Gender balance on forum?

Had a random musing that I almost automatically assume most persons on this forum are male. Probably not without cause - average bikes I see being ridden and sold are in the 54-60cm range and I would often see women, female bikes and kit mentioned in the same sentence as 'my partner's' - would you agree there is a large preponderance of male users on the forum and any idea why that might be the case?

Edit: Am aware a lot of this discussion is necessarily going to involve a degree of generalisation but don't think that should stop the discussion anyway, so general health hazard to be left at the door!

would you agree there is a large preponderance of male users on the forum

Yeah. Probably it was the forum's initial user base. There was slightly more macho attitude around at the start too from memory. Most online forums at that time were male dominated, weren't they? It's interesting.

There was slightly more macho attitude around at the start too from memory

You say that to my face!

As one of the more macho women on here I can confirm that the women are few in number compared to the men.

I was just thinking the other day that it feels like there are even fewer now than in "the good old days".

lol

There aren't any girls on the internet.

There was a fair few more 2007-10 Katt, Natt, Clefty, Roxy, Jacqui, Emilia + many others that I can’t remember the user name of or that I still see/keep in contact with but only know their real name now.

Think this has got a lot to do with this place being less of a place for organising real life social meets beers/rides/pedalo TT/other social events etc and is now more like any other online forum

Is there a general majority of males on 'any other online forum's? Would also be interested to know why!

Mumsnet?

I've always believed that 1/3 of London cyclists are Women and 2/3 are Men, I don't know how accurate this is. I suspect Female membership of this site is much lower than 1/3; 1/10 or less perhaps ? Again I don't know.

This prompts two questions, Why is Female represenation so low? And Do we want to do anything about it?

Men enjoy posturing and preening online: women realise its a load of old toss. Probably

Men are lonelier.

Sounds like an ideal time for a list

Man

1. Doubleodavey
   

Women seem to have less of a "voice" in forums like this one. There are far more men and lots of them are self-selecting "experts".

There's only so much mansplaining women will take in their free time when they will spend a lot of their IRL time dealing with the same.

As the forum has aged, so have the members. Statistically, men get more free time than women. Some research shows that men are more likely to spend more free time online socially, women often use being online in a more transactional way to get shit done rather than pissing about.

I think it's just representative of forums generally rather than anything LFGSS can affect change with.

Men are lonelier

Yeah the stats on this are particularly worrying.

I'm inclined to think it's a mix of factors most of which have been flagged.

Facebook Marketplace and Candy Crush are where females spend their free time (sample size of two)

I almost automatically assume most persons on this forum are male

Statistically you're more often right than not, but maybe just try not to assume and it makes the place feel that tinier bit more welcoming to us non-males.

I know a couple of women in real life and, without generalising too much, I just don't think they're geared up to deal with using something as tragic and mundane as an internet forum on a daily basis. I'm just telling it how it is.

I know a couple of women in real life

Humblebrag

Mum and gran

Very well put! And was only a recent realisation so am certainly trying to counteract that tendency. Very interested to know why the statistics tend this way (and statistics do tend to subconsciously predispose behaviour in a particular direction, I think)..

Do we want to do anything about it?

Yes, places online shouldn't have any barriers to exclude others.

I'm a woman, and I post daily on another internet forum. More of a lurker here though.

more macho attitude around at the start

I've got other stuff keeping me busy these days, I can't keep telling everyone to harden the fuck up, at some point you guys need to sort your own toxic masculinity out.

#HTFU

Omg!