6 ms·

Not OP, so please don't presume I'm speaking for him, but there's a HUGE difference between a "woman only" event (from which men would be excluded) and a "woman

by bmelton 10y ago

Not OP, so please don't presume I'm speaking for him, but there's a HUGE difference between a "woman only" event (from which men would be excluded) and a "woman focused" event. Similarly, there would be a difference between an all-male conference to which no women were invited and an all-male conference to which no women submitted. To state the obvious, exclusion is the differentiator, and it is not counterintuitive to be simultaneously in favor of promoting women while also being against the exclusion of non-women. My wife founded local chapters of a women-focused Girl Develop It organization, so I dearly understand that the issue can be divisive, but I personally find it hard to judge someone on whether they choose to be exclusive or inclusive, and not every event needs to conform to one "right" moral standard against which all others will be deemed deficient.

kohanz 10y ago
I'm not advocating that exclusion is the main solution (see my last paragraph), but it boils down to: do you think these events are a bad thing? Do they have a net-negative effect when it comes to balancing the gender inequality in our profession? I don't think so. Just because exclusive events exist temporarily while the imbalance is so great, doesn't mean inclusive events can't continue to thrive. Taking a principled stand against them means you don't support them and think they detract rather than contribute. If that's honestly your stance, I guess we just disagree on that. I will happily send my daughter to one of these events when she is old enough, but I hope they aren't necessary anymore by that time.
- bmelton 10y ago
  > but it boils down to: do you think these events are a bad thing? And I guess what I failed to express that it doesn't have to be a binary 'good' or 'bad'. I personally don't judge inclusivity or exclusivity as either good or bad, nor do I see why anyone should, beyond determining what it means to them. If Boy Scouts of America want to exclude certain demographics, fine -- it's their club after all, but I don't want to participate in that, so I won't. Similarly, if Girls Who Code want to exclude certain demographics, that is also fine with me, and I still don't want to participate. I'm not making a value judgement on whether or not they're good or bad, but am instead deciding whether or not I personally want to be party to exclusion. For me, usually, the answer to that question is 'No'.
  - kohanz 10y ago
    That's totally fair. Thanks for explaining. I'm on the opposite side of that, but I can see where you're coming from. I could see my daughter or some other young girl benefitting from this type of instruction so I wouldn't hesitate to volunteer with them again. I also see no shortage of opportunities for my son to learn about coding, so I don't think it's a detriment to him. I'd much rather send them to the same place, but if it's 95% male, then I can understand why a girl would rather have a different environment to start out in.
    - EdHominem 10y ago
      Why are you going to tell your hypothetical daughter that it's fine for her to have gender-segregated events and tell your son that it's a bad thing for him to do so? (Because presumably you don't support men (or whites, etc) only clubs...) And how do you do it without saying to your daughter that it's because she's weaker than your son and needs help? How do you explain to your son that he's so privileged that he needs handicaps to avoid hurting others? (Especially if he's not actually some alpha-male stereotype who embodies that.) I see so much potential for accidentally hurting people with this path that I'd rather jump through a bunch of hurdles to make all events inclusive rather than reverse the original discrimination.
      - kohanz 10y ago
        First, I assure you my daughter is very real and ceased to be a hypothetical about a year ago ;) As I said earlier, I don't think gender-segregated events should exist in a balanced world, but I don't have a problem with them when there is a great imbalance and they have the potential to tilt that balance back towards equality (by existing temporarily). The whole idea of them is to create an environment welcoming to girls and get them interested in coding. I don't particularly care whether they do this by promoting only to one gender or explicitly allowing only one gender; that's logistics. I care that if we can provide more girls and women with an accessible pathway into software, that's a good thing, because once CS classes are and industry are more gender-balanced, we won't need these types of camps. Calling it "weakness" to gravitate towards something that other members of your gender are doing is misplaced, in my opinion. My computer engineering classes were roughly 95% male and I'm not so naive to think that those were exactly welcoming enviornments for women. To deny these pathways is to claim that the status quo is fine and that this inequality is either meant to be or will somehow solve itself. I don't believe either of those things. I don't really understand what "handicaps" the existence of an all-girl coding camp represents to men or boys. There are a plethora of options for us/them. Who is getting really, genuinely hurt by this, in your opinion?

by bmelton 10y ago

kohanz 10y ago

I'm not advocating that exclusion is the main solution (see my last paragraph), but it boils down to: do you think these events are a bad thing? Do they have a net-negative effect when it comes to balancing the gender inequality in our profession? I don't think so. Just because exclusive events exist temporarily while the imbalance is so great, doesn't mean inclusive events can't continue to thrive. Taking a principled stand against them means you don't support them and think they detract rather than contribute. If that's honestly your stance, I guess we just disagree on that. I will happily send my daughter to one of these events when she is old enough, but I hope they aren't necessary anymore by that time.

bmelton 10y ago
> but it boils down to: do you think these events are a bad thing? And I guess what I failed to express that it doesn't have to be a binary 'good' or 'bad'. I personally don't judge inclusivity or exclusivity as either good or bad, nor do I see why anyone should, beyond determining what it means to them. If Boy Scouts of America want to exclude certain demographics, fine -- it's their club after all, but I don't want to participate in that, so I won't. Similarly, if Girls Who Code want to exclude certain demographics, that is also fine with me, and I still don't want to participate. I'm not making a value judgement on whether or not they're good or bad, but am instead deciding whether or not I personally want to be party to exclusion. For me, usually, the answer to that question is 'No'.
- kohanz 10y ago
  That's totally fair. Thanks for explaining. I'm on the opposite side of that, but I can see where you're coming from. I could see my daughter or some other young girl benefitting from this type of instruction so I wouldn't hesitate to volunteer with them again. I also see no shortage of opportunities for my son to learn about coding, so I don't think it's a detriment to him. I'd much rather send them to the same place, but if it's 95% male, then I can understand why a girl would rather have a different environment to start out in.
  - EdHominem 10y ago
    Why are you going to tell your hypothetical daughter that it's fine for her to have gender-segregated events and tell your son that it's a bad thing for him to do so? (Because presumably you don't support men (or whites, etc) only clubs...) And how do you do it without saying to your daughter that it's because she's weaker than your son and needs help? How do you explain to your son that he's so privileged that he needs handicaps to avoid hurting others? (Especially if he's not actually some alpha-male stereotype who embodies that.) I see so much potential for accidentally hurting people with this path that I'd rather jump through a bunch of hurdles to make all events inclusive rather than reverse the original discrimination.
    - kohanz 10y ago
      First, I assure you my daughter is very real and ceased to be a hypothetical about a year ago ;) As I said earlier, I don't think gender-segregated events should exist in a balanced world, but I don't have a problem with them when there is a great imbalance and they have the potential to tilt that balance back towards equality (by existing temporarily). The whole idea of them is to create an environment welcoming to girls and get them interested in coding. I don't particularly care whether they do this by promoting only to one gender or explicitly allowing only one gender; that's logistics. I care that if we can provide more girls and women with an accessible pathway into software, that's a good thing, because once CS classes are and industry are more gender-balanced, we won't need these types of camps. Calling it "weakness" to gravitate towards something that other members of your gender are doing is misplaced, in my opinion. My computer engineering classes were roughly 95% male and I'm not so naive to think that those were exactly welcoming enviornments for women. To deny these pathways is to claim that the status quo is fine and that this inequality is either meant to be or will somehow solve itself. I don't believe either of those things. I don't really understand what "handicaps" the existence of an all-girl coding camp represents to men or boys. There are a plethora of options for us/them. Who is getting really, genuinely hurt by this, in your opinion?