Last night I went to the first Girl Geeks Scotland dinner. It is great that finally there is a presence in Scotland! I first heard about Girl Geeks a couple of years ago, when everything was London based, so I joined their mailing list, thinking that I may go to an even since I am in London a fair bit. But I never quite get around to these things when I am down there.

The turn out was good, and the sense of community was invigorating. For some odd reason it reminded me of totally different and extreme opposite experiences I had in Sydney about 10 years ago when I was trying to meet like-minded intelligent women… only they turned out to be not so like-minded. I used to live in a rather alternative indy part of Sydney called Newtown which I just love! It is a colourful place, always full of interesting things happening.

On Enmore Rd, just a short distance from where I lived was a “cyber-café” which remember it was 10 years ago, was a pretty innovative thing. It was called the E.M.U Café, a clever pun on our Australian Emus, but it also stood for Electronic Mutants United. That really should have been a warning sign, and I do recall thinking that calling oneself a mutant was only going to bring negativity, but I also really wanted to find other girls who knew about technology and played with the kit, but weren’t so aggressive or ego-driven as my male peers. How naïve I was.

My first meeting of whatever the group was called (I have long since forgotten) at the E.M.U. café was utterly terrifying. The other group members were a motley group with moth-eaten hairstyles and multiple piercings in their faces.. Not that this was strange for Newtown, many locals sport this look as they take their ferrets on leashes out for walkies. It was the overall atmosphere of passive aggressiveness that was so unsettling. None of the others had hair that had grown longer than their shoulders and they were not very feminine. I felt very self conscious with my long red hair and rather girly feeling dress in a room full of women dressed in overalls, stubbies shorts and tank tops.

It was a time in Sydney when unhappily there was friction between the straight and gay communities due to some awful one off incidents incited by red-necks. Understandably these left many gay people feeling disenfranchised, but unfortunately also left many hostile of “breeders” (or straight people). I seemed to have tripped merrily into such a circle of women, and they were rather disparaging of me to begin with.

However I was determined not to be scared off by gender politics and was adamant in my belief that one’s interests should not be determined solely by the choice of sexual partner one has. People are more than just their sexuality. Although quite a few of the women were angry man haters they were also the only women who were engaging in the same sorts of technical and creative practices that I was, and so we reached an equilibrium of sorts. I was always on edge at these meetings because I felt like an outsider, but it was good to at least be able to bounce ideas off others who knew what I was talking about. I actually did even make a very good friend from the group who is a friend to this day, but I could never quite relax and have a god time.

The Girl Geeks Scotland group was the exact opposite of the E.M.U group and was just really inspring. There was a healthy mix of women from a wide range of backgrounds, and I am sure gender preferences, but the thing was it didn’t matter, and this is how it should be! Being a women involved in technology does not have to be or more to the point, shouldn’t turned into a platform for gender politics. Rather it is a space for discussing things that interest and inspire us in an environment which is supportive and relaxed.

So why have Girl Geeks in the first place? Because the world is not an equal place for all the government rules and political correctness, many of us still have to put up with a lot of sexism at work, so such events provide a safe haven away from that. There are still issues that are predmoninatly female, like if one wants to go for an evening event (like this one was) and one is single-handedly bringing up children, what options are there for childcare? This in particular was one issue discussed, after it became apparent that there were women who would have loved to have come but were caught with childcare issues and the fact that for them the dinner would be more expensive by threefold given they would have to pay for a childminder as well.

Things like this need to be addressed, and they may not be raised in meetings and groups where men are the predominant participants. Women in technology are still a minority and it is always heartwarming to find others who share the same frustrations and joys that you do, and to have a network of people who can inspire and support one another. And just for the record, interested men are allowed to accompany Girl Geeks to the dinners and are always welcome for these events are not discriminatory.