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that's all fine and dandy, but no one is bitching about the fact we have very very very few men working in the child care industry, for instance... better start

• zorpner 11y ago
  It's exhausting to keep having this same conversation over and over, but I suppose that's the purpose of comments like yours. Look at the graduation rates for women and minorities from CS programs; then look at the industry participation rates, particularly over time and particularly with reference to seniority. They're not turning their back on tech, they're being driven out.
  • kelukelugames 11y ago
    It is exhausting and frustrating. We need to store copy pasta for these conversation. Maybe I will compile a list.
  • htns 11y ago
    Looking at women's CS graduation rates means nothing if you don't look at overall graduation rates. I have yet to see any proof that women are really being driven out from CS rather than being driven into some other field.
    • pdabbadabba 11y ago
      True enough. But I don't think everything is necessarily A-OK so long as women are landing in some other field. It is also important why women are being driven away from CS (whether into some other field or not).
• beachstartup 11y ago
  it's always been profitable. but now it's socially acceptable, even prestigious depending on your role. big difference.
• pdabbadabba 11y ago
  Yes, I am all for greater male participation in the child-care industry. (I really am!) So say we all. Are you satisfied? Will you now please join us on in constructively discussing the exclusion of women from tech, law, science, politics, accounting, carpentry, the military... and how to fix it? If the child care industry were representative of men's exclusion from most high paying, socially powerful fields, then I would expect the 'bitching' to begin. But, as it is, the child-care field is not a field that a lot of men would like to get into, it pays fairly poorly, (unfortunately) confers little power or respect, and is largely an anomaly in an economy where most jobs, especially powerful ones are dominated by men. The "confers little power and respect" bit, by the way, seems to be true of most woman-dominated fields (child care, teaching, nursing...). Do you suppose this is a coincidence?
  • dragonwriter 11y ago
    > But, as it is, the child-care field is not a field that a lot of men would like to get into, it pays fairly poorly, (unfortunately) confers little power or respect, and is largely an anomaly in an economy where most jobs, especially powerful ones are dominated by men. Its actually not really an anomaly for jobs that pay fairly poorly and confer little power or respect to be dominated by women and/or persistently disadvantaged minorities. (It's really part of the same effect as jobs that pay well and confer power and respect being dominated by white men.)
    • eonw 11y ago
      oh this is a copout! there are many low wage job categories dominated by men... garbage collection, construction(low level), shipping, commercial kitchens, yard work, i could go on and on. none of which get neither money nor respect.
  • Fratercula 11y ago
    why should someone engage with you when you are already convinced you are right?
• jameshart 11y ago
  Yes, people are bitching about the lack of men in childcare. Go seek out child development communities online and see them wrestling with the problem! See men who try to et into childcare complain that they are assumed to be incapable of working in early-years education because they might be a pedophile! It's a huge problem, and one we should get upset about. On teaching and child development forums these exact issues are discussed. But this is hacker news. A site for people in the tech industry, not the childcare industry. We can and should care about representation and participation and opportunity in our industry. We can do something about it here.
  • eonw 11y ago
    interesting, i was unaware of a movement in childcare to get more men involved. i do think it similar to tech, in that(historically) if a man said he wanted to run a daycare for a career, it would have raised eyebrows. just as a woman saying she wanted to be a software engineer might have at a time. that said, in the above reference. the man would still, to this day, get a lot of strange looks for picking that as a career choice, whereas the woman would not.
    • jameshart 11y ago
      In spite of the fact that countless surveys and specific women regularly report that they often still face difficulties being accepted as techies, both by male technical peers, and by nontechnical people, and that they are persuaded against going into technology by both explicit advice from family, teachers and role models, as well as cultural expectations and media images, you're saying you think that women don't get "strange looks" for picking software engineering as a career any more? Why do you think women feel the need to create websites like this (https://mixpanel.com/i-am-tech/ https://mixpanel.com/i-am-tech/) in the first place if the idea of being a woman in tech is only "historically" eyebrow-raising? The assumption that sexism is, like racism, one of those things that people used to do in the 1950s, is really not helpful.
      • eonw 11y ago
        you are assuming that men don't also face this issue or similar? not dressing hipster enough, not being a mac fanboy, being older then the rest of your team, preferring one programming language over another, etc. Men have issues as well, and I've seen men catch much worse hell at work in IT then any woman i have worked with. until you have worn another's shoes, you cant state that they have it any easier with any more certainty then picking a keno ticket.
• DanBC 11y ago
  > but no one is bitching about the fact we have very very very few men working in the child care industry, for instance Don't lie. A simple websearch returns very many hits for people talking about the shortage of men in pre-school and primary school education.