Also, if you make the argument that a feminist environment was in some way necessary rather than merely conducive to the development of this particular solution, then were the experiences gained in a hyper-masculine and highly misogynistic organization based on the needs of state violence required for Grace Hopper to invent compilers, given that she was a Rear Admiral in the US Navy?
edit - I fully support the creation of comfortable safe spaces and organisations that bring more people into programming as society in general seems far too accepting of abusive bigots, so these places and organisations serve a good and useful purpose. I also think that the creation of spaces like this will in time help raise the quality of software by having a wider range of perspectives looking at the problems, so it isn't just a good idea because it is being nice. I just think that the author here is putting an undue amount of weight on feminism as a major cause of this particular solution to the atime problem. I can't see anything about it as a solution that couldn't have been worked out by, say for instance, a hermit who hates everyone.