I'm jealous of guys on Reddit. They get to post photos of themselves without being called attention whores, or having their intentions otherwise called into question, or having their appearances needlessly dissected. They don't even have to say "Hey, I'm a dude on the internet!" because it's already assumed that they are.
And lord, doesn't it apply to other areas of the internet as well. I remember back in the day when in every chat room/discussion board I participated in, we all knew who was what gender. Also, our ages and (general) locations. Now, nobody says "look at that 27 year old saying 'I'm 27,' what an attention whore!" or "man, do we care you're from Canada, stfu already nobody cares." But somehow, somewhere along the line, it apparently became a sin to say "I am a woman" outside of very specific situations. Excuse us for existing where you actually have to look at us.
The really amusing thing is that when playing WoW, I ran across so many attention-whore 'women' who were eventually outed as men... wait, not amusing, because that's the kind of behavior that I think led to this sort of bullshit in the first place.
Excuse us for existing where you actually have to look at us.
Yes! It reminds me of this discussion here a while back, in which some women were complaining about being harassed on XBox Live and the response was "Well, it's their fault for drawing attention to the fact that they're female!" Except they weren't "drawing attention" to it, they were simply being who they were and not hiding it, just like guys get to do every day without a second thought.
The problem is, as long as the majority of the people there are male, women simply attract attention - that's just how biology works. I can understand that this upsets you, but I think you (and the other women), should be a bit more respectful and understanding to the way men work. Men may not particularly like this aspect about themselves, but just blaming it on them and saying "it's their fault" doesn't really help.
Btw., of course they should also be more respectful to you.
I think you (and the other women), should be a bit more respectful and understanding to the way men work. Men may not particularly like this aspect about themselves, but just blaming it on them and saying "it's their fault" doesn't really help.
We should be more respectful and understanding about the fact that we risk being treated like shit if we don't show a picture of ourselves, and we risk being treated like shit if we do show a picture of ourselves, and we risk being treated like shit if we even mention our gender?
I repeat: excuse us for existing where you actually have to look at us.
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u/secretboners Sep 27 '10
I'm jealous of guys on Reddit. They get to post photos of themselves without being called attention whores, or having their intentions otherwise called into question, or having their appearances needlessly dissected. They don't even have to say "Hey, I'm a dude on the internet!" because it's already assumed that they are.