Readercon 18: "The Singularity Needs Women!"

Second panel of the con. These reports are coming along, slowly, as I'm finishing one every two or three days...I hope they're useful and/or interesting.

"The Singularity Needs Women!"
Elizabeth Bear, Kathryn Cramer, Louise Marley, Victoria McManus (L), James Morrow
At Readercon 14 (2002), GoH Octavia Butler said "As the only woman up here, this may be a strange question, but I can't help wondering how much of this speculation about a post-human future has to do with men's desire to control reproduction." We sadly can't ask Octavia exactly what she meant, but we want to pursue this striking statement. Does the post-humanist ideal of freedom from bodily constraints clash fundamentally with the ideal of freedom for the more than half of the population with female bodies? Or might the Singularity actually be a means to the freedoms sought by feminism? Has anyone written fiction about how these ideals interact, and if not, is this an opportunity?

Great set of panelists for this one, with James Morrow as the token male.

[These are reconstructions by memory based on notes. I apologize in advance for any mistakes, and nothing here (even if in quotes) should be assumed to be an exact or even inexact version of what someone said without checking it with them. Comments of the form [ckd: bracketed text] are my own glosses, comments, or snarky bits.]

( my notes on the panel )

Interesting topic, and an interesting panel, though I think Kathryn Cramer was actually on a panel about online society and anonymity rather than the Singularity discussion that the other panelists were on.