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On being a girl in computer science - a confession

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Re: On being a girl in computer science - a confession

#161

Post by newnewnew »

noonespecial wrote: post #60
mindcrime wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So here's the question: How old is your daughter? And where do you suppose she got the idea that programming is "a boy thing"? I suspect that the answers to these questions is a good lead to understanding why women are under-represented among programmers / techies.

That actually is the question I've been struggling with. She's only 7 and I've tried to keep her quite insulated from that kind of idea but it seems to just bleed in from all over the place. Since I've tuned out powerless to stop the bias from getting in, I've started to really think about the best way to help her rise above it.

Do what cultural dissidents have been doing for decades - home school.

Re: On being a girl in computer science - a confession

#162

Post by hackinthebochs »

jimzvz wrote: post #157
hackinthebochs wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am suggesting we not make self-serving assertions about how women should feel. There is debating and then there is putting words in other people's mouths that are perfectly capable of speaking for themselves. If women themselves are not making this type of argument, men have no place in making it on their behalf.

Please explain to me where I made an assertion about how women should feel. I said that girls will wonder why they are being treated differently and I said that people do not like being segregated. What words am I putting in whose mouths? What type of argument?

Let's not devolve this discussion into a language-parsing exercise. Take your comment as a whole, its clear you are saying "this is how women will/should feel". I'm saying there is no reason to suppose how women will feel: they can tell us themselves if they feel this way.

Re: On being a girl in computer science - a confession

#163

Post by hackinthebochs »

LockeWatts wrote: post #152
hackinthebochs wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am suggesting we not make self-serving assertions about how women should feel. There is debating and then there is putting words in other people's mouths that are perfectly capable of speaking for themselves. If women themselves are not making this type of argument, men have no place in making it on their behalf.

How about we argue instead that discriminating is wrong, and we shouldn't actively promote it.

Racism, sexism, etc are necessarily wrong. However, discrimination is not necessarily wrong. Whether its wrong depends on the context and the motivations. I submit that this is a valid form of "discrimination".

Re: On being a girl in computer science - a confession

#164

Post by kaa2102 »

newnewnew wrote: post #142
kaa2102 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say that racism is about hate, ignorance, and creating systematic barriers to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Women are considered a minority group; yet, white women still retain the privilege of being white. It sounds like the essay echoes the sentiment of being privileged and not wanting to be sub-grouped. I've noticed that some white friends didn't consider themselves to belong to any special "…

Is racism just about white privilege, though? In America, ethnic Indians and east Asians outperform all other ethnic groups on a host of metrics - income, criminality, education, and etc. Isn't there a huge Asian privilege in America that nobody is talking about? Why don't we talk about the Asian/White achievement gap?

This isn't an apples to apples comparison. Asian Americans have never systematically disenfranchised white Americans.

However, you bring up some interesting points but that I have a couple of issues with including probationary whiteness, survivor-ship bias, and performance vs. access. I don't think Asian Americans had to drink from the "colored" fountain. It's easier to win the game if you are allowed to play. In many cases, Asians are considered probationary white so should we be talking about a White/White achievement gap?

Children of immigrants are highly motivated to achieve by parents who selected to come to the US. The folks that immigrate were motivated enough to come here and be successful. This is the essence of survivor-ship bias.

There was a study a couple years ago that showed that having an black-sounding name on your resume lead to fewer callbacks. You have a better shot at batting .300 if you are allowed to pick up a bat.

Re: On being a girl in computer science - a confession

#165

Post by d0mine »

LockeWatts wrote: post #138
rayiner wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For me, I'm not sure how productive all this gender hand-wringing really is. It's potentially very productive. The culture of CS, "judgmental introversion" as you put it, is not anything intrinsic to CS. Indeed, software engineering is a profession that demands a high level of communication and cooperation. The "lone hacker" stereotype is in my opinion quite the opposite of the kind of people you want in software e…

>So your dichotomy about "meritocracy" is short-sighted. There is nothing "meritocratic" about indulging male culture to keep a field male-dominated. Indeed, that's anti-meritocratic I don't see how a blind meritocracy is indulging male culture. Isn't the whole point of a meritocracy the idea that the only thing it cares about is performance?

You are ignoring initial conditions. I understand rayiner's comment as:

  1. high male/female ratio + blind meritocracy => self-sustaining male culture
  2. affirmative action as a temporary kludge to shift male/female ratio
  3. lower male/female ratio + blind meritocracy => self-sustaining new equilibrium
That is after affirmative action stops; it is not necessary that the system returns to old high male/female state.

Re: On being a girl in computer science - a confession

#166

Post by [deleted] »

jimzvz wrote: post #159
jimzvz wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The contexts for the two groups are completely different, thus a simple "swapping the two labels and seeing what results" gives absolutely no insight. This is an argument that has been used by most proponents of discriminatory practices.

Is this not true?

[deleted]

Re: On being a girl in computer science - a confession

#167

Post by hackinthebochs »

jimzvz wrote: post #159
jimzvz wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The contexts for the two groups are completely different, thus a simple "swapping the two labels and seeing what results" gives absolutely no insight. This is an argument that has been used by most proponents of discriminatory practices.

Is this not true?

It's just irrelevant. If the argument is wrong, then explain why its wrong. Trying to shut it down because someone has misused a similar-sounding argument in the past is not a refutation.

Re: On being a girl in computer science - a confession

#168

Post by bestlai »

I’ll just jump the shark. I feel sick and irritated today, so I won’t pretend political correctness.

Fuck this feminist, sexist shit.

First, I am the most orderly developer you could ever meet. My desk is absolutely clean. Everything has a well defined technical purpose there. Whenever I leave, those purposes cease to exist so I eagerly remove or put away those objects. I could walk in any day, pick up my desktop and get seated anywhere else.

“computer games, science-fiction memorabilia and junk food”?! Fuck that, who cares about that shit anyway? I might have a clean mug, but I ain’t never have no fucking plant. How could I be the nit-picking detail-obsessing code freak I am if I was careless with my physical environment in the functional domain? (I don’t give a shit about aesthetics, most of the time.) Some of my colleagues' desks seem to be covered with pig shit, and I don’t cease chiding them for it.

I treat my female coworkers with respect, I politely discuss technical stuff with them if they feel like. I do make sexist jokes if I was able to get to know them sufficiently before, like any healthy male. They mostly laugh and if they don’t, I apologize and tune it down. They don’t refrain from spicy topics, we even discuss that kind. My wife’s male coworkers behave the same way and I have no problem with that. American overdriven political correctness shall get the fuck off my lawn.

“Missing out on best career opportunities?” Well, concentrate on the fucking task at hand, not irrelevant details. Suppose I’d like to work in a fuckin' bakery but hate that the clothes are white (which doesn’t mean in the least that they are clean). So who will start a crusade for me? If the circumstances of your otherwise coveted dream-job are accidental, try to change them. If they are intrinsic, live with them or leave.

I was never hostile towards women in IT. Women consider sexist jokes repugnant in conference presentations? Well, I don’t go to no fucking conference, because I hate to travel, I hate to spend money, I hate the crowd. Networking is a lie if you don’t work with your peers on actual projects for longer times. Presentations are slow, linear, non-searchable. Give me a fucking transcript, post it to reddit, and I’m happy. Can’t recommend anything else to women either.

In my college class we had this beautiful girl with huge boobs. She was smarter than any guy in the whole class. Did we envy her? Did we hate her? Hell no. We respected her and we constantly tried to bring her in discussions for her insights. Did we talk about her body among ourselves? Hell yes, we’re no monks!

The fact is, most girls cannot not care about stuff that’s irrelevant in computer science / software engineering, and also lack the necessary attention to detail. They are simply not interested in it. Guess what, they have no place here, just like I could never be a historian or translator or lawyer or doctor, because I hate meeting new people. I’m not “enforcing” this or some shit like that, I simply accept that most girls are like this for whatever reason and I’m not trying to force them into IT. I’d rather be happy if some guys left software development. (Yeah, yeah, I’m conflating IT with compsci / sweng, who cares now.)

I practically don’t shave, but I’m clean. I never ever stink. I’m not attractive to women I guess, but I don’t give a flying fuck. I’ve got a beautiful, intelligent, loving wife; I don’t need to pretend. I wear sandals with socks because shoes are much too warm in the summer, and without socks I sweat like a pig. Don’t like it? Have a good laugh; I don’t care. I put on (clean) clothing items that are on the top of the respective stacks in my wardrobe. Are you a female who’d like to work as a software developer but you feel you cannot work with me because of my inconsistent clothing? Be a fucking fashion model, then. I never treat, I never even feel an urge to treat female colleagues negatively because they aren’t slender, young, or clothe “gray”.

There is no problem with girls in IT. They’re mostly not here because they don’t want to. Pick any female-dominated non-sex-worker job. Yay, who is protecting the poor shunned males? American media is blowing this shit out of proportion again. (Or if the surveys are right, then american girls are out of their minds, which might be true anyways, with requiring an expensive as hell diamond ring for wedding, or so I read. WHAT THE FUCK?!)

The whole issue is being overcompensated now. On some technical forum I’ve seen somebody ask for advice on whatever. Another user replied with a link to women.debian.org. What the fuck? Do we have “men.debian.org”? If you’re no different wrt. technical matters, then you need no different website. If you need different treatment, then don’t be surprised if you’re treated differently.

I’m tired of this shit.

Re: On being a girl in computer science - a confession

#169

Post by mpyne »

Camillo wrote: post #135
mpyne wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The other side believe that an artificial environment needs to be created to correct an imbalance. Rooted in this principle there is often a belief that this situation only exists because of artificially created and perpetuated gender roles. If you're referring to affirmative action, the other side is more akin to the belief that without corrective action of some sort, that there will never be a fair environment in…

When people talk about meritocracy, they are thinking of a competition between individuals. When you assert that it's a competition between races, or between sexes, or between other social groups, the concept of meritocracy doesn't even apply any more.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but in America WASPy types of persons enslaved black and "mixed" types of persons, and even after that was theoretically eliminated post-Civil War, Jim Crow laws ensured that racial equality was not even possible until near the end of the 1960's.

So certainly at a socio-political regional and national level it was very much a "competition between races".

At an individual level then sure, it's not like you could point a finger as a black man at one particular white oppressor, but that still didn't make it any better for you (statistically speaking) to have been born black.

That's the whole point about the discussion about a meritocracy: How can you say that the alpha nerd on this side and the failed athlete struggling with math on the other were ever engaged in a fair competition for that one programming job? Alpha nerd had a two-parent home (probably a two-income home as well), with computers to practice on since he was a teenager (or earlier), didn't have to worry about being stabbed at school or shot at the public park, went to a public school with a stable and well-established tax base, etc. etc. Whereas Super Jock came from the slums, had to step over the passed-out crackheads on his way to walking miles to school in the morning, his dad was floating along from prison cell to prison cell and it would be even odds if his mother was drunk or not when he got home that evening from his hours of practice for the sport that represented his only effective chance at a stable life as an adult. Math homework? He don't have time for that shit!

Now obviously both of those are highly contrived, but the issue is that it doesn't even have to be that severe in practice to go from little individual effects to a noticeable high-level socio-economic effect.

Is affirmative action the answer to that? Hell man, I don't know. The underlying issues certainly go much deeper than just "we should give more scholarships to poor minority candidates", for all we know that's 10 years too late to even get minorities interested in STEM, let alone struggling to catch up with it.

But HELL YES the concept of "competition" applies to meritocracy. I'm not saying race should have something to do with a meritocracy, I'm saying that it shouldn't, and so are people who actually argue for affirmative action for future equality.

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