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I think everyone jumping in to say "it's not the industry it's the people" or "other industries are like this, too" is missing the point. We tech people tend t

I think everyone jumping in to say "it's not the industry it's the people" or "other industries are like this, too" is missing the point. We tech people tend to think of ourselves as problem-solvers and intellectuals who would welcome anyone interested in the domain, and who was willing to contribute. And yet, many, many women in this industry feel marginalized and/or excluded. Even if that is based on the behaviour of a few bad actors, even if it is somethat that other male-dominated industries (like finance or manufacturing) suffer from, why not try and fix this? Why tolerate the behaviour, or shoot the messenger? People who get angry at posts like this seem to feel personally attacked somehow, which is a weird reaction. (I mean, unless you also harass women, in which case you should feel guilty and take this peronsally, and you should stop.) Otherwise, why not band together in solidarity with the women who experience it, and help put a stop to it? It will make your industry better, your companies more valuable, your workplaces more pleasant, and your conferences more interesting. And most importantly, people who right now are getting a lot of shit thrown their way will be treated better. There is seriously no downside.

concinds 10y ago
Saying "it's not the industry, it's the people" simply means that you can't fix the problem without fixing the people. Changing a few company policies here and there won't fix anything, especially since we're talking about open-source projects here. My other comment addresses "if the problem is the people, what's wrong with them exactly, and how can we fix it?"
odiroot 10y ago
> I think everyone jumping in to say "it's not the industry it's the people" or "other industries are like this, too" is missing the point. To the contrary. It's exactly on point. We don't see anyone saying "school industry is fucked" just because some teachers are abusing the students or "airline industry is fucked" because pilots pick up stewardesses. I find it really repulsive how it's somehow okay in our industry to throw blanket accusations and demand collective responsibility. This is a huge weakness of our environment. Something that actually makes me consider leaving the industry from time to time.
- bb88 10y ago
  >> ... or "airline industry is fucked" because pilots pick up stewardesses. You're right. They don't for the reason you mentioned. They do it for worse things: http://www.westword.com/news/frontier-airlines-subject-of-gender-discrimination-investigation-8004262 http://www.westword.com/news/frontier-airlines-subject-of-ge... https://bossip.com/1365175/another-one-second-black-female-doctor-says-delta-airlines-discriminated-against-her/ https://bossip.com/1365175/another-one-second-black-female-d... https://www.change.org/p/stop-the-bullying-intimidation-and-discrimination-against-women-on-el-al-flights https://www.change.org/p/stop-the-bullying-intimidation-and-...
belorn 10y ago
A major problem with the focus of gender equality in the tech industry is that complete lack of perspective on the work market as a whole and where the tech industry fit on that scale. The more unbalanced the perspective get, the more it looks like political interference for personal gain, and the result will largely be a negative reaction. To bring in some numbers (from Sweden since our government collects it), only 12.5% of those that are employed work in a profession that are consider gender equal and thus have more than 40% of both women and men. 87.5% of people do not, and the tech industry with its ~79%-21% ratio is very average in that group. In contrast we got 38 different profession with 90%-10% gender distribution which employ a very large portion of all employed. Maybe a reason why we tend to inflate the tech industry problems are that there simply are more people here that can be marginalized (for which a subset will write a blog post which then has a chance to end up on HN). A profession that is 99,6 women, or male profession with 99,4 men, will simply not have many people complain that they are feeling marginalized, since the minority gender could almost be seen as a statistical error. Google translation of the statistics: (https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.duochjobbet.se%2Fnyhet%2Fnio-av-tio-har-jobb-med-ojamn-konsfordelning%2F&edit-text=&act=url https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&pr...)
- bb88 10y ago
  Basically you're arguing that we could say that "X" in the US is the norm, because worldwide this amount of "X" is the norm, where in this case X = "gender equality". And arguments like that in some cases raise a valid point. But when "X" is morally repugnant, your argument appears cold, calculating and statistical.
  - belorn 10y ago
    Sweden and US has similar work markets, and while not identical, the data that Sweden has is simply more available. To my knowledge job titles are not reported in as part of tax collection in the US, which mean that any similar data will be poll based and less reliable. It is common to see data researcher praising the nordic european states for the completeness of the data records. If you want warm, emotional and opinionated point, let me bring one that also is supported by the available data. 12.5% is horrible, and that the underlying trend today is steadying pointing downwards is nothing less than a complete failure of gender equality politics. A society that speak of gender equality should not accept it, and even more it should be repulsed by the fact that many of the 90%+ profession have the government as the employer. It shows a strong lack of compassion and understanding on what such work environment do to people, and by focusing the political discussion elsewhere it cowardly avoids scrutiny. If we see people feeling marginalized for being one odd in every 5, imagine how exposed it would be to be 1 odd out of every 300.
falcolas 10y ago
> why not try and fix this? In short? Because it's not a technical problem, it's a political problem; it involves dealing with people and their motivations, irrationalities, hangups, biases, etc. It's a common stereotype that most engineers make terrible managers for the very same reason, and it's not an unreasonable stereotype. If we could break this down to a technical problem, it would be solved. It's not a technical problem, and most of us don't know how (or can't afford the massive time cost) to fix it on the larger scale. So those who care do what we can do best: attempt to fix ourselves: we strive to overcome our internal hangups and biases, to act rationally, to not become part of the problem. And frankly, for most of us, that's the most we could hope to realistically do.
abandonliberty 10y ago
Let's focus on any harassment or bullying. Environments that ensure low likelihood of repercussions encourage it. Social groups with a small proportion of victims will be particularly bad, as the victim pool is smaller and there are more potential perpetrators. What the author experienced is criminal. Until we treat it as such, and the perpetrators experience consequences for their actions, these problems will continue to plague victims - of all genders.

concinds 10y ago

Saying "it's not the industry, it's the people" simply means that you can't fix the problem without fixing the people. Changing a few company policies here and there won't fix anything, especially since we're talking about open-source projects here. My other comment addresses "if the problem is the people, what's wrong with them exactly, and how can we fix it?"

odiroot 10y ago

> I think everyone jumping in to say "it's not the industry it's the people" or "other industries are like this, too" is missing the point. To the contrary. It's exactly on point. We don't see anyone saying "school industry is fucked" just because some teachers are abusing the students or "airline industry is fucked" because pilots pick up stewardesses. I find it really repulsive how it's somehow okay in our industry to throw blanket accusations and demand collective responsibility. This is a huge weakness of our environment. Something that actually makes me consider leaving the industry from time to time.

bb88 10y ago
>> ... or "airline industry is fucked" because pilots pick up stewardesses. You're right. They don't for the reason you mentioned. They do it for worse things: http://www.westword.com/news/frontier-airlines-subject-of-gender-discrimination-investigation-8004262 http://www.westword.com/news/frontier-airlines-subject-of-ge... https://bossip.com/1365175/another-one-second-black-female-doctor-says-delta-airlines-discriminated-against-her/ https://bossip.com/1365175/another-one-second-black-female-d... https://www.change.org/p/stop-the-bullying-intimidation-and-discrimination-against-women-on-el-al-flights https://www.change.org/p/stop-the-bullying-intimidation-and-...

belorn 10y ago

A major problem with the focus of gender equality in the tech industry is that complete lack of perspective on the work market as a whole and where the tech industry fit on that scale. The more unbalanced the perspective get, the more it looks like political interference for personal gain, and the result will largely be a negative reaction. To bring in some numbers (from Sweden since our government collects it), only 12.5% of those that are employed work in a profession that are consider gender equal and thus have more than 40% of both women and men. 87.5% of people do not, and the tech industry with its ~79%-21% ratio is very average in that group. In contrast we got 38 different profession with 90%-10% gender distribution which employ a very large portion of all employed. Maybe a reason why we tend to inflate the tech industry problems are that there simply are more people here that can be marginalized (for which a subset will write a blog post which then has a chance to end up on HN). A profession that is 99,6 women, or male profession with 99,4 men, will simply not have many people complain that they are feeling marginalized, since the minority gender could almost be seen as a statistical error. Google translation of the statistics: (https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.duochjobbet.se%2Fnyhet%2Fnio-av-tio-har-jobb-med-ojamn-konsfordelning%2F&edit-text=&act=url https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&pr...)

bb88 10y ago
Basically you're arguing that we could say that "X" in the US is the norm, because worldwide this amount of "X" is the norm, where in this case X = "gender equality". And arguments like that in some cases raise a valid point. But when "X" is morally repugnant, your argument appears cold, calculating and statistical.
- belorn 10y ago
  Sweden and US has similar work markets, and while not identical, the data that Sweden has is simply more available. To my knowledge job titles are not reported in as part of tax collection in the US, which mean that any similar data will be poll based and less reliable. It is common to see data researcher praising the nordic european states for the completeness of the data records. If you want warm, emotional and opinionated point, let me bring one that also is supported by the available data. 12.5% is horrible, and that the underlying trend today is steadying pointing downwards is nothing less than a complete failure of gender equality politics. A society that speak of gender equality should not accept it, and even more it should be repulsed by the fact that many of the 90%+ profession have the government as the employer. It shows a strong lack of compassion and understanding on what such work environment do to people, and by focusing the political discussion elsewhere it cowardly avoids scrutiny. If we see people feeling marginalized for being one odd in every 5, imagine how exposed it would be to be 1 odd out of every 300.

falcolas 10y ago

> why not try and fix this? In short? Because it's not a technical problem, it's a political problem; it involves dealing with people and their motivations, irrationalities, hangups, biases, etc. It's a common stereotype that most engineers make terrible managers for the very same reason, and it's not an unreasonable stereotype. If we could break this down to a technical problem, it would be solved. It's not a technical problem, and most of us don't know how (or can't afford the massive time cost) to fix it on the larger scale. So those who care do what we can do best: attempt to fix ourselves: we strive to overcome our internal hangups and biases, to act rationally, to not become part of the problem. And frankly, for most of us, that's the most we could hope to realistically do.

abandonliberty 10y ago

Let's focus on any harassment or bullying. Environments that ensure low likelihood of repercussions encourage it. Social groups with a small proportion of victims will be particularly bad, as the victim pool is smaller and there are more potential perpetrators. What the author experienced is criminal. Until we treat it as such, and the perpetrators experience consequences for their actions, these problems will continue to plague victims - of all genders.