Oh my god, it's a girl (2010)
micheleincalifornia.blogspot.com
micheleincalifornia.blogspot.com
1) Attraction: Oh my god, it's a girl and she has a brain
and is interested in some of the same things I am
interested in. Maybe I can get a date!
2) Misguided attempts to encourage women to post more: Oh
my god, it's a girl and we need more girls posting here.
Let's be nice and friendly and make her feel all welcome
and stuff so she will post more (thereby sucking all the
intellectual content out of their posts and killing any
reason you have to post there).
3) It's not really kid gloves, it's really walking on egg
shells: Oh my god, it's a girl and what if she breaks
down and cries because I argued with her (like my
girlfriend routinely does)
3b) or what if I make a joke and she takes it all wrong
and everyone will think I am some horrible sexist pig!
4) Shyness: A lot of the very intelligent men you find
hanging out in certain types of online forums (like
Hacker News) are very introverted and just awkward around
women and some of them have gotten a lot of rejection, so
they get nervous once they find out it's a girl.
>it's for your job prospects that you avoid off color jokes?
yes.
>Not the comedic banality
no.
>or actual disgust with sexism?
no.
I'm not a crusader, nor am I a paragon of morality. I would suggest to you, that such personally held traits are dangerous.
As an example, the dongle joke had nothing to do with sexism.
I am not trying to shame you but have you ever been around groups of women as they work or play? Off color jokes are typical of the species homo sapiens in 2014.
The real sexists are the people - including the distinguished Miss Richards who initially reported the joke - who presume that women are such delicate little flowers that they can't exist in an environment for adults, where people occasionally make jokes that are unsuitable for kindergarten kids.
(i.e. I quite agree with you!)
At least you also said what you really mean, that the sexism is problematic, but far too often I have seen people pretend that their issue with a offensive/bigoted/problematic joke is that it is not funny or cliche^. Let's be honest here, that is not actually what bothers people. We only hear those objections when there is something else wrong with the joke; nobody objects to non-offensive unfunny jokes. Groan perhaps, but not object.
^ Usually this manifests as something like "it's not even that it is offensive, the joke is just _lazy_"
Right, but that is not because they are unimaginative or cliched (evidenced by you being able to wade through mountains of bad puns). It is because they are scatological or sexist.
I like dick jokes as much as the next person, but they have to be funny. It's not as "shocking" as you think. It's cliche.
5) I don't really care what your gender is (unless it is particularly germane to the topic of discussion) and I don't take it into account with regard to the content of my posts or responses.
People aren't taken aback at the office, when they deal with female engineers. Why should it be any different on the internet?
I understand women often have to deal with these awkward situations online. Granted. But let's remember that these are a minuscule fraction. It's like walking down the streets of New York and applying the reaction of one construction whistler cat-calling someone passing by and painting the other four million men in the city.
Of course, when you're on the receiving end of encounters with the one person in a massive group that always zooms in on you, it likely feels disproportionate.
I know many people arn't introspective, they don't think their behaviour changes at all. How many people have you met that have honestly told you: "Well placebo's don't really effect me." "Commercials don't have an effect on me." "I don't see race when I'm interviewing someone." "I treated that person as I would anyone else."
I hear it often, I also hear about study after study debunking such beliefs.
I believe you are right, most of HN would definitely take #5. I'm convinced most of HN would be mistaken. I can't help be racist, I can't help be sexist, I can't help be misguided and mislead. What I can do is recognize that I am effected by such proclivities, and compensate for them.
That is truly the best I can do. I am jealous of the person who can justifiably say they are #5.
(Originally posted elsewhere on 2010/12/25.)
I am moving a few things from an old personal blog to a new one. This was previously posted on HN under the old url. I did not expect it to be upvoted this much or get any traction. I just thought a few people might be interested in knowing where it got moved.
I haven't really seen that much "weird conspiracy theorists", though.
Guys, give it a rest and treat women the same as you would men. They don't want or need special treatment.
My dream of bridging man pages and info manuals crushed.
> They don't want or need special treatment.
Many women these days are certainly expressing that they want special treatment. The question is if they need it, and if they are representative of women in IT as a whole.
I'm a female programmer. I don't want to be hit on or looked at like I'm from another planet; I want to be judged by the quality of my work. It's going to my satisfaction, so I don't feel the need to complain.
But because you posted this sort of comment I actually read your username for the first time :)
Personally, I at least look at who I am responding to (especially when I disagree with them; sometimes the person you're responding to has readily-apparent expertise that you'd feel foolish disagreeing with.)
OTOH, I'd also be similarly polite to a respected person, particularly from outside the field, who posted something wrong. e.g. if a regulator or most VCs said something fundamentally incorrect, I'd politely try to counter it, but I'd back off rapidly unless the disagreement were really core.
All of this is without specific information about the person; there are specific counterexamples. e.g. if pmarca were the VC who said something "wrong", I don't think "back off to be polite" would be useful or necessary; however, he's probably also less often wrong about things.
this whole thing about how women are treated is utterly dumb. am I male or female? Who can tell, does it matter, does it change anything about this comment? Of course not. gender agnostic language begets gender nondiscrimination.
But not everyone is like that. When people complain about sexism in the tech industry, they aren't saying that everyone in the industry is sexist. I'm sure that at least some of the time people would treat you differently online if your username was stephanieburleson.
1) discussions of gender 2) discussions of gentrification in the bay area 3) financial or political ideology (anything especially randian, for instance)
Interactions / discussion tend to not be as factual or informative as other discussions.
The poster makes great points on how to engage, sometimes, however, good posts are lost within a bunch of noise.
Imagine if man posted a similar statement about some female community, he would be called sexist right away...
Conversely, as "outsiders" who are greatly affected by the dynamics of the in group, women have had more of a reason to pay attention to the group dynamics of men for a long time. They are more likely to have a sense of these things, conscious or not. The same dynamic happens any time there is a minority. Black people tend to be more astute observers of white people's behavior than the reverse because a white person is more likely to live their life without having to understand how to get what they want from the black folks who have the power, while the reverse is less often true.
Personally, in my AFK life and online, I treat women with the same respect (and critique) as I do men. I also don't know many people who would treat people differently based on their gender. Well, obviously disregarding the case for romance/relations..
I do understand the interest in women in fields like tech and gaming. It certainly is something that can pique ones interest when a person of the opposite gender shares the same interests as you, but that doesn't mean you need to treat them differently unless otherwise hinted.
The only people I can think of that do (treat women the way the OP describes), are also people that are generally awkward in social settings, so it's not gender focused per se, just a bit more apparent there, maybe.
I found this a little troubling. I wish women didn't have to feel like they're "one of the guys" in an online community.
So, really, it's hard to reduce these ingredients to a sex or gender.
Part of the reason this is such a hot topic right now is because the above statement is not at all true. It is certainly applicable for some, but not enough to claim true equality in the system.
Show me a woman who has actually accomplished something of merit who also writes about gender inequality. Complaining about inequality is just an excuse for not producing anything of value.
Do you think I star repos on Github based on the sex of the author? NO! I star them based on their utility, elegance, etc.
This issue is a non-issue.
I would say all of these women have accomplished something of merit while talking about gender inequality.
I have to admit that I know very little about feminism, so I'm honestly all ears here.
Rather, they contributed to the derailing of feminism into the contemporary postmodern feminism that dominates the public sphere. The one which gets uptight over private jokes between people at tech conferences.
You're kidding, right? I know many of the following extremely successful and intelligent women have written about gender inequality:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/meghancasserly/2013/05/22/the-wo...
Yes, there do exist some people who "complain" about gender inequality in instances when that is not quite the fundamental issue, but you're ignoring the entire picture. These are serious issues that actually do exist and that people are trying to change. Some people aren't as constructive as others, but ignoring the reality and weight of the issue is certainly not productive.
And yet, I write about gender inequality - because it actually exists. I'd be very happy if it were a non-issue, but it isn't.
It's very rarely the big ticket items that are the problem, even if they grab all the attention, though. It's all the small things that say "you're not quite welcome here". The constant barrage of sexist jokes, followed by "present company excluded". The eternal "you're a programmer?" question at conferences. The media portrayal of computer scientists. And yes, the constant denial that there even is an issue.
Yes, I know the jokes are not meant to hurt. And the question is honest surprise. And media in general sucks. But at every step, women do get told they're "not part of the club". It grates, occasionally.
So please, do listen a tiny bit to the women who do talk about gender inequality. Don't assume a priori we're just doing it for the attention. I'd rather discuss the latest awesome CS paper, too - so please assume instead that we talk about a problem because there seems to be a problem.
EDIT: Perhaps more constructively, you have demonstrated exactly why "this again" -- because many people still don't understand that tech is not exceptional and is not a "meritocracy". The same biases that exist in all other walks of life exhibit themselves in the tech world but are often more insidious because people refuse to acknowledge them.
"I basically think "dating" -- ie men spending money on women in hopes of getting laid -- is a form of socially sanctioned prostitution."
Why are we wasting time discussing this author?
She may have unusual opinions on dating, but that's not the topic of this discussion.
I'm male. I consider myself a feminist. It's just as possible to offend me with ignorant statements as it is to offend anyone else, female or otherwise.
Right, and frankly they're not professional. An in that sense, why are you hung-up on them? Its a bit of a stretch to assume everything that is <not> professional is "un" professional.
Any stories that had enough instances of this occurring that linking to it wouldn't be unfair?
Ask yourself how anyone would feel about that kind of attention.
type wiseley
Later.
majority of people dont read into usernames, nor care of your gender.
the only time i see kid gloves being used based on gender is that the lack of that gender in this field may raise some questions about the skillset. applies either way to gender.
i have never seen kid gloves used on here for several years
i think blogposts like this, no i dont think someone is being nice for a date on here because you are female, leads to gender discrimination. attention seekers using gender for cover of seeking attention.
sex - either of the two main categories (male and female) into which humans and many other living things are divided on the basis of their reproductive functions.
gender - the state of being male or female (typically used with reference to social and cultural differences rather than biological ones).