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

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

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

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

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

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

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 There are certain contexts where use of outdated patriarchal norms of the past will garner a response.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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

  • Zero percent.

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

93 comments