Mastodawn

Jules she/her 1d ago

This shouldn't still need saying in 2026 but all else being equal women are just as capable of doing anything - coding, understanding maths, running a company, training consistently as an athlete, doing science - as men are and you can't deny that and call yourself a feminist. But you also can't call yourself a feminist if you deny that everything else is not equal and the way society is currently structured women face more barriers to doing these things than men do.

secretsloth 1d ago

@afewbugs my former neighbor did computer coding on punch cards**, back when it was considered women's work. I dunno who might need to hear this, but it used to be women's work, before men decided oh, wait, no, this gives women too much power and influence to actually make decisions autonomously, and then it became "men's work." This is within living memory! And yet some people deny that women even have the capacity for it. Ridiculous.

**update, she has corrected me, paper tape

@secretsloth @afewbugs i once got told by a colleague women can't do technical stuff like coding and electronics.

A flight computer I designed has orbited the planet.

secretsloth 1d ago

@quixoticgeek @afewbugs people make me tired. The number of things I've been told "women can't do," when women were actually the pioneers in that field, it's absolutely. (Silent scream.) I'm sorry you have to put up with that, it sounds like a fascinating thing to have done and a very cool thing to get to talk about with others, if only they wouldn't do. Yeah. that kind of thing. 😞 You can tell me all about it annny time and I will go all glittery eyed!

PalmAndNeedle 1d ago

@quixoticgeek dang, thats a brag

@secretsloth @afewbugs

secretsloth 1d ago

@PalmAndNeedle @quixoticgeek @afewbugs absolutely, that really might set a record for mansplains I have personally heard about

Niels Moseley 1d ago

@quixoticgeek @secretsloth @afewbugs I might want to know more!

Reginald 1d ago

@quixoticgeek @secretsloth @afewbugs Ignorance:

No way women can program.

Wilful ignorance:

“No way Margaret Hamilton invented the field of software engineering to put a man on the moon. She must be taking credit for the work of men.”

HighlandLawyer 21h ago

@raganwald @quixoticgeek @secretsloth @afewbugs
Ada Lovelace wrote programs, but Charles Babbage never got around to finishing his computer for them to run on.

@quixoticgeek
That is so cool. Not the assholery, obviously, but the orbiting computer.
@secretsloth @afewbugs

jamesb (MW1CGG)1d ago

@quixoticgeek
One that might resonate with you (iirc)... I got told that women can't brew beer. Which was news to me having been taught how to brew by a woman and everything.
@secretsloth @afewbugs

Quixoticgeek 1d ago

@jamesb @secretsloth @afewbugs this is news to me as a brewer by trade...

jamesb (MW1CGG)1d ago

@quixoticgeek
Having drank some of the beer you would have had a hand in making I'd say it's total bollocks too.
@secretsloth @afewbugs

Quixoticgeek 1d ago

@jamesb @secretsloth @afewbugs it's also a stunning lack of knowledge about the history of brewing and the role of the alewife in medieval culture...

Phil Thane ✅1d ago

@jamesb @quixoticgeek @secretsloth @afewbugs I'm sure I read in a history book that brewing was one of the more respectable options for a medieval widow to support herself and her children.

@quixoticgeek That is incredibly brilliant and cool.

@secretsloth @afewbugs