#waking the feminists - when acknowledging mistakes benefits us all

I’ve ben following the #wakingthefeminists debate in Ireland which was the social media response to the recent announcement of The Abbey Theatre 2016 Programme which, unfortunately, had only one play written by a woman of the ten plays programmed in total. I’ll raise my hand here and declare that I am an old friend of the Artistic Director Fiach MacConghail and given the activity on Twitter had reason to remember that I’d been the person who suggested he should join the platform several years ago.

Fiach MacConghail Artistic Director of The Abbey Theatre

I work with a lot of senior people around digital literacy some of which includes encouraging them to use social media to provide more open leadership. A key sign of course of whether they get it or not is how they behave when things don’t go as they might have liked. Do they stay open and accessible? Or do they suddenly become silent? So the debate was a testing one in this regard and I think it is to his credit that Fiach did not become suddenly incommunicado. I was also struck by the differences in the arts and culture sector and the gaming/tech sector. In the latter women who declare themselves feminists or express forcible options become the subject of  horrendous abuse and trolling as evidenced by the whole #gamergate saga something that was covered in last years brilliant Inspirefest and which I wrote about in my blog Stamping Feet of Social Sword. While I’m sure there has been some negative feedback to the women participating in the campaign, what’s been amazing to see has been the open solidarity expressed around the world by so many women for Irish women playwrights and the need for greater gender parity in the arts.

Actress Debra Messing showing her support for the #wakingthefeminists campaign

I welcome the vigorous debate that has ensued since the announcement of the WAKING THE NATION programme. I look forward to participating in an open and frank dialogue and offer the Abbey Theatre as a venue for this discussion.

Fiach MacConghail
Director, Abbey Theatre
06/11/15

The initial response from Fiach probably demonstrated some of the perils of Twitter - 140 characters does not allow for any nuance or subtlety but I think the open letter from The Abbey to the arts community is an exemplar of how mistakes should be acknowledged and dealt with. In the open and calling for open debate. Not like in the game and tech community where it is brushed aside, ignored or descends into such harmful trolling (SXSW showing another good way to deal with controversy).

I look forward to the coming debate on Thursday (details here) and to the contribution that it will make to moving the agenda forward so that women will be better represented in Irelands cultural landscape in the future. And I congratulate and thank all of the women who have been part of the #wakingthefeminists campaign.

But I also think that it should be noted that in acknowledging a big mistake, remaining open to debate, hosting,  attending and participating in that debate demonstrates the kind of leadership from Fiach that I for one would welcome seeing much more of in the tech and gaming community. We need men to provide visible leadership most especially when they have made a mistake. It’s the lack of this that creates the current structures that make changing the ratio such a battle.