Did you get a chance to look into that great Intro to Statistics course at UW Extension? I think you'd really get a lot out of something like that, Eli.

Clearly women should loose the right to vote. They OBVIOUSLY do not care!

As was said in earlier comments, without knowing the breakdown of Slog readers by gender, this is meaningless. It is not just an issue of, "that would be interesting," but rather, if you want to answer your question, you need to know how many men/women read Slog.

What, have Eli understand that a non-random sample with a leading question that is more likely to be checked might affect the results?

Nah.

Next thing you know, you'd want them to ask something like:

1. Are you male?
Yes
No
I'm transgendered you insentive clod

1.A. Do you post to politics threads?
I post
I read but don't post
I am Fnarf
What threads?

2. Are you female?
Yes
No
I'm transgendered you insensitive clod

2.A. Don't you think Brittney let herself go after the second child?
Yes
No
I'm ECB - where's the politics question on the express bus for non-wheelchair bike riders?

You can't trust either of the results. I kept emptying my cookie cache to vote for 'man' whenever 'woman' score a few % points.

Based on the total votes, I'm guessing I'm not the only one.

WOOT!

Cookie Cache really needs to be a 21st century breakfast cereal.

*scored.

Woo! I am quoted! Fame is mine!
Theories about why men have it? Poe surely helped, but assuming there really is that kind of divide, I have no idea. I explained why my girl never posts, but that reason may not apply to other ladies. So....
Kind of a pointless exercise, wasn't it?
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Men are better than women.

Herstory just whispered to me that women are better to men, but she didn't want to post on this obviously MCP thread.

Most people are apathetic towards politics in general, regardless of gender. This poll, if it says anything, says that men are more likely to comment than women are, which says nothing about politics and everything about Slog.

maybe more men in general read slog than other blogs? it could just be your sample

1) Almost all politicians and the staffers they appoint are white men.

2) Almost all political speakers and writers in the media are white men and they tend to invite white male guests.

3) The white men in charge like to dissuade women from joining in political discourse by belittling women and by using irrelevant but culturally male language and concepts. For example, it seems like every political blogger and pundit loves to talk about baseball and football and uses sports analogies. For some reason, I never see makeup analogies.

4) Every post but one on the Stranger's 2008 election blog was written by men. Of course, there's also the blog's focus on gay male issues while almost ignoring lesbian issues and completely ignoring transgender issues.

I'm surprised that the female readership is as high as 39%. For the men out there, how many blogs do you read and comment on that are mostly written by women?

@13

It's a gay rag. Deal with it.

Also, the above is why I completely support Hillary Clinton and am baffled when women don't (ECB?). Women and racial minorities will never be as politically active or respected as white men until we're well-represented.

Jesus!

Is it really so suprising and heartbreaking that men are 2/3 more interested in politics than women?

Maybe you all didn't notice, but for the last oh...half-million years or so, outside of who gets to breed, men have called most of the shots. So this result is strange to you? Bizarre? Unfair? Wtf?

And what's with attacking the methodology? It's a simple poll! Are you male or female? It's a question of biology. And where biology fails to adequately define, such as in the case of the hermaphrodite, I would think the individual self-identifies with one group over the other.

On top of all of this, who cares?! Who cares what gear you have between your butthole and your belly button? Aren't we all political junkies? Aren't we all concerned about the future of our planet, our species, and our nation?

Focus people! Shit like this cost us the last two presidential elections and barley got us a majority in the House. Focus on the problem! Work toward the solution! Penises and Vaginas are wedge issues!

Now get serious and get out there and get those motherfucking Kleptocrats out of the government!

I suspect that the reason more men slog is much like the reason that more men prefer video games - men are more likely to feel content after hashing things out or venting frustration in a non-personal setting.

. . . And sorry for the comparions to Halo, guys, but, from nature or from nurture (and this is just from my experience), women tend to be more practical.

Women also tend to be less "LISTEN TO ME! LISTEN TO ME!"

"FIRST!"

@13- If the stranger was woman-controlled, but still as irreverent, zany, and transgressive, I would still have been reading it (vs Seattle Weakly) and still have ended up on Slog. Just because the structures in place are currently male-controlled doesn't mean women couldn't step in and still get respect and attention. Just because the status quo is X doesn't mean we all support that. Change it and see if we act like the chauvinist shits you think we are.
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also men most likely are big nerds for posting on slog, or more likely they are big nerds for polling on slog.

@17

Everything you just vomited is pure shit, and you know it.

jamier, you live in Seattle, no? Then you live in a state with two female senators, a female governor, a state senate whose Democratic caucus is 67% female and a state legislature that is 40% female overall. You live in a city whose council is 1/3 female, and was almost half female recently. In this particular context, at least, the notion that women are naturally shying away from the political talk because "almost all politicians are white men" has flaws.

Oh, and ... makeup analogies? You've got to be fucking kidding me.

@17- Good observations, but from the male side let me say it seems most women are too quiet and don't speak up whether it would help them or not. If they don't like a situation, they'll let themselves be frustrated rather than bother trying to change things. Or they'll be passive aggressive- more likely to poison an enemy than to shoot them, which to a man's view is more cruel and creepy than open aggression.
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btw, my post @22 was speaking in gross generalizations, since a lady opened up the floor to that.
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Eli, you seem genuinely interested in polling and statistics... I think you'd really benefit from taking a statistics course. It's one of those fields that isn't intuitive. You're collecting a lot of data, but I worry that you're just taking blind stabs at analyzing it.

I hate video games, and I don't like to speak up about politics, and this goes for most women I know as opposed to most men I know -

@ 20 - you can take that, or leave it, because it's from my experience, not yours.

@ 22 - you're absolutely right, But to see an example of a woman who likes video games and hashing things out aggressively online, see @ 20.

@25- Yes, we are both speaking in gross generalizations- there will be many exceptions. I'm sure I've known several guys lacking the self-confidence to be outspoken as well...
BTW, there's middle ground- My gf hates speaking about politics and posting online, but does like video games. Of course, not shooters... She likes Silent Hill, Katamari Damacy, and other noncompetitive fare.
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Eli: What's the difference between a poll and a survey?

* And @ 17 I meant "women are more practical" only in this context only. I don't think either gender, even in my dialogue of gross generalizations, could be called more practical than the other.

@17: ...and women use three to seven times more words per day than men, but men have the edge in the happiness gap, and the Inuit have at least 40 words for snow. Psychobabble.

I'm so happy cuz I'm a gummy bear! GUMMY BEAR!

What I've apparently learned today:

1) Women are too weak-willed to assert themselves online in the face of strong opposing opinions.

2) Men are stupid and waste their time ranting pointlessly online while women dedicate themselves to more productive pursuits.

3) Men are big nerds.

4) White men run everything and need to talk more about makeup and shopping or women will get bored and go home.

5) Eli doesn't know shit about statistics. And is insensitive to trannies.

Instead of endlessly analyzing an online poll of questionable validity, wouldn't it be more fun to get back to talkin' smack politics and gossiping about boys?

Can't we all just get along?

The ultimate analysis of the poll:

61% of respondents (n=669) identified themselves as men, and 39% identified themselves as women. The conclusion can therefore be drawn that 408 respondents were probably male and 261 were probably female.

The end.

"This poll, if it says anything, says that men are more likely to comment than women are, which says nothing about politics and everything about Slog."

No, it says that, on the male-oriented SLOG, that a vast majority of the ones who read the poll and voted in it self-identified themselves as male.

We can draw no conclusions as to the real gender, the gender of Stranger readers, the gender of blog posters, or even the gender of people who post on political blogs in poll threads.

For all we know three-quarters of the voters were Mr. Poe.

This is true.

You can thank me later for my hard work.

Dern, I was out sick yesterday and I missed out on getting poled.

Gummi Bears sound good.

40% taco, 60% sausage is not a "total sausage fest"

@17 - Killtacular!

I'm a woman. I read The Slog every day. I love it. I never post.

There's a certain pack mentality that permeates The Slog - and other blogs. And if there is one thing I've learned it is to stay the fuck away from male environs when The Pack's running.

Individual men are great. But somehow when they bunch up they often form into something different from the nice guy you were talking to 5 minutes ago. Don't know why. Don't care to ponder why. It just happens. Best to leave the boys to their fun and leave the field.

Even male groups with issues one against the other - ie. white vs non-white, gay vs straight, liberal vs conservative, will suddenly go into Pack Mode with the female as the agreed upon goat.

I call it "The Brotherhood of The Genitalia" … it trumps all male divisions and finds a common enemy - women.

@39 - Uh-oh fellas! [Hill contested]

Could you repeat the question?

I like tacos.

Fish tacos are nice too.

@39

Like pit bulls, they can smell your fear.

@43 - [Hill controlled]

@43....
I'm not 'afraid'. I'm not interested. Let the boys play! It's harmless.

It isn't like blogging matters. They want to do group mastubatory, high-fiving sessions why should I care?

There's no pay check attached.

It's worth pointing out that this poll's results are consistent with other surveys of political blog demographics which find a predominantly male (and white, and older) reader base. See http://www.blogads.com/survey/2006_political_blogs_reader_survey.html and http://www.blogresearch.com/articles/JOHNSON_&_KAYE_2004.pdf

Oops. Sorry. I meant to reference Gregg at #39.

I'm unable to access the links to Hill Contested or Hill Controlled so I don't know what the point is - when I get to a bigger system I will.

Because these polls are unscientific, they are a waste of time and breath.

Science matters.

Also, for those who just can't get enough of the online front in the war between the sexes, this.

gummies of the world, represent yo! our gender bending gelatin bodies are the tasty utopia of the masses!!! the future belongs to gummi.

I regret I have but one gummi bear to sacrifice ...

maybe you should get Science on the case to fix your survey methods.

Dr. Science?

Oh no. Eli is just a little benighted, but that Jonathan Golob is up to no good. He sounds like he's from the Discovery Institute, promoting intelligent design by casting doubt on real science. He basically wrote all this utter blather on the Slog one time to convince anyone who didn't know better that scientific polling was riddled with doubt.

So once real polls were dragged down to the same level as a silly self-selected web poll, and you're supposed think they're both equally suspect, and you might as well use an unscientific web poll.

I don't know why he said it -- he seemed like somebody who would know better. Maybe he thought it was funny? He's no David Schmader, that's for sure.

Perhaps women are more analytical than men and the vast majority of slog posts are just regurgitations of already reported facts without any insightful additions. Why bother posting if you're just reposting something I've already read, already thought about, analyzed and digested, it's all old news, you don't even bother reading any of the alternative news feeds (The Nation/Harpers/Foreign Affairs/etc - - not you Eli, I saw that post a few months ago). We ladies are bored with Reuters and the NYT. Maybe I'll try posting more often. Frankly, I'm usually far to busy thinking about bigger issues than Nickels' cheating brother. Opinions insight discourse, facts are just facts.

@ 39 - I certainly have to agree with you.

@ 55 - I agree with this as well.

Even what I thought was an innocent post, an attempt to be helpful, was criticized in nonproductive ways.

And it wasn't even entertaining.

I mean - about as entertaining as a game of football.

Didn't vote in the survey, but thought I'd mention there's apparently going to be a real, live Everett Sausage Fest this week. Or so I've seen on Everett Ave. this week.

Less women take idiotic surveys?

I am just glad that 61 plus 39 equals 100, otherwise I MIGHT CARE.

Men have invented everything.

I've seen the banner for everett sausage fest! That kills me. @39- I take offense. I'm a dude and I don't "gang up on women." You see a few token misogynistic fucks who always talk smack at you lady types and perceive that we form some evil brotherhood keeping you down. Y'know what? Seems most times I'm in a unisex chat room and someone insults a lady, there's guys that come to her defense. A cheesy sense of chivalry, which is also sexist I guess.
But you get my point- I ain't in no brotherhood of cock-havers. And I honestly haven't seen that there is one.
I do see some pack mentality that even women get in on- When an unpopular view is posted, many people will bombard it it with ridicule and sometimes abuse as well. Maybe you get ganged up on because you talk a lot of shit.
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Maybe there is a correlation with the study that says men have a lot more leisure time than woman.

Even here in Seattle most women I know work, they are the primary care takers of any offspring, and are the primary homemakers.

I on the other hand am a lesbian so my partner and I share the workload more evenly. And we don’t have kids. Thus, I have time to sit around slogging about Hillary v. Obama and Ron Sims latest political fiasco.

I have worked for a lot of political campaigns and non profits and hands down women make up a much greater percentage of contributors and those who volunteer. Maybe we can say that women put their money where their mouth is rather than sitting at their computer pontificating about what they think.

Maybe women don't like to post in trash-talking enviros like politico threads on SLOG?

That would be my guess.

@62- I have to agree with my girl- it's hard to feel motivated to do much more than vote. I couldn't campaign for the Dems because I don't trust them as far as I can kick 'em. We're among the multitude of voting Americans who can be relied on to vote for the lesser of two evils. But if there's ever a revolution with a real chance of succeeding... You'll see what kind of campaign the rest of us will join.
Meanwhile, pontificating helps me feel like I am contributing to the discourse of civilization in some small way. Ways of thinking are spread only when people TALK about them. Your campaigns and non-profits help, but I think internet discourse really can help too.
I think the real reason women don't post is simple social anxiety. You've been socialized to keep your mouths shut and be agreeable. In arguments many women frequently capitulate or give up, even though they don't want to, and therefore feel like they aren't qualified to defend or promote a viewpoint. That's what my lady seems like. When confronted at work or whatever, she freezes up and just keeps her head low and accepts the abuse, then thinks of stuff she could have said later. Guys need to get stuff off their chests, and girls SEEM like they're OK with never letting bastards know how they feel, but it's hard for dudes to imagine being that quiet is healthy. Tell me I'm wrong.
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