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Counterpoint: I'm 48. I work in the Valley. I do wear suits and dresses because that's what I like. (Some days, you can catch me in jeans and t-shirts. It's rare). I don't pick up hobbies I don't care about just because "everybody does it". (Looking at you, bicycling!). I'm not even male.

I still (just verified :) ace my interviews. I'm well respected at my job. I've got a decent income and a decent set of responsibilities.

Maybe I'm an exception. But, alternative thought, maybe the "youth obsession" is also partially created because everybody thinks it exists.

Yes, I'm wondering what happens when I get post 50 as well. But mostly I'm thinking that because everybody tells me it will be bad, not because I've seen actual evidence. I've got wonderful colleagues who are 50+, and nobody would dream of firing them. I've got industry contacts who are 50+. So, I guess I'll find out in about two years.

> I'm not even male.

I sure do wish I could convince people of this, but getting "they" from folks has been impossible.

> But, alternative thought, maybe the "youth obsession" is also partially created because everybody thinks it exists.

If that's the case than it's much worse than simple bias.

>> I'm not even male.

> I sure do wish I could convince people of this, but getting "they" from folks has been impossible.

It could be that pronouns have no bearing on one's sex class.

If that's the case then why refuse any such designation? We certainly put up with more eccentric affectations than this is our community, like the idea of 10x programmers, the relevance of object oriented programming, free $4 bottle water, ping pong during work hours, or the idea that everyone needs a $3200 laptop.

No, it's precisely because it has bearing that people oppose it.

It seems eccentric but harmless to ask that people use non-gendered pronouns, but when other people respect that, it is almost certainly not because they now believe that you are somehow not male.

I haven't asked them to approve of my lifestyle, just not actively erase it or demand I pander to their desire to ignore it.

If you don't care how I feel, I'm willing to extend symmetrical courtesy. However, basic affordances accepting other people's differences seem like an excellent comprimise, and has worked quite well historically.

But here you are, acting like it's an undue burden and I should be ashamed. Why is that?

I don't think you understand what I am saying.

Convincing people to use gender-neutral pronouns for you and convincing them that you are not male are two entirely different things. That is all.

I would venture to guess that you have convinced zero people that you are not male, but I made no statement about how pronoun preferences are an undue burden or how you should be ashamed; you made that up yourself.

> Convincing people to use gender-neutral pronouns for you and convincing them that you are not male are two entirely different things. That is all.

And I'm telling you that it definitely does.

> I would venture to guess that you have convinced zero people that you are not male

This is untrue. But it depends on the venue. And in many cases succeeding at this changes how people treat me.

> but I made no statement about how pronoun preferences are an undue burden or how you should be ashamed; you made that up yourself.

No. You're just here to represent the "I will never accept what you're saying" squad.

> You're just here to represent the "I will never accept what you're saying" squad.

The question of whether you are a male or not is not dependent on whether I or anyone else accepts what you are saying. It is a material condition.

If we want to change words so that "male" is what you are talking about and e.g. "AMAB" is what I am talking about, so be it. The second is not dependent on what anyone believes or "assigns."

I'm so relieved there now we're going to bring judeo-christian pseudoscience in this conversation. Finally we're back on familiar territory.

Human reproductive function and capacity is not dependent on cultures or beliefs; hope this helps clear things up for you.

Ever produced small motile gametes? Then you're a male! Congrats!

A classic example of the judeo-christian appeal to misunderstood high school science: you just said if you ever are infertile you're not "male".

That's almost certainly not what you meant, which is: "My worldview is that no one is allowed to opt out of my gender foreverwar because of how much I benefit from the status quo."

Fertility and reproduction have very little to do with 'gender' except where people attempting societal manipulation try and force it to. From a scientific perspective the correlations are minimal and difficult to measure.

> you just said if you ever are infertile you're not "male".

For a computer person, your logic sure is weak.

"If you've ever produced small, motile gametes, then you're male."

"If you've never produced small, motile gametes, then you're not male."

P → Q does not entail ¬P → ¬Q. Literally 100-level propositional logic, here.

> Fertility and reproduction have very little to do with 'gender' except where people attempting societal manipulation try and force it to. From a scientific perspective the correlations are minimal and difficult to measure.

Who's talking about gender, here? I'm not.

I'm talking about sex; specifically, the material basis for reproductive roles and the exploitation of female (sorry, AFAB) reproductive function for the advantage of male (sorry, AMAB) people.

You edited your post, so I edited mine.

But nice try.

In any case, if you're talking about this ill-defined and frequently unverified concept of "sex" then I'm uninterested in talking with you further. You're don't have any interesting insight into the subject. You can barely keep it together explaining logical implication.

Please find someone more interested in this level of discourse. I'm bored with it.

>Silicon Valley likes young people

People get the wrong impression that it's a SV thing. It's not just SV. Lots of employers (who are themselves age 40+) like to hire 20-somethings.

As one example, there was a reddit thread with a woman in Tennessee trying to start a hot sauce business. In one of her replies, she wrote: "I wanted my company to be young and hip, so I hired young and hip -- okay, ‘hip’ might be subjective, but we’re definitely young."[1]

It was fascinating to watch an honest moment of communication because she later deleted that reply. However, others had already quickly replied to it which left her original comment for prosperity.[1]

In another example, the aides that sit directly adjacent to the President's oval office are traditionally staffed by 20-somethings.[2] There's nothing in the job description that says the gatekeeping work can't be done by senior-citizens but every WH Chief of Staff always wants the high energy of a recent college grad stationed there.

It's not just programming. Whether it's packaging up food sauce in Tennessee or filtering visitors into the President's office in Washington DC, employers want the vibe of a young crew.

[1] original text still in a reply: https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/4hiipf/update_hi_redd...

[2] Bush aides: https://youtu.be/lNhpsPvMYAE?t=5m37s

Obama aides: https://youtu.be/p-U0-0anzV0?t=28s

Clinton aides: https://youtu.be/uzZ-gfvXN-c?t=25m17s

You forgot the military...

And Hollywood...

Hollywood loves them, esp. if you come from money. To get a foot in the door anywhere, there's unpaid internships that you might work anywhere from 3-6 months, then maybe roll onto the next. I've met people that interned for 1-2 years before getting a Production Assistant job (pays about $12/hr starting, IIRC) in which you step up from taking out the trash but are still working 12-hr days. Once you pass that hurdle though, you can keep moving on up to better pay and positions but the expectation is to pay your dues (for free).

Young, recent grads are great for that I guess because of how unencumbered most are but, when you look at the debate on diversity in Hollywood, it's not about what's in front of the camera but about the opportunities behind the scenes, which your background might limit when you're starting out.

Jobs in tech seldom involve carrying around half one's body weight in equipment, and the ability to recover from serious injury is less likely to be important.

Right, serious injury would probably lose you the job entirely.

You're looking for "posterity," not "prosperity."

Your experience may vary, but as a relatively younger person, I've had a ton of respect for older, wiser programmers, but only when they do show said wisdom. These are people who are technically very sound, are very precise when they speak, can explain clearly the consequences of different engineering design decisions. They are also adept at staying mostly out of office politics and bringing the focus on engineering, mostly because they are very low drama people themselves, and are genuinely interested in good engineering rather than their engineering.

I hope that when I age, I do become somewhat of a similar person. But I know that there is a ton I have to learn.

On the other hand, I've also seen older people who seem worse than the dumbest college graduates. These are the uncurious people, who never delved deeper, never tried doing more than required, to learn more than necessary, and went from satisfying requirements of one role from the next without developing the wisdom that comes from having made a ton of mistakes, the knowledge that comes from asking curious questions. These people are safe only because of their seniority, and are among the first to be laid off during harsher times.

Ok, but who you value and who gets fired/laid off may not match up.

> These people are safe only because of their seniority, and are among the first to be laid off during harsher times.

These two phrases don't agree. ;-)

Maybe I was not very clear. They continue to be employed because of their seniority when the company is doing well. But when shit hits the fan and you have to make difficult decisions about who are absolutely necessary to the working of the company, that's when they are laid off.

>These are the uncurious people, who never delved deeper, never tried doing more than required...

So in other words, some old people are good, some are bad. Just like young people. This is not known?

I'm 'only' in my early thirties and I'm worried enough about the things you mention that I'm trying to change my trajectory as a programmer slightly away from 'web stuff' and towards, well, I'm not entirely sure, but at the very least back-end and data-sciencey things.

The boundless optimism I had about there 'always being work' is not there anymore. Now I'm probably too cautious of a person, in general, and perhaps this is more just me getting older rather than anything real. Still.

Over 45 here and have been life long tech. I'm not 100% sure what the job market is like as I'm just getting back in, but I can say it's life long learning.

I've created the products for a number of startups all by myself and I'm hoping that with the tight market there's enough room for me.

If that doesn't work out, I've run my own company for a number of years and that's another option.

If you keep grinding, when you get 45+ you'll have deep knowledge. I've know a LOT of fakers over the years, they don't last. Know your stuff.

I can and have created the product from idea to merger, you've got to learn everything you can, everything.

It's not fun, but it'll make sure that you have value.

There's something that transcends discrimination, and that's valuable skills.

> Especially in academia, where women and men of astounding intelligence are doing work that in 10 years will probably reshape the industry (put forth, naturally, by breathlessly enthusiastic 21 year old "devrel" folks mis-attributing the work of 2 generations of academia to the brilliance of the senior technical staff at that company).

I may be misunderstanding your sentence structure, so please forgive me, however, the vast majority of research in nearly every corner of science/academia is no longer done by anyone over 35. The large majority of professors have transitioned to grant writing and nearly none of them 'touch the bench' anymore. As such, the near entirety of science today is done by 20-somethings, from experimental set-up through completion, validation, writing and publishing. Professors provide guidance (stress) and funding, not really anything more.

Without the profs' guidance most grad students would take too long converge on an interesting topic and still have time to see it through in a standard length grad school stay.

I disagree entirely.

> ...employment contracts....

What employment contract?

I would assume "s/employment contracts/employment agreements/" is closer to what was meant.

They are contracts though, we just agree to miserable terms.

They aren’t contracts in at-will employment states

Most jobs require the employee to sign a contract. It's just not a contract that gives them any assurance of keeping their job.

The at-will clause in your employment contract is one of MANY terms with rather far-reaching legal implications.

But for example you almost certainly have a moonlighting clause with specific rules. You have invention disclosure and ownership with rules. These represent binding contracts between you and your employer, often with rules around conflict resolution that are also legally binding.

https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=15349994

I took that not to mean literal contracts, but rather a "contract of expectations"—we pay you X, in return you do Y (where in this case Y is "work longer hours" and such).

If you work full time you sign an agreement which contains contractual obligations. The fact that employment is 'at-will' doesn't really change this fact or characterization.

I am curious about who are some of the academics that you are referring to that may reshape he industry, care to share ?

Silicon Valley has to be at least 65% cult.