Is this group's explicit aim to exclude men?

I'm curious what members of this group think of the idea that it is desirable to keep men out/discourage them from joining.

Note that the group is currently set up so that you must join in order to post, meaning that "Girlybooks" appears in the group list on profiles.

I think we are all aware your average dude may not care to have such a handle on his profile, but then, neither do all women. I used to join-post-leave repeatedly until I got tired of it.

I won't go out of my way to defend the average dude's squeamishness about all things "girly", I fully understand how problematic such attitudes are.

But what bothers me is that the average dude with the problematic attitudes may be right in this case, that this IS about keeping him out.

So, a poll. Feel free to comment your vote or not. Thank you.

I guess my feeling is that if a male LT member is squeamish about having the Girlybooks name as one of however many groups he may be in, then he's likely a little insecure about his masculinity. Personally I don't care if he is or isn't insecure, but I don't think the group has any obligation to defer to his insecurity issues if it's a group name they like otherwise.

The heading on the group says that male readers are welcome. I guess they could say something if they feel uncomfortable.

>2 amysisson:

The problem is that it's not just the question of the male member's squeamishness, if most posters here--all the active ones seem to be women--see it explicitly as a tool of discrimination. Then it is MEANT to signal "men not welcome". Combined with the requirement to join to post, it's a test of some kind. Or a hazing ritual--except it keeps going on.

Picturing the reverse situation--men doing this to women--I'm just not comfortable with such an attitude, if it truly prevails. (I know--my problem. I can deal.)

>3 krazy4katz:

They can't say anything unless they join. Incidentally, have you noticed men posting in here? I can't remember.

Well, I certainly have no objection to men joining. In fact I would welcome them. Perhaps they have an entirely different perspective. The idea of the group is to promote reading female authors, not talking just to females.

Maybe there are male members but we can't tell from the names?

I suppose we could set up a poll in a general group to ask if men feel intimidated coming here. That's the only way I can think of that would be able to settle this.

ETA: I assume SimonW11 is male from the profile but one never knows I guess. I saw "he" posted on an earlier thread. So I think there are males here.

I know that Arctic-Stranger is a member here. I invited him in the way way back when we did monthly (quarterly?) reads for any input he had on the women/theology thread.

New name.
New rules.
New administrator.

Sounds like what is really needed is a totally new group.

>5 krazy4katz: The idea of the group is to promote reading female authors, not talking just to females.
That is what I assumed too. I think it would be a pity if men who enjoy and want to discuss books by women are excluded from doing so. I think it's a good thing to get men to take women's lit seriously! I have to say I've never noticed anything in the content or tone of the conversations here that seemed anti-male in any way (anti- some specific books by men, but anyone can write a yucky book whatever their gender and we call out those by women too) or that suggested men are not welcome. So this is the first I've been aware that the group was consciously intended for women only.

I hesitated a bit before joining the group because of the name, but as it came up on my list of recommended groups based on my library, I realised quickly that it was not, in fact, a group solely to discuss chicklit, but all kinds of writing by women.

I never thought that this group was for women readers only.

>8 wookiebender:

Neither did I.

Lola, I think you are overthinking this.

Like Sakerfalcon, I think the group name suggests chicklit rather than all literature written by females. But it's catchy and really not that big a deal.

As I said on the other thread, I think we should be encouraging men to read more books by women! Thus, I think they should be here.

The original intent of the group was to welcome men. It says so on the group description. Anyone joining knows men can come here to talk about books by women.

Like the name and other proposed changes, this smacks of alienating members who joined under the original rules and tone of the group to suit a certain faction.

>12 nohrt4me2:

Eh, no, sorry, you don't call a group "Girlybooks" and force joining in order to post, with the intention to "welcome men".

I wouldn't trip over myself to join "Guybooks" under the same circumstances--join to post, discussions 100% male-dominated--would you? It wouldn't occur to me that I was welcome at all, and a parenthetical note such as the one in the description would strike me as passive-aggressive double talk and bad faith.

Granted, it's subjective. So--where are the male posters?

>11 rebeccanyc:

Exactly what I'm thinking. You'd think if anyone ought to be encouraged to read and discuss books by women, it would be men.

>10 WildMaggie:

I don't think I'm overthinking anything--I'm just asking about how current posters feel about men joining the discussion because I became aware only yesterday that some might actually prefer to make it as unfriendly to men as possible. That this evident absence of male posters is what makes the group attractive to them.

I'm glad to see the poll isn't bearing out that as a desideratum and agenda.

So the question remains--whether no one here actually wants the group and the discussions to be 100% female or not, is the combined effect of the name and joining request keeping male posters away?

So it appears that nobody here specifically wants to exclude or discourage men. That's good.

But I think there's a pretty big gap in opinions over the name of the group. Not changing the name does not equal "we want to discourage men from joining." Personally I think there's a world of difference between 1) discouraging men from joining, and 2) bending over backwards to change the name of the group so that potential male members don't have their sensibilities injured by a girly name.

In my opinion, changing the name in case it might scare away a few men is exactly the kind of catering to men that women have been doing, and/or have been forced to do, for all of history.

>14 amysisson:

To be clear, personally I'd like to see the name change first of all because I dislike it (it is infantile and misleading), second because of the people I know who don't bother with the group because of it, and third because I don't think it is fair to create deliberate obstacles to men joining the discussions. I don't see this as "catering to men" at all and I can only regret anyone would.

>15 LolaWalser:

Your third reason assumes the name was chosen as a deliberate obstacle to men joining the discussions. Haven't these two discussion threads just shown that that was NOT the reason the name was chosen?

But I do concede that your first two reasons seem valid to me. I don't agree with the first (that the name is infantile and misleading) but I have to admit that there is evidence for the second (that some people have avoided the group because of it). I just don't think that potential benefits of changing the name outweigh the negatives.

Hello, ladies! Since this is a discussion about whether men should feel excluded from the group, I thought it made sense that a man should comment on it, naturally.

Personally, outside of this group, I don't necessarily feel discriminated against just because a group of women want to get together and not allow men to join. I totally understand why things like Guys Night Out and Girls Night Out are popular, and am totally okay with that sort of thing.

As for this group specifically, I don't feel discrimianted against and I don't think the aim of the group is to exclude men. However, the title is naturally discouraging for men, and I don't think it's fair to blame men or their 'machismo' for not wanting to joining.

If you'll forgive me for the stereotype, imagine if a male construction worker had an LT account. While there are plenty of female construction workers, it is indeed a male-dominated industry (for now.) If he were to create a group and named it the "Manly Construction Workers" group, you can imagine how female construction workers would feel. I imagine they would not be interested in joining, because they wouldn't want "Manly Construction Workers" on their profile.

In the same way, a group named "Girlybooks" is certainly discouraging. While I don't think that is the intent of the group, nor do I think it is wrong to intend that even if it was, it is the unintended consequence.

Personally, I think the group is fine, and if everyone is happy here then there is no reason to change anything.

As an aside, I read the "Vote for group name change" thread and was quite offended by an incredibly sexist post there. Though I don't take that as a representation of the group as a whole.

>16 amysisson:

Haven't these two discussion threads just shown that that was NOT the reason the name was chosen?

Er, no, the name was chosen by one person who's not now present. I don't mean to be pedantic--I think the situation would be different if she were here.

The most that can be said is that those who answered the poll say they do not want to exclude men. That's great. If we can assume it's representative of the whole group, even better. So now that that is clear, the question about the combined effect of the name, joining request and posting practice (I mean it being all women for ages) remains: are men being excluded because of that even though most posters do not deliberately mean to exclude them?

>17 Ape:

Thanks for chiming in.

I'm always happy to force my opinion on others. :P

I'm a man who likes "girlybooks" and has no problem admitting it. Make of that what you will. :)

>11 rebeccanyc: To me, this has been a place to talk about books written by women. Everyone, men included, should be able to do that.

Creating a group to discuss books by women and encouraging men to read books by women are two different objectives.

The latter requires outreach, which doesn't seem like a priority here.

>22 southernbooklady:

It's not a priority, why can't it be simple decency? I can't wrap my mind around expressly wanting to make male participation difficult--I mean, name aside, and this poll too (btw, I realised belatedly I worded this poll really badly--tricky things!), it seems that there IS a preference for keeping men out.

>21 Leseratte2:

That's great, hello.

I don't like men as a rule, but I don't think it's fair to exclude them, either.

What if somebody wanted to have an all-white-male book club. Oh, wait, there is; it used to be called "college" with special classes in "women's lit" so nobody was forced to read these books unless they wanted to. Cringe.

Anyhow, I don't know how you'd police this. Maybe LibraryThing collects gender info (I forget, because it's been so long ago that I joined), but would it even be constitutional for the site to block people from a group on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, or sexual preference?

>24 nohrt4me2:

I think what we are discussing is much subtler than that.

>25 LolaWalser: Men: They're not like me, and they've been running things too long, frequently with guns and dicks. If it's more subtle than that, please send me a private e-mail.

My main question is whether LT would even let a group exclude people based on gender. If not, this whole thread is moot, no?

>23 LolaWalser: it seems that there IS a preference for keeping men out.

I haven't really felt that, don't have any desire to keep men out, personally. I certainly don't feel about this group the way I felt about taking, for example, Mary Daly's women-only feminism courses--where the intent was to create a space free of the male voice.

But I think some are going to feel deliberately excluded no matter what you do--some people feel rejected when they are not explicitly invited or accepted. If the word "girly" is enough to put them off, then I question their sense of intellectual adventure. But as I said, I'm neutral. What's valuable to me is the ongoing discussion of books written by women, not what we call the group. If it was called the BWW group, I'd still be here. If it was called Literary Bitches, I'd still be here.

I'm more attached to the Join to post concept, because I have it in my head that is an explicit request to all members to abide by the goal of the group, the parameters they are trying to set. I will natter on in my bitchy atheistic way on the Pro/Con, Religion, and Christianity fora because I have opinions about the topics they're discussing. But I leave the Catholic Tradition forum alone -- even though they will on occasion talk themselves into some truly dreadful (to my mind) stances -- because it is join to post and I just don't bring a Catholic sensibility to the table. Just the opposite.

So join to post says to me isn't a deterrent so much as statement that you're committed to follow the purpose of the group.

That might be reading too much into it, I suppose.

27> Agree completely with your analysis of the join-to-post rule.

>26 nohrt4me2:

I meant that the ways of exclusion here are more subtle than a banner saying "Men/Women/PoC/Jews etc. not allowed". It doesn't make them less real.

>27 southernbooklady:

Yes, I suppose I see "join to post" somewhat differently than you, but not all that much. But in this case, it's the combination of the name and the request that makes it, I think, a more difficult case than, say, "Catholic tradition". The latter is a neutral name, as is "Christianity".

If I felt like discussing religion with the religious, I'd have no problem joining these groups (although, like you, I know I don't "fit").

Speaking of sensibility, though, that exactly part of my problem (nothing to do with men)--"girly", as I mentioned already in several places, isn't "me" and it isn't how I see books by women I read, books and authors. I feel it is debasing to imply by however flitting an association that I think Woolf or Beauvoir or Simone Weil are "girly". It's just wrong, and it is misleading.

I get that some might feel this is the way to redeem "girly", but I don't think it needs or warrants that. Why shouldn't a word pertaining to an immature stage of female development mean just that? (I don't want to defend "slut" either. That one I'd just like to see stop being used in regard to women, period.)

Wow. This conversation isn't going anywhere, and I personally will not take part in it anymore. It's too bad a productive conversation degenerated to this. Regardless, I'll probably be lurking about the group, but I won't take part in petty squabbling.

I still don't think the group's explicit aim is to exclude men, however, so my vote stands at no.

Amen to that, >30 Ape:

>30 Ape: >31 krazy4katz: I've said all I have to say on this subject too.

The heading for this group read as follows:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Girlybooks
For people who make an effort to read books by and/or about women. Whether it's sci-fi, social sciences or literature, we support female writers and positive representations of women.

(yes, male readers are welcome!)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That is exactly what this group is. Do I want to discourage men from posting here? I do only if they are not supportive of female writers and positive representations of women as it says in the description.

Do I want to discourage misogynists from posting here? YES. I do not want to debate with anyone about feminism, or about whether a female author's point of view is valid. Or whether "reverse sexism" exists. You can do that in other groups all over Library Thing.

Nowhere does it say that the purpose of this group is to promote books written by women. The purpose of this group is not to try to get men to read and/or discuss books written by women. Someone certainly could start a group on LibraryThing that had those purposes. But that is not the stated purpose of THIS group, that I happen to love just as it is.

>33 vwinsloe: I agree. It's a fun and lively group that I like as it is.

>33 vwinsloe:

I didn't notice anyone saying it should be the purpose of the group to get men to read books by women. Rather, the question is why would anyone want to positively discourage male participation--which is what is happening, whether anyone wants it or not.

That said, I'll remind all again that this wasn't the original focus of the argument for changing the name (not mine, anyway).

But after some of the attitudes that surfaced, I admit it now seems to me as the bigger problem (again--I know--it's my problem I feel that way).

wow, i don't log into lt for a few days and i miss a lot.

i've always thought this group was just for people reading and posting about books by women. i never really thought about the gender of the posters at all, although if i had thought about it i would have realized that most of the genders i knew were female, and if i'm honest that knowledge would have made me comfortable in the group. (not to be in a group that is exclusionary, because i don't think this group is, but to be in a group dominated by female voices.)

i came to this group because i thought it is what it is - the name never made me think it was "chicklit" or romance books. i thought it was exactly what it is and haven't been offended by the name although i'd be fine if we changed it. (i don't care what we're called as long as we talk about books by women.)

in the same way i would have no second thoughts about joining a group called "guybooks" if i read and wanted to talk about books by people like lee child, nelson demille, david baldacci. actually, i would probably look at the description of the group to see if it was for authors like that or just male authors because i wouldn't want to assume it was the more macho-type books and if it was the latter i would join right now. it wouldn't occur to me that it was for men, not about male authored books.

>35 LolaWalser:. Actually, although you may not have noticed it, >5 krazy4katz:, >7 Sakerfalcon:,>11 rebeccanyc: all stated that they thought the purpose of this group was to promote women's books and to encourage men to read them.

I'm afraid that it was my comment or "attitude" as you put it, that you considered a "problem." It was entirely speculation on my part that the name of this group may be responsible for the fact that the group has been virtually free of sexist trolling and hate speech.

That being said, I have not been a member of this group for that long, probably a couple of years at best. I did not invent the name and I do not know the person who started the group or what that person's intent was. I have no right, and did not have any intent, to speak for the person who started the group or for anyone else. My support for keeping the name and the membership requirement arises out of my desire to keep this group the way that it is, with the purpose that is explicitly stated on the group page.

I don't know about you, but I am online a lot. Any story, news item, or group online that concerns women's issues and allows comments is full of ugly misogyny by anonymous posters (who unfortunately sometimes may be women.) At best they are dominated by people speaking from a position of privilege attempting to drown out or invalidate feminist views. When I found this group and started posting here, I was very pleasantly surprised that that sort of thing does not happen here. Regardless of our varying viewpoints and opinion, there is civility here, which is rare in today's society.

I don't know why this group is an exception to the rule. Maybe it is the name, maybe it is something else. But I find it to be so rare that I do not want any changes if it means placing the civil atmosphere of the group at risk.

>37 vwinsloe:

No, I read all those posts and I don't interpret them the way you do at all. But I don't want to discuss other people's posts in their absence.

No one has to defend their preferences. The original preferences from which the current situation arose were set by someone who is not now involved, so it stands to reason to check what the people who ARE involved think about them.

So, we had two polls, and although only a small minority of the total members responded, the discussions around them point that they reflect majority attitudes, which is not to change anything.

Got it.

I am a guy. I don't post here very much, but I have no problem with the name on my group list. Anyone who has a problem with that (i.e. "Ohhhhhh, he is in a girly group!") needs to get a life!

On the name: I think I had a "book by it's cover" reaction to the name Girlybooks when I first ran across this group and didn't set it to watch or join. Because I mostly read talk by "groups and posts" I didn't see any of the group's threads. Now that I've looked again and see that the group is moderately active and has generally interesting comments, I've happily joined. I am not troubled by having the name on my profile page.

On join-to-post: If I am at all interested in a group I either join or set it to watching. It is possible to watch a group that is join-to-post and if I found a conversation in such a group interesting enough that wanted to post, I would have little hesitation in joining. I've not been too consistent in my use of join vs watch. But in general, I use join for groups that are more active or more interesting to me and watch for groups that are inactive or only marginally interesting. It is nice to be able to post an odd occasional comment in a groups that I am only watching, but I don't see a join to post requirement as a problem. On the other hand, I doubt there is much benefit in terms of keeping out spam and unwanted drive-by comments.

I don't care about the name nor who posts. I love this group. It makes me very sad that it has devolved into this conversation. It also makes me sigh that women are (once again) devoting energy to thinking about how we might welcome men and the notion of 'reverse sexism'. If men were interested enough in discussing these books, they'd ignore the name just as many of the women said they did.

There is no inherent exclusion of men here. As was pointed out, it says otherwise at the top of the thread for heavens sake. I think that most men will find a thread discussing books by women specifically and exclusively somewhere they don't want to be. For those that feel otherwise, the should jump into the pool as those women did.

I like a group where the majority of the voices belong to women. That has happened organically it seems to me. The fact that the outcome is considered in and of itself off-putting to men is of no concern to me. I cannot imagine this conversation happening in a grop that was dominated by male voices.

>41 nancyewhite:

I cannot imagine this conversation happening in a group that was dominated by male voices.

I can. In fact, it's one of more frequent "meta" conversations I have in real life--how to get more women into my profession, into the hierarchy etc.

I can't think of any reason why a conversation about the group's workings would be taboo. The creator of the group is absent (has been absent for basically the entire time, her presence would obviously change the situation significantly), so why would it be unthinkable to even ask what the opinions may be on the set-up?

It began simply enough--a few days ago someone said something about the name (I don't recall immediately in which thread, but I can find it), I replied that it could be changed if we asked the staff to do it (or if they transferred admin to someone in the group), the other person said "oh, really?", I said, "sure--let's poll opinion about the option".

And, like I said in the poll threads, the result, the majority trends are not to change anything.

Questions were posed and answered. Some vapours could have been spared; nobody died; anyone who knows how to ignore threads (and/or posters) can go on having whatever conversation they prefer having wherever they prefer it.

Yes, I agree, it can be annoying to have conversation on "meta" be more active than the one "on topic". But you know what's the best remedy? Posting on topic and ignoring meta.

I'm a straight male who enjoys the romance genre. The happy ending to me is less important than the story line and details to get there.