To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes • Hacker News Board

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#171

Post by dsuth » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:21 AM UTC

primitivesuave wrote: post #125

obstacle1 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

primitivesuave's post is fraught with unconscious sexism. That is the problem. First he generalizes that all adolescent males put on "pseudo-masculine efforts". No they don't. That's just as much a stereotype as "all girls suck at coding" or whatever stereotype-du-jour militant feminists are raging about this week. Maybe a few of the students put on "displays" that he considers to be "pseudo-masculine efforts". That…

I'm not saying all males put on pseudo-masculine efforts, I'm saying it only takes one kid who makes an inappropriate joke like changing "public void" to "pubic void" when we're doing a code review. In such a situation, the boy will suppress a smile while he innocently exclaims he made a typo, while his friends all giggle innocuously. If you don't work with kids, you will not fully understand how the adolescent mind…

Thanks for your posts, primitivesuave. I have to say I was surprised and extremely disappointed with the ridiculously defensive (of mostly strawman arguments) and needlessly accusatory posts in response to yours.

Needless to say this is an issue which constantly generates weird hate from certain aspects of geek culture, but I'm glad you're taking actual steps to improve the situation.

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#172

Post by belorn » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:23 AM UTC

[deleted] wrote: post #96

alan_cx wrote: post #47

Tongue in cheek, but I think there might be a point here struggling to see the light of day... Why? I mean, why would women want to get into coding? If one is not already working with computers, from the outside world, its a crappy job, and the money isn't better than many other things. Not to mention the insane hours culture. Women have a clean sheet choice. Why work in an office, killing your brain on hugely comple…

[deleted]

> All the money, fame, and the joy of owning your own company

I think drug sellers says the exact same thing.

Of course, thats the problem here. One person is describe the work, while the other is describing the sought result.

Everyone wants money, fame and a rich life. That is not the issue. The question is how to get there, and what you need to do in order to get the money, fame and rich life.

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#173

Post by DanBC » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:30 AM UTC

nthrow wrote: post #142

_bfhp wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

@poorelise - you seem unfamiliar with what DanBC means by "mens rights advocate" -- let me help you: Men’s Rights Activists advocate for ‘human rights’ with rape and death threats - http://feministcurrent.com/7555/mens-rights-activistsadvocat... The most persuasive MRA ever - http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/06/11/the-most-p... White Hot Rage: the men's rights movement - http://prospect.org/article/white-h…

Cherry picking incidents involving the actions of disturbed individuals to attempt to smear a multifaceted movement is intellectually dishonest. That's like claiming all Muslims are terrorists because some Muslims are.

MRA at this time is strongly linked to wingnuts.

That is not to say there there is no benefit to considering the rights of men or the problems that men face with issues like violent attack or custody disputes.

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#174

Post by DanBC » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:40 AM UTC

yummyfajitas wrote: post #136

DanBC wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It did have a horrible tone but we know it's true. There are some deeply unpleasant people on HN who are happy to spew some really vile opinions.

Once upon a time, progressive modernist thinkers believed that the correct response to vile speech was a well thought out logical rebuttal. I miss those days. Nowadays it's dismiss, demonize and downvote.

I miss the days when things that gratify my intelectual curiosity where the things that got upvotes on HN and things that attract low value flaming didn't get upvoted.

Have a look through this thead for the number of people making the "we don't have programmes to get men in nursing" point. Then see that point being made, and rebutted, in every single previous similar thread. There is no point trying to hold logical conversation with people who are dishonest.

These people don't recognise their bias. Indeed, they have a weird pride in that bias, as if they have The Truth and all those other sheep are being duped by The Women.

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#175

Post by belorn » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:40 AM UTC

daleharvey wrote: post #141

yeukhon wrote: post #118

Here is my abridged comment: 1. It is important to like who you are and what you do. I am glad you are proud of being who you are, 2. But at the same time I don't like when people are calling out initiatives like "more women in tech". Look, getting a job is tough. It can be luck or qualification. I know someone is going to cite some research studies but at this point, let's just say yes we get it, a lot of assholes o…

I dont think the gender split is the issue that needs to be fixed, if the ratio was uneven for some particularly boring reason then I dont think its an issue that people would care about as much. The problem I care about is that this industry is hostile to a very large group of people, women arent around not only because they arent encouraged early on, but because they are being driven out when they do get here, ask…

Its hand-waving comments like this that really annoys me when reading HN. As with anecdotal evidence, it tries to masquerade as scientific while being the exact opposite. My reply to such comment is like always: Bring in the real science (i.e. Sociology).

If women are being driven out as you describe, it should be possible to measure. For example, if they are being actively driven out, women in technology should then be naturally gravitating towards those companies, conferences and similar spaces which has an lower hostility than the average.

While some people do perform some studies like that, it still very much in a early stage.

From statistics and Wikipedia and HN have done, one shared answer that have provided is a cultural phenomenon, in which anonymous non-social interacting work is a male dominated area. I would very much like to see a study how true that is, if its located to the IT industry, and if it is true globally.

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#176

Post by DanBC » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:42 AM UTC

BWStearns wrote: post #123

DanBC wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A better reply would have been "we'd like mean to take paternity leave too". I sometimes wonder if HN commentors ever think that maybe their comments might leave them open to legal liability in some future case.

>> I sometimes wonder if HN commentors ever think that maybe their comments might leave them open to legal liability in some future case While I agree with advising caution, and disagree with the gp sentiment, I don't think that mild gender insensitivity and poor communication skills are as of yet civil or criminal offenses on comment sections.

Bob says "hiring women is risky because they all have babies".

Bob sets up a startup and gets to the point of hiring.

Does Bob wonder whether his earlier public comments have left him open to discrimination claims?

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#177

Post by Zombieball » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:44 AM UTC

JonnieCache wrote: post #152

Zombieball wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately I believe there are gender stereo types in our culture which make many men view women as inferior coders (both in the workplace situation and an interview environment) simply because they are female. A situation where I have experienced this first hand is where a fellow SDE (female) colleague by chance happened to sit at a desk next to one of the VPs at our organization. Many people instinctively though…

>Not trying to sound like a feminist (I am far from one) but I believe what women are being robbed of is 'equality'. Does not compute.

Haha, until this comment thread I don't think I ever would have written that sentence.

Maybe I should go buy a bra to burn...

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#178

Post by vacri » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:49 AM UTC

ramblerman wrote: post #121

[deleted] wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

" All the money, fame, and the joy of owning your own company..." Yeah, I think maybe you're the one that is slightly deluded. OP offered a realistic view of what a coding job often implies, and why it might not be that glamorous to many women. You pretend they're all going to own their own company and make a ton of money.

No, he didn't. He said "smart women choose not to go into coding. Leave that to us men to handle for you". Men hate the job? Really? Then why has Silicon Valley filled up with men from all over the world struggling to crowbar their way into it? Coding isn't a horrible job - if it was, you wouldn't have such high salaries and companies with anti-poaching arrangements to prevent further inflating those salaries. It was an extremely patronising comment, and seemed to verbally pat women as a demographic on the head. "I don't discriminate against applicants on gender, but hey girls, you don't want to apply anyway"

The irritating thing is that you can only rarely group men or women together as being one way or the other. Once you get past primary and secondary sexual characteristics, there are no blanket statements which apply. Pick pretty much any blanket statement you like, and if you actually look at the men and women around you, you'll find plenty of exceptions.

I actually think that the comment was a troll, but Poe's Law applies, and plenty of people will support his view.

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#179

Post by daleharvey » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:57 AM UTC

belorn wrote: post #175

daleharvey wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont think the gender split is the issue that needs to be fixed, if the ratio was uneven for some particularly boring reason then I dont think its an issue that people would care about as much. The problem I care about is that this industry is hostile to a very large group of people, women arent around not only because they arent encouraged early on, but because they are being driven out when they do get here, ask…

Its hand-waving comments like this that really annoys me when reading HN. As with anecdotal evidence, it tries to masquerade as scientific while being the exact opposite. My reply to such comment is like always: Bring in the real science (i.e. Sociology). If women are being driven out as you describe, it should be possible to measure. For example, if they are being actively driven out, women in technology should then…

What is hand-wavey, that women are being driven out of stem or that any women I have talked about the subject has repeated how hostile it is?

The fact that women are leaving stem fields is very easy to measure and has lots of reports and studies, the fact that everyone I talk to about it has hostile experiences to describe is very much an anecdote, one that I think its easy for a lot of people to share.

The reference to sociology seems like some xkcd joke, are you annoyed that I commented on an issue without doing a pdh on the subject or that you dont think it is an issue?

Re: To the Girls of HackerNews: I am a Female Founder who Codes

#180

Post by vacri » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 11:58 AM UTC

flebron wrote: post #24

wetmore wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes explain to me how keeping things the way they are will fix the situation.

I will do that as soon as you explain how treating female coders as if they were freaks, segregating them in their own class, decreases the problem of integration of more female coders in tech. Perhaps the issue of "feeling alien to the community" would be improved by, you know, not alienating females from the community, with sexist behavior such as this.

"Hey, female coder, you can choose to be in a co-ed class or a female-only one, your choice" is hardly treating them as freaks. You're completely misrepresenting the original commentor.