Fun fact of the day! Literature and movies are, in fact, not the same as real life!
For the record, that particular love story cliche did actually work out for me personally, as the guy. Maybe it's not common, but it's not ridiculously unrealistic.
When I decided I wanted to get into this industry, I was a teenager in highschool who figured it all seemed fun and exciting. Creating stuff for a living was awesome, and I wanted to be apart of it.
Fast forward a highschool and college diploma, 10 years in the future. I have gotten where I wanted to be, and it is pretty great. Only now though is something else about this industry really starting to sink in for me: the stereotypes. Not the nice "those guys make a lot of money" stereotypes, but rather the vicious kind. I am talking about stereotypes portrayed in media and and embraced by society that suggest anyone who interacts with computers for a living has bad hygiene, long hair, likes fantasy and sci-fi a little too much, is rude or otherwise lacks social skills, etc. A lot of them don't even make any sense; I still can't figure out if all programmers are supposed to be drinking mountain dew all day, or beers. Even the stereotypes that are not seemingly contradictory rarely apply to any particular programmer. I like to think few if any apply to myself...
This is just how stereotypes work I guess, and I am learning to deal with it. I can't say it is easy though, and I have altered my behaviour in many cases to distance myself from it. When people at parties ask me, "What do you do?", I no longer actually answer the question. Instead of saying that I am a computer programmer or that I work with computers, I say, "Oh, I work for [company name]". They still know what I really do (if they give it a little thought at least) but the reactions I get are noticeably better.
This is all more or less inconsequential though. These are not great hardships; these are "First World problems". What is an issue though are certain very particular stereotypes that our industry has acquired: sexism/misogyny. I don't think it is really important how deserved or not these labels are; but what I do know is that these labels are social kryptonite. They are the things that can end friendships and careers.
We hear about these issues in our industry a lot, particularly here on HN. Usually the poster of the story makes it clear that they think these are issues that the industry only has because a few men act this way. Everyone is not guilty, except perhaps so far as they turn a blind eye to it. The apparent idea behind raising awareness for this issue is to get people to speak up when they see it. I understand that, and I understand why it is necessary. I don't like having these labels anywhere near me, that they are applied to my industry at all makes me uncomfortable, but I understand it is important.
So what then am I supposed to do when I see comments like the one by isalmon above? I am pretty certain he meant nothing untold by it, I am sure his intentions were all decent. I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt there. Even so, I can absolutely see how a comment like that could be read as being rather offensive and could help solidify the sexism/misogyny complaints that have been levelled against our industry. It should not be hard to imagine a blog post making it to the top of HNs about a comment exactly like that being overheard at a tech conference. I don't want to burn isalmon for something I am sure he did not mean to do, but I feel that I must do something.
So what am I supposed to do?
"How are you?", "Nice weather", and "What do you do?" are typically throw away interactions. Most people aren't expecting a conversation thread to fork at that point. However, if you want to inject a little energy/entropy into the conversation say something that reveals your own real interests
For example: "I am a programmer. Yeah, it's geeky but I like being able to craft stuff for a living - I'm very luck to be able to build something that other people can use - though sometimes it requires a sledgehammer to bang stuff into shape. However, what I really like doing is drawing caricatures. It's taken a while to get to the point where I can actually make it look like the person...in less than a day. How about you, what do you enjoy doing?"
> So what am I supposed to do?
Like dinner parties in France, the best conferences/meetings are the ones that have more than a minority of either sex represented.
If you really want to do something, you can't just write a blog post or a comment. Organize some sort of hacker/meetup and actively reach out to the minority population (this can involve women, urban youth, heck - even senior citizens) - do it and then write about it. Or you can write about it to challenge people (before doing it), as this person has (below).
> Which is where this conference thing gets interesting. Rather than throw up your hands and say it’s the nature of the business, you can embrace this challenge. You can read about what other people have done in this realm, and you can apply your considerable problem-solving skills to come up with new solutions that will benefit us all.
http://www.dogsandshoes.com/2012/06/getting-women-and-other-...
Both mekoka and TazeTSchnitzel did just that, and I do it when people make stupid racist comments, too, for instance (I live in South Africa and sadly this still happens more often than I'd like).
It's a non-confrontational way of dealing with the difference in opinion, and critically, gives people an opportunity to move forward while saving face.
Some people don't think giving a diplomatic exit is appropriate in -ism scenarios, but I prefer giving people an opportunity to change their opinions - and the reality is that if you try to tell someone they are sexist or are racist you will never get through to them because their ego defences will kick in, but if you point out, with sensitivity, that their statement is unfair in some way they 'seem' to have missed, you give them an opportunity to grow because you didn't involve their ego.
Remember that most people's opinions are handed down from friends/family/social programming and seldom subject to introspection; they may be just embarrassed by what they've said as you are, but most people lack the self esteem to admit they're wrong openly. If you give them some sense of self respect despite their gaffe they often appreciate it.
In my experience most people pick up that if they don't deal fairly with reality as you propose then they'll have to admit they are sexist/racist/etc. and they quickly learn to revise their statements. Of course some people really are sexist or racist and don't care, but then at least you won't have to worry about misinterpretation once they freely acknowledge that.