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My First Hand Experience With Sexism

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Re: My First Hand Experience With Sexism

#11

Post by untog »

mynameisasdf wrote: post #7

This article is incredibly badly written and lacks any real thought about the matter. So he had one interview with some douche CEO and now jumps to the conclusion that: >"Sadly, sexism is alive and well in my industry. " >"Now I really empathized with all the women who were victims of assault or rape." Fucking really? I've been a developer for now over 11 years and must have met thousands of other devs from countless…

Only once, ONCE, have I ever met someone who made a women-bashing comment similar to what he is talking about.

I'm guessing you're not a woman. Now, I'm not trying to make judgement on the article either way, but I don't think you can really say "I've only ever seen sexism in tech once" when you aren't someone that actually experiences it.

Re: My First Hand Experience With Sexism

#12

Post by arbutus »

mynameisasdf wrote: post #7

This article is incredibly badly written and lacks any real thought about the matter. So he had one interview with some douche CEO and now jumps to the conclusion that: >"Sadly, sexism is alive and well in my industry. " >"Now I really empathized with all the women who were victims of assault or rape." Fucking really? I've been a developer for now over 11 years and must have met thousands of other devs from countless…

"The only real sexism prevalent in the tech industry are the groups of militant feminists setting up endless, patronizing, segregated "coding for girls" meetups."

It's easy for this kind of thing to be completely invisible when this is your attitude. Sexism in the tech industry is alive and well, and there are a lot of good reasons to have meet-ups for both girls and women.

When you immediately start lashing out about "militant feminists" the second someone suggests that sexism exists, you're saying that our experiences are invalid and that you know better than us how welcome we are in the industry. It should be completely unsurprising that this does not make us feel welcome.

Re: My First Hand Experience With Sexism

#15

Post by tbrownaw »

facepalm wrote: post #3

Jerks exist in the world. Frankly I don't see the big deal. It's clearly not a company he (or many other people) would like to work for. That happens a lot. Interviewing is a two sided process - the company has to like the candidate, and the candidate has to like the company. So it's a case of the candidate not liking the company. Surprisingly, even among men, not every man likes every other man. While I don't agree…

While I don't agree with the CEOs statement, I think people should be allowed to hire whoever they want.

The trouble with this is that a set of biases can become near-universal.

I have the right to associate (or not) with whoever I choose. But if everyone (or nearly everyone) choose not to associate with people from a particular group, that is harmful to society[1].

So, there are exceptions made to your freedom of association. IIRC these exceptions only apply to companies with more than 50 employees, which seems a decent balance between "we're all friends here" small/family businesses (individual rights win) vs "you are a cog in a wheel" megacorps (the good of society wins).

[1] For example, I understand that people refusing to hire ex-convicts is a significant contributor to recidivism.

Re: My First Hand Experience With Sexism

#16

Post by innertracks »

angersock wrote: post #5

Author ought to have mentioned the name of the company--otherwise, it's just more vapid hearsay. If we don't know who was supposed to have done this, what does it matter? Morever, this quote got under my skin: "Now I really empathized with all the women who were victims of assault or rape. To me, this was equivalent to videoing an assault or rape, doing nothing to stop it and later claiming you didn’t have a part in…

As someone who has been a victim of sexual assault (rape) I would like to up vote your comment about a hundred times. The author apparently hasn't had to deal with the years of healing needed on so many levels. And yeah, it happens to men, too. By women.

Re: My First Hand Experience With Sexism

#17

Post by draugadrotten »

> “Women are incapable of making the tough decisions necessary to run a profitable company on low margins.” - CEO of a Women’s Product Retailer

Frankly, I think the CEO was pulling this guys leg and wanted to see how he reacted when his buttons are pushed. That is a situation that frequently occurs in customer meetings and you don't want your rep to blow up in the customer's face.

That said, did you see the recent Swedish study of 125.000 companies that proved women-run companies makes 15% less profit? SOURCE: http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=2054&art...

> You should know this about me. I don’t do well around alpha males.

Yeah, so the blogger can't deal with CEOs and other authority figures. Wouldn't hire him/her either.

Re: My First Hand Experience With Sexism

#18

Post by meritt »

> "Now I really empathized with all the women who were victims of assault or rape."

You interacted with a bad person or two and suddenly you're able to empathize with victims of assault and rape? What? Exactly how minimal is your understanding of those issues to equate them accordingly?

Re: My First Hand Experience With Sexism

#20

Post by pessimizer »

facepalm wrote: post #6
fleshweasel wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of silly shit is much easier to say when you're a member of that racial or gender group that more people want to hire.

The reverse exists, too, and I am pretty sure there are enough companies who want to hire women to give all women in IT sufficient choices. What do you suggest - should the CEO be imprisoned? Disallowed from doing business? Go to brainwashing camp to set his brain right? It's easy to get angry about such cases, but think about what you want to achieve. Perhaps he had some bad experiences with women. It's unfortunate,…

>I am pretty sure there are enough companies who want to hire women to give all women in IT sufficient choices.

Why are you sure of that? Is it because you have to be to overcome the cognitive dissonance of supporting the right to discriminate against women but not feeling like you yourself are a sexist, or because you have information that I'm not privy to?

edit: Maybe the "law of averages" tells you that for each group with an opinion, there's an equally large counterbalancing group with the opposite opinion?

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