[Back In The Saddle]

Originally Posted by rainmaker

BITS' comments ended here. I know very well that BITS isn't "part of the problem". And I don't think that Rita was offended by BITS' comment.

HEY, back off! You're messing up my 15 minutes of fame.

For the record, I am quite the misogynist. In fact, my wife thinks I give fantastic misogges. It's part of why I'm not cranky despite the lack of sleep and having missed breakfast. I'm just saying...

Originally Posted by rainmaker

Mark's "joke" was, as you point out, non-sensical, but I understand how it could be perceived as offensive to women. I still don't get the joke, but I get how it might be offensive.

Hmmm, this seems like a really good time for a "patient whistle." You don't understand the statement, but you "get" how you could take offense at it? Wouldn't going off in this situation be arguing from ignorance? It is true that just because you're paranoid doesn't mean "they" are not out to get you, but realizing that you are paranoid should lead you to be more careful about the conclusions you come to, lest you allow your paranoia to lead you to false conclusions.

Originally Posted by rainmaker

Rita wasn't generalizing about men. She was simply surprised that no forum people thought Mark's joke was sexist.

Mark makes a hundred off-hand, silly, out there, or otherwise off the wall comments every week. He, and his comments, are part of the furniture around here. To comment on them all, would just encourage him . Besides, let me tell you a little secret...sometimes we of the oppressive gender don't always understand them either. And we have a genetic flaw that prevents us asking for an explanation.

Originally Posted by rainmaker

She also commented on some other comments that were sort of throw-offs in this thread about women. Ya gotta admit, there is a little bit of sexism in there.

Scrappy, you are (like JR) a nice guy, but you don't see how tough it can get for the non-majority when dealing with the not-nice-folks. It's easy to get paranoid, and it's difficult to be able to pick out the good guys from the bad, sometimes. Rita just hasn't been around here long enough to know which are whom.

You've been here a very long time. Stay here long enough and you'll be exposed to sexism, stoopid monkey-ism, old school-ism, fan boy-ism, and lots of other -isms. We're referees, which means we're very self-assured and don't really give a hoot what the rest of the world thinks. And yet despite those prevalent tendencies, the amount of genuine sexism here is pretty minimal. In other words, this whole place is largely overrun with "nice guys".

Rita chose a silly place to pick a fight over this. Participation here is voluntary, nobody here controls or affects her assignments or advancement in any way. She has nothing at stake here other than a place in this community. And as far as I recall, she has always been well received. Even the "furor" over her accusations has been pretty muted, more reasoned than emotional, and mostly directed at the validity of her accusation. If we were really a bunch of knuckle-dragging, poorly disguised misogynists there would have been an immediate avalanche of ad hominem (or ad feminam?) headed her direction. But there wasn't; we're really not the enemy. So why start a shooting war over sexism here?

Originally Posted by rainmaker

And I still don't get the sophomore/woman/language thing. Perhaps you could explain it?

Why are you asking Scrappy? Like you, he can only infer Mark's meaning. It was Mark's post. Go ask him what he actually implied.