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Comment by throwawayaway | Hacker News Reader

Why don't they want to be there though?

There's gender imbalances in lots of places now between executives, teachers, prison, the military, some of those are positive places to have a gender balance in.

I've seen lots of discrimination against females in the places I have worked, behind their back for the most part. I have also seen examples of positive discrimination in their favour, but not as much.

Personally, I think it's a manufacturing line of institutions that lead to a hireable tech worker - and if you go back each step along the assembly line, the female involvement is higher percentage wise.

So I think the lower representation is a product of women opting out of maths and science based subjects at an early stage, and later choosing the medical profession over engineering.

It would be interesting to get some statistics over the span of a career, do a higher percentage of women change career away from tech once they start?

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Anyone that doesn't think there is a problem should try asking a female dev about her experiences in her career. Besides typical societal problems like calling 35 year old women "girls" and forcing them to choose between having a family or a successful career, they face all sorts of discrimination and sexism that men don't even realize they're doing. My SO on multiple occasions has been told things like "You're the best female dev I've ever seen", "It's so nice to have girls on the team!", and "Don't worry you'll find a job because companies always want female devs". Add on top of this any sort of general sexist behavior that is rampant in offices like unwanted advances, inappropriate touching, etc. It becomes really painfully obvious why there aren't more women in tech.

I am in complete and total agreement with what you are saying. I once heard an undergraduate female dev be fed the "companies always want female devs" and a female colleague my junior having self doubt over getting promoted. The whole thing stinks.

To be honest I'm sure I've transgressed a few times myself! Like many things you just have to be vigilant.

>and forcing them to choose between having a family or a successful career

This is not true. There are always trade-offs in life, even for men. Almost everything has an opportunity cost. You focus on your family the career suffers, focus on your career family suffers. The same is true of men except they don't have a biological clock.

>Add on top of this any sort of general sexist behavior that is rampant in offices like unwanted advances, inappropriate touching, etc.

I hear this, but have honestly only ever been present for a single awkward comment in my 10+ year career. I think "unwanted advances" is going to be a continual problem because most of the guys in tech are socially awkward, unnattractive nerds, so any advance they make is going to be by definition, unwanted. However these guys have no way of knowing that before-hand, unless they make "nobody wants me" their default assumption.

>they face all sorts of discrimination and sexism that men don't even realize they're doing

this is what bothers me the most, there is no concept of "mens rea" in issues of discrimination, you are guilty even if you try not to be. People choose to be offended or not, that's a voluntary choice. So if your SO is offended by people who have no intention to commit offence or cause harm, then what can I say? What can they do? Everybody will have to walk on eggshells around your SO so they don't offend her I guess. Doesn't sound like the problem is with "tech" to be honest.

The price of the privilege and prestige of being a member of the oppressive majority is eternal vigilance against overstepping the mark. Sure it's inconvenient, but politeness doesn't cost much effort. Eggshells is a good way of putting it.

If you or anyone you see steps over the line, get an apology out there and discuss it and move on. Over time what constitutes a transgression seems to get more minor and trivial in my eyes, but until we're at a star trek utopian standard of living, progressing towards it is worthwhile in my view.

Of course if somebody is taking the piss and claiming oppression when there isn't any, they deserve to be called out on that too. In the poster's comment to which you are replying I do think his SO's grievances are valid.

>The price of the privilege and prestige of being a member of the oppressive majority

I disagree with this assertion that I belong to an oppressive majority, or that the majority is oppressive.

>Sure it's inconvenient, but politeness doesn't cost much effort. Eggshells is a good way of putting it.

Tolerance goes both ways. Why should 100 people modify their behaviour so that 1 person doesn't get offended, when 1 person could modify simply raise their threshold for offence, and save a 100 people a lot of hassle.

>If you or anyone you see steps over the line

There is no way to know what or where the line is. The line is totally subjective and unique to each individual. So it would simply be easier and less risky (remaining employed wise) to avoid interacting with the person than spend the time to learn how to avoid triggering their offence reaction. I guarantee the path of least resistance is the one that will be followed.

100 people should modify their behaviour if they are being impolite and unprofessional.

The line is subjective I agree. Being polite and courteous rather than unprofessional works best for everyone. It's pretty easy too.

The path of least resistance is being followed and we are all the worse for it.

Also the opinions you are expressing are very much those belonging to a member of the oppressive majority, as far as I am concerned. 100 to 1? Oppressive majority? Fairly cut and dried.

>The price of the privilege and prestige of being a member of the oppressive majority

That sure sounds like most nerds I know - we are just so high on the social scale, even pop stars wish they were us.

And let me put it this way: I have no intention of walking on eggshells my entire career, never knowing when I hurt some delicate being. I don't for a second believe women are that delicate (there are far too many women in combat for that to be the case) but if they are as delicate as I read your comment to assume they are then they don't belong in computing - the compiler will not care how much it hurts your feelings.

for the record, my comments assume no delicacy on the part of women.

i actually hate working with and being around people who hold your viewpoint.

keep shooting from the hip buddy, everybody who finds you offensive is a delicate being - right on.

And you are some sort of compiling automaton? Keep telling it like it is - you stick to your guns. You won't have to walk on eggshells when you're done trust me.

Oppressive majority: I meant white male, rather than programming nerd.

And I am pointing out that you can't simply include all white males and say that they are all oppressing majority (for one there are more people who are not white males on this planet) - not only would you have to include nerds, but you would also have to claim that homeless people are oppressing (since they tend to be men).

so you want to be an ass (not walk on eggshells as you put it, be unforgiving like a compiler) because there's homeless people and because nerds get a hard time?

yep i'm convinced those industry ladies should get thicker skins alright, especially when they are in your industry - they should play by your rules - right?

Why don't men want to be elementary school teachers? Well nobody really cares that much why, but they definitely don't. I think they don't because it's a low-pay, low-respect job and there's a risk of being called a pedophile.

Why don't women want to be in tech? Full of nerds, full of people they don't really want to be around. Hard work, the pay is getting lower every day, have to compete with low wage offshore workers. There are lots of men with no social skills in tech. Women can probably earn more money outside of tech, and have more networking and social outlets in non-tech jobs.

Elementary teachers -> a lot of people care because they think that without men, it runs the risk of becoming a marginalized, low paid female only job. Some of which is already true in your view.

I'm with you on why women don't want to be in tech, except disagree about the hard work or lower pay ever day and offshore workers. Not all women are social butterflies either, so it's just the negative stigma around it.

So that's why I asked, they don't want to be in tech cause of a bunch of needless, highly negative stuff. Stuff that could easily be rectified and thereafter everyone would be much better off.

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