6 ms·
Working While Female
- Oxitendwe 10y ago>He told me, “Oh, he’s a good writer, but he tends to get over emotional about things and let that get in the way of his writing. He’s kind of a girl like that.” >I stared at him, not quite believing what he had said. To me. The only girl he had ever hired. He knew immediately that he had fucked up. He stuttered, tried to backtrack, un-backtracked, ultimately apologized and acknowledged that it was a wrong thing to say. But that didn’t matter. Message received. I put up my walls, and buckled in to try to survive at this job. This is so horrible. I feel so sorry for this poor girl, having to endure such awful treatment at the hands of her misogynistic boss. It's so absolutely disgusting that people like him are allowed to continue working after abusing his employees like this. How many casualties must we suffer in the war on women before something is done about this? How many more women have to be abused before we put an end to this? I'm absolutely speechless at how people can stay silent and give their implicit endorsement to such abhorrent mistreatment.
- hackits 10y agoAre you being sarcastic?
- onion2k 10y ago"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." Edmund Burke
- dissent 10y agoEdmund Burke clearly didn't take much stock in good women being able to do much.
- legostormtroopr 10y ago> war on women Thats a big of an exaggeration. Some people in some industries are hostile to women - and it ahouls go without saying that those people need to be reprimanded. But painting it as society actively fighting half of its population is a bit much.
- Oxitendwe 10y agoYou don't think we're at war? Think again: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/26/opinion/president-trumps-war-on-women-begins.html?_r=0 https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/26/opinion/president-trumps-... Every day is a struggle for our fundamental human rights.
- alphabettsy 10y agoIt doesn't take all or even most of society to make things difficult or worse for some, it only takes a determined few combined with others being ambivalent.
- kampkrusty 10y agoYou're getting pretty emotional in your writing over this thing that has nothing to do with you, dude. You're kind of a boy like that, getting worked up about the stuff you criticize others for despite you having no skin in the game in the first place.
- dang 10y agoPlease don't do this here. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13836588 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13836588 and marked it off-topic.
- throwaway399 10y agoI feel sorry for her, and her story is probably an example of sexism at the workplace. That is when her boss says that Martin's style is feminine and that that is bad. However, the linked Martin's story is not a good test of sexism, because the one customer example is anecdotal and sometimes if you pretend to swap customer reps, you end up with a better experience because the customer feels like they are "starting over". The week-long experiment is also a bad example because it is not a double blind test. Martin could have acted differently than he normally does knowing that he signs as a female. And even if they did do a double-blind test, another reason for more rude replies directed at female employees could be that social expectations are different. That is the same word choice by people of different genders/sexes can imply different things. This is not necessarily "bad".
- emsy 10y agoIt could be entirely the men's fault. However, the article struck me as odd. She presented the issues seemingly from a moral high ground and overly black and white. It's somehow always the other's fault (even her helpful coworker). I get the impression that she's a troublemaker. Visiting her Twitter profile, she is out and "smashing the patriarchy". I think it's important to hear the issues of women in the workplace, but we shouldn't let the extremists take over the conversation. Reading about a patriarchy in the US makes me escpacially angry, because it belittles the suffering from women under actual patriarchies.
- gsch 10y ago> Reading about a patriarchy in the US makes me escpacially angry, because it belittles the suffering from women under actual patriarchies. Oppression isn't a contest. It takes different forms in different places, and all of them merit smashing. This is not an "extremist" view by any measure.
- emsy 10y agoPatriarchy is a clearly defined term and most western societies don't have one. Much like Hitler comparisons, it only dillutes the term and makes the original concept look more harmless.
- alphabettsy 10y agoYea, sure. A country where not so long ago women couldn't vote or own property, no patriarchy there.. Suddenly things have drastically changed and women have complete parity with men in society. /s She didn't say this was the case everywhere, but I wish it was surprising at all that she would have her experiences dismissed or excused. Seems like it would be easier to criticize that situation and wish it didn't happen again, but so many would rather insist it never did in the first place.
- legostormtroopr 10y agoIts worth recognising that until the 1800s the US was a country where most people couldn't vote or own property -regardless of colour, creed or gender. Voting was restricted to landowners, and that was concentrated among quite a small minority.
- WomanLover 10y agoOH NO! not another ... every working woman cribs ... frankly every woman cribs! :D
- prance 10y agoThe fact that this is flagged gives strong evidence of the truth in this article.
- vatotemking 10y agoThe other thread about sexism is also flagged.
- dang 10y agoNot every article on this topic is equally substantive. The less substantive ones reliably lead to worse discussion. In this case I would say the speaking from personal experience makes the article more substantive, so we turned off the flags.
- vatotemking 10y agoIm glad HN has a voice of reason in the form of dang
- bArray 10y agoThe boss was right about the "experiment". It simply wasn't enough proof to show that sexism exists in the work place. 1. One experiment run. 2. Only two participants. 3. At least one of the participants had a bias from the start of the experiment. I find it difficult to believe this happens like this, at least after my personal experience of women working on par to men. One notable point has always been that it was men working over time when the opportunity arose, other than that things were equal. We shared good jokes, we went toe to toe with work motive. I don't know where people keep finding these places - but I don't think I ever worked in one.
- peterwwillis 10y agoThe whole point of the story is the guy who was her ally didn't even believe that she got treated differently, until he was mistaken for she. You will forever perceive there is no problem because you will never experience it first hand, and your lack of this personal experience feeds a confirmation bias.
- LyndsySimon 10y agoI'm a man named "Lyndsy" - my experiences definitely don't match those of the author.
- bArray 10y agoMaybe, but I do actually talk to both sexed colleagues outside of the workplace and ask how they're finding work. I find it difficult to believe they would lie to me, especially the gruntles we do share. I think we can assume that even if this is the case, it's not the case everywhere. It's going to not be standard across the globe. Also, if they share a customer - she may just be bad at her job. It's entirely possible that she is treated badly because she isn't very good. It's also entirely possible that this company has shitty customers. Perhaps an all male company attracts a certain type of customer, that doesn't represent how all women are treated.
- peterwwillis 10y ago
- andreicon 10y agoPointing out that men are sexist is also sexist. Just my 20k satoshi.
- peterwwillis 10y agoWhy was this flagged? And how do I vote for it to be un-flagged? The thing I find strange is she doesn't know why the boss would deny it's a problem even after addressed by multiple people (a man, even!) with actual evidence. Basically, accepting that the problem is real would imply negative, potentially painful things about the way he lives his life, treats others, and his self image, and so he has to cling to any possible excuse to dismiss the idea so his identity isn't challenged. It's an ego response. When threatened, the ego shapes your conscious mind's reality to protect it. It's very similar to the defense mechanism that lets creationists believe the earth is 6,000 years old and jesus rode dinosaurs. Even actual evidence to the contrary doesn't phase them. Kind of like the men in this thread who ridicule the post and ignore the actual point of it that shows a man experiencing the behavior first hand.
- jbob2000 10y agoIt's flagged because these "personal issues" articles appear constantly on HN, and they're all kinda the same. "He said this, I did this, somebody said this, I didn't like when this happened". It's just noise at this point, it's the same story but with different actors. (I get that that in itself is a problem - that the issue isn't going away, evidenced by the continual posting of this articles - it just becomes a bit much for a casual internet message board)
- peterwwillis 10y agoAnd you don't find that important? Don't you think seeing these stories constantly is a necessary part of eventually ending them? If we flag them all and they disappear, will we have helped end oppression, or helped perpetuate it? ("Neither" is not an option because flagging is taking direct action)
- jbob2000 10y agoSociety is moving forward, it's happening. It's not something that's going to correct itself fully in a day, month, or year. It will take at least another generation to fully work out these problems, but it's happening. There's a nice quote that I just read, but I forget the author: "It's easier to raise strong children than to fix broken adults". This is how we are going to fix sexism. Not by writing and reading huge personal diatribes. Not by protesting. Not by affirmative action. But by raising smart, empathetic children.
- LyndsySimon 10y agoI find it interesting that the author's male employee had such a terrible experience - but I'm a man named "Lyndsy", and I have never had such an experience.