Why No Women Want To Be On A “Women In Tech” Panel

This article is representative of an even bigger issue - I think "women" (as a gender) are still trying to find their place as society continues its change to a more female-friendly one. More than that, women seem to be split on how it should progress.

In the Parkour community, the female practitioners fall into two separate groups: "We're women, we have to stick together, and we need to help each other out however we can. Women are physically different from men and have to do some things differently" and "We're women, so what? We'll do all the things the boys have to do, we'll hang out with the boys, we don't need our own separate women-only events." Women in both of these camps strongly defend their view.

Despite my role in various parkour communities, I've largely taken a back seat to the issue, or at least tried to position myself in the middle. I've been a proponent of female only events, as long as their focus is to get women comfortable with parkour to the point where they can go to the regular events.

It's a complicated issue, and this article made me realize it was bigger than just the parkour community. I hope my analogy will help others realize that this issue is bigger than just the tech community too.