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In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

sarajchipps.com

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Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#31

Post by jt2190 »

csense wrote: post #13

I think educating our young about technology, computer science, the hacker mindset, etc. is a good thing. As a kid, I'd really wished there'd been more mentoring, education, and general support available for young hackers. I would have been seriously pissed about discrimination -- and I daresay rightly so -- if exactly the sorts of things I wanted to participate in had existed, but had been closed to me because I was…

  > It's always seemed strange to me how many people seem to 
  > think that the right way to solve discrimination is with 
  > more discrimination, just in the opposite direction.
This is a very common and very strange non sequitur, that presumes that the total supply of opportunity is fixed.

Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#32

Post by ewoodrich »

buckbova wrote: post #16
offbrand wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The agenda is to make the tech community a more hospitable place for women who WANT to be in tech. It's not an agenda to force women into the industry just for the sake of numbers.

Depends on who you ask. Some people are advocating just that. https://medium.com/tech-culture-briefs/a1e93d985af0 >Get women hired. Make your workplace give a fuck about hiring diverse teams. You are in a wonderful position to advocate and agitate for more diversity in your workplace. Draw attention to your company’s demographics internally, bring in speakers on building team diversity, start a committee dedicated to…

>Oh and make sure this doesn’t just end up in a position where you just hire a few white women and call it a day. Not good enough.

This doesn't sound like they are encouraging employers to hire less qualified candidates just to check off boxes.

Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#33

Post by AnimalMuppet »

chc wrote: post #19
csense wrote: post #13

I think educating our young about technology, computer science, the hacker mindset, etc. is a good thing. As a kid, I'd really wished there'd been more mentoring, education, and general support available for young hackers. I would have been seriously pissed about discrimination -- and I daresay rightly so -- if exactly the sorts of things I wanted to participate in had existed, but had been closed to me because I was…

> It's always seemed strange to me how many people seem to think that the right way to solve discrimination is with more discrimination, just in the opposite direction. Is that as strange as believing that ignoring a problem will make it go away? Because the only alternatives I can see to "Actively try to attract more of the underrepresented group" are "Do nothing about the gender inequality" — which obviously won't…

I think that's a false dichotomy. Don't attract discrimination by the opposite discrimination. Attract discrimination primarily by exposing and removing the discrimination. Also (in this example) try to nurture more talented females, growing their skills to the point that they can be hired even in head-to-head competition with males.

Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#34

Post by chc »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #33
chc wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's always seemed strange to me how many people seem to think that the right way to solve discrimination is with more discrimination, just in the opposite direction. Is that as strange as believing that ignoring a problem will make it go away? Because the only alternatives I can see to "Actively try to attract more of the underrepresented group" are "Do nothing about the gender inequality" — which obviously won't…

I think that's a false dichotomy. Don't attract discrimination by the opposite discrimination. Attract discrimination primarily by exposing and removing the discrimination . Also (in this example) try to nurture more talented females, growing their skills to the point that they can be hired even in head-to-head competition with males.

I think you need to define what you mean by "discrimination" here, because the obvious definition of "excluding someone based on certain traits" doesn't work here. Men are very much not being excluded from tech fields, nor is anyone attempting to do so, so what do you mean when you say "discrimination"?

And how to you "expose and remove the discrimination" in this case?

Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#35

Post by sukuriant »

JacksonGariety wrote: post #28

There are plenty of people who don't want women in tech, but no blog post will be able to change all of them. They have traditional values and that is their right. Thankfully, their time is passing. All we can do now is get more young women into technology out of high-school/college. I'd love to see someone, anyone's thoughts on encouraging young women to become interested. I think it's possible, but I think programm…

If memory serves me, it's more of this generation that doesn't like women in tech. The one before us, or perhaps two before us, was very female-friendly. In fact, some famous photographs of computers and people working on them, display women in them, actively working. The modern perspective is that the lady is the equivalent of a Booth Woman, just there for eye candy; but a historical account from the woman herself was that she as an active participant and it wasn't strange for her at all to be on the team. I don't remember exactly what article it was, so if anyone could bring it up. A quick glance at Wikipedia suggests it was in the 40's ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_computing#Timeline_of... )

Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#36

Post by zorpner »

SheepSlapper wrote: post #17
zorpner wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the two articles existed in isolation, I would be inclined to agree (though I think Jeff's is actually pretty poorly thought out -- as the man himself said: https://twitter.com/codinghorror/status/273551344533639169 ). But there's a clear, obvious chain of events here that starts with Jeff reading Shanley's post, criticizing it, then writing his own version with the same title without acknowledging why.

For the record, I don't like either piece (cards on the table, I don't really care for Sara's either). Jeff thinks we shouldn't drink at work functions, because men + women + booze = sexism or something, and Shanley wants us to reverse the (perceived) discrimination with some sort of affirmative action for ladies. I was just pointing out that the two pieces have the same topic and the same 4 word title (because Jeff…

After talking with a couple of the commenters in question, it sounds like some people are using "plagiarism" not to mean that he specifically stole words from her post verbatim, but to mean that he "rewrote" what she wrote without giving her credit. It's not how I'd use the term, but I think that's what people are getting at with it.

It's gotten a little weirder now, since Atwood is communicating with people about it but appears to be justifying not crediting Shanley by saying she was too negative, which is a little appalling: https://twitter.com/codinghorror/status/459796782164103168

EDIT: Also, I just read this, which addresses a lot of the things I didn't like in Jeff Atwood's post better than I can: http://jacobian.org/writing/what-can-men-do/

Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#37

Post by gordonguthrie »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #33
chc wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's always seemed strange to me how many people seem to think that the right way to solve discrimination is with more discrimination, just in the opposite direction. Is that as strange as believing that ignoring a problem will make it go away? Because the only alternatives I can see to "Actively try to attract more of the underrepresented group" are "Do nothing about the gender inequality" — which obviously won't…

I think that's a false dichotomy. Don't attract discrimination by the opposite discrimination. Attract discrimination primarily by exposing and removing the discrimination . Also (in this example) try to nurture more talented females, growing their skills to the point that they can be hired even in head-to-head competition with males.

> so they can be hired even in head-to-head competition with males

Maybe read what you write?

Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#38

Post by verdi327 »

I don't understand. I get the idea for us to self organize and bring about more diversity to the tech industry. What is lost on me with all these posts/comments/arguments is that they act as if white males are trying to stop women and other minorities from entering the field. More than most fields, getting a job as a developer is based on objective facts. Can you solve x problem. Especially in a market where good talent is hard to come by, I can't imagine an employer saying, "well, you have the technical chops, but i'm not going to hire you bc you're a woman". This just doesn't happen.

Yes, let's be open minded and work on making programming as accessible to as many ppl as we can. But, let's not start affirmative action here.

Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#39

Post by AnimalMuppet »

chc wrote: post #34
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's a false dichotomy. Don't attract discrimination by the opposite discrimination. Attract discrimination primarily by exposing and removing the discrimination . Also (in this example) try to nurture more talented females, growing their skills to the point that they can be hired even in head-to-head competition with males.

I think you need to define what you mean by "discrimination" here, because the obvious definition of "excluding someone based on certain traits" doesn't work here. Men are very much not being excluded from tech fields, nor is anyone attempting to do so, so what do you mean when you say "discrimination"? And how to you "expose and remove the discrimination" in this case?

If I'm hiring for a programmer position, and I have a man and a woman who have applied, and I don't hire the man because he's a man, that's discrimination. (Note that this is identical to hiring the woman because I don't have enough women.)

What I meant by "expose and remove discrimination" is point out that the team atmosphere is hostile to women, and start disciplining people until that changes. Or, realize that Fred is automatically rating resumes lower if it has a feminine name, and confronting Fred on that. Or... you get the idea. If there's something going on (other than lack of viable candidates) that leads to fewer female programmers, find it out and fix it.

The remaining problem is lack of viable candidates. To fix that you have to fix problems outside of your own organization - problems in the education system, in homes, and in society in general. That's a tall order, and it's beyond any one person's power. But still, when you see obstacles that differentially harm females (or blacks, or gays, or whoever), don't just ignore them. Do what you can to expose and try to fix them.

Re: In which I answer all of the questions (2012)

#40

Post by lobotryas »

I'm glad that Sarah is being so open on this topic because, after reading the entire article, I remain unconvinced. Please allow me to share my experience.

I'm part of a small multicultural team of 8 engineers, 4 of which are women. The team is a professional outfit, makes consistent effort to remain inclusive, and ensures that everyone has a comfortable way of voicing their opinions, thoughts and other intellectual contributions. Despite this, all 4 of our female engineers prefer to avoid product discussion (be it 1:1 face-to-face, group, email, etc) and as such, their contributions amount primarily to SVN commits of what they're asked to build. In my 4+ years of working closely with them I never observed them having an impact on our deliverables that could be attributed to their gender.

Our operations team of 30+ people has only 2 female system administrators. This is a pair of fantastic individuals who are kind, positive and wicked-smart. Their experience and skills command respect and people like them because they're enjoyable to work with. In my observation, they have these qualities because they are:

a) Excellent engineers

b) Excellent human beings

Both of the above traits can be displayed equally well by both men and women, making gender a completely moot point in the comparison.

I completely agree that we need more excellent engineers and more excellent human beings in our line of work regardless of their gender, however nothing I've seen so far indicates to me that we need more women specifically.

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