However, I have a somewhat provoking question. Could you prove if anyone is or isn’t a woman, if they themselves didn’t state it clearly? Or if you could, could you further prove that their female partner didn’t post on their account?
People who start questioning a rule’s enforcement are generally not painting themselves as the kind of people who would follow the rule. Just thought I’d let you know.
And generally it’s pretty obvious when men post here. See, this isn’t a court of law. There’s no “beyond a reasonable doubt” or even “preponderance of the evidence” burden here. The mods are generally really good at spotting men even in those very rare cases that the men don’t make it so obvious that a child of two would shout “DADDY!” But in the end, this isn’t a court and sometimes the mods just go by instinct.
What I’m questioning is the need to uphold it when someone’s asking a genuine question to better understand a specific subject, that may lead to everyone involved benefitting. It seems like a net loss for society to me, just to ensure an arbitrary string of words is followed to the letter. Does that fulfill any purpose other than fueling someone’s ego?
You’re being polite so I’m going to try to be similarly polite back.
It’s a question of space.
I have been part of two real-life, face-to-face social groups with exclusive membership (both were in Ottawa). One was a Chinese group, the other was a “women’s group”. The women’s group thought the way you do; thought there was nothing wrong with male allies and the genuinely curious and/or helpful to be present. The Chinese group was hardline: Chinese people only. No excuses. No “my spouse is Chinese”, no “I lived in China”, no “I really love Chinese culture”, etc.
The women’s group started out fine, but slowly, inexorably, and in the end inevitably the men, despite being a minority in the group, became the focus of it. And note: this was not maliciousness. They didn’t do this because they were trying to undermine things. It’s just the nature of things. Consider this representative conversation.
Woman A: I think that gefluggenschnitz is one of those things women will never understand. It’s a guy-only thing.
Man: Well, I can explain the appeal. It’s that splittung of the norzrenderung is an interesting intellectual challenge.
Woman B: But there’s so many other intellectual challenges. Why gefluggenschnitz in particular? Why not knitting? Or Chess?
Man: Well, men tend to prefer a bit of physicality in their challenges, so …
Woman C: But again, there’s so many things. Schneekanning, for example.
Man: Yeah, but Schneekanning needs …
… and so on and so on and so on. And in this conversation, in a women’s group, the man is now supplying 50% of the content. And, again, I have to stress, he’s not being malicious. He’s not even being unreasonably intrusive. But now a women’s group is half-filled with the voice of a single man. And that’s not what I’m looking for from a women’s group. What I’m looking for is like what I was looking for in that far stricter Chinese community: a place to just unload and relax and talk to people of my kind; people who share many of my warrants and experiences and who don’t need the basics of that shared life explained.
There’s plenty of “shoot the shit” kinds of places on Lemmy: topical or general. There’s a good feminism community on Lemmy, for example, that explicitly welcomes men and their (polite, respectful) input. But this is not that group. This is a place for women to talk to other women about things without men becoming the focus. This is like that strict Chinese group, but for women.
People who start questioning a rule’s enforcement are generally not painting themselves as the kind of people who would follow the rule. Just thought I’d let you know.
And generally it’s pretty obvious when men post here. See, this isn’t a court of law. There’s no “beyond a reasonable doubt” or even “preponderance of the evidence” burden here. The mods are generally really good at spotting men even in those very rare cases that the men don’t make it so obvious that a child of two would shout “DADDY!” But in the end, this isn’t a court and sometimes the mods just go by instinct.
You’re being polite so I’m going to try to be similarly polite back.
It’s a question of space.
I have been part of two real-life, face-to-face social groups with exclusive membership (both were in Ottawa). One was a Chinese group, the other was a “women’s group”. The women’s group thought the way you do; thought there was nothing wrong with male allies and the genuinely curious and/or helpful to be present. The Chinese group was hardline: Chinese people only. No excuses. No “my spouse is Chinese”, no “I lived in China”, no “I really love Chinese culture”, etc.
The women’s group started out fine, but slowly, inexorably, and in the end inevitably the men, despite being a minority in the group, became the focus of it. And note: this was not maliciousness. They didn’t do this because they were trying to undermine things. It’s just the nature of things. Consider this representative conversation.
Woman A: I think that gefluggenschnitz is one of those things women will never understand. It’s a guy-only thing.
Man: Well, I can explain the appeal. It’s that splittung of the norzrenderung is an interesting intellectual challenge.
Woman B: But there’s so many other intellectual challenges. Why gefluggenschnitz in particular? Why not knitting? Or Chess?
Man: Well, men tend to prefer a bit of physicality in their challenges, so …
Woman C: But again, there’s so many things. Schneekanning, for example.
Man: Yeah, but Schneekanning needs …
… and so on and so on and so on. And in this conversation, in a women’s group, the man is now supplying 50% of the content. And, again, I have to stress, he’s not being malicious. He’s not even being unreasonably intrusive. But now a women’s group is half-filled with the voice of a single man. And that’s not what I’m looking for from a women’s group. What I’m looking for is like what I was looking for in that far stricter Chinese community: a place to just unload and relax and talk to people of my kind; people who share many of my warrants and experiences and who don’t need the basics of that shared life explained.
There’s plenty of “shoot the shit” kinds of places on Lemmy: topical or general. There’s a good feminism community on Lemmy, for example, that explicitly welcomes men and their (polite, respectful) input. But this is not that group. This is a place for women to talk to other women about things without men becoming the focus. This is like that strict Chinese group, but for women.