Azure Jane Lunatic (Azz) 🌺 (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
azurelunatic) wrote2012-05-09 03:47 am
azurelunatic) wrote2012-05-09 03:47 am
Things up with which I do not have to put: fat-shaming titters at the tech talk
A co-worker tipped some of us off to a relevant-to-our-interests talk taking place in Palo Alto this evening, from ![[twitter.com profile]](https://p2.dreamwidth.org/e0caa790ec10/-/twitter.com/favicon.ico)
BayCHI. It sounded interesting, so I decided to go.
There were two presentations that evening. One was from the author of a forthcoming book, Make It So, taking a look at how user interfaces in speculative fiction and real life influence each other. I really enjoyed that talk, and I may take a look at that book once it comes out (probably someone in my department will let me borrow it from them, heh).
The second one was about how computer/human interaction in the health care field really actually sucks in a lot of ways, and is not particularly effective at actually getting people to do things that are in their better long-term interests.
There were a lot of good aspects to that talk. The top-level overview was excellent: there are a few components contributing, and by improving them, people can be empowered to make more effective health choices. Education is one component. Making it easier to fit into people's lives makes it better. And of course you can't do anything if you're too busy coping with other shit.
During the early part of the talk, I noticed that yeah, she was totally right that if you use technology to aid the choices you've been meaning to make, so that you can do it while you're thinking about it, when it would really be convenient rather than when you actually do remember it and you're exhausted and busy and just no. That motivated me to take a step I'd been meaning to take for a while.
I spend a lot of time at my desk. I'd like to be more active. My schedule is kind of crappy, and I need low-impact exercise. Once upon a time, someone listing some devices they thought were amazingly useless linked to a tiny little under-desk pedal machine, and I was instantly enchanted with it. If I can get a tiny little workout while I'm doing other random stuff, that's more of a workout than I'd be having without it, and I don't have the endurance I'd like to have.
Right in the middle of the presentation, I did a quick google, I wound up at Amazon, I picked out one, reset my password (argh), realized I didn't have my current debit card set, set that, and ordered the little thing. Woo, motivation!
Then the presentation got around to the practical bits of the environmental factors, and I stopped having such a good time. The presenter started mentioning fat. She was perfectly professional and not saying anything out of line with current prevailing doctor opinions*. It was the audience that broke professionalism. After the second or third time she mentioned weight, about 10% of the audience tittered. It was never more than maybe 10-20%, and it was a nervous sort of laugh, but getting more and more comfortable laughing at the fat people. Between that and the "inspirational" example of the megachurch pastor who decided that not only he, but his entire church, was going to lose weight, and they did -- and the total that his church collectively lost got the biggest laugh yet -- I decided that I was done.
A tech talk is not the number one place where the topic of conversation is supposed to be specifically weight-focused. I'm braced for the unique blend of sexism and inappropriately sexualized content that pops up in tech just when you think it's going to be all cool. I was not prepared to handle that part of the presentation, and the tittering -- and the fact that no one actually called the audience to order after the first or second outburst -- decided me.
She'd moved on to the next slide by the time this train of thought finished, and it was possible that the uncomfortable -- and yes, triggering -- part of the presentation was over. I no longer actually cared. I was not unsafe, but this was not what I had signed up for. The audience's rudeness cancelled my willingness to grit my teeth and put up with it, and in any case gritting the teeth is directly against the advice of every dental professional I've had the pleasure to be advised by. I was in the front row. I did not make any untoward fuss or deliberately call attention to my departure. Now, a person of my stature in a swirly skirt and a "Wicked Girl Saving Herself" shirt can *be* stealthy, but that involves effort that I was not taking.
By the time I'd regained some composure outside, the talk had finished; apparently there had been just a few slides left. Some people stayed to ask questions. As soon as I felt myself equal to it, I departed. Then I callednorabombay and we ranted at each other all the way home. (Well, more or less. Within five miles we were talking cracky Sherlock AUs; by the time I hit Daly City I was proposing a Barrayar-Sherlock crossover fusion with Hogwarts, one where Mycroft gets an Ivan. WORST IDEA YET.)
* Which is to say, not exactly HAES-enlightened.
There were two presentations that evening. One was from the author of a forthcoming book, Make It So, taking a look at how user interfaces in speculative fiction and real life influence each other. I really enjoyed that talk, and I may take a look at that book once it comes out (probably someone in my department will let me borrow it from them, heh).
The second one was about how computer/human interaction in the health care field really actually sucks in a lot of ways, and is not particularly effective at actually getting people to do things that are in their better long-term interests.
There were a lot of good aspects to that talk. The top-level overview was excellent: there are a few components contributing, and by improving them, people can be empowered to make more effective health choices. Education is one component. Making it easier to fit into people's lives makes it better. And of course you can't do anything if you're too busy coping with other shit.
During the early part of the talk, I noticed that yeah, she was totally right that if you use technology to aid the choices you've been meaning to make, so that you can do it while you're thinking about it, when it would really be convenient rather than when you actually do remember it and you're exhausted and busy and just no. That motivated me to take a step I'd been meaning to take for a while.
I spend a lot of time at my desk. I'd like to be more active. My schedule is kind of crappy, and I need low-impact exercise. Once upon a time, someone listing some devices they thought were amazingly useless linked to a tiny little under-desk pedal machine, and I was instantly enchanted with it. If I can get a tiny little workout while I'm doing other random stuff, that's more of a workout than I'd be having without it, and I don't have the endurance I'd like to have.
Right in the middle of the presentation, I did a quick google, I wound up at Amazon, I picked out one, reset my password (argh), realized I didn't have my current debit card set, set that, and ordered the little thing. Woo, motivation!
Then the presentation got around to the practical bits of the environmental factors, and I stopped having such a good time. The presenter started mentioning fat. She was perfectly professional and not saying anything out of line with current prevailing doctor opinions*. It was the audience that broke professionalism. After the second or third time she mentioned weight, about 10% of the audience tittered. It was never more than maybe 10-20%, and it was a nervous sort of laugh, but getting more and more comfortable laughing at the fat people. Between that and the "inspirational" example of the megachurch pastor who decided that not only he, but his entire church, was going to lose weight, and they did -- and the total that his church collectively lost got the biggest laugh yet -- I decided that I was done.
A tech talk is not the number one place where the topic of conversation is supposed to be specifically weight-focused. I'm braced for the unique blend of sexism and inappropriately sexualized content that pops up in tech just when you think it's going to be all cool. I was not prepared to handle that part of the presentation, and the tittering -- and the fact that no one actually called the audience to order after the first or second outburst -- decided me.
She'd moved on to the next slide by the time this train of thought finished, and it was possible that the uncomfortable -- and yes, triggering -- part of the presentation was over. I no longer actually cared. I was not unsafe, but this was not what I had signed up for. The audience's rudeness cancelled my willingness to grit my teeth and put up with it, and in any case gritting the teeth is directly against the advice of every dental professional I've had the pleasure to be advised by. I was in the front row. I did not make any untoward fuss or deliberately call attention to my departure. Now, a person of my stature in a swirly skirt and a "Wicked Girl Saving Herself" shirt can *be* stealthy, but that involves effort that I was not taking.
By the time I'd regained some composure outside, the talk had finished; apparently there had been just a few slides left. Some people stayed to ask questions. As soon as I felt myself equal to it, I departed. Then I called
norabombay and we ranted at each other all the way home. (Well, more or less. Within five miles we were talking cracky Sherlock AUs; by the time I hit Daly City I was proposing a Barrayar-Sherlock crossover fusion with Hogwarts, one where Mycroft gets an Ivan. WORST IDEA YET.)* Which is to say, not exactly HAES-enlightened.
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And yet, I would read that.
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Clearly, it's the worst for *them*, not for us. :D
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*also offers hugs*
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2. I LOVE YOUR ICON. Where is it from?
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I'm not sure where I snagged the icon itself from, but apparently the quote is SGA.
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(I just realized that I hate getting hugs—sensory issues, etc—but love giving them and I cannot explain why they are so different because they are kind of the same thing and now I feel weird. Mmph. I am a mass of contradictions.)
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