Why aren't there more women on audiophile forums?


I've seen this question bandied about on forums frequently. Here's a long analysis of the subject matter.  For those going to the beach and needing a read, the whole dissertation is available for download.

"Masculinity and gear fetishism in audio technology community discourse"
Annetts, Alex (2015)
Doctoral thesis, Anglia Ruskin University.

"This thesis is a study of audio technology community discourse and its historical features. I contend that the audio technology domain is fundamentally exclusive and hierarchically stratified, based on discursively inscribed prerequisites to participation and enunciation, notably a hegemonic masculine performance, gear fetishism and the articulation of technical knowledge.

I show that communities organised around audio technology, socially construct and perpetuate these features as components of their respective discourses. I expose all three elements to be rooted in culturally embedded gender stereotypes, dating back to a nineteenth century dichotomy of public and private space.

I present a deconstruction of the complex discursive performances of masculinity and offer opportunities for privileged masculine recordists to critically reflect upon their dominance and homogeneity within the domain as an original contribution to knowledge. In this endeavour, I investigate the emergence and development of exclusive tropes as components of audio technology culture, and demonstrate how they continue to be perpetuated in the face of both social and technological developments that offer possibilities to destratify the community hierarchy and enunciative function.

My methodology is based on a comparative discourse analysis of industry and academic texts, as well as the communities that surround and influence the construction of modern audio technology discourse. Case studies are conducted of two leading industry publications: Tape Op and Sound On Sound, and supplemented by an exploration of Women's Audio Mission. I combine these sources with interview material gathered from relevant industry professionals. In doing so, I observe how the audio technology community has maintained barriers to participation, often in the face of technological progress that offers supposed opportunities for democratisation. My work presents an argument against this notion, exposing the supposed democratisation as an illusion of accessibility and thus as mere massification."

https://arro.anglia.ac.uk/id/eprint/702044/
128x128hilde45

Showing 14 responses by nonoise

@hilde45,
Just teach your daughter to be strong willed and to stand up for herself as we've got a long ways to go before we're civilized enough to drop our guard.

All the best,
Nonoise
I'm waiting for MC to start waving a piece of paper stating:
" I have here in my hand a list of 205—a list of names that were made known ...."
And end it with a link to this:
https://orchidend.com/id-rather-be-a-russian-than-a-democrat-shirt?gclid=CjwKCAjwq7aGBhADEiwA6uGZp1_B7bYXp9OxWd06ikXG1Jik2y8BxVUnE7ZJnCoPqNenrVT05_MRLhoChdwQAvD_BwE&options=gildan-cotton-t-shirt-sport-grey&v=5d4fd4ae485b160001d5feb2

The conflicting positions would go right over his head.

All the best,
Nonoise

Speaking of the TSA, years ago, one progressive pundit was over in Europe and when preparing to board a flight, started to take off his shoes only to be stopped by their version of the TSA, who said, "You must be American, right?", laughed, and told him he could keep his shoes on.
Don't forget those TSA appointments came with that ever changing color level of threat assessment any time Bush came under fire. It always went up when he got in trouble.
Look! Squirrel!

All the best,
Nonoise
@hickamore,
Thanks for the clarification and jogging of my memory (which seems to have found it's rabbits hole). 

And, thanks for pointing out how MC uses the language of the left in his attempts to use it against them, portraying himself as the holder of those values. He does that. A lot.

I wish I could agree with you that this tribalism will play itself out, but current events point to something else.

All the best,
Nonoise
Thanks @hickamore, 
I'll admit that I liberally used some shorthand in the alt right designation but it would take way too long to put it into perspective, and, I wouldn't be able to do as good a job as you did in describing it.

On a similar note, I always thought it was referred to as Liviathan, and not Colussus. Maybe it was Burke and the critters in his timeframe that started to use that term. It could very well be that once religious domination started to wane a bit and politics sought some differentiation that that term was used to supplant the previous one.

As for MC's clumsy take, I'll let his own words "own" him.

All the best,
Nonoise
@lalitk ,
Thanks for reposting what @dtrandall posted. It never fails to amaze me how all the alt right macho wannabes practice the cancel culture they project onto others.

Preferring to outright censor them to make it appear there are fewer saner voices in this wilderness, gives them a false sense of security.

All the best,
Nonoise
Anglia Ruskin University is ranked 301 in World University Rankings by Times Higher Education and has an overall score of 4.0 stars, according to student reviews on Studyportals, the best place to find out how students rate their study and living experience at universities from all over the world.
...in answer to...
Is this the same Anglia whose predictive modelling said there would be no ice on the North Pole by 2015?

No, that was East Anglia and not Anglia Ruskin.
Please, by all means, continue.

All the best,
Nonoise
Listening to sexists arguing they're not sexist is like listening to a racist arguing they're not racist. This is most entertaining. How many here lead that Walter Mitty existence where they use the keyboard as their escape mechanism from that straight line they try to toe so hard all day?

All the best,
Nonoise
The OP doesn't seem to think so. Maybe some introspection on your part would do you a world of good, or is that my education speaking?

All the best,
Nonoise
Academics here couldn’t understand how and why the revolt to higher learning was being rejected out of hand by some in one particular group. It took a journalist to chime in and state that he was from a dirt poor part of the country, steeped in bigotry and harboring a hatred of the "others."

When he came back home after getting his degree he was met with disdain and rejection. He had explanations for the things that bothered them but the response he got was. "That’s your education talking."
They were so conditioned in their hate, that they rejected anything that would better their situation. They needed it. He then remembered why he left in the first place and left, for the last time.

All the best,
Nonoise
I wouldn't go so far as to say it's intellectually self conscious as these types of studies were done all the time back when serious analysis was done on a somewhat regular basis. God, how I miss those days.

All the antics gong on now merely reflect the hatred and rejection of the mental science based analysis for the sake of convenient memes and angles to play. If one is shown to more neurotic than usual, then it needs to be pointed out lest others take them seriously.

All the best,
Nonoise
@hilde45, Yup.
And from the responses you’ve gotten, it goes a long way towards the premise that the alt right has been pissed ever since The Enlightenment.

All the best,
Nonoise