@grimalkina Related wavelength: I was reading K-Punk (aka Mark Fisher) last night and he mentioned imposter syndrome without naming it as such, but quite clearly naming underlying causes. Downright revelatory: https://chaosfem.tw/@johana/112557323320388529
@grimalkina Anyhow, I appreciated his concept of disavowed fascism/homophobia. In other areas I’ve encountered this as negative epistemology, the process through which people in privileged positions construct ignorance of the other, and when I encounter it next I’ll be able to tell myself, "ah, this is disavowed ableism." Naming the problem doesn’t fix it, but it does greatly increase my capacity for self-control when I bump into it.
I can't figure out if this is a good blogpost topic or not, but I've been thinking about how many conversations I see about human behavior in software overindex on like, differences between people* and not within-individual variation**
Overall malleability of our own traits and states over time is fascinating and underexplored in a very essentialist kind of culture***
"all managers are like x"
** "some days I am like x and some days I am like y"
@grimalkina No, this would be helpful. <oversharing>I'm late-diagnosed autistic, and when I finally figured it out, I thought that if I was just honest about what I was struggling with, my management would find ways to support me. Instead, it just set me on a different struggle track with managers who just want teams of "Type A" team players, and don't recognize that sorta difference as a potential strength.</oversharing>
I have been pretty darn blessed by the estrogen goddesses during my transition and there are so many wonderful things that have helped me feel more and more at home in my body and being-in-the-world through this body....but...
One area of dysphoria that I just kind of have to accept as background noise that will never change is about how big my body is. Both my height and how wide my underlying body structure is are things that my brain never feels fully at home in or connected to. It's not even the ratio of proportions, and I actually kinda like my fat for the softness and curves it gives me. But my brain struggles to track how actually big my body is to this day, when I see a picture of me with anyone else is shorter or smaller, I feel icky and uncomfortable because I'm so dang huge.
And I don't forsee any way this can change in my lifetime and I don't even think there's any way for me to indirectly access the euphoria or yearning I have.
@JoscelynTransient relatable. I’m thankful I don’t experience height or voice dysphoria, but also, while I love my new curves, I continue to worry that I’m fat. I know I weigh significantly more than I did a decade ago, but even at my skinniest I felt like I should be just a little less. It’s the brainworms our looks-ist culture programs us with.
One thing that drives me nuts as a polyam person is that a lot of people feel compelled to identify as monogamous and won't date polyamorous people....even when they are single and going on dates with multiple people and having casual relationships with other "monogamous" people.
Like, i am overjoyed for everyone that finds monogamy works for them as a relationship structure and identity, but it is weird that people feel pressured to maintain the label and pretense when that's not what they are actually doing, isn't it? I known i'm not even close to the firsr person that has said it, but it just reads so much as "I'm not gay, i'm just a guy who fucks guys."
@JoscelynTransient I think there are loads of social contradictions which neurotypical people never even process as a logical issue that uphold the normative regime. This I've-always-been-monogamous-(even-when-I date-multiple-people) attitude is just another 'typical' blind spot.
@JoscelynTransient like my most significant relationship both of us went in "cis" and came out of the whole experience trans af. (We were also hella gay for a "straight" couple.)
Very relatable point about sexism in this vid about social transition. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJuoZHCcj0w&t=332s For example, I'm a mediocre programmer, and before transition others assumed I was a good programmer, and after transition, others now assume I am a not-that-good programmer.
Relatedly, my skills developed very unevenly ("T-shaped") due to undiagnosed autism. I think when I expressed that I didn't understand a peripheral topic when working on code as a man, folks read it as an indicator of aloof genius, but now that I present as a transfem enby, folks take any ignorance as a sign of incompetence.
Folks, an open call: I am #hiring TWO Principal Research #Scientists to join the Developer Success Lab!
One is a scientist with statistics/psychometrics focus (R is our ecosystem here), and one is an intervention science focus; both are fully remote roles working directly with me, our current Principal Scientist, and our brand-new Principal Dev Experience Engineer on our public-facing empirical research mission 🙌
@grimalkina I wish I had the PhD background for the intervention focused one. Do you think y’all will get around to advertising lower req’d roles once the Principal seats are filled?
@JessTheUnstill@RickiTarr@waitworry I’d go one further, empathy cannot only be taught, its core component is a set of skills psychologists call "cultural competence." You can practice empathy by reviewing sets of critical questions (like, "are you able to purchase bandages that match your skin color?") to consciously understand difference and increase awareness of othering. My key text on this is Heesoon Jun's "Social Justice, Multicultural Counseling, and Practice."
@RickiTarr@JessTheUnstill@waitworry Yes, absolutely. Two things… one, it is like talking or walking, most people can do it with a few years of observing others and interacting with your environment, but to do it well (singing or jogging) takes real training. Two, sympathy is the sense, empathy is the skill. Sympathy is mirror neurons firing and knowing your dad is sad even when he doesn’t say so, empathy is managing emotional regulation, knowing how to say the impactful thing, and staying in a place of comfort (rather than falling into emotional distress) when going through critical conversations.