Intuitively I was not shocked by the nude pregnant woman. I found it very casual instead. Might be my European education, I don't know.

I think that for medical articles, all the relevant body parts must be fully exposed. And believe me I have seen much worse than a healthy pregnant woman, because i do website editing for a faculty of medicine.

In that case the part to be expose would be the whole swell of the belly, from pelvis to thorax. Including the breasts is ok to me.

Showing that part exclusively would not only be more medically relevant (because thighs and neck are not relevant here), it would also make the person non identifiable.

The clothed photograph seems to me more improper than the nude one for a medical article. If it is medical, then the body part must be exposed without clothes. Even if it might sound surprising, I also disagree all photographs showings hands on belly, nude or clothed. I acknowledge that it shows the mother's care, but for medical purpose it is the belly alone that must be shown.

What I find much more disturbing is WP being used to publish pictures of the photographer's wife. Even if he is very proud of her. It might be an unwanted precedent, first of people posting pictures of their children to show blond hair, tennis playing, whatever, second of people posting photos of their girl-friend at the first opportunity.

That might against the interests of female participation.

Arnaud

On 06/09/2011 11:10, Laura Hale wrote:

From a women's sport perspective, we could really, really use some images featuring women's sport and encouraging people to post images of their friends and family to demonstrate certain things feels wholly appropriate.

Ah yes, when there is a lack of images, certainly.

I was rather thinking of already very documented topics, and a certain type of illiterate population equipped with silly smartphones, like :

Article Baby : Picture of MY baby smiling, straight from my smartphone. He is so cute you're a Nazi if you refuse publication.

Or if there was an abundance of photographs in the sports you mention, that would be :

Gymnastics : MY daughter shining at the local championship. Not YOURS.

You can see that on Panoramio already, like :

Eiffel Tower : Picture of my girl-friend and her brother in front of the Eiffel Tower.

Such pictures require a lot of editing from Panoramio volunteers, which is done for important places, but the more you chose unknown places the more you find silly pictures. It was so endemic that they decided there should be a review step before allowing pictures to appear from Panoramio to Google Earth. There are thousands of irrelevant or to poor quality photos uploaded everyday.

In the case of Wikipedia, I think such "authors" would not even care to read the article. Maybe they will even have an iphone or android app to directly upload a smartphone picture to WP, without caring about what is written in the article.

That's my Prophecy of the Smartphones of Doom.

Can anybody confirm that there have already been invasions of "authors" contributing uniquely to post photos of their personal lives ?

Arnaud

I have to say that viewing pregnancy as a "medical article" seems to be a rather male point of view :) I also find it telling that maternity clothing isn't even mentioned in the article (but I guess that makes sense if pregnant women don't wear clothes).

Ryan Kaldari

On 9/6/11 12:04 AM, Arnaud HERVE wrote:

Intuitively I was not shocked by the nude pregnant woman. I found it very casual instead. Might be my European education, I don't know.

I think that for medical articles, all the relevant body parts must be fully exposed. And believe me I have seen much worse than a healthy pregnant woman, because i do website editing for a faculty of medicine.

In that case the part to be expose would be the whole swell of the belly, from pelvis to thorax. Including the breasts is ok to me.

Showing that part exclusively would not only be more medically relevant (because thighs and neck are not relevant here), it would also make the person non identifiable.

The clothed photograph seems to me more improper than the nude one for a medical article. If it is medical, then the body part must be exposed without clothes. Even if it might sound surprising, I also disagree all photographs showings hands on belly, nude or clothed. I acknowledge that it shows the mother's care, but for medical purpose it is the belly alone that must be shown.

What I find much more disturbing is WP being used to publish pictures of the photographer's wife. Even if he is very proud of her. It might be an unwanted precedent, first of people posting pictures of their children to show blond hair, tennis playing, whatever, second of people posting photos of their girl-friend at the first opportunity.

That might against the interests of female participation.

Arnaud

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On Tue, Sep 6, 2011 at 19:27, [email protected] wrote:

Lots of us old hippie women are exhibitionists and I could advertise and get a few of us to pose. Then the young guys would have to discuss whether the 19 year old or 60 year old breast/nude/buttock etc. is more appropriate for an article.

Hope that also engenders a good laugh....

Carol in dc

It's actually a serious point, though. It would be great to provide images for those articles that don't portray women the way certain men want to see them portrayed. I recall the Body Shop did that a couple of decades ago -- started using images of women that fell outside the usual range that tended to be objectified (older, not thin, etc). They produced some very good ads as a result. The difficulty for us would be in finding those images, then in maintaining them on the pages.

Sarah

On Tue, Sep 6, 2011 at 20:08, Fred Bauder [email protected] wrote:

...

On Tue, Sep 6, 2011 at 19:27,  [email protected] wrote:

...

Lots of us old hippie women are exhibitionists and I could advertise and get a few of us to pose. Then the young guys would have to discuss whether the 19 year old or 60 year old breast/nude/buttock etc. is more appropriate for an article.

Hope that also engenders a good laugh....

Carol in dc

It's actually a serious point, though. It would be great to provide images for those articles that don't portray women the way certain men want to see them portrayed. I recall the Body Shop did that a couple of decades ago -- started using images of women that fell outside the usual range that tended to be objectified (older, not thin, etc). They produced some very good ads as a result. The difficulty for us would be in finding those images, then in maintaining them on the pages.

Sarah

The concept of "being objectified" needs to be explained to the community and incorporated into our style guides. This has to make sense rather than being misunderstood.

Fred

It's the kind of idea that people would become hostile towards, because accepting how extensive the objectification is is part of feminist consciousness. I see text and images on Wikipedia that are very clear instances of it (in my view), but over the years I've learned to keep my mouth shut about it.

Sarah

If someone wants to beat me to the punch, go for it. Hmmm, I know some feminist photographers.... In fact, a few of us probably do. What better consciousness raiser than a fact (or photo) on the ground that they then have to deal with??

On 9/6/2011 9:51 PM, Sarah wrote:

On Tue, Sep 6, 2011 at 19:27,[email protected] wrote:

...

Lots of us old hippie women are exhibitionists and I could advertise and get a few of us to pose. Then the young guys would have to discuss whether the 19 year old or 60 year old breast/nude/buttock etc. is more appropriate for an article.

Hope that also engenders a good laugh....

Carol in dc

It's actually a serious point, though. It would be great to provide images for those articles that don't portray women the way certain men want to see them portrayed. I recall the Body Shop did that a couple of decades ago -- started using images of women that fell outside the usual range that tended to be objectified (older, not thin, etc). They produced some very good ads as a result. The difficulty for us would be in finding those images, then in maintaining them on the pages.

Sarah

On Wed, Sep 7, 2011 at 01:33, Daniel and Elizabeth Case [email protected] wrote:

Do we have an article on that women's club somewhere in England that, one year, put out their annual calendar showing them going about their regular club activities (gardening, tea, etc.) nude? IIRC, they were all in their fifties and sixties at the time, and the calendar sold quite well. I wish I could remember more details.

Here's what I found, not sure if it's what you had in mind.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calendar_Girls#Inspiration http://leukaemialymphomaresearch.org.uk/get-involved/calendar-girls/calendar...

-Jeremy

On Tue, Sep 6, 2011 at 9:27 PM, [email protected] wrote:

On 9/6/2011 5:18 PM, Ryan Kaldari wrote:

...

I have to say that viewing pregnancy as a "medical article" seems to be a rather male point of view :) I also find it telling that maternity clothing isn't even mentioned in the article (but I guess that makes sense if pregnant women don't wear clothes).

Ryan Kaldari

So funny...

I won't even start on the naughty thoughts this sexagenarian has had about adding nude body part photos to all sorts of articles. Oh, why not...

I thought about this when I saw all of the images of young attractive women in heels that had been uploaded and displayed together. The lack of diversity was striking.

Lots of us old hippie women are exhibitionists and I could advertise and get a few of us to pose. Then the young guys would have to discuss whether the 19 year old or 60 year old breast/nude/buttock etc. is more appropriate for an article.

Hope that also engenders a good laugh....

Carol in dc

There have been groups of women who have done to fund raise. Calenders usually. We need to find some of them which would be notable and worth writing about.

Sydney

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On Wed, Sep 7, 2011 at 2:07 PM, Sue Gardner [email protected] wrote:

It seems to me that if we had access to the kinds of best practices or guiding principles used in the medical profession, that might give us some guidance for how to select images that are optimally neutral for educational purposes. Because as your note implies, that expertise does already exist.

Thanks, Sue

Sue,

Not exactly what you were asking about but related.

These are some policy statements about consent from patients for the use of their image in a medical publication.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1112855/

http://www.acmg.net/resources/policies/pol-020.pdf

Commons now does not require consent for images of people that are not identifiable. This does not meet the newer standards adopted by medical groups. This is particulary concerning since our license encourages reuse. We are lowering the standard for obtaining medical images and encouraging other people to do so too.

Sydney Poore User:FloNight

Sydney -

I think (correct me if I'm wrong) that Sue is referring to best practices in regards to medical encyclopedia entries...and the type of images, where they are placed in articles, and such?

I do think it'd be GREAT to have the input of medical professionals. I'm starting to notice that the majority of people who participate in medical topics RARELY actually deal with the subject at hand in a professional environment (i.e. I'd love to meet the gyno or nurse who is writing the vagina article..)

Just like we need museums, women, and students...we need doctors and medical professionals. Nursing school outreach anyone? :)

-Sarah

Use by doctors of Wikipedia is massive with 50% using it at least occasionally and 5% editing.

Fred

On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 8:46 PM, Sarah Stierch [email protected]wrote:

Daniel, I totally <3 your use of denial and hostile work environment.

Chiming in right now. Been following it since it was posted on WP:Feminism and was sickened by the conversation, so had to move on..

-Sarah

Daniel pointed to the reply to his comments as of particular interest to this list... but I think Daniel's comments themselves are just as weighted with unintentional meaning. Describing a photo of a nude pregnant woman on the [[Pregnancy]] article as potentially gratuitous in its nudity, using a euphemism for nudity, and assuming that "most workplaces" have rules against nudity demonstrate that it is difficult, if not impossible, to separate cultural biases from editorial decisions.

Since we know that the gender gap exists in many cultures, and not just the U.S. or Europe, being aware of and sensitive to specific cultural biases takes on special merit here. Far more "gratuitous" nudity is not terribly uncommon throughout Western Europe, for example, in everything from general interest magazines and newspapers to street ads, movies, other media and even in personal interaction (see [[Love parade]]).

It seems like there must be lower hanging fruit than the image of a naked pregnant woman on the pregnancy article, or an image of a vagina on the vagina article. Using the principle of least surprise as a guide, these examples should be on the lower end of the spectrum of concern.

Nathan

On Wed, Sep 7, 2011 at 10:34 AM, Arnaud HERVE [email protected] wrote:

On 07/09/2011 04:02, Nathan wrote: If you have time you can have a look at the photos in pregnancy pages in Farsi and Arabic. You have the languages column in the left of the English page. The decency of those pages, which in North American feminism would be typically considered as protecting women, is now in Western Europe becoming associated with a threat to civic rights of women. The pages with the naked woman are the pages of countries with strong women rights.

You can possibly more easily check Linguistic Points Of View (LPOV) of different Wikipedia communities using Manypedia, a tool we developed for cross-cultural investigations. For example, http://manypedia.com/#%7Cen%7CPregnancy%7Car is the comparison of page "Pregnancy" in English Wikipedia and Arabic Wikipedia (translated into English). http://manypedia.com/#%7Cen%7CPregnancy%7Cfa is the comparison of page "Pregnancy" in English Wikipedia and Persian/Farsi Wikipedia (translated into English). http://manypedia.com/#%7Cen%7CPregnancy%7Chi English and Hindi Wikipedia (translated into English). For more, just use the "Compare with the" other language dropdown menu on top left of the interface. Currently 56 languages are supported (the ones the Google translate API provides)

Moreover note that English is not the only language supported, since you can have the pages translated in any of the 56 languages. For example, if you know Arabic and Dutch you can have the comparison of page حمل (pregnancy in Arabic) from Arabic Wikipedia and Dutch Wikipedia (translated into Arabic). http://manypedia.com/#%7Car%7C%D8%AD%D9%85%D9%84%7Cnl

Images present in the page are grouped on top of the page (along with other statistics such as most frequent words, top editors, number of edits, creation and last edit dates, ...) so that you can have a quick visual hint about the differences in representations of the concepts by images.

I'll be presenting Manypedia at next WikiSym (3 October, California). And of course I'll be very happy to hear any suggestion/criticism/feedback about Manypedia by people interested in the gendergap issue and suggestions on how to improve Manypedia in order to ease cross-cultural investigations and studies.

Thanks a lot and have a good time browsing Manypedia!!! ;)

On Wed, Sep 7, 2011 at 4:34 AM, Arnaud HERVE [email protected] wrote:

On 07/09/2011 04:02, Nathan wrote:

...

Since we know that the gender gap exists in many cultures, and not just the U.S. or Europe, being aware of and sensitive to specific cultural biases takes on special merit here. Far more "gratuitous" nudity is not terribly uncommon throughout Western Europe, for example, in everything from general interest magazines and newspapers to street ads, movies, other media and even in personal interaction (see [[Love parade]]).

Yes nudity in Western Europe has become so frequent that it is devoid of any significance now. Showing sexual intercourse can provoke a debate about proper and improper, but Western Europeans will hardly notice an ad with a naked woman.

However, there is a new element. That is the pressure from Islamic immigration.

Some radical Muslims want the sharia immediately applied to all populations, even non Muslims, because sharia is the law from God, and God is far superior to any parliament or constitution. Some Muslims are more tolerant for other populations, but for their own family it is still the law, the law as in not a personal choice. Some other Muslims would like to get rid of Islam, but they are not helped by the prevailing multicultural policies, which tend to accept community leaders as the true representatives of what they wish.

In the past, xenophobia was restricted to extreme-right political groups. However recently there has been a change, and the liberal lobbies have turned against Islam, which creates a new situation as it is the immigrant population which is now perceived as culturally backwards and threatening for civic rights. The majority of native European populations now perceive immigration as civilization threatening, and in this context Islam is perceived as particularly incompatible with Western civilization. Gender issues have become a major landmark for that in public debate. Gay groups, feminist groups, secular groups, now perceive the right to show female nudity, the right to celibate autonomous life, the right to gender orientation as gains of modern civilization, to defend actively and specifically against Islam. In the past it was against the local conservative right, now it is explicitly against Islam.

As far as medical treatment of women is concerned, the sharia explicitly states that :

• A woman patient cannot be seen naked, or even touched, by a male

doctor. When the doctor is female that is not an issue, and fortunately many doctors are female. However, for specialized or emergency treatment, we now have a record of of life threatening situations or severe lasting damages, because the husband, the father or even the brother did not allow treatment.

This also includes severe damages to the baby in obstetrics, when a complication occurred and the intervention of a male specialist was refused by the "man in charge". All this to explain to you that in Western Europe as it is now, the refusal to show nudity is becoming clearly identified with Islam, and feminists are turning clearly against Islam.

snip

If you have time you can have a look at the photos in pregnancy pages in Farsi and Arabic. You have the languages column in the left of the English page. The decency of those pages, which in North American feminism would be typically considered as protecting women, is now in Western Europe becoming associated with a threat to civic rights of women. The pages with the naked woman are the pages of countries with strong women rights.

Urdu and Punjabi pages are not developed, but then they are seldom developed for anything, so it is not very relevant. Some European languages have very little population and contributors, so they are not very relevant either. The Dutch page is surprising, as it shows more nudity, and in Holland they both enjoy high standards of women's rights, and Islam has become widely considered as an equivalent for political murder and threats to civic rights.

Arnaud

Hi Arnaud,

Thank you for this enlightening email.

In the past I work as an obstetrical and gynecological nurse, and know some of the difficulties in treating Muslim women in the United States where they would be a minority population. In the United States, our health care system is totally inadequate to meets the needs of people who wanted high quality medical care and have religious/cultural beliefs that prevent people from the opposite gender from seeing them nude.

The way that it can effect women who want to be educated is important, too, and very relevant to our work on Wikimedia projects.

I find your information about feminist reaction in Western Europe to be interesting and informative. As I mentioned in another thread today, there can be vastly differing opinions among feminists about issues related to sexually topics.

Sydney

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While this is an interesting post, I do feel that most of it needs a big {{citation needed}} tag

All this to explain to you that in Western Europe as it is now, the refusal to show nudity is becoming clearly identified with Islam, and feminists are turning clearly against Islam.

This is not my experience in the UK. Both feminism and Islam are too diverse for any of this to be "clear".

Chris

Did anyone realize just how provocative the illustrations of the arabic pregnancy article must appear for certain people then? http://ar.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D9%85%D9%84%D9%81:Hoact21.jpg in the lead section of the article.

The question now: Should we consider this a good thing or a bad thing? Should the picture of the male doctor touching the belly of the pregnant woman be removed from the article, like the picture of the nude woman in the english wikipedia? Better to replace it with a pregnant woman wearing hijab? does anyone want to start a RFC?

That should be up to the Arabic Wikipedia community, IMO (To have an RFC on it and participate, one would not only need an account there but Arabic more fluent than I would consider my own to be).

Interestingly, the picture is from a clinic in Central America.

Daniel Case

On 9/7/11 1:34 AM, Arnaud HERVE wrote:

Western Europeans will hardly notice an ad with a naked woman.

Yes, I remember being in Berlin where every billboard was either a woman in a bikini or a man dressed as a clown. It was disturbing on multiple levels. At least in San Francisco we have a few billboards of men in their underwear (although they are still rather rare). Personally, I have no problem with nudity, but when women are the only gender being exposed, I can't help hearing Ariel Levy and Andrea Dworkin in my head talking about the commodification of women's bodies and the prevalence of rape culture in Western society. Of course, these are not easy concepts to explain to people who only see nudity as a black and white issue of censorship or freedom.

I agree with Nathan's comment that we are not going to be able to educate every person on Commons and overturn the culture there (given the demographics we are working with), so we should choose our battles carefully. We should also be very conscious about how we are framing these debates. If we frame them as "protecting children and the culturally sensitive" we will certainly be ignored. If we frame them as "making Wikipedia safe for work" we will also be ignored. In most of these cases we need to concentrate on leveraging existing policies and guidelines, as well as arguing for small incremental changes in those policies. For example, until recently we had a blatant double standard in Commons nudity guidelines regarding photos of men's genitalia versus photos of women's genitalia. Through persistent and reasoned argument, the guidelines were eventually changed. We now have a board resolution endorsing the "Principle of least astonishment", which should help to address some of these problems. We just need to identify where it makes sense to push for changes and be smart about it. We also have to realize that we aren't going to win a lot of these debates. Such is the nature of consensus-building.

Ryan Kaldari

Another blatant violation of the Principle of least astonishment: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhombic_drive

Ryan Kaldari

:)) A.

--- On Wed, 14/9/11, Ryan Kaldari [email protected] wrote:

From: Ryan Kaldari [email protected] Subject: Re: [Gendergap] Gendergap humor To: [email protected] Date: Wednesday, 14 September, 2011, 2:04

Another blatant violation of the Principle of least astonishment: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhombic_drive

Ryan Kaldari

_______________________________________________ Gendergap mailing list [email protected] https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/gendergap

I am not sure this is strictly on-topic, but I thought it might be interesting concerning female appearance issues.

We are starting presidential campaigns in France now, and there is a candidate for the right of women to wear the niqab (full clothing except for the eyes)

Here is an article, you probably won't understand it but you will see the video, which I think is telling :

http://www.lepoint.fr/societe/2012-la-candidate-du-niqab-22-09-2011-1376118_...

In this interview, basically she claims it is her individual right as a woman, to wear the niqab as she would wear a mini-skirt. Feminists on the contrary argue that it is not a mere piece of clothe, but a submission to Islamic law, which implies a loss of civic rights for women.

So that's what I said earlier, there is now a contradiction between multiculturalism and women's rights. Both of which used to belong together in the side of progress, traditionally.

On a more practical level, you can understand that she won't be able to run the full campaign, because it will not be possible to identify her. It could be her sister or her mom any time. Women wearing the niqab are already refused in many jobs, because precisely it is impossible to know who is the employee. In the case of a kindergarten for example it could even be a man impersonating his sister.

But here it will make some noise, because it is her intention to get banned for the presidential campaign, and it is precisely that sort of publicity she is looking for.

Arnaud

Ok I will be a bit long here.

On 23/09/2011 01:07, Emily Monroe wrote:

Personally, I really don't understand why people get upset about Islamic women /choosing/ to wear hijabs, or niqabs, under the pretense of feminism. Part of what feminism fights for is the right to choose. This is the unintended consequence.

I get the practical arguments (ie, "I don't know who this person is" etc.) is, though, and I think any girl or women who has their wardrobe dictated by another person is being abused, unless there's a non-abusive reason behind it; I doubt that anyone wearing a work or school uniform would qualify as being abused.

That is probably because you still consider the niqab as a piece of garment only. But the niqab doesn't come alone, it comes in a set, with Islamic law included. And that law necessarily includes the submission of women to men.

It is very important to understand that Islam is not exactly a personal choice faith, in the sense that you would consider tolerance between different churches of Protestantism on the American territory. Islam doesn't do tolerance, in the sense that we understand it. In Islam you cannot leave, it is death penalty if you chose another religion.

It is not either to be considered with a benevolent multicultural mind, like you would tolerate the differences of Buddhist immigrants. A law-abiding good-citizen attitude is recommended to Muslims only if they are a minority in a Western country. If they become a majority, then they must take power, and impose Islamic law. This entails dividing the population into three categories ; Muslims who have full dignity, Christians and Jews who are sub-citizens subjected to occasional abuse, non believers or heathens who have no rights. This also necessarily includes a loss of civic rights for all women.

During the twentieth century there were positive signs from the Muslim world. They were due to :

- local customs atoning Islamic law - The modernist mentalities of post-colonization Nation-States

However this is disappearing now, due to :

- New globalized generations who conceive Islam not as local custom but as globally opposed to the Western world - The systematic destruction of the modern Muslim Nation-States by NATO

Only in the mainstream media you hear that Bin Laden was captured because it suddenly became possible, and Lybian democratic forces suddenly rebelled against dictator Khadafi. In fact Bin Laden's capture was a public relations operation, which helped conceal the fact that Nato has been promoting Al-Qaida to fight in Lybia. This in turn helps establishing business interests in NATO-controlled Muslim countries, with Western capital controlling the big business, the local population subjected to religious obscurantism and not participating to the democratic defense of their rights, and in between a zealots mafia..

In Islam women do have rights, yes, like your teenage daughter has rights. Not like an adult professional woman has rights and can call her lawyer. In Islam if you have no husband and no father, then you are subjected to the authority of your younger brother, who can decide of your life for you, and occasionally beat you up if you don't obey. In Islam you cannot divorce if you wish, only if the Muslim judge thinks that your husband did something wrong according to Islamic law. In Islam you cannot be raped by your husband, he is your husband it's the word of God that he can do what he wants with you. In Islam if you complain that you were raped by strangers, you have to prove first that you were not sexually provocative. In Islam if you are found with a person of the same sex, the community can stone you to death as they wish.

The reason why I write all that is that I have talked with feminists from Muslim countries, so I try to convey their message.

The first thing is that they really would like to get rid of Islam. Not being mildly respected as a member of the Muslim community, but really get rid of Islam, and being actively protected from it. They want to have a life, they cannot even subscribe an insurance policy, buy a car, go visit friends without the agreement of male relatives.

Then there is the sociological problem, that Islam doesn't tolerate a sexually neutral civic life. It might not be obvious in North America because you are so used to it, but in order to have a professional life women need to work in an environment where there are male colleagues and clients, and therefore need laws against sexual harassment, for the simple common sense reason that when you work you work, you don't date. Islam doesn't do that, in Islam a woman is either owned by the males of her family or her husband, and if she she walks free from male authority then she is sexually available. The male in turn is considered as immediately sexually eager and willing to rape as soon as he sees a female in the absence of a relative from her family.

In that sense a male teacher alone with a girl is not decent, because it is considered that the teacher will attempt to seduce her anytime, and the girl will compulsorily feel a burning desire as well. I know, I help the 10 years daughter of my Muslim neighbors every week with her schoolwork, because the parents cannot read the language. And yet I cannot be left alone with her, the father or the brother have to be present in the same room.

Walking in public spaces is tolerated if the girls are in groups only, so there cannot be a moment alone with a man. For example a female client talking to a male shopkeeper about a shop's product is a moment of burning raging obscenity. Islam doesn't do free neutral space for allowing women to develop civic activities. Let alone professional activities.

"Tolerant" Islam is gradually decreasing, and it is more and more the radicals we will have to deal with. In dealing with women's rights we will have to surrender to or to break Islam. Because once more, Islam is not only a faith, it's a law, alw as in You Don't Choose.

Last, let me quote you a short "dialogue" I recently witnessed on Facebook. There was a girl from Algeria saying "Wow the weather is still much too hot in this month of September. Then a male Algerian replied "You don"t chose the weather, God choses the weather". That is the kind of cultural life most educated girls in Muslim countries would like to get rid of.

Arnaud

I've been procrastinating on replying, but I do agree with Fred and Emily.

Additionally, realize that many Islamists are really just a few decades behind most forms of Christianity and Judaism in its patriarchal dominance and bad attitudes towards women.

This is due in part to the reaction and over-reaction to continuing Western imperialism (including the dominant forms of expansionist Zionism), and the fact that "moderate" Muslims too often have sold out to the west. These facts have empowered the radical and anti-feminist Islamist elements.

And the U.S. and Israel particularly need a radical enemy so they can excuse massive war machines paid for by terrorized taxpayers who excuse the atrocities carried out by their militaries in their names. I really resent and work to change various Wikipedia articles that use feminism as an excuse to slam all Muslims and make them the "enemy" worthy of attack.

Gender apartheid was one particularly bad article where there was WP:UNDUE emphasis (whole sections and long paragraphs) on this phrase being used against Islam, especially Undue considering that there is already a whole article on Sex segregation in Islam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_segregation_in_Islam. The editor trying to keep in the Undue material not only resorted to sock puppetry but vandalism of my web page and threat-laced emails galore.

So let's not forget that the the psychos on the issue of Islam and woman are everywhere.

On 9/23/2011 10:23 AM, Fred Bauder wrote:

This rant is inappropriate.

"Islam doesn't do tolerance, in the sense that we understand it. In Islam you cannot leave, it is death penalty if you chose another religion."

There is a grain of truth in such accusations, but you ascribe them to the entire religion.

A part of what we are doing here is attempting to foster an atmosphere on Wikipedia where Muslim women feel welcome to edit. Wikimedia is a global multicultural organization.

Fred

...

Ok I will be a bit long here.

On 23/09/2011 01:07, Emily Monroe wrote:

...

Personally, I really don't understand why people get upset about Islamic women /choosing/ to wear hijabs, or niqabs, under the pretense of feminism. Part of what feminism fights for is the right to choose. This is the unintended consequence.

I get the practical arguments (ie, "I don't know who this person is" etc.) is, though, and I think any girl or women who has their wardrobe dictated by another person is being abused, unless there's a non-abusive reason behind it; I doubt that anyone wearing a work or school uniform would qualify as being abused.

That is probably because you still consider the niqab as a piece of garment only. But the niqab doesn't come alone, it comes in a set, with Islamic law included. And that law necessarily includes the submission of women to men.

It is very important to understand that Islam is not exactly a personal choice faith, in the sense that you would consider tolerance between different churches of Protestantism on the American territory. Islam doesn't do tolerance, in the sense that we understand it. In Islam you cannot leave, it is death penalty if you chose another religion.

It is not either to be considered with a benevolent multicultural mind, like you would tolerate the differences of Buddhist immigrants. A law-abiding good-citizen attitude is recommended to Muslims only if they are a minority in a Western country. If they become a majority, then they must take power, and impose Islamic law. This entails dividing the population into three categories ; Muslims who have full dignity, Christians and Jews who are sub-citizens subjected to occasional abuse, non believers or heathens who have no rights. This also necessarily includes a loss of civic rights for all women.

During the twentieth century there were positive signs from the Muslim world. They were due to :

• local customs atoning Islamic law
• The modernist mentalities of post-colonization Nation-States

However this is disappearing now, due to :

• New globalized generations who conceive Islam not as local custom but

as globally opposed to the Western world

• The systematic destruction of the modern Muslim Nation-States by NATO

Only in the mainstream media you hear that Bin Laden was captured because it suddenly became possible, and Lybian democratic forces suddenly rebelled against dictator Khadafi. In fact Bin Laden's capture was a public relations operation, which helped conceal the fact that Nato has been promoting Al-Qaida to fight in Lybia. This in turn helps establishing business interests in NATO-controlled Muslim countries, with Western capital controlling the big business, the local population subjected to religious obscurantism and not participating to the democratic defense of their rights, and in between a zealots mafia..

In Islam women do have rights, yes, like your teenage daughter has rights. Not like an adult professional woman has rights and can call her lawyer. In Islam if you have no husband and no father, then you are subjected to the authority of your younger brother, who can decide of your life for you, and occasionally beat you up if you don't obey. In Islam you cannot divorce if you wish, only if the Muslim judge thinks that your husband did something wrong according to Islamic law. In Islam you cannot be raped by your husband, he is your husband it's the word of God that he can do what he wants with you. In Islam if you complain that you were raped by strangers, you have to prove first that you were not sexually provocative. In Islam if you are found with a person of the same sex, the community can stone you to death as they wish.

The reason why I write all that is that I have talked with feminists from Muslim countries, so I try to convey their message.

The first thing is that they really would like to get rid of Islam. Not being mildly respected as a member of the Muslim community, but really get rid of Islam, and being actively protected from it. They want to have a life, they cannot even subscribe an insurance policy, buy a car, go visit friends without the agreement of male relatives.

Then there is the sociological problem, that Islam doesn't tolerate a sexually neutral civic life. It might not be obvious in North America because you are so used to it, but in order to have a professional life women need to work in an environment where there are male colleagues and clients, and therefore need laws against sexual harassment, for the simple common sense reason that when you work you work, you don't date. Islam doesn't do that, in Islam a woman is either owned by the males of her family or her husband, and if she she walks free from male authority then she is sexually available. The male in turn is considered as immediately sexually eager and willing to rape as soon as he sees a female in the absence of a relative from her family.

In that sense a male teacher alone with a girl is not decent, because it is considered that the teacher will attempt to seduce her anytime, and the girl will compulsorily feel a burning desire as well. I know, I help the 10 years daughter of my Muslim neighbors every week with her schoolwork, because the parents cannot read the language. And yet I cannot be left alone with her, the father or the brother have to be present in the same room.

Walking in public spaces is tolerated if the girls are in groups only, so there cannot be a moment alone with a man. For example a female client talking to a male shopkeeper about a shop's product is a moment of burning raging obscenity. Islam doesn't do free neutral space for allowing women to develop civic activities. Let alone professional activities.

"Tolerant" Islam is gradually decreasing, and it is more and more the radicals we will have to deal with. In dealing with women's rights we will have to surrender to or to break Islam. Because once more, Islam is not only a faith, it's a law, alw as in You Don't Choose.

Last, let me quote you a short "dialogue" I recently witnessed on Facebook. There was a girl from Algeria saying "Wow the weather is still much too hot in this month of September. Then a male Algerian replied "You don"t chose the weather, God choses the weather". That is the kind of cultural life most educated girls in Muslim countries would like to get rid of.

Arnaud

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Arnaud, I think you should not underestimate the impact of poverty as compared to religion. Before the Western world became the 1st World, the typical Christian was just as intolerant, bigoted, and patriarchal as your most extreme Muslim. Once Westerners went from being peasants to middle-class professionals, business became more important than religion, and the enemies of capitalism (communists) became the bogeyman rather than other religions. This pulled the rug out from Christianity, which used to have a monopoly on bogeymen. So Christianity had to go for the soft-sell and reinvent itself as a feel-good spiritual social club rather than fire and brimstone. All the sudden women could wear pants and run for office (and become priests). Of course the Christian Bible still says that women are subservient to their husbands (as Michelle Bachmann recently reminded us). It also endorses slavery, says that adulterers must be put to death, and requires men to grow beards. But who cares? If you live a comfortable life, religious dogma doesn't have much appeal.

Sociological studies have shown a strong correlation between patriarchal attitudes and lack of economic development. Look at the difference between Pakistan and Indonesia. Both are majority Muslim countries which officially endorse Sharia law. In Pakistan, religious fundamentalism is strong and women have little access to education, employment, or power. In Indonesia, there is far less religious fundamentalism and women have far more access to education, employment, and power (though still pitiful by Western standards). Women can even serve as Sharia judges in Indonesia, which would be heresy in Pakistan. If you compare the GDP per capita between the 2 counties, Indonesia's is over twice that of Pakistan. The effect is even more pronounced if you compare rural areas to urban areas rather than country to country.

Ryan Kaldari

On 9/23/11 1:56 AM, Arnaud HERVE wrote:

Ok I will be a bit long here.

On 23/09/2011 01:07, Emily Monroe wrote:

...

Personally, I really don't understand why people get upset about Islamic women /choosing/ to wear hijabs, or niqabs, under the pretense of feminism. Part of what feminism fights for is the right to choose. This is the unintended consequence.

I get the practical arguments (ie, "I don't know who this person is" etc.) is, though, and I think any girl or women who has their wardrobe dictated by another person is being abused, unless there's a non-abusive reason behind it; I doubt that anyone wearing a work or school uniform would qualify as being abused.

That is probably because you still consider the niqab as a piece of garment only. But the niqab doesn't come alone, it comes in a set, with Islamic law included. And that law necessarily includes the submission of women to men.

It is very important to understand that Islam is not exactly a personal choice faith, in the sense that you would consider tolerance between different churches of Protestantism on the American territory. Islam doesn't do tolerance, in the sense that we understand it. In Islam you cannot leave, it is death penalty if you chose another religion.

It is not either to be considered with a benevolent multicultural mind, like you would tolerate the differences of Buddhist immigrants. A law-abiding good-citizen attitude is recommended to Muslims only if they are a minority in a Western country. If they become a majority, then they must take power, and impose Islamic law. This entails dividing the population into three categories ; Muslims who have full dignity, Christians and Jews who are sub-citizens subjected to occasional abuse, non believers or heathens who have no rights. This also necessarily includes a loss of civic rights for all women.

During the twentieth century there were positive signs from the Muslim world. They were due to :

• local customs atoning Islamic law
• The modernist mentalities of post-colonization Nation-States

However this is disappearing now, due to :

• New globalized generations who conceive Islam not as local custom

but as globally opposed to the Western world

• The systematic destruction of the modern Muslim Nation-States by NATO

Only in the mainstream media you hear that Bin Laden was captured because it suddenly became possible, and Lybian democratic forces suddenly rebelled against dictator Khadafi. In fact Bin Laden's capture was a public relations operation, which helped conceal the fact that Nato has been promoting Al-Qaida to fight in Lybia. This in turn helps establishing business interests in NATO-controlled Muslim countries, with Western capital controlling the big business, the local population subjected to religious obscurantism and not participating to the democratic defense of their rights, and in between a zealots mafia..

In Islam women do have rights, yes, like your teenage daughter has rights. Not like an adult professional woman has rights and can call her lawyer. In Islam if you have no husband and no father, then you are subjected to the authority of your younger brother, who can decide of your life for you, and occasionally beat you up if you don't obey. In Islam you cannot divorce if you wish, only if the Muslim judge thinks that your husband did something wrong according to Islamic law. In Islam you cannot be raped by your husband, he is your husband it's the word of God that he can do what he wants with you. In Islam if you complain that you were raped by strangers, you have to prove first that you were not sexually provocative. In Islam if you are found with a person of the same sex, the community can stone you to death as they wish.

The reason why I write all that is that I have talked with feminists from Muslim countries, so I try to convey their message.

The first thing is that they really would like to get rid of Islam. Not being mildly respected as a member of the Muslim community, but really get rid of Islam, and being actively protected from it. They want to have a life, they cannot even subscribe an insurance policy, buy a car, go visit friends without the agreement of male relatives.

Then there is the sociological problem, that Islam doesn't tolerate a sexually neutral civic life. It might not be obvious in North America because you are so used to it, but in order to have a professional life women need to work in an environment where there are male colleagues and clients, and therefore need laws against sexual harassment, for the simple common sense reason that when you work you work, you don't date. Islam doesn't do that, in Islam a woman is either owned by the males of her family or her husband, and if she she walks free from male authority then she is sexually available. The male in turn is considered as immediately sexually eager and willing to rape as soon as he sees a female in the absence of a relative from her family.

In that sense a male teacher alone with a girl is not decent, because it is considered that the teacher will attempt to seduce her anytime, and the girl will compulsorily feel a burning desire as well. I know, I help the 10 years daughter of my Muslim neighbors every week with her schoolwork, because the parents cannot read the language. And yet I cannot be left alone with her, the father or the brother have to be present in the same room.

Walking in public spaces is tolerated if the girls are in groups only, so there cannot be a moment alone with a man. For example a female client talking to a male shopkeeper about a shop's product is a moment of burning raging obscenity. Islam doesn't do free neutral space for allowing women to develop civic activities. Let alone professional activities.

"Tolerant" Islam is gradually decreasing, and it is more and more the radicals we will have to deal with. In dealing with women's rights we will have to surrender to or to break Islam. Because once more, Islam is not only a faith, it's a law, alw as in You Don't Choose.

Last, let me quote you a short "dialogue" I recently witnessed on Facebook. There was a girl from Algeria saying "Wow the weather is still much too hot in this month of September. Then a male Algerian replied "You don"t chose the weather, God choses the weather". That is the kind of cultural life most educated girls in Muslim countries would like to get rid of.

Arnaud

---

Gendergap mailing list [email protected] https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/gendergap

Actually that's the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible which is accepted more or less by most of Christianity. Though obviously evangelicals take all of it more seriously, even some of the parts Jesus (allegedly) rejected.

On 9/23/2011 7:23 PM, Michael J. Lowrey wrote:

On Fri, Sep 23, 2011 at 4:52 PM, Ryan Kaldari[email protected] wrote:

...

Of course the Christian Bible still says that women are subservient to their husbands (as Michelle Bachmann recently reminded us). It also endorses slavery, says that adulterers must be put to death, and requires men to grow beards.

Gee, thanks for telling me what my religion teaches and believes - NOT!

Try studying the variety of Christian teachings outside the televangelists sometime.

On Fri, Sep 23, 2011 at 8:38 PM, Emily Monroe [email protected] wrote:

Michael Lowry, what you just said was said was sarcastic and potentially uncivil.

So Ryan and Carol can lie about MY religion, and I'M the one accused of incivility?

On Fri, Sep 23, 2011 at 9:19 PM, Laura Hale [email protected] wrote:

Your "religion" includes  Roman Catholicism, the Church of Latter Day Saints, Christian Scientists, Watchtower Society, Russian Orthodox, Anglican, Coptic, Quakers, and Amish? Christianity, like Islam, has a lot of branches and you could say almost anything about Christianity and some sects it would be true in and others it would not.  It would be accurate to say "Jesus Christ is not divine" and "Jesus Christ is divine" and different sects hold this to be true.  It would also be true to say that Christianity is a driving force in the United States towards pushing women out of work and into the home, is opposed to women having access to birth control, and is opposed to abortion in all cases, and that women should be totally subservient to men, and that if you are moral, you don't need a doctor because Jesus will provide.  The opposite could also be said and be equally as true.   If you want to see how two opposite sides have aspects of the truth, look at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abortion/Evidence .

Okay, Ryan's statement was more sweepingly generalized than Carol's; I still consider that such sweeping "more or less" statements about other people's faiths have no place in a discussion forum such as this one; and I refuse to be even remotely apologetic for defending the religion of Martin Luther King, Ammon Hennacy, Ivan Illich, Dorothy Day and Norman Thomas.

I'm sorry we lost Arnaud over a conversation like this, the power of conversation is that people do disagree, and sometimes people don't quite like disagreement. --Sarah

I guess Arnaud is a man, although I'm still not sure. I'm not all that firm in rejecting his viewpoint about Islam, which I think has some traction in Europe. Sometimes I wonder whether tolerance of Islam in any form isn't really dumb, but then I think about Muslims I have met though Wikipedia and elsewhere on the internet and know that this is not a black and white issue, as is also not the case with most gender issues.

Fred

Just wanted to say that I didn't take any offense from Michael's comments. I was probably a bit out of line in my characterization of Christianity. I was just trying to point out that any religion, when taken literally, can be problematic. There were actually many books published during the American Civil War about how the Bible endorsed slavery. They make a convincing argument if you accept all of their Bible quotes taken out of context.

The part about women being subservient is actually quite pervasive in the bible, both old and new testament. See: 1 Peter 3:1-6 1 Timothy 2:11-14 Colossians 3:18 Ephesians 5:22-23 1 Corinthians 14:33-35 1 Corinthians 11:3-10 Isaiah 19:16 Deuteronomy 22:20-21 Genesis 3:16 Genesis 2:18 This is certainly not a novel interpretation. Indeed it seems very difficult to argue that the Bible does not consider women subservient to men.

The part about beards is Old Testament and only taken seriously by Orthodox Christians, Amish, Mennonites, etc.

The part about putting adulterers to death is also Old Testament and obviously not taken seriously by most Christians, although John Calvin did argue that the Bible justified the death penalty for adultery (as have other Christians historically).

All that said, I am not trying to imply that modern Christianity is an oppressive religion. I'm just saying that historically, it has a few skeletons in its closet and it went through some serious growing pains, as is Islam.

Ryan Kaldari

On 9/23/11 7:00 PM, Michael J. Lowrey wrote:

On Fri, Sep 23, 2011 at 8:38 PM, Emily Monroe[email protected] wrote:

...

Michael Lowry, what you just said was said was sarcastic and potentially uncivil.

So Ryan and Carol can lie about MY religion, and I'M the one accused of incivility?

on 9/27/11 5:02 PM, Netha Hussain at [email protected] wrote:

Hi everyone,

Apologies for my bad English. English is not my mother tongue.

Let us not use this mailing list to discuss religion. Let us concentrate on strategies to improve participation of women in Wikimedia projects instead.

Thank you

Netha,

Your English is fine - and your point is well made. I agree, completely.

Marc Riddell

Hmm. Perhaps, Fred, perhaps. ;-)

From, Emily

On Tue, Sep 27, 2011 at 4:28 PM, Fred Bauder [email protected] wrote:

So you think we might get more done if we have the common sense not to discuss politics and religion?

Fred

...

Hi everyone,

Apologies for my bad English. English is not my mother tongue.

Let us not use this mailing list to discuss religion. Let us concentrate on strategies to improve participation of women in Wikimedia projects instead.

Thank you

-- Netha Hussain User: Netha Hussain Student of Medicine and Surgery *nethahussain.blogspot.com swethaambari.wordpress.com*

remember that women's rights are way, way more important than the interests of Wikimedia Foundation. On Tue, Sep 27, 2011 at 12:58 AM, Ryan Kaldari [email protected]wrote:

...

Just wanted to say that I didn't take any offense from Michael's comments. I was probably a bit out of line in my characterization of Christianity. I was just trying to point out that any religion, when taken literally, can be problematic. There were actually many books published during the American Civil War about how the Bible endorsed slavery. They make a convincing argument if you accept all of their Bible quotes taken out of context.

The part about women being subservient is actually quite pervasive in the bible, both old and new testament. See: 1 Peter 3:1-6 1 Timothy 2:11-14 Colossians 3:18 Ephesians 5:22-23 1 Corinthians 14:33-35 1 Corinthians 11:3-10 Isaiah 19:16 Deuteronomy 22:20-21 Genesis 3:16 Genesis 2:18 This is certainly not a novel interpretation. Indeed it seems very difficult to argue that the Bible does not consider women subservient to men.

The part about beards is Old Testament and only taken seriously by Orthodox Christians, Amish, Mennonites, etc.

The part about putting adulterers to death is also Old Testament and obviously not taken seriously by most Christians, although John Calvin did argue that the Bible justified the death penalty for adultery (as have other Christians historically).

All that said, I am not trying to imply that modern Christianity is an oppressive religion. I'm just saying that historically, it has a few skeletons in its closet and it went through some serious growing pains, as is Islam.

Ryan Kaldari

On 9/23/11 7:00 PM, Michael J. Lowrey wrote:

...

On Fri, Sep 23, 2011 at 8:38 PM, Emily

Monroe[email protected] wrote:

...

...

Michael Lowry, what you just said was said was sarcastic and

potentially

...

...

uncivil.

So Ryan and Carol can lie about MY religion, and I'M the one accused of incivility?

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Dear Fred,

We have 'n' number of mailing lists and forums to discuss politics and religion. I am subscribing to many such mailing lists, and I take part in active discussion in them. But now that we are here in gender gap mailing list to discuss about women participation in Wikimedia projects, let us not entertain off topic discussion. Let's discuss just enough politics and religion that may concern gender gap issues on Wikimedia projects - not more.

Thank you.

In Wikilove,

Hello Carol,

just a small note: please don't start a new thread by replying to an existing message and changing the subject line and restarting a new message body. This way, threaded E-mail user-agents will display it under the replied-to-message which in this case is many months old.

Instead, compose a new message to [email protected] or whatever is the mailing list's address.

Regards,

Shlomi Fish