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Comment by benreesman | Hacker News Reader

When I got started in this business 20 some years ago it was wildly diverse: you’d have like a biker-gang looking guy with hard right politics getting yelled at by a chick with bright pink hair, but it would be about bash or perl or something. Never about stupid political posturing.

We’ve managed to destroy the one profession with serious vertical class mobility where no one gave a fuck about your race or age or sexual orientation or politics or anything but can this person code, do they geek out.

The one thing we didn’t used to tolerate and now do is flagrant nepotism. Which seems like a step backwards on any of diversity, equity, or inclusion.

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> no one gave a fuck about your race or age or sexual orientation or politics or anything but can this person code, do they geek out

Is this really true though? There is so much evidence that shows women and other minority groups to be systematically discriminated against in tech.

I’m sure there is better data than my anecdotes.

Back in the day it seemed like everyone was “different” somehow.

Certainly when I ran the biggest group I ever have my boss (Ning Li, absolute pro) was a woman, and 2/4 of the managers I supported were women, and in a group of pushing 40 I was one of two who was an American white guy.

I suppose it’s a judgement call if FSU folks count as “white”, but if not then “white men” are, or were at least, a vanishing minority on hardass infra teams.

> Back in the day it seemed like everyone was “different” somehow.

Sure, I guess that's more to do with the computing industry becoming more corporate.

The point I'm trying to make is that what you refer to as "stupid political posturing" is a good thing actually. It's a sign of progress that people feel more free to speak out about issues affecting them. They can seem insignificant, but it's only by having difficult conversations and demanding better that we make the whole industry a place where all that matters is "can this person code, do they geek out".

You're absolutely correct.

Well as people started seeing (big) money in the area more and more "business people" started to inject themselves into the structures and now it is full of MBAs and all sorts of grifters.

I know, I was there.

Glass half full?

Never been easier to take on a trillion dollar company run by non-technical people.

>you’d have like a biker-gang looking guy with hard right politics getting yelled at by a chick with bright pink hair, but it would be about bash or perl or something

Yeah but they were all white

I’ve addressed this to a sibling, but on the hard core infra teams I’ve worked on American White men were pretty scarce. Maybe 3-5% of the broader population?

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