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Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

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Re: Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

#11

Post by slantyyz »

cperciva wrote: post #4
ashedryden wrote: post #3

As a woman (and someone who is friends with the Brazen peeps) this is highly insulting. It assumes that all women want to have children, that men are mostly absent/dismissive in their children's lives (if they have them), and insinuates that women just aren't biologically fit to run a company. I know Penelope has kind of made a name for herself in saying things that shock people, so I wouldn't doubt that this is in t…

It assumes that all women want to have children Headlines omit qualifiers. If you read the headline as " Fewer women than men want to run startups because many of them would rather have children", I think it's entirely accurate. Sure, there are women who don't want children, just like there are men who want nothing more than to be stay-at-home dads -- but they're the exception, not the rule.

Well, that headline is designed to get eyeballs.

It should have been headlined "Opinion: ...", as it's not like the article is full of research, etc.

Re: Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

#12

Post by notauser »

ashedryden wrote: post #7
cperciva wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It assumes that all women want to have children Headlines omit qualifiers. If you read the headline as " Fewer women than men want to run startups because many of them would rather have children", I think it's entirely accurate. Sure, there are women who don't want children, just like there are men who want nothing more than to be stay-at-home dads -- but they're the exception, not the rule.

I know tons of successful women who run businesses who are fine without having children; I also know quite a few who have children and are still able to run a business. This whole argument goes back to the beginning of the feminist movement and people not being willing to hire women because they should be making some man sandwiches and popping out babies. The trend is leaning towards more women having fewer children,…

Just like almost everyone on HN, you are a statistical anomaly.

(This is nothing to do with you being a woman - that just increases the factor by an order of magnitude or two.)

Even the people you know are probably outliers. So you have to be a bit careful relying on your experience and instead look at broader demographic trends.

Nearly all of the people I know well have no TV. Should I assume that TV is hugely unpopular with everyone?

Re: Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

#14

Post by gcheong »

kiba wrote: post #6
ashedryden wrote: post #3

As a woman (and someone who is friends with the Brazen peeps) this is highly insulting. It assumes that all women want to have children, that men are mostly absent/dismissive in their children's lives (if they have them), and insinuates that women just aren't biologically fit to run a company. I know Penelope has kind of made a name for herself in saying things that shock people, so I wouldn't doubt that this is in t…

Evolutionary pressure in our society will tend toward women that have children, not women who don't have children. If women all run business, go to wars, and the like. All of which implies that women won't have time to have children because it take 9 months to make a baby as well the maternity leave that come with it. It will be a population disaster if that were ever to happen. Pretty soon, you won't have a self-sus…

Not necessarily. Birthrates in developed countries where resources are plentiful and infant mortality rates are low tend downward, not upward. Our species has adopted the strategy that it is better to put more resources into fewer offspring than the shot-gunning approach. We only need to maintain replacement levels or slightly above to be self-sustaining.

Re: Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

#15

Post by sprout »

cletus wrote: post #8
ashedryden wrote: post #3

As a woman (and someone who is friends with the Brazen peeps) this is highly insulting. It assumes that all women want to have children, that men are mostly absent/dismissive in their children's lives (if they have them), and insinuates that women just aren't biologically fit to run a company. I know Penelope has kind of made a name for herself in saying things that shock people, so I wouldn't doubt that this is in t…

Apparently it only took 16 minutes for the take-offense-out-of-context strawman to rear its ugly head. Did you even read beyond the headline? The author doesn't say "all women" to the point that a single counterexample disproves the hypothesis. Not only does the auther qualify statements such as "fewer women" but any such analysis is a statistical study of a group. It says something about a group and similar groups b…

The offense taken at this article is intentionally undertaken to change the norm, to encourage men to take more responsibility for their children and for women to take more responsibility in society at large.

The offense is not at the statement of fact, the offense is that the fact is stated as if it were the good and proper order of things. The good and proper order of things is equality.

Now, you're free to disagree, but don't misunderstand us.

Re: Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

#16

Post by ashedryden »

cperciva wrote: post #4
ashedryden wrote: post #3

As a woman (and someone who is friends with the Brazen peeps) this is highly insulting. It assumes that all women want to have children, that men are mostly absent/dismissive in their children's lives (if they have them), and insinuates that women just aren't biologically fit to run a company. I know Penelope has kind of made a name for herself in saying things that shock people, so I wouldn't doubt that this is in t…

It assumes that all women want to have children Headlines omit qualifiers. If you read the headline as " Fewer women than men want to run startups because many of them would rather have children", I think it's entirely accurate. Sure, there are women who don't want children, just like there are men who want nothing more than to be stay-at-home dads -- but they're the exception, not the rule.

This also assumes that having children means one or the other parent's job is to stay at home with them, which hasn't been true for a number of years because of the amount of money needed to sustain a family and the fact that women no longer need to give up their careers to have children.

Re: Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

#17

Post by jacquesm »

The internet has actually enabled a whole generation of female entrepreneurs to 'do their start-up thing' and have children to boot.

It's the perfect tool to have a company and be around the house all day long (or as long as you want to be), I'm not exactly female but I would have found it very hard to decide for children if I had been a person with a 9 to 5 job.

If you and your spouse can work together on a start-up (not always the best for everybody, but there are definitely cases were it worked very well and plenty were it worked good enough) then you can find some pretty good splits between raising children and running a company.

Things like web design and programming go very well with working from home and raising kids, I see it as a win for everybody.

If your idea of a start-up is to have lots of employees, a huge office and turnover in the millions then that's another case entirely, but on a lesser scale it is perfectly doable.

Re: Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

#18

Post by robryan »

gcheong wrote: post #14
kiba wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Evolutionary pressure in our society will tend toward women that have children, not women who don't have children. If women all run business, go to wars, and the like. All of which implies that women won't have time to have children because it take 9 months to make a baby as well the maternity leave that come with it. It will be a population disaster if that were ever to happen. Pretty soon, you won't have a self-sus…

Not necessarily. Birthrates in developed countries where resources are plentiful and infant mortality rates are low tend downward, not upward. Our species has adopted the strategy that it is better to put more resources into fewer offspring than the shot-gunning approach. We only need to maintain replacement levels or slightly above to be self-sustaining.

Apart from isolated examples in certain countries I don't think the world as a whole has much to worry about in maintaining replacement levels.

Re: Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

#19

Post by zavulon »

cperciva wrote: post #2

The author points out that women who want to have kids can't wait very long, generally don't have time to do a startup first, and that you'd have to be crazy to try to do a startup and raise young kids at the same time. I'm not sure that I believe her arguments about men, though: For men it’s different. We all know that men do not search all over town finding the perfect ballet teacher. Men are more likely to settle…

I'm with you as I'm also a single 29 year old working 80 hour weeks on my startup, and still hoping one day to get married and have a lot of kids.

The difference is though, we as men can (hopefully) keep spending 80 hour weeks on work now, get insanely rich by 35, meet a woman of our dreams at 40, get married at 45, and have kids at 50. Women don't have that option.

Re: Women Don't Want To Run Startups Because They'd Rather Have Children

#20

Post by ewjordan »

ashedryden wrote: post #3

As a woman (and someone who is friends with the Brazen peeps) this is highly insulting. It assumes that all women want to have children, that men are mostly absent/dismissive in their children's lives (if they have them), and insinuates that women just aren't biologically fit to run a company. I know Penelope has kind of made a name for herself in saying things that shock people, so I wouldn't doubt that this is in t…

I run a company, work ridiculous hours, and the other devs on my team are male. I don't think any of us puts it fewer hours or energy based on the number of ovaries each has.

All of which is completely irrelevant.

It's great that you ended up in tech, nobody is suggesting you're in any way less suited to perform well than men are (at least not in any reasonable discussion).

They're simply suggesting reasons why other women don't choose the field; clearly there are some causes for this phenomenon, and they've got to be pretty strong given the overwhelming disparity.

It assumes that all women want to have children, that men are mostly absent/dismissive in their children's lives (if they have them),

No, it assumes that many women want to have children, and tend to take greater roles in their lives if and when they do so. Do you really disagree with that? I know it's anecdotal, but both these things hold true for such a vast majority of the people that I know personally that I'd have trouble believing it wasn't the case, not to mention the overwhelming biological imperatives in play here.

and insinuates that women just aren't biologically fit to run a company.

That's a radical interpretation of the text; the closest thing that she said to that was that women with children have a difficult time putting in the insane hours that a venture-backed startup requires.

FWIW, despite my apparent defense, I don't think that this article really pins down a significant reason we don't see more women running tech startups - the sad fact is, most women never get interested in programming in the first place, and that happens way before they're thinking about having children or what sort of career might go well with that goal.

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