Essay:Conservapedia and Women
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This essay is an original work by Stabby the Misanthrope. It does not necessarily reflect the views expressed in RationalWiki's Mission Statement, but we welcome discussion of a broad range of ideas. Unless otherwise stated, this is original content, released under CC-BY-SA 3.0 or any later version. See RationalWiki:Copyrights. Feel free to make comments on the talk page, which will probably be far more interesting, and might reflect a broader range of RationalWiki editors' thoughts. |
Note: I was going to make this an essay, but then, in the spirit of accuracy, I checked CP's sysop list and compared it against RW's sysop list. I realized that not only does CP have more (self-identified) regular female contributors than us, but they even have more female sysops than us, despite having far fewer sysops in total. So basically, the entire premise of this essay is bullshit.
Consevapedia has a well-established hatred of women's rights. The evidence of this is overwhelming: their craptastic article on feminism, abortion, birth control, the HPV vaccine, and the notorious "Feminine" article[1] (now deleted). Hell, Andrew Schlafly's own mother supports the oppression of women. The environment such attitudes foster has resulted in there being very few regular female contributors to Conservapedia.
Granted, the internet, and wikis in particular, has always been a haven for young males, with women often the exception rather than the rule. And women are also overwhelmingly liberal. Both of these factors weight things against Conservapedia. But even taking these factors into account, there is a dearth of women on Conservapedia. Outside of BethanyS (who almost doesn't count, as she clearly has no mind of her own), Conservapedia has almost no women.
Some may argue that we ourselves (RationalWiki) have nothing to brag about. RationalWiki has only five or six regular female contributors itself. However, while Conservapedia (subconsciously or not) marginalizes its female contributors, the few women RationalWiki has are all respected and integral members of the site. Kels was one of the founders of RationalWiki, and SusanG wrote most of its help pages. And don't forget Eira, Barbara Shack, and newcomer Pretzel.