Confessions of a Failed Female Coder • Hacker News Board

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#71

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:39 PM UTC

33a wrote: post #68

dxhdr wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> at a fundamental level, there are differences in how men and women think It's undeniable there are biological differences between men and women, but this seems far fetched. Biological differences don't manifest themselves in an intuitive way; for example, there is no difference between men and women's hair. However we perceive a large difference entirely due to environmental training.

Not that I disagree with the sentiment, but hair is a bad example. Men go bald and get beards, while women don't.

[deleted]

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#72

Post by searealist » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:45 PM UTC

rocqua wrote: post #66

> girls and women prefer collaborative rather than solo work, that they are more engaged in “things” if they can see the “people” aspect to it, and that they are prone to perfectionism and a fear of failure. This does not quite jive with enrollment at my university. I am thinking specifically of maths as compared to other STEM fields. Of all seriously theoretical courses, maths has the most women, last time I checked…

Most math majors are there to become math teachers, which is very people oriented. If you consider only PhD programs for math then it becomes very male dominated.

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#73

Post by 0xbear » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:45 PM UTC

walshemj wrote: post #52

0xbear wrote: post #42

“I also, as an ex-Googler, know that the company places a high value on internal open dialogue and personal expression” That’s only true as long as your “open dialogue” and “personal expression” aligns with the prevailing liberal dogma. Step off the officially sanctioned path and the same thing will happen to you as happened to Damore.

mm you mean go of the deep end into far right politics this isn't setting up a Branch of young conservatives in the London google offices is it.

No. Just show up to work in a pro-Trump baseball hat, or speak openly against illegal immigration, and see what happens. No one cares about the London office.

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#74

Post by NiceGuy_Ty » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:51 PM UTC

jansho wrote: post #55

There seems to be a bit of a contradiction in her post: > Despite the cargo shorts and the loner attitude, I learned like a girl. And: > it was an all-girls school, and every single other woman who took that computer science class that year became an engineer or scientist. Hmm, it sounds more like she has a different learning style, which is not necessarily down to her femaleness. That said, I think that at a fundame…

Every time I hear someone mention behavioral differences due to the biological differences between men and women, my response (that I'm stealing from my professor) is that the differences amongst men and women outweigh the differences between men and women. Applied to this topic, that means that you're going to find people that prefer these different learning styles on both sides of the gender gap.

Also, I feel like wanting to increase the human aspect of programming isn't just a girl thing. The people whom I know that best fit the solitary hacker type love sharing their work, offering advice, and collaborating on projects with friends and peers.

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#75

Post by ztjio » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:53 PM UTC

33a wrote: post #68

dxhdr wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> at a fundamental level, there are differences in how men and women think It's undeniable there are biological differences between men and women, but this seems far fetched. Biological differences don't manifest themselves in an intuitive way; for example, there is no difference between men and women's hair. However we perceive a large difference entirely due to environmental training.

Not that I disagree with the sentiment, but hair is a bad example. Men go bald and get beards, while women don't.

You must be young or not know very many women. Nearly every woman eventually starts growing facial hair. Many remove it every day. And some women do lose their hair, though admittedly it's much less common.

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#76

Post by maxxxxx » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:54 PM UTC

I am more the lone wolf type myself. I am fine with collaborating, actually enjoy it when needed, but I prefer doing the majority of my work alone or with a small team and banging my/our head against a problem until I/we have figured it out.

What's starting to bother me is that there is a trend where extroverted people (like her I assume) try to change education and workplaces to suit their style but introverted people get pushed aside. A ton of people sitting in a room and talking is good, working alone is bad, not inclusive and biased.

Am I the only one who actually enjoys working alone and is this a bad thing? Do we have to accommodate extroverts everywhere and always? I don't complain about HR and marketing not being inclusive towards shy introverts. Sometimes I am starting to feel like a small minority although I am a white middle aged male.

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#77

Post by mirko22 » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:55 PM UTC

walshemj wrote: post #52

0xbear wrote: post #42

“I also, as an ex-Googler, know that the company places a high value on internal open dialogue and personal expression” That’s only true as long as your “open dialogue” and “personal expression” aligns with the prevailing liberal dogma. Step off the officially sanctioned path and the same thing will happen to you as happened to Damore.

mm you mean go of the deep end into far right politics this isn't setting up a Branch of young conservatives in the London google offices is it.

How did Damore went of to deep end of far right politics?

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#78

Post by natalyarostova » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:56 PM UTC

zengid wrote: post #60

> "Rather, I was frustrated because the course consisted of lone work on exercises that seemed to have little application to the real world, the expectation that coursework required coding and debugging for hours after school threatened my ability to excel in other classes or in varsity sports" Just taking this at face value, I think she failed because she was afraid of failing. I've always learned better from having…

If there is an effective way to improve skills in coding that doesn't require hours of debugging and frustration through the day and into the night, I'm not aware of it.

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#79

Post by taysic » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:57 PM UTC

GhostVII wrote: post #21

It's interesting that a lot of her experiences are similar to what the Google manifesto said - that currently, computer science is more targeted towards the way men learn and work than the way women learn and work. Although she was focusing more on the education side of things versus the work side, the core message seems to be that men and women learn and work differently, and that needs to be addressed to get more w…

I am all for discovering new learning techniques to help woman but as a woman who got my degree in computer science, I can't help but doubt this. I would describe much of the subject matter in my classes to appear "dry" or unenthused at times but I've talked to men who perceived computer science in the same way - and only came to learn it and appreciate it later in their lives.

There were subjects I was required to take such as EE which did not interest me whatsoever. But with CS, I was genuinely enthused and a "lack of collaborative work" was certainly not stopping me personally. (If anything, I really liked solo work) I think what could have helped me was simply a bit more humor and light heartedness in my classes. College moved fast for me and I would have benefited from more opportunities to ask "dumb" questions in a friendly setting. I wonder how else they could address "perfectionism and a fear of failure".

Re: Confessions of a Failed Female Coder

#80

Post by GhostVII » Sat, Oct 07, 2017, 6:57 PM UTC

clairity wrote: post #38

GhostVII wrote: post #21

It's interesting that a lot of her experiences are similar to what the Google manifesto said - that currently, computer science is more targeted towards the way men learn and work than the way women learn and work. Although she was focusing more on the education side of things versus the work side, the core message seems to be that men and women learn and work differently, and that needs to be addressed to get more w…

the snide addition of "Hopefully she doesn't get fired for it." makes it hard to be objective about the rest of your comment, but putting that aside, i agree that there is a tinge of implicit buy-in of gender stereotyping in her writing. it's almost certainly more complicated than just "biology did it". that biology simply _dictates_ the way we learn is naive, rather than being a complicated dance between biological…

> the snide addition of "Hopefully she doesn't get fired for it." makes it hard to be objective about the rest of your comment

True, although I honestly hope she doesn't, and think there is a decent chance of her getting some backlash/having a risk of getting fired.