Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers • Hacker News Board

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#111

Post by zer00eyz » Thu, Jun 02, 2016, 11:52 PM UTC

mathgeek wrote: post #36

grahamburger wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I did know that. I assume you don't have kids? Breastfeeding is extremely difficult and painful for most women, and pumping moreso. I can only watch my wife crying from the excruciating pain of having her breasts pumped by a cold machine several times a day so many times before I say 'you know what, let's not do that anymore.'

Just wanted to chime in here to agree with you. While some people don't mind pumping, there are benefits to both the mother and the child when breastfeeding directly. It does come down to choice about what you prioritize in life. Far be it from any of us to deride women who prioritize their family's income, but we can't simply hand wave by saying "we have pumps and refrigerators!"

I can't believe I'm about to talk about breast feeding on hacker news but here goes.

> there are benefits to both the mother and the child when breastfeeding directly

There is data that points this in both directions, and there isn't a lot of agreement in any of it. There is a push for "brest is best", and a LOT of that is based on W.H.O recommendations. These are a direct result of Nestle pushing formula in the third world, and the impact it had on infant mortality.

If you live in a place without clean water, then breast feeding is the way to go. This assumes you don't have any communicable diseases, AIDS being the biggest one, but it is a large list of infections that preclude you from breastfeeding.

If you live in a first world country, and have access to clean water, and the facility to clean and sterilize bottles, there isn't a BIG gain that is universally agreed on in the research available.

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#112

Post by exstudent2 » Thu, Jun 02, 2016, 11:53 PM UTC

harryh wrote: post #110

exstudent2 wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Raising kids is often hard unfulfilling manual labor I don't see how raising a human can be classified as unfulfilling. Is making a CRUD app really more fulfilling than raising a child to a happy, healthy, well-adjusted adult? That seems an order of magnitude more fulfilling. As for the ex-exec who's now bored, that can also be seen as a symptom of "career worship" that projects such as the OP seem to focus on. The…

Just out of curiosity, what is the largest # of consecutive hours you have been responsible for a young child? I love my son and watching him progress over the last 11 months has been amazing but the day-to-day of raising a child can be mind numbingly boring.

I know it's boring and very, very hard work. Which is why I believe that we should support stay at home moms (and dads) by elevating the position in society and recognizing the hard and rewarding work it is. Going back to a career and paying someone to take care of your child is quite frankly the easy way out.

Women leaving the workplace to raise kids should be seen as a victory, not a "problem" that needs to be fixed. It's definitely not easy though and all of this media broadcast negativity surrounding being a parent instead of having a career can't make it any easier.

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#113

Post by thaumasiotes » Thu, Jun 02, 2016, 11:56 PM UTC

lukeschlather wrote: post #50

jfe wrote: post #28

i have trouble accepting the idea that fewer women in tech is a problem. it's not that i want to discourage women -- or anyone -- from going into tech. i just don't believe in encouraging anyone to do anything in particular, except what they enjoy. i'd appreciate it if someone can persuade me that the hype is true so i no longer need to feel like a black sheep. but.. for one, the fact that there are fewer women than…

> for one, the fact that there are fewer women than men in any field, computing or otherwise, is neither good nor bad. the disproportionate number of women in nursing is not seen as a problem, but somehow it has become one in tech. I don't agree. I think the gender disparity in nursing is just as much a problem. I think it's a significantly less tractable problem though, because I don't think the monetary incentives…

One reason nursing has a substantially lower median salary is that it's largely women. You might be interested in the median salary of male nurses.

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#114

Post by NTDF9 » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 12:04 AM UTC

nostrebored wrote: post #106

NTDF9 wrote: post #96

I don't understand this constant fight to have 50%. There are capable women who climb ladders successfully. The other women who couldn't, simply couldn't, just like many men who couldn't. Also, pregnancy and breastfeeding cannot be done by a man. A woman who aspires to be a mother will have to compromise on other things to be a mother, which probably will include a compromise in career. A man who aspires to be a fath…

So you think that there are more incapable women than men in the world? Women are capable of working in fields like tech through pregnancy. We have breast pumps and formula. If you're going to complain about maternity leave, why is the man not taking paternity leave to help his partner and bond with his child? Why does it have to be the man making all of these decisions? Why can't both partners work together ot suppo…

>> So you think that there are more incapable women than men in the world?

Incapable of what? Never once did I say women are incapable of either career or motherhood. Women can efficiently do what they choose to. Juggling many roles on the other hand is hard for any human being (regardless of gender)

>> Women are capable of working in fields like tech through pregnancy. We have breast pumps and formula. If you're going to complain about maternity leave, why is the man not taking paternity leave to help his partner and bond with his child?

Who said that man doesn't want to take a paternity leave? Every single recent father I know wants to take time off to bond with the kid. Unfortunately, he can't without a cut in pay (in the US). Get this law in and you'll see so many fathers doing it.

>> Why does it have to be the man making all of these decisions? Why can't both partners work together ot support a child?

It is always a partnership. Only a partnership works. More often than not, partnership == compromise from all parties involved to WIN.

If you were a basketball watcher, you'd know that not everyone can play point guard even if they want to. Only one person plays that role and the remaining support that person. Why? So that the team wins.

In a baby-making situation, WIN = produce a healthy baby and have enough resources for its upbringing and the mother's safety.

With this definition of WIN, a man/woman who only wants selfish desires and doesn't care for the partner or the kid is a subhuman being. Sorry. You both need to be less selfish here for the sake of the kid.

>> Why is motherhood in the ridiculous, rigid way that we see it today a given? The thing is, given attitudes like yours (which are emblematic of societies) you're presented a false dichotomy of "career-woman" or the martyrdom of modern motherhood.

Fine. Do both jobs half-heartedly. Anybody who has been a successful mother knows that it is HARD. If you think it just "happens" you're badly mistaken.

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#115

Post by pkaye » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 12:06 AM UTC

larrik wrote: post #7

Women who are halfway into their careers in tech are leaving at a rate of 56%, which is more than double the quit rate of men. One reason for the high quit rate may be that women have a much lower chance of being promoted, even when they have the same amount of experience and tenure as their male peers, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research. So around the time a lot of people have kids? They probably…

Can they compare it to rates for countries which are more supportive of mothers (paid maternity/paternity leave, pay for daycare, etc.) Apparently US is the only country which doesn't have this should the data should easy to obtain.

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#116

Post by st3v3r » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 12:16 AM UTC

busterarm wrote: post #42

nck4222 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>i just don't believe in encouraging anyone to do anything in particular, except what they enjoy. There are plenty of women who would enjoy being a developer but it wasn't presented to them as a realistic option in their childhood, or it wasn't a welcoming atmosphere for them when they started learning about it.

You could swap the gender and career with just about any field in either end of this list[0] and have the same argument, but there is a razor focus on this one specific field/gender combination. [0]: https://espnfivethirtyeight.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/chal...

So what? That's not any kind of rebuttal to doing this.

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#117

Post by H0n3sty » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 12:17 AM UTC

What would people think if the genders were reversed and this institution was discriminating against women and only helping men? Women have a far larger presence in other fields like biology and education, but you don't see new organizations popping up every other month to change that in favor of men.

Discrimination like this should be illegal.

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#118

Post by falsestprophet » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 12:17 AM UTC

The two sexes are not identical. Boy are you going to be surprised about what pants are hiding.

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#119

Post by wpietri » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 12:19 AM UTC

sandworm101 wrote: post #19

throwaway293810 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you might as well just stay home But why does it have to be the woman who stays home? Why is this just the tacit assumption? I'd love to see not just solid support for moms at work, but solid support / encouragement for dads at home: paternity leave up-to-par with maternity leave, a normalization and acceptance of stay-at-home dads where desired, etc. It's kind of amazing how prevalent the assumption is that childr…

We should do all we can to support mothers and parents. They should be free to make their own choices. But nobody should be surprised if mothers make different choices than fathers. Nor should we force the matter. There is some biology here. Equality doesn't create interchangeability.

> There is some biology here.

Sure. But there's also centuries of entrenched societal structure that is only slowly dissolving. And much of that structure was built up with bogus explanations of what women were biologically capable of.

So at the very least, we need to carefully consider both biology and possibility when we talk about this. But if we're going to err, I think it's worth leaning the other way for a while. We'll never really know where the true balance lies until we try things with the assumption that biology is not all that important.

That's certainly popular for most topics on Hacker News. Can people live on synthetic food substitutes? Let's put some up on Kickstarter and see! Do humans have a natural lifespan? Let's try pretending otherwise and see where we get. Maybe we could also favor it for radical ideas like women having careers.

Re: Women Who Code (YC S16) helps female engineers level up in their careers

#120

Post by nostrebored » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 12:21 AM UTC

NTDF9 wrote: post #114

nostrebored wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you think that there are more incapable women than men in the world? Women are capable of working in fields like tech through pregnancy. We have breast pumps and formula. If you're going to complain about maternity leave, why is the man not taking paternity leave to help his partner and bond with his child? Why does it have to be the man making all of these decisions? Why can't both partners work together ot suppo…

>> So you think that there are more incapable women than men in the world? Incapable of what? Never once did I say women are incapable of either career or motherhood. Women can efficiently do what they choose to. Juggling many roles on the other hand is hard for any human being (regardless of gender) >> Women are capable of working in fields like tech through pregnancy. We have breast pumps and formula. If you're goi…

>"There are capable women who climb ladders successfully. The other women who couldn't, simply couldn't, just like many men who couldn't." There are fewer women, proportionally, who "climb ladders" successfully. This implies that there are fewer capable women than men in the world.

>"Who said that man doesn't want to take a paternity leave? Every single recent father I know wants to take time off to bond with the kid. Unfortunately, he can't without a cut in pay (in the US). Get this law in and you'll see so many fathers doing it."

The mother being present is not required for a child to be exclusively breastfed anymore. Pumping is quite effective. The only argument for only the woman to be taking the time off and making these career compromises is one that views women as the only capable caregivers.

>"It is always a partnership. Only a partnership works. More often than not, partnership == compromise from all parties involved to WIN."

And this can't be done with both partners sharing in childcare responsibilities and working? The data is out there (see my other posts) to show that SAHM are significantly more angry, depressed, etc. than their working counterparts. Is this a win for the mother and the baby?

Do you think that women are incapable of "playing point guard", i.e. providing for their family?

>"Fine. Do both jobs half-heartedly. Anybody who has been a successful mother knows that it is HARD. If you think it just "happens" you're badly mistaken."

I've stayed at home with child. I know that it's hard. Being a successful PARENT is hard too, and the reason that motherhood is even harder for the majority of the people that I know is their sole responsibility as child-rearer.