There are a couple of email lists I belong to that are related to women working in technology. As I've seen far too frequently in women/girl-related email groups, a discussion thread was started about men joining the group or subscribing to the email following a question about developing a mission statement for the website which quickly turned into male bashing. Will spare you all the drama in between but wanted to share my thoughts I sent the list about creating a more embracing culture in the group:
I was thinking about unsubscribing today and wanted to share with why. All of the "man" bickering of late had me flashing back to another foundational girl group. One of the main reasons I stopped being a member of (name removed) in LA a few years back was because I thought I was joining a pro-woman group that turned into an anti-man group. Personally I think that's the reason Martin Luther King is remembered far fonder than Louis Farrakhan. It's hard sometimes to be a woman and have to deal with feminists. In their attempts to prove women are just like men, feminists fight to get all women into the labor force and combat -- never mind that not all want to join. Those who prefer stay-at-home motherhood are ridiculed. God created men and women, and, thankfully, he created us different. But he still made us equal.
Have you seen the West Wing episode recently about the ERA's Article 14? It was a discussion about guns, Republicans, ERA etc. and one of the cast was really opposed to it. She went on to say she didn't agree with the ERA because it was redundant. This is what she said:
You know, you insist that government is depraved for not legislating against what we can see on the newsstands or what we can see in an art exhibit or what we can burn in protest or which sex we're allowed to have sex with or a woman's right to choose. But don't you dare try to regulate this deadly weapon I have concealed on me for that would encroach against my freedom. And Democrats believe in freedom of speech unless you want to pray while you're standing in school. And you believe in the freedom of information act except if you want to find out if your 14 year old has had an abortion.
A new amendment we vote on declaring that I am equal under the law to a man? I'm mortified to discover there's reason to believe I wasn't before. I'm a citizen of this country. I'm not a special subset in need of your protection. I do not have to have my rights handed down to me by a bunch of old white men. The same Article 14 that protects you protects me. And I went to law school just to make sure.
There are some great articles on the web about this and I'd encourage you to read them before the next email tirade you launch into.
My new favorite toy of the week is the Replay. It's like Tivo or Ultimate TV, you can record programs on a hard disk instead of a VCR. It's great, I search for unusual films I haven't seen in a while and I can save them in the middle of the night. Today while I was sleeping I was recording Mi Vida Loca. It's about Los Angeles girl gangs in Echo Park. Saw it a few years back and wanted to check it out again.
The cool part is with a click of a button you can save it to your VCR on tape, delete it from the Replay and you're ready to go again. They are local company called Sonic Blue who also made the RIO MP3 player. Interested to see how the DVR world shakes out.
I'm thinking about burning some of my CD's to mp3's. Might be easier to have them all on my server/computer than I can search with the computer rather than having to look through all the cases. You know i just think that's the one thing that computers have over humans. Computers have a much better finder features, it's more intuitive than the human brain.
Sure we have unlimited capacity but hey that's a rant I'll get into later. other opt is to hack to the cat and scan all of my CD's in and that way I can search my title/artist and then it'll make it easier to locate.
*grin* Do I have too much time on my hands or what? I did that once with my books, I wrote down all the books I own and then put it in a spreadsheet. Yes, I'm nuts and you can check it most of them in the
library area of my site.
I spent some of today trying to get on the "Survive the Mall" contest on z100 a local radio station. I'm going to send an email to the and call in during the morning show. This is the bio I sent, it's a joke profile (starting at I am a dynamic figure...) that made the rounds in the 99/00's which always cracked me up.
ABOUT ME:
I'm pretty new to PDX, I moved up here after a relaxing vacation in Central America. I'm originally from Massachusetts via a 10 year stint in Venice Beach, CA. There is more information and photos on my personal site but as far as highlights: I am an eclectic blend, from a Peter Pan lifestyle (that's PPS not PMS) to having an IRA since my teens. Music is one of my passions. Have Elton John to Gus Gus and Ozzy to Ozomatli. Just saw Ozomatli recently, they are like the Gypsy Kings on crack! I've got close to 3 thousand albums now and still remember my very first LP, 45, CD, Tape and 8 Track. I love Mother Nature, car racing, art shows, Scrabble and Cranium.
I am a dynamic figure, often seen scaling walls and crushing ice. I have been known to remodel train stations on at lunch, making them more efficient in heat retention. I translate ethnic slurs for Cuban refugees and write award-winning operas. Once I treaded water for three days in a row. I cook 30-min brownies in 20. I am an expert in stucco, a veteran in love, and an outlaw in Peru. Using only a hoe and a large glass of water, I once single-handedly defended a small village in the Amazon Basin from a horde of ferocious army ants. I play bluegrass cello, was scouted by the Mets and I am the subject of numerous documentaries. I enjoy urban hang gliding. I am an artist, computer junkie, concrete analyst, and a ruthless bookie. Critics worldwide swoon over my original line of corduroy evening wear. I don't perspire. Last summer I toured in New Jersey with a traveling centrifugal-force demonstration. My deft floral arrangements have earned me fame in international botany circles. Children trust me. I can hurl tennis rackets at small objects with deadly accuracy. I once read Paradise Lost, Moby Dick & Atlas Shrugged in one day and still had time to refurbish the dining room that nite. I have performed several covert operations for the CIA & NSA. I sleep once a week; when I do I sleep in a chair and I just maybe stole this whole profile from someone else.
Here’s the challenge — if you could invite 5 people to a dinner party (not counting best friends or relatives), who would they be? What would you eat? What music would be playing? What would you talk about? Who would you invite?
Considering all the options available, it took me a few minutes and I hereby deliver my list with a disclaimer — the names will probably change with time, environment and mood.
patsy cline
janeane garofalo
charles bukowski
dorothy parker
fran lebowitz
the music:
patsy cline (of course)
hank williams
james brown
otis redding (all of above-greatest hits)
elliot smith-either/or
catpower-what would the community think
built to spill-the normal years
june of 44-tropics and meridians
the first crush compilation
unwound-challenge for a civilized society
black sabbath-the ozzy years
the food:
whiskey and large strawberries
the conversation:
70% of the night would be consumed with laughter, 20% with deep disscussion, 15% with bitching and 5% with depression. we would start out by making fun of EVERYTHING and ease into sex 101. after discussing sex and realizing the lack of it in our lives, we would get depressed. fortunately, james brown would save the day and we'd dance. we would then over-analyze a variety of inane subjects before drifting off/passing out.
