Women Bloggers – BlogHER or BloggER?

By nickwBlogger

Back in January, we had a great discussion about women in blogging, and try as I did, I still didn’t manage to get much female representation here on Performancing — a great shame, as I know we have some awesome bloggers (who happen to be women) in the Performancing membership.

Today, i see Kathy Sierra of “Creating Passionate Users” posting what I’m sure will become a much talked about piece called I am not a “woman blogger” — In it she makes some fine points:

I am “one who blogs” (among many other things). I happen to be a woman. But I am NOT a blogHer, and my male co-author is not a blogHim.

I write code. But I am NOT a programmHer.

I write tech books. But I am NOT a writeHer.

I ride horses. But I am NOT a rideHer. (sounds vaguely sexual… never mind)

I am NOT a skiHer or a skateboardHer or a runHer.

I work on ecological causes, but I am NOT an enviHERmental activist.

And I am NOT typing this on my computeHer (even if it is, I must say, a sexy-yet-adorable black MacBook)

These are my passions, but they reflect the part of me that is about horses, running, skiing, skating, the environment, writing, or creating. If I relabel them to reflect my gender, I believe both (my gender and the labeled thing) are diminished by the “Her” qualifier.

And in talking about the coverage of the recent BlogHer conferance, Kathy has this (among much else) to say, and its what clinched forgoing an early coffee to quickly get this post out the door — Im dead keen to hear what the women of Performancing have to say….

I’m tired of being told things about myself that sound as foreign to me as they might to a space alien. I am tired of others describing what it’s like to BE me. I’m tired of being told what others think of me. And I’m especially tired of being told how naive I am, and of having my accomplishments diminished by women who insist that to have visibility as a “Woman Blogger” I must have done something, um, special. And by “special”, I mean… sucking up, kissing up, or otherwise catering to the “male establishment that’s oh so determined to keep me “invisible.”

The professional and semi-pro blogging women I know of at Performancing tend to fly low under the radar here, but they’re just as industrious, just as savvy, as anyone else making a living from blogging — I like to think of the whole of the Performancing membership as containing members of the real blogosphere, those bloggers not all puffed up with their own self importance, busy bellowing their opinions into the echo chamber, but those bloggers quietly getting on with the business of blogging.

Men and Women alike.

Tell us what you think…

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14 thoughts on “Women Bloggers – BlogHER or BloggER?”

  1. Now I understand what BlogHER is I’m assuming that BlogHER was started by a woman? If so, why would you want to separate yourself from everyone else, a blogger is a blogger no matter the sex, ethnic origin etc.

    I wouldn’t say no to more female bloggers around here though 😀

  3. Good to hear from all of you female bloggers! What would be the PC word for it? Native Female Bloggers …

  4. I really did consider the whole thing… for about 30 seconds. When I discovered by clicking around through blogs that bragged about it, I saw mainly “mommy blogs”.

    I was kind of disappointed in my gender at that point, to be honest.

    I’m 29 years old, have been single for a few years now, and have no children, never been married, yadda yadda yadda. Mommy blogs don’t do anything for me except make me long for children even more than I do now… they actually kind of depress me to be honest.

    You know, I do a lot of stereotypically “male” things – I’m a volunteer firefighter, I own my own business, I love old cars, and while I haven’t had time in my “older years”, used to love fishing with my dad. But I’m still a girl… I wear makeup, worry about my weight, dye my hair, love to dress up (almost as much as I love sitting at home in my pajamas all day!), dream of a perfect wedding someday, and melt at the thought of getting flowers and jewelry on my birthday from the guy I’m with. (Well, that’s if and when I wind up with another one of course!) 😉

    So what does that make me? Would I qualify for “BlogHer” simply because I’m anatomically female, or would I be disqualified because I’m not a mom yet, and do so many typically “male” things?

    The whole thing is silly if you ask me. The power of a blogger is their words, their style, and their brain. Not what’s between their legs (or not). Sorry, I’m not a believer in the existence of the “glass ceiling” anymore, and I’ve read some kickass blogs by women that are NOT mommy blogs. And I think that any woman who needs to define her anatomy as a venture toward success is less of a woman than she professes to be… she’s relying on it in a manner no less equivalent to Jessica Simpson relying on her stupidity to look “cute”. (And there’s nothing I can’t stand MORE than a woman who plays dumb!)

  5. The mommy bloggers thing is interesting – that’s exactly what I would picture blogHer to be like.

    I blog. I heard of BlogHer. I have no interest. Personally I’d be more interested in being a part of a blogSEO or blogSanFrancsico or blogFunnyStuff or whatever. To each their own blog niche, right? Some are just proud to be women bloggers. Good for them

  7. around the world for many reasons.

    Why do we need things like the Lilith Fair and BlogHer? I think about this often because there’s such conflict between women now. There are the Kathy Sierra’s, the Yvonne’s (Lipstick), the amazing female musical artists like Tracy Chapman and Sarah McLachlan (to name a teeny two out of so many). There’s the women burned for adultry, or who give birth to girl babies and are forced to give them away because girl’s are inferior. There are women and girls whose genitals are cut off and are raped as if this is natural and expected behavior. There’s the “mommy wars”. There’s me, at my son’s baseball games, playing down what I do for a living because in my rural town, women who work with computers and web sites is a foreign concept. Even a threat.

    And then, I turn on the TV and see women who are skin and bones and I don’t relate to them at all. Hugging skeletons is gross.

    I get what Kathy is saying but I’m not moved enough to join in and rant with her. Sometimes I think the “her” club is so exclusive that I’ll never get in and other times, it’s so pathetically violent or judgemental that I don’t care to try.

    I think, Nick, some of your female bloggers are quiet because they’re busy and self satisfaction comes from someplace within. It does seem that the most famous blogs are written by men. I don’t understand why that is but it hasn’t made me furious either.

  8. Heh. I just didn’t want to be traffic baiting. Thanks for posting it. Oh, if you do go read it, be sure to read the comments. Worth it for the insight.

    My original post seems to have been eaten. Undercaffeinated user errror? Reconstructing in this post…

    I have been blogging for the BlogHer site for about six months. I signed up because I thought that working with BlogHer might bring me some of the same kinds of opportunities I get from my own site. (I’m openly opportunistic.) That hasn’t played out, but I do get a small stipend from BlogHer for my work. FYI, I am still ad free at Nerd’s Eye View, but my site does bring me freelance work from time to time.

    I never understood the division by gender. Ultimately, that’s why I didn’t attend BlogHer. I want three things: excellent writing, information about how make my blog/blogging experience better, and answers to the question of if I should use my blog to make money and if so, how.

    Gender has never played a part for me in any of those issues. Ever. It’s too big a group to have value for me – in my mind it’s like having a group of American bloggers. Or Northern Hemisphere bloggers. I do understand that there are women who think it’s useful to divide that way, but I’m not one of them.

  9. Damn stupid drupal 4.7 duped me into thinking nerdseyeview’s first comment was an accidental repost (it puts it at the end of the thread and marks it as new if you edit) and i nuked it 🙁

    Im really worry about that…

    Reading her original thoughts at Thoughts about BlogHer, which I did not attend is hopefully just as good though.

  11. I never thought about that. But …

    Well, I have some RSS feeds in a guide/folder which is named “Readable – private female” which is nothing more then some feeds which are really well written on a private base from women. The same exists for some male bloggers.

    Yes, I have invented these guides as sub-categories of ‘readable’ because of gender related writing. ‘Private’ just means I shouldn’t get lost there during my working hours 🙂

    The guide ‘readable’ contains much more feeds and I don’t care about the gender at all.

    Long intro… short resume: Yes there are differences but not the differences made up by others but by the writer herself/himself.

  12. It’s interesting stuff, would be good for one of the “blogher” people to come back with an answer. I for one don’t look for a bloggers gender when reading, it doesn’t factor into whether I will subscribe or not.

  13. I agree too. Bloggers just get on with it and the good ones (male or female) doubtless don’t want to be recognised for their gender (unless, perhaps, they are blogging about gender issues).

  14. I agree with Kathy Sierra. I dont think that it should make a difference. At least not for most subjects.

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