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Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

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Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#181

Post by argumentum »

md224 wrote: post #133
aaronbrethorst wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inform: I personally would expect that the representation of a given gender, religion or race in an arbitrary body (a school, a company, an industry, a governing body, etc.) would pretty closely match the representation of the gender/religion/race/etc. in society at large. The tech industry is clearly falling flat on its face when it comes to adequate representation of women. Persuade: Do you really need me to spell…

I tend to agree with your view, though I'm curious if this assertion: > the representation of a given gender, religion or race in an arbitrary body (a school, a company, an industry, a governing body, etc.) would pretty closely match the representation of the gender/religion/race/etc. in society at large is necessarily true. I mean, how does one come up with a normative stance on the relationship between proportion i…

I doubt it, because the groupings you mentioned are themselves arbitrary. We could just as easily split society into tall people and short people.

The distribution of professional basketball players is always going to have more of the tall group than the short group, simply because the rim is arbitrarily at 10 ft.

If a particular ethnic group happens to be taller on average than another, it's likely they will be more represented amongst professional basketball players, all other things being equal.

What we want is not proportionate representation based on arbitrary groups, but rather the correct representation. We want the best basketball players to be playing basketball, because that makes it more fun for the rest of us to watch.

Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#182

Post by [deleted] »

enneff wrote: post #153
paulhauggis wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"If you truly care about people in tech, you should applaud any well-meaning effort to get more people excited about tech, such as this, irrespective of how the event is phrased." What if it was phrased "whites in tech". Would you be okay with it?

I would wonder why the hell it's necessary, considering the technology industry is dominated by white people. http://www.lpfi.org/sites/default/files/tilted_playing_field...

[deleted]

Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#183

Post by PhasmaFelis »

staticelf wrote: post #29

I dislike the fact that females get a lot more attention because of their gender. If you want true equality you've to start treating everybody as equals and giving extra space for some just doesn't cut it. I see this all the time in my country (I don't know if this is the case here) but females get a lot more attention in basically all areas of society and I don't think much good can come from that. Well, I guess I'm…

> I dislike the fact that females get a lot more attention because of their gender. If you want true equality you've to start treating everybody as equals and giving extra space for some just doesn't cut it.

"In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets, and steal loaves of bread."

If you want true equality, you must help the downtrodden to rise up and stand as equals. These days, when someone in a deep hole is given a ladder to help them climb out, it's popular for bystanders on the sidewalk above to cry "It's not fair! Why don't I get a ladder? I'm being treated unequally!" Well, no. You don't get a ladder because you're not in a hole.

That's an oversimplification, of course. We all have our own holes, of varying depths, and for all our best efforts there still aren't enough ladders to go around, nor enough people to distribute them. I'm not sure what the solution is. But I'm pretty sure that demanding that we smash all the ladders isn't it.

Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#184

Post by PhasmaFelis »

cube_yellow wrote: post #83
danilocampos wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's cute, but attrition for female tech workers is double that of men. Something is going on.

Yeah, women are raising kids. And, they negotiate lower pay, so are less invested in the industry. And, they find opportunities in other industries more enticing than men, so are more likely to jump ship for more pleasant pastures. And, and, and shit that people in tech shouldn't bust a brain cell over figuring out and seeking rent to validate their feelings. If you haven't had your warm fuzzies for today, go work a…

What's with your obsession with "working out"? You keep bringing it up.

Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#185

Post by wpietri »

cheez wrote: post #139
beambot wrote: post #23

To all the people kvetching in the comments... this is the live stream for "YC's Female Founders Conference" [1]. That's why "female" is in the post title. I'm an ardent supporter of the effort, and I hope (much like startup school) that YC is able to make it into an annual event! Very inspiring! Also, my wife is in attendance. I look forward to hearing her reactions later tonight. If the live stream is any indicator…

What if only 10% of women are interested in working in tech but 20% of men are interested? (Random numbers not based in reality). Does a 50/50 split make sense? My personal experience is that there are fewer Black and Hispanic high tech workers than pretty much any other demographic, including women, if you get out of the big cities. I wish the answers were clearer, but all I can say is that if women are actually dis…

> For those who hire, do you pay women developers less than male developers of the same skill level?

Skill level perception is influenced by gender, even for experts. [1] [2] Unless hiring managers are blinding the process by which they determine skill and/or pay, then they could well be paying women less even if they think they aren't.

[1] http://www.pnas.org/content/109/41/16474.full [2] http://www.nber.org/papers/w5903

Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#186

Post by wpietri »

spirefly wrote: post #137

I was surprised it was only open to female attendees. Having the female role models is both important to females AND males since they need to support the inclusion of females. (And not spank the behinds of founders in VC meetings!!!)

Both experiences are useful.

I attended AdaCamp last year and it was fascinating. In previous AdaCamps they'd tried mixed-gender stuff. At mine, though, they did an "allies" track for guys (and any women who wanted to pop in).

It felt a little weird being excluded from the main track, but honestly, it made sense to me from the moment I arrived. Suddenly, for the first time at a conference, I was part of a small, visible minority. It was uncomfortable. Everybody was perfectly nice, but I was acutely aware that I did not look like everybody else.

That made it easy for me to imagine how empowering an experience it could be to for the women at AdaCamp to experience a women-only environment at the conference. It reminded me of the time I rode in Critical Mass: suddenly, because bikes vastly outnumbered cars, I felt free and safe in a way I had never experienced biking in the city.

So now I'm entirely in favor of things like this. To me, it's all part of tidying up the legacy of millennia of oppression of women. In 50 years, I hope it's not necessary. But for now, I say it's great.

Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#187

Post by cube_yellow »

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #184
cube_yellow wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, women are raising kids. And, they negotiate lower pay, so are less invested in the industry. And, they find opportunities in other industries more enticing than men, so are more likely to jump ship for more pleasant pastures. And, and, and shit that people in tech shouldn't bust a brain cell over figuring out and seeking rent to validate their feelings. If you haven't had your warm fuzzies for today, go work a…

What's with your obsession with "working out"? You keep bringing it up.

1. I don't do it enough myself, so I'm projecting my anger/disappointment. 2. In the past months I've come to notice that I respect built men so much more than average guys, and how many social ills could be solved if every guy just lifted heavy weights a few times a week.

Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#188

Post by patrickyeon »

beambot wrote: post #23

To all the people kvetching in the comments... this is the live stream for "YC's Female Founders Conference" [1]. That's why "female" is in the post title. I'm an ardent supporter of the effort, and I hope (much like startup school) that YC is able to make it into an annual event! Very inspiring! Also, my wife is in attendance. I look forward to hearing her reactions later tonight. If the live stream is any indicator…

When people start whining about events or programs like this, I like to send them off to read "When I Moved Abroad"[1], a blog post by that was like flipping a switch in my mind that suddenly made these things make so much more sense.

[1] https://blog.mozilla.org/it/2013/03/29/when-i-moved-abroad/

Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#189

Post by vacri »

Crake wrote: post #116
vacri wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So essentially you're saying that wheelchair ramps shouldn't be installed because we need to maintain an ironclad everone-gets-exactly-the-same-treatment position? A ramp serves only a very select part of the population, therefore it isn't 'fair' and should be shunned? Women are being treated differently, that is what is keeping them out, so I will endeavour not to treat them differently? The flaw here is the fundame…

At least with my own disability/disabilities, I much prefer people to act normally around me. I absolutely feel othered if people go on forever about it. Able-bodied people can use ramps too. If I were in a wheelchair, I'd prefer my friends to walk beside me without talking the whole time about how tragically victimized I am by the existence of stairs and other devices employing 90 degree angles of oppression. I'd de…

I absolutely feel othered if people go on forever about it.

Where did I suggest this at all? You're projecting your issues onto me. I wasn't painting people with disabilities as tragically victimised or any of that other shit. I gave one example that happened to be about people with a disability, then talked about advantage and privilege as largely abstract concepts.

you might want to find a different way to word it to avoid unpleasant implications.

You might want to find a way to respond without putting words in people's mouths. The audience that would actually take what I said as saying that being a woman is a physical disability does not exist. It's a bogeyman used for arguments like yours. "But these hypothetical morons might take you the wrong way and take offense!". Well, if they do take offense, no harm done, because they're morons. You're also arguing from hyperbolic outliers - painting 'well-meaning activists' as the ones who fight to ban sharing the ramp (because that happens... how often?) rather than the ones who fought to have the ramp put there in the first place.

The irony is that you've just said you don't like people taking offense on your behalf, and yet here you are taking offense on behalf of these hypothetical morons.

Women control 70% of global [consumer] spending.

Yes, women do a disproportionate amount of shopping for staple items like food or clothing. This is not 'controlling the economy'. It's like saying that since most workers in hospitality are in their early 20s, this means that people in their early 20s know the most about fine dining, since they are the ones that handle the plates.

I'm confused by the way you mention class privilege and then assume that somehow this means that women are disadvantaged

This is a fair comment. I was responding to a comment about women with a more abstract comment about social advantage, using wealth as an easy example. It wasn't meant to be a causal relation.

When even ACLU says...

Citation needed.

Re: Y Combinator Female Founders Conference LiveStream

#190

Post by aaronbrethorst »

argumentum wrote: post #181
md224 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree with your view, though I'm curious if this assertion: > the representation of a given gender, religion or race in an arbitrary body (a school, a company, an industry, a governing body, etc.) would pretty closely match the representation of the gender/religion/race/etc. in society at large is necessarily true. I mean, how does one come up with a normative stance on the relationship between proportion i…

I doubt it, because the groupings you mentioned are themselves arbitrary. We could just as easily split society into tall people and short people. The distribution of professional basketball players is always going to have more of the tall group than the short group, simply because the rim is arbitrarily at 10 ft. If a particular ethnic group happens to be taller on average than another, it's likely they will be more…

> What we want is not proportionate representation based on arbitrary groups, but rather the correct representation. We want the best basketball players to be playing basketball, because that makes it more fun for the rest of us to watch.

Let me reiterate what I infer from your words: 'black people are naturally more athletic, so they should keep playing basketball, and leave all that pesky business and government-running to white people.'

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