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Meet Google's Security Princess

elle.com

47 pointsjonbaer31 comments

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> “Security Princess” is Parisa Tabriz’s official title at Google. Seriously.

Well, sure, but at the same time my official title at Google is "Engine Ear". It just takes manager approval.

http://chademeng.com/jgf.jpg

http://googlechromereleases.blogspot.ru/2014/07/flash-player...

read the comments princess..

The photo credit is Brandon Downey -- the Googler?

Almost certainly, since Brandon is a brilliant photographer who often does portraits of other security Googlers.

Yes - he posted about it on G+

https://plus.google.com/108799184931623330498/posts/C99qhxbK...

Not really sure that needed 5 pages, but I guess ads don't view themselves.

"She has a ... sleek tomboy aesthetic: dark-wash jeans, clean-line crewnecks, and Chuck Taylors, with the occasional bomber jacket thrown on top."

"“It’s slimming,” she says, shrugging, not that she needs to worry about that."

Why the fuck does this damn article undermine itself by talking about what kind of clothes she wears and her shape? Completely irrelevant.

It's Elle Magazine, not Wired. Clothes, style and aesthetics is what their readers are interested in and what their advertisers make money from. Relevance requires context, and in the context of a fashion magazine it is relevant.

The same line in Wired would be irrelevant.

The world is a subtle and nuanced place.

I'm not so sure. The slimming line, probably, but the painting of the physical picture of the person, in a biographical article? It's pretty common for a bio. Wired probably wouldn't use 'tomboy', but I'd expect they'd play up the 'hacker'-esque appearance a little. It's not the main point of the article, just setting the scene.

In addition to the other arguments (Elle is a fashion magazine, focused on style and suchlike) -- why is it so undermining to talk about how people look?

As someone who sees a lot of overweight, sloppily dressed people (occasionally with poor personal hygiene) in our industry, I find it good to know that someone is well-dressed and of normal weight. I find it a positive characteristic, indicative of discipline and attention to detail. I have seen articles about Jack Dorsey and Steve Jobs that paid attention to their personal style, and I often like those parts of the articles.

Unless the article is purely technical in nature ("Tate's parametrisation of p-adic Curves" or suchlike), could you explain why is it so important to you that that this information be deemed "undermining", and be suppressed?

Just for the record, I'm a female programmer, and I don't think I've ever read Elle. I think I was in my teens the last time I read something in a fashion magazine.

I had assumed, perhaps mistakenly, that an important subtext of the article is to show the success of a woman in a technical field, and that a woman can achieve a leadership role at a leading technology company, in a role that is all about intellect -- not sales or customer-facing stuff where appearance matters. I found the mentions of looks and clothes to be at odds with this.

Now I'm curious to know how men's fashion magazines treat similar subjects....

Dude. It's an article published by Elle. What do you want? :) You are not their target audience. Women who love fashion and other trends are. There is nothing wrong with caring about what she wears in that context (i.e. audience that cares about fashion).

Because Elle is a fashion magazine and readers are interested in these details. Is it so hard to empathize?

There's a running joke in a student organization I'm involved in, whether a situation is absurd or completely ordinary, someone might ask: "Is it sexist?"

Occasionally it leads to interesting, and difficult discussion that waxes philosophical.

So, her self-declared official title is "Security Princess".

Is it sexist?

Edit: I encourage readers to read my reply to jamesaguilar, here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8013723, to elucidate why we still ask the question, "Is it sexist?", and not just to be funny.

My flavor of feminism holds that you do not judge a woman's choices about her own priorities, dress, sexuality, the terms she uses to describe herself, etc. Others might feel differently though.

Your concern is admirable. If men paid as much attention to their own speech as you are to this woman's, we might not even have to have this discussion. I do consider it ironic though considering you and your friends liked to trivialize the question "is it sexist" in random situations, apparently, reading between the lines, because you found it funny.

Sure, the question is sometimes trivial. But it's also a question that keeps us on our toes. I run a secular student organization - atheist, agnostic, secular humanist, pro-free speech, establishment clause, all that and so on. Our group is largely feminist, but for years suffered a severely lopsided gender disparity.

We ask ourselves "is it sexist?" because sometimes things that seem so obviously, ordinarily not-sexist, like a self-ascribed title, can result in a sexist impact. Some atheist student organizations I've met across the country allow personalized titles. I've met people who described their position in the organization as "Batman", or "God". These titles send signals that the group isn't serious.

Completely innocuous, non-sexist things can send entirely sexist signals. The types of events a student organization advertises: board games versus video games, can result in huge gender disparities. Catering to one because your current members prefer it is not sexist. Catering to one and ignoring the impact it has, is.

I think to be a proactive feminist, you have to examine the total impact of your actions, not just what individuals intended to happen. You have to examine not just why a decision was made, but what factors weren't considered in making it.

Is Parisa Tabriz sexist? No, I don't think so. Is she a bad feminist? I couldn't even begin to answer that question, I don't know her.

But is her title sexist? I have to think of my student organization and the signals we send. If my Director of Membership asked to change her title to "Membership Princess", I would say no. That sends the wrong signal to potential members.

> I think that to be a proactive Feminist, you have to examine the total impact of your actions . . .

Then I beg you to consider the impact of this sort of cross examination, which men seem to engage in as a knee jerk reaction whenever they encounter a woman who don't fit the desired flavor. It is part of the problem; it is not part of the solution.

Nope. Self-declared largely makes it okay.

If you looked down the job listings and one was, "Security Princess", that would be sexist.

Neither does the title carry enough baggage to make it demeaning. This is generally where self-declared things get into trouble, but "Security Princess" is, I think, novel enough to avoid this.

Sure, but what about the people who aren't aware that it's self-declared? I would hate to have some pop culture drivel pick up this story and talk about Google's "Security Princess", wouldn't you?

People who can't figure out that a clearly jocular title like 'security princess' at a large, highly-visible corporation must be self-assigned... these are the kind of people that utterly sap the joy out of life and generally aren't worth talking to in the first place. Yes, people who have English as a second language might not pick up on the joke as fast, but they're also unlikely to be writing pop culture drivel articles if they aren't that familiar with the language.

I went on a long rant at my last company about how pretentious it is for anyone to call themselves a "thought leader". Guess what my next nametag had as my position...

I'm not sure if "lizard wrangler" for example is a self assigned title :)

My favourite movie credit was for a "butterfly wrangler". I had an image of someone in chaps and a cowboy hat, holding a really tiny whip...

Not really, given that it's a self-assigned title with no pressure from the organisation to make it that way.

For myself, I got tired of title inflation at my work and changed my position title on my emails from 'sysadmin' to 'grand duke of information systems infrastructure'. The front-end people liked it enough that they changed it on the 'about us' page as well. I got bored of the joke after a few months and reverted it, but though it was never official, I was never asked to 'correct' the title.

A self-set self-aggrandising title like this might be conceited, but it's not sexist. The way people treat you for it might be, though.

I'm replying to myself to keep the above short and sweet.

I'm inclined to think it is. I'm worried that someone could see that title, not understand her position or its importance, and disregard her. Or assume Google has disregarded her. Or assume that you have to have adhere to "Princess-like" gender norms.

All of which bother me. If I didn't read the article, I might think:

* Google doesn't take security seriously. (A topic for another topic, but I digress.)

* Google doesn't take women in senior positions seriously.

* If I'm a woman, I can expect to have a title like that at Google.

Etc.

Is it sexist? Knowing more facts makes it less-so, but can we rely on the general public knowing all the facts?

You're confusing sexist interpretation with sexist action.

If Person A chooses to wear a pink t-shirt, this is not sexist. If Person B chooses to interpret such a t-shirt as feminine, that is sexist.

I'm deliberately avoiding giving Person A a gender, you'll notice.

I think you're confusing your interpratation of the question "Is it sexist?" with its actual effect :)

Google, and even the employee herself, are sending signals, just like startups send signals to investors and people signal their gender with what they wear. Is it sexist to interpret pink t-shirts as feminine? (I think that's more a question of gender construction, but I digress again.)

I think there's a big problem with the way that tech giants send signals towards women who want to approach technology. Having a senior-level highly technical role in your company with the title "Security Princess" sends a lot of signals, and I don't think most of them are good for fighting sexism.

Does that make sense?

> I'm worried that someone could see that title, not understand her position or its importance, and disregard her.

How does it make the title sexist? It makes it confusing or non descriptive if you like. And what if the title was "security prince"? Would it make any difference regarding the above? I don't think so. It would be as much confusing as a "security princess". So it's not sexist really.

lets try - Bob says to John "ask for our Security Princess". ok. Being from another department, John later asks for "Security Queen"... Princess ok? Queen - not? At least it wasn't ok back then in the Github sexual harassment story : https://twitter.com/nrrrdcore/status/444646082857820160/phot...

Bumbla claat princess riddems. Control your space lady.

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