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My positive experience as a woman in tech

lea.verou.me

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Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#21

Post by smikhanov »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #6

Sexism is not "over-rated" OECD's Social Institutions and Gender Index Is at http://www.genderindex.org , and is a litany of baked in prejudice, violence, lack of access to education, lack of access to property and other normal legal rights. When we compare the lot of a 16 yo girl in Rwanda to a High schooler in SF, yes it is hard to find where the High schooler is having problems, but we just have to look at the rat…

    When we compare the lot of a 16 yo girl in Rwanda to a
    High schooler in SF, yes it is hard to find where the High
    schooler is having problems, but...
You should have stopped at this "but". Do you seriously think that it's reasonable to put into the same basket the girls' problems in Rwanda and girls' problems in modern San Francisco?

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#22

Post by blowski »

sktrdie wrote: post #3

Am I the only one who thinks "sexism" is overrated? It's misinterpreted by so many and I'm not sure I understand what it means most of the time. I think humans are prejudice about so many things that it's hard to keep track and "give a name" to every single prejudice. Obviously "sex" does set us apart much more strongly than, say, race, or probably any other thing, so I really find it normal that there are stereotype…

Exactly. Sexism is not identical to misogynism. Where the latter is about being nasty, sexism is believing something about somebody solely based on their gender.

So if I assume you don't like pizza and football because you're female, so instead buy you frozen yoghurt, I'm being sexist even if it's with the nicest of intentions.

We're all human and we all make mistakes, but sometimes people blow those mistakes out of all proportion. We just need more understanding and patience on both sides of the fence.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#23

Post by icebraining »

Wintamute wrote: post #14
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #4

> "Ironically, one of the very few times I have experienced any sexism in the industry was when a dude was trying to be nice to me." I'm not sure how ironic this is. It seems to be setting up a straw man of sexist behaviour being the domain of moustache-twirling villians, rather than something that often perfectly normal men and women inflict on each other and experience unwanted outcomes of because of their culture…

> something that often perfectly normal men and women inflict on each other and experience unwanted outcomes of because of their culture and the structures of the society they grew up in This is ideology, it's not a given that everybody thinks the same as you on this point.

That's just a definition of the term, how is it ideological? You can use the definition without believing it exists.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#24

Post by rayiner »

adrianN wrote: post #11
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #6

Sexism is not "over-rated" OECD's Social Institutions and Gender Index Is at http://www.genderindex.org , and is a litany of baked in prejudice, violence, lack of access to education, lack of access to property and other normal legal rights. When we compare the lot of a 16 yo girl in Rwanda to a High schooler in SF, yes it is hard to find where the High schooler is having problems, but we just have to look at the rat…

I'm still not convinced that the lack of women in tech is due to sexism. Maybe women just aren't as excited by the field as men? Nobody seems to question that this is the reason why there are so few male preschool teachers.

There are so few male preschool teachers because our society is very sexist against men when it comes to interacting with kids. This is societal and not innate because in many other countries male teachers are the norm.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#25

Post by jkot »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #6

Sexism is not "over-rated" OECD's Social Institutions and Gender Index Is at http://www.genderindex.org , and is a litany of baked in prejudice, violence, lack of access to education, lack of access to property and other normal legal rights. When we compare the lot of a 16 yo girl in Rwanda to a High schooler in SF, yes it is hard to find where the High schooler is having problems, but we just have to look at the rat…

Poor and oppressive countries (India, Ukraine, Saudi...) typically have more women in tech compared to western countries. There are not that many job options, and IT is often only reasonable option to get western salary.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#26

Post by scintill76 »

avz wrote: post #17
dajohnson89 wrote: post #5

She had me until the very end, with the anecdote about the guy apologizing for swearing in front of her. I would apologize if I said "fuck" near my country's president, or even the president of my small-ish company. Both of whom are male. It's a sign of respect. In the context of women, I see it in a similar light to holding the door open for a lady. It isn't me assuming she's too weak to open a door, it's just a com…

You're missing this important point: > His effort to be courteous made me feel that I was different, the odd one out, the one we must be careful around and treat like a fragile flower. We should respect all our colleagues equally regardless of the type of sexual organs they happen to be equipped with (and regardless of other irrelevant characteristics). Singling out one group over others for additional "respect" is w…

And you missed the point of the GP poster. The GP would have apologized for this to anyone he didn't know well. Why would it be GP's fault for "making" someone feel "out of place" by treating them with a certain respect that has nothing to do with any personal characteristics? Her role wasn't "lady" or "engineer", it was "person I don't an F-bomb-level rapport with."

At least that's the main point of GP's post. What the guy in the story was thinking is debatable I guess, but I don't see much point since we can't know.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#27

Post by cubano »

Here is my personal experience with the fringes of this issue over a lifetime of watching it play out before my eyes...

If a female is attracted to the guy, things he says or does are considered "cute", "flirtatious", and/or "interesting".

If not, the same actions are often considered "creepy", "jerkish", and yes even "sexist".

I think its just human nature to perceive things in this way, and since women grow up in such a vastly different, sexually charged environment (I'm watching it happen with my 13 year old daughter right now) as guys do, it is, of course, impossible for me to understand all the nuance.

Just my anecdotal thoughts on it...btw it is good to see this woman make an attempt to address the issue.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#28

Post by swombat »

avz wrote: post #17
dajohnson89 wrote: post #5

She had me until the very end, with the anecdote about the guy apologizing for swearing in front of her. I would apologize if I said "fuck" near my country's president, or even the president of my small-ish company. Both of whom are male. It's a sign of respect. In the context of women, I see it in a similar light to holding the door open for a lady. It isn't me assuming she's too weak to open a door, it's just a com…

You're missing this important point: > His effort to be courteous made me feel that I was different, the odd one out, the one we must be careful around and treat like a fragile flower. We should respect all our colleagues equally regardless of the type of sexual organs they happen to be equipped with (and regardless of other irrelevant characteristics). Singling out one group over others for additional "respect" is w…

Why can't she be treated as both simultaneously? Why does treatment as an "engineer" require the abolition of her "lady" role? Are the two roles not compatible?

I personally thing it is more sexist to try and deny gender differences than simply recognise them and deal with people respectfully. I find the implication that the only way to not be sexist is to treat everyone as gender neutral disturbing.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#29

Post by DanBC »

facepalm wrote: post #12
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #6

Sexism is not "over-rated" OECD's Social Institutions and Gender Index Is at http://www.genderindex.org , and is a litany of baked in prejudice, violence, lack of access to education, lack of access to property and other normal legal rights. When we compare the lot of a 16 yo girl in Rwanda to a High schooler in SF, yes it is hard to find where the High schooler is having problems, but we just have to look at the rat…

I find it a bit funny that they call it a "gender index", but it really just cares about discrimination against women. Way to go... Are girls equally likely as men to be recruited as child soldiers? Presumably their statistics won't show it... Also I think access of women to education in the third world might be a good indicator of economic and health care in those countries, not necessarily discrimination. If women…

> Are girls equally likely as men to be recruited as child soldiers?

Yes, girls are likely to be recruited as children. Sometimes that's as a child soldier, sometimes that's as a sex slave.

Some armed groups see women (including girls) as equal to males.

>> About 40 percent of the hundreds of thousands of child soldiers scattered across the world’s conflicts today are thought to be girls, but the numbers of girls enrolling in child soldier DDR programmes dwindles to five percent or less.

http://www.irinnews.org/report/97463/analysis-girl-child-sol...

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#30

Post by Kenji »

As a man, I'm really glad to read things like that. You know, the sexism problem makes both sexes feel bad. I think it is really important for our society in general that we don't let differences like sex get between us. It's silly and petty.
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