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YK Thoughts

Jill

Just finished the panel at Yearly Kos. It was… ok. Glenn was awesome, as expected. There are a few things I wish I would have said that I didn’t get out. Jenn Pozner from WIMN’s Voices asked about female bloggers being marginalized by the mainstream media, and I made the mistake of simply saying that the blogosphere tends to reflect traditional power structures, with men and white people and upper-middle-class people on top. I think that’s true. But what I neglected to do was point out all of the incredible, powerful female bloggers who are out there and who do have thriving readerships — and I neglected to point out that their voices are being ignored by traditional media, even while they’re thriving in the blogosphere.

So that’s the big regret, and it was pointed out to me after the panel — one person even told me that I aided in disempowering women with my answer. Ouch. So there’s that. Now it’s the feminist blogging panel. More thoughts later.

24 thoughts on YK Thoughts

  2. Congrats! You got good review, and another big name fan:
    “The only person on the panel whose work I was previously unfamiliar with, Jill, is perhaps the most impressive… So while I listen I’m going through the Feministe archives, and it’s some really good…”
    A.J. Rossmiller · 8/03/2007 03:13:00 PM ET
    http://www.americablog.com/2007/08/ykos-media-panel.html

  3. The person who accused you of helping to “disempower women” with your answer is a perfect example of the added (and unfair) pressure on women (and minorities). While the guys there are just “bloggers” you are expected to always play the role of the “woman blogger,” minorities have the roll of “minority blogger,” etc…Because you have the dual role, it’s twice as impossible to please everyone.

    For an excellent reality check, read the post on Americablog about YKos – it’s extremely complimentary about you and is why decided to check you out today. 🙂

  4. Actually, Jill, it would make a great topic for discussion later on and could be submitted to DK.

  5. I wouldn’t worry too much about it. Granted, it’s good that you’re aware of the flub, as that will enable you to do better next time you appear on a panel, but it isn’t something I would waste too much time beating yourself up over. Extemporaneous public speaking is a tricky enough thing without giving yourself jitters over errors. Mistakes are inevitable, especially early in the game. Just file it away under a “next time I encounter X, say Y” heading, and you should be fine.

  7. The person who accused you of helping to “disempower women” with your answer is a perfect example of the added (and unfair) pressure on women (and minorities).

    Seriously.

    It sounds like you did great. Congrats!

  8. Once I was invited to speak on a panel and I was sick the week before, was unprepared and as a result had really nothing to say, so believe me, it could it worse.

  9. I was there. You did great. They were really rushing things along. I kind of wished they’d directed more questions your way. It was kind of irritating that they only seemed to turn to you when it was a “women’s” question.

  10. I was there too, and I think Allie’s comment is spot on. They definitely could have distributed panel time better. I was also a little dissatisfied with the way they stacked the audience’s questions. I understand the rationale behind it, I guess, but it didn’t seem to work particularly well.

  12. Not a flub, but the truth. Someone has to tell the truth.

    Don’t worry about getting every little word correct Jill, do your best. 🙂 Love ya.

  13. I think it’s much easier to sit in the audience and try to pick apart what the speaker is saying than to be the speaker up before a crowd, trying to do your best to be extemperaneous and profound. I’ve done enough public speaking to know it’s not easy, and there’s always going to be one or more audience members who didn’t like what you said, or how you said it, etc. I wasn’t at the event in question, but if you speak half as well as you write, I’m sure you were a hit.

    Just be yourself, Jill–that’s always what’s been keeping your readers reading!

  14. Gotta say, way to go, there Jill! I am so glad you helped perpetuate the patriarchal corporate structure of the blogosphere.

    Should have said, could have said…well bottom line is you didn’t say. I guess this is the difference between experience and youth. This all may be a learning experience for you, but stop and thing of the paradox you’ve perpetuated. Here’s Jill, the “Feminist,” who in public, cannot break out of the patriarchal structure, but on her blog, says sorry women, I should have said “Y”. Then comes all her supporters, to say “that’s okay, look the patriarchy is recognizing you!”

    I’m just floored.

  15. Well, but it’s true, isn’t it? The blogosphere power structure does generally follow the white-men-on-top structure of the rest of the world? It’s called patriarchy, I think.

    How did you personally “disempower” women by telling the truth? Oh, because you didn’t say, “Look! There are lots of great blogs by women! So we’re really just as good as the menz, and I didn’t mean to point out that in reality, we’re the equivalent of Fortune 500 female CEOs!”

    Bah, I say. People who speak the truth always get in trouble. You did great.

  16. Jill, I’m at YK and I saw the panel — you did just fine! No one’s perfect and everyone I know who ever does one of those things always have things they wish they’ve said, things they would have done somewhat differently, etc. Both my husband and my sister-in-law were on YK panels yesterday and they said the same thing about themselves (they wished they’d said X or brought up Y, etc.).

    To say that you “disempowered” women is bullshit (yeah, like I’m sure you all by your little ole self have have the ability to empower or disempower women). Feminists who achieve the prominence you are beginning to achieve unfortunately tend to get a lot of shit from certain other jealous and perpetually aggrieved feminists. There may not be too many of these feminist critics around, but even one can be hurtful.

    Listen to constructive criticism when it’s offered, but don’t let the mean-spirited carping get to you. I think that you, like every other feminist blogger I’ve heard at YK this year, are an excellent spokesperson for the feminist movement, and I for one am proud to have someone like you represent me. Women tend to be self-doubting enough as it is — don’t let the sniping get you down.

  17. Well, but it’s true, isn’t it? The blogosphere power structure does generally follow the white-men-on-top structure of the rest of the world?

    Jill could have used that forum (YKos) to crack the mold of the corporate structure of the liberal blogosphere. Why else would she have participated in that particular panel, unless she was the “token” woman, realized she was the “token woman” and played the part of the “token” woman?

    Reiterating truth as if it can’t change does not further the issue of inequality, it just perpetuates inequality.

  19. Gotta say, way to go, there Jill! I am so glad you helped perpetuate the patriarchal corporate structure of the blogosphere.

    Should have said, could have said…well bottom line is you didn’t say. I guess this is the difference between experience and youth. This all may be a learning experience for you, but stop and thing of the paradox you’ve perpetuated. Here’s Jill, the “Feminist,” who in public, cannot break out of the patriarchal structure, but on her blog, says sorry women, I should have said “Y”. Then comes all her supporters, to say “that’s okay, look the patriarchy is recognizing you!”

    I’m just floored.

    I was given ten seconds to answer the question. The question about female bloggers wasn’t even directed at me — it was directed at Jay and Mike, and it was asking why the mainstream media doesn’t recognize female bloggers. I pointed out that the blogosphere is not a meritocracy. I wish I would have said more. I wish I would have emphasized the great female bloggers who are already out there and already have strong readerships. I didn’t, and that was a mistake. That’s the point of this post — to recognize that I could have done better.

    I’m not sure what you want from me at this point. Sorry I didn’t say what you would have said, bur coming on here and essentially accusing me of not being “feminist” enough is horseshit.

    Also, how did I help “perpetuate the patriarchal corporate structure of the blogosphere”? What was “corporate” about what I said? And while I think I should have said more, I still stand by me original comments. Ignoring the fact that the blogosphere does privilege white male voices isn’t going to change anything.

  20. Well heck, you’ve said nothing that hasn’t said by experienced feminists who do research on the internet as a form of social discourse, including Lynn Cherney, Susan Herring for most of the last 15 years. Often I feel that a big problem with bloggers is that they think they reinvented the wheel and have to rediscover issues that have been around since the listserv days.

    The world of blogging can’t confront problems if it pretends they don’t exist.

  21. Good lord. So it was her sole responsibility to change forever the face of the blogosphere for women, in a 10-second response?

    Give me a break. You do it! Be my guest.

  22. tinfoil, I have done it — I have personally spoken on panels in the past, and I have talked over moderators to get my point in.

    Jill, think of the liberal blogoshpere as a corporation. There are a few select bloggers at the top doing the dictating, nearly everyone has talked about it at one point or another for at least the last 4-5 years. A few women bloggers, like you have broken through the proverbial glass ceiling in this liberal blogoshere. Yet, funny thing, women bloggers make up half of all bloggers, like our populace. So, the liberal blogosphere like a corporation is a good analogy.

    And, yes, being in that position, does put more pressures on you — simply because you are viewed as being in a position to create change. No different from the women CEO’s that are viewed as being in a position to make changes to the corporate structure.

    Admitting the disparities within the structure is important — but admitting this has been going on for as long as the discussion of privilege. If YKos wasn’t/isn’t a forum to effect change, what forum is?

  23. I was the one who asked the question that Jill is talking about, and so I think I can add some relevant context to this discussion.

    First, my question was not only about women bloggers but women’s voices generally, both online and offline. It was about how corporate media — as well as the A-listers of the netroots — can avoid replicating the Old Boys Club as a New Boys Network online.

    Second, I did not address my question to Jill, and I am mad as hell that the moderator asked her to answer it. I began my question by referencing sexist coverage of women and of feminism in the corporate media and in online new media, giving strong examples of same that had been advanced by Time magazine and The Politico website, both of whom had representatives on the panel. I referenced the infamous (and shoddily reported) Time cover story about the supposed “death of feminism” in the late 90s, and then I referenced the inane story on The Politico last week about how the low ratings of Geena Davis’s TV show Commander In Chief and Katie Couric’s CBS newscast supposedly show that Hillary Clinton will never win the presidency because women don’t want to see women in leadership positions.

    In light of the long history of marginalization, misrepresentation and malignment of women in traditional corporate media, and the continuation of this sort of treatment of women in new media — and then noting that data shows that women are 50% of all bloggers but most of the time when media run stories about blogging they seek out primarily male bloggers, giving the misleading impression that there aren’t powerful women bloggers out here — I asked the panel (specifically the TIME and panelists) what they would do to ensure that women are covered equitably in corporate media as well as blogging and online media, as if we were (shocker!) half the population.

    Third: the fact that the moderator tossed my question about corporate media accountability and new media accountability to Jill, a feminist blogger (and the only woman on the panel) is INFURIATING.

    It was not Jill’s responsibility to answer that question. Jill is doing her part to create and advance a feminist presence in the blogosphere and to feature other feminist bloggers on this site. The people who represent the corporate and online outlets that are the problem (ie, Time and Politico) were supposed to answer that question. It was a question about corporate and new media accountability to women readers and bloggers and expert voices, addressed to representatives of corporate and new media staffers–staffers of outlets I addressed by name, who were on the panel, to whom I made specific reference to their outlets’ prior bad behavior…

    By giving the question to Jill, who is not a representative of corporate media but rather a feminist blogger, the moderator illustrated the implicit sexism in corproate media and even on the left, where all issues or questions related to women or gender or feminism are considered simply “women’s issues” and side distractions that only women need to listen to or respond to, and men are perceived as having no interest in or responsibility around. He might as well have said, “Ummm… this is a question about chicks, so Jill, you’re a chick, you write about chick things – deal with this question for us, OK?”

    Finally, I’ll also say that unlike the very long answers that the men on the panel gave, Jill seemed to answer the few questions she was brought in to answer with an eye to being brief enough to respect time constraints and allow for more questions from the audience, which the men did not do, with their long, long answers. She didn’t hog the mike but was respectful.

    (In a way, Jill, I wish you had hogged the mike, because those boys seemed to think they were slightly more entitled to have their say than you were. I could be wrong, it wasn’t an overwhelming impression, but a subtle one.)

    Jill answered the question well, especially in the short time frame and even more especially since she was not from the area of media that my question was speaking to.

    Would it have been great if she’d pplugged feminist bloggers? Sure. But perhaps that point would have been addressed by someone else if there had been more than one woman on a panel of five people (four speakers and one moderator).

    I should also note that the session panelists were 100% white, at least I believe this to be the case though I don’t know the ethnic background of one of the men on the panel (he seemed white, but visuals can be misleading).

    I will likely blog about this at WIMN’s Voices, the group blog on women and the media. http://www.wimnonline.org/WIMNsVoicesBlog

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