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According to the authors of Feminist Technology it is possible that a technology used in men’s bodies could be feminist. I would like to consider the case of drugs to treat erectile dysfunction. For the moment, let’s leave aside how men might enjoy this technology, either in using the treatment or being the partners benefitting from it, and focus on if and how women might benefit from this technology. The successful application of this treatment can provide women whose partners lose the ability to muster an erection with continued sexual activity involving the penis of that partner. It can also provide a greater choice in sexual partners equipped with an erection-capable penis to women looking for such a partner, by allowing available men to remain in the category of erection-capable when they might otherwise lose that ability.

I have some concerns. These benefits revolve around the presence and use of a penis in that activity; it does nothing for women interested in sex without a penis. These drugs are marketed primarily towards men, and it may be that by focusing on this market segment research and development of technologies aimed at facilitating sexual activity without a penis are marginalized. Relying on pharmaceutical companies to create technologies that facilitate sexual activity seems to offer little promise of equitable distribution of attention to obstacles to that activity and may very well work to reinforce only the kinds of sex that do sell.  Even within the narrower population of those who are in the market for sexual activity involving an erection-capable penis, this technology stratifies sexual pleasure along class lines; there are those that simply cannot pay to keep it up. This has repercussions for sexual selection, since men who cannot afford such a treatment disqualify themselves from going all the way with those who are looking for an erection-capable penis.

What I find ultimately at stake here is: how important is the male penis to female sexual satisfaction? There are other technologies that can be used to make the penis erect such as implants to simulate an erection, but these present even more extreme versions of the concerns outlined above. There are certainly technologies that can substitute for the erect penis in sexual activities in terms of simulating dimensions and motion.  As it stands, the technology of pharmaceutical treatments for erectile dysfunction appear to be quite unsatisfactory from most feminist perspectives, but what improvements or alternatives would be better?  Can this treatment technology be improved or can alternative technologies serve just as well or even better in affording women sexual pleasure?

Woman pictured using baby changing table on Continental Airlines.

In this post I add another; instructions directed to riders of public transportation. In a recent post to the Material World blog entitled, “Feminist Technologies Are Assistive Technologies: What the Feminist Technology Movement Can Learn from the Disability Rights Movement,” I explain why alterations to public transport, initially designed for people with disabilities and later extended to pregnant women and passengers with small children, should be embraced as feminist technologies.  Here I address how these priority seating policies are conveyed to the public and conclude that this is a case of a feminist technology which is undermined by sexist graphics.

Given the multilingual, multicultural backgrounds of passengers, most public transport systems use pictograms or a combination of pictograms and text to designate reserved seats for people with special needs. In Vienna, and on some  local Japanese Railroad Lines, seats near the door are reserved for the elderly, the disabled, pregnant women and women traveling with young children. The pictograms in both cases are gendered.

Women are pictured in the two reproductive roles and men in the two non-reproductive ones, even though, with the exception of being pregnant, all of the states pictured (being elderly, using assistive technologies, traveling with an infant) pertain to both men and women. In other words, all but the pregnant woman could have been represented by a gender-neutral human symbol, or by a man or a woman.

What are the gender politics of these choices?   One could say that the signs are gender-fair since equal numbers of women and men are pictured.  One could also argue that the image of a woman traveling with a baby should be lauded for representing reality, for crediting women with the work they do. But if the pictograms are meant to represent the sex of the people most likely to be in any of the four groups, one would need to also depict the elderly, since in Austria and Japan, as in the US, women represent a significantly larger proportion of the aged. Women are also more likely to have an ambulatory disability, in part, because of their longevity.*1

I believe the more convincing argument is that graphics inscribe sexist gender scripts. The depiction of the person caring for the child as woman should be condemned for reinforcing stereotypes, and in so doing making it harder for men to do this job comfortably, and harder for women to get men to do this job.

There are several alternatives. One is to use gender-neutral icons as done on Keio trains in Japan reserving priority seating for the same four categories of riders as in Austria, even for the pregnant woman. This is certainly preferable to the sexist-stereotype-reinforcing graphics pictured above. Although “gender-neutral” pictograms actually look identical to the icons used to represent men, such  icons leave open the possibility for both women and men to be imagined as occupying these roles. 

An even better alternative, from my point of view, is to post multiple versions of the instructions with the sex of all but the pregnant woman changing.   These versions might keep the two and two ratio: e.g., one with men representing the elderly person and the child-minder and women representing the pregnant person and the person with a disability; another version with men occupying the disabled and child-minding categories; and women representing pregnancy and seniority. Or perhaps, some versions could have men representing all but the pregnant category; or women for all four categories. Creating multiple gendered alternatives would be similar to the strategy adopted by some feminist authors of systematically alternating the use of male and female pronouns in their writing (Madson and Shoda 2006). In both cases, the practice destabilizes established gender norms in ways that benefit women by conveying wider ranges of freedom from sex-restricted social roles. Unlike the gender-neutral icons, which allow the reader to bring her/his own stereotypes to the interpretation of the message, these sexually-explicit pictograms convey information about who occupies these roles;  information which may be at odds with the readers’ assumptions. It is this possibility which gives the proposed graphics their feminist potential as consciousness-altering technologies.*2  Variety would increase the likelihood that passengers would notice the signs.

Advertisers understand the huge potential that notices on public transportation hold for reaching and influencing people. As one English advertising company that specializes in reaching “consumers on the move” notes, the potential for reaching this “captive audience” is huge. Of the interior panels on London tubes they sell, they note, “With an average 13 minutes spent in carriage, Tube Car Panels offer advertisers the benefit of long dwell time… [which] ensure[s passengers]  have time to consider and attend to the content.”  The “dwell time” is even longer on buses.  The “5 billion bus journeys made in the UK last year” averaged 30 minutes, hence, offering “a large and receptive audience to communicate with.” This company also reports research finding which indicate advertisements on public transportation are “welcomed” by passengers, in comparison with advertisements on tv, for instance, presumably because of their potential to reduce boredom. These same affordances pertain when it comes to feminist actions.

Of course, it would be wonderful if we were able to get those, and all other, advertisements to convey feminist messages too. Doing so, however, seems a much more daunting challenge than making changes in official communications like the instructional signs discussed here. Furthermore, the authority of such official communications may make interventions in this area have particular merit.

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Linda L. Layne is the Hale Professor of Humanities and Social Sciences and a professor of anthropology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. She co-edited the book Feminist Technology.

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References Cited

CBS Outdoor: Media on the Move http://www.cbsoutdoor.co.uk/Discover-CBS-Outdoor/About-CBS-Outdoor/  Accessed January 31, 2011

Erickson, W., Lee, C., von Schrader, S. 2010 “Disability Statistics from the 2008 American Community Survey (ACS )” Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on Disability Demographics and Statistics (StatsRRTC). Accessed Jan 31, 2011 from www.disabilitystatistics.org 

Madson, Laura and Jennifer Shoda 2006 “Alternating Between Masculine and Feminine Pronouns: Does Essay Topic Affect Readers’ Perceptions?” Sex Roles  54(3/4):  2006 

Winner, Langdon 2002 Gender Politics and Technological Design” Paper presented at the Women’s Studies Center, Colgate University.

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*1 Statistics for Austria are from the UN Disability Statistics Compendium (1990).

In the US women report significantly higher rates of ambulatory disability. 

*2 A similar effect was reported by Langdon Winner the first time he encountered a baby changing station in a men’s public restroom. His first assumption was that he had entered the women’s room accidentally (Winner 2002).

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I stumbled across the Property Leash security system while searching the web for feminist technologies.  I found the website Market Launcher, which tries to connect inventors with investors. Under the section “Women’s Products (including for children)” I found the ad for “The Property Leash.” I thought that his would be good candidate for feminist technology since it was developed with women in mind.  The product was developed by a man whose mother had had her purse snatched when he was young.

The leash is meant to  protect by thwarting  bump and grab attack and would also prevent women from accidentally walking away from their purses. The goal is to bring attention to the purse snatcher so that others can come to her aid. It is not intended for use when alone or at night when it might become dangerous for the woman to remain attached to her bag while her assailant struggles to take it. 

While primarily conceived of as a solution to the problem of purse snatching, the creator suggests that the product has a wide demographic due to the large concern for maintaining personal property including in addition to purses, book bags and briefcases. The creator sees a role for this product at restaurants, summer festivals and concerts but  focuses on the high risk of purse snatching at casinos, the intended introductory market. The strap allows the user to attach it to her leg or arm and prevent the attack.

What I couldn’t get out of my head  was the image of a potential purse-snatcher jerking and pulling on the purse in full public view and the potential for injury that could result. Catching a belt loop or loose clothing can be painful enough if only propelled by the person’s own careless force. Imagine the injury potential when a person is forcefully pulling and jerking on the property leash. Granted, the creator notes this danger as a problem at night, but is it merely limited to that? The underlying assumption of the Property Leash is that the world is dangerous and that it is better to attach a nylon cord to the purse in order to hang onto it rather than letting the item go. At what point does the property become more important than the person attached to it?

Furthermore, it may serve only to reinforce fears of theft in the public world. How can you forget that you might be in the presence of those who seek to victimize you when a strap constantly reminds you that you are secured to your own purse? It also suggests an even stronger connection between women and their purses. Rather than just being associated, they are physically connected. The purse, in a sense, is now an attached part of the woman’s body. Perhaps it has the picture of the handcuffed briefcase that protects nuclear secrets or other valuables in mind, but creates a gendered product in order to approximate that object. Although it mentions that this product might also be useful to men and children, it ignores the differences about what men and women are expected to carry with them that might require a leash. It claims to be a product that is designed to protect robberies and theft of ID, but men typically keep their IDs and money in wallets. Chain wallets have had various amount of success. So if men were using the property leash, it is much more likely it would be an occasional use, not something that was carried with them every day.

In essence, the inventor does not seem to  be thinking  about the real circumstances in which women and men find themselves. While it has a useful goal, it is unlikely that it provides the peace of mind that it claims, and in fact, may produce more harm than help. It does raise the interesting question of why women are expected to carry purses. Perhaps, like high heels, they are intended to encumber women, restricting their freedom by making movement more difficult?

The more prominent message of this “seduction kit” is an endorsement of female sexual pleasure and sexual assertiveness. Is it easier for women to demand safe sex  if they do so under the guise of an entitlement to sexual pleasure?
  
Several of the other products sold in the 15,000 washroom vending machines operated by Perform Marketing in the UK also promote both male and female sexual pleasure (though none other than the condoms promote safe sex).   According to their website, “washroom vending provides solutions for distress, impulsive and anonymous purchases.”   For the “implusive” buying price of 8.88 pounds, pub-goers may purchase herbal supplements to enhance sexual performance and pleasure in two varieties, Bleu Zeus for men and Pink Venus for women, or a water-proof stimulator ring  (with battery life up to 40 min.) advertised to “provide the ultimate sexual buzz for him and her.”

On the one hand, the fact that women’s sexual pleasure is now so routinely understood to be as legitimate as that of men’s is surely a good sign.  On the other hand, it is doubtful if any of these products actually enhance sexual pleasure, but are rather simply a way for the product producers, vending machine companies, and pubs to “exploit profitable market trends?”  But if the cultural acceptability of women’s sexual pleasure evident in these products makes it more likely that male partners will be willing to use condoms, should they not be not be welcomed as a feminist technologies, while at the same time understanding that a “cultural fix” is needed to bring women’s sense of entitlement to safe sex to the new, welcome level of culturally acceptability that sexual pleasure now appears to hold?

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Linda L. Layne is the Hale Professor of Humanities and Social Sciences and a professor of anthropology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. She co-edited the book Feminist Technology.

I refer here not to the perennial questions of whether one can be ‘pretty’ and still a feminist or whether one can wear (or adorn one’s kindle or phone in) pink, and still be a feminist, though these questions remain compelling for my students almost all of whom began the course unwilling to label themselves feminist. 

I’m thinking now of the role of fashion in consumer culture and whether its pervasiveness serves women well or ill.  ‘Fashion’ is one of the primary means for getting people to buy goods they don’t need.

According to Strasser (1999:188), in her book on the social history of trash, middle-class Americans women were introduced to the concept of fashion through clothing in the 1850s, and the notion had been extended to many other items by the 1920s. It was at this time, for instance, that bathroom fixtures started to be available in different colors.

As Sallie Han notes in her comment to my previous post, when we personalize mass produced items with fashion accessories, we often do so with other mass produced, often gendered items. 

From an ecological, socialist, or existential feminist position, the spread of ‘fashion’ to every increasing range of cheap, mass-produced goods, such as the ‘fashionable’ pill pack is not in women’s best interest (or men’s either). At an individual level, it’s a waste of money, is probably made by underpaid, toxically-exposed women in the South, uses nonrenewable resources to produce and transport, and when it ends up in a landfill will be nonbiodegradable.

Does this form of self-expression serve women well? How do such products extend their capacities, and/or further their life projects?

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Linda L. Layne is the Hale Professor of Humanities and Social Sciences and a professor of anthropology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. She co-edited the new book Feminist Technology.

The page proofs of Feminist Technology were ready in time for me to give the book a trial run in my spring course, Women Leaders/Feminist Entrepreneurs. As anticipated, the students really connected with the material. Always keen discussants, they were exceptionally animated and engaged with the chapters on tampons, birth control pills, and home pregnancy tests, items with which they had personal experience.

In discussing the two-edged sword of being able to pass as a non-menstruating woman by using tampons, the discussion turned to similar issues with regard to the birth control pill. Before I knew it several of the students in this all-female class had whipped out their pill packs to illustrate the point. One student used an Ortho brand case which a flower on it which she explained was designed to look like a compact, i.e., to disguise the pills, and present them to the casual viewer as a makeup tool (something appropriately feminine) rather than a tool for non-reproductive sex (something for which one should/would feel embarrassed). A google search led me to an article by Dawn Stacey (2009) where I learned that my student’s case was one of a line of “stylish pill compacts” developed by Ortho in 2002 “that allow women to be fashionably discreet while feeling at ease carrying pills on the go. . . . There are several designs, including limited editions by fashionista Nicole Miller, who is ‘passionate about continuing to design fashionable compacts for the Pill since it allows women to feel confident and helps them live a more balanced lifestyle.’” One company, Cover Me Crazy, urges women to “Perk Up Your Purse!” promising that with their pill and condom covers  “no longer will you have to be embarrassed about carrying your birth control pills or loose condoms in your purse.”

There are two issues: 1) Does making a pill pack “fashionable” make them more or less feminist? And, 2) Does disguising pill packs as non-sexual tools make them more or less feminist?

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Linda L. Layne is the Hale Professor of Humanities and Social Sciences and a professor of anthropology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. She co-edited the new book Feminist Technology.