The Personal Presentation Dilemma: Sexuality, Gender and Professionalism in the Social Media Sphere
August 16, 2007
I got into it with my good friend Robert Scoble a couple of months ago over Facebook and the personal/professional boundary:
I’ve had some time to mull the issues over, and I think there’s a component that Robert and I did not discuss: gender.
As Wade Rocket so aptly summarized:
Scoble thinks that in the world of the future, not only will CEOs be able to post goofy pictures of themselves on their profiles, such photos will be expected.
Fig. 1 - Sadly, we were unable to secure permissions to a photo of a scantily clad Teresa Valdez Klein prior to publication.
Ok, Wade. 
Here you go:
That’s about as scantily as I’ll allow myself to be clad on the Internet.
I’ve shown that swimsuit off before. On YouTube, and basically all over the Web. And I’m not ashamed of it. I have nothing to be ashamed of. I’m happy with my body — it can climb 5.11b rock walls, after all — and I’m proud of the fact that I look like that in a bikini.
But while the photo of Robert “naked” with his book is endearing, amusing and goofy. My photo has the potential to attract the very wrong kind of attention. It has. I’ve gotten weird e-mails from creepy guys.
And it doesn’t stop on the Web. I’ve met guys at events — some of them prominent bloggers, and no I won’t name names — that hugged me a little too long or too tightly or otherwise made me feel skeeved out. And I’ve got a higher tolerance for that kind of thing that most.
Everyone has their burdens and their frustrations in life. But Robert is much less likely than I am to feel sexually threatened by a fellow denizen of the blogosphere.
Some might say that I ask for it by posting bathing suit photos of myself on the Web, publicly announcing my bisexuality on Facebook and generally exuding sexuality. But that’s just who I am. I’m an attractive, bisexual and sexually charged woman. But I don’t think I’m unreasonable to expect that people treat me with the same basic respect they would give to Robert Scoble — online scanty picures or not.
At the very least, I expect people not to act as though they are entitled to grope me because of what I look like, or what content I choose to publish online.
As Robert wrote in the wake of the horrible attacks on Kathy Sierra, Maryam Scoble and others:
It’s this culture of attacking women that has especially got to stop. I really don’t care if you attack me. I take those attacks in stride. But, whenever I post a video of a female technologist there invariably are snide remarks about body parts and other things that simply wouldn’t happen if the interviewee were a man.
It makes me realize just how ascerbic this industry and culture are toward women. This just makes me ill.
I don’t think it should affect hiring processes, either. But I’ll never really know if it does. There are likely employers out there who won’t want to take a chance on a woman who would showcase her sexuality like I do. But I wonder if they would take the same chance on a guy.
I’m about to embark on a project that may put that double standard to the test. We’ll see.
Teresa:
“Some might say that I ask for it by posting bathing suit photos of myself on the Web,”
They’d be dead wrong. That’s like saying a woman asks to be raped by being out on a dark street at night. NOBODY deserves disrespect, violations of their rights or their privacy for any reason, least of all gender or how you choose to dress.
It would be unreasonable to not expect some additional attention if you’re dressed scantily, but that logic does not extend to behavior - there’s a world of difference between me looking at your picture and thinking “wow!” and then treating you as a second class citizen. The first is natural; the second is plain wrong.
Unfortunately, the reality is that you’re quite right - me being male, I can tell you that you’re always going to attract the unwanted attention that Robert Scoble is essentially immune to, and the only difference is gender. I know how men behave. Most men know that finding a woman ‘hot’ from far away has no bearing on how they’d treat her up close - but there are many men who cannot make that distinction and the internet seems to bring them out in droves.
Ha! Thanks, Teresa.
I’m very glad you wrote about this aspect of the discussion. Although I wasn’t going to get into gender issues in my own post, one of the reasons I wanted to juxtapose Scanty Scoble with Scanty Teresa was to make readers aware of how they respond differently to each image.
Could a Carly Fiorina let down her guard online to the same degree as a Michael Dell, and take the same risks with her public persona? The Magic 8-Ball says No.
Wade: I think it’s a great topic and I hereby authorize you to post any scanty picture of me that you can find on your blog for the purposes of that conversation.
Just so you know, I never saw your original request. Otherwise I would have absolutely approved it.
I’d also like to point out that Scoble’s picture, while shirtless, is more goofy, screwing around. I wonder if he’d be willing to post a picture of himself trying to look seductive and flexing his muscles with his shirt off.
So right Teresa about your rights, but as mentioned, there appears to be many that don’t feel the same way. As a member of the male subset of humanity, I must say that several men I’ve met in the past couldn’t care less about how what they say or do affects the women they mistreat. This I find more commonly noted in men towards women than vice versa, but I’ve met one or two women with the same pattern of behavior.
That said, this is always worth bringing up and reminding folks about.
As for seeing naked Scoble pics…you mean you aren’t a member of the Naked Scoble Shots group on Flickr too? (wink)