On sexism in the tech industry - rebuttal

The rockstar shit is a filter for me. If a company advertises itself as wanting rockstars, ninjas, "hardcore" people, or whatever brogrammer bullshit of the week is, I put that job advert to the bottom of my list. The thought of working around the sort of people who would apply because they consider themselves a hardcore ninja rockstar puts me off. (I spent more than enough time with homophobic macho fuckwits when I was at school, I'd rather not have to deal with them at work.)

There are gendered problems in tech: social bugs, really.

There's the putting-yourself-forward problem. I was at an event a while back and ran a birds-of-a-feather session on open source geo stuff (I'm an OpenStreetMap editor). At the session was a woman who is involved with a startup in the same area, but she didn't seem to have the confidence to run the session, even though her involvement in open source geo is much higher than mine (I just piss around editing maps). Ensuring that our community institutions invite women in is a good step: they don't have to accept the invitation, but many will. And that's good.

Another problem some women I know face: social expectations. They have to dress more masculine in order to be taken seriously at real-life gatherings. We as hackers like to say we don't judge people based on their appearances but based on their code. Then at the same time, we like to judge the "suits". I know women who have said they have to go home and change out of feminine wear (of all levels of formality) into jeans and a t-shirt in order for the hacker crowd to take them seriously. If a guy turns up to an event in a suit, people will just naturally assume he needs to wear it because he's doing coding in some kind of corporate environment. But if women turn up in a dress, they just get the presumption that they are in sales or PR or something. That's bullshit. (This stems from the geeky hackery idea that dressing nice makes someone untrustworthy. Sorry, no, I've worked with utter assholes who come to work in jeans every day, and I've worked with people who are awesome, ethical and never fuck people over who–gasp!–wear formal or dressy clothing.)

Is there an endemic problem of malicious deliberate sexism? No. That exists in some companies, sure, but I don't think that's the primary problem. Instead, there's lots of little nagging bugs, some of which stem from unconscious attitudes perpetuated by geek culture. The sexism problems such as they are consist of lots of little nagging bugs that taken together exclude women. Unless you are some kind of hardcore misogynist, fixing them will have generally positive side effects for everybody.

Think a little about what you're saying here.

For example, the dictionary definition of atheism is a lack of belief in the existence of God or gods. However, many religious people believe that atheism is a conscious rejection of an existing God, a deliberate embracing of evil, and that all atheists are intrinsically amoral or indeed immoral. This understanding is so common that most people who do not believe in a god refuse to self-identify as atheists, and those who do are reviled somewhat less than child molesters.

My point here should be obvious: You're right. If you don't believe in God, you are an atheist. If you think your social rights should be independent of your genitals or gender identity, you are a feminist. But if you don't use the word to describe yourself (and that's forgivable), it's not because it has "baggage"-- it's because hateful organizations and individuals have been attacking the word as a proxy for attacking the concept, and it is working.

We don't have to let them off the hook for this.

"However some other roles in IT might be better for women to start, like BA and QA and project management where frankly they excel."

Yeah, that's not itself sexist or condescending or anything...

The original "Primer On Sexism" : 8 points and dead, 0 comments

The Rebuttal: 150 points and rising, 140+ comments

If that in and of itself doesn't say volumes about the sexist attitudes of the majority of HN readers - and as such, the tech industry as a whole - I don't know what does.

Surely a long, thoughtful article, with tons of context in the form of links and research, written by the creator of Modernizr and a former Appler beats a shouty "enraged me so much" rebuttal by a designer at a minor UK web agency for 7 months and prior to that, a movie usher for 2 years?

People on HN are fond of saying things like, "I couldn't care less whether someone has a vagina or a penis, as long as they write great software". So how come Laura The Troll is getting so much attention for "telling it like it is", just because she is an "actual girl"?

I am an "actual girl" too and I am seriously disappointed. We were offered a 5-star meal but we pounced on a 99-cent gas station burger because it had a picture of a ripe tomato on it, so hey, it must be healthy.

And Laura, if you are reading this, a small bit of advice for you. Next time an article "enrages" you, re-read it and I guarantee you will see that it doesn't say what you think it does.