Re: a little somethin' somethin'

• From: cooterchekov
• Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2001 02:57:55 -0700
• Message-ID: <000TJOK93.000VUM58F.12170551-quizbowl_at_...>

I hadn't been meaning to say anything about this
publicly.

Earlier tonight, I told one of the creators of the list
that it offended me. Granted, I was more upset than I
should have been going in; more than that, I was angry.
But in the discussion that followed, she rejected
what I had to say out of hand, so I'm bringing it
here.

Maybe I am hopelessly neurotic, but this list smacks
too loudly of hallway giggles in grade school --
except now it's been posted publicly, letting everyone
know who's In and who's Out.

A few months ago,
to my continued regret, I did something not too
different from this. The Deb Fuller Awards I embarassed us
all with were crude and mean; they were theatre club
in high school all over again, some small cadre of
people taking it upon themselves to call the shots for
the community, and in so doing to highlight part of
group to the degradation of everyone in it: This person
is special, for a superficial reason. You are not
special.

As the posters note, this kind of list has popped up
before. I should note here that the poster I talked to
said that they thought this list would provide a short
laugh one day, and be forgotten the next. For dramatic
effect, I now remind you all that we still remember that
first list, and it was posted five years
ago.

Five years ago, there was no NAQT, and there was no
chatroom or Yahoo! board; more than that, there were no
high schoolers involved in the community the way they
are now. In the interval, the gender ratio of QB has
improved, and at the same time, awareness of gender issues
has markedly improved. This community of ours has
changed from a cult into a symposium.

Maybe this
is all just bitterness about not being on the list;
I was usually also on the non-fun end of the
dodgeball game, so maybe that all ties in too. Everyone's
neuroses are a rich tapestry. However, being the person I
am today, having made this same mistake not too long
ago, I have to say that I object to the spirit of this
list.

Edmund