DhO male gender skew

DhO male gender skew Matt 11/2/14 3:54 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 11/3/14 12:43 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew Simon T. 11/3/14 2:37 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew Matt 11/5/14 8:59 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 11/6/14 8:40 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Daniel M. Ingram 11/6/14 4:22 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew Matt 11/7/14 8:53 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 11/7/14 9:44 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Matt 11/7/14 11:29 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Dream Walker 11/5/14 12:50 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Howard Maxwell Clegg 11/5/14 6:32 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Matt 11/6/14 10:11 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Dream Walker 11/6/14 7:21 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew Dave sdfsdf 11/5/14 8:32 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew H McElroy 11/6/14 10:37 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew Illuminatus 11/7/14 2:30 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Jenny 11/7/14 3:47 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Matt 11/7/14 11:26 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Jenny 11/8/14 4:04 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Matt 11/11/14 10:57 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew Jenny 11/12/14 8:03 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew Dada Kind 11/7/14 12:47 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew Laurel Carrington 11/7/14 2:53 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew boubs fatty 11/11/14 7:57 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew (D Z) Dhru Val 11/13/14 8:27 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 11/14/14 7:26 PM
RE: DhO male gender skew Jenny 12/3/14 12:16 AM
RE: DhO male gender skew Laurel Carrington 12/3/14 7:57 PM
Matt, modified 9 Years ago at 11/2/14 3:54 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/2/14 3:52 PM

DhO male gender skew

Posts: 316 Join Date: 1/14/14 Recent Posts
I posted this in the middle of another thread, thought it deserves it's own thread.

Danial opines that DhO has very low representation from women meditators, while retreat centers have relativily high representation from women meditators.

I assume this is true, and that the reason for lower participation from women is not a DhO issue, rather it might be a general internet forum issue.

Sorry if my response is sophmoric, but I have not heard a tie-in here between trollism and gender ratio, and I'm feeling like a bit more engagement, probably because I'm on a mini  DN jag at the moment...

Recently, because I'm orbiting around the issue of 'self' in my practice, I've been attracted to a couple of, I feel related, features of the rest of the world.

For one 'Gamergate', which is all wrapped up in the general issue of internet trollism.   Sexism, testosterone, anonymity all seem to be wrapped up in a burrito of pain that the online community is trying to take apart, keep the avacado and pork, loose the acidic hotsauce.  If you google 'wired magazine trolls' there are a bunch of stories. https://www.google.com/search?q=wired+magazine+trolls&gws_rd=ssl#q=gamergate

Paul Wheaton of Permies.com devoted practically an entire keynote around the idea that nice people get sick and tired of the aggressive atmosphere online, then carry on their practice in private.  My guess is that the bell curve of women is more to the 'nice' side than men.
http://www.permies.com/forums/posts/list/40/34441#318422

Start at the 00:52:10 mark for the point, but if you’re interested in 'perma culture', watch the whole video because the guy is such a flaming icon. Wheaton is the Ingram of permaculture, apologies to both parties for the generality.  "I thought Namaste means 'I'm going to F*ck up your sh*t tomorrow" is an example of a Wheaton quip.
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katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 9 Years ago at 11/3/14 12:43 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/3/14 12:42 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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"wrapped up in a burrito of pain"
=] Funny words, Matthew


Okay, DhO ladies, a digit ratio question:
Who among you have the smaller index finger relative to the ring finger ("small ratio" gals), which trait is associated with higher levels of testoserone in the womb? 

I have said small ratio, aka: "a small 2D:4D ratio, pointing to a high exposure to testosterone in the uterus" (wikipedia article linked above).


Perhaps the DhO posting phenomena is related to prenatal hormone conditions more than a genitals/sexism question?

If there were an enrollment survey when people registered for the DhO, I'd love to know gender and digit ratio in the enrolling females to start forming understanding here.
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Simon T, modified 9 Years ago at 11/3/14 2:37 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/3/14 2:37 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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I can't wait to see the peer-reviewed paper on this when Enlightenment science take off: Enlightenment correlated to pre-natal in-utero testosterone exposure in rats. My index finger is shorter than my ring finger, this is good, right?
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Dream Walker, modified 9 Years ago at 11/5/14 12:50 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/5/14 12:50 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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matthew sexton:

Paul Wheaton of Permies.com devoted practically an entire keynote around the idea that nice people get sick and tired of the aggressive atmosphere online, then carry on their practice in private.  My guess is that the bell curve of women is more to the 'nice' side than men.
http://www.permies.com/forums/posts/list/40/34441#318422
That was a great talk...I went back and watched it all....thanks for posting that Matt. As I meditate in the gym I see the yoga classes....predominately women there in my gym. I wonder if they wonder why they can't get more men to participate.
~D
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Howard Maxwell Clegg, modified 9 Years ago at 11/5/14 6:32 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/5/14 6:32 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Ditto, DW. I went to my regular group last night. All women. Maybe the DHO gender thing is counter intuitive? Maybe we are a lonely campfire of masculine practice in a landscape of Oestrogen? Maybe we should be self-consciously celebrating our expression of diversity? I'd be interested to know if my gender imbalance observations are the norm.

I'm not a fan of the idea that there is such a thing as masculine or feminine practice. But dharma discussions in my regular group do tend to be framed differently, although the content is similar. Maybe this is because we are all in the same room and have just sat together, maybe not.
Dave sdfsdf, modified 9 Years ago at 11/5/14 8:32 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/5/14 8:32 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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GamerGate has two levels first its about the cortupt nature of game journalism. Journalist endorsing their friends etc. Its a real mess. In response to this the journalist orchestrated an anti gamergate campaign which said the gamer identity was dead and all that still identifies with it are white twenty something loosers and nerds who lives in their moms basement. Which is not a very good thing to do since alot of ppl like and play games. So the reactions of a few were expected and gave desired result. So now focused was switched from corruption to misogony. 

With regards to female representation online. Women are much more active on social networking oriented sites. Facebook, instagram, twitter. Also forums of a less goal oriented nature where they can get positive reinforcement from likeminded. I dont know why but lots of women prefer settings that are women only. My social network site has more women than men and that site is about golf. Men mostly read news etc, play games or chat.
Matt, modified 9 Years ago at 11/5/14 8:59 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/5/14 8:59 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Simon T.:
I can't wait to see the peer-reviewed paper on this when Enlightenment science take off: Enlightenment correlated to pre-natal in-utero testosterone exposure in rats. My index finger is shorter than my ring finger, this is good, right?


Hi Katy, Simon.  I don't participate that much online here, it's so nice to be in a civil conversation! emoticon

I'd love it if this website was so darn special that people just *had* to join and participate.  Then Danial could do is own studies based on Katy's questions and we'd have a valid sample for coming to conclusions.

My thought is about how each individual responds to a rough and tumble conversation. People get online (hopefully) to participate in a personal way.  At Permie.com it's about getting creative with nature and sustainablility, which seems different than here at a mediation site.  But at each venue we're dealing with personal stuff, perception of reality and choices with respect to dealing with reality.  It's personal, and thus disagreements cut at core feelings of self.

I'd use the survey data to see if what spectrum of people join, then when their beliefs are challenged, which ones deside to bow out.
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katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 8:40 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 8:40 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Well, it was funny for me to see permies.com/Paul raised here, too.
Matt, modified 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 10:11 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 10:09 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Dream Walker:
matthew sexton:
That was a great talk...I went back and watched it all....thanks for posting that Matt. As I meditate in the gym I see the yoga classes....predominately women there in my gym. I wonder if they wonder why they can't get more men to participate.
~D
You're welcome DW.

Let's see, I want to ask something but my senses tell me I may really blow it to try this...

I can only ask that readers take my questions as a sincere desire to help me manuver my practice around the diverse and ever changing landscape of the world:

DW, when mediating in the gym around a bunch of women doing yoga, what object to do you use?  How does your environment effect your state of mind?  Maybe I won't really need to think about this in my own practice for a few years.
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Dream Walker, modified 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 7:21 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 10:33 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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matthew sexton:
DW, when mediating in the gym around a bunch of women doing yoga, what object to do you use?  How does your environment effect your state of mind?  Maybe I won't really need to think about this in my own practice for a few years.
I start meditation with 10 minutes or so in the sauna....the heat is almost a cheat to getcha to instant vipasanna.note each sweat drip and move back to heat as object....then I move to the stretching area away from the yoga room. I have done mostly noting woith the constant sounds of weights clanking, music playing, treadmill thumping and some tire flippping to really bring you back. I also notice seeing and thinking and feeling a lot, but more hearing.
When I first started meditating I needed quiet, now I can meditate in almost any noisy environment. Try it out and see what it does for you...esp. the sauna
~D
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Daniel M Ingram, modified 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 4:22 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 4:22 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Interestingly, my index fingers are significantly longer than my ring fingers, which is not typical of males, so I hear. What this means, I have no idea.
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H McElroy, modified 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 10:37 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/6/14 10:37 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Sexism? Anywhere? You must be joking!!!!

;)
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Illuminatus, modified 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 2:30 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 2:30 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Women troll. They just do it in more "socially acceptable" ways. So whereas a male might just be upfront in his trolling, and openly be a bastard to someone, a woman will instead do it way more subtly, usually invoking societal "rules" to cover up her trolling and provide plausible deniability should she be called out. So she might point to some social transgression of the poster in order to get the group on her side against the poster. Or she might use a cultural loophole to troll -- e.g. it's societally "okay" to poke fun at men at the moment; it's all kind of a "nudge-nudge" in-joke to imply the male gender are all braggarts, or bumbling incompetents -- but if women are generalized similarly it's "sexist" and all hell breaks loose. Women know this, and play the system like this all the time, on forums and in real life (and yes I've seen it happen here on the DhO). Passive-aggressive is another female forté.

So trolling is alive and well amongst women. They just get in under the radar.

Trolling is all about desire for recognition. It's a self-important act. This desire is ubiquitous in both genders.
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Jenny, modified 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 3:47 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 3:31 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Matthew:
I assume . . .  and that the reason for lower participation from women is not a DhO issue, rather it might be a general internet forum issue.

I'm not sure why you would assume that. I've belonged to a goodly number of forums and journaling sites--never one with anything close to the gender skew that exists here. An easy case in point is Awake Network: The gender mix is much more balanced there, and the discourse is consistently civil and therefore goes deeper into practice support. I've established my journal and main dharma discussions over there, for reasons that I don't have much hope will change, but that I nonetheless hope will change for the sake of the new crop of readers of MCTB2 who will be looking for an onsite landing place, many of whom will happen to be women.

Why this site is skewed so heavily to the male numbers and masculinst cultural norms is rather obvious, isn't it? I would think so. It is to me. It is a matter of very simple cultural studies analysis, together with the moderation style. Look at the metaphors and images that govern the site. Although I understand the context in which Daniel felt it necessary to position MCTB and DhO as no-nonsense, goal-oriented, "badass cowboy," and so forth at the time that he did, it seems that the unfortunate consequence has been this skew, which is self-reinforcing and even escalating. 

As Daniel himself writes in his book, the Three Trainings (Morality, Concentration, Wisdom) should be kept separate: 

A brief note of caution is in order here: Occasionally, when people begin to engage with spirituality, they may become fascinated with it and may forget some of the useful relative wisdom they learned beforehand. Caught up in “ultimate wisdom” and their “spiritual quest,” they can sometimes abandon conventional wisdom and other aspects of their “former life” to a degree that may not be wise. They falsely imagine that by training in insight they are also mastering or transcending the first training, that of living in the ordinary world. We awaken to the actual truth of our life in all of its conventional dimensions by definition, so make sure that yours is a life you will want to wake up to.

In this context, there can be seen a pernicious and insidious co-opting of moral considerations with regard to women here by means of this overlay of "all this is selfing, women do it too when they complain about men's doing it, Jenny is just in the throes of Second Path," and so forth. In short, that rationalization is a rationalization for subtending an unbalanced situation here that I will continue to find and call questionable on moral grounds, no matter how friggin' enlightened I do or don't become, and no matter how enlightened the rest of you are, Daniel is. What goes on here, and what doesn't, in this regard has ceased to be my personal problem, but make mo mistake: It is a problem. 

Katy, my index and ring finger are in length equal, unlike some other measures close at hand. emoticon



Matt, modified 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 11:26 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 8:45 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Jenny,

You cut out part of my statement, that changed the meaning of what I said.

If you understood what I was saying, what I think I clearly wrote, your message to me would have to be different.

That you chose to write what you did makes me think you and I can't have a productive conversation.

Edit: changed what I wrote to be more informative and helpful, hopefully. Editied again, and again... I find this an informative experience, how selfing seems to arise and stick when the ideas and words get commited to 'paper' for the whole world to see.  This is a different kind of vipasanna, it's an interesting question to me to decide how to better use my time, sitting, flopping around in this kind of wordy/concepty tangle, or listening to dharma talks.
Matt, modified 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 8:53 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 8:51 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Daniel M. Ingram:
Interestingly, my index fingers are significantly longer than my ring fingers, which is not typical of males, so I hear. What this means, I have no idea.

Daniel, long index finger means you have a high 2D:4D ratio. From the link above:
"Paranormal and superstitious beliefs among men with a higher digit ratio[73]"

You're an indicative data point! [assuming the wikipedia page was not gamed just to make this thread a joke. emoticon  I didn't check the footnote]

M
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katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 9:44 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 9:44 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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matthew sexton:
Daniel M. Ingram:
Interestingly, my index fingers are significantly longer than my ring fingers, which is not typical of males, so I hear. What this means, I have no idea.

Daniel, long index finger means you have a high 2D:4D ratio. From the link above:
"Paranormal and superstitious beliefs among men with a higher digit ratio[73]"

You're an indicative data point! [assuming the wikipedia page was not gamed just to make this thread a joke. emoticon  I didn't check the footnote]

M


Hi Matthew, 

I will look at this over the weekend set up a new thread for this and provide links to the primary research, consideration for the research. Some of you profs/students may get contacted if I can't download the primary research...

I am a little concerned about the wikipedia characteristics capturing negative "labels", which would discourge people from reporting.

Thanks, Daniel and Jenny for replying to the digit ratio question.
Matt, modified 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 11:29 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 11:29 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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My 2D:4D ratio: 0.88
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Dada Kind, modified 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 12:47 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 12:46 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Hi Jenny,

Your post perplexes me. Do you mind rewriting or rephrasing it without any form of the verb 'to be'? I suspect I'll find it easier to understand.

Thanks
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Laurel Carrington, modified 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 2:53 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/7/14 2:53 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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In response to Matt's original comment: There is a male gender skew here, obviously, but when I think of the problem of men trolling on the internet, particularly the kind of nastiness so many trolls inflict on women writers, I don't see that here. Let me explain what I mean: no one here is promising to inflict sexual or other varieties of violence on anyone, or to kill or torture someone, or calling women the c-word or even the b-word, or saying nasty things about a woman's appearance (when there's a picture), and so on. That doesn't mean we should take that dubious standard as a baseline, but still, it's worth mentioning, especially since the subject of trolling has come up. This behavior has become horrifically common on the internet. I know some people, both men and women, who want nothing to do with an internet forum because of the concern about throwing details of their personal meditation practice in the path of that kind of buzzsaw. 
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Jenny, modified 9 Years ago at 11/8/14 4:04 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/8/14 4:04 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Hey, Matthew,

I didn't mean to be pointed at you with all that, in particular. I'm responding to a lot more than just what you wrote, even though the way the thread structure works is that my response was ostensibly to you. 

I take it that in your edit you added the part about trolling? So that is what you meant about assuming that women, in general, wouldn't want to participate on forums in general because trolling is a largely male (adolescent male?) sport. Or if that bit was there from the beginning, sorry I didn't pick up on your emphasis.

We were talking about why women might not feel comfortable participating here. My observation is that when you have a 98%, or whatever the high percentage is, membership and posters who are men, and you have recirculated masculinist metaphors, such as "badass dharma cowboy" and "Wild West" as analogues for the DhO, have a logo that the site owner admits is "too masculine and militaristic," have a section titled "Dharma Battleground" where debates tend to be aggressive, have a hands-off moderations style (if you can call it that), then is it any wonder that so few women participate here? I think not. I don't think it is exactly a mystery.

To be clearer, I'll add that Edd was someone I was responding to in this thread with the selfing stuff, as well as to Daniel in that Daniel is ultimately responsible for the metaphors, images, moderation style, moderation rules, leadership, and other frameworks for this discourse community, and so is ultimately responsible for the dearth of women here, the skew. In quoting Daniel's MCTB2 recurrent emphasis that the three trainings be kept separate, I was also responding, I think, to some of what he said to me privately weeks ago, whereby it seemed that my concerns were being somewhat written off as my own somehow deficient wisdom or unfortunate current insight stage. Some people past 4th Path sometimes seem to have this annoying lack of need to exert themselves in the conventional world, saying something instead like, "The bad will just fall away, and the good will rise to the top." To me, this sounds like inappropriate conflation of the Three Trainings. Hence my quoting MCTB on the need to avoid conflating insight (the truth of the fluxing aware-where-it-is field) with morality.

I acknowledge that Daniel has made a number of statements and started in the direction of addressing the skew, although he is busy all the time, so who knows whether much will come of it among all the competing demands on his time and energy. From a dharma point of view, it may be worthwhile to imagine that this new edition will garner more women readers, and these readers may come here looking for support, but they won't really feel comfortable enough to participate if status quo remains intact.
boubs fatty, modified 9 Years ago at 11/11/14 7:57 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/11/14 7:57 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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I'm gonna saw what everybody else is too scared to say...Women like to talk about their emotions and get touchy-feely. Go to a 'medition centre' in any town and you will find women gossipping about coworkers.  And sustained concentration would be difficult considering the monthly period, and seldom worth the effort of getting involved giving advice. Buddha's words.
Matt, modified 9 Years ago at 11/11/14 10:57 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/11/14 10:32 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Hi Jenny,

Sorry for my blurriness, but I buried the only point I cared to make in this thread:

Perhaps nice people get sick and tired of the aggressive atmosphere online, then carry on their practice in private.  Perhaps women are, on average, nicer than men.

I'll add that I agree with you, to the point that you seem to agree with this: depending on anonymity and moderation laxity, aggressiveness is a *feature* of the Internet.  Not a nice feature, but an expected one.

All this is independent of DhO in particular.

Compared to elsewhere, I feel the 'badass dharma cowboy' aspect of DhO is a feature to be treasured.  I hope that does not change.  I also hope that nice people, men or women, can be badass *dharma* cowboys

Perhaps for new threads:

1. Awakening is *so* high stakes, and the process is *so* personal, and the DhO gist is *so* straight to the real deal of ourselves (historical quotes get dissed in favor for *actual personal experience*) that maybe DhO is naturally going to be the sparkiest place on the internet?

2: For better for worse, my practice seems to have made me *less* likely to react to dickhead moves by people and things, leading to some consternation on the part of people around me.  I'm quite capable of letting things slide that just a few years ago would have sent me on the warpath.  What one reacts to, is willing to fight for is a big part of how we choose our friends, and lowered reactivity for those treasured subjects strains relationships.  Maybe the (highly attained)  moderators are just not bugged by what bugs the rest of us.

3. Maybe the bad feelings that come out of this f*'ed up online environment are opportunities for practice.
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Jenny, modified 9 Years ago at 11/12/14 8:03 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/12/14 7:49 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

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Matthew:
For better for worse, my practice seems to have made me *less* likely to react to dickhead moves by people and things, leading to some consternation on the part of people around me.  I'm quite capable of letting things slide that just a few years ago would have sent me on the warpath.  What one reacts to, is willing to fight for is a big part of how we choose our friends, and lowered reactivity for those treasured subjects strains relationships.  Maybe the (highly attained)  moderators are just not bugged by what bugs the rest of us.

Yes, me too. Much less reactive, than, say 4 years ago, and when I do react, it subsides quickly. Hard to hold grudges, but I've never been much of a grudge holder. 

Here's the thing for me with this issue--for better or worse, I was steeped in feminist theory for a decade in grad school. It raised my awareness of all kinds of systematic, subtle, subliminial injustices and exclusion effects against people merely because of their being categorized according to some trait or other. Although I'm not in that academic world anymore and seldom find a need in daily life to invoke or think about feminist theory, it has come up here for me repeatedly. I feel a responsibility to and compassion for all the women out there who read Daniel's book and come here as a landing place but merely lurk. There is a very aggressive streak here, and I was ripped to shreds by a sockpuppet for merely writing the words "feminist theory" on "his" dharma forum. Yes, he was just a sock, and I didn't figure that out right away. He ripped into me for 2 days, and nothing was done about it until I called Daniel himself in the middle of the night. Now, if I was a new woman who had just read MCTB2 and came here out of curiosity and want for a supportive community and I saw that thread, I would be appalled and afraid to participate. So, this was not just about "me." I kept and keep speaking up because it was about the responsibility I feel and the compassion I feel for women who do not manifest here in anything like equal numbers. 

In general, women are conditioned in our society to be contextual, open, and receptive in styles of all kinds of things and activities. Even "noting" practice is kind of ultra-masculine, from a certain perspective. I've never been into it in practice. Nor have I ever emphasized speed of discernment on the cushion, although that speed has arisen on its own. Interestingly, from what I've read so far of MCTB2, this edition is going to give almost equal emphasis to "softer" styles of practice, those that emphasize opennes, receptivity, and surrender. From a cultural perspective, I think this enhances MCTB in that it offers many women a way to enter the practice from where many of them are, from a cultural conditioning point of view. 

So I expect that when this book comes out, there will be more women coming in here. What will they see and hear? How will they be received? Are droves of them going to want to jump into a Wild West Badass Dharma Cowboy "spiritual" scene? Are droves of them doing so now? No and no. Is it a systemic exclusion principle that exists needlessly. Yes, indeed. Is that a problem? That depends on how gendered Daniel wants his Dharma to be.

I'm good at debate, damned good. I taught college-level argumentation for a decade, etc., etc. I like things a little edgy and gritty, more so than most other women I know, which is probably why I've been one of the very few women here. Despite that background, I find all the debate, aggressive, unskillful speech, trolling that goes on here absolutely NOT an opportunity for meaningful practice. Daniel himself has said that he has felt so ridiculed by certain persons for his practices that he rarely shares them on here anymore. Now that is odd, isn't it? As someone else said, I DO NOT come to my sangha looking for a prefab dukkha obstacle course. I have plenty of suffering already in my life to work with that I don't need it artificially amped up for me by some Internet "Wild West," which, by the way is a masculinist narrative right out of American literature, which I happen to have degrees in and have published papers on. One thing I learned from the Tibetans was that baseline Morality practice is to use ordinary means to avoid aggressive interactions that can lead to heedlessness. So, no, I just don't get the idea that any of this is anything but a distraction, and a harmful one, from practice.

My primary space now is Awake Network, and my practice has thrived more from my being there because there is just none of this nonsense. There are quite a few highly realized people there who follow journals and really, really help practice along--not argue, troll, and misdirect "Dark Night" energies. You have to be vetted at the moderator level to enter the sangha. And when things start getting a little weird, the thread is locked. Three threads I was on over there that started to have the "feminist theory" controversy leak over to there were locked, BAM BAM BAM! That is how moderation is done and how a space truly, rather than only nominally, focused on and conducive to actual practice is done.
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(D Z) Dhru Val, modified 9 Years ago at 11/13/14 8:27 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/12/14 11:08 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

Posts: 346 Join Date: 9/18/11 Recent Posts
My observation having participated in various groups related to this stuff, is that the skew is negatively correlated with age.

If we look at the subdemographic of people in their 20s there are relatively few women compared to men. But as the demographic gets older there is a higher proportion of women. And at some point in the 40s or 50s maybe even gets reversed.

Older people are also generally more mature and have more polite and considerate conversations.

Being considerate is  invariably a good thing, but politeness isn't always a plus in the context of dharma discussions. 

I read Tolle and before finding the MCTB, and DhO. I got the sense that it was full of lots of nebulous ideas, but little practical advice, and that Tolle had basically lucked into realization. The hardcore, no-nonsense stuff appealed to me at the time.

Not so much anymore. But at the time I would not have taken the time to read this stuff if it was too soft and fluffy.

I imagine that for some people (men and women) with different cultural conditioning, it is just the opposite and the hardcore thing would be a turn off. 

My ringfinger is longer than my index. I am also left handed.
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katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 9 Years ago at 11/14/14 7:26 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 11/13/14 9:47 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Hi DZ,
My ringfinger is longer than my index. I am also left handed.

Thanks. I will need to start a spread sheet. The point is that chemistry may be relevant (as well as a few rude passers-by and lingo) in the gender ratio here. But see *** below =]

Yes, I feel that the DharmaOverground has a sampling of society and there's a ton of welcoming communication here as well as scrutiny and challenge. It's a pity that sometimes a person comes along a bit rude, but that's also very realistic of life and there's not always a doctor to call in the middle of the night to police this. 

I certainly don't need anyone to mamma me or heroically pave the DhO way for me nor protect me from their feeling of sexism becuase it's not my perception at all. Though people can say they are protecting and advocating for "my" gender; I get that that's their passion.

So I haven't experienced sexism here and I have experienced fine moderation (before I was a moderator) and I do receive notices when there are issues now as a mod (thanks Simon).  I do think people have deep wounds and can be hypervigilant about them. Now i write this having left a 6-figure job due to what I perceived and perceive as flagrant gender-based discrimination done by well-meaning, but willfully bias-habituated folks. 

***Something I remember in reading this thread is a knitting group I had years ago. There was one guy in it. His wife taught him to knit and he loved it. He wanted other guys to join, but it never happened, year and year. So he sat with us female-gender folks and knit beautifully. If a sociologist had recorded our talks and transcribed them and anonymized them I have no doubt that many people would correctly guess that the group was nearly all woman, that we sometimes were making gender-based generalization ("My husband does that, too! Gah!" or "I can't stand it when guys do that!"), and we'd have loved to have other guys there, but it was just the forum of our knitting group. In fact, the guy outknitted us all and runs that group =]


http://hollywoodprogressive.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/dido-602.jpg (edit, added link)
(Kosky @ Dido, LAO, 2014...)
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Jenny, modified 9 Years ago at 12/3/14 12:16 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 12/3/14 12:16 AM

RE: DhO male gender skew

Posts: 566 Join Date: 7/28/13 Recent Posts
Ha! Would you look at that "masculine" logo? No, you wouldn't, because it is gone!

So now I'm going to take off my badass dharma cowgirl hat, and even my santa hat, to Daniel Ingram . . . and then eat them, too!

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Laurel Carrington, modified 9 Years ago at 12/3/14 7:57 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 12/3/14 7:57 PM

RE: DhO male gender skew

Posts: 439 Join Date: 4/7/14 Recent Posts
Jenny:
Ha! Would you look at that "masculine" logo? No, you wouldn't, because it is gone!

So now I'm going to take off my badass dharma cowgirl hat, and even my santa hat, to Daniel Ingram . . . and then eat them, too!

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I wouldn't be too quick to celebrate--there's a nice, polite new font visible with my computer browser, but the iPad browser (Chrome in both cases) shows the same old letters. Unless the old letters got put back; that's a possibility. I used a computer at work and an iPad at home. I could check my home computer, but I'm too lazy. 

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