Hello Sidra. This is a really great piece. Thank you. I totally get it.

We have a lot of work to do. Julie Sloane. And her comment under your article ( plus my response to her) suggests one way to start to plow through this mess. I for one, would like to build on her point about “ the stories”.

The “ humanist” label works for me too. Because the issue is simple, really. Domination or who is queen/ king of the castle this month will never ever fix it. We all need to be accepted as equal human beings. Treated the same way no matter any difference in skin colour, gender, religion, language, age, nationality, partner preference etc etc.

Yet we must be careful. Each one of us.

I just attended an international technology conference. Yup, yet another industry that talks the talk on diversity…but goes no further. Or not much further.

In one general presentation there were three participants on stage. Three GenY/X women. One black, one Asian, the other white. (Trust me, that was NOT the norm for that conference.) Yet when those women were asked a “gender question”, they absolutely dropped the ball. “Gender is irrelevant” , they each said in one way or another, “we are all equal”.

Hmmmmmm. I thought. You are correct in that “all equal” is where we WANT TO BE. Yet your responses imply that we are already there! What?? Um folks…look around you. Look at all the misogynistic*stuff going on in the country and in the world.

(* remember, the segment I am describing in the presentation involved a question about gender only)

My take on those very successful, intelligent and accomplished women panelists? They suffer from the “you don’t look like me syndrome”, since they had already “made it” in their industry and at their company. They do not see( nor relate to) others ( the vast majority) who have not(yet) made it.

I suggest this thought as well( only because I too have witnessed it in another old, straight, white, male dominated industry) that most likely these three women felt that they were already part of the “club”. A boys club because of the industry make up. The boys ( the majority of them) do not see, relate to or probably, don’t even care about gender. The minute those three women vocalize about gender( among other issues of diversity) …well, where DOES THAT leave them and their status….?

It’s so tough to step outside our own experience and reality. Yet we cannot assist in making this world a better place unless we do see beyond our own noses. There is unbelievable richness in seeing, listening to and embracing people who do not “look like you”.

P. S. Thanks Sidra for the follow. Right back atcha.