I don't get it.

[lederhosen]

I don't get all the fuss about the 'Open Source Boob Project' business.

Don't get me wrong, I agree that it's skeezy and obnoxious and all. I just don't get why Some Guy On LJ being skeezy at a con is suddenly provoking such a flurry of posting, because my understanding is that there are lots of skeezy people on LJ - quite a few of whom go to cons - and generally it doesn't attract anywhere near this level of attention. If it was Orson Scott Card or somebody else famous (or even Brendan Nelson) I could understand, but not this.

(I think what this boils down to is that a lot of people seem to view the originator of the concept as a Somebody, and I've never figured out what makes him any more noteworthy than all the other folk on LJ who have opinions and aren't afraid to post them. Therefore I just write him off under the "lots of people are idiots" umbrella category.)

Comments

[trixtah.livejournal.com]

That may be true (not at any sci-fi con I've been too, but I admit my sample is not large or North American), but I would also not expect to see explicit sexual behaviour (and I'm sorry, feeling up someone's tits is) in that kind of public context. I agree that fetishwear can be confronting, but if you're expecting it, fine. Most cons do have a well-known culture of "dressing up".

But if there is going to be sexual behaviour, I'd rather be prepared for it. I attended a poly conference which happened to have no overt sexual behaviour, but it would have been fine if there were (up to a point). I would simply have gone elsewhere if something had started up that I wasn't willing to be a party to.

That was something I was prepared for, not a bunch of geeks deciding something amongst themselves, and then perhaps attempting to normalise that behaviour in that context - it can be very difficult for some people to assert themselves against certain kinds of peer pressure (although I'd agree that it's useful if people do learn to grow a pair and tell the breast-feelers to fuck off and find a room).