After a lot of fuss on the nz-libs listserv, with around 2000 subscribers, several items appeared in the news about librarians and their antagonistic attitude to a generous Paula Ryan offering to host a session at the LIANZA national conference on fashion and style...
apparently some objections were lost in the need for an entertaining story. Professionalism and dress sense are not as closely linked to some as hinted in the promotional email for the event.
What's more, there was not a whisper, not a skerrit, about what was most interesting to me personally... the gender bias of the event and how it was considered a suitable event to have at a professional conference. I voiced some objections on the listserv and a kind male colleague advised me that the flash-over-substance attitude is moving to the male-dominated arenas too... apparently it's quite common to get a group of male professionals together and tell them they need to wear more fashionable clothes at work.
What are we coming to when this sort of 'sizzle' is more important than the 'steak'?
apparently some objections were lost in the need for an entertaining story. Professionalism and dress sense are not as closely linked to some as hinted in the promotional email for the event.
What's more, there was not a whisper, not a skerrit, about what was most interesting to me personally... the gender bias of the event and how it was considered a suitable event to have at a professional conference. I voiced some objections on the listserv and a kind male colleague advised me that the flash-over-substance attitude is moving to the male-dominated arenas too... apparently it's quite common to get a group of male professionals together and tell them they need to wear more fashionable clothes at work.
What are we coming to when this sort of 'sizzle' is more important than the 'steak'?
Powered by ScribeFire.
No comments:
Post a Comment