A woman's opinion on dick jokes at conferences

conference_dicks.txt

[redacted] is real good at making me angry.

the argumentation lacks any show of willingness to try to empathize
with those that whole differing view points, or who may be impacted
negatively by the behavior in question.

Why is he defending dick jokes, moreover, why is he defending people
that make dick jokes; why does he make dick jokes. I feel like, by
asking those three questions, I am currently at a more powerful point
for real understanding than he is, because he is
defending/asking/responding from a place of feeling like he already
knows all that he has to know about the issue.

Is he _honestly_ asking why dick jokes at a professional conference
for a profession dominated by men may be (ARE) alienating,
marginalizing, and oppressive?

Or is asking why dick jokes may be (again, ARE) alienating,
marginalizing, and oppressive?

Snide condescending asshattery which is AS alienating if not more so
than the act of making dick jokes at a conference. and I'm not even
there.

I guess this is about last week-end. At some points I felt really uncomfortable about the level of sexualization of the atmosphere that some people (even speakers) contributed to a lot. And not (only) because I thought about how the (few) women in the room probably felt about this. This was also marginalizing me, as I don't want to be reduced to being someone who happens to have a dick. I'm there because I want to learn and share knowledge.

During one particular talk on sunday I just had to leave the room. Probably I should have stayed and yelled "Asshole!" a few times, as I feel that would've been appropriate.

EDIT: By the way, hopefully there'll be a recording online of this one talk I mentioned. Because it was just super-embarrassing.

This was also marginalizing me, as I don't want to be reduced to being someone who happens to have a dick.

Right. I was uncomfortable too. That said, I tend to take oppressed groups' opinions more seriously than non-oppressed groups, but that doesn't mean that your/my concerns aren't also valid.

Yeah, just wanted to emphasize that this should be concerning everyone.

That said, I tend to take oppressed groups' opinions more seriously than non-oppressed groups

Good point is good!

I remember the last time one of these little scandals erupted there was an argument made that "you're offended because you're American; in Europe we're grownups who are OK with that sort of thing". Could this be a cultural difference?

I wondered the same thing. FWIW, a comment from a Polish person who was there:

I always get really upset and a little sad at all the blatant sexism that happens at any conference where there's a large eastern european population. I know that's stereotyping, but I've seen it happen too many times.

Honestly, I think that even that 'cultural difference' means that 'they' need an even BIGGER cultural shift than 'we' do.

Hmm, about Eastern Europe. Remember TechCrunch in Moscow? (It had a live video stream) Absolutely nothing ever was about sex. Asexual conference <3

Thanks for pointing that out. We organizers really hear your feedback. I personally hope next time more care will be taken to avoid such jokes during the talks.

I did not like this one particular talk on Sunday either, not only because of some jokes, but also because speaker spent 5 minutes talking about himself. I also hear a lot of complains about technical level of this talk.

Thanks @jdudek. I was planning on sending a link to this to the organizers after some people had commented.

It was really drawn into sharp contrast because of the RailsGirls talk, too...

Other than this one aspect, I had a really good time at the conf. I'm just really concerned that this kind of thing is what's keeping women out.

Other than this one aspect, I had a really good time at the conf.

Same for me, btw! What I told @mlomnicki on Monday morning is what I still feel (that it was a great conf!).