The Open Source Boob Project and subsequent stoning

[netmouse]

This morning I find myself asked in email both what my take on the OSBP is and (in a separate message) whether or not someone can quote a comment I made on it elsewhere. People are welcome to quote me, and in fact here I will quote myself.

To me this was really about gender-nonspecific personal connection and permission-granting (or not granting), not women caving to the male power or notions of body-rightness.

A lot of people are concluding it was a "You had to be there" kind of thing, but it's frustrating that people clearly don't understand.

Society has been telling us women all our lives that our breasts are not our own to make decisions about--that they are inherently only for certain approved purposes and we must otherwise cover them and protect them from detailed touch or inspection with things like bras and clothing and moats and lions and tigers, if necessary, because the only person who is allowed to see and touch them is YOUR MAN and you aren't allowed to assert a non-standard set of access permissions yourself.

This project stood that on its head. It was in fact a fine case of feminist rebellion, combined with general rebellion against socially defined rules and toward opt-in interpersonal intimacy and appreciation.

I am really sorry that at least one track of the widespread online discussion of this project was headlined with mean disdain and an association of it with the thousands of creepy, unsanctioned gropes and feels that many women have suffered over the years, especially at conventions. The way the people who started it have been attacked for the pure pleasure they found in opening themselves to this idea and in thinking that their thoughts and feelings about it could be shared with a larger group is nothing less than horrible. Clearly it isn't for everybody, but they never *said* it was for everybody. They also didn't claim it was without flaws, and obviously one issue with it is that people may have chosen to participate due to perceived peer pressure, and/or without understanding that the little buttons meant "I may say no" just as much as they meant "you may ask."

I also think the name of the project is not quite right, since "Open Source" traditionally means no barriers, anyone can play, and while anyone could join this project, it was about permissions and consensual contact, not about making your body a public resource or about taking away your right to control access. As I said above, it was rather the opposite.

And I think it was a good thing, and I admire my friends who started it, and I stand by them, and I am not ashamed that I was pleased to take part.

Comments

[ckd]

I think one of the things that led to that was that it was posted about by a man, from a male perspective, with the idea that it should be made into a "Project" and expanded beyond the original group. Whether or not he was the originator, the "public face" of this was theferrett and his posts, and the public perception was that the intent was to spread this far and wide.

That lent quite a bit of weight to those interpretations that made it into a pure "guys grab girls" situation, at which point retrospective "no, I really meant it this way" explanations start looking like "how can I dig myself out" justifications. From an external viewpoint, the two look exactly the same, and "good intent" is hard enough to demonstrate when you haven't framed the discussion badly already.

My early (possibly my earliest, I haven't checked) comment still mostly applies; the first paragraph was based on my interpretation of the original post, and I don't consider it an accurate reaction to the actual events as described by participants who've since discussed it.

Would I like there to be more touch in the world? Definitely. Would I like there to be more touch in the world, if getting there involved social pressure to conform to a very male-privileged and heteronormative model of behavior? Not just no but hell no, even though as Mr. McStraightypants I would be in the privileged position. I don't want the privileged position. I want mutuality, dammit.

netmouse says that her experience had that mutuality. I don't doubt her in the least. I don't have any reason to think that her experience was atypical among the people who participated at Penguicon. I don't think that there was Horrible Exploitation going on among the people who were involved. (As I've said, I wasn't involved and so have no direct evidence either way.)

However, to haul in a suitable Geek Analogy: "this solution does not scale". Just as you can't survive a slashdotting on your 384kbps DSL line, just as USENET's culture couldn't survive the massive influx of users from AOL in the Endless September, the good parts of something that worked among a group of friends couldn't survive becoming an Internet Project, and they didn't. Unfortunately, I think that the resulting fracas has added quite a bit of baggage to any effort to be more touch-positive, and that's a very sad thing.

[http://users.livejournal.com/jer_/]

Okay, let me take exception to the last bit there. You don't KNOW if this solution doesn't scale. You might theorize that it won't. You might hypothesize that it won't. You simply don't know.

I, personally, don't think it's a good idea to try on a larger scale. I think it would be damaging. But I don't try to express that as the certainty that it will fail, nor would I attempt to trip up those who try it. I might poke a demure "told ya so" out there if it does collapse under its own weight... but I wouldn't profess to know that it doesn't scale.

My modem is testable. I can see if it will support the traffic and make a reasoned scientific hypothesis that I'm going to get slashdotted. Society is not. We can guess, but we never do know what will happen when we introduce variables into the mix.

Sorry, but the "will not work" line sounds too much like "women will never integrate into corporate society" from decades ago.

[ckd]

At this point, we have pretty good evidence that making it an Internet "Project" in the way that was actually attempted won't work. Existence proof: thousands upon thousands of comments, much unhappiness on all sides, and severe breakdowns in communication.

I accept the correction that it cannot be proven that it cannot scale, and that my phrasing was more definite than the argument merited. I think that (by analogy to other cultural assimilation processes) it cannot scale without a significant change in the larger culture (fandom at a minimum, society as a whole more likely), except at the relatively slow growth rate that takes place through personal relationships.

[davehogg.livejournal.com]

I understand that, early in the discussion, people were only able to respond to theferrett's original description. I still think some of those reactions were wildly over the top, but the picture was unclear at that point.

My problem is with the later generations of comments - the ones that have clearly come after exposure to the stated experiences of numerous participants and eyewitnesses.

You've taken that information and been willing to adjust your thinking about what happened. That's good, not that you need me to validate anything. A lot of people are just going forward with their preconceived agenda, and ignoring anything that might invalidate parts of it.