signal boost: don't take the survey!
There's a fanfiction survey going around "for research purposes." I know a number of us have filled those out before, in a 'hey, help a grad student, why not' sense.
You shouldn't fill this one out; I wouldn't recommend it.
A long and thoughtful explanation of why not is here, and a couple of briefer summaries are here and here, but, in brief, a few issues are at play:
1. The researchers seem to be attempting to essentialize female sexuality and use us to prove something about the hardwiring of women's brains, which is a questionable proposition to start with -- and many of the questions are designed unfairly to reinforce their assumptions. For instance, the sexuality question originally didn't have an 'asexual' or 'other' option -- and apparently some of the questions assume that every slash pairing has a 'dominant' partner and a 'submissive' one.
2. Even if you don't care about that: indications are that the survey is not, shall we say, terribly anonymous. This is iffy enough if they're asking questions about puppies and kittens, but IP tracking/lack of anonymity in a survey that discusses sexual identity, sexual preferences, and topics such as illegal drug use? Particularly dangerous. Especially when you note that one of the survey designers has worked in data mining and the other was funded for some time by Homeland Security.
Now, some people are funded by Homeland Security for entirely innocuous things, but... that plus no privacy plus objectifying/essentializing female desire? No, thank you.
I don't want to be the bug under these peoples' microscopes. I don't recommend you be, either.
Posted on LJ and DW, reply here or there. Currently there are
comments at DW.
You shouldn't fill this one out; I wouldn't recommend it.
A long and thoughtful explanation of why not is here, and a couple of briefer summaries are here and here, but, in brief, a few issues are at play:
1. The researchers seem to be attempting to essentialize female sexuality and use us to prove something about the hardwiring of women's brains, which is a questionable proposition to start with -- and many of the questions are designed unfairly to reinforce their assumptions. For instance, the sexuality question originally didn't have an 'asexual' or 'other' option -- and apparently some of the questions assume that every slash pairing has a 'dominant' partner and a 'submissive' one.
2. Even if you don't care about that: indications are that the survey is not, shall we say, terribly anonymous. This is iffy enough if they're asking questions about puppies and kittens, but IP tracking/lack of anonymity in a survey that discusses sexual identity, sexual preferences, and topics such as illegal drug use? Particularly dangerous. Especially when you note that one of the survey designers has worked in data mining and the other was funded for some time by Homeland Security.
Now, some people are funded by Homeland Security for entirely innocuous things, but... that plus no privacy plus objectifying/essentializing female desire? No, thank you.
I don't want to be the bug under these peoples' microscopes. I don't recommend you be, either.
Posted on LJ and DW, reply here or there. Currently there are
comments at DW.