likely remain that way, being too old to morph entirely. Nevertheless, most of my best friends are women. I learned to use descriptors like 'hottie' and 'eye candy' from women. Being a child of the Sixties, I believed a lot of the propaganda put forth by women and men alike; that when women were 'liberated', men would be likewise 'set free'. Well, they aren't free and neither are we. Co-worker got married about five years ago. Bride's dress cost ten-thousand dollars. Another male co-worker opined that you can't tell the difference between a ten-thousand dollar dress and a five-hundred dollar one. I begged to differ (I sew, among my other 'manly' and 'unmanly' skills). Response: "If you can tell the difference, you should be wearing the dress!" Much laughter, led by male and female alike.</p>

<p>I think there are two very large Elephants in the Room. First, we are fighting a million-odd years of hominid evolution. It's a worthy fight, and it needs to be fought and won, but it will take an extremely long time. For details, check out <a href="

song</a> as well as <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eY2kyRQA_E&feature=related">this one.</a> They say it better and far more concisely than I could.</p>

<p>Elephant number two is photographic. It is true that the preponderance of 'gearheads' are male. They spend inordinate amounts of time and money worrying about what 'lense' the 'pro's' would use at wide 'apature', buying endless 'upgrades' and 'glass'. And then some damn 'girl' comes along and does <a href="http://jpgmag.com/photos/2767343">this</a>, or <a href="http://jpgmag.com/photos/2765136">this</a>, or <a href="http://jpgmag.com/photos/2762862">this</a>, or <a href="http://jpgmag.com/photos/2764581">this</a>, or.... Without ever asking whether Canon or Nikon had the most Eye-Cue, or the least See-A. Why, some of them even shoot beautiful wedding images with the camera on the 'P' mode. (Someone told them it stood for 'Professional'. Ha! Ha! So bleepin' funny.)</p>

[rebecca_l]

<p><em>They like to have a good laugh about men not knowing what a washing machine is for or that men don't know how to use it. </em></p>

<p>Duuuuude, nooooooo. </p>

[StuartMoxham]

<p>Rebecca, you've never heard women get together and start roasting men about the washing machine and the various other thing they feel us men are not very good at?</p>

[jennifer_spencer]

<p>I have heard us ladies do it, plenty. I've done it myself from time to time. Guilty as charged. It's true. Would a man feel welcome at one of those kinds of lunches? No he would not. Would he feel like he, too, could have lunch at that table and be appreciated when he talked about Woolite & the delicate cycle? Probably not. Would I be making him unwelcome if I participated in the comment-making? Yeah.</p>

<p>Rebecca's making her point in a harsh way, in my opinion, but she is right when she says no woman would feel welcome to talk photography with a man who made the remark about women buying cameras only to match their outfits. Now, if it's a guy who shops at the camera store, who smells bad, is ugly and poorly dressed, and doesn't know what he's talking about anyway, a woman could choose rationalize that he's a loser anyway and who cares. She could make herself feel better because he was in no position of power or interest. But if he's a prominent photographer, and successful in his business, and he says that? Or a teacher at the photography school? What if we had looked up to him until that remark? Or what if it was the boss and the remark was overheard at the water cooler? How would that be? Point is that environment and context matter. If we are trying to make PNet an environment that is friendly to women, we should consider leave the context of all-male locker room behind. </p>

[lisa_lowden]

<p>im here all though there are some forums on dpreview that scared me away. thx ll</p>

[jtk]

<p> Women seem to me to be less tolerant of boredom than are men, therefore less appreciative of hobbies. C'mon, bug photos? Ducks? Rocks and trees? Hanging out in bars? Sheesh!<br>

There are LOTS of women in professional photography.<br>

Top tier galleries around here (ie non-tourist, non-scenic) show a high minority percentage of women photographers...typically big prints. A woman's murals recently involved oak gall dye, Epson printer..beautiful. Serigraphs and other fine photo-derived prints may involve as high a percentage of women as men.</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>My wife always jokes with her friends how men including me never ask for directions in the car when they're lost. I always laugh along with them. I mean, what does it matter? I don't really ever get lost so why not laugh.</p>

[StuartMoxham]

<p>The wedding forum on this site has quite a few women that participate there regulary. It's also a very nice forum to hang out and I don't remember if I've ever seen any of the locker room behaviour over there.</p>

[john_h.1]

<blockquote>

<p>Women seem to me to be less tolerant of boredom than are men, therefore less appreciative of hobbies.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I'm trying to figure out how anyone opposed to boredom will tend to be opposed to something that reduces boredom. I'm also trying to figure out how someone would conclude that one gender tends to embrace boredom and isn't all that interested in engaging in enjoyable activities. What possible explanation or evidence could there be to support this?</p>

[User_2000406]

<p>It's sad and rather frustrating that basic consideration, thoughtfulness, and respect towards others are denigrated by some as being "political correctness".</p>

[StuartMoxham]

<p>Political correctness and thoughfulness are rather different though and not being very thoughtful is different from being rude.</p>

<p>Here's a great example of political correctness getting out of control.<br>

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/article738292.ece</p>

[mukul_dube]

<p>I cannot agree that <em>thoughtless</em> does not equal <em>rude</em>. Such reasoning would explain away anything, and nothing would remain an offence.</p>

[StuartMoxham]

<p>Thoughtless does not equal rude how can it. It's perfectly possible to be thoughtless without being rude. There are many actions that could be described as thoughtless that may not be rude. There are many comments that could be thoughless that may not be rude, there are many rude comments that are also thoughtless but the two don't equal or mean the same thing.</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>I've seen wars created at work due to improper handling of emails, where fighting words are "spoken" and can't be taken back. I'm sure others have seen that as well where threads get hotter and hotter. Where one would go slowly in person-to-person discussions, and be more tolerant or at least more in control, something happens to many of us when we're on line. We jump to conclusions, allow our egos to stick right out, misunderstand what others are saying, and expose all the little intolerancies, prejudicies and snarkiness we would otherwise withhold when communicating one-on-one. Restraint of "pen and tongue" is harder to do on-line and takes practice. Certainly I still suffer from this and have paid many a penalty because I'm too quick to type.</p>

[mukul_dube]

<p>"Thoughtless does not equal rude how can it. It's perfectly possible to be thoughtless without being rude. There are many actions that could be described as thoughtless that may not be rude. There are many comments that could be thoughless that may not be rude, there are many rude comments that are also thoughtless but the two don't equal or mean the same thing."<br>

1. <em>prove</em> (v.t.)<br>

2. <em>assert</em> (v.t.)</p>

[mukul_dube]

<p>Well, all right. Maybe this can be broken up for analysis.<br /> One consideration is <em>intention</em>. A person who might say, "I'm sorry, that was thoughtless of me" would not apologise for having been rude because the rudeness will have been deliberate.<br /> The other consideration, which I hold to be more important, is <em>effect</em>. I'm likely to be offended or hurt by thoughtless remarks as well as by rude ones. To me, therefore, the two are the same.</p>

<p>So far as this thread is concerned, here are two posts which I think are focussed on the subject. The first was ignored and the second was imagined to be something else altogether and was blasted:<br>

<strong>Jeff Spirer</strong>: "Women generally post photos in the gallery rather than waste their time hanging out talking about gear...".<br /><strong>Mukul Dube</strong>: "Women generally are more interested in getting results than in discussing equipment to death."</p>

[StuartMoxham]

<p>The pupil could also write a thoughltess essay. That could mean that the content was rude and offensive or maybe it was just poorly written.</p>

[mukul_dube]

<p>Well said. A thoughtless and poorly written essay about a holy cow, towards which I am neutral, would not offend me; but a similar one about a dog or a cockroach, both of whom I venerate, would certainly be offensive to me.</p>

[jtk]

<p>I think women are more visual than are men, but from different angles. If more women took part in Photo.net I think we'd all benefit by their perspectives: their images and whatever they might choose to say in words. </p>

<p>Photographer women may be less frozen into analytical responses than men, less linear than men usually are (ie less interested in "therefore" etc). Many women excel in analytics (the sciences, law etc) but I find that many others of their species offer a rich, alternative perspective.</p>

<p>If the percentage of posts that were made by photographers (defined as people who share P.N portfolios) was increased I think more women would enjoy Photo.net.</p>

<p> </p>

[jerry_sousa]

<p>I wonder what the Taliban would have to say about all this? </p>

[chelsea]

<p>Okay, Kayam, we're into the 8th page of responses with a whole lot of arguing over the subject, and very few women bothering to get into it. That alone should speak volumes. I was going to keep my fingers off the keyboard on this one, but I've been here for years, peeps on here that know me know I can't resist. </p>

<p>Women are generally more reticent about getting into forums online for many reasons. One is certainly security. When I tell people about participating in photography forums on the internet some of my friends are horrified, there is still a stigma about the web. I'm also more tolerant of the crap I've seen here over the years, most of the men are pretty much gentlemen, but there are a few who see a woman's name on a post and launch into a condescending lecture. I have just walked away from this site for months at a time because of it. If I had it to do over, I would have chosen a nickname that was gender neutral.</p>