So her talk was on tech interviews and someone thought she was a recruiter? Doesn't seem that big a stretch...
It'd be pretty unlikely to hear a recruiter talk at such a technical level.
Different people will interpret the term differently. Based on your website and your book, you portray yourself as a Recruiting Consultant. So my assumption after seeing all the material you presented is that you are a programmer in the sense that you CAN program (and possibly well given the success of your book) but you are not necessarily a programmer in the sense that you don't do that for a living.
For me, I wouldn't call you a "programmer" unless you did "computer programming" for a living, but that's just how I use the term. I would call you a recruiting consultant, and for me that's no better or worse than "programmer".
Of course, if you define it in the sense of what someone can do, has been employed specifically to do in the past, and continues to do as a core part of their job, then I am a programmer.
But, again, that's not relevant to the situation being described. The situation being described is not someone offhandedly saying that I'm not presently employed as a programmer, or asking about why I'm no longer a programmer [by some definitions]. You, and many other people, are creating new situations and saying "well if someone said X after you did Y, then it's totally reasonable." That's not the situation being described. It's the straw man fallacy.
I am describing a specific situation in which someone listened to a talk about data structures, algorithms, big O time, etc (yes, within the context of interviewing) and saying "So when you WERE a recruiter at Google, ...".
The information on my website is entirely irrelevant.
Possibly I wouldn't characterize you as a recruiter or a programmer based on what you described.
I've been a development manager for many years and programming is an integral part of my role. But I'm a manager, not a "programmer", since I believe it's the dominant aspect of what I do.
So that choice of words could have been more influenced by a possible emphasis on the interview aspect of your role, rather than its programming aspect. I haven't seen the discussion so I can only speak from what I've read.
I've known many hiring managers who were not programmers and knew all of what you mentioned. Some of them were even program managers with a strong CS background - none of them programmers by any definition since they didn't program at all, ever.
If I were arguing that every single time that I'm called something other than programmer that there is gender bias, then your point would be valid. But I'm not arguing that.
All I'm saying is that I haven't seen evidence in what I read that would strongly indicate gender bias in this instance. You are making the claim so you have the burden of proof. I'm just stating my skepticism regarding your presented evidence.
The best way for bias to be taken seriously by others is to only claim bias when the case for it is very clear. This helps combat people who say that "anything today is considered bias".
"I wrote a book about programming interviews" does not signal to me that you are, in fact, a programmer.
I am happy to believe Gayle is a programmer, but I wouldn't use her book as a credential to support that claim.
(And I just realized that I'm replying to Gayle. I didn't read your username before posting. oops. The "you" above wasn't meant to be directed at you personally.)
Elements of Programming Interviews: authors include an algorithms professor, a software engineer, and an engineer/CTO.
Programming Interviews Exposed: authors include software engineer, a CEO & VP Technology, and a radiologist. (Note that this book was written a long time ago. The radiologist probably was a programmer at the time.)
Ace the Programming Interview: software developer
Data Structures and Algorithms Made Easy: software developer
Out of 9 authors (including myself), 8 are/were software developers or something else very, very deep in technology. Possibly all 9.
Notably, zero are/were recruiters.
That ignores all the times when people who are given the same information -but about a man- but who don't make the assumption that he was a recruiter.