My hair curled over a blog entry entitled Again with the “women and blogging” meme (in response to two entries). The tone is insulting, arguing that the topic of women and blogging has been done to death. It is precisely this kind of post that reminds me of how the blogosphere solidifies misogyny and prejudice rather than acknowledging that people are trying to process. Dismissing discussions about gender inequality permits the marginalized subjects to be dismissed.
There is no doubt that blogs can be clustered by gender, class, race and age simply by clustering based on subject or style. Guess what? Most knitting blogs are written by women and women make up the majority of personal blogs are written by women. Recognizing that style and topics are dividing factors, i’d still argue that the difference has more to do with audience relationships. How are people constructing expression for their audience? How are they seeking to attract/manage an audience?
Move away from the blogosphere. How many women do you know that seek to be heard concerning their political opinion ever anyhow? Proportionally fewer. Why? That’s a damn fine question. Men do not dominate the political arena; they dominate a certain aspect of the political sphere, and that’s often the most vocal. Go to Capitol Hill and you will see many fine women engaging in change. I remember asking my mother why she didn’t run for office; she told me that she wouldn’t want to put us through the ringer, having our past dredged up.
Marginalized populations have different issues at risk when they voice their opinion. And damn do you have to be strong when you have an audience who feels the need to berate you just because. That’s hard for anyone, but imagine how it feels when you look around and feel like you’re one of few, when you feel marginalized from the get-go.
Are women more protective of their stories than men? More protective of their voice? Do they have good reason to be? Cause damn it feels shitty to be told that your concerns are written to death.
[Also on Misbehaving]
I’m on deadline so I haven’t been keeping up with my own blog too closely! but I did skim Pete’s “enough/meme” post and my impression was that he wasn’t saying that this isn’t a valuable topic of discussion but that he’s tired of the “women don’t blog” inferences drawn from skewed statistical pools (such as the readers or writers of wonky political blogs in which such typically male pursuits as publicly competing to demonstrate mastery over details are treasured).’
I can’t speak for Pete and he may want to clarify this. I will re-read his entry to see if it does in fact dismiss the whole idea of looking at gender and blogging at all, because I would agree with you then that that’s not appropriate.
That would be like saying that affirmative action is unneeded since “we live in a colorblind society now, don’t we?”
Anyway, keep holding our feets to the fire, danah…
Gender, Teens, and Blogging
The role of gender in any cultural movement always raises important issues regarding how we interpret and dissect information, power, and the connections between. Over the past few weeks I have been keeping track of a few different pointers that…
Given what you research and your mention of gender in blogs I thought you might find this site interesting
http://pickupyourowndamnsocks.com/
I find it humorous but would be interested in what you would think of it….if you have the time to check it out.
One of the most common sexist dismissals of women bloggers is that we’re “self-involved”. Particularly if we deign talk about our bodies, relationships, or problems living in a sexist culture.