Which country are you from? Where I'm from, the American woman enjoys more privileges, rights, and societal benefits than any other class in recent memory. I know that's not true in some other countries (obviously wherever you're from), but we coddle women here in the US.Atrus said:
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Wikipedia and the Gender Gap
- Thread starter Invisible_Insane
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Chet Rippo
Member
Slavik81 said:
He lives in Canada.
Calgary, AB according to his profile
firehawk12
Subete no aware
VelvetMouth said:
From my experience, women are more interested in content creation than content management. We're at a point where you don't need to learn anything to start a blog. In order to create a Wikipedia/Wikia page that conforms to a style, you still need to learn the markup language and style. It's a hurdle that will put off a lot of people, and I think that hurdle is in part tied to some form of technological literacy.
Besides, I've seen enough backstabbing and "big dickery" amongst women to know that they're perfectly willing to tear each other apart - at least in professional circles.
Fugu said:
There's nothing about computer science/math/physics/engineering that is predominantly male either. It's not like you need a penis in order to write #import <stdio.h> in Visual C.
Certainly there's a class/race link as well - if you're poor, you're less likely to have a computer/less likely to go to college/less likely to make Facebook. But as far as I know, there are more middle class white women in America than there are middle class white men. Something in the education system or parenting or whatever is guiding men toward certain occupations/studies and women toward others.
But I'm not a sociologist, so I have no idea what that might be.
I was watching a BBC documentary concerning testosterone and intelligence/savants.
It proposed that testosterone is linked with a deficiency in social capabilities, and that the more social skills depreciate, the more intelligent the person becomes.
There were female savants, that also had an overflow of testosterone, were extremely intelligent, but also, like their male counterparts, had no social capabilities. One woman couldn't even understand what it is like to care for anything.This is linked with testosterone, it boosts intelligence, but limits social skills/emotions.
One German scientist professed that it wasn't the women around the fire that invented the wheel, and it wasn't the men that went after these women that invented the wheel, as they were too preoccupied with social frivolities. It was the outcast, less socially conforming individual that made it happen.
So there you go. Men are more naturally inclined to be socially deprived, because of the levels of testosterone and this can help increase the thirst for knowledge. While the same can be said for a few women, though in general women are more interested in socializing.
It proposed that testosterone is linked with a deficiency in social capabilities, and that the more social skills depreciate, the more intelligent the person becomes.
There were female savants, that also had an overflow of testosterone, were extremely intelligent, but also, like their male counterparts, had no social capabilities. One woman couldn't even understand what it is like to care for anything.This is linked with testosterone, it boosts intelligence, but limits social skills/emotions.
One German scientist professed that it wasn't the women around the fire that invented the wheel, and it wasn't the men that went after these women that invented the wheel, as they were too preoccupied with social frivolities. It was the outcast, less socially conforming individual that made it happen.
So there you go. Men are more naturally inclined to be socially deprived, because of the levels of testosterone and this can help increase the thirst for knowledge. While the same can be said for a few women, though in general women are more interested in socializing.
CurlySaysX
Banned
Simple Solution.
Perm Ban 50% of the Male wikipedia contributors so as to even out the ratio of male/female.
Easy.
Perm Ban 50% of the Male wikipedia contributors so as to even out the ratio of male/female.
Easy.
PetriP-TNT
Member
95% of Wikipedias content (measured by word count) is about anime D&D monsters and everyone knows that women don't watch anime play D&D
edit: fixed for accuracy
edit: fixed for accuracy
Masked Man
I said wow
It seems as though the biggest points of contention, if you will, are the system of "edit warring" and the nature of Wiki's talk pages. While I know from experience that debate can become quite heated (depending on the participants and the subject at hand), one could just as well make a totally egregious error in editing a page about Carmen Barajas Sandoval and no one would be any the wiser. By contrast, if someone were to alter the wording in a description of Master Chief, all Wiki-hell would break loose.
Although I also find it problematic that information about some important sociocultural figures--Mexican feminist writers, for example--is so scarce, I think that it ultimately comes down to an issue of traffic and/or notoriety. Someone like Susan B. Anthony has a pretty sizable Wikipedia page to her name--and rightfully so. But there just simply isn't enough widespread interest among the general public when it comes to, say, Mexican feminist writers. The information itself is no less valid nor any less important, but I think that the example given by the author is slightly misguided in its application. While I acknowledge that the issue at hand does concern gender, it doesn't seem to me that gender is the barrier preventing the spread of information that appeals to a smaller audience than the GTA crowd.
Wikipedia does not force its users to declare their respective genders, so I am a little hesitant to accept the authors' argument that the nature of Wikipedia reinforces a psychological barrier that prevents women from participating in talk page discussion. The argument (from what I gathered) is rooted in the idea that women are treated with contempt if they use more aggressive language and/or methods of debate; but if no one's identity is made public, does this discrimination still apply?
Although I also find it problematic that information about some important sociocultural figures--Mexican feminist writers, for example--is so scarce, I think that it ultimately comes down to an issue of traffic and/or notoriety. Someone like Susan B. Anthony has a pretty sizable Wikipedia page to her name--and rightfully so. But there just simply isn't enough widespread interest among the general public when it comes to, say, Mexican feminist writers. The information itself is no less valid nor any less important, but I think that the example given by the author is slightly misguided in its application. While I acknowledge that the issue at hand does concern gender, it doesn't seem to me that gender is the barrier preventing the spread of information that appeals to a smaller audience than the GTA crowd.
I hate GTA, so take that with a grain of salt.
Wikipedia does not force its users to declare their respective genders, so I am a little hesitant to accept the authors' argument that the nature of Wikipedia reinforces a psychological barrier that prevents women from participating in talk page discussion. The argument (from what I gathered) is rooted in the idea that women are treated with contempt if they use more aggressive language and/or methods of debate; but if no one's identity is made public, does this discrimination still apply?
I think she's talking about the cultural barriers instilled in women as they grow up, rather than explicit discrimination from Wikipedia. She is very confusing on this front, on the surface the article seems like a criticism of wikipedia but it's really talking about the cultural differences that make men more equipped to participate in something like wiki than women. Which is reasonable, but only if you buy into the stereotypes and forget about the effects of anonymity on personality.
We need both. Obviously useless voices are, well, useless. But if you're only exploring a subject from one perspective then you're likely to miss areas that someone with another perspective may focus on. I don't see why there needs to be a divide along gender lines unless women's voices are generally more useless than males'.Count Dookkake said:
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
This is actually a good point. There are some studies showing that if women are anonymous they often lose the inhibitions to be "womanly".Halycon said:
One in particular I recall where women admit to much less sex and interest in sex if asked about it in front of the whole group, but if asked in private they admitted to thinking about it or having it as much if not more then men. Might it be the same for women who seem "disinterested in information and/or technology"?
Joel Was Right
If you smell burning, it's probably the generators acting up. Report it anyway.
Invisible_Insane said:
The crux of her argument isn't so much about Wikipedia (she is invoking it as an example of a fountain of knowledge) but rather the contribution men and women make towards that knowledge with the latter falling behind and subsequently having a smaller footprint in that overall contribution. Moving away from the Internet, you could take that argument into the library - how many books there are authored by women in comparison to men, or rather how is there a distinction to what topics being written?
It's a wider point. I've had this perception that most books I've come across were authored by men, despite the fact that some of my favourite (on politics, history and theology) are female written. I went to Amazon UK and looked at the best 40 sellers in most of their categories. Initially I left out Computing & Internet, Fantasy, Comic Books, Crime, Thillers & Mystery as they are male dominated e.g. 35 or more of the top 40 are male authors. Then I got tired and didn't do all of the categories. Note - each category has a sub-category of a dozen specific topics, each with their own chart, but this is the best sellers of that category as a whole.
Some of the books were written by institutions so take into consideration, when looking at the numbers, that there could be less women than stated (I counted the male authors first and then subtracted that number from 40 to get an estimate of how many were female).
The first row 'Overall' denotes the current Top 40 throughout all of the categories. Haven't looked at Amazon.com
Count Dookkake
Member
Legendary Warrior said:
I never suggested that, nor do I believe that.
José Mourinho
cocknose
This thread is a non-issue.
One would assume yes but anecdotal evidence says otherwise. While females I've encountered tend to be more open on the internet, they are still saddled with many mores from the real world. Men, obviously, are much quicker to shed these cultural restrictions.The_Technomancer said:
Invisible_Insane
Member
Kylehimself said:
Thank you for bringing that to our attention.
Consult your nearest dictionary for the definition of "forum."
charlequin
Banned
Masked Man said:
Yeah, there's really no reason to assume a discrimination or "psychological barrier" explanation here when diffuse sociological reasons will suffice as an explanation.
kevm3 said:
Why? If some kind of "concerted effort" resulted in more articles on currently underrepresented topics, without any loss of effort on other topics, that would pretty much definitionally not be a "waste of time."
FunkyPajamas
Member
So is your spelling.Drkirby said:
Count Dookkake
Member
Legendary Warrior said:
If the contributions are of equal quality then the all of this crying over gender-disparity is 100% useless wankery, from the perspective of Wikipedia users searching for quality information.
milkyjay20
Member
Arcane Hayter said:
haha
so right
beelzebozo
Jealous Bastard
Veidt said:
this is EXTREMELY interesting. what is the name of it? do you remember? i gotta see it.
charlequin
Banned
Count Dookkake said:
What if they're of equal quality but in different areas?
I mean, to me, the focus on men and women here is a bit misleading. Wikipedia has a "problem" where its users tend to be demographically narrow so the attention paid to different articles is not well-proportioned compared to their importance. (The insanely elaborate articles on individual Pokemon are the go-to example on this.) On top of "more women" it could probably also benefit from more old people, people who speak German, practitioners of heirloom crafts, and people who don't just repeatedly scan Wikipedia for sexual articles to which they can upload Creative Commons-licensed photographs of their own genitals.
Count Dookkake
Member
charlequin said:
Fans of relatively unpopular topics, when realizing that Wikipedia does not cover their field of knowledge or inquiry, are free to start a relevant page.
EDIT- That is, of course, assuming that they have the charitable interest to help the community, rather than just the urge to consume for free.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
There'd have to be girls on the internet before girls could edit Wikipedia edits.
charlequin
Banned
Count Dookkake said:
Of course they are. That is a deeply pointless response.
The question is, if you're running Wikipedia, and you can somehow encourage people who are fans of topics which are poorly represented now to contribute more, do you do so?
(hint: the answer is "yes")
They could replace the "Featured Article" section with something like "Save Our History!", with a different page each week.
Of course that might just encourage the editing diehards to research as much information for that page as possible and the contributing perspectives will be skewed anyway.
Of course that might just encourage the editing diehards to research as much information for that page as possible and the contributing perspectives will be skewed anyway.
I notice even you feel the need to put "problem" in quotation marks, suggesting that you realize there not an actual problem. Rather, there is a perception that the quality of Wikipedia has suffered as a result of not enough women contributing. This "problem" with Wikipedia's model is still not being born out anywhere within Wikipedia itself.charlequin said:
I asked earlier for examples of topics which are absent on Wikipedia due to too few women contributors, or which are not adequately covered for the same reason, and wasn't given any. The examples in the OP's article were short episode summaries for SatC and fashion designer bios, or the difference in length of articles on friendship bracelets vs. action figures. And here you are using the same logic, that overlong entries for Pokemon are somehow a hindrance towards other entries that deserve more attention.
This completely misses the fact that even if Pokemon had a paper thin entry, the other topics you feel are being not being given adequate coverage would STILL not be given any more attention. The Pokemon zealots would not be any more interested in those topics, and the people who haven't felt the need to expound on them already wouldn't be more interested because some Pokemon fan stayed away from Wikipedia. This "length" issue is a red herring. I'm interested in actual important topics being ignored or under attended, not the length of articles about toys and fashion designers and cartoons.
This "problem" with Wikipedia is so vague as to be irrelevant. Of course one can say "Wikipedia should be contributed to by every single demographic in the known universe, which would guarantee adequate coverage on more diverse topics." But at some point you have to accept the fact that certain demographics are just not as interested in contributing as others. Trying to frame that as a "problem" that needs "fixing" is basically saying that you need to "fix" certain people, a task certainly out of the scope of Wikipedia or their outreach.
The only reason he needs to put the word problem in quotes is because of people like you who misconstrue or overstate the meaning of the word.Satyamdas said:
I also don't see why you're so fanatically opposed to the idea that a more diverse pool of editors might be good for Wikipedia. *shrug*
Or maybe because it's not an actual "problem" at all. Problem implies an error, or a matter which needs to be fixed. In this case, the "problem" is with certain demographics being less inclined to contribute to Wikipedia. As such, what needs fixing is not Wikipedia's model (which accepts contributions from any and all), but people themselves. I find this notion ludicrous.Korey said:
I never said that a more diverse pool wouldn't be good for Wikipedia. That is desirable as long as useful and correct knowledge is brought to the table. I'm not interested in the gender or race of the contributors being perfectly balanced, I'm interested in accuracy. What difference does it make to a person looking up a Klein Bottle whether the contributors were women or men or Jew or gay? None at all. They are interested in accurate information, period. And in something like an encyclopedia that is of paramount importance. Wikipedia should not concern itself with attempting to change human tendencies.Korey said:
charlequin
Banned
Satyamdas said:
Shockingly enough, this is the entire point I am making.
Wikipedia is open for anyone to edit. People are entirely free to contribute to whatever articles they want, however much they want. That's great. That is what is wonderful about Wikipedia.
However, if all the people who choose to contribute have a narrow set of interests, some articles will get oodles of attention, while others will be underserved. That is not anybody's fault and nobody is doing anything wrong by contributing to the articles they want to contribute to, but it still means the end result could be better than it is.
Now, someone could say "oh, pare down those overly full articles" but that wouldn't be any help to anyone -- those people aren't going to work on different articles, they're just going to stop contributing. Nobody wants that. Instead, it makes more sense to find people who are interested in whatever is underrepresented and try to get them involved in Wikipedia.
That is why nobody in this thread has suggested trying to dissuade men from editing, or that a status quo where fewer total editors of a more even gender balance would be a good thing. The discussion is very much entirely about whether it would be beneficial to attract more women (or, as I've noted several times, old people, or artists, or Russophiles, or whatever) while retaining existing contributors.
If you're going to invent your own arbitrary standards it is going to be very difficult to convince you. Toys and fashion designers and cartoons are all "important" topics by Wikipedia's own standards. So are other topics cited in this thread, like the Mexican feminist writers cited by Masked Man. Wikipedia's goal is to be a comprehensive encyclopedic reference in, essentially, all areas of thought and knowledge, and to always be improving the quality and breadth of its articles. Any area that has short, poorly cited, or inaccurate articles is a potential area of improvement.
Why is "some point" equivalent to "immediately, without any further discussion or investigation" for you in this discussion?
If nobody who patronizes Wikipedia cares enough to notice that a topic is under served, does said topic really need to exist there? Theoretically, if someone with a desire for the information realized that Wikipedia was lacking it, and was unsatisfied with the fact, it would be a motivation for that person to add the information.
Kind of a "if a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it, does it make a sound?" situation.
Kind of a "if a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it, does it make a sound?" situation.
I've asked for examples of this underrepresentation and have yet to hear one. It is easy to say "whatever is underrepresented", but that could mean anything at all. It's uselessly vague. It's like you have an undefined and unspecific quota that Wikipedia should be meeting and isn't, which Wikipedia needs to be addressing somehow.charlequin said:
Is there potential for improvement throughout all of Wikipedia? Sure, I am positive that will remain the case for as long as it exists. Saying that something could be better is quite different from saying there is a fundamental problem with its model (which is what the OP's article was asserting).charlequin said:
This "problem" of the lack of female contribution has not been born out in anything other than the length of articles which are at best tangentally related to them. Is that the extent of the evidence? Small entry for Mexican feminist writers? Maybe there just aren't many who are noteworthy. Maybe the subject has a very small interest among readers and in turn small interest for contributors. It's very easy to say "Well it could be better", but that is not pointing to any real problem as relates to underrepresentation or omission of topics relating to ____ demographic.
Don't get me wrong, I've no interest in stopping anyone's investigation into, or discussion of this topic. It very well may be that in the future the balance of contribution will even itself out, and that's fine by me. I just don't think that any concerted effort by Wikipedia or anyone will bring this about. People can and do change their tendencies, but not at the request of outside influences.charlequin said:
davepoobond
you can't put a price on sparks
ok, then according to them, 50% of everything in the world is created by women, right?
There are, but this isn't one of them, and the fact that this is being brought up as THOUGH it were one of them only trivializes REAL gender inequity. Seriously, if you want women to be better represented on Wikipedia, get more women to edit Wikipedia!Feep said:
Masked Man
I said wow
charlequin said:
I think you hit the nail on the head, so to speak. If members of the active userbase (i.e. those who are inclined to update existing articles and create new ones) are not interested in a topic, it is unlikely that much information pertaining to the subject will appear on the site, regardless of the desires of the passive userbase (i.e. those who simply view Wiki articles without contributing). I think that the gender gap is less a problem inherent to Wikipedia and more a societal issue by which women have been historically underrepresented.
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