How much do you think gender matters on Lemmy?

multicolorKnight@lemmy.world to Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world – 54 points –

I personally don't think it matters much at all, except in channels that specifically identify that way. However, I am male, hetero, cis, so its possible I'm just clueless.

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Doesn't matter at all. A person is a person.

and some of us are barely people

I swear there’s at least one wasp who posts pro-wasp propaganda

I do think we all try to keep that spirit around here.

I know you're probably a kind person, but imo, this kind of reductionistism is incompatible with being pro-trans-rights.

In what way am I reducing them?

Not the person you're replying to but it kinda feels like the "oh I don't see color" comment when somebody brings up racism. To me, it feels... dismissive? I dunno. I don't think what you said is a problem or anything, it just... feels like it has bad connotations to me. Take this with a grain of salt, what I understand and interpret can be very different from what you say, which can also differ from what you mean.

Is it? Then what is the gender of the person you're replying? Surely if it was important you would need to know it before replying. The fact that you can reply someone without knowing their gender is proof that it doesn't matter here.

If gender didn't mattered IRL, trans people would be seen in the same light of someone who likes wearing black, or is unhappy with the way their nose looks to the point of doing a surgery about it. Trans people suffer because society puts a lot of importance in gender, therefore wanting to dress clothes from a different gender, or having a body that looks a different gender are "radical" ideas that offend simple-minded people.

I'm not quite grasping the context you're asking the question, but I will say gender matters on Lemmy in the sense that I want full representation from all genders (and non-gender folk). The value of conversation here is derived from the many viewpoints that each of us bring. Without full representation, we'll be missing valuable inside and perspective if a specific gender (or non-gender) is missing.

I'm primarily interested in the opinions of people who are not at least one of male/hetero/cis; it's too easy for the privikeged group to delude themselves about how good they are behaving.

Transfem here, generally unless the topic being discussed is gender specific users genders aren't relevant. Though, Lemmy has a pretty bad track record with gender relations imo, the whole women choosing the bear thing was such a shit show. The men's lib community is good though, I've interacted with a couple posts there that popped up on my feed while scrolling and it actually consists of users who are empathetic and understanding and not anti-women like the reddit one turned into. It's interesting, Lemmy has many many more male users than female, and it goes a bit further, with the ratio of transmascs to transfems being reversed. I just think it's interesting that it's an amab/afab split rather than a gender split. As someone in the thread trans-hatingly put it, "even the women are men here."

Identity in general doesn't matter much on forums (as opposed to microblogs, like Twitter or Mastodon). Forums are focused on topics rather than people, and what is said is generally more important than who says it.

Tell that to all the super users.

What is a superuser in Lemmy? What can it do that's so special? I don't think I've ever encountered one.

Same as it was on reddit, but slightly more self-righteous about it.

I'm a lady and haven't had any trouble here. The only place I really notice how ridiculously male - skewed Lemmy is, is on the NSFW. That is definitely all "male gaze" stuff, with the occasional actual lesbian also posting stuff guys like. Even the posts OF men are FOR men, everything posted with some assumption only men are looking at the posts.

The other communities just aren't so gendered, I don't notice much whether someone seems to be one or the other, it isn't relevant to cocktails or cooking or gardening or science fiction.

The only place I really notice how ridiculously male - skewed Lemmy is, is on the NSFW. That is definitely all “male gaze” stuff, with the occasional actual lesbian also posting stuff guys like. Even the posts OF men are FOR men, everything posted with some assumption only men are looking at the posts.

That sounds like a you problem. Everyone like to look at sexy ladies.

You misunderstand. Lots of women like to “look at sexy ladies,” but the things that turn men and women on in pornography are different (this should not be a surprise if you’ve sexually engaged with a member of the opposition sex). They’re noting that they didn’t find anything aimed at women, which is reflective of the gender demographics here.

the things that turn men and women on in pornography are different

Good point.

(this should not be a surprise if you’ve sexually engaged with a member of the opposition sex).

Don't be a dick, Lemmy user. You made a good point. Don't ruin it.

Not everyone is straight, I wasn’t digging at you for inexperience.

Lemmy is definitely a more male space than I think even reddit was, and that does affect the tone of certain conversations. It really is a whiplash coming here from Mastodon sometimes and seeing a very different vibe.

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Depends on context, as always. A user sharing a story on social interaction, gender may be quite important to how they experienced it and how others perceive it. I.e., a post the other day asking about worst dates and the average worst date for men was a woman on coke or a no show. The average worst date for women was about getting sexually assaulted or raped.

Men are victims of those things too and can face different repercussions when they try to pursue help. Understanding their experiences within the context of them being men is also important.

Stripping gender from these stories only obfuscates some of the problems.

Why not make a new account with a femme sounding username and see? Don’t pretend you need help with a bra or anything, just interact with lemmy while “labeled” a woman.

I have a more masculine username and a more feminine username (both seem like spins on given names, think UrArthUr and Bekky), and there is a difference in how I’m perceived, or at least how people respond to me. It’s not huge, and I’m afab irl, so I’m also not surprised- I don’t think I’ve ever been somewhere where people can freely interact and it had no effect (or at least not since I grew tits).

Do people look at the usernames before replying to a message or post?

I may do it if the username is spelled with emojis (color is really noticable when everything around it is plain text) or has a stupid take.

I'm really happy my Lemmy app (Thunder) has an option to not show display names. I only see normal usernames and none of that KOLONAK bullshit.

I couldn't understand your last sentence, could you please explain it? /lh

There’s always a difference in how men and women are treated. It’s not always a horrible evil sexist thing, but people pick up on cues from tone and username and react to that.

Being online is nice, because the default assumption is that you’re a man, so unless you have a super femme username or are talking about something femme-coded like gardening or knitting, people tend not to treat you like a woman. “Treating you like a woman” basically means being dismissive of your experience or knowledge or tone policing (if I make a rude joke under a femme username, people downvote the hell out of it unless it’s about a very safe target- that’s how minor the difference is, to be clear). I’m also probably an egg, so my perception of not being treated like a woman as nice might be skewed.

By the way, if that's not too much to ask, what do you mean with "skewed"? I'm a slow person 😓

Off, or not really the norm :)

Like, I said it’s nice that people think I’m a dude, but I don’t know if fully cis women think that’s nice 😅

Some time ago, I had the contrary thought of everyone being a man, so I used to think that just the way you described, everyone was a woman. I don't know what happened to that thought, though. By the way, ::: spoiler I'm a GIRL! Guy In Real Life :::

That Lemmy hasn't devolved into an incel freak show is a barely functional alliance between the left lean and heavy moderation against the fact that Lemmy skews into Extra Opinionated Redditors (aka nerdy, lonely men)

When some poor lady tried to get a TwoX going here the comment sections were always a sausage fest of attempting to mansplain away women's personal experiences and concerns and that's really all you need to know about things.

I’m male, hetero, and cis, too. I know there will be some things I’ll never fully understand because of that.

I try to keep things gender neutral (they, y’all). I know I’ll be wrong sometimes. When I’m corrected, I apologize and make sure I don’t repeat the mistake. There will be rare occasions where that’s not good enough for someone, but I look at that as more their issue than mine. I’m being sincere, and doing the best I can.

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Far less than on Reddit, but it still affects someone's experiences. e.g. just bc someone does not experience something daily does not mean that it never happens, but often a person in a minority status group has no choice to ignore such, while the privileged status person can.

You can’t really generalize. It matters as much as the person you’re talking to or about thinks it matters.

If they don’t care; fine. But most people want to be properly gendered.

In most discussions here it’s not really relevant or important but it’s simple enough to use gender neutral pronouns when someone’s gender is unknown

I'll disagree with most of this thread and say it somewhat does, because your views and biases are heavily influenced by your gender. So if genders are all the same, you're just going to have a circlejerk. Is there something we should do about it? No, but I feel recognizing that it plays a big factor in a community is important.

It is very much context dependant. People want to say it does not matter, and in our default context, it theoretically does not. There are certain contexts where use of outdated patriarchal norms of the past will garner a response. In a sense it must matter that it does not matter.

My mind is drawn to the old adage, "hate is not the opposite of love; indifference is. For to hate is to still care in common with those that love."

If you use gender incorrectly here, or, in a broader context, act like an ass about gender you are likely to garner a reaction.

There was a post here in the last few weeks about someone on reddit that posted about a guy giving his partner an old iPod or some device like that as part of a birthday gift with other things, and getting eviscerated for the idea. Then after reversing the gender roles, under the same premise, the opposite reaction was the outcome. I don't think we are the same demographic here, but I also imagine we might display a similar objective bias in honest and objective aggregate.

So does it matter here, IMO, we'd like to think it does not, but we are biased like any group. We are generally aware and appreciative of our diverse community members and tend to prefer gender neutrality when possible, like assuming they/them is generally good decorum and practiced here. When an anthropomorphic gender assignment is appropriate, the cool kids default female.

At least that is the lay of the land abstracted as I see it when one speaks the unspeakable.

It doesn't. What they say is what matters. Not whose saying it. Gender is irrelevant unless I'm going to date them or we're about to lift heavy things.

Using people's PPs still matters. Especially if you're talking about a user who clearly puts them in their display name. If someone with she/her pronouns is replied to by someone referring to them as him and he, that's a dick move.

It doesn't really matter, anyone can use Lemmy, regardless of gender identity or orientation. Some instances and communities are better suited for specific groups than others but for the most part we're all people.

::: spoiler My gender: No gender, Only Dragon🐉
🖤🤍💚🤍🖤 :::

on the internet everyone is just a wall of text to me. (pronouns: it/its)

A wall of text characterized by a name and sometimes a profile picture.

You should definitively watch Everybody Hates Chris, by the way.

In the context of the internet at large seeming to believe every user is male? I'd say that's still standard practice here even if it's not as prevalent an assumption as on other social media. How much that matters though is subjective.

I would say less than on reddit but still a thing. Being cisgender still is treated as a norm and the sort of folks who openly display misogynistic tendencies are fewer and farther between... But any innocuous mention to being trans will very get you a couple of dedicated downvoters or people who use gender essentialist arguements, silencing tactics (oh you're just being devisive) or transphobic rhetoric.

Not to say that it is bad comparatively. This is one of the most trans neutral places on the internet. It's not "trans friendly" mind you, I would categorize that as places where concensus about trans people being a normal thing to be has been reached and attention has shifted away from our basic rights as being up for debate... But trans neutral spaces are important too. We need holding spaces away from places where trans people talk openly where people can get to know us where the majority of support shuts down open hostility towards us prompting more nuanced interaction.

A lot of trans hostile spaces exist out there where being openly trans or advocacy for our needs invites a lot of death threats, calls for suicide, doxxing attacks and so on. If you see a comment section on youtube on a queer creator for instance that's overwhelmingly trans positive that generally means there's heavy moderation at play because they are trying to create spaces safe for their queer audience to interact with each other. What you as a casual visitor generally don't see is the mental cost being taken on by that moderation team to artificially create the illusion of that positive space. Here on this instance that level of moderation is unnecessary because generally speaking the volume is manageable.

I'd say zero because I don't give a single fuck what anyone is. I hardly believe you aren't bots lol

That said if the specific thread is asking for the specific opinion or experience of someone of a particular sort, then genuine replies are valuable for the purpose of that conversation

on lemmy world? Not terribly much. On blahaj zone? Probably a bit more.

Eh, unless you're discussing something gender specific it generally doesn't come up. I find it's honestly kinda rare to refer to users you're not addressing so pronouns never really come up

Not at all! What matters is the person and what they have to say. If it's good content I'll upvote and chime in! 😃

I'm pretty sure everyone here is a cis man or trans woman, and I think the communities reflect that (noncredible defence = military memes, politics, computer nerd stuff, greentexts, anime nerd stuff), and tbh I can't imagine any of the cis women in my life being interested in anything on lemmy

I'm a cis woman on lemmy, and it's my primary (and only) social media consumption. That being said, I do tend to lean nerdy. Highly doubt I'm the only one on here, tho.

I was about to comment a similar sentiment. I didn't realize I stopped existing or had my gender identity reassigned because I'm on lemmy instead of other social media.

Genderfluid AFAB... I mean, I already know I don't exist, so I guess this user just confirmed it, lol

The shills and bots from Hexbear love using it as a wedge to divide people, so I'd say it's very important to them

Most of the time it's not too big of a deal but sometimes it's very clear that it's a male dominated social media, like when the pay gap between men and women is mentioned

Although I block a lot of content because of depression...I don't care at all. I care for honest participation and positive intention if that makes any sense, no matter who you are...many folks impress me on the fediverse and I strive to be better like them.

I don't really think it matters. I can only think of trans leftists, but I think the trans leftists would be leftist whether they are trans or not.

Zero percent.

I'm pretty skeptical so, I’m not sure I’d believe everyone even if they told me.