u/Hagisman

Do you have learned helplessness in your job?

Essentially no matter what you do you can't affect positive change at your job.

Something I've brought up in company surveys has been that PI Planning feels useless because regardless of what we plan the plan changes by the end of PI Planning.

Another situation is that I feel pressured not to say how long I feel like tickets should take because despite the fact that we've had tickets take longer than previous estimates on average there is always pushback on estimates being "too long".

I was talking to a friend years ago about this guy who modded the original Super Marios Bros to have Princess Peach save Mario from Bowser. The article mentioned how it was a feminist mod, but I remember thinking "But she's a woman whose goal is to rescue her boyfriend". Which in my opinion is kind of like the Bechdel Test.

And I went down a rabbit hole of what the combination of genders would come across as in more than just a singular perspective:

* Man saves Woman - Damsel in Distress trope

* Woman saves Man - Woman is required to fix the man's problems.

* Man saves Man - They are in a romantic relationship.

* Woman saves Woman - They are in a romantic relationship.

* Non-Binary saves or is saved by x - They are in a romantic relationship.

It got me to think more so about the way stories are told. I think often I appreciate stories where the story's goal is targeted to the self. For instance, trying to escape a prison your goal is separated from the well-being of someone else.

Just kind of a thought experiment, how would you think of an existing story if the gender roles were reversed? Is it more feminist, less, or no change?