What topics (if any) have you considered posting about (or replying to), but then decided not to because of fear of gender-specific negative response or attention? If there any specific question you’d be interested in participating in a future discussion upon, on the same anonymous lines as this one?
I post more in PUA and gender type threads than I otherwise would because I worry about the male response to this question. Also, I find people are more receptive to my statement of pro-PUA points because I can include female-centric anecdotal evidence, and I have a feeling that men talking about PUA and gender differences is a massive ugh field.
I would love to be proven wrong about this, if guys want to answer this question.
I’d be interested in knowing more generally how many people refrain to post or reply about potentially mind-killing topics in general because they (think they) are in a group underrepresented on Less Wrong (e.g. conservatives or theists).
I’m neither a conservative nor a theist, but I often feel rather underrepresented here. I tend to refrain from posting, period, because of the general sense of how that goes; I usually go through a bit of a cycle where I won’t post at all for a while, then find some random, pretty neutral thing I feel prepared to comment on intelligibly, then get drawn into whatever userbase-splitting argument is going on recently after it’s been a while (this part mostly happens if I’ve been low on spoons, am feeling irate, or just generally am not feeling much impulse control at the time).
Part of this is just that I’m not very good at arguing-as-a-skill; I’ve noticed that even when correct I’m fairly easy to outmaneuver because that particular approach to language is fairly alien to me (probably to do with some of the neurological blah).
And then certain types of misogyny or other dumbassery will end up making me rage-quit for a month or two, where I just no longer feel any desire whatsoever to participate, beyond maybe a media post.
I don’t think I’ve ever feared a gender-specific negative response when posting on LessWrong, though I also deliberately use a gender-neutral username.
I post less to PUA/genderthings type threads than my naive inclination would be. Part of this is the (good thing) that there are some people around who sometimes find these threads before I do who I trust to say sane things, many of whom are better at keeping their cool than I am. Part of this is the (bad thing) that I expect to be attacked when I do post, via generalization or just insensitive badgering (and also by voting).
While in such threads, I make a general policy of withholding some relevant personal information, even when I think it could make me more convincing, because I don’t want to paint more of a target on myself, or risk the greater emotional fallout of even that not being persuasive.
None. I have far too much self-confidence to be scared off for that reason. I can deal with the frequent disagreements but it took me a looooong time to become comfortable with that. I was people-pleasing and at first I couldn’t tolerate the experience of causing or persisting with disagreements because I didn’t like making others uncomfortable. I had to train myself to deal with that but I’m good at it now. I have to wonder how many other women would find it hard to put themselves out there and take all the resulting criticism. If women often have a preference for supportive environments, that may be part of the reason for the gender ratio being skewed.
What topics (if any) have you considered posting about (or replying to), but then decided not to because of fear of gender-specific negative response or attention? If there any specific question you’d be interested in participating in a future discussion upon, on the same anonymous lines as this one?
I post more in PUA and gender type threads than I otherwise would because I worry about the male response to this question. Also, I find people are more receptive to my statement of pro-PUA points because I can include female-centric anecdotal evidence, and I have a feeling that men talking about PUA and gender differences is a massive ugh field.
I would love to be proven wrong about this, if guys want to answer this question.
I’d be interested in knowing more generally how many people refrain to post or reply about potentially mind-killing topics in general because they (think they) are in a group underrepresented on Less Wrong (e.g. conservatives or theists).
I’m neither a conservative nor a theist, but I often feel rather underrepresented here. I tend to refrain from posting, period, because of the general sense of how that goes; I usually go through a bit of a cycle where I won’t post at all for a while, then find some random, pretty neutral thing I feel prepared to comment on intelligibly, then get drawn into whatever userbase-splitting argument is going on recently after it’s been a while (this part mostly happens if I’ve been low on spoons, am feeling irate, or just generally am not feeling much impulse control at the time).
Part of this is just that I’m not very good at arguing-as-a-skill; I’ve noticed that even when correct I’m fairly easy to outmaneuver because that particular approach to language is fairly alien to me (probably to do with some of the neurological blah).
Ditto.
And then certain types of misogyny or other dumbassery will end up making me rage-quit for a month or two, where I just no longer feel any desire whatsoever to participate, beyond maybe a media post.
I don’t think I’ve ever feared a gender-specific negative response when posting on LessWrong, though I also deliberately use a gender-neutral username.
I post less to PUA/genderthings type threads than my naive inclination would be. Part of this is the (good thing) that there are some people around who sometimes find these threads before I do who I trust to say sane things, many of whom are better at keeping their cool than I am. Part of this is the (bad thing) that I expect to be attacked when I do post, via generalization or just insensitive badgering (and also by voting).
While in such threads, I make a general policy of withholding some relevant personal information, even when I think it could make me more convincing, because I don’t want to paint more of a target on myself, or risk the greater emotional fallout of even that not being persuasive.
None. I have far too much self-confidence to be scared off for that reason. I can deal with the frequent disagreements but it took me a looooong time to become comfortable with that. I was people-pleasing and at first I couldn’t tolerate the experience of causing or persisting with disagreements because I didn’t like making others uncomfortable. I had to train myself to deal with that but I’m good at it now. I have to wonder how many other women would find it hard to put themselves out there and take all the resulting criticism. If women often have a preference for supportive environments, that may be part of the reason for the gender ratio being skewed.