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Discussion on: Being A Woman On The Internet Is... "Fun": A Scientific Study

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elmuerte profile image
Michiel Hendriks • Edited

You can upgrade this experiment to a scientific one by trying the same with an account operated by a man, and one operated by somebody whose sex cannot be determined. I think you will probably get a similar results. As in, mostly men responding, albeit fewer in number. The difficult part would having the same reach from those accounts.

Or maybe this one, let a male friend/colleague post a similar statement where you then respond to that he's still using twitter. I'm sure there will be plenty of people pointing out your mistake. This does require some timing though, you don't want to do this too soon.

But it is probably not really worth the effort as we all know what the outcomes will be. You can better spend the time dotting all the i's in your code.

On the internet, nobody knows you're a horse.

One thing I've observed in the past 20+ years I've been on the internet is that people have become way more public on who they are. Previously people used handles (or nicknames), so you never really knew what they were in meatspace. I think it started with Facebook requiring real names, and the easy ability to post pictures of yourself, that people on the internet became more public. We know their name, and see their face, we know their sex and race. (Rhyme not intended) And with it, the prejudice.

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bizzy237 profile image
Yury

the handle I used during the good old times of anonymity looked feminine enough for some people to assume I was a girl. don't remember them acting differently from people who thought I was a guy though except for occasional "wait, you're a dude?" every month or so but that was rather amusing