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Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#31

Post by mmirate »

SandersAK wrote: post #14

Google, like all corporate structures is hierarchical. Corporations recognize "success" for employees through promotion. Promotion usually includes higher pay. Men are taught from a young age that they need to "compete" for "success" There is no way to win the game for all players inside corporate hierarchy. If you can't win the game, but wish to remain (or are trapped by your economic situation) you will have pressu…

> "success" isn't about being an individual that becomes rich

Independent of the rest of your comment: the quoted concept is trivially false as long as resources are scarce. (i.e. the foreseeable future; barring severe, draconian and arguably-unethical controls on population size)

("Powerful" being an additional non-redundant qualifier, is merely a consequence of the monopoly called "government".)

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#32

Post by ocdtrekkie »

rpiguy wrote: post #6

I really enjoyed the well reasoned discussion. I think a lot more constructive dialog is happening now that people have calmed down. Of all the sentiments expressed in the article, I mainly disagree with the comment that Damore did the company harm. He posted his thoughts on an internal discussion board and someone else leaked this internal document to the press. The leaker did harm to Google not Damore. In fact, I t…

I agree, and I suspect the attitude of cooler heads may act in Damore's favor when all is said and done.

The number of leakers has to be quite the headache for Google's StopLeaks folks. Between people leaking Damore's memo because they were upset by it, and people talking to Breitbart because they were angry he was fired, there's been a LOT of leaks. How Google approaches handling this issue is going to be interesting, there's a lot of hurt feelings on all sides.

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#33

Post by killedbydeath »

SandersAK wrote: post #14

Google, like all corporate structures is hierarchical. Corporations recognize "success" for employees through promotion. Promotion usually includes higher pay. Men are taught from a young age that they need to "compete" for "success" There is no way to win the game for all players inside corporate hierarchy. If you can't win the game, but wish to remain (or are trapped by your economic situation) you will have pressu…

Are women not taught to compete? I do not remember girls being any less competitive (in school, in sports, etc.) Almost everyone wants to stand out and be better than others in some aspects and is proud when they can achieve that. Life is very competitive, I am not sure why need to de-emphasize it to much. Making it "us" vs "them" is the more problematic part, but individual competition is a pretty constructive force overall, for men and women of all colors.

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#34

Post by nailer »

yflu wrote: post #9
sremani wrote: post #2

with the recognition that gender and sex aren’t binary. Is there a biological basis for this? I do not want "Gender Studies" references. I want real BIOLOGICAL, you know code mother nature put in you.

Gender is a semantic concept. Biology (and sex) is not. So no, there isn't a biological basis for this, because gender isn't biological.

It's not as simple as that. The word 'gender' has a history of being used for biology - think of every form you've ever filled out. The OED [1] says:

> Either of the two sexes (male and female)

before following up with:

> especially when considered with reference to social and cultural differences rather than biological ones.

And also notes:

> The sense denoting biological sex has also been used since the 14th century, but this did not become common until the mid 20th century. Although the words gender and sex are often used interchangeably, they have slightly different connotations; sex tends to refer to biological differences, while gender more often refers to cultural and social differences and sometimes encompasses a broader range of identities than the binary of male and female

If it's unclear, I'm not saying either is correct. Many people don't like saying 'sex' as its also a verb for copulation hence use 'gender' as a polite alternative. The idea of gender as an entity separate from biology is from Dr John Money, who has his own sad and controversial history [2], though his ideas have gained more popularity recently.

[1] https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/gender

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Money

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#35

Post by mizchief2 »

sremani wrote: post #2

with the recognition that gender and sex aren’t binary. Is there a biological basis for this? I do not want "Gender Studies" references. I want real BIOLOGICAL, you know code mother nature put in you.

I think this misses the real point. The idea is presenting a reason why google (and all of tech) has more male engineers than female that aren't based totally on bigotry and discrimination. He is right. Google isn't hiring female engineers because they simply aren't applying.

In reality their aren't enough trans-gendered people to really involve that in this conversation.

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#36

Post by dkn »

danharaj wrote: post #12
sremani wrote: post #2

with the recognition that gender and sex aren’t binary. Is there a biological basis for this? I do not want "Gender Studies" references. I want real BIOLOGICAL, you know code mother nature put in you.

The Hijra have existed for millenia and now have legal status: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/apr/16/india-third-... There are several cultures that have arisen independently and have had more than two genders. Many of them are still extant today, despite the best effort of colonialists. So that's gender down. Intersex individuals exist. Intersex conditions range from physiological to karyotypes with varian…

Are intersex or transgender considered to be viable sexes though?

What seems reasonable to me is M/F/N where N is not capable of reproduction due to some kind of outlying error, so they cannot be a part of sexed reproduction. Are they omitted?

Sex and reproduction seem binary to me and most people. We should ignore technological or medical assistance and sort those results through the gender buckets which are more important to how they are perceived semantically, as you said.

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#37

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

angersock wrote: post #20
danharaj wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Hijra have existed for millenia and now have legal status: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/apr/16/india-third-... There are several cultures that have arisen independently and have had more than two genders. Many of them are still extant today, despite the best effort of colonialists. So that's gender down. Intersex individuals exist. Intersex conditions range from physiological to karyotypes with varian…

Are the numbers of intersex individuals large enough to actually matter? And how many of them are fertile?

Every single one of them matters and deserves the same dignity and respect you expect for yourself.

Re: Ask a Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo

#40

Post by bufbupa »

tedivm wrote: post #26
rpiguy wrote: post #6

I really enjoyed the well reasoned discussion. I think a lot more constructive dialog is happening now that people have calmed down. Of all the sentiments expressed in the article, I mainly disagree with the comment that Damore did the company harm. He posted his thoughts on an internal discussion board and someone else leaked this internal document to the press. The leaker did harm to Google not Damore. In fact, I t…

Lets assume that we're in an alternative universe where the document was never leaked. The document still did harm. Just read this quote from the posted article- > When I walk into my job at a tech company, how do I know which of my colleagues thinks I’m an outlier among women versus someone who was hired because I’m female that doesn’t deserve the job they have? How do I prove myself to people one way or another? Th…

Are you arguing we should spare factual discourse for the sake of someones subjective feelings?
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