Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

It's Different for Girls

heidiroizen.tumblr.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

301–310 of 400 posts

Re: It's Different for Girls

#301

Post by meric »

mafribe wrote: post #283
enraged_camel wrote: post #117

I have an ex-coworker who is a really attractive girl, and she used to tell me lots of stories like this about places she had worked at previously. Vice presidents calling her to their room and offering her promotions if only she would give them weekly blowjobs, prospective customers turning away from million-dollar deals at the last minute after she refused to sleep with them, etc. The really sad thing about is that…

Are you in all seriousness saying that attractive women have it hard? You are suffering form a massive case of what modern social though terms "privilege blindness". (And, as an aside, probably have the hots for that girl als well.) Nobody on this plane is more privileged than attractive girls. They don't even have to work if they don't want to. In your delusion, you also conveniently ignore that (within certain limi…

You have a point - a woman can always choose to be relatively unattractive by cutting her hair short, not wearing makeup, wear unattractive clothes, etc... They choose to present themselves as attractive because there are more social advantages of doing so.

Re: It's Different for Girls

#302

Post by meric »

JackC wrote: post #295
Castlereagh wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a counter-point to this that is likely to be unpopular, but it's deeply rooted in human biology and isn't going to go away any time soon. Attractive young women may have difficulty getting people to take them seriously, and have to deal with things like frequent unwanted sexual advances, but they have no trouble getting laid . Attractive young women have easy, practically unlimited access to sex (if they so d…

Unsurprisingly, this comes at a cost. Seriously, no. Don't do this. Don't do "being attractive to men unsurprising comes at the cost of sexual assault." Don't do "not having sex when you want to is as bad as being forced to have sex when you don't want to." Don't do "attractive young women are the only women worth having sex with." Don't go for the mathematical impossibility that women get to have more sex than men.…

You might be interested in this book, by a woman, about privileges women enjoy, that men are generally unaware of:

http://dontmarry.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/the_manipulated...

Re: It's Different for Girls

#303

Post by abracar »

robobro wrote: post #300

How exactly is this "news"? What does it have to do with "hacking"?

from HN's FAQ: "On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity."

Re: It's Different for Girls

#304

Post by oh_sigh »

enraged_camel wrote: post #146
ars wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes you wonder about how many women do accept such offers and get ahead that way. Which is "unfair" in a way to the men who don't have such an option. I'm really curious about the numbers here - what percent of women have ever agreed to such offers for the purpose of getting ahead (at any point in their lifetime). I'm hoping the number is in the single digits, because if it's higher this type of harassment will nev…

>>Makes you wonder about how many women do accept such offers and get ahead that way. Which is "unfair" in a way to the men who don't have such an option. Oh yeah, that's another thing that happens: when a good-looking woman is successful, others (men and not-so-good-looking women) will assume she must have done sexual favors for someone in power - as opposed to because she's smart and capable. (You may have asked th…

You can't argue that men generally aren't aware that a lot of sexual harassment takes place against women or attractive women, and also that they would assume that when they do come into power that they got ahead by accepting sexual harassment.

Re: It's Different for Girls

#305

Post by kaitai »

ShardPhoenix wrote: post #282
tptacek wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. In an employment setting, it's an unlawful question. The reason it's unlawful to ask a job candidate the question is the same reason that it's unethical to ask a prospective investment target: the premise of the question is bogus, and rebutting it requires the candidate to explain and defend private child care and home life arrangements. Offering a candidate an "opportunity to explain" a question that shouldn't…

It's obviously a reasonable question and the fact that it's illegal to ask is outrageous.

There was a bunch of discussion of good intentions above. You're one of those people who may or may not have good intentions, but as a woman who might someday have a kid, you make me angry. People like you make me REALLY angry. It's reasonable to doubt my interest in my own f(&ing company, it's reasonable to think I'll suddenly get stupid for hormonal reasons and won't be able to deal with business, it's reasonable... what? Do you not think I'm an intelligent being who has thought about the ramifications of having a kid and running a business? Do you think that it's just some sort of thing that I don't even notice until pop I have a squalling child and then I'm all like wow my brain has turned into maternal mush and I never even expected that! Unlike men who just do stupid business s#(& for rational reasons, like wanting to buy a yacht or upgrade the girlfriend or plain old greed. You don't even give men the credit of asking them if they might pay enough attention to their own kids to lose a moment's focus when one is born.

People like you see stupidity, lack of focus, and incompetence in men as simply individual traits. At the same time you treat women as some sort of broad idiot class, implying that women need to justify to you that popping out a kid won't jeopardize the business. You're the reason one of my friends in grad school wouldn't tell anyone she was pregnant for months and months and months, so that no one would deny her a research or teaching assignment or put her on some involuntary leave.

edited for asterisks. And one last comment: if you think the woman you are doing business with is not good at business, stop doing business with her. If you think she is, give her enough respect to figure she'll deal with children appropriately, and don't ask stupid questions about whether she'll lose interest in her own company. If you want to ask who will handle x business aspect if she takes leave, that's fine, as it is not a stupid question.

Re: It's Different for Girls

#306

Post by tptacek »

ShardPhoenix wrote: post #282
tptacek wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. In an employment setting, it's an unlawful question. The reason it's unlawful to ask a job candidate the question is the same reason that it's unethical to ask a prospective investment target: the premise of the question is bogus, and rebutting it requires the candidate to explain and defend private child care and home life arrangements. Offering a candidate an "opportunity to explain" a question that shouldn't…

It's obviously a reasonable question and the fact that it's illegal to ask is outrageous.

I just explained why it wasn't. You didn't even acknowledge my comment, let alone rebut it.

Re: It's Different for Girls

#307

Post by dethstar »

sliverstorm wrote: post #172
stormbrew wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's even worse than being 'crafty', they're actually trying to show you respect under the idea that because you're with her you have a claim on her and they're deferring to that. Which is incredibly creepy and offensive.

Well, or they just feel that they will be much less successful hitting on a girl who is accompanied by a guy, platonic or otherwise.

Contrary to the success always obtained by catcalling?

Re: It's Different for Girls

#308

Post by meric »

pabb wrote: post #152
jawns wrote: post #6

I think the big takeaway here, not just for women but for anyone in the workplace who feels uncomfortable with or offended by something someone else has said, is to consider the intent. Sometimes somebody says something offensive, and they don't even know they're being offensive. And in those cases, you can take them aside, explain to them why it's offended you, and hopefully they'll say, "Oh, dreadfully sorry, I did…

As someone who actually enjoys making offensive comments in the _right context_, I can't disagree more with you. When somebody says something offensive, context is everything. If you're in a meeting with a group of adult men that are culturally similar to you and there's nothing pressing on the table, sure, a dick joke might be fine. But in the case of the article, I think the author even let off lightly situations l…

"I don't think there are many excuses to be made in these contexts. If you've ever known your mother, or had a sister or a girlfriend who was attractive (and the recipient of suggestive comments), you know exactly what's acceptable and what's not. Picture it's your girlfriend getting harassed."

Your argument is incomplete. I doubt most people have an attractive women in their lives, having either the role of mother, sister, or girlfriend, since such a minority of women are attractive, even if they might be the only women you notice every day.

Re: It's Different for Girls

#309

Post by meric »

NhanH wrote: post #299
mafribe wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you in all seriousness saying that attractive women have it hard? You are suffering form a massive case of what modern social though terms "privilege blindness". (And, as an aside, probably have the hots for that girl als well.) Nobody on this plane is more privileged than attractive girls. They don't even have to work if they don't want to. In your delusion, you also conveniently ignore that (within certain limi…

Without commenting on the first two paragraphs, your last paragraph makes it sounds more malicious than reality probably is. It's entirely possible that attractive women got BOTH privilege and harassment.

"It's entirely possible that attractive women got BOTH privilege and harassment."

Women tend not to report on minor sexual harassment incidents, since it is socially disadvantageous to do so. They only speak about it in aggregate terms, which will have zero effect, except in the very long term, on the number of sexual harassment incidents they will experience. Speaking about in aggregate terms, also draws in attention from people sympathetic to the woman's situation, at the expense of other people who may be in even more need of attention, (e.g. say starving children in africa, elder women unable to pay bills, foster children being abused), and enables the attractive women to earn additional privileges.

I agree it probably isn't their deliberate intention to have that effect on society, but I do think that effect exists.

There's a woman who's written a book about this sort of thing: http://dontmarry.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/the_manipulated...

Re: It's Different for Girls

#310

Post by dzink »

mafribe wrote: post #283
enraged_camel wrote: post #117

I have an ex-coworker who is a really attractive girl, and she used to tell me lots of stories like this about places she had worked at previously. Vice presidents calling her to their room and offering her promotions if only she would give them weekly blowjobs, prospective customers turning away from million-dollar deals at the last minute after she refused to sleep with them, etc. The really sad thing about is that…

Are you in all seriousness saying that attractive women have it hard? You are suffering form a massive case of what modern social though terms "privilege blindness". (And, as an aside, probably have the hots for that girl als well.) Nobody on this plane is more privileged than attractive girls. They don't even have to work if they don't want to. In your delusion, you also conveniently ignore that (within certain limi…

Imagine being an attractive skinny guy in a prison? Or a token burned-out hacker at a business school where everyone needs a "coder" to be the next Steve Jobs? How will you make friends? How much privilege will you be granted to compensate for the perpetual annoyance/fear of being taken advantage of?
Post reply on HN