This is an incomplete FAQ, but it's the current state of play.
Contributors are welcomed.
This FAQ is on sourceforge, under linuxchix-faqs.
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1. Women's Studies 101 (or: What's all the fuss about?)
1.1. What is feminism - really?
Feminism - sometimes called equalism - is an attempt to make the world
as fair as possible. Women should be able to do any job they
are physically capable of and qualified for - so should men. So should
the disabled. So should elderly people, young people, those of
any race and those in any location.
Well, that's the ideal. It is unlikely that someone will be able to
manage a Kenya game park from New York City. Ever. But within
reasonable, realistic limits, feminists want male kindergarten teachers,
female CEOs of major companies, wheelchair-bound presidents,
and poor third-world villages with clean water and schools.
1.2. Isn't the world fair now?
Many of the Linuxchix over about thirty report personal experiences of
discrimination. Many of the Linuxchix under about thirty report
that they haven't seen any. This is a very, very hopeful sign.
On the other hand, look around you. Look for local politicians of
whatever races are minorities in your country. Look at the gender
balance. Look at anyone in power in your local country, your local city
- whether that power is monetary, political, legal or military. See
for yourself whether the spread of power is even over race, gender, and
(within reasonable limits) physical ability.
Consider how your local community and legal system would treat your
younger sister if she was attacked, perhaps raped. How about
your younger brother. How about if you (and they) were of another race?
How about if they were disabled?
Would a male be welcome as a kindergarten teacher? A female? How about
head of a major newspaper? A bank? The military?
If they would be welcome, how would they behave and dress? Could you
imagine your female newspaper head pregnant? The male
kindergarten teacher as a body-builder in his spare time? Now think
again about race. Now about disability. Now mentally locate these
people in a third world country. Now in New York City (or if you are in
NYC, try London.)
Once you've thought about all that, answer this question yourself.
1.3. Why 'Political Correctness' stinks
Most of the Linuxchix who have spoken about it (at the time this is
written), felt 'political correctness' worked against what we're after.
What we (most of us who have spoken about it) want is to be judged
fairly, on our skills and abilities. We do not want to be the token
female, to be hired to fill quotas, or to be the cause of discrimination
against a better-qualified person who happens to be male.
This seems to surprise a lot of people. At least, one of the common
things new males who join the lists do is ask us why we 'want'
tokenism and quotas. And it seems to be extremely difficult to get them
to believe that we don't. Sigh.
1.4. 'Just live with it'
This ('just live with it') is a common response to complaints about
teasing, seduction attempts and other such crud in the workplace.
Now, I (Jenn) happen to work in a great place. It's a small company,
close-knit, where we all make a point of getting to know each other
and how we feel about things. In this environment, I'm perfectly happy
to tease my workmates and be teased by them. I know what they
do and don't mean, and I'm comfortable with asking for clarification
when I don't. I also have the skills to leave if I want to.
When I was seventeen, at university, we had a lecturer who had a habit
of discussing female students in the lecture room. He
discussed clothing, implied prostitution, and in at least one tutorial,
asked female students if they were available on the weekend. The
women (myself included) were, young and unsure of themselves, and (fresh
from high school) perceived him as an authority figure.
Most had little or no chance to leave if they wanted a degree - even
transferring to a different university would have to wait till the end
of the academic year.
In my current workplace, 'hazing', teasing and sexual innuendo have
little effect on my ability to work. I know that I am not being
belittled
in front of others. I know that I'm not really being asked out - or that
if I am, it's purely social and will have no effect on my pay or
position.
At uni, I was being belittled in front of my peers, and there was a
subject where my marks were considerably lower than my average. I'll
leave it to the reader to decide which one.
Most workplaces are somewhere between the two situations. Most are too
large for staff to know each other well. Most have some
staff in positions of authority over others. Most people have reasons
that they can't resign a job on the spot.
In most workplaces, hazing, teasing and innuendo affect how well people
do their job, as well as how happy they are. Why should
anyone be asked to 'just live with it'?
1.5. 'Gender politics scares me.'
It scares me too. But I am a geek, and I want to be treated as a geek.
If I wanted to make the same amount of money and be treated as
a stereotypical female, I'd be a rich man's trophy wife.
I prefer dabbling as necessary in gender politics. It feels more honest.
1.6. 'I never intend to upset anyone, so it's not my problem'
This is very hard to answer. I'll try to demonstrate with examples.
A friend of mine is a very intelligent man. He's nice, he's
helpful, he's a tech manager of a company. When he's got a job opening,
he advertises on the lists he's on. There aren't many women on the
lists he's on, and he just doesn't think of the ones they're on.
So he doesn't get female applicants.
(He's not the only one like that. One list member complained on
issues that he hadn't had any female applicants for a position
he'd just advertised. He'd been on linuxchix for ages, so we asked
him when he'd advertised it on [EMAIL PROTECTED] He
hadn't.)
At one point, one list member said 'I know this list is supposed to
be full of geeks, but....'. Now replace 'list' with 'gym' and 'geeks'
with .. say .. 'jocks'. Do you think you'd get away unscathed? This
list member had no idea what he'd said wrong.
Most of us do things every day which are based on unconscious
assumptions. I (Jenn) tend to buy shoes which are slightly tight on
the assumption that I'll be wearing stockings - and I wear socks. I own
casual, smart casual, semi-formal and formal clothing for both
summer and winter - and I know what each means.
These behaviours are because I am socialised female. It's part of what
and who society (not necessarily my parents) have taught me
to be. Everyone has socialised behaviours. If you're not conscious of
yours, you'll do them constantly. If you're not conscious of other
peoples', you won't take them into account.
It's these socialised behaviours which lead to the female students in
teams at uni being given documentation to do, rather than
programming. Or to women finding most linux mailing lists 'unfriendly',
and not being able to point to why. Or to men posting their ads
only to those male-dominated lists, and not to the places female geeks
gather.
Creating an equal society isn't just about removing the overt, obvious
barriers. It's about figuring out the others. It's about noticing that
we've put the kids' computer in the boy's room. It's about producing
more games like Theme Hospal (as well as Command and
Conquer). It's about noticing that that smartly dressed female is just
as geeky as the sloppy male - or the smartly dressed male, or the
sloppy female.
And it's about noticing that it is your problem, and you have upset
someone.
It's about thinking.
1.7. '... but names will never hurt me'
Then why are there slander and libel laws?
Oh, and by the way, I've heard something about your mother....
1.8. Other sources of information
***** FILL THIS IN *****
2. Women and Linux
2.1. Women in Open Source
Where are all the women in the Open Source community? Some are coders,
yes, but look further. Look at documenters. At artists.
Sound engineers. Project coordinators. List maintainers. Testers. Look
at the lower-key, less flashy jobs. Women are usually trained in
childhood to aim for support roles, even if they hate them.
And think about where Open Source would be without them.
2.2. The Top Ten Women In Linux!
Most 'top people in Linux' or 'top people in Open Source' lists don't
seem to have any women in them. We've considered reasons for
that, and determined that most such lists seem to be kernel-focused, or
coder-focused. So here's a list of some (not the top ten, just a
random selection) of the top women in Open Source - whether coders,
artists, writers, bug-finders, advocates, organisers, or anything
else.
Telsa Gwynne
advocate, Gnome bugfinder
Deb Richardson
advocate, documenter, Open Source Writer's Group organiser,
Linuxchix organiser
'Kalana'
Worldforge, linuxchix
2.3. I saw this on slashdot....
..... and there's this hideous mass of stereotypical guff about women in
the comments area. We know. A lot of us just avoid slashdot
completely, because of it. Which, of course, means we don't get the same
news as the male geeks, because so many news items are
on slashdot (or similar places which we also avoid.)
Which goes right back to the Feminism 101 section of this FAQ.
(I just read this answer to Dancer (Squid and Exult hacker, and my
husband). He says he thought slashdot was aimed at teens and
kiddie wannabe techies. He also avoids it. Andover, if this isn't the
case, you'll want to do something about that.)
3. Women and Computing
3.1. Home
3.2. School
3.3. Work
3.4. Play
3.5. Mentors and visible women
4. Managing Geek Life
4.1. The Two-Hacker Household
4.2. Geek Isolation
4.3. Partners
4.4. Families
4.5. Housework & Clothing
4.6. Larval Phases
4.7. Other Information
5. Mailing List Stuff
5.1. List rules
Be polite.
Be helpful.
5.2. Reply to sender, reply to all?
5.3. To HTML or not to HTML
5.4. Related lists
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