Pronoun policing in hobby groups

[MissScarletInTheBallroom]

I'm in a Facebook group for embroiderers. I don't do much myself (turns out it's harder than it looks!) but I like seeing other people's creations.

Anyway, the gender wars are raging.

Every so often someone posts a political pattern they've stitched, usually something to do with trans rights, and the comments are an even split between allies cheering them on and other people asking to keep the discussion related to embroidery and away from politics.

This morning someone posted a general message, not related to an embroidery they had done, calling others out for starting posts with, "Hey ladies!" or similar, saying that not everyone in the group is a woman, and signing off "from this enby".

The comments were the usual shit show that I have come to expect, with half the commenters saying, "stop ramming your special identity down our throats, we don't care" and the other half bemoaning the transphobia in the group.

But what I noticed was that several people posted to thank the person who had posted the comment and saying that they were also not women, and every single one of them was either a female person who identified as non binary, or a trans man. I did not spot one single natal male in the group.

It struck me as odd to pipe up and say, "Hey, thank you, there are men in this group too!" if the only men in the group are female.

I want to say that embroidery clearly is a very gendered activity, but weirdly it looks like more of a sexed activity, if the only people doing it are female, but identify as a range of different genders.

Anyway, that's my random thought for the day.

https://www.dymocks.com.au/threads-of-life-by-clare-9781419747656
This is a lovely read. She covers tapestry as an opportunity for political expression for medieval women, and soldiers recovering from shell shock - all sorts of stories woven together.

And my (2nd ww army colonel) Dad was in traction for a slipped disc when I was a baby. He made a teddy for me which I still treasure.

I work in a girls' school and they all use 'guys'. I suppose it is neutral, but I dislike it because it seems to me to reinforce the male default setting.
I naughtily say 'girls' because that's what they are. Don't tell anyone, it's not an approved term.

My father was taught embroidery in a TB sanatorium as well and was proud of his satin stitch, not that he did much of it in later life. He did have a respect for any craft or art work.

There also used to be a thing about Scottish shepherds knitting when they were out with the flocks, but according to this it was a kind of proto-crochet akin to nalbinding.

fascinating, I must research some more.

https://loopholes.blog/2018/11/two-bootees/

But I am English, and a "guy" is a man. And so i will pushback (or be an arse about it as described above to make a point).

English doesn't work that way. As St. Dent reminds us, the final arbiter is usage, no matter how much we may dislike it.

If you want a language which has it's usage prescribed by law then France is thataway --->

If you're quick you can catch the tide.

On a similar vein, are there many female watchmakers ?

Funnily enough, it seems the answer is 'yes'.

https://revolutionwatch.com/revolution-100-most-influential-women-in-watchmaking/

https://myjewelryrepair.com/2024/03/trailblazing-women-of-watch-world/

https://wristcheck.com/discover/culturecheck/horology-queens-women-that-made-watch-history

https://www.watchonista.com/articles/watch-industry/female-gaze-celebrating-women-watchmaking

'For International Women’s Day on March 8th, we wanted to do something to commemorate the ladies who help make watchmaking great. After all, women have played an important role in the industry for centuries (Marie Perregaux co-founded Girard-Perregaux in 1856, for example).
Women also make up a significant percentage of the unsung heroes of the production line. For instance, the régleuses (or “balance-spring fitters”) – the people responsible for fine-tuning a movement’s tiny hairspring – are (and have historically always been) almost entirely women.'

'In 2021, the <a class="break-all" href="https://www.fhs.swiss/eng/homepage.htmlwww.fhs.swiss/eng/homepage.html" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry reported that 32,536 men and 25,014 women worked in the watchmaking industry. Still, the sisters are underrepresented in many aspects of watchmaking. For example, the same study showed that of the executive class, 1,338 were men while only 278 were women'

Fishermen have traditionally done needlework whether it was repairing nets or knitting ganseys (jumpers)

you're a charmer.

I never successfully learned how to sew, crochet, knit or quilt (I thank many older women in my life who tried to teach me).

For me, it’s that tabletop gaming has gone this way: the latest idea is for players to fill in forms listing their triggers before a game so that the games master (GM) can avoid these subjects when designing the plot for a quest. Also, the number of OTT ‘queer’ characters has increased. I just want to solve an eldritch puzzle that could potentially destroy humanity by releasing Cthulu or I want to fight some Orcs. I want an escape from politics, ideology and daily life - I don’t want those things following me into my escape.

And things are weird when even the Babylon Bee noticed what’s happening (could do without the hackneyed ‘nerd’ stereotypes in the video tho’ 🙄):

Totally over the fawning in craft communities over "special" people with pink and sparkly femininity of the kind not practiced by any of those born into it.

However, i am guilty (very guilty) of the "hi guys" or more commonly "hey chaps" opener. One of my friends has had HR hassle after her TIM colleague objected to her doing it as he felt she wasn't respecting his femininity (the rest of the meeting except him were female in the old fashioned sense and none quibbled about the greeting). Friend saw red and responded by saying she wouldn't be lectured on what was an appropriate greeting for a group of women by someone who had been one for all of 6 months and had previously benefited from the social, educational and financial privileges of masculinity.

Not spoken to her for ages so not sure where things are up to.

As I work in the heavily captured NHS I think "hi all" is probably the way to go to avoid trouble as I can see me responding in similar way if challenged.

I think 'guys' can be a cultural thing. I didn't grow up in the UK (nor US) although live in UK now and 'hi guys' was very generic and not particularly gendered. I absolutely understand why a lot of people see it that way, but there are definitely people using it as the same as 'Hi everyone' and not thinking more of it.

That might explain the anime avatar on the Discord lifeboat.

The problem (some people have) with "Hey everyone" is that it doesn't mark them out as special and unique. As if otherwise we would be living in a world of Roberts

For me, it’s that tabletop gaming has gone this way: the latest idea is for players to fill in forms listing their triggers before a game so that the games master (GM) can avoid these subjects when designing the plot for a quest. Also, the number of OTT ‘queer’ characters has increased. I just want to solve an eldritch puzzle that could potentially destroy humanity by releasing Cthulu or I want to fight some Orcs. I want an escape from politics, ideology and daily life - I don’t want those things following me into my escape.

The "triggers" thing has been going on for a while, at least in the live-action circles. But the live-action experience is much more immersive than tabletop, so I can understand this to an extent.

There is currently a very large festival LARP in the UK - one of the biggest, if not the biggest in the country. It's always been pretty pronouny but it's gone all-in in recent years - a lot of participants have unintuitive pronouns and even pre-Covid, it really pulled me out of the roleplay trying to remember whether someone was they/them or ei/eir or something else entirely. I'm ND myself, I can barely remember people's names or the faces they attach to, and it's very difficult to have fun when you're scared of slipping up and getting in trouble with the organisers.

The women's toilet block is also effectively mixed sex and you can't challenge males going in there. To make matters worse, there have been multiple sexual assaults on-site and one of the victims was someone I knew. The power dynamics in certain sub-groups are awful and it's generally the right-on men throwing their weight around.

Some of the women set up a private group on Facebook to warn each other about the various missing stairs at the events, but of course they didn't keep the group women-only - they let the right-on bully men in as well.

I know I'm ranting but I feel so fed up and disappointed by a hobby that I used to love.

Re tabletop gaming specifically, I think a large part of the change is due to the influence of Critical Role and the large CR fanbase that started playing as a result of the show.

Dungeons and Dragons is the main system that's been affected, and maybe (?) World of Darkness (it's been a while since I played either). But as you move away from the more popular and commercialised systems, it tends to feel more old-school. Partly because the more unknown systems are passion projects and there's less business incentive to appeal to a specific subset of the market, and partly because the sorts of GMs who run these systems take their tabletop gaming very seriously.

Of course, it's a case of pick your poison. You can either have obnoxious IRL politics, or you can be leered at by sweaty neckbeards over beer and pretzels. It's never been so exciting to be a woman in the tabletop gaming space. 🙄

I'd watch embroidery content on YouTube instead. Nobody should be yapping about political issues on an embroidery thing.

Bayeux Tapestry ? Riddled with politics.

I know what you mean, being a woman who likes scifi and tabletop gaming has led to some very weird and unpleasant experiences with men over the years. For example, I learned very early on not to play Vampire: The Masquerade with strangers because men will flirt creepily with you while 'in character'.

I gave up LARPing for the very reason that the power dynamics and politics of the local 'cool' people in the group led to everything becoming fraught and stressful.

I will admit to being very old school with the games that I enjoy in that we use old sourcebooks and rules for games like Call of Cthulhu, Dungeons and Dragons, Warhammer etc and so a lot of developments in gaming passed me by for a long while. But it seems like the same sort of neurotic and entitled behaviour that ruined online fandoms and fanfic and crafting is happening in RPG.

I wonder do the tabletop wargamers have to deal with this stuff as much? They always seemed like a calm lot, off in the corner setting out their miniatures, when I saw them at local groups or at Cons.

Oh gosh yes, the power dynamics and politics in my local group was awful too. There was a subset of people who'd been doing it for a decade or longer and were extremely averse to any challenge to the status quo. There was friction over LARP games where the original creators handed over control of the system to someone else, didn't like what that person ended up doing with it, and were really passive aggressive to the point of attempted sabotage. There was a whole load of polycule drama. There were creepy male "feminists". There were bullying allegations that led to people being kicked out. And of course there was a lot of real-life political discourse and an expectation to toe the line or be ostracised. I know of other people who were very involved in the group and have now stepped away because they're so sick of it.

Part of me hopes this description isn't outing and the other part of me wishes it was - sadly I think this is commonplace among LARP groups, having known people from a few different ones.

that ruined online fandoms and fanfic

I refuse to touch a lot of online fan spaces because they're guaranteed to ruin the experience for me - anything with a Tumblr following is an immediate no. I tend to stick with fandoms that are heavily male dominated - not because they're better (they're better in some respects, worse in others) but because the associated fanfiction spaces are smaller and often less toxic. I'd rather have 5 chill readers than 500 drama llamas who'll start up a harassment campaign because they didn't like something in one of your fics. Big fandoms with small fanfiction spaces also means that trouble doesn't tend to follow you into the rest of the fandom.

I wonder do the tabletop wargamers have to deal with this stuff as much?

My instinct is no, but I suspect it will come for them too sooner or later. I do think that having less mainstream appeal is a protective factor though - wargaming is more about number crunching than roleplay, so it doesn't tend to attract the same types of people.

Sigh. It was reading the very long thread where the medication came up, and many things made more sense.

I cannot stand woke D&D! I want to escape from reality for a few hours and preferably kick some orc arse. Not listen to whining about pronouns and how 'triggered' they are by pretty much anything likely to befall a party of fantasy adventurers.

I appreciate that there is a whole conversation to be had though about what topics are/ should be off limits for RPGs (do you allow eg toture to feature?) and to be fair, this is an extension of those decisions, but this seems to be all encompassing and very one way.

I appreciate that there is a whole conversation to be had though about what topics are/ should be off limits for RPGs

If you can't do it in an RPG, then where can you ?

I found so much I can relate to in your post!!!

I found socialising in gaming and scifi groups really confusing until I came across the Geek Social Fallacies https://plausiblydeniable.com/five-geek-social-fallacies/ and reading those made so much sense to me and helped to explain how toxic dynamics can happen in a hobby group. And sexism has something to do with it too - back in the day, I found certain male geeks were highly suspicious of women who turned up to groups, as though we could only be there for one of two things: to laugh at them or to try and trap one of them as a boyfriend 🙄🤷‍♀️

Online fandom and fanfic, when I became interested decades ago, were suffering from some BNFs (Big Name Fans) in my favourite fandoms who were encouraging their ‘followers’ to squabble and find fault with other writers’ work - very nasty stuff and highly reminiscent of current online cancellation behaviour where people were just looking for anything they could use to act offended and virtuous about. It was purity spiral stuff that I’ve learned to avoid and, these days, I just read fic and leave a polite comment for the author if I enjoyed the story. That’s another thing, why do so many readers not leave comments for authors nowadays? I think the kudos button on AO3 has made people lazy 🤔

I think your observation about wargamers is astute, it isn’t as much about the feelings and emotions (and perhaps social aspects) with that hobby 🤔