I live in three very male-dominated spaces: transportation, bicycling, and academia. I’m rarely able to tweet about any of those topics without receiving replies & R/Ts that range from mansplaining to outright threatening. 2/
4:02 PM · Mar 8, 2022

Just about every time I demonstrate any sort of expertise in any of these topics, I can expect to need to follow up with multiple blocks and reports of accounts I’ve never heard of. Y’all, it sucks. 3/
4:02 PM · Mar 8, 2022

But when I removed the obvious female markers from my profile, everything instantly changed. One innocuous thread about interactions with drivers garnered 1148 likes and 133 retweets, a podcast invitation, and importantly only a single ‘well actually’ reply. 4/
4:02 PM · Mar 8, 2022

The rest of my tweets during that time had similar, if less viral, responses. Over the course of the month I got 109 new followers and zero harassing or threatening replies, R/Ts, or @s. ZERO. 5/
4:02 PM · Mar 8, 2022

It made a huge difference on me, emotionally. I felt lighter, freer, much more welcome to speak my mind in the virtual spaces I occupy when I was being perceived as a man instead of a woman. For the first time, I felt like the expert my friends & colleagues say I am. 6/
4:02 PM · Mar 8, 2022

I’m not a gender scholar, but I can attest first hand that online gender-based harassment is real, hurtful, and dangerous.
Please: learn how to recognize it, call it out, and knock it off. 7/
4:02 PM · Mar 8, 2022

[the next day...]

I'm not surprised how many women this thread resonated with, but I'm pleased w/ how broadly it's spread & how many important convos it's sparked. If you want to do more, chheck out @JulieSLalonde's bystander intervention training https://twitter.com/JulieSLalonde/status/1500966252298317826… (h/t
@JonahGrahamKC
) 8/

...and follow, support, and cite the women doing amazing work in typically male-dominanted fields.
@UrbanDemog has started a great list for urban mobility, many of whom were new to me: https://twitter.com/UrbanDemog/status/1501371415337082883… 9/

... and finally, please remember this isn't a men vs. women thing. It's about those with privilege failing to use that privilege to lift others up (and often using it to keep others down). @Osaabiikwe & @rebeccalsanders both explain this brilliantly in the thread... 10/
1:50 PM · Mar 9, 2022

...here: https://twitter.com/Osaabiikwe/status/1501548685095841793… and here: https://twitter.com/rebeccalsanders/status/1501472903832879115… 11/
Quote Rebecca Sanders
@rebeccalsanders
·
Mar 9, 2022
A deeply troubling account from a brilliant, thoughtful friend and colleague. Men, you may not ever mean to mansplain or worse, but patriarchy is the water in which you swim, as white supremacy is for us white folks. We must be more aware of how we affect others and do better. x.com/DrTCombs/statu…

Thanks to all y'all for listening to me, supporting me, and amplifying me. And thanks to my parents for giving me a nickname that could go either way. 😉 12/12
1:50 PM · Mar 9, 2022

OK, back to today.

I know the fediverse hasn't felt like home for a lot of people, but to me, it's indescribably more welcoming than that other place. I miss my friends in the old neighborhood, and the amazing connections I was able to make around the world, but those of you who are here, keeping this place safe and tolerant and affirming, more than make up for it.

thank you.