Hamm On Wry

“When was the last time you saw your boyfriend?”

“In person?”

“No, through the scope of your rifle.”

There has been a lot written lately about gender as it pertains to professional conferences on web technologies. First off was Jason Kottke presenting the question. Then I caught Eric Meyer, the Patron Saint of CSS, who responded with a resounding “meh” followed by John Gruber’s gender-fireball post, and a comment of clarification by Zeldman in the linked list. Truly Eric received the torment he knew he was setting himself up for. Ouchie. And so totally not deserved. I suggest reading those articles and comments, and then coming back here. I’ll wait.

Back? Good. I love discussing gender, because as a gay man in 2007, it’s certainly a topic that provides countless hours of amusement. And frustration. And a couple of attempts to rewrite the U.S. Constitution. It’s also a subject that, when taken out of context, is beyond frustrating, it’s insulting. And that’s where I think this discussion has gone.

If you look at what Kottke presented, yes, there is a dearth of women speakers at web conferences, and most especially those that focus on HTML and CSS. Kottke is particularly off when he says:

…it seems to me that either the above concerns are not getting through to conference organizers or that gender diversity doesn’t matter as much to conference organizers as they publicly say it does.

Gruber goes off into the realm of Title IX, which has, truthfully, done a world or three of good for women in all things. However, he misses the point of Kottke’s piece, which is that things are inequal in a professional setting. Title IX doesn’t really apply there, so going off into the studies of who got educated where and for what is off-topic. Interesting, and well worth reading, but off-topic none-the-less. And don’t think I’m against Title IX, nothing could be further from the truth. We are all improved when everyone receives an equal chance, which is what Title IX was designed to do. And amazingly, considering it’s legislation, it seems to do relatively well.

Notice that I said “everyone receives an equal chance” and not “everyone receives everything equally.” and for good reason. Title IX doesn’t mean that there will be a women’s football team at your local high school, but it does say that for every men’s sport there shall be an equally funded women’s sport. Don’t care what they play, but they get the game. That’s equality at it’s finest. Which is what Gruber was leading up to.

However, it’s not what Kottke was on about at all. Kottke is about specific equality for professional roles. Can’t, and won’t, happen. Not because it’s a bad idea, but because after giving everyone equal chances, what those people do with those chances will be quite unique to each individual, and therefore, we are unable to predict their results in such a way that we could ever guarantee that there is a 50/50 split along the sex lines.

Meyer doesn’t mind this situation, not because he doesn’t want women around or thinks they are inferior, but because he, quite rightly, sees that while there are fewer women there, overall the web is very well represented by both sexes. And, in this case, gender means less than nothing.

While I, having been discriminated against because of an external trait (e.g. who I have sex with) and have had professional roles given to others because of it, I still agree with Meyer. Kottke thinks that having a vagina attached to some of the speakers would improve the quality of the presentation. That’s thinking that a woman who happens to be a mom can only socialize with other moms if all are either a) not drinking, or b) if they want to drink, they must be chaperoned by someone with a penis.

I don’t see how being male, female, white, black, brown, purple, queer, asexual, cancerous, capricorn or a carrot would matter if you happen to also be a professional in the web-standards-meets-development world. I would, honestly, attend a speech given by a carrot if that carrot was recognized as a leader in the field. That’s what professional speeches are all about.

I have a huge problem with people getting so bent sideways in the effort to be politically correct that they lower the quality of the product. I know it’s rough, and I can’t say that I understand why people are racist, sexist, homophobic or just flat out fucked-up, but I do know that for a conference where people are going to learn about a specific topic, finding the best people, regardless of gender is more important than counting the number of XX’s versus the number of XYs sharing their knowledge.

I want more brilliant people, I don’t care who you are or how you fuck. I don’t even care if you do. I want you for your mind, and guess what, Kottke is wrong to reduce the talent and knowledge of the people involved with these events to their gender. Alas, I’m a bit chubby and have a decent set of tits if he truly thinks that physical traits make a shits difference.

[UPDATE] I see that Zeldman has joined the fray with more on his blog, but I disagree that it’s a fundamental part of the conference planner’s concerns. He thinks it’s important to include women, I think it’s more important to not exclude women, and those, truly, are completely different tasks. Oh, and I still think I’m right.

Ok, so Steve Jobs, the guy who invented the friggin’ iPod (have you heard of it?), took a stand at the School Reform Conference and said that teacher’s unions are the big problem. Nothing crazy there, really, but truly, the morons are coming out of the woodwork to say that Jobs isn’t connected with reality on this.

As evidence, the first asshat of the day, Leander Kahney, of Wired News complains about the fact that Jobs, who sends his kids to private schools, doesn’t know what he’s talking about, and posits that Jobs must want us to send education to the “non-union Chinese factories that build his iPods” because, well, there was that sweat-shop scandal a while back. And then, immediately next in his article, he has this gem:

The issues are many and complex, and yes, there is a problem with firing incompetent or indifferent teachers, but it is not the number one reason schools are failing. It’s not even in the top 10.

In California, the most pressing problems are schools that are the too big, too bureaucratic and chronically under funded. Teachers are criminally low paid and under trained. Education — and school funding — has become solely about test scores.

Look at Number 2 in that list. Well, gee, Mr. Kahney, do you think, perhaps, that since the bureaucrats are also part of that same organization called the NEA, also known as a Teacher’s Union, that you might be an asshat? I certainly think so.

As an aside, I’ve been working with some high school drama classes lately, teaching them about how theater is different than film, and showing all the various things they have to take into account when telling a story via motion picture. I was stunned to find out that my drama teacher, who I’m working with, has been told that she can’t fail kids, and must consider them “the customer”. She was told this by the principal, who was informed of this broad change by the superintendant. But they don’t mean “the customer, who is shopping for the best value” which would have been fine. They meant “the customer, who is always right” which, when you’re trying to teach, is an impossible situation to deal with. Of all the ways they could emulate a corporation, they chose the pedantic, unrealistic and completely dysfunctional one. Great.

Forgiving the oddness of presenting a recipe linked to rock-n-rolls one and only king, let’s just eat and be merry, ok?

Take two slices of wonder bread, the kind the king’s mama used when he was growing up, and apply a generous slathering of creamy peanut butter to one side of one slice. A full banana should then be peeled, taking care to remove the strings and any seedlings from the ends. The naked ‘nanner should then be sliced into quarter-inch coins that can then be shingled over the creamy peanut butter on the slice of wonder bread, giving the look of a squished white-trash house found in the hood several streets away from any gingerbread mansion. However, looks are deceiving, and now’s the real coup de grace: grilling!

With the other slice of magnificent wonder bread covering up the shingled bananas-on-creamy-peanut-butter-on-white-wonderbread, the sandwich is born, but not yet ready to be considered done. In fact, it’s merely a ghost of itself, needing to be cooked in the most southern of ways to make it a real Elvis Special.

Hopefully you have some butter standing about that’s easy to spread on bread. We’re talking room temperature butter. Preferably butter that has not been near a cat. Or a dog. Or e.coli.

Take a butter knife, which, like a salad fork, has some sort of super power requiring that it, and only it, be used for the foodstuff it is named, and slather the top of the sandwhich until the white wonderbread takes on the color of butter, much the same way that snow takes on the same color, but in a much less appetizing way. Moving on.

A griddle is preferred for this part of the recipe. If, by some unfortunate twist of fate, you lack a griddle, you shall be shunned from Graceland forever. Looked upon with disdain. Found lacking in all things good. Or you can use a frying pan. No biggie.

Fire that baby up and drop the buttery side of the sandwich onto the heat. If you missed and your sandwich lands on the floor, may I recommend that one: you get a small dog, like a terrier, who will clean up the mess on the floor in a selfless and loving way, and two; cook with your eyes open. You might also try cooking with your eyes open.

Once on the griddle (for the chefs out there) or in the frying pan (for the stoners) grab that butter knife again and repeat the covering of the former-bottom-turned-top (insert gay joke here) as if you had never buttered before. Better yet, do it like you have a clue, and do it quickly. You’ve got to flip the sandwich before it burns, then get it on a plate and eat it. Now sing with me (to the tune of Blue Suede Shoes)

It’sa one with the peel,

and we’ll have an Elvis-loved sandwich instead!