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Too Few Women In Tech? Stop Blaming The Men.

121 points by MediaSquirrel 16y ago

lotharbot 16y ago
The editorialized title here ("Dear Women in Tech: Put Up or Shut Up") fails to convey the sentiment in the article (titled "Too Few Women In Tech? Stop Blaming The Men. Or At Least Stop Blaming Me.") The article isn't really aimed at women in tech so much as people who complain about women in tech, and especially women who are not in tech but complain that there aren't enough women doing what they themselves aren't doing either.
- greenlblue 16y ago
  The problem is that women in general do not feel comfortable in the male dominated ecosystem of tech startups. Could men be doing more to change that perception, I think so. So whenever somebody complains about the problem men like Mike Arrigton should not lash out but instead they should just list all the things they do to encourage more female participation. Then the people that complain about the problem can actually point at the proactive steps people are taking to address the problem and tell them these things are working and those things are not. It's silly to tell women to put up or shut up because it's a lot like telling somebody if you don't like the country then leave.
  - philwelch 16y ago
    The problem is that women in general do not feel comfortable in the male dominated ecosystem of tech startups. You can replace "tech startups" with "med schools" or "law firms" or "MBA programs" or "factories" or "the military" or "science fiction fandom", but women have entered all of those male dominated ecosystems and are still there in far greater numbers than the tech industry. There has to be another factor.
    - greenlblue 16y ago
      The military? I'd have to disagree with you on that one. The other ones I'm not sure about but I agree that women have entered those industries and it is because those industries started being proactive about recruiting women much earlier than the tech industry. Most things that are male dominated are simply because of historical accidents and nothing else. As soon as women are given the chance they tend to step up and outperform the men. Education is one example I can think of but I am sure there are many other instances.
      - philwelch 16y ago
        Various results on Google say the US military is 10-20% female, which is low but, I suspect, still above the tech industry. I'm not sure what you meant about "as soon as women are given the chance they outperform the men". Really? I wouldn't be surprised if women in male-dominated fields tend to perform well above average--they'd likely have to in order to stay in a male-dominated field--but you seemed to imply that, given equal opportunity, women would still outperform men in nearly every field.
    - mkramlich 16y ago
      Yep I just got back from a 7-hour or so long wargaming session. Historically I'd say the participation has been about 99% male. There was actually 1 female there today, but the other 10+ people were males. This is extremely common. And I've never heard any participant in this hobby complain about it or point out oppression/repression/supression/conspiracy. The simple fact is that if more females wanted to play wargames, and got out there and played them, there would be more females playing, and thus they would not be able to say they feel dissuaded by the gender ratio. Arrington's point was: maybe this is the natural gender ratio (or very close to it, plus/minus some small percentage, however you could possibly deduce that), and the women in these cases just have to suck it up and deal. Just like a man would have to suck it up and deal if he wanted to work at a Great Clips or as a cosmetics salesman in a department store. Life is not evenly homogenous in every aspect, and there isn't anything inherently insidious about that. It just is. Heck I wish there was 1 Earth-like planet in every star system we've probed so far -- there isn't -- therefore perhaps we're discriminating against them. :)
      - rbanffy 16y ago
        > maybe this is the natural gender ratio Why nobody complains all mothers are female?
      - ZeroGravitas 16y ago
        There was a very eye opening post on metafilter recently when Blizzard suggested all World of Warcraft players should be forced to use their real name. A woman pointed out this was bad for the women (and girls) who play and listed off a shocking litany of the BS that any obviously female player needed to deal with. Maybe the gender ratio in your game would have been better if this thing was more widely acknowledged and therefore dealt with. edit for link: http://www.metafilter.com/93492/But-my-name-really-is-Deathblood-Blackaxe#3171416 http://www.metafilter.com/93492/But-my-name-really-is-Deathb... The whole thread is eye-opening, regarding female experiences in such arenas.
  - mkramlich 16y ago
    Men probably would not feel comfortable working in female-dominated industries like hair salons, professional child day care, cosmetic sales or modern dance classes. But nobody cares about those cases for some reason.
    - Psyonic 16y ago
      Agreed, for the most part. Although when it comes to child day care, there is another factor. Any job dealing with children puts a man at serious risk to any accusation of predatory behavior, and he'll have great difficulty defending himself. Not really worth the risk, even if you like children.
      - chc 16y ago
        Which is actual, demonstrable discrimination, so even more reason people might make a fuss.
    - Dove 16y ago
      Amusing anecdote about the social dynamics in that situation: When I was in high school, the options for phys ed class were Weight Lifting and Aerobics. While the entry wasn't restricted by gender, all of the guys took Weight Lifting and most of the girls took Aerobics. Except for my friend. He took aerobics. I guess, initially, because I was in it. Ultimately, when his friends questioned him about it, he just said, "Meh. It's me and 25 girls. :)" And nobody bothered him about it after that.
  - 3pt14159 16y ago
    Although I disagree with greenlblue I'm pretty dismayed that (s)he has -4 votes. We shouldn't downvote people for stating their opinion, we should downvote people that don't contribute meaningfully to the discussion. The essence of greenlblue's post was that it would be better to list how we could help women rather than lashing out at them which could further alienate them. Which contributes the the conversation.
Towle_ 16y ago
The more excuses any given demographic has available to it, the worse it will fare.
- greenlblue 16y ago
  What excuse exactly are you talking about? That most tech startups are run by men? That's not really an excuse but a fact and I think people are right to demand more participation of women in the tech world in general.
  - FlemishBeeCycle 16y ago
    Honestly, why? What does bringing X demographic into industry Y accomplish? "The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal." Perhaps different people, have different interests?
    - greenlblue 16y ago
      Are you seriously asking how having the views of different demographics represented actually helps? In any domain where ideas count having different views with different perspectives often enriches the discipline and leads to more breakthroughs and beneficial products for the rest of us. I point you to the civil rights movement and the fight to have more people included in the political process if you want an actual example of how having a demographic X in an industry Y can enrich the lives of everyone and make the world a better place and perhaps those different interests of those different people should contribute to the things that have such a large impact on our lives.
      - sruffell 16y ago
        Like FlemishBeeCycle said, perhaps different people have different interests. I believe the number of men and women who want equal treatment under the law is more even than the numbers of men and women who are attracted to (or tolerant of) the realities of working in tech. Therefore I do not think it is fair to compare this disparity to the civil rights or suffrage movements. Perhaps evolutionary biology has something to say about why there aren't more women techies, entrepreneurs, prisoners, or homeless. If you missed it a few days ago, here is the link again: http://www.psy.fsu.edu/~baumeistertice/goodaboutmen.htm http://www.psy.fsu.edu/~baumeistertice/goodaboutmen.htm Even if you don't agree with it, I think it is safe to say it is an idea worth considering and seems pertinent to this debate.
btmorex 16y ago
I don't know the answer, but I have to agree that it has nothing to do with silicon valley, venture capitalists, or really the tech industry at all. My introductory freshmen computer science course had about 100 people of which maybe 10 were female (this is at a school that has more women overall than men). You simply can't recover from a gender disparity like that. Also, remember, this is a course that you decide on taking essentially before even getting to college. The kids enrolling in this course hadn't even been exposed to all the things that people usually blame the gender disparity on.
- Groxx 16y ago
  Similar setup at my school, albeit smaller. A single female goes through the CS major every year or two at most, compared to 30-50 males, and fewer still graduate with a CS major. We have a 2:1 ratio in favor of women, and it used to be higher, and still had a similar amount in the major.
- timr 16y ago
  "I don't know the answer, but I have to agree that it has nothing to do with silicon valley, venture capitalists," Yes. The "system" really does seem to try. "or really the tech industry at all." ....aaaaand, No. You've just grossly over-generalized. The tech industry is clearly unappealing to women. Maybe that's because women like to have a sense of the humanity of their work. Maybe it's because it's a terrible choice of long-term career. Maybe it's Barbie's fault. But just because you can't identify the reason, doesn't mean that the phenomenon doesn't exist. Instead of observing that your freshman courses were hideously gender-unbalanced and then stopping the intellectual pursuit, you have to dig deeper. It's a hard problem, but even hard problems have an explanation. I can come up with one consistent pattern without even trying: most women don't like working with anti-social losers. And like it or not, our industry is filled with 'em. Personally, I had about the same number of women in my CS101 course (back in the mid-90s) as you did, but the difference is, I saw them treated like shit -- usually by guys who didn't have a clue that the way they behaved was boorish and offensive. Those guys also liked to believe that the gender inequality in CS was "just the way things are". Nonsense. More recently (just a couple of years ago), I had a female friend who became really interested in CS, and enrolled in the 101 courses at a top program. Because of the way the courses were structured, she was a brand-new programmer, competing with guys who had been writing code since they were knee-high. Doesn't matter -- she still kicked their asses; she was one of the top students in the class. But she ultimately dropped out of the program because she felt unwelcome, and felt that the barriers she had to overcome were too high. Every day, I was treated to a new story of how some dude ignored her opinions, stared at her chest, or belittled her in front of her peers. It was infuriating. To this day -- from classroom to coffeehouse -- I see programmers who treat women like another species. Just today, I watched a guy write code, while taking a break every two minutes to check out a nearby girl's "attributes". It isn't cute, it isn't endearing, and you can damn well bet that this kind of stuff plays a role in why women decide that they don't want to work with us -- even before they get to school. And it's our fault.
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dieterrams 16y ago
This is just Michael Arrington defending TechCrunch against one person's assumption that they're not aware of the issue. There's nothing really relevant to the issue itself here, aside from the obvious point that the reason why there are "too few" women in tech is because there aren't enough women who want to be in tech.
- dgreensp 16y ago
  Arrington disagrees that the criticism has any merit; at worst he's letting himself be trolled. I guess he feels something needs to be said, and I respect that.
  - dieterrams 16y ago
    Which is fine, of course. He's more than justified in defending himself. This article just isn't interesting from a "too few women in tech" angle, and you can't really generalize from what's going on here. It's fine that he wrote it, I just don't see that it warrants much attention from HN.
patio11 16y ago
I think the Valley greatly overestimates how much inside baseball like conference speaking slots impacts startup formation or decade-prior turning points like taking AP English instead of AP CS because English is the easy A and your GPA gets you into a better college.
blahedo 16y ago
I certainly wouldn't blame Michael Arrington in particular, but this entire argument is precisely parallel in form to the one held up by casual racists in the US where they say, well, I haven't done anything to keep black people down, and I have nothing against black people (see also: "I have lots of black friends"), so don't look at me. The problem there is that white people (in the US) operate from a position of implicit privilege---not that we asked for it, but we are unable to reject it, either, not that it would serve any good to try. The situation wrt women in technology is not quite the same, but it's not entirely different, either. As Arrington points out, techcrunch and YC and a lot of other groups go out of their way to try to recruit women, which is fantastic. But to then turn around and say, well, if you personally aren't out there founding a business, you have no right to complain... that's a pernicious idea and it certainly is not furthering any useful cause.
mkramlich 16y ago
I'm totally with Arrington on this one. The next time I see somebody complain about too few women in software I want to see them complain about too few men working in hair salons, too few men working in child day care centers, too few women working the trash pickup trucks, too few men in corporate HR, too few women in Tactial Special Ops teams. But I'll never see that because I think secretly deep down they know, gee, people are different, genders are different, and there's something about gender that just has this shaping force on our interests and talents. And that there's nothing wrong with that. Really, it will be okay. Just relax. Carry on. Instead let us all please focus on real problems and challenges like hunger, disease, WMD proliferation, climate change, pollution, education cost & disparity, etc.
- greenlblue 16y ago
  It's not about differences or different people having different interests. Technology and technology companies are major drivers of societal change and it is important to have as many different groups involved in that process as possible. That is the larger philosophical issue here and I don't think anyone can disagree with that.
  - sz 16y ago
    If you want a group to become more involved with a process, they need to be interested in it first.
    - mkramlich 16y ago
      Exactly. And this was Arrington's point.
    - wanderr 16y ago
      So how do we get them interested?
      - zacharypinter 16y ago
        Television?
philk 16y ago
I'm always slightly puzzled as to why this is an issue. Surely the goal is to have lots of innovative and successful startups, and the gender of who is founding them is irrelevant. There aren't, as far as I can tell, any real barriers to women starting a tech company; being able to code, having a lot of mental resilience and having some starting capital is not something that's only possible if you're male.
- whakojacko 16y ago
  IMO, Its considered an issue because 1. Women have succesfully entered lots of other previously male-dominated fields (Doctors, Lawyers, Business execs, etc). 2. Tech is considered a "sexy" field to be in. To expand, Women are still a minority in a lot of areas of work where physical differences are mostly unimportant-E.g. truck driving, skilled construction workers (carpenters/electricians), etc. Other engineering fields (eg EE) are similarly male-dominated, but being an EE or whatever isnt "sexy" in the way tech is, so it doesnt get as much attention. By "sexy" I mean the software industry has lots of high-paying jobs, growth, job security (if you are good at what you do), and, most importantly, publicity. Facebook essentially didnt exist 6 years ago, now they have 500m users every tiny change they make is "big" news. If you can create your own company (which , relative to other industries, is incredibly easy to do), you get lots more money and publicity. This makes it a popular target for the "Why arent there more women in industry x" discussion.
  - ahoyhere 16y ago
    Do you really believe that the general perception of programming/IT is "sexy"?
    - lenni 16y ago
      I agree, my little theory about why women don't want to work in IT or study CompSci is that they don't want to hang around with the nerdy types. Medicine and Law has more prestige.
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robryan 16y ago
I think rather than looking at the overall numbers, what you really need to identify is if there are any women out there that do want to get into the industry but are being held back by something. If in fact every woman that wants to run a startup or be employed as a programmer ect doesn't have different barriers to males then I don't think there is really an issue here. I think many female dominated fields just genuinely don't interest the majority of males so that fact that they are female dominated isn't a big deal. The important thing is that both sexes get the opportunity to participate, whether they choose to take up the option is another matter.
mkramlich 16y ago
The nice thing about computers is that they don't discriminate. A male and a female have equal opportunity to sit down at a computer, and get themselves to learning about it, write "Hello World", read books, study, learn new techniques, grow their programming knowledge, etc. But you know what? I bet the ratio between genders of the folks that actually sit down and do that, at home, wherever, is skewed toward male by a large percentage. Exact amount? Dunno. But I'm sure it skews male. All else is going to follow from that. ]> man vi HAL: I'm sorry, Susan. I'm afraid I can't allow you to do that. You see, your gender is wrong and I'm going to have to oppress you. It's for the sake of the mission and I hope one day you understand.
JCThoughtscream 16y ago
70% of the technical degree holders living under the Iranian patriarchal theology... are women. That's problematic to me. That suggests to /me/ that the gender disparity in Silicon Valley has very little to do with genetics. In fact, the role of genetics in intelligence is too heavily disputed to be considered anyhow - the tech field being a supposed /meritocracy/, and genetics having little to do with personal /merit/, it instead suggests to me that the problem is how our culture is defining "ideal merit" to our women. The reason why tech conferences can't find enough women speakers is because there aren't enough girls encouraged /socially/ to enter the tech field. And by "girls," I don't mean to use disparaging language, but indicate that the problem is rooted all the way in how they're taught and influenced, be it in schools or amongst friends and family. When mathematics, science and computer programming are considered culturally gender-neutral, that's when female representation in the tech industry will be less of an issue. Until then, we remain unable to tap a good half of our population's intellectual resources. That's a bit of a problem.
- mkramlich 16y ago
  I can't speak to your 70% Iran science degree holder figure but I do want to make the point that we can't make generalizations about gender participation in "tech" when tech is a generic heterogenous basket of different activities. It jumbles together all/most of the the sciences (for example, would bio be tech but social science not be tech?), engineering and programming, for example. Still speaking in rough terms, but at a little higher degree of fidelity, I'd say female interest/talent/ambition in science fields is much higher than in programming, which in turn is higher than in traditional engineering (EE, mech eng, etc.) -- and even within engineering the percentages vary by specific field. So if you told me of one particular country or region or whatever where say 70% of bio science degree holders were women, that wouldn't sound too extra-ordinary to me. If you said 70% of electrical or mechanical engineers, that's different. Btw, do you think society also has a problem (speaking USA) that the vast majority of cosmetics salespeople are women? Do you think there's some horrible educational/cultural/societal conspiracy or flaw going on that has caused there to be so few men in that field? And how about child day care? How about the small percentage of women that are garbage truck pickup workers? Auto mechanics? Hunters? Weightlifting? I think that today in the USA we're about as close to "culturally gender neutral" in mathematics, science and programming as we're ever going to get without some sort of significant genetic engineering or neurological/cyborg modification. Small changes? Sure, of course. Big changes? I highly doubt it without hacking on our DNA or hormones.
Eliezer 16y ago
> there are women... who complain about how there are too few women in tech, and then there are women who just go out and start companies Never heard it put quite that way before, but very well said.
lhnz 16y ago
I understand that sexism might cause companies to not employ women in management/technical positions. But how can this affect whether they create their own successful startups?
stackthat 16y ago
Real reason is ridiculously simple as most of the men don't care about if the color of their great hat matches with their nice boots, most of the women are not geek.
punnned 16y ago
How about the idea of role models? There simply isn't many female role models that motivate young women to go into tech. Being involved with young athletes in high school - I know 18 year old boys who aspire to be the next Michael Jordan or next Michael Phelps. I know 18 year old girls who aspire to be the next Cathy Freeman. Outside of sports there are also many industries where potential female AND male role models are rife. Film, dance, journalism just to name a few. Even the 'normal' fields which have been thrown around - doctors, lawyers, business, teaching etc. Many young people are may aspire to be like that 'aunty who is a lawyer' or that 'family friend who is a doctor' etc. But tech? .... Because the industry is so skewed towards males and because of that there is no... female version of steve jobs, or bill gates, mark zuckerberg to aspire to. Just a thought.. what do you guys reckon?
- sorbus 16y ago
  Ada Lovelace was the first computer programmer. Of the first six programmers for the ENAIC, all were women. Of course, that isn't quite as well known as it could be, and recent role models are more important than historical ones, but still. Another problem is that, by and large, the only tech people who the average person can name are those who have hit it big, generally by starting and running a famous company (Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Mark Zuckerberg are not well known because of their programming, but because of their companies).
todayiamme 16y ago
This is a really complex question, and I doubt that anyone will ever have the answer to this. As, there are so many variables at play over here that most of the times we can't see them let alone comprehend them. Most people over here have a pretty unary point of view i.e. they don't even realize the subtle signals they get everyday about socially acceptable behavior. Even though, I don't want to be unique in this regard, but unfortunately I am and there are a few things that I would like to share. First of all, the 5 year old me knew that I couldn't act "feminine" (what was feminine for the 5 year old me is laughable at best). Why? I just knew at that age that I couldn't do that. The adults around me simply wouldn't approve. In fact, they would be disgusted if I did. I knew that I couldn't play with my cousins' dolls because it was wrong for me to do that. I knew that I couldn't talk about the fact that I liked making stuff in the kitchen to other kids because it was wrong for me to do that. In fact, I stopped doing it after a while and I constantly had to suppress behavior to fit into that mold. Take a look at any kid at an early age and see what happens if that child picks up a "masculine" or "feminine" toy. Most adults simply don't engage, or they engage too aggressively. For a child these subtle things matter a lot and they start dictating the pattern which still exists till later life. You won't believe how suffocating it is to be an outlier in this regard, a freak for all intents and purposes. I have to constantly pretend to be someone else and it is amazing how subtle those cues which operate are. I can't talk the way I want to. I can't gesture in the same way. I can't walk "that way". I can't eat "that way". I can't move "that way". I can't relate to others "that way". I can't pick up topics "that way". This list goes on and on and on. The truth is that who we are is hammered into shape by our experiences to a large extent. Unless, we consciously embark on exploring ourselves and examining our motives for everything. So, yes it's true that on average male and female brains are different (it's a bell curve), but to what extent do those "differences" shape future behavior? To what extent is a person's behavior determined by what's between their legs? Or in their blood? These are questions that we simply don't have an answer too. It's not like we will never have it, but it's just that right now we don't. So, in the mean time maybe we shouldn't write articles going either way and, perhaps, focus on creating things instead. An even bigger perhaps is that we might want to try respecting people for who they are. Not who we want them to be. Just saying.
Charuru 16y ago
Especially interesting in light of: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1634955 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1634955
didip 16y ago
Not really contributing to the arguments... But rumor has it, Etsy have female (Python) programmers and they make boring online shopping experience fun with their creative UI. See: http://www.etsy.com/color.php http://www.etsy.com/color.php or http://www.etsy.com/time_machine.php http://www.etsy.com/time_machine.php or http://www.etsy.com/geolocator.php http://www.etsy.com/geolocator.php Imho, female input is valuable when it comes to software design especially UX.
nochiel 16y ago
In absolute terms, women constitute the largest segment of the market. That alone should be sufficient reason to have more women participating in or founding start-ups. It stands to reason that their intuitive insights, understanding and vision, due to their affinity with women at large, will lead to products and services which serve that market segment --and perhaps humanity in general-- better.
mobile 16y ago
If you want to know how predisposition can affect the outcome, please read this article and you will understand what we are discussing here: "Princeton Economist Finds that Auditioning Behind Screens Helps Women Win Orchestra Positions" http://www.princeton.edu/pr/news/97/q2/0425orch.html http://www.princeton.edu/pr/news/97/q2/0425orch.html Quoted directly from the article: "The switch to blind auditions can explain between 30 percent and 55 percent of the increase in the proportion female among new hires and between 25 percent and 46 percent of the increase in the percentage female in the orchestras from 1970 to 1996," the economists write. The study notes that the surge of women in symphony orchestras has occurred despite the fact that the number of positions is highly fixed and turnover is slow.

121 points by MediaSquirrel 16y ago

The editorialized title here ("Dear Women in Tech: Put Up or Shut Up") fails to convey the sentiment in the article (titled "Too Few Women In Tech? Stop Blaming The Men. Or At Least Stop Blaming Me.") The article isn't really aimed at women in tech so much as people who complain about women in tech, and especially women who are not in tech but complain that there aren't enough women doing what they themselves aren't doing either.

greenlblue 16y ago
The problem is that women in general do not feel comfortable in the male dominated ecosystem of tech startups. Could men be doing more to change that perception, I think so. So whenever somebody complains about the problem men like Mike Arrigton should not lash out but instead they should just list all the things they do to encourage more female participation. Then the people that complain about the problem can actually point at the proactive steps people are taking to address the problem and tell them these things are working and those things are not. It's silly to tell women to put up or shut up because it's a lot like telling somebody if you don't like the country then leave.
- philwelch 16y ago
  The problem is that women in general do not feel comfortable in the male dominated ecosystem of tech startups. You can replace "tech startups" with "med schools" or "law firms" or "MBA programs" or "factories" or "the military" or "science fiction fandom", but women have entered all of those male dominated ecosystems and are still there in far greater numbers than the tech industry. There has to be another factor.
  - greenlblue 16y ago
    The military? I'd have to disagree with you on that one. The other ones I'm not sure about but I agree that women have entered those industries and it is because those industries started being proactive about recruiting women much earlier than the tech industry. Most things that are male dominated are simply because of historical accidents and nothing else. As soon as women are given the chance they tend to step up and outperform the men. Education is one example I can think of but I am sure there are many other instances.
    - philwelch 16y ago
      Various results on Google say the US military is 10-20% female, which is low but, I suspect, still above the tech industry. I'm not sure what you meant about "as soon as women are given the chance they outperform the men". Really? I wouldn't be surprised if women in male-dominated fields tend to perform well above average--they'd likely have to in order to stay in a male-dominated field--but you seemed to imply that, given equal opportunity, women would still outperform men in nearly every field.
  - mkramlich 16y ago
    Yep I just got back from a 7-hour or so long wargaming session. Historically I'd say the participation has been about 99% male. There was actually 1 female there today, but the other 10+ people were males. This is extremely common. And I've never heard any participant in this hobby complain about it or point out oppression/repression/supression/conspiracy. The simple fact is that if more females wanted to play wargames, and got out there and played them, there would be more females playing, and thus they would not be able to say they feel dissuaded by the gender ratio. Arrington's point was: maybe this is the natural gender ratio (or very close to it, plus/minus some small percentage, however you could possibly deduce that), and the women in these cases just have to suck it up and deal. Just like a man would have to suck it up and deal if he wanted to work at a Great Clips or as a cosmetics salesman in a department store. Life is not evenly homogenous in every aspect, and there isn't anything inherently insidious about that. It just is. Heck I wish there was 1 Earth-like planet in every star system we've probed so far -- there isn't -- therefore perhaps we're discriminating against them. :)
    - rbanffy 16y ago
      > maybe this is the natural gender ratio Why nobody complains all mothers are female?
    - ZeroGravitas 16y ago
      There was a very eye opening post on metafilter recently when Blizzard suggested all World of Warcraft players should be forced to use their real name. A woman pointed out this was bad for the women (and girls) who play and listed off a shocking litany of the BS that any obviously female player needed to deal with. Maybe the gender ratio in your game would have been better if this thing was more widely acknowledged and therefore dealt with. edit for link: http://www.metafilter.com/93492/But-my-name-really-is-Deathblood-Blackaxe#3171416 http://www.metafilter.com/93492/But-my-name-really-is-Deathb... The whole thread is eye-opening, regarding female experiences in such arenas.
- mkramlich 16y ago
  Men probably would not feel comfortable working in female-dominated industries like hair salons, professional child day care, cosmetic sales or modern dance classes. But nobody cares about those cases for some reason.
  - Psyonic 16y ago
    Agreed, for the most part. Although when it comes to child day care, there is another factor. Any job dealing with children puts a man at serious risk to any accusation of predatory behavior, and he'll have great difficulty defending himself. Not really worth the risk, even if you like children.
    - chc 16y ago
      Which is actual, demonstrable discrimination, so even more reason people might make a fuss.
  - Dove 16y ago
    Amusing anecdote about the social dynamics in that situation: When I was in high school, the options for phys ed class were Weight Lifting and Aerobics. While the entry wasn't restricted by gender, all of the guys took Weight Lifting and most of the girls took Aerobics. Except for my friend. He took aerobics. I guess, initially, because I was in it. Ultimately, when his friends questioned him about it, he just said, "Meh. It's me and 25 girls. :)" And nobody bothered him about it after that.
- 3pt14159 16y ago
  Although I disagree with greenlblue I'm pretty dismayed that (s)he has -4 votes. We shouldn't downvote people for stating their opinion, we should downvote people that don't contribute meaningfully to the discussion. The essence of greenlblue's post was that it would be better to list how we could help women rather than lashing out at them which could further alienate them. Which contributes the the conversation.

Towle_ 16y ago

The more excuses any given demographic has available to it, the worse it will fare.

greenlblue 16y ago
What excuse exactly are you talking about? That most tech startups are run by men? That's not really an excuse but a fact and I think people are right to demand more participation of women in the tech world in general.
- FlemishBeeCycle 16y ago
  Honestly, why? What does bringing X demographic into industry Y accomplish? "The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal." Perhaps different people, have different interests?
  - greenlblue 16y ago
    Are you seriously asking how having the views of different demographics represented actually helps? In any domain where ideas count having different views with different perspectives often enriches the discipline and leads to more breakthroughs and beneficial products for the rest of us. I point you to the civil rights movement and the fight to have more people included in the political process if you want an actual example of how having a demographic X in an industry Y can enrich the lives of everyone and make the world a better place and perhaps those different interests of those different people should contribute to the things that have such a large impact on our lives.
    - sruffell 16y ago
      Like FlemishBeeCycle said, perhaps different people have different interests. I believe the number of men and women who want equal treatment under the law is more even than the numbers of men and women who are attracted to (or tolerant of) the realities of working in tech. Therefore I do not think it is fair to compare this disparity to the civil rights or suffrage movements. Perhaps evolutionary biology has something to say about why there aren't more women techies, entrepreneurs, prisoners, or homeless. If you missed it a few days ago, here is the link again: http://www.psy.fsu.edu/~baumeistertice/goodaboutmen.htm http://www.psy.fsu.edu/~baumeistertice/goodaboutmen.htm Even if you don't agree with it, I think it is safe to say it is an idea worth considering and seems pertinent to this debate.

btmorex 16y ago

I don't know the answer, but I have to agree that it has nothing to do with silicon valley, venture capitalists, or really the tech industry at all. My introductory freshmen computer science course had about 100 people of which maybe 10 were female (this is at a school that has more women overall than men). You simply can't recover from a gender disparity like that. Also, remember, this is a course that you decide on taking essentially before even getting to college. The kids enrolling in this course hadn't even been exposed to all the things that people usually blame the gender disparity on.

Groxx 16y ago
Similar setup at my school, albeit smaller. A single female goes through the CS major every year or two at most, compared to 30-50 males, and fewer still graduate with a CS major. We have a 2:1 ratio in favor of women, and it used to be higher, and still had a similar amount in the major.
timr 16y ago
"I don't know the answer, but I have to agree that it has nothing to do with silicon valley, venture capitalists," Yes. The "system" really does seem to try. "or really the tech industry at all." ....aaaaand, No. You've just grossly over-generalized. The tech industry is clearly unappealing to women. Maybe that's because women like to have a sense of the humanity of their work. Maybe it's because it's a terrible choice of long-term career. Maybe it's Barbie's fault. But just because you can't identify the reason, doesn't mean that the phenomenon doesn't exist. Instead of observing that your freshman courses were hideously gender-unbalanced and then stopping the intellectual pursuit, you have to dig deeper. It's a hard problem, but even hard problems have an explanation. I can come up with one consistent pattern without even trying: most women don't like working with anti-social losers. And like it or not, our industry is filled with 'em. Personally, I had about the same number of women in my CS101 course (back in the mid-90s) as you did, but the difference is, I saw them treated like shit -- usually by guys who didn't have a clue that the way they behaved was boorish and offensive. Those guys also liked to believe that the gender inequality in CS was "just the way things are". Nonsense. More recently (just a couple of years ago), I had a female friend who became really interested in CS, and enrolled in the 101 courses at a top program. Because of the way the courses were structured, she was a brand-new programmer, competing with guys who had been writing code since they were knee-high. Doesn't matter -- she still kicked their asses; she was one of the top students in the class. But she ultimately dropped out of the program because she felt unwelcome, and felt that the barriers she had to overcome were too high. Every day, I was treated to a new story of how some dude ignored her opinions, stared at her chest, or belittled her in front of her peers. It was infuriating. To this day -- from classroom to coffeehouse -- I see programmers who treat women like another species. Just today, I watched a guy write code, while taking a break every two minutes to check out a nearby girl's "attributes". It isn't cute, it isn't endearing, and you can damn well bet that this kind of stuff plays a role in why women decide that they don't want to work with us -- even before they get to school. And it's our fault.

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dieterrams 16y ago

This is just Michael Arrington defending TechCrunch against one person's assumption that they're not aware of the issue. There's nothing really relevant to the issue itself here, aside from the obvious point that the reason why there are "too few" women in tech is because there aren't enough women who want to be in tech.

dgreensp 16y ago
Arrington disagrees that the criticism has any merit; at worst he's letting himself be trolled. I guess he feels something needs to be said, and I respect that.
- dieterrams 16y ago
  Which is fine, of course. He's more than justified in defending himself. This article just isn't interesting from a "too few women in tech" angle, and you can't really generalize from what's going on here. It's fine that he wrote it, I just don't see that it warrants much attention from HN.

patio11 16y ago

I think the Valley greatly overestimates how much inside baseball like conference speaking slots impacts startup formation or decade-prior turning points like taking AP English instead of AP CS because English is the easy A and your GPA gets you into a better college.

blahedo 16y ago

I certainly wouldn't blame Michael Arrington in particular, but this entire argument is precisely parallel in form to the one held up by casual racists in the US where they say, well, I haven't done anything to keep black people down, and I have nothing against black people (see also: "I have lots of black friends"), so don't look at me. The problem there is that white people (in the US) operate from a position of implicit privilege---not that we asked for it, but we are unable to reject it, either, not that it would serve any good to try. The situation wrt women in technology is not quite the same, but it's not entirely different, either. As Arrington points out, techcrunch and YC and a lot of other groups go out of their way to try to recruit women, which is fantastic. But to then turn around and say, well, if you personally aren't out there founding a business, you have no right to complain... that's a pernicious idea and it certainly is not furthering any useful cause.

mkramlich 16y ago

I'm totally with Arrington on this one. The next time I see somebody complain about too few women in software I want to see them complain about too few men working in hair salons, too few men working in child day care centers, too few women working the trash pickup trucks, too few men in corporate HR, too few women in Tactial Special Ops teams. But I'll never see that because I think secretly deep down they know, gee, people are different, genders are different, and there's something about gender that just has this shaping force on our interests and talents. And that there's nothing wrong with that. Really, it will be okay. Just relax. Carry on. Instead let us all please focus on real problems and challenges like hunger, disease, WMD proliferation, climate change, pollution, education cost & disparity, etc.

greenlblue 16y ago
It's not about differences or different people having different interests. Technology and technology companies are major drivers of societal change and it is important to have as many different groups involved in that process as possible. That is the larger philosophical issue here and I don't think anyone can disagree with that.
- sz 16y ago
  If you want a group to become more involved with a process, they need to be interested in it first.
  - mkramlich 16y ago
    Exactly. And this was Arrington's point.
  - wanderr 16y ago
    So how do we get them interested?
    - zacharypinter 16y ago
      Television?

philk 16y ago

I'm always slightly puzzled as to why this is an issue. Surely the goal is to have lots of innovative and successful startups, and the gender of who is founding them is irrelevant. There aren't, as far as I can tell, any real barriers to women starting a tech company; being able to code, having a lot of mental resilience and having some starting capital is not something that's only possible if you're male.

whakojacko 16y ago
IMO, Its considered an issue because 1. Women have succesfully entered lots of other previously male-dominated fields (Doctors, Lawyers, Business execs, etc). 2. Tech is considered a "sexy" field to be in. To expand, Women are still a minority in a lot of areas of work where physical differences are mostly unimportant-E.g. truck driving, skilled construction workers (carpenters/electricians), etc. Other engineering fields (eg EE) are similarly male-dominated, but being an EE or whatever isnt "sexy" in the way tech is, so it doesnt get as much attention. By "sexy" I mean the software industry has lots of high-paying jobs, growth, job security (if you are good at what you do), and, most importantly, publicity. Facebook essentially didnt exist 6 years ago, now they have 500m users every tiny change they make is "big" news. If you can create your own company (which , relative to other industries, is incredibly easy to do), you get lots more money and publicity. This makes it a popular target for the "Why arent there more women in industry x" discussion.
- ahoyhere 16y ago
  Do you really believe that the general perception of programming/IT is "sexy"?
  - lenni 16y ago
    I agree, my little theory about why women don't want to work in IT or study CompSci is that they don't want to hang around with the nerdy types. Medicine and Law has more prestige.
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robryan 16y ago

I think rather than looking at the overall numbers, what you really need to identify is if there are any women out there that do want to get into the industry but are being held back by something. If in fact every woman that wants to run a startup or be employed as a programmer ect doesn't have different barriers to males then I don't think there is really an issue here. I think many female dominated fields just genuinely don't interest the majority of males so that fact that they are female dominated isn't a big deal. The important thing is that both sexes get the opportunity to participate, whether they choose to take up the option is another matter.

mkramlich 16y ago

The nice thing about computers is that they don't discriminate. A male and a female have equal opportunity to sit down at a computer, and get themselves to learning about it, write "Hello World", read books, study, learn new techniques, grow their programming knowledge, etc. But you know what? I bet the ratio between genders of the folks that actually sit down and do that, at home, wherever, is skewed toward male by a large percentage. Exact amount? Dunno. But I'm sure it skews male. All else is going to follow from that. ]> man vi HAL: I'm sorry, Susan. I'm afraid I can't allow you to do that. You see, your gender is wrong and I'm going to have to oppress you. It's for the sake of the mission and I hope one day you understand.

JCThoughtscream 16y ago

70% of the technical degree holders living under the Iranian patriarchal theology... are women. That's problematic to me. That suggests to /me/ that the gender disparity in Silicon Valley has very little to do with genetics. In fact, the role of genetics in intelligence is too heavily disputed to be considered anyhow - the tech field being a supposed /meritocracy/, and genetics having little to do with personal /merit/, it instead suggests to me that the problem is how our culture is defining "ideal merit" to our women. The reason why tech conferences can't find enough women speakers is because there aren't enough girls encouraged /socially/ to enter the tech field. And by "girls," I don't mean to use disparaging language, but indicate that the problem is rooted all the way in how they're taught and influenced, be it in schools or amongst friends and family. When mathematics, science and computer programming are considered culturally gender-neutral, that's when female representation in the tech industry will be less of an issue. Until then, we remain unable to tap a good half of our population's intellectual resources. That's a bit of a problem.

mkramlich 16y ago
I can't speak to your 70% Iran science degree holder figure but I do want to make the point that we can't make generalizations about gender participation in "tech" when tech is a generic heterogenous basket of different activities. It jumbles together all/most of the the sciences (for example, would bio be tech but social science not be tech?), engineering and programming, for example. Still speaking in rough terms, but at a little higher degree of fidelity, I'd say female interest/talent/ambition in science fields is much higher than in programming, which in turn is higher than in traditional engineering (EE, mech eng, etc.) -- and even within engineering the percentages vary by specific field. So if you told me of one particular country or region or whatever where say 70% of bio science degree holders were women, that wouldn't sound too extra-ordinary to me. If you said 70% of electrical or mechanical engineers, that's different. Btw, do you think society also has a problem (speaking USA) that the vast majority of cosmetics salespeople are women? Do you think there's some horrible educational/cultural/societal conspiracy or flaw going on that has caused there to be so few men in that field? And how about child day care? How about the small percentage of women that are garbage truck pickup workers? Auto mechanics? Hunters? Weightlifting? I think that today in the USA we're about as close to "culturally gender neutral" in mathematics, science and programming as we're ever going to get without some sort of significant genetic engineering or neurological/cyborg modification. Small changes? Sure, of course. Big changes? I highly doubt it without hacking on our DNA or hormones.

Eliezer 16y ago

> there are women... who complain about how there are too few women in tech, and then there are women who just go out and start companies Never heard it put quite that way before, but very well said.

lhnz 16y ago

I understand that sexism might cause companies to not employ women in management/technical positions. But how can this affect whether they create their own successful startups?

stackthat 16y ago

Real reason is ridiculously simple as most of the men don't care about if the color of their great hat matches with their nice boots, most of the women are not geek.

punnned 16y ago

How about the idea of role models? There simply isn't many female role models that motivate young women to go into tech. Being involved with young athletes in high school - I know 18 year old boys who aspire to be the next Michael Jordan or next Michael Phelps. I know 18 year old girls who aspire to be the next Cathy Freeman. Outside of sports there are also many industries where potential female AND male role models are rife. Film, dance, journalism just to name a few. Even the 'normal' fields which have been thrown around - doctors, lawyers, business, teaching etc. Many young people are may aspire to be like that 'aunty who is a lawyer' or that 'family friend who is a doctor' etc. But tech? .... Because the industry is so skewed towards males and because of that there is no... female version of steve jobs, or bill gates, mark zuckerberg to aspire to. Just a thought.. what do you guys reckon?

sorbus 16y ago
Ada Lovelace was the first computer programmer. Of the first six programmers for the ENAIC, all were women. Of course, that isn't quite as well known as it could be, and recent role models are more important than historical ones, but still. Another problem is that, by and large, the only tech people who the average person can name are those who have hit it big, generally by starting and running a famous company (Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Mark Zuckerberg are not well known because of their programming, but because of their companies).

todayiamme 16y ago

This is a really complex question, and I doubt that anyone will ever have the answer to this. As, there are so many variables at play over here that most of the times we can't see them let alone comprehend them. Most people over here have a pretty unary point of view i.e. they don't even realize the subtle signals they get everyday about socially acceptable behavior. Even though, I don't want to be unique in this regard, but unfortunately I am and there are a few things that I would like to share. First of all, the 5 year old me knew that I couldn't act "feminine" (what was feminine for the 5 year old me is laughable at best). Why? I just knew at that age that I couldn't do that. The adults around me simply wouldn't approve. In fact, they would be disgusted if I did. I knew that I couldn't play with my cousins' dolls because it was wrong for me to do that. I knew that I couldn't talk about the fact that I liked making stuff in the kitchen to other kids because it was wrong for me to do that. In fact, I stopped doing it after a while and I constantly had to suppress behavior to fit into that mold. Take a look at any kid at an early age and see what happens if that child picks up a "masculine" or "feminine" toy. Most adults simply don't engage, or they engage too aggressively. For a child these subtle things matter a lot and they start dictating the pattern which still exists till later life. You won't believe how suffocating it is to be an outlier in this regard, a freak for all intents and purposes. I have to constantly pretend to be someone else and it is amazing how subtle those cues which operate are. I can't talk the way I want to. I can't gesture in the same way. I can't walk "that way". I can't eat "that way". I can't move "that way". I can't relate to others "that way". I can't pick up topics "that way". This list goes on and on and on. The truth is that who we are is hammered into shape by our experiences to a large extent. Unless, we consciously embark on exploring ourselves and examining our motives for everything. So, yes it's true that on average male and female brains are different (it's a bell curve), but to what extent do those "differences" shape future behavior? To what extent is a person's behavior determined by what's between their legs? Or in their blood? These are questions that we simply don't have an answer too. It's not like we will never have it, but it's just that right now we don't. So, in the mean time maybe we shouldn't write articles going either way and, perhaps, focus on creating things instead. An even bigger perhaps is that we might want to try respecting people for who they are. Not who we want them to be. Just saying.

Charuru 16y ago

Especially interesting in light of: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1634955 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1634955

didip 16y ago

Not really contributing to the arguments... But rumor has it, Etsy have female (Python) programmers and they make boring online shopping experience fun with their creative UI. See: http://www.etsy.com/color.php http://www.etsy.com/color.php or http://www.etsy.com/time_machine.php http://www.etsy.com/time_machine.php or http://www.etsy.com/geolocator.php http://www.etsy.com/geolocator.php Imho, female input is valuable when it comes to software design especially UX.

nochiel 16y ago

In absolute terms, women constitute the largest segment of the market. That alone should be sufficient reason to have more women participating in or founding start-ups. It stands to reason that their intuitive insights, understanding and vision, due to their affinity with women at large, will lead to products and services which serve that market segment --and perhaps humanity in general-- better.

mobile 16y ago

If you want to know how predisposition can affect the outcome, please read this article and you will understand what we are discussing here: "Princeton Economist Finds that Auditioning Behind Screens Helps Women Win Orchestra Positions" http://www.princeton.edu/pr/news/97/q2/0425orch.html http://www.princeton.edu/pr/news/97/q2/0425orch.html Quoted directly from the article: "The switch to blind auditions can explain between 30 percent and 55 percent of the increase in the proportion female among new hires and between 25 percent and 46 percent of the increase in the percentage female in the orchestras from 1970 to 1996," the economists write. The study notes that the surge of women in symphony orchestras has occurred despite the fact that the number of positions is highly fixed and turnover is slow.