Free Public Speaking Workshop For Women
github.com
github.com
(The other stage in the funnel which needs work is the "going into engineering" stage, but that's much earlier.)
The other stage to help out would be someone covering travel expenses/etc. for the pool of qualified and willing female speakers to attend events they otherwise might not. I wonder if any tech companies would contribute to that.
But if you do care, then giving more women the ability to raise their profile helps to attract more women. And you should care,if for no other reason than you are unlikely to get all of the best and the brightest if half the population is unlikely to participate.
GitHub is hosting a FREE event to support a group of hackers that are under-represented and discriminated against at conferences. How is this anything but wonderful?
Stop heckling. Your sarcasm is laced with entitlement and ignorance. It doesn't help anyone.
Note: the values driving this post are a respect for individual rights regardless of gender. What are your values? When you clearly state them you will probably understand the point of disagreement.
The argument is purportedly one of fairness: it's unfair to discriminate against men. Which is true. And we should make things fair.
But it seems very difficult to, with a straight and honest face, say whatever set of circumstances has led to the massively skewed gender ration] in cs/tech is fair either.
So, there is a value question: is it ok to make things slightly unfair locally to improve global fairness. There's also a practical question, does this actually cause that.
(Note: I have no strong opinion on the morals of sexual discrimination, though I do find it distasteful. But for the sake of argument I'm appealing to the mainstream "it is wrong" perspective.)
> Note: the values driving this post are a respect for individual rights regardless of gender.
I don't see how individual rights has anything to do with this. Github is not obligated to provide a workshop for every person and Github employees have a right to create a workshop that targets women. Nobody is being prevented from running their own workshop or being forced to attend a workshop.
Assuming the following:
- the amount of women in tech is a fraction of the amount of men
- the intelligence/experience/skills of all of these men and women is about even
- percentage-wise there are just about as many men as women that are crap at public speaking
- the intent is to put more women in front of crowds
Assuming these, teaching none but women how to speak (or, none but men, for that matter) only serves to make the level of these events lower. You want the best, not the /best of this or that minority/.
This goes both ways, and that's what the OP pointed out, with an unhealthy dose of sarcasm.
That said, I think having some women up there might actually help. It gives the youth a better impression, perhaps even inspiring some women to have a go at IT.
Your argument is predicated on the idea that the only fair allocation is a pro-rata distribution of time, resembling almost perfectly the demographics of the audience. Consider instead that the echo chamber effect is real, and it is to the benefit of the community that people with fundamentally different backgrounds will introduce perspectives which, when mixed with those of the majority, will make the entire community more robust.
Second, your concept of applying quality standards, while ostensibly a desirable thing, is problematic in application. In a community where majority/minority dynamics apply, invariably the assessment of quality will tend towards what the majority feels is most aligned with its own sensibilities. Those of course are informed by their own experiences, and to the extent that there are strongly overlapping elements, the consensus view will contain blind spots. I don't know what the answer is to that, but it's something to think about if you want to take the issue seriously.
So yeah, if you think that the best thing for a conference, or a community in general is to only hear from perspectives in equal proportion to how they occur in the population at large -- which is the effect of so-called meritorious approaches such as yours -- then by all means you should count the allotment of every second. Black programmers should be invited to give 30-second lightning talks whereas smart, young white males from middle class backgrounds should pontificate for hours.
I personally think that the quality of your conference will be much worse. I would rather see someone decide to give a woman a chance, yes because she's a woman but also because she's smart, so as to give a voice to people who don't normally get a chance to be heard much.
The one starting with the words I think. I was just pointing out what the OP meant.
In other words, don't address your comment to me. I'm on your side.
Your first sentence suggests some value system based on group rights, individuals are irrelevant. Could you state your values more carefully? (Im especially curious how you determine which groups to give rights to.) As I said, I suspect you will recognize the points of disagreement when you do.
This workshop in no way harms men as the dominant group in tech and tech public speaking events. Offering a workshop that targets for a type of person who is underrepresented and faces unique challenges for not being in the majority group doesn't constitute sexual discrimination. The workshop is discriminating in the sense that it selects for a particular kind of person, but this is different from what we mean by sexism and sexual discrimination.
> Your first sentence suggests some value system based on group rights, individuals are irrelevant. Could you state your values more carefully? (Im especially curious how you determine which groups to give rights to.) As I said, I suspect you will recognize the points of disagreement when you do.
The question would be are your individual rights being violated when Github hosts a workshop targeted for women? The answer is clearly no. Private individuals and groups have a right to form voluntary workshops that have criteria for entry. It would be silly to say that individuals who face unique problems from not being a part of the dominant culture can't form groups or hold events that address their specific problems.
Of course it's sex discrimination. Sex discrimination is when a function satisfies the equation:
allowEntry(x.copy(gender=Female)) != allowEntry(x.copy(gender=Male))
If you want to argue that sexual discrimination is acceptable under some circumstances, go ahead - but as I said before, please be explicit about what your underlying values are. It'll help us all understand why we disagree.
Private individuals and groups have a right to form voluntary workshops that have criteria for entry.
So if a group of brogrammers form a voluntary corporation that has being male as a criteria for entry, that's acceptable? If not, why not?
Thanks.
I do tend to reflexively discount those people.
Thanks for replying.
As a github event, it is alienating, off putting, sexist, and creepy.
Male programmers need public speaking skills just as much as female programmers do.
What this tells me for the nth time, is that github as a company has their head wedged, and I would never want a job with them, they are clearly sexist, agenda driven, and whether explicit or not will almost certainly have quotas favoring women developers.
Edit: It's a shame downvotes do not require that a comment in reply first be made.
There are already lots of events that primarily attract male programmers. Do you know what they call those? "Events." It doesn't even need to be stated that men will be vastly overrepresented compared to the general population — that is simply the way it is. Men are already served quite well in the tech world. It is one of the most man-heavy fields in existence. You are not being persecuted here.
More generally, this is not a zero-sum game being played between the sexes. It is possible to hurt one sex while helping the other, but the existence of something that benefits women does not automatically threaten us as men. And even worse, this kind of angry opposition to things that benefit women do take from them without conferring any benefit to you. This kind of hostile negativity is not a good thing.
So you're telling me there are more public speaking workshops for male developers than female developers? I'm not sure I believe that. I think ALL developers could benefit from this workshop. And that inviting all developers would still provide women the skills they need to become successful public speakers.
I agree, this is not a zero sum game, but github just turned it into one.
If you are a github employee and now have public speaking skills on your resume as well perhaps as a speech or two at a conference, your career will probably do better than the male github employee without, who, contrary to your claims, is underserved with public speaking workshops and the networking opportunities they will provide.
And no, Github did not turn anything into a zero-sum game. And no, male Github employees are not now forbidden from gaining public speaking skills. That is just needlessly dramatic. Take a step back and ask yourself, "Does the landscape I see in the field of software development really look like one where women have a large advantage over me and I need to defend my sex from them?" I posit that the answer is "No, male programmers are doing just fine for themselves and Github is not endangering them in any way through this workshop."
I am certainly not in a position to make an educated guess, do you want to make any sort of estimate?
You can reach out to more women, and invite them to apply, but it is sexist discrimination to offer women only training in public speaking on the basis that a certain group of conferences is under-represented.
You would reach the same outcome, more qualified women speakers, if you offer that training to anyone who wants it.
Same outcome, but one approach is sexist, and one approach is inclusive of everyone.
What you are trying to do is guarantee an outcome. Some ratio of women speakers at conferences that satisfies your requirement. Approaches like that usually lead to sexism and discrimination.
A better approach is to a) ensure there is an ample supply of well qualified people for your conferences and then b) encourage conferences to perform better outreach to the kinds of speakers they are seeking. Approaches like that are non-sexist and inclusive.
As I said, github, an employer, should not be seen directly giving women, even non-employees, preferential treatment. If they want to donate to a women's group putting on such a workshop, that would be a different matter.
Edit to add: chc, we have run out of thread reply. What is HN etiquette on that?
I will say I disagree with your reply that somehow women are disadvantaged in public speaking. Having fewer women at conferences is not evidence of any disadvantage that merits a discrimination based remedy. And even if so, such a disadvantage! We're not talking job discrimination, income equality, firing policies, etc., we're talking about public speaking something that applies to very very few people across the IT world. A remedy to that does not require sexist discriminatory approaches.
From my vantage point, the only exclusionary, discriminatory behaviors and attitudes in the tech industry are directed at men.
FYI, this is not a thing. HN discourages immediate replies by hiding the reply button for a few minutes after the comment goes up. If you do want to reply immediately, you can click on "link" at the top of the comment, which will still provide you with the text box.
So truly, thank you!
I like how you mix affirmative action quotas, sexism, and having an agenda all together as though Github is orchestrating some anti-male conspiracy.
1) Putting on a workshop for women on public speaking != hiring quotas based on gender 2) Excluding a dominant group from a workshop is not sexism, the dominant group is not having its collective power threatened in any way 3) There is nothing wrong with having an agenda, people and organizations have them all the time
I am not a dominant group, I am an individual and I am excluded based on my genitals. This does not seem right.
It's not a threat to me and I don't honestly care about conferences. But that is what it comes down to.
Since it looks like you're going for a rather fake attempt at gender equality, one wonders why you aren't also requesting that any upvoters also equally justify themselves with a comment.