371–380 of 403 posts
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Are we really sexist against male teachers? I don't buy it. There are male teachers everywhere at all levels in Chicago, and male teachers are routinely represented in the media, usually positively.
Much like the existence of female engineers does not prove that the industry does not discriminate against women...
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I'm approaching the car at 30-70 mph from an oblique angle and trying to determine both the car and occupant status and whether I can safely get over and stop. I also wasn't expecting the situation, because I was out going about my business. I admit that if the car was occupied by 6 elderly females, each with a pistol in one hand, a grenade in the other, and a deranged look in their eyes, that I wouldn't stop, but re…
It's worth noting that the Good Samaritan stopped for a man, and it's likely the Samaritan was running a real risk of an ambush and mugging. We're all free to choose not to stop, which is the premise of the story, but the point of the story is that stopping is the right thing to do. Though for people who aren't Christians, it's just a convenient metaphor.
I also suspect that some people who judge me negatively for my selective stopping have never in their life stopped to help a fellow motorist of any gender.
She had me until the very end, with the anecdote about the guy apologizing for swearing in front of her. I would apologize if I said "fuck" near my country's president, or even the president of my small-ish company. Both of whom are male. It's a sign of respect. In the context of women, I see it in a similar light to holding the door open for a lady. It isn't me assuming she's too weak to open a door, it's just a com…
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We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10761246 and marked it off-topic.
That's a pretty fast turnaround time. 6 minutes! I don't think the Air Force can even scramble jets that fast. Would you care to point out exactly what part of the comment is "off-topic" pursuant to `the experience of women in tech`?
The comment is trying to convert this thread into the most well-rehearsed flamewar of the last several years. That's not just off topic, it's arson. The HN guidelines explicitly ask you not to do such things on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
Also, please stop posting inflammatory rhetoric to HN generally. That's not what this site is for.
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I'm still not convinced that the lack of women in tech is due to sexism. Maybe women just aren't as excited by the field as men? Nobody seems to question that this is the reason why there are so few male preschool teachers.
There is an excellent Norwegian documentary, Hjernevask, that explores this question and many others like it. The premise is set up in the first couple minutes of the first episode: why is it that in one of the most gender equal countries in the world that women and men still flocked to traditional jobs? It had such an impact that the government decided to shut down their Gender Studies Institute. But you won't see t…
(http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xp0tg8_hjernevask-brainwash...)
The above link is from Wikipedia and is a English subtitle - the comedian / host wants to know why in Norway there are clear gender divides - 10% women in a construction firm, no men in a hospital maternity ward. He approaches Norwegian researchers who basically say there is no biological difference, but it's cultural (boys clothes in blue etc). He then points at a road sign with a male worker digging.
Then we fly to USA and England, visiting researchers in biological basis of gender difference. And hey presto there are some. He amusingly shows English researchers video of Norwegians and vice versa, running his own academic face-off.
In the end the Norwegians Coke off worse, being dogmatic about there being no biological basis instead of some mixed approach.
Well worth a look.
Does it matter? Is there some (testosterone related) difference in empathy that means jobs with more human to human basis (nursing, pre-school teaching) attract women / reject men and vice versa for construction / IT?
Well, yes.
Does this mean that you and I and every hiring manager and departmental culture is perfect, balanced, diversity friendly,. No of course not.
The biological basis for our geneder differences is valid and (not being an expert) probably unassailable. However if there is some scientifically determined geneder ratio for each industry (or even individual job!) is the firm you work in showing that ratio - or is it biased towards some other ratio?
That's my point - no matter if biology says 50/50 or 80/20 , I refuse to believe every tech firm out there is perfectly gender balanced and has nothing to learn.
Oddly enough, one thing that shines through is that in "poorer countries" (India, Eastern Europe) gender preferences are over-ridden by the simple desire to get lucrative jobs. And anecdotally, there are more non- western women in my Fortune 500 workplace than western.
And this leaves the last question - what should be the ratio of men/women in software? 10% like construction firms? 50/50 like medicine?
I doubt this is a simple or solvable question - but Inwoukd always suggest that if you think you are doing it all right and have nothing to learn - you are wrong.
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I was just having a conversation with my roommate about why I have trouble identifying/believing a lot of feminist propaganda. And your statement is exactly why. Even when it is not a gender issue, femnism seems to only focus on improving female standing. That's not equality.
This seems like seeing someone trying to stop genocide in the Congo, and yelling at them because they're not simultaneously trying to stop street violence in Brazil. There are a lot of problems, they have varying magnitudes, and some people choose to focus on a particular problem. That's okay. It's frustrating how often it seems like feminists are expected to solve every problem in the world simultaneously to legitim…
If we came together as people, regardless of gender, and demanded more rights in the work place (family leave instead of just focusing on maternity leave for example), we would have a LOT more standing to accomplish our goals.
By fragmenting the population, telling the middle class white guy it's his fault the middle class white woman doesn't have maternity leave because the boss happens to be a white male (though upperclass), you are only hurting your cause.
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I am honestly as confused by your interpretation as you are by mine. I don't have any of those degrees, and I don't infer that Supercomputing is dismissing me as "tangentially" involved in tech. They are suggesting that Adria Richards' "Developer Evangelist" role wasn't a real technical role, which I couldn't really comment on. I don't think they are implying that ksenzee's "Senior Software Engineer" role doesn't cou…
Certainly, and your interpretation is logical. I agree the original commenter didn't necessarily mean to imply that. However, they appear to have bought into a kind of false dichotomy that gets applied to women and minorities all too often. It's a mindset where there are "fake" woman developers (or gamers, or whatever), and there are "real" woman developers, and you only get perceived as one of the "real" developers…
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There are so few male preschool teachers because our society is very sexist against men when it comes to interacting with kids. This is societal and not innate because in many other countries male teachers are the norm.
Are we really sexist against male teachers? I don't buy it. There are male teachers everywhere at all levels in Chicago, and male teachers are routinely represented in the media, usually positively.
[Edit: For comparison it shows 21% of computer programmers as women.]
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That's a pretty fast turnaround time. 6 minutes! I don't think the Air Force can even scramble jets that fast. Would you care to point out exactly what part of the comment is "off-topic" pursuant to `the experience of women in tech`?
The timing is random. The comment is trying to convert this thread into the most well-rehearsed flamewar of the last several years. That's not just off topic, it's arson. The HN guidelines explicitly ask you not to do such things on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html . Also, please stop posting inflammatory rhetoric to HN generally. That's not what this site is for.
If you don't want to allow discussion of a topic, maybe the better option is to disallow discussion of the topic. Otherwise it looks a lot like you are pushing a personal agenda in your position as moderator. That's tyranny. Are you a tyrant?
As you can see, my account is relatively new. I'm not familiar with the flame war you're speaking of. Can you tell me more about it so I don't post any more comments that could be construed to perpetuate it?
Which part did you think was inflammatory, the part where I said I'm acquainted with dozens of industry women I respect, or the part where I lament that the dialogue has been manipulated by a few bad apples?
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The timing is random. The comment is trying to convert this thread into the most well-rehearsed flamewar of the last several years. That's not just off topic, it's arson. The HN guidelines explicitly ask you not to do such things on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html . Also, please stop posting inflammatory rhetoric to HN generally. That's not what this site is for.
You didn't address my question. Which specific part of my comment was "off-topic" given the topic of `the experience of women in tech`? If you don't want to allow discussion of a topic, maybe the better option is to disallow discussion of the topic. Otherwise it looks a lot like you are pushing a personal agenda in your position as moderator. That's tyranny. Are you a tyrant? As you can see, my account is relatively…