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I code like a girl

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Re: I code like a girl

#131

Post by amyjess »

facepalm wrote: post #84
rmc wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But how much of that "lack of interest" is due to the person not finding the thing interesting, or not finding the industry/their peers interesting? If there are sexists in a group, then people who are the target of that sexism are less likely to enjoy that group. As the number of women decreases in a group, then the remaining women experience more sexism. Negative feedback.

Well do you have an answer? To me it seems highly unlikely that all the women have been turned away by sexism. I remember the times when programming and computers where considered extremely unsexy and basically made you an outcast and unlikely to get a girl-friend. Computer kids back then would have been very happy to meet a girl who was interested in computer stuff.

The worst of the sexism comes from other girls.

Nerdy boys largely get ignored by their non-nerdy peers. There's an attitude of "I don't know why anybody would like that, but whatever".

On the other hand, nerdy girls are treated like absolute shit by other girls. Instead of "not my cup of tea", it's more like "eww, that's disgusting, and you're disgusting for liking it". The movie Mean Girls could have been a documentary.

And adults can influence this too. Even well-meaning feminists are more likely to steer young girls towards careers in more "acceptable" professions like business, law, or medicine rather than something down-and-dirty like engineering. And if science is involved, it's likely to be either medicine or a research career in natural sciences (e.g. physics, chemistry).

Re: I code like a girl

#132

Post by xenophonf »

kazinator wrote: post #123
amyjess wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can also add a couple more in somewhat more modern times: * Lynn Conway, who co-launched the Mead & Conway revolution that made VLSI feasible for the first time * Sophie Wilson, who developed the ARM architecture

Did you cherry pick these examples to some ironic purpose? Sophie Wilson was "born Roger Wilson" (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sophie_Wilson ). "While struggling with life in a male role, Conway had been married to a woman and had two children." (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynn_Conway )

How's that ironic? They identify themselves as women and they're notable scientists/engineers.

Re: I code like a girl

#133

Post by PJDK »

Svip wrote: post #19
smhenderson wrote: post #12

A good read. Although I was surprised the grandmother of programming, Ada Lovelace, wasn't mentioned. Ada Lovelace, was an English mathematician and writer chiefly known for her work on Charles Babbage's early mechanical general-purpose computer, the Analytical Engine. Her notes on the engine include what is recognised as the first algorithm intended to be carried out by a machine. Because of this, she is often descr…

As interesting as Ada Lovelace's and Charles Babbage's story is, their efforts have had little (if any) influence on the computer we know today. In a sense, they are not completely relevant when talking about modern computing. I also feel Lovelace tend to distract the subject on women in computing.

I agree, really it's Grace Hopper that we should be celebrating as "the woman who founded modern computing", because we're still feeling her influence every day!

Re: I code like a girl

#134

Post by MollyR »

liotier wrote: post #126
MollyR wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it fair to say putting your heart into something makes you an amateur at something ? I dunno, this feels off. Did I misunderstand the analogy ?

> Is it fair to say putting your heart into something makes you an amateur at something ? Yes, that is the etymology of the word 'amateur' : 1784, "one who has a taste for (something)," from French amateur "lover of," from Latin amatorem (nominative amator) "lover," agent noun from amatus, past participle of amare "to love" - http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=amateur Later this word has been used derogatorily,…

Thanks, you're one of the reasons I like hackernews. I learn something new every day!

Re: I code like a girl

#135

Post by gigglesfact »

_bfhp wrote: post #88
nadam wrote: post #83

It think this has nothing to do with gender: In those early projects those who got the biggest respect (like John Neumann) have done the intellectual heavy-lifting. Seriously, that guy was a genius. Today it is the same way: The CTO or chief scientist of an elite company gets much bigger respect than a subordinate programmer who mostly does what he/she is instructed to do. This is not a gender issue in my opinion. Wo…

You are naming anecdotes (really just one that is relevant to the era of history in question) involving individual people, while the writer is pointing out more general trends. I'm going to sympathize with author.

Is that why the same few programmer women are mentioned in these discussions?

It seems really simple to me: where are all the programming languages designed by women? Why is open source 95-98% men? This does not match gender in CS or IT at all.

Answer: because women as a group are overwhelmingly not interested in it. The patriarchy isn't telling the men to clock 80 hour weeks or selflessly maintain repos through the night. So why don't the women do it at any level close to men?

Almost 10 years since FLOSSPOLS showed this massive imbalance. Feminists still in denial.

Re: I code like a girl

#136

Post by amyjess »

kazinator wrote: post #123
amyjess wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can also add a couple more in somewhat more modern times: * Lynn Conway, who co-launched the Mead & Conway revolution that made VLSI feasible for the first time * Sophie Wilson, who developed the ARM architecture

Did you cherry pick these examples to some ironic purpose? Sophie Wilson was "born Roger Wilson" (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sophie_Wilson ). "While struggling with life in a male role, Conway had been married to a woman and had two children." (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynn_Conway )

Trans women are women.

Re: I code like a girl

#137

Post by minikites »

lorddoig wrote: post #98
minikites wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why isn't it relevant?

Because any other approach, even those with the best of intentions, eventually boils down to the supposition that what you've got between your legs is somehow relevant. And you know what - on an aggregate, societal level - it might actually be : men and women are not the same, and that's OK. But this is a statistical observation that only applies to the population as a whole and is completely invalid at the individua…

It's extremely relevant for women. Women are harassed more online and the harassment is more personal for women than men. Men get their work attacked, women get their identity attacked:

http://www.psmag.com/health-and-behavior/women-arent-welcome...

> According to a 2005 report by the Pew Research Center, which has been tracking the online lives of Americans for more than a decade, women and men have been logging on in equal numbers since 2000, but the vilest communications are still disproportionately lobbed at women. We are more likely to report being stalked and harassed on the Internet—of the 3,787 people who reported harassing incidents from 2000 to 2012 to the volunteer organization Working to Halt Online Abuse, 72.5 percent were female. Sometimes, the abuse can get physical: A Pew survey reported that five percent of women who used the Internet said “something happened online” that led them into “physical danger.” And it starts young: Teenage girls are significantly more likely to be cyberbullied than boys. Just appearing as a woman online, it seems, can be enough to inspire abuse. In 2006, researchers from the University of Maryland set up a bunch of fake online accounts and then dispatched them into chat rooms.

> Accounts with feminine usernames incurred an average of 100 sexually explicit or threatening messages a day. Masculine names received 3.7.

http://time.com/3305466/male-female-harassment-online/

> [W]omen’s harassment is more likely to be gender-based and that has specific, discriminatory harms rooted in our history. The study pointed out that the harassment targeted at men is not because they are men, as is clearly more frequently the case with women. It’s defining because a lot of harassment is an effort to put women, because they are women, back in their “place.”

Re: I code like a girl

#138

Post by amyjess »

mrits wrote: post #48
ianstallings wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you are aware of these sayings correct? This was not the first time you've heard them, right?

Yes, I am aware. But then again I phrased my original statement to show that there was a small frequency of use of these terms. Where females (in my area) have a very high frequency of referring to each other as girls. Almost like "woman" is a formal term.

Yes.

I'll gladly refer to myself as a girl, but I only ever use "woman" in formal contexts.

Re: I code like a girl

#139

Post by lucozade »

kazinator wrote: post #50

> What is now considered a male-dominated field, was once defined as “women’s work.” Once? It's naive to think that these attitudes do not persist, albeit in somewhat disguised forms, perhaps. At some universities, for instance, engineers regard CS majors as "wimps". Engineering is hard, CS is soft. Moreover, think about how there is an attitude that some "softer" or "easier" programming is lower on the pecking order…

I think the point is that it was a much more literal connection.

Specifically, programming itself was often considered secretarial work and, as such, was generally given to women.

Men tended to participate as engineers or mathematicians.

I don't think anyone would contend that CS is a female-dominated field although I take your point that some may consider it somewhat lower on the testosterone chart than traditional engineering.

Re: I code like a girl

#140

Post by facepalm »

rmc wrote: post #119
facepalm wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you say yourself that girls don't like nerds. So who is to blame? And the "treated as potential meat" remark is just sexist from you. Also those where the days of playing video games on home computers. Professional IT work was decades later. And boys weren't the gate keeper to the technology either - how should that have worked? Today as then, if you are interested in doing stuff with computers, nobody can prevent…

> So you say yourself that girls don't like nerds. No many women don't like being hit on constantly by people. That's not the same thing as "not liking nerds".

You are creating a fantasy narrative. I guarantee you that nerds don't constantly hit on girls or women. They are famous for not doing that and being more concerned about their computers instead.

My claim was that nerds back in the days of home computers would have been happy to meet a girl interested in computers. That is a far stretch from the Beavies and Butthead scenario you are trying to create. It's simply normal and healthy to hope for other human beings to share some interests with you.

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