Comment by sunahsuh | Hacker News Reader

Comment by sunahsuh | Hacker News Reader

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It's not an easy fix, but there's been a lot of scholarly work that points to some of the "societal beliefs" you talk about reverse engineering (grad school protip: that reverse engineering is called "deconstructionism" and there's an entire discipline called "gender and women studies" that delves into it ;)). I haven't scanned all the comments yet but I suspect a good number of them call for things like "education" or "coaching" on negotiation -- basically, that "women should ask for more". The thing these solutions overlook is that the root of the problem is socialized, enforced gender roles and there are serious social consequences for women who overstep these boundaries.

An interesting recent study study studied the behavior of women when negotiating for themselves vs negotiating for others. When negotiating for themselves, they exhibited the kinds of behavior in the original link, ending up with salaries far below the men in the study. When they were asked to negotiate for someone else, however, they performed on par with the men. (link: http://www4.gsb.columbia.edu/news/item/7223326/Role+of+Gende..., original: http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/psp/98/2/256/) And you know that oft-cited study that men think about sex way more than women? Well, they also think about sleep and food at about the same rate.. and way more than women. One way to interpret these results is that women are socialized to think less of their own needs (and to voice them less) -- and this is a societal norm that's heavily enforced with consequences for those who don't toe the line.

Think about how strong women are regarded vs men who exhibit the same behavior. A woman that does what she needs to get what she deserves runs the risk of being called a "bitch" or, at the very least, being thought of as unfeminine. Personally, I find fucking with gender norms an amusing hobby so I don't give a shit about the consequences.. but a lot of women aren't into that ;) Just remember this when thinking about possible solutions -- the root causes are way deeper than the appallingly patronizing "women need to be taught how to negotiate."

"Think about how strong women are regarded vs men who exhibit the same behavior. A woman that does what she needs to get what she deserves runs the risk of being called a "bitch" or, at the very least, being thought of as unfeminine. "

I think that most men who exhibit the same behavior that would get a woman the title of "bitch" fall under the umbrella of "sociopathic asshole". It just so happens that there's a lot more of those, especially in upper management, so it almost becomes the norm, and thus people don't complain about the status quo.

You're way off. A guy walks up to a woman and says something to her. She says "I'd rather not talk to you right now" in a direct, unapologetic way. A small but real minority of men would instantly label her a bitch.

No one would call a man who said that a "sociopathic asshole".

>A small but real minority of men would instantly label her a bitch.

Well, yeah - they put themselves out there and got swatted aside without a second thought. That's called a defense mechanism. Actually calling her a bitch is something else, though.

>No one would call a man who said that a "sociopathic asshole".

Sociopathic, no, but I'd certainly call him an asshole.

Yes, as a male it's easy for me to get sucked into the patriarchal conclusion: it's the fault of clueless females. And rather than taking this moment to question whether our remuneration system is comically aggressive and deceitful, it's better to finally teach the females a couple weapons of the menfolk.

(After all, we males have never been known to retaliate against females asserting themselves in meaningful ways, particularly not when some aggressive guy's haggling them down. Patriarchy is actually caused by whatever's going on in women's heads, turns out. Men are neutral. Especially the kindly guys in the hypermale programming profession.)

absolutely agree. It's incredibly disingenuous of the author to lay all the blame at the feet of his female job applicants.

The problem is his companies aggressive hiring practices and his willingness to follow them, not his applicants.

I think you lost yourself in your attempt at extreme sarcasm.

Sorry to disappoint. ;) The remuneration system is well-known for its antagonism. While (if you're fortunate) some individual negotiations may not seem aggressive on their face, if you step back and consider the forest, there's intense pressure to bargain down costs.

Like take "labor" costs (most of us here get called "labor", even if we're a privileged class of it). Lots happens behind the scenes to beat down things like collective bargaining, because they increase labor's bargaining power.

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