And yes, I know I'm perma-banned for not being feminist enough for you. I just wanted to point out your systematic pushing of a political agenda to those who dare browse with show dead.
I still believe that silent down votes do not contribute to intelligent discussions either. If someone can take a minute to read an article, its comments, and down vote, they should also be able to politely explain to the commenter in question how and why that comment may be detracting from the discussion. That way the commenter may defend his position or adapt his behavior to better contribute within the community.
I think at that level (education) intervention is fine. However at the workplace, recruiting processes should have an equality of opportunity. People with the same qualifications, skills, etc. should have equal opportunity. And actually that's the law (EEO).
The problem with diversity starts very early in the process. By the time graduates apply for jobs there is already a significant lack of diversity. This is why I think it makes sense to focus the diversification effort earlier in the process, in education.
If women succeed more when they have someone to emulate this should be encouraged. If men succeed more on their own leave them alone. The last thing we need is the notion that to be fair everyone needs a mentor or no one can have one.
An integer not the same as a boolean even if they both have the value of one.
Let's say you have a team that is majority women, and you have 2 candidates for promotion: a man and a woman. The EEO law says sex should not be a criteria for promotion.
However if you promote the women based on sex (e.g: following your idea that women work better with women mentors) this could be considered an EEO violation (sex discrimination).
So if you want to abide by the law, you need a promotion criteria that's better than "women work better with women".
The sharp edge raises the question are women more valuable or less than men? Does this change the value.
On one hand men don't need mentors to succeed that provides more value. On the other hand women who can act as mentors to other women are more valuable than men.
In the end it doesn't matter to the business because both cases provide value in different ways. But it could make a big difference to the individual. Treat everyone differently because everyone has different needs and they learn in different ways.
Downvoting isn't helpful, it's a dirty little feature implemented to police certain opinions, usually via chilling effect. I upvoted GP.
(Not that I am in a position to use it personally at the moment, but I would be happy to post it on my blog on the theory that someday I might use it, and, in the mean time, others might find it of interest.)
It is now listed down below "Useful HN-related tools."