User talk:Neotarf/Stammtisch/Archive 1

New Facebook page "Herstory of Art"

"Herstory of Art" is a new Facebook page that features short bios along with images of the artists' work. It describes itself as "a forum to showcase as wide a range as possible of women's work in the arts." —Neotarf (talk) 20:13, 17 January 2015 (UTC)

I like the images you've chosen here, especially File:Edelfelt Läsande kvinna.jpg. Sarah (SV) ^talk 00:53, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Wikiprojekt Frauen uses an image by the same artist in its header. You can see more of his portraits on Commons. The frame in the above image is really distracting, but I like the image itself, both because it shows men and women interacting together positively, and as a symbol of the page's Stammtisch theme, because it implies a social contract between the participants that takes the place of rules.

I seem to be having a lot of trouble with the cross-wiki markup though. —Neotarf (talk) 04:57, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

That certainly appears to be a civilized gathering. An image like that can convey a sense of tone and emotion quickly and simply; the need for non-text channels to make for a culture of kindness is a point well taken. --Djembayz (talk) 17:59, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Baby fawn's first steps

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Interesting link. There are a number of grant proposals listed in the comments there that I was not aware of, in addition to the ones I listed at Grants:IdeaLab/WikiProject Women, namely Grants:IdeaLab/Fund a community human resources staffperson and Grants:IdeaLab/Gender-gap admin training.

Grants:IdeaLab/Code of conduct synchronization

Grants:IdeaLab/Human resources complaint processing best practices

Grants:IdeaLab/Human resources complaint receiving

Grants:IdeaLab/Gender Gap Allies training

Perhaps it would be useful to keep a running list somewhere.

Also this is interesting, from the notes of the Ada Initiative 2013 Diversity Conference.

What worked:
•Building affinity groups
•Leveraging conferences
•Existing community leaders taking action
•Paying people to do diversity work

What didn't work:
•Only volunteers working on diversity
•Organizing one-off workshops or events
•Keeping problems secret/being nice to power
•Preventing safe private spaces
•Adopting vague and/or unenforceable codes of conduct
•Flame-style discussion

—Neotarf (talk) 20:21, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Only volunteers working on diversity, keeping problems secret, one-off workshops and events: yes, all big problems and we keep seeing them. I really hope this upcoming three-month initiative will change some of it. Sarah (SV) ^talk 02:43, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

This is a compelling case for paid moderators.

It took me a while to find this again, but I came across it while I was copyediting the GGTF resources section and made a mental note to come back and read it later. Jessamyn was a moderator on MetaFilter, where I used to lurk every once in a while when they had some interesting linguistic discussion. She wrote a brief piece in the NYT as a part of a panel on women in Wikipedia: "More About Power Than Gender", Jessamyn West, NYT, February 4, 2011. I see she is now a member of the Wikimedia Advisory Board. —Neotarf (talk) 15:47, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

"Only volunteers working on diversity" is a key point. When an organization with a $50 million annual budget can't be bothered to have a trained, paid person assigned to receive sexual harassment complaints from volunteers and enforce the organization's rules, it is clear that addressing sexual harassment is not a priority. --Djembayz (talk) 14:57, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

Outing RFC on en.wp

There is a Request for Comment on English Wikipedia that would change the WP:OUTING policy to prohibit all mention of outside accounts, including Reddit Men's Rights and Reddit Gamergate. For more about Redddit Men's Rights, see the Southern Poverty Law Center "Misogyny:The Sites" —Neotarf (talk) 21:21, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Sexual refusal

In view of the proposed "affirmative consent" law for New York universities, and a proposal for similar legislation on the federal level, the Campus Accountability and Safety Act, expected to be given national exposure at tonight's State of the Union Address, here is a review of a conversation analysis paper on sexual refusal.

Women's forum discussion on Metafilter

Discussion about creating a sub-forum for women on MetaFilter. Some quotables:

The world is already so segregated. I would hate to have all that woman energy siphoned off of Metafilter to a subsite. Metafilter would be a greatly diminished by that. It wouldn't just be the loss of women-specific posts, but the inevitable decrease in comments by women in general topics that would follow. Please no.

Given that I wouldn't have much interest in anything that was labeled "for girls," I guess if it was shuffled off to some ghetto where I didn't have to see it that wouldn't be so bad either. But seriously please don't do this, all of MetaFilter is for women. It always has been.

...Like, if we could get to a place where the Very Important Opinions gang would just allow that women are frequently subjugated and oppressed in ways that are completely invisible to men, if those dudes could accept that the reason they've never been on the receiving end of sexist behavior is because they're men rather than because they're smarter or tougher, more special or more socially adept than women?

—Neotarf (talk) 06:13, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

Floquenbeam flips off the ArbCom

The most loathsome thing you can call someone on English Wikipedia is still a woman's body.

There's a word for people who try to drag someone they dislike into a conflict, hoping and praying he reacts "uncivilly". It starts with a "C", but I dare not say it, because on Wikipedia rudeness and sniping behind people's backs must be done using only a list of approved words.... --Floquenbeam 22:18, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

This, from an administrator and former arbitrator. [1]

In case anyone missed it, the recent Gender Gap arbcom case specifically recognized insults based on the female reproductive system as being offensive:

"Although there are cultural differences in the use of certain expletives, there is rarely any need to use such language on Wikipedia and so they should be avoided. Editors who know, or are told, that a specific word usage is reasonably understood as offensive by other Wikipedians should refrain from using that word or usage, unless there is a specific and legitimate reason for doing so in a particular instance."

and called the specific term Floquenbeam refers to "highly offensive in many cultures".

A man blowing a raspberry

Is there any question that Floquenbeam is aware of the ArbCom finding? Why else would he claim that he "dare not say it". And yet he just has. This type of circumlocution is a rhetorical device called paralipsis or apophasis. Floquenbeam uses it to accuse Jimmy Wales of "pompous hypocrisy", an abomination so despicable and contemptuous that the only thing revolting enough to compare Jimmy to is a woman's body.

Don't get me wrong, Floquenbeam is entitled to his opinion. There are plenty of people with an aversion to women, or dark skin, or specific sexual practices, or for that matter to men, and they probably can't help it. But what Floquenbeam is NOT entitled to is to make Wikipedia a private club, that is closed to anyone who does not share his private and deeply internalized contempt for women, and to post these sexually charged epithets on the most widely viewed page in all of Wikipedia.

Will anyone bring this to the attention of Arbitration Enforcement or file a Clarification Request at Arbcom, or even make an attempt to discuss this with Floquenbeam? Will anyone even notice?

Or will it be Business As Usual? —Neotarf (talk) 15:16, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

Good question. It's not just women. A male editor objecting to being treated poorly, gets this response from site administration, and then everything returns to "normal". All editors deserve better than this. Where are the adults here? --Djembayz (talk) 03:32, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

A few years back they had all those gay teen suicides too. And public outrage. I seem to remember turning my icon purple, where ever I was blogging at the time, as a protest. Schools will not act on bullying, you notice the father made a police report. I have advised parents in my neighborhood to do the same. But admin bullying? It's such a cliche now, no one thinks twice about it. There used to be some strong adoption programs on Wikipedia, for boys at least. The few girls did not fare well in such programs. But things change. —Neotarf (talk) 21:29, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

"Feminists are to be purged en bloc from the encyclopedia."

From the Guardian:[2]

“No sanctions at all were proposed against any of Gamergate’s warriors, save for a few disposable accounts created specifically for the purpose of being sanctioned,” said Mark Bernstein, a writer and Wikipedia editor.

In contrast, he says, “by my informal count, every feminist active in the area is to be sanctioned. This takes care of social justice warriors with a vengeance — not only do the Gamergaters get to rewrite their own page (and Zoe Quinn’s, Brianna Wu’s, Anita Sarkeesian’s, etc); feminists are to be purged en bloc from the encyclopedia.”

And nothing is being done about SPAs this time either.

Sound like the Gender Gap case?

—Neotarf (talk) 21:37, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Gamergate press coverage

A running list:

• "Wikipedia votes to ban some editors from gender-related articles" Alex Hern, The Guardian, 23 January 2015.
• "Wikipedia Purged a Group of Feminist Editors Because of Gamergate", Andy Cush, Gawker, 1/23/15
• Wikipedia tacitly endorses GamerGate by blocking its opponents from editing gender-related articles", Nathaniel Mott, Pando Daily, January 23, 2015
• http://www.volkskrant.nl/tech/hoe-gamergate-wikipedia-blijft-vervuilen~a3835403/
• http://derstandard.at/2000010843264/Eintrag-zu-GamerGate-Wikipedia-sperrt-feministische-Nutzer
• http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/01/29/gamergate-wikipedia-and-the-limits-of-human-knowledge/
• http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/28/7927425/wikipedia-bans-gamergate-editors-violating-policies
• http://www.themarysue.com/wikipedia-gamergate/
• http://www.themarysue.com/wikipedia-gamergate-update/
• http://www.themarysue.com/gamergate-asked-leigh-alexander-about-pushing-values/
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Wikipedia_Signpost/2015-01-28/In_focus
• http://www.technewsworld.com/story/81659.html
• http://thinkprogress.org/culture/2015/01/26/3615559/wikipedia-wants-ban-feminist-editors-gamergate-articles/
• http://www.inquisitr.com/1786642/gamergate-wikipedia-ruling-bans-harassed-feminist-editors-outrage-ensues-videos/
• https://blog.wikimedia.org/2015/01/27/civility-wikipedia-gamergate/ WMF official reaction
• http://www.markbernstein.org/Jan15/Infamous.html
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Statement_on_the_GamerGate_case Arbcom press release
• http://internet.gawker.com/the-gamergate-decision-shows-exactly-whats-broken-about-1682639327
• https://overland.org.au/2015/02/are-misogynists-running-wikipedia/
• http://socialtextjournal.org/affective-labor-of-wikipedia-gamergate/

Discussion area for Gender topics

I have offered to maintain this space for, say, the next month, post any new items I find, and take out the trash, if any.

So, my question is this:

Is there any value to a user-page based talk area on Meta? Or maybe the better question would be: what is needed, what is the ideal format for it, and what tradeoffs are necessary/acceptable? —Neotarf (talk) 22:12, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

Quarterly reviews available

From the Wikimedia mailing list -- the following quarterly reviews of high priority WMF initiatives are available:

• Language Engineering team
• MediaWiki Core team
• Talent & Culture team (slides only)

—Neotarf (talk) 22:52, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Rehtaeh Parsons Wikipedia article

A Canadian defense department computer has been linked to edits of Rehtaeh Parsons' Wikipedia article. Parsons committed suicide after she was sexually assaulted at the age of 15.

Among other changes, the edits [3] changed the statement

In response, Parsons' father Glen Canning accused Blatchford of victim blaming and argued, "The two boys involved in taking and posing for the photograph stated Rehtaeh was throwing up when they had sex with her. That is not called consensual sex. That is called rape."

to read

The two boys involved in taking and posing for the photograph stated Rehtaeh was throwing up after they had sex with her. That is called consensual sex.

The Canadian Armed Forces is investigating. [4] —Neotarf (talk) 00:41, 13 February 2015 (UTC)