A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech • Hacker News Board

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#151

Post by mikeash » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:36 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #58

> [If you’re a dude and you’re reading this article] Go befriend a girl in your class or company. It’s not creepy. Include her, ask her for advice, introduce her, learn about her work and her life in the same way you would with any male friend or coworker. If you’re an investor, professor, journalist, or manager, take it on yourself to sponsor a young woman’s career. While I totally agree with this advice, I think th…

Women are people. Talk to them like people.

If you’re so bad at socializing that you might accidentally harass someone, fix that! Don’t just retreat from the world because you can’t handle a basic skill.

Edit: Interesting downvotes. Is it the suggestion that women are people, or the suggestion for self-improvement if you’re incapable of treating them accordingly?

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#152

Post by TACIXAT » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:36 PM UTC

ryanobjc wrote: post #107

kazinator wrote: post #28

> Go befriend a girl in your class or company. It’s not creepy. "Honey, there is this random blogger who thinks I should befriend a girl in my company. It's supposedly not creepy or anything. What do you think?" If I didn't care what my wife thinks, I'd still have to think twice and consider the gender-political climate of the modern age. The mere perception of having some intention of wrongdoing can harm you. In all…

Here's your simple rule: https://medium.com/@annevictoriaclark/the-rock-test-a-hack-f... Quoting: "It’s as clear cut as this: Treat all women like you would treat Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson." and "But definitely don’t hit on her. It looks like she could kill you with the chair you’re sitting on." It's really that simple.

This article is pretty condescending.

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#153

Post by tptacek » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:36 PM UTC

taurath wrote: post #117

tptacek wrote: post #50

Are the rest of the STEM career paths seen as more social than CS? Is mathematics more social than CS? Because CS is almost (not quite: physics is almost as bad) unique among STEM specializations for its gender disparity. I talk regularly to academic math people (because cryptography) and the sense I have is that if anything, CS is far more social than the work they do --- to get anything significant done in technolo…

Big difference to me is how does the core work get done. If it’s like coding where you need zero distraction time and actively have to turn off socially, it becomes less appealing. As a former PM turned dev, the difference is striking in how isolated the work can require you do be.

I believe this. The problem is, it's not unique to CS (it might be unique to knowledge work, but CS is far from the only species of knowledge work). So for it to have demographic explanatory power, it would have to account for the intense solitary concentration required for elite research in other STEM fields --- including fields like math, which are very closely related to CS, and the multitude of random STEM fields which have been taken over by computational approaches where the underlying work is really just domain-specialized programming by another name.

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#154

Post by leshow » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:36 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #99

always_good wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you're making the claim that men think that. You can't just pass the buck to your own premise with "dunno, you'll have to ask them."

> You can't just pass the buck to your own premise with "dunno, you'll have to ask them." Yes I can. It's completely reasonable to be observe something even if you can't offer an explanation. I don't know why some people are racist but I can see that they are. I don't know why some people are sexist but I can see that they are. I don't know why some people think women are inherently weaker at computer science, but I…

We have no evidence that people do think that though. I have never heard that women are 'weaker' in computer science than men. My guess is most people think that competence in computer science is independent of sex.

If you're presenting that they don't, where is that information coming from?

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#155

Post by jehlakj » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:37 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #50

Are the rest of the STEM career paths seen as more social than CS? Is mathematics more social than CS? Because CS is almost (not quite: physics is almost as bad) unique among STEM specializations for its gender disparity. I talk regularly to academic math people (because cryptography) and the sense I have is that if anything, CS is far more social than the work they do --- to get anything significant done in technolo…

I have friends from other STEM areas, and we jokingly agree that my major has the weirdest people. That includes me.

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#156

Post by Mythanar » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:37 PM UTC

lilactown wrote: post #118

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #58

> [If you’re a dude and you’re reading this article] Go befriend a girl in your class or company. It’s not creepy. Include her, ask her for advice, introduce her, learn about her work and her life in the same way you would with any male friend or coworker. If you’re an investor, professor, journalist, or manager, take it on yourself to sponsor a young woman’s career. While I totally agree with this advice, I think th…

JFC. If you're afraid of accidentally harassing or molesting someone I think you have the wrong idea of how to interact with people.

What you think is harassing might quite well disagree with target female view of what harassing is, complicated by the fact that HR department might disagree with you both. And should that whole thing become public, you'll be judged by the entire office, with the entire spectrum of views on what harassment is.

Personally, as a male, you have absolutely nothing to gain, and everything to lose. The most rational thing is to not engage at all.

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#157

Post by stcredzero » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:37 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #50

Are the rest of the STEM career paths seen as more social than CS? Is mathematics more social than CS? Because CS is almost (not quite: physics is almost as bad) unique among STEM specializations for its gender disparity. I talk regularly to academic math people (because cryptography) and the sense I have is that if anything, CS is far more social than the work they do --- to get anything significant done in technolo…

I talk regularly to academic math people (because cryptography) and the sense I have is that if anything, CS is far more social than the work they do --- to get anything significant done in technology, you have to coordinate and cooperate amongst teams of people.

I recall a paper I read in grad school which found that programmers actually had more need of interaction than other fields. As jdavis notes elsewhere, accounting and bookkeeping employs more women nowadays. I also note that very early on, computer programming was seen as a desirable job by women. Is there a common thread between computer programming in the very early days and accounting and bookkeeping today?

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#158

Post by peoplewindow » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:37 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #89

commandlinefan wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Are the rest of the STEM career paths seen as more social than CS? This guy actually put some pretty decent work into researching this - he found that women dominate "sociable" STEM fields like veterinary sciences and obstetrics, while men dominate the "cold" STEM branches like surgery and computer science. http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/08/07/contra-grant-on-exagger...

Alexander believes a lot of things. But you can just look up the stats on STEM fields yourself; they're not hard to find. There are STEM fields that approach parity, there are a couple in which women slightly lead men, and there are a bunch with more men than women. But CS is, by what to a casual glance looks like multiple stddevs, worse than the rest. Unless math is "warmer" than CS --- it isn't --- this explanation…

Maths is clearly warmer. Go look at the stats for undergrad vs postgrad. There's a huge difference. Women get maths degrees to become teachers, more or less.

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#159

Post by colemickens » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:37 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #58

> [If you’re a dude and you’re reading this article] Go befriend a girl in your class or company. It’s not creepy. Include her, ask her for advice, introduce her, learn about her work and her life in the same way you would with any male friend or coworker. If you’re an investor, professor, journalist, or manager, take it on yourself to sponsor a young woman’s career. While I totally agree with this advice, I think th…

This comment is in every single one of these threads. I am not trying to be hyperbolic here, but it reminds me of people that act as if "laws" are the only thing keeping them from murdering their annoying neighbor. I don't know how to read it without thinking "wow, this confirms what women are saying about men".

I mean, I guess I should be glad there's some self-awareness?

Maybe I just can't empathize as a gay man though, but I've never, ever felt this way around a male coworker, gay or otherwise.

edit: To further explain my thinking... what's the alternative? The only way I can understand the comment is "Oh, well this is a witchhunt and I'm afraid of being swept up" ... or else, "I have done those behaviors that men are getting in trouble for and am worried about doing them to a coworker." Maybe there's another interpretation that I'm not able to understand? Trying to understand here. Thanks.

Re: A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech

#160

Post by thucydidesofusa » Wed, May 09, 2018, 8:37 PM UTC

jrs95 wrote: post #83

thucydidesofusa wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny how that works. I heard one man say to a woman that he didn't schedule a meeting for a particular time because he saw that she had a conflicting meeting. Later that same woman described (to another woman) that the man had been "creeping on her calendar". If it weren't for society's deference to women's feelings, that would probably be read as a hostile comment.

There's definitely a bit of a double standard here. I overhear comments like this fairly regularly. It's just normal and accepted behavior. (I wouldn't go as far as to say society generally has "deference to women's feelings", though.)

A sizable fraction of restraining orders are granted on women's feelings. And look at conversations around the social relations of men and women - women have rights and men have responsibilities. Women get to abort fetuses and unilaterally give children up for adoption, men get locked up if they dont pay child support.

If you're a man go into public with a woman and get her to cry. Measure how long it takes until someone angrily asks you "what did you do".