My positive experience as a woman in tech • Hacker News Board

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#361

Post by typon » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 6:58 PM UTC

oldmanjay wrote: post #289

theinternetman wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Way to downplay their contributions in tech just because they work in a department you don't deem as important.

There is a very basic dynamic at play here. Take away every department outside of engineering and you still have the chance to actually make technology. Take away engineering and you have literally nothing. The contributions don't need to be downplayed. Logic demonstrates the hierarchy of importance rather plainly.

This is rather funny comment made on a place like Hacker News, full of web developers who refer to themselves as "Engineers".

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#362

Post by kaitai » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 6:59 PM UTC

yummyfajitas wrote: post #152

blowski wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Is it sexism to make assumptions that are probabilistically correct? Consider the following procedure: 1) For a woman I don't know, I buy her frozen yogurt. 2) For a man I don't know, I buy him pizza. Now suppose my stereotypes are actually accurate - i.e., P(likes froyo > pizza|woman) > 0.5 and P(likes pizza > froyo | man) > 0.5. This procedure, based purely on stereotypes, will make everyone happier than flipping a…

Please, buy chocolate. Froyo is demeaning.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#363

Post by kaitai » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 7:03 PM UTC

Lawtonfogle wrote: post #270

newscracker wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If I'm buying my young niece a toy, and see two otherwise equal toys except one is blue and one is pink, is it sexist to choose the pink one? I have to make a choice, there is no non-colored toy. This is where knowing how these associations came into being could also help you and also help educate others (including your young niece). Several decades ago, the colors promoted were blue for girls and pink for boys. To…

>This is where knowing how these associations came into being could also help you and also help educate others (including your young niece). Several decades ago, the colors promoted were blue for girls and pink for boys. I'm fully aware this use to be the case. I'm not saying there is some biological reason that the average girl today will prefer pink to blue, only that, as for now, they do, and as such and given no…

What confuses me about your statement is that several commenters have provided evidence from studies that on average the girl will prefer blue, and yet you're insisting she'll prefer pink. I don't get it.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#364

Post by kaitai » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 7:14 PM UTC

alashley wrote: post #286

kaitai wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to say, I've met a number of socially awkward guys who flirt in a cute way, and a number of socially smooth guys who are super creepy. And some people are creepy on purpose -- negging, pushing boundaries, looking for the weak one in the herd or the woman who can't say no because of her own internal algorithms. They are often not socially awkward, either. I think Captain Awkward and Dr. Nerdlove have done some…

I get the sentiment of the thoughtcatalog link you posted, but aren't those exchanges either an extension of people taking advantage of either the relative anonymity provided by the internet/social media or private text conversations where no one else will likely ever read the messages? I have never seen a guy get turned down by a woman in the real world and disparage her in such a way. Not at the bar, not anywhere e…

It is true that it is easiest to provide transcripts of written conversations.

How are you going to see such disparagement in the "real world" though? First, the women are all already using indirect rejection to head that off, or wearing fake rings or saying, "Sorry, my boyfriend wouldn't like that" whether a boyfriend exists or not, or giving out a fake phone number. Those are all standard tactics for a soft let-down designed to avoid conflict.

Second, how would you hear about it? Usually a guy who responds poorly doesn't flip a table, he just says, Well yeah you're ugly anyway, or something like that. Why would you hear that? Are you sitting so close that you'd hear the whole conversation? These are generally not loud conversations, and most women are shrinking in their seats trying to de-escalate and just make it/him go away. No one wants to cause a scene.

For an authoritative and peer-reviewed source (/s) check out the reddit accounts here: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskWomen/comments/20xdni/what_is_th... Most of these reactions are things a nearby guy wouldn't ever notice.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#365

Post by kencausey » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 7:25 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #24

adrianN wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

In these 'many other countries' are women as high of a percentage of the workforce as in the US? I personally believe that more women are teachers in the US because it is an occupation that is more open to them than many. Men simply have more options.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#366

Post by sonabinu » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 7:53 PM UTC

pdex wrote: post #357

sonabinu wrote: post #55

There are definitely good experiences. I think the problem is when management pretends they did not hear something. I remember another female colleague (absent at the meeting) being referred to as a 'chick' and the other men laughing it off. It was a very bad experience. Being the only woman in the room, I did not speak up but I wish I did.

Sometimes management needs to be tactfully reminded that they have the power to correct these things, but they need to be made aware and it needs to be done tactfully. I can see how you regretted not speaking up in front of a majority who seemed to bless the bad behavior by indulging in it, but if it happens again you may want to speak to your supervisor in private. We hired a new guy who needed some education from t…

I've since moved. That was one of the many boys club vibe I got there!

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#367

Post by silentplummet » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 7:56 PM UTC

This is fair, but let's recognize that the discussion takes place in the context of a few well known individuals who have made an enviably successful career as freelance victims, who stridently prevaricate about the persecution they've experienced in the industry, but by all accounts don't actually do any work on technology at all.

One wrote a story for a mediocre video game and claims publicly to be a game developer. Is she a 'woman in tech'? It's like if I painted a mural on a house during construction this one time and went on claiming a career in carpentry. But don't you dare claim I'm not legitimately a carpenter, because hey, stop persecuting me!

The dichotomy isn't false, it's quite real and true, and it seems obvious to me that there are a handful of lamentably visible charlatans who are to blame for it. On the other hand, I could list dozens of women in the industry whose output I greatly respect and they seem to experience great success, but you never hear a peep out of them. It's almost like the more "tangentially involved" one is with tech, the more vocal one becomes about this supposed persecution...

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#368

Post by dang » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 8:02 PM UTC

silentplummet wrote: post #367

This is fair, but let's recognize that the discussion takes place in the context of a few well known individuals who have made an enviably successful career as freelance victims, who stridently prevaricate about the persecution they've experienced in the industry, but by all accounts don't actually do any work on technology at all. One wrote a story for a mediocre video game and claims publicly to be a game developer…

We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10761246 and marked it off-topic.

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#369

Post by silentplummet » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 8:12 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #368

silentplummet wrote: post #367

This is fair, but let's recognize that the discussion takes place in the context of a few well known individuals who have made an enviably successful career as freelance victims, who stridently prevaricate about the persecution they've experienced in the industry, but by all accounts don't actually do any work on technology at all. One wrote a story for a mediocre video game and claims publicly to be a game developer…

We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10761246 and marked it off-topic.

That's a pretty fast turnaround time. 6 minutes! I don't think the Air Force can even scramble jets that fast.

Would you care to point out exactly what part of the comment is "off-topic" pursuant to `the experience of women in tech`?

Re: My positive experience as a woman in tech

#370

Post by patio11 » Sat, Dec 19, 2015, 8:41 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #352

rayiner wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Are we really sexist against male teachers? I don't buy it. There are male teachers everywhere at all levels in Chicago, and male teachers are routinely represented in the media, usually positively.

Much like the existence of female engineers does not prove that the industry does not discriminate against women...