[citation required]
Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
21–30 of 66 posts
Re: Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
#22[citation required]
Take a look at my most recent comment.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6879195
Re: Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
#23I'm commenting here as a response to a few posts that highlight my use of the word "hostile" - a somewhat inflammatory word but my time in the journalism world taught me to bait clicks.... c: I wouldn't say -hostile- in the sense that there's an active conscious attempt to bar women and people of color from computer science, what I mean is that in the computer science world there's an underlying structure which is ra…
I think the underlying question should be, "Why are fewer and fewer women are attracted to the field?"
Re: Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
#24I suspect it is the "Role model" problem.
I am told, this is very well researched. And there is overwhelming evidence that role models do solve the problem. I understand UK office of statistics has the numbers that show how to solve this.
So if you are black/female and in IT let the next generation of kids know about it.
Re: Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
#25Well, one thing that could be done to change this would be to stop complaining about how one of the most meritocratic groups of people in the history of mankind is hostile, and get forking. The code is thataway: https://github.com/
Your attitude is childish and short-sighted. When certain groups are -by default- disadvantaged compared to a dominant group, just saying "go do work like I did" - is meaningless.
Answer is as question does.
Re: Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
#26http://learncodethehardway.org/ http://ruby.railstutorial.org/ http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/full-text/book/book.html There. That should do it--for our part, we'll try to be friendly. What more do you want? EDIT: http://railsgirls.com/ is actually pretty great to be fair.
I decided that I wanted a new career in programming. I learned Rails through Michael Hartl's (wonderful) tutorial. Several months later, I had a job as a programmer. My being female has never, ever come up. In fact, of the five programmers in my shop, two are female.
Any interested party can learn the skills, and then all you have to do is find someone you can help. There's a huge demand for programming skills, but a lot of potential clients/employers don't necessarily know what value we can bring. You also need to be somewhat of a salesman.
(Full disclosure: I did come from a programming background, but I was self-taught. My previous job was in an unrelated field.)
Re: Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
#27I'm commenting here as a response to a few posts that highlight my use of the word "hostile" - a somewhat inflammatory word but my time in the journalism world taught me to bait clicks.... c: I wouldn't say -hostile- in the sense that there's an active conscious attempt to bar women and people of color from computer science, what I mean is that in the computer science world there's an underlying structure which is ra…
I think the underlying question should be, "Why are fewer and fewer women are attracted to the field?"
Maybe I should have thought this one out a bit... I'm pretty drunk!!
Re: Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
#28Well, one thing that could be done to change this would be to stop complaining about how one of the most meritocratic groups of people in the history of mankind is hostile, and get forking. The code is thataway: https://github.com/
The problem is that the hostility has no target. That's exactly the problem. It's hostility in virtue of the climb of a ficticious hierarchy, albeit a pragmatic-utilitarian one, which fails to acknowledge the socio-political and historical context in which it emerged, not to mention the outmoded economic, peculiar institution that made it possible.
To be clear? Slavery made most of America's economic infrastructure possible. The subjugation of women made America's economic infrastructure possible. The Internet was born out of those economic foundations. There is no meritocracy in a vacuum.
Not to be too reductionist, but I believe a big narrative may help here: It's like when some bully barges in on a group of kids playing a new game unknown to the bully. The bully calls its friends over, and they all demand that scores be kept and aggression be matched. Yet they fail to understand that the game could be played just as well without the contrivance.
Re: Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
#29Seriously stop make these accusations without any proof. Where is the hostility? Just because there are a lot of white males™ doesn't mean there is hostility against other people.
To clarify, check my recent comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6879195
Re: Ask HN: Why is the hacker scene so hostile to women and black people?
#30I suspect it is the "Role model" problem. I am told, this is very well researched. And there is overwhelming evidence that role models do solve the problem. I understand UK office of statistics has the numbers that show how to solve this. So if you are black/female and in IT let the next generation of kids know about it.
One of the irksome things in trying to show good role models in computing is that one in particular seems to show up: Ada Lovelace. Very white, very Victorian, very nerdbait.
I'd much rather see young women learning about Adm. Grace Hopper, Roberta Williams, Sophie Wilson, or anyone who has actually done something in recent enough time that they aren't given fake glamor.