The gender gap gap

[MMAR]

I would have tacked this onto the end of Liz's RfA topic, since that's it's origin, but it's locked. It's also a large enough topic all of it's own. But obviously if someone else has made this same point, go ahead and tack it onto wherever that thread is.

The reason Wikipedia has such a massive gender gap problem is because the majority of Wikipedians have absolutely no clue what people mean when they raise the issue of the 'gender gap', i.e. they have no idea what causes it and what's likely to fix it. But crucially, they show an extraordinary high capacity for not even bothering to even try to understand it, even when someone spoon feeds it to them. Examples of this abound everywhere, but the latest is in response to this post diff. It seems there's not a single logical fallacy or misunderstanding of the scientific method that doesn't emerge at one time or another during their attempted rebuttals of posts like this.

Whether they like it or not, and whether they can even understand how to spot it or not (and some clearly can), there is no doubt whatsoever that Liz faced opposition in her RfA that had a definite gender component, for the reasons described in that post. Perhaps not as significant as the other wiki-political aspects, but enough to push it into the discretionary zone, and therefore make it much harder than it should have been to promote an admin who will obviously go some way to closing the gender gap, since a), she is female, and b), despite the attempted smear campaign, her presence will increase the levels of empathy, kindness and respect among the admin ranks (but make no mistake, this is only because the current average is so low, not because she herself was an ideal candidate).

In a moment of lucidity, serial GGTF baiter Sitush even recognises the issue, yet then hilariously tries to blame other people for his own ignorance.

my bet is most people reading this page do not even know what "second generation gender bias" is. That may be a problem, sure, but if you can't even communicate the buzzwords then you have no chance, and that is nothing to do with sexism etc

This is the guy who had absolutely no clue what the Ally Skills Workshop was for, yet railed against it anyway, in the same way he does to any proposal to close the gender gap. I'm still not sure if this is just an act or not. Unsurprisingly Drmies, an admin ally of the GGTF baiters, also decided to respond.

It is entirely possible that I was underscrutinized and treated too kindly in my RfA because I was one of the boys. Possible--sure. But it's all too easy to start with the premise that "women get a rougher ride at RfA" and then find the evidence for it, evidence which must have been carefully cloaked.

This guy's now spent far more words trying to stop his opposition of Liz being downgraded or trying to counter the idea that Liz got a rough ride because of her gender, than he has in responding to those many people who found fault with the way his opposition seems to have entirely misrepresented Liz. Not that it would be useful to prove the trend, but if Drmies re-submitted himself to RfA, he would in all likelihood still pass, even though his admin history is littered with clear evidence (i.e. in the form of diffs which need no out of context quotation) that his general communication style and capacity for agenda pushing/politicking goes far beyond, miles beyond, anything that Liz was accused of. The Wikipediots would literally tie themselves in knots trying to explain that, without admitting that the gender gap exists and manifests itself at RfA in an obvious and detrimental way.

They are willfully blind. As one of the more lunatic admins put it:

Gender should have NEVER have been brought into this; and in fact it should never be brought into ANY RfX discussion.

Stupid breeding stupid. Assholes promoting assholes.

[Midsize Jake]

We've covered gender-disparity issues fairly heavily in the Wikipediocracy blog (I should say they've covered it since I haven't written any of those posts myself). This one in particular - or just do a blog-search on the word "gender" and you'll find a whole bunch of them.

This notion of "second-generation gender bias" is certainly germane to their problem, but at least in this most recent situation with the User:Liz RfA, I'm pretty sure what we were seeing there was first-generation gender bias. I had no idea who she was until yesterday, but apparently the worst hardcore misogynists on Wikipedia have known User:Liz's identity for about a year now, and they usually only need a few days to get wide distribution of names on their collective hit-list. And sure enough, they've been busy. The idea that this was not an organized, well-orchestrated "offsite !vote-canvassing" campaign just isn't credible to me, despite all their earnest efforts to claim that gender had nothing to do with it. It very much did, and frankly, they dodged a potentially serious PR bullet by ignoring them and granting her admin rights.

If they can't even get their first-generation gender bias under control, they're not likely to have much luck with the second-generation stuff. Maybe they've turned the corner with this latest incident, but more likely it will only convince these dudes to redouble their efforts against a user base that's probably waning in their enthusiasm for dealing with it.

[MMAR]

An ongoing example of the gender blindness during this very RfA - as I explained here viewtopic.php?p=147323#p147323 Dennis Brown has already tried once to force his peculiarly male opinion of how Liz was treated in this RfA once already. He didn't seem to take the hint that she completely ignored him, so now she's finally an admin, he's gone to her talk page to yet again try to force this opinion on her diff.

Overwhelmingly, those that opposed did so because of concerns about experience in the right areas, not because we questioned your character or intent.

This is not even close to a true summary of the opposition, as seen by the 'crat chat'. She's ignored him a second time, will he get the message now?

Further down the page, one of the other GGTF baiters Hell in a Bucket (T-C-L) has tried a subtle attempt to get Liz to say something stupid about gender diff. Not quite as well done as Cla68's attempt to propose the idiotic (and entirely non-GGTF originated) issue of Affirmative Action on the crat chat talk page, but obvious fake concern nonetheless, designed only to entrap or enflame. Dennis has weighed in here too diff, demonstrating what I said above about Wikipedian's general inability to understand the issue - in his (anecdotal of course) experience, women have a higher success rate at RfA compared to men, so that proves there's no issue, right? Wrong. If. You. Bothered. To. Understand. The. Issue. FloNIght, originator of the post above, explains it to him, and unsurprisingly, her theory is similar to Liz's own experience. diff That post shows Liz has a pretty good handle on what the gender gap issue really means for Wikipedia, and how it's got nothing to do with the sort of nonsense sexism strawmen the like of Sitush often erect by way of rebuttal.

[MMAR]

We've covered gender-disparity issues fairly heavily in the Wikipediocracy blog (I should say they've covered it since I haven't written any of those posts myself). This one in particular - or just do a blog-search on the word "gender" and you'll find a whole bunch of them.

This notion of "second-generation gender bias" is certainly germane to their problem, but at least in this most recent situation with the User:Liz RfA, I'm pretty sure what we were seeing there was first-generation gender bias. I had no idea who she was until yesterday, but apparently the worst hardcore misogynists on Wikipedia have known User:Liz's identity for about a year now, and they usually only need a few days to get wide distribution of names on their collective hit-list. And sure enough, they've been busy. The idea that this was not an organized, well-orchestrated "offsite !vote-canvassing" campaign just isn't credible to me, despite all their earnest efforts to claim that gender had nothing to do with it. It very much did, and frankly, they dodged a potentially serious PR bullet by ignoring them and granting her admin rights.

If they can't even get their first-generation gender bias under control, they're not likely to have much luck with the second-generation stuff. Maybe they've turned the corner with this latest incident, but more likely it will only convince these dudes to redouble their efforts against a user base that's probably waning in their enthusiasm for dealing with it.

If your'e talking about Sitush et al, I seriously doubt there was any back-channel organisation - as I said on the RfA thread, I think it's simply a product of the social network nature of Wikipedia.

[Midsize Jake]

FloNIght, originator of the post above, explains it to him, and unsurprisingly, her theory is similar to Liz's own experience. diff That post shows Liz has a pretty good handle on what the gender gap issue really means for Wikipedia, and how it's got nothing to do with the sort of nonsense sexism strawmen the like of Sitush often erect by way of rebuttal.

Deserves a full quote, IMO (emphasis mine):

As far as whether I was treated differently than a man, that is hard to say because I can't have an RfA redo with a male username. I will say that I was struck by how some of the critical comments were very personal, about me as a person, my faults and why I was unsuitable. I've participated in over a dozen RfAs and probably read over two dozen more in preparing for this RfA and it's not typical that voters get that personal. It has happened in the past if an editor is seen to have a temper and fights with other editors. But that wasn't my problem. I was seen by some voters as naive, meddling, drawn to conflict and sarcastic. These are judgments about my personality, qualities that seemed to some voters to be unfixable.

And I think this happens to more often to women than men. I was once told by an employer that I was bad at my job because I made him feel "uneasy", that he felt tension when I was around. This had nothing to do with my job performance, which was fine, it happened right after I stopped laughing at his awful jokes in the breakroom. Because I didn't care about making him comfortable, there was something wrong with me. And he didn't tell me what he wanted me to change, how I could improve. Most of my coworkers were men and they weren't expected to make the boss feel good about himself. This is what sociologists call "emotional labor" and it is frequently a part of stereotypical female occupations (nurses, teachers, stewardesses, etc.). One is not judged by one's skills but how you make other people feel. That is part of the gendered nature of the modern workplace and the situation is more subtle and complex than simply saying something is "sexist" or not.

[Midsize Jake]

If your'e talking about Sitush et al, I seriously doubt there was any back-channel organisation - as I said on the RfA thread, I think it's simply a product of the social network nature of Wikipedia.

Actually, I'm not talking about Sitush et al - those guys wouldn't have needed any personal glad-handing or lobbying to get them to oppose this particular RfA, their votes were already in the bag. I'm talking about the guys who hang out in the MRA and Gamergate forums on Reddit and *chan, the hard-core Twitter-obsessed, guys like that. People who wouldn't have taken the slightest notice of this RfA if someone (probably Mike Cernovich himself) hadn't told them to "get in there" and "protect the shield." All of these guys have Wikipedia accounts, probably several each, they're intelligent (despite their lack of critical thinking ability), and their only real challenge on WP has been to make it look like they have more than one area of interest.

I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if the number of opposers brought in via that avenue was over 30. More likely it was closer to 20, but take those away and the whole thing becomes a cakewalk.

[MMAR]

Even 20 seems high to me from memory, but as I said before, I take very little interest in gamergate (about the only things I've learned have been via osmosis on here), so I'm not in the best position to spot them. But there's no doubt that on sheer numbers, enough anti-GGTF trolls turned out to have a significant effect. But as you said on another thread just recently, being anti-GGTF/gender gap blind isn't as much of a defining feature, they're contributors to a wide range of inter-linked wiki-political agendas being pushed on WP. What marks them out from gamergate recruits though, is that these people aren't faking their other interests/disputes just to push a single issue, they genuinely consider themselves real Wikipedians and so will happily and with great gusto turn up in various place to mess with various people.

[thekohser]

I would have tacked this onto the end of Liz's RfA topic, since that's it's origin, but it's locked. It's also a large enough topic all of it's own.

I'm just curious, are you aware that there is a difference between its and it's?

[Sitush]

MMAR, you are no better than the WP idiots, spouting the same line over and over without much thought. Why don;t you mention the times when I have collaborated with self-identified women and - surprise, surprise - supported their noms for adminship?

Of course, the reason is obvious: you've got an agenda and you won't let truth get in the way of it.

[evangeliman]

As far as whether I was treated differently than a man, that is hard to say because I can't have an RfA redo with a male username. I will say that I was struck by how some of the critical comments were very personal, about me as a person, my faults and why I was unsuitable. I've participated in over a dozen RfAs and probably read over two dozen more in preparing for this RfA and it's not typical that voters get that personal. It has happened in the past if an editor is seen to have a temper and fights with other editors. But that wasn't my problem. I was seen by some voters as naive, meddling, drawn to conflict and sarcastic. These are judgments about my personality, qualities that seemed to some voters to be unfixable.

And I think this happens to more often to women than men. I was once told by an employer that I was bad at my job because I made him feel "uneasy", that he felt tension when I was around. This had nothing to do with my job performance, which was fine, it happened right after I stopped laughing at his awful jokes in the breakroom. Because I didn't care about making him comfortable, there was something wrong with me. And he didn't tell me what he wanted me to change, how I could improve. Most of my coworkers were men and they weren't expected to make the boss feel good about himself. This is what sociologists call "emotional labor" and it is frequently a part of stereotypical female occupations (nurses, teachers, stewardesses, etc.). One is not judged by one's skills but how you make other people feel. That is part of the gendered nature of the modern workplace and the situation is more subtle and complex than simply saying something is "sexist" or not.

Before this thread becomes yet another vapid slugfest, this quote deserves re-emphasizing.

RFA seems to be built around, "how [the candidate] makes others feel." This appears to be the reason why Wikipedia has difficulty selecting administrators in general, selection pool non-withstanding.

I think it would be worth observing wiki's attempts to correct their RFA system. If they can manage it without hiring, then it should carry useful lessons for things offline.

[Malleus]

This notion of "second-generation gender bias" is certainly germane to their problem, but at least in this most recent situation with the User:Liz RfA, I'm pretty sure what we were seeing there was first-generation gender bias.

Or perhaps no gender bias at all.

Your belief that "second-generation gender bias" is in play at WP implies that you know how many of the WP administrators are female though. So are you going to tell us?

[Malleus]

FloNIght, originator of the post above, explains it to him, and unsurprisingly, her theory is similar to Liz's own experience. diff That post shows Liz has a pretty good handle on what the gender gap issue really means for Wikipedia, and how it's got nothing to do with the sort of nonsense sexism strawmen the like of Sitush often erect by way of rebuttal.

Deserves a full quote, IMO (emphasis mine):

As far as whether I was treated differently than a man, that is hard to say because I can't have an RfA redo with a male username. I will say that I was struck by how some of the critical comments were very personal, about me as a person, my faults and why I was unsuitable. I've participated in over a dozen RfAs and probably read over two dozen more in preparing for this RfA and it's not typical that voters get that personal. It has happened in the past if an editor is seen to have a temper and fights with other editors. But that wasn't my problem. I was seen by some voters as naive, meddling, drawn to conflict and sarcastic. These are judgments about my personality, qualities that seemed to some voters to be unfixable.

And I think this happens to more often to women than men. I was once told by an employer that I was bad at my job because I made him feel "uneasy", that he felt tension when I was around. This had nothing to do with my job performance, which was fine, it happened right after I stopped laughing at his awful jokes in the breakroom. Because I didn't care about making him comfortable, there was something wrong with me. And he didn't tell me what he wanted me to change, how I could improve. Most of my coworkers were men and they weren't expected to make the boss feel good about himself. This is what sociologists call "emotional labor" and it is frequently a part of stereotypical female occupations (nurses, teachers, stewardesses, etc.). One is not judged by one's skills but how you make other people feel. That is part of the gendered nature of the modern workplace and the situation is more subtle and complex than simply saying something is "sexist" or not.

What Liz's comment demonstrates is that she has rather a flimsy grasp on the reality of RfA, which almost invariably becomes personal, and character attacks are not at all uncommon.

[Moral Hazard]

As far as whether I was treated differently than a man, that is hard to say because I can't have an RfA redo with a male username. I will say that I was struck by how some of the critical comments were very personal, about me as a person, my faults and why I was unsuitable. I've participated in over a dozen RfAs and probably read over two dozen more in preparing for this RfA and it's not typical that voters get that personal. It has happened in the past if an editor is seen to have a temper and fights with other editors. But that wasn't my problem. I was seen by some voters as naive, meddling, drawn to conflict and sarcastic. These are judgments about my personality, qualities that seemed to some voters to be unfixable.

And I think this happens to more often to women than men. I was once told by an employer that I was bad at my job because I made him feel "uneasy", that he felt tension when I was around. This had nothing to do with my job performance, which was fine, it happened right after I stopped laughing at his awful jokes in the breakroom. Because I didn't care about making him comfortable, there was something wrong with me. And he didn't tell me what he wanted me to change, how I could improve. Most of my coworkers were men and they weren't expected to make the boss feel good about himself. This is what sociologists call "emotional labor" and it is frequently a part of stereotypical female occupations (nurses, teachers, stewardesses, etc.). One is not judged by one's skills but how you make other people feel. That is part of the gendered nature of the modern workplace and the situation is more subtle and complex than simply saying something is "sexist" or not.

Before this thread becomes yet another vapid slugfest, this quote deserves re-emphasizing.

It's worth reading, because it demonstrates that Liz has not mastered high-school grammar and composition. The notion that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel would not survive long outside the sociology gender-studies seminar at a weak college for privileged students.

[iii]

The notion that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel would not survive long outside the sociology gender-studies seminar at a weak college for privileged students.

Your commentary on the existence (or perhaps lack of existence) of emotional labor is difficult for me to parse. I'll just point out that this paper on the broader subject has been cited 1275 times.

[Malleus]

The notion that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel would not survive long outside the sociology gender-studies seminar at a weak college for privileged students.

Your commentary on the existence (or perhaps lack of existence) of emotional labor is difficult for me to parse. I'll just point out that this paper on the broader subject has been cited 1275 times.

Doesn't matter how many times it's been cited, it's not claiming that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel, which is the claim.

[iii]

The notion that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel would not survive long outside the sociology gender-studies seminar at a weak college for privileged students.

Your commentary on the existence (or perhaps lack of existence) of emotional labor is difficult for me to parse. I'll just point out that this paper on the broader subject has been cited 1275 times.

Doesn't matter how many times it's been cited, it's not claiming that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel, which is the claim.

Seems to me that depends on what you mean by "evaluated". According to the paper, emotional labor is part of the work associated with those jobs. To the extent that people are evaluated on how well they do their jobs, there is going to be a sense in which people in certain professions are more likely to be "evaluated" on the basis of how they make others feel.

On the other hand, performance reviews tend to avoid metrics that focus on emotional labor in spite of it being documented as a part of many jobs, so in a formal sense I think there is a reasonable point to be made that people are not "evaluated" on their emotional labor.

[Malleus]

The notion that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel would not survive long outside the sociology gender-studies seminar at a weak college for privileged students.

Your commentary on the existence (or perhaps lack of existence) of emotional labor is difficult for me to parse. I'll just point out that this paper on the broader subject has been cited 1275 times.

Doesn't matter how many times it's been cited, it's not claiming that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel, which is the claim.

Seems to me that depends on what you mean by "evaluated". According to the paper, emotional labor is part of the work associated with those jobs. To the extent that people are evaluated on how well they do their jobs, there is going to be a sense in which people in certain professions are more likely to be "evaluated" on the basis of how they make others feel.

On the other hand, performance reviews tend to avoid metrics that focus on emotional labor in spite of it being documented as a part of many jobs, so in a formal sense I think there is a reasonable point to be made that people are not "evaluated" on their emotional labor.

Perhaps, but what has this to do with any gender gap, the topic of this thread?

[iii]

The notion that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel would not survive long outside the sociology gender-studies seminar at a weak college for privileged students.

Your commentary on the existence (or perhaps lack of existence) of emotional labor is difficult for me to parse. I'll just point out that this paper on the broader subject has been cited 1275 times.

Doesn't matter how many times it's been cited, it's not claiming that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel, which is the claim.

Seems to me that depends on what you mean by "evaluated". According to the paper, emotional labor is part of the work associated with those jobs. To the extent that people are evaluated on how well they do their jobs, there is going to be a sense in which people in certain professions are more likely to be "evaluated" on the basis of how they make others feel.

On the other hand, performance reviews tend to avoid metrics that focus on emotional labor in spite of it being documented as a part of many jobs, so in a formal sense I think there is a reasonable point to be made that people are not "evaluated" on their emotional labor.

Perhaps, but what has this to do with any gender gap, the topic of this thread?

Just clarifying a technical point, I guess. Sorry if it comes off as pedantic. That's kinda my thing.

[Moral Hazard]

The notion that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel would not survive long outside the sociology gender-studies seminar at a weak college for privileged students.

Your commentary on the existence (or perhaps lack of existence) of emotional labor is difficult for me to parse. I'll just point out that this paper on the broader subject has been cited 1275 times.

Doesn't matter how many times it's been cited, it's not claiming that nurses and teachers are evaluated based on how they make others feel, which is the claim.

Wikipedia just promoted a busybody who reflects on her RfA by writing ungrammatically and by misrepresenting a source (as Eric noted). Liz's successful RfA is a victory for neither an encyclopedia nor feminism.

[Ihatemyusername]

From the Collins Dictionary of Sociology:

emotional labour: the face-to-face interaction and the sustained display of particular ‘emotions’ required by workers in particular occupations, such as air stewardesses or bar and casino staff. The term was introduced by A. Hochschild (The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling, 1983). According to Hochschild, such work is guided by ‘feeling rules’ (governing the appropriateness of particular emotions to particular social situations) and effectively means the COMMODIFICATION of emotions. As the service sector of most advanced economies expands (especially personal services) the number of people (often women) involved in emotional labour processes continues to rise.

I don't see what's so wrong with how she used the term.

[Malleus]

From the Collins Dictionary of Sociology:

emotional labour: the face-to-face interaction and the sustained display of particular ‘emotions’ required by workers in particular occupations, such as air stewardesses or bar and casino staff. The term was introduced by A. Hochschild (The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling, 1983). According to Hochschild, such work is guided by ‘feeling rules’ (governing the appropriateness of particular emotions to particular social situations) and effectively means the COMMODIFICATION of emotions. As the service sector of most advanced economies expands (especially personal services) the number of people (often women) involved in emotional labour processes continues to rise.

I don't see what's so wrong with how she used the term.

What's wrong is that she implied it was a uniquely female phenomenon. Plus teaching, for instance, isn't by any means a "stereotypical female occupation".

[MMAR]

spouting the same line over and over without much thought.

Irony?

Why don;t you mention the times when I have collaborated with self-identified women and - surprise, surprise - supported their noms for adminship?

Because that would be sort of 'some of my best friends are women' argument that I referred to in the OP.

Of course, the reason is obvious: you've got an agenda and you won't let truth get in the way of it.

What's my agenda? Other than making you look stupid by illustrating how willfully ignorant you are, even in a thread calling out your propensity for willful ignorance, of course.

[iii]

From the Collins Dictionary of Sociology:

emotional labour: the face-to-face interaction and the sustained display of particular ‘emotions’ required by workers in particular occupations, such as air stewardesses or bar and casino staff. The term was introduced by A. Hochschild (The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling, 1983). According to Hochschild, such work is guided by ‘feeling rules’ (governing the appropriateness of particular emotions to particular social situations) and effectively means the COMMODIFICATION of emotions. As the service sector of most advanced economies expands (especially personal services) the number of people (often women) involved in emotional labour processes continues to rise.

I don't see what's so wrong with how she used the term.

What's wrong is that she implied it was a uniquely female phenomenon.

I interpreted her as saying that emotional labor affects women more than men. There's a lot of evidence that this is true. Whether it is applicable in her particular case is another matter....

Plus teaching, for instance, isn't by any means a "stereotypical female occupation".

Teaching in primary schools is certainly seen as a stereotypically female role.

[Malleus]

From the Collins Dictionary of Sociology:

emotional labour: the face-to-face interaction and the sustained display of particular ‘emotions’ required by workers in particular occupations, such as air stewardesses or bar and casino staff. The term was introduced by A. Hochschild (The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling, 1983). According to Hochschild, such work is guided by ‘feeling rules’ (governing the appropriateness of particular emotions to particular social situations) and effectively means the COMMODIFICATION of emotions. As the service sector of most advanced economies expands (especially personal services) the number of people (often women) involved in emotional labour processes continues to rise.

I don't see what's so wrong with how she used the term.

What's wrong is that she implied it was a uniquely female phenomenon.

I interpreted her as saying that emotional labor affects women more than men. There's a lot of evidence that this is true. Whether it is applicable in her particular case is another matter....

Plus teaching, for instance, isn't by any means a "stereotypical female occupation".

Teaching in primary schools is certainly seen as a stereotypically female role.

But the context of Liz's remark was in relation to her experiences in the workplace, not in a primary school. And where is the evidence that this "emotional labor" is uniquely or even largely applicable to women?

[Malleus]

spouting the same line over and over without much thought.

Irony?

Why don;t you mention the times when I have collaborated with self-identified women and - surprise, surprise - supported their noms for adminship?

Because that would be sort of 'some of my best friends are women' argument that I referred to in the OP.

Of course, the reason is obvious: you've got an agenda and you won't let truth get in the way of it.

What's my agenda? Other than making you look stupid by illustrating how willfully ignorant you are, even in a thread calling out your propensity for willful ignorance, of course.

So that's your idea of an agenda? Since when was this thread about Sitush's alleged stupidity or ignorance anyway? I assume BTW that you're aware of the difference between stupidity and ignorance?

But to return to the theme of this thread, I asked a very simple question about this so-called "second-generation gender bias" on WP. Do you have an answer?

[MMAR]

FloNIght, originator of the post above, explains it to him, and unsurprisingly, her theory is similar to Liz's own experience. diff That post shows Liz has a pretty good handle on what the gender gap issue really means for Wikipedia, and how it's got nothing to do with the sort of nonsense sexism strawmen the like of Sitush often erect by way of rebuttal.

Deserves a full quote, IMO (emphasis mine):

As far as whether I was treated differently than a man, that is hard to say because I can't have an RfA redo with a male username. I will say that I was struck by how some of the critical comments were very personal, about me as a person, my faults and why I was unsuitable. I've participated in over a dozen RfAs and probably read over two dozen more in preparing for this RfA and it's not typical that voters get that personal. It has happened in the past if an editor is seen to have a temper and fights with other editors. But that wasn't my problem. I was seen by some voters as naive, meddling, drawn to conflict and sarcastic. These are judgments about my personality, qualities that seemed to some voters to be unfixable.

And I think this happens to more often to women than men. I was once told by an employer that I was bad at my job because I made him feel "uneasy", that he felt tension when I was around. This had nothing to do with my job performance, which was fine, it happened right after I stopped laughing at his awful jokes in the breakroom. Because I didn't care about making him comfortable, there was something wrong with me. And he didn't tell me what he wanted me to change, how I could improve. Most of my coworkers were men and they weren't expected to make the boss feel good about himself. This is what sociologists call "emotional labor" and it is frequently a part of stereotypical female occupations (nurses, teachers, stewardesses, etc.). One is not judged by one's skills but how you make other people feel. That is part of the gendered nature of the modern workplace and the situation is more subtle and complex than simply saying something is "sexist" or not.

What Liz's comment demonstrates is that she has rather a flimsy grasp on the reality of RfA, which almost invariably becomes personal, and character attacks are not at all uncommon.

Other than the cheap shot against Liz, I won't dispute your assessment of RfA. But of course, the subject of this thread is the difference in treatment when the candidate is female. It might help you understand the point if you hear it directly from a successful male candidate's perspective:

From what I've seen over this RFA, being female makes it much harder to pass since males (like myself) don't have the MRAtards / redpillers opposing you because you're a woman. Also, the level of scrutiny of Liz's "interactions" with other editors was appalling. I've been significantly more sarcastic significantly more commonly and not one person opposed my RFA for it. (I think one person opposed my checkuser appointment over sarcasm concerns.) It's a well-known fact that men will scrutinize women significantly more on their personality than they will other men. Seeing it in action in this RFA was abhorrent. Good luck with the mop, Liz, and ignore the people whining that you're "too rude". Half of them wouldn't know "rude" if it hit them in the face. Reaper Eternal (talk) 22:18, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

If you don't recognise who that is, it's the admin who is about to be admonished by arbcom for making a huge error that benefited you recently by improperly releasing you from an WP:AEBLOCK, an error which it is bizarrley presumed by some at RfA is avoidable once you've written a few articles. In this specific case, I'd say a candidate like Liz, an experienced arbcom clerk, was eminently more qualified. Yet in the opinion of this very admin, she was given a rougher ride at RfA.

[Moral Hazard]

It's surprising to read that Reaper Eternal used "MRAtards", like a Rush Limbaugh-listener would say "libtard". (On the side of the angels, he did oppose Liz's RfA.)

[Malleus]

If you don't recognise who that is, it's the admin who is about to be admonished by arbcom for making a huge error that benefited you recently by improperly releasing you from an WP:AEBLOCK, an error which it is bizarrley presumed by some at RfA is avoidable once you've written a few articles. In this specific case, I'd say a candidate like Liz, an experienced arbcom clerk, was eminently more qualified. Yet in the opinion of this very admin, she was given a rougher ride at RfA.

Nobody is going to be admonished at ArbCom, as that would entail GorillaWarfare being admonished.

Reaper Eternal's opinion is interesting, but I see no merit in it.

[MMAR]

spouting the same line over and over without much thought.

Irony?

Why don;t you mention the times when I have collaborated with self-identified women and - surprise, surprise - supported their noms for adminship?

Because that would be sort of 'some of my best friends are women' argument that I referred to in the OP.

Of course, the reason is obvious: you've got an agenda and you won't let truth get in the way of it.

What's my agenda? Other than making you look stupid by illustrating how willfully ignorant you are, even in a thread calling out your propensity for willful ignorance, of course.

So that's your idea of an agenda? Since when was this thread about Sitush's alleged stupidity or ignorance anyway? I assume BTW that you're aware of the difference between stupidity and ignorance?

But to return to the theme of this thread, I asked a very simple question about this so-called "second-generation gender bias" on WP. Do you have an answer?

I am aware. Ignorance is a lack of understanding. Stupidity is a lack of awareness that persists even after people have spoon fed you enough information to correct that deficiency. It's about Sitush because he's the standout example of this sort of stupidity, I see it frequently - he's even come here to display it as a first hand account.

As for the question (how can you know how many admins are female when it's not mandatory to disclose your identity), the topic of this thread is Wikipedian's capacity for willfully refusing to understand the issues or the research behind it. You have asked this question, and variations on the theme, many times before on Wikipedia, notably during your attempts to swamp the GGTF with WP:TE. The small number of Wikipedians who do understand the issue were extraordinarily accommodating to you, providing all sorts of data and arguments in reply, which you consistently refused to accept or even acknowledge, simply repeating or rephrasing the same issues over and over and over.

It would seem pointless to play that farce out again here, where it would merely be a sideshow. It would be like arguing about the research supporting the theory of man made climate change in a thread about how stupid Wikipedians are for not accepting it as the scientific consensus (bad example, because they do, and you will no doubt dispute the level of outside acceptance on this issue, but I hope you get the analogy anyway). A useful contribution would be for you to show you do understand how and why most people who are up to speed on the issues don't believe there's anything like an even gender split among admins, and make some cogent argument for how they're wrong.

[Malleus]

A claim was made about a second-generation gender gap on WP, which cannot be substantiated for the reasons you say.

[Midsize Jake]

It's worth reading, because it demonstrates that Liz has not mastered high-school grammar and composition.

You're disappointing me, Mr. Hazard - I expect this sort of thing from Malleus 'n' Sitush, but not you. Unless, of course, you can show us examples of you making that same sort of remark about a guy who posted something with similarly negligible grammatical flaws.

[Malleus]

It's worth reading, because it demonstrates that Liz has not mastered high-school grammar and composition.

You're disappointing me, Mr. Hazard - I expect this sort of thing from Malleus 'n' Sitush, but not you. Unless, of course, you can show us examples of you making that same sort of remark about a guy who posted something with similarly negligible grammatical flaws.

If you feel it necessary to make a comment on something that Moral Hazard posted then please try to do so in future without dragging in others of those you perceive to be your natural enemies.

[MMAR]

A claim was made about a second-generation gender gap on WP, which cannot be substantiated for the reasons you say.

Except it can, and it has. Wikipedians like yourself have effectively constructed a whole new form of denialism out of this tedious schitck. And it's every bit as pathetic as the other forms of denialism out there in the world.

[Midsize Jake]

This notion of "second-generation gender bias" is certainly germane to their problem, but at least in this most recent situation with the User:Liz RfA, I'm pretty sure what we were seeing there was first-generation gender bias.

Your belief that "second-generation gender bias" is in play at WP implies that you know how many of the WP administrators are female though.

Why would that imply that I know how many WP admins are female? Obviously there are several, and I assume it hovers around 8-10 percent of the total - but as you're well aware, just counting admins is practically meaningless in almost any context. For a realistic assessment of impact you'd have to weight the numbers based on activity levels, factor in the date of the successful RfA, maybe even run some sort of popularity survey to get usable baselines. What's more, I didn't even say it was "in play," I wrote that the notion is germane to their problem - that problem being recruiting and retaining female admins (and female users in general).

And hey, because I'm such a nice guy I'll even repeat myself in a more concise form: Sexism on Wikipedia is pervasive, but the time to worry about what happens in the background is usually after you deal with the stuff that's up-front and staring you right in the face, as proven by what happened in that RfA.

Still, I'll admit that your apparent deliberate refusal to read people's posts for comprehension even when the poster is male, like myself, does tend to bolster the argument that your behavior is due less to sexism than to sheer bloody-minded obtuseness in general. You could use that, if you've even managed to read this far.

[Midsize Jake]

If you feel it necessary to make a comment on something that Moral Hazard posted then please try to do so in future without dragging in others of those you perceive to be your natural enemies.

I don't perceive you to be my natural enemy.

[Malleus]

A claim was made about a second-generation gender gap on WP, which cannot be substantiated for the reasons you say.

Except it can, and it has.

It can't and it hasn't, else you would be able to produce the evidence rather than mere hand waving and assumptions.

[MMAR]

A claim was made about a second-generation gender gap on WP, which cannot be substantiated for the reasons you say.

Except it can, and it has.

It can't and it hasn't, else you would be able to produce the evidence rather than mere hand waving and assumptions.

Why would I even bother? Given the premise of this thread. The point you're intentionally ignoring in all this tedious nonsense is that your ignorance is DELIBERATE. What's not clear about that? I would no more waste my time on further spoon feeding you, where others have so spectacularly failed, than I would sit down and try to patiently explain the laws of Physics to an obvious 9/11 truther.

[iii]

And where is the evidence that this "emotional labor" is uniquely or even largely applicable to women?

Uniquely applicable to women? No. Largely applicable to women? Yes.

[Malleus]

And where is the evidence that this "emotional labor" is uniquely or even largely applicable to women?

Uniquely applicable to women? No. Largely applicable to women? Yes.

That paper doesn't seem to say what you claim it does: "We find that managing feelings of agitation increases burnout and inauthenticity and that inauthenticity is most pronounced among those experiencing the highest levels of agitation. These effects do not differ by gender, however."

[Malleus]

A claim was made about a second-generation gender gap on WP, which cannot be substantiated for the reasons you say.

Except it can, and it has.

It can't and it hasn't, else you would be able to produce the evidence rather than mere hand waving and assumptions.

Why would I even bother? Given the premise of this thread. The point you're intentionally ignoring in all this tedious nonsense is that your ignorance is DELIBERATE. What's not clear about that? I would no more waste my time on further spoon feeding you, where others have so spectacularly failed, than I would sit down and try to patiently explain the laws of Physics to an obvious 9/11 truther.

We are all ignorant of the gender breakdown of WP administrators, you no less than anyone including the WMF, your assumptions notwithstanding. If you actually had evidence of this "second-generation gender gap" on WP you would have been able to produce it by now.

[iii]

And where is the evidence that this "emotional labor" is uniquely or even largely applicable to women?

Uniquely applicable to women? No. Largely applicable to women? Yes.

That paper doesn't seem to say what you claim it does: "We find that managing feelings of agitation increases burnout and inauthenticity and that inauthenticity is most pronounced among those experiencing the highest levels of agitation. These effects do not differ by gender, however."

Since there are more women doing jobs subject to these conditions, this means it is more applicable to women. So emotional labor burdens women as a population more than men as a population. Individually is another matter, of course.

[Moral Hazard]

It's worth reading, because it demonstrates that Liz has not mastered high-school grammar and composition.

You're disappointing me, Mr. Hazard - I expect this sort of thing from Malleus 'n' Sitush, but not you. Unless, of course, you can show us examples of you making that same sort of remark about a guy who posted something with similarly negligible grammatical flaws.

I criticized the prose of candidates in many RfAs, for example,

• a candidate's lede of an article on association football (in 2013?), provoking The Rambling Man (T-C-L)'s wrath (especially with my comment about "traditional encyclopedia content"), and
  Worm That Turned (T-C-L)'s RfA, where I copyedited one of his articles.

Similarly, I was accused of "misogyny" for my comments about pictures of one Arbcom candidate; when I made a similar criticism of the picture of a male last year, nobody cared. (In the linked comment, I intended this RfA-link for Hahc21. ) I may be wrong, but I am equal-opportunity wrong.

Perhaps you should try to read closely what Sitush and Eric have written, trying to judge them also with greater fairness, before criticizing them again.

[Midsize Jake]

...when I made a similar criticism of the picture of a male last year, nobody cared.

Hmm, you were right on that one - he should have zipped up that hoodie if he knew he was running for Arbcom. Sorry I missed it!

Perhaps you should try to read closely what Sitush and Eric have written, trying to judge them also with greater fairness, before criticizing them again.

Seeing as how practically every post both of them have made in the last two months has consisted of one or two sentences, with no links or supporting evidence whatsoever, that shouldn't take long...

*two minutes later*

OK, done. I am now ready to criticize them again.

[MMAR]

A claim was made about a second-generation gender gap on WP, which cannot be substantiated for the reasons you say.

Except it can, and it has.

It can't and it hasn't, else you would be able to produce the evidence rather than mere hand waving and assumptions.

Why would I even bother? Given the premise of this thread. The point you're intentionally ignoring in all this tedious nonsense is that your ignorance is DELIBERATE. What's not clear about that? I would no more waste my time on further spoon feeding you, where others have so spectacularly failed, than I would sit down and try to patiently explain the laws of Physics to an obvious 9/11 truther.

We are all ignorant of the gender breakdown of WP administrators, you no less than anyone including the WMF, your assumptions notwithstanding. If you actually had evidence of this "second-generation gender gap" on WP you would have been able to produce it by now.

And so it goes on. Stop deluding yourself that anyone but you and the other Wikipediots are taken in by this nonsense. You were told many times before on Wikipedia where to look to figure out for yourself why it's not remotely reasonable to assume that just because we don't know the precise gender split of admins, we can't discount the possibility that it could in reality close enough to be an even 50-50 split, or at least close enough for gender gap effects not to manifest in areas like RfA. You're well out on your own in this belief, it is shared only by the other denialists like Sitush and that crazy Ched character. The only relevant information here is that you continue on this track. It's old hat. During your campaign to disrupt the GGTF, you consistently denied the very existence of a gender gap on Wikipedia, or as a fall back position, insisted that it has no detrimental effect on Wikipedia. No amount of links or facts or reason or logic swayed you. It is absolutely no coincidence that this is remarkably similar to the way a climate denier approaches opinions contrary to their own.

[Randy from Boise]

A claim was made about a second-generation gender gap on WP, which cannot be substantiated for the reasons you say.

Except it can, and it has.

It can't and it hasn't, else you would be able to produce the evidence rather than mere hand waving and assumptions.

Why would I even bother? Given the premise of this thread. The point you're intentionally ignoring in all this tedious nonsense is that your ignorance is DELIBERATE. What's not clear about that? I would no more waste my time on further spoon feeding you, where others have so spectacularly failed, than I would sit down and try to patiently explain the laws of Physics to an obvious 9/11 truther.

We are all ignorant of the gender breakdown of WP administrators, you no less than anyone including the WMF, your assumptions notwithstanding. If you actually had evidence of this "second-generation gender gap" on WP you would have been able to produce it by now.

And so it goes on. Stop deluding yourself that anyone but you and the other Wikipediots are taken in by this nonsense. You were told many times before on Wikipedia where to look to figure out for yourself why it's not remotely reasonable to assume that just because we don't know the precise gender split of admins, we can't discount the possibility that it could in reality close enough to be an even 50-50 split, or at least close enough for gender gap effects not to manifest in areas like RfA. You're well out on your own in this belief, it is shared only by the other denialists like Sitush and that crazy Ched character. The only relevant information here is that you continue on this track. It's old hat. During your campaign to disrupt the GGTF, you consistently denied the very existence of a gender gap on Wikipedia, or as a fall back position, insisted that it has no detrimental effect on Wikipedia. No amount of links or facts or reason or logic swayed you. It is absolutely no coincidence that this is remarkably similar to the way a climate denier approaches opinions contrary to their own.

You know, for somebody who allegedly arrived at Wikipedia in April 2015 to contribute to an article about a German world traveler and his automobile, you certainly seem awfully obsessed with what happened to the Gender Gap Task Force back in 2014 and the first quarter of 2015.

I salute you, "new editor," on your historical diligence!!!

RfB

[MMAR]

A claim was made about a second-generation gender gap on WP, which cannot be substantiated for the reasons you say.

Except it can, and it has.

It can't and it hasn't, else you would be able to produce the evidence rather than mere hand waving and assumptions.

Why would I even bother? Given the premise of this thread. The point you're intentionally ignoring in all this tedious nonsense is that your ignorance is DELIBERATE. What's not clear about that? I would no more waste my time on further spoon feeding you, where others have so spectacularly failed, than I would sit down and try to patiently explain the laws of Physics to an obvious 9/11 truther.

We are all ignorant of the gender breakdown of WP administrators, you no less than anyone including the WMF, your assumptions notwithstanding. If you actually had evidence of this "second-generation gender gap" on WP you would have been able to produce it by now.

And so it goes on. Stop deluding yourself that anyone but you and the other Wikipediots are taken in by this nonsense. You were told many times before on Wikipedia where to look to figure out for yourself why it's not remotely reasonable to assume that just because we don't know the precise gender split of admins, we can't discount the possibility that it could in reality close enough to be an even 50-50 split, or at least close enough for gender gap effects not to manifest in areas like RfA. You're well out on your own in this belief, it is shared only by the other denialists like Sitush and that crazy Ched character. The only relevant information here is that you continue on this track. It's old hat. During your campaign to disrupt the GGTF, you consistently denied the very existence of a gender gap on Wikipedia, or as a fall back position, insisted that it has no detrimental effect on Wikipedia. No amount of links or facts or reason or logic swayed you. It is absolutely no coincidence that this is remarkably similar to the way a climate denier approaches opinions contrary to their own.

You know, for somebody who allegedly arrived at Wikipedia in April 2015 to contribute to an article about a German world traveler and his automobile, you certainly seem awfully obsessed with what happened to the Gender Gap Task Force back in 2014 and the first quarter of 2015.

I salute you, "new editor," on your historical diligence!!!

RfB

Clearly you haven't been paying anywhere near enough attention to me as you apparently like to think, otherwise you'd have been able to piece together the various events and threads which led me from one to the other. Even if you couldn't, what kind of a retard (other than the standard fare Wikipediot) assumes that there's any difficulty in figuring out events from recent Wikipedia history that align with a person's real world interests, when most of the people involved in it on Wikipedia are active members here and the ongoing issues that arose from it (such as the later LB case and Eric's dual asshole/gender ban) have been discussed in threads here recently, since the time I was first a member here? I mean, you are yourself supposed to be an experienced editor right? I'm not being unfair to assume that none of this should really be outside your supposed level of competence?

[Midsize Jake]

I salute you, "new editor," on your historical diligence!!!

He's right, though. Even if the numeric disparity didn't exist, the lack thereof would have little or no direct bearing on the issue of "second generation gender bias" - and that's bias, not gap, let's not substitute words to confuse the issue, shall we. "Bias" in this context means "partiality," not numeric skew - and could apply to non-admin users as well, if not more so, since there are obviously more of them.

[Moral Hazard]

Would MMAR please reduce the needless abuse and offensiveness, e.g., "retard"?

[Ihatemyusername]

From the Collins Dictionary of Sociology:

emotional labour: the face-to-face interaction and the sustained display of particular ‘emotions’ required by workers in particular occupations, such as air stewardesses or bar and casino staff. The term was introduced by A. Hochschild (The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling, 1983). According to Hochschild, such work is guided by ‘feeling rules’ (governing the appropriateness of particular emotions to particular social situations) and effectively means the COMMODIFICATION of emotions. As the service sector of most advanced economies expands (especially personal services) the number of people (often women) involved in emotional labour processes continues to rise.

I don't see what's so wrong with how she used the term.

What's wrong is that she implied it was a uniquely female phenomenon. Plus teaching, for instance, isn't by any means a "stereotypical female occupation".

She didn't say uniquely, she said " it is frequently a part of stereotypical female occupations."

Even if you think the concept is a load of crock, she's still describing it in a similar way to Hochschild.

See a relevant passage from "The Managed Heart" below:

[MMAR]

I salute you, "new editor," on your historical diligence!!!

He's right, though. Even if the numeric disparity didn't exist, the lack thereof would have little or no direct bearing on the issue of "second generation gender bias" - and that's bias, not gap, let's not substitute words to confuse the issue, shall we. "Bias" in this context means "partiality," not numeric skew - and could apply to non-admin users as well, if not more so, since there are obviously more of them.

You'd hope though that reduction of one (gap) would be reflected in the other (bias).