Also, calling herself sexy and wearing a bikini is specifically aimed at males, so no defense of her should include the phrase "white male". Of course most people paying attention to anything she does are male--she's doing that deliberately!
Finally, the Halo Effect is a thing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_effect
I think this part of her complaint with western media is legit. They all just assume that she’s doing it for the views. Ignore the gay and lesbian scene in Asia entirely to come up with a fake narrative. Completely ignore that she has done some good work just because of the way she looks. Then go on and on about inclusivity and LGBT rights.
Even Adam Savage’s Tested.com seems to have snubbed her. They requested a few CR-30s be sent over for review but then <some shenanigans> And the review never came and I guess they never sent them back to her.
Calling yourself "sexy" and dressing in a bikini appeals to males, and males greatly outnumber lesbians, and that will lead to lots of male twitter followers who would not follow her if all she had were her actions and words. She can't not know this stuff.
You can argue that she isn't deliberately appealing to men, but at some point, "in the knowledge that" is indistinguishable from "deliberately" by anyone who can't read minds.
But what does that have to do with the work she does? And why is that her problem? Given the snubs she’s received, I’d argue that her appearance actually costs her. If she looked more like the western ideal of a female lesbian hacker she’d get more work and sponsorships.
She's doing something that makes it look like she's gaining fans for reasons unrelated to the quality of her work. People will be skeptical of the work of a person who trades on something other than her work.
After all this time the media, popular personalities, maker communities that espouse inclusivity didn’t once look at her work? Got the first mass produced Infinite Z printer to market - still skeptical? Got Chinese companies to comply to open source licenses - still skeptical? Makes a bunch of stuff - still skeptical?
Naomi certainly does seem right that all these communities are judging her on her appearance.
Women who are attracted to women exist. It's possible to think that yourself is sexy without desiring external attention. What you're doing here is projecting and victim-blaming.
I think that honestly underestimates the amount of work that goes into being a consistently successful tech-themed content creator: Wearing a bikini isn't enough to brave competition and short-lived attention spans in that space. Being attractive helps in media, for sure, but you can't go on without putting work into the essential content for very long.
P: "you really only have to read the comments in pretty much every thread about her to figure that one out. I can't even imagine what her inbox must look like."
And to P I'd like to reply that I agree with GP: It appears to me that she has voluntarily joined fighting the anti- white/male fight.