This needs to be read here:
I’m still reading this blog, and I’m still not feeling like blogging for it. And I’ve finally figured out why. It’s a boys’ club. Not that I don’t love boys, but it’s one thing hanging out in the bar with them and quite another trying to get them to take you seriously when you’re talking, um, golf, with them. Digital ink, ID cards, government inquiries, Mars, US politics, transport … it’s a man’s world. And frankly, I am not man enough to go up there and start talking about shoes. Don’t interpret any of that as insulting: I read Samizdata every day, and find it not only interesting and righter than lots of other places, but diverse and entertaining as well. In a very very male kind of a way.
Hm. Yeah. Good point, er, what did you say your name was again? Alice. Yeah. So. Tell us about shoes then. How are they designed? – do they use the latest materials for those super-thin high heels? – you know, the ones the Space Programme made for the outsides of Shuttles, I bet they do, and get those acrylic surfaces, first used in the automobile industry I believe (although I’m open to correction on this – I’m not any sort of techno-fanatic you understand), for the Ford Psychopath ZPX100 Concept Car in 1971 which never made it into production but which looked really cool, like a Dan Dare rocket …
That’s enough about shoes. Get a load of this:
Shaped like a giant jellyfish and sheltered from the sun beneath its own artificial clouds, the world’s first underwater luxury hotel is to open beneath the waves of the Persian Gulf within three years.
The 220-suite Hydropolis Hotel in the Arab emirate of Dubai will cost £310 million to build. It aims to charge guests up to £3,500 per night and to provide them with the last word in undersea luxury.
It will be built of toughened, clear plastic Plexiglas, concrete and steel. Guests will be able to experience the sensation of sleeping in the sea by booking a bubble-shaped suite – including a clear glass bath tub – offering views of the sea life all around.
For those worried about terrorist attack, it will boast a high level of security, including anti-missile radar. If disaster does strike in one section, it can be sealed off with watertight doors.
Babe magnet or what?
Actually, Alice might quite like a night in that.
Sorry but it seems to me you didn’t get Alice’s commment right. In fact she said she finds your site interesting, only the issues debated, and probably the way to expose them, fit a very male pattern. That is nothing to be ashamed of.
Me i’m also a woman, and eagerly follow many political blogs, among which Samizdata. This said, i agree that many posts/comments are written in a way that could only be made by a man. Sorry, this is a subjective feeling, but i can’t help it: that’s the way i see it.
Sad you reacted so sarcastically.
WO
I absolutely wasn’t trying to be sarcastic, and am mortified that this was how it came across. In other words as making the problem worse instead of getting to grips with it.
I was trying to do a send up of the toys-for-boys style we so often do here, not to assert its superiority over a more woman-friendly style.
Alice is a very good friend of mine, and I found her comment extremely true, and revealing and interesting. My bit immediately after it was intended to take the piss out of males suddenly confronted with a different way of thinking, who immediately pervert the new point of view back into the same old rubbish.
Apologies all round.
We all love ’em, these female creatures. But they do so suffer from little lives. Sorry girls, I know you have to look after the kids and all and, genetically, your freedoms are strictly limited. But it’s a fact. You do not think like we do. We do not feel like you do.
However, accordingly to lots of print media last week the poor, already mostly superfluous male is on the way out – a degrading Y chromosome, apparently. The world of biker girls, egg-on-egg fertilisation and supermarket respectability for the humble dildo is just over the horizon. Ride on, you may say. Though on what exactly is a bit of a mystery. The washing machine, maybe.
True, a manless world would have no wars, no football, no toilets seats left standing. But what a hopeless place it would be. Max empathy buts lots of jealousy, scratching and periodic hysteria. Also, and more to the point, no grand vision. No technological advancement (or even stasis). No spiders shifted out of the bath. No one to moan at or misunderstand. Most of all, no one to drop his jaw at your drop-dead gorgeous looks, to love you unreservedly, to be that reliable, stable, strange thing about the house – an ordinary man who maybe can’t afford the Hydropolis but remembers your anniversary just the same.
Enjoy us while you can. And indulge us in our blogs.
I think Alice Bachini may have a point — while the opposition of Mars and the invention of digital ink are fascinating in their own way, they’re not every libertarian’s cup of tea. In fact, I’ve got a feeling that posting too much techno stuff pushes your otherwise brilliant site on to the slippery slope towards nerdishness.
What’s next? Brian The Trainspotter meets Andy the Anorak?
Know what your site needs? Perhaps a tad of SEXING UP!
Cheers,
Charles
Personally, I think we fell into the chasm of nerdishness a long time ago. That’s okay with me. I’m a nerd. On the other hand, adding non-nerdish viewpoints as well is good, which is why I like it when Alice posts. Also, as far as female Samizdatistas are concerned, I wish Natalie would post here more often too. (Her own blog has been particularly good lately however).
And where has Adriana gone?
It’s hard to get men to take women seriously in most places and topics, has been my observation, except for those fellows who are not threatened by and who love women- which does not include most of the male population of the earth, I conjecture.
Actually, I think that nerdy guys tend to be more open to listening to women than many other male populations- say, construction workers or professional sports players. Then again, such a thing can’t really be generalized- individuals are individuals.
To give over “a man’s world” to the men without any feminine input would be a pity. While the women who enter into those bastions had best be passionately interested in and know their stuff and be ready to weather the inevitable hard time that some will throw thier way, as well as to perservere through those who will try to treat her as eye candy and not a brain, there is much to learn by doing so. For both men and women.
For goodness sake, it all is a matter of an individual, not sexual preference. I love stories about Mars and digital paper. I follow politics with religious zeal. If you were discussing ?girl stuff? on this site, I would not be reading you. And I can assure you, nobody would mistake me for a man.
I like stories about diamonds, though. Like the one about making ?cultured diamonds? on Wired.
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.09/diamond_pr.html
Why not just link to Alice’s blog, Lord knows, she could do with a few commenters.
First it was the public bar at the pub, then it was the golf club – is nowhere sacred?
Men used to use the argument, thet they didn’t feel comfortable, telling dirty jokes and swearing when the Ladies were present, and that was why they liked their ‘men-only’ sanctums. Now the Women curse worse than men and tell really dirty jokes. Alice has a particularly strong line of Anglo-Saxon curses.
I have followed Alice’s blog for some time now, why I don’t rightly know, she never seems to follow through on anything, and she really does have some bright ideas, but unfortunately the attention span of a (beautiful), butterfly. Yes we are still waiting for that picture you repeatedly promised us some time ago!.
Typically female, typically frustrating!. Very victim oriented, (poor little me, I’m so helpless!), but then you younger guys are suckers for that line. (Don’t think your attentive little gestures of support have gone unnoticed Michael!).
Her items on TCS are excellent and there she has quite a following, but then that is something she knows and cares passionately about. Keep at it girl!.
Her support among you Samizdatistas is puzzling – maybe she is distributing some special cookies at those little soirees you have occasionally!.
It sounds from her remarks, that you are begging her to blog regularly for you, please fellas, lets keep it at the occasional level, after all, I should hate to have to find another sanctum.
I can definitely see what Alice B means.
I feel the same about all the gee-wizz space stuff, and you’ll have noted how little I comment on war-reports, guns and blogging technology. However, I don’t have strong feelings about shoes either. Put me down as gender-neutral if you like. See if I care.
One of the marvelous things about the internet is that, if you want (though I don’t know why you would), you can be nameless and sexless. And that like interests attract to like.
Men and women who like politics can congregate to share ideas and refine their beliefs. Men and women who like fashion can do the same.
The answer is not forced diversity of subject to accomodate feminine interests (I loathe that sort of feminist claptrap), but subject forums that focus their mental energy to develop a general body of thought.
That said, I think both genders can appreciate sexy subjects.
Remember the flap a few years ago when Mattel marketed a talking Barbie doll that said things like, “math is hard!” and “let’s go to the mall!”? Those shifting cultural stereotypes…it’s like digging holes and filling ’em up again.
This whole thread has cooties…
Re Andy’s posting:
Yeah, the old joke is of course:
“On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog” (over 2000 Google hits).
But if all you write about is sniffing other dogs’ backsides, then people will SUSPECT you are a dog … and switch to another blog.
The same, of course, applies to anoraks and trainspotters.
Here’s the cartoon again, for those who’ve forgotten it:
http://www.unc.edu/depts/jomc/academics/dri/idog.html
S Weasel – Yes, this thread has cooties! Ewwww! If I see a piece about cars or space, I don’t even read it, but I know it will get 20 or 30 posts, and they will be major obsessive, but enjoying themselves. Not for me, but so what? But if I see a piece about politics, that’s red meat. Why are we discussing this? This is a lively blog whose readers have a vast range of knowledge and opinions. That is why we keep coming back. If you did a piece on fashion, my eyes would glaze over. Fashion I can get anywhere. Samizdata bloggers I can only get here.
OMG…women are here…
Ah, do you, ah, like…..stuff?
Blog nekkid!!!
Christ.
“It’s hard to get men to take women seriously”
At times, indeed it is. It gets even harder when women tell men that politics and science stuff is “male”, and it’s just tooooo haaaaard for women’s minds, and why don’t we talk about shoes? Surely it’s possible to embrace one’s Inner Airhead without attributing her to women in general?
yes