A female computer science major at Stanford: “Floored” by the sexism • Hacker News Board

Re: A female computer science major at Stanford: “Floored” by the sexism

#171

Post by msandford » Fri, Feb 20, 2015, 11:06 PM UTC

ezy wrote: post #158

msandford wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wholeheartedly agree that she faced a lot of prejudice. But not all prejudice is sexism, just ask any other kind of minority! There are minority men who are on the receiving end of prejudice who will tell you that there's a lot more to it than just sexism. > The idea that the harassment wouldn't happen if she were old and ugly doesn't make it not about sexism Yes, yes it does. From the dictionary: sexism: prejudice…

Oh well, we will not agree. Again, I will say, especially to your concluding remark, this is a distinction without a difference. Because (eg.) if someone is prejudicial against a human with breasts, that does not make them simply "breast-ist" because to boil down to that level is ridiculous and entirely context-free. SImilar to everything youw rote, because all of this is occurring in a particular context.

The distinction absolutely does matter! It wouldn't matter if ONLY WOMEN dressed differently than stereotypical techies, or ONLY WOMEN had higher-than-average pitch voices, and ONLY WOMEN were young. But they're not! Both women and men might display those attributes. In order to treat people fairly, you have to treat people fairly. It wouldn't be a triumph of justice to reset men's prejudices towards women but not also towards other men.

In other words, discriminating against someone for a particular characteristic like the ones she mentioned is terrible and it shouldn't happen, regardless of the sex of the person being discriminated against.

Re: A female computer science major at Stanford: “Floored” by the sexism

#172

Post by pen2l » Sat, Feb 21, 2015, 5:38 AM UTC

cmsj wrote: post #169

pen2l wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All I said was listen to the people that are affected, try to learn about their problems, and be empathetic, and maybe you'll find the answers. Are you aware that one female will have entirely different experiences and suggestions on how to solve tech's sexism problem than the next? E.g., you implicate Vivek Wadwa as being a problem (probably due to Amelia Greenhall's accusations), and yet there are an overwhelming…

More people accepting the problem, reading up on the experiences of those facing discrimination, and thinking about what they can do to change themselves and those around them. That seems like a pretty good starting point, no? Whatever you read about, you're going to come up with conflicting opinions and suggestions, so that is hardly new, and is certainly not an excuse for doing nothing.

> That seems like a pretty good starting point, no?

Honestly, not at all. I really think the exact opposite is true. The debate in this arena is hellishly toxic. You read into it a little and you quickly find out how disturbing ideas flying around really are -- especially from the prominent voices. Staying away from these debates is probably the best option for now. I really hope in time something happens and the toxicity goes away.

Re: A female computer science major at Stanford: “Floored” by the sexism

#173

Post by danielmiessler » Sat, Feb 21, 2015, 10:06 PM UTC

Arnt wrote: post #8

danielmiessler wrote: post #4

30 points and on the front page, yet basically no commentary. That's a message by itself.

What is the message?

The message I got from it was that Hacker News is tired of hearing about it, which is a bad sign indeed.

Yet another message was sent by downvoting my comment, which I interpret to be because they thought I meant that nobody wants to hear about this anymore.

And that WAS what I was saying, but I wasn't saying it was justified.

Anyway...lots of messaging going on here.

Re: A female computer science major at Stanford: “Floored” by the sexism

#174

Post by jesuislelui » Sun, Feb 22, 2015, 11:38 PM UTC

I'm a CS grad at CSUEB in the Bay Area (I was also an undergrad there previously), and this "women are absent" nonsense is very much the opposite of what I see in my classes.

Most of my classes are comprised of roughly 25-30 students. Of those, roughly 20+ students are Indian, and of those 20+, 15+ are females, and I assure you they're really good!

Now, it may not be Stanford or Berkeley or whichever high-horse university some of you would like to use to dismiss this information, but in my experience there are women in CS, lots of them. It seems folks are just looking at the "bigger buzzfeed" schools or where they want for these "ohh.. I'm a girl in CS and I'm not recognized". Take a look outside these prestigious schools and the gender demographics will change. I'm not saying these don't exist, I'm just saying look around a little more.

Now, I can't speak for female presence in IT in the professional world, but with regard to those feeling belittled or taken advantage of, women are unfortunately targeted by unsolicited/creepy advances all the time, everywhere. It's not a tech industry thing, it an unfortunate all-over-the-world problem.

If when asked where one person did an internship the answer is "facebook", then yeah maybe some surprise, I guess it would be nice to intern at facebook. If the following 1,2,3 people also answer "facebook", then I too would probably think to myself "oh, I should have probably applied then". At this point, I'll just have to take Lea's word that the reaction was truly because she was a girl?!