7 ms·

Somewhere, a woman undergrad read this thread and said to herself "screw this" and transferred out of computer science.

by Zigurd 8y ago

catacombs 8y ago
*female undergrad
- Zigurd 8y ago
  I'm sure you have some snark reason. Because snark about the difficulties women face in this industry is such a good look.
  - stevew20 8y ago
    For the good of the human race, let's all assume that catacombs was just being petty, please!
  - catacombs 8y ago
    Huh? Not snark if the previous commenter used "woman" as an adjective when it is a noun. The proper use is "female."
    - Zigurd 8y ago
      Actually it is a correct use of "woman" as an appositive noun. It may be arguable if it is a desirable style, but it isn't outside of grammatical correctness.
swiley 8y ago
I understand the sentiment here but can we shut up about it for five seconds? As a guy I feel like I'm walking on eggshells every time I'm around women after reading enough of these. I feel like I'm going insane.
- Zigurd 8y ago
  In a word, no. How do you think the women in tech feel? So, yeah, you can relax. Right after that problem gets solved.
- rangersanger 8y ago
  As a dude I'm exhausted too. As a boyfriend and a son of a mother, I'm accepting that I'll continue to be exhausted by it until it changes. But, I'm not walking on eggshells. I'm having, and will continue to have debates with women, and more often than not, have my view expanded by the conversation. Things are changing, pretty rapidly. I hope the continue to change. Current situation is untenable for men and women, which is probably a societal improvement over situation way untenable for women. I'm also accepting that this is going to continue until men do a better job of policing men.
  - SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
    I think it’s optimistic of you to think it’ll ever be “enough”. It’s a pendulum, not a scale, it never stops because things are even.
andreakate 8y ago
Can confirm. I have this thought about tech on HN about once a week. Though I will say this thread is relatively tame compared to others I've seen today.
- nkurz 8y ago
  What are your feelings the currently-top ranked comment suggesting that the Media Lab is damaging their engineering credentials by embracing social activism? If you are saying that as an engineering-focussed female undergrad this improves your image of the Media Lab, I'd be interested to hear more.
  - PavlovsCat 8y ago
    I'm not OP, but why would an engineer write a "paper on the impact of #MeToo" that anyone would need to "trust" purely on the engineering experience of the author? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Media_Lab https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Media_Lab > Some recurring themes of work at the Media Lab include [..] designing technology for the developing world. What about this? Is this not also activism in a way? IMO, if engineers were just making little toys they in engineering clubs with no impact on wider society, sure, they could have no interest in human affairs for all I care. But insofar they want to draw from and impact on human affairs, they need to assume the responsibility they have anyway, if they accept it or not. From the 2017 award page: > Their work shows that science and scholarship are as powerful tools for social change as art and protest, and it challenges those of us in academia to use our powers for good. And again, this is really not a rhetorical question, what would a paper on "the impact of metoo" by an engineer even look like? Would there be a personal opinion in it somewhere, if not of the author then of "subjects", or would it be all "objective" and mathematical, employing "best practices" with no judgement calls in sight? I'm totally not seeing it, so my main "opinion" on that is surprise, and interest, like when a program exhibits a really odd bug where I don't even see how that part could possibly affect that other part. I don't have an opinion on it at this point like I would on a program feature because I can't even parse it as such. It seems like a category mistake, if that's the right term.
    - 8y ago

Somewhere, a woman undergrad read this thread and said to herself "screw this" and transferred out of computer science.

by Zigurd 8y ago

Somewhere, a woman undergrad read this thread and said to herself "screw this" and transferred out of computer science.

catacombs 8y ago

*female undergrad

Zigurd 8y ago
I'm sure you have some snark reason. Because snark about the difficulties women face in this industry is such a good look.
- stevew20 8y ago
  For the good of the human race, let's all assume that catacombs was just being petty, please!
- catacombs 8y ago
  Huh? Not snark if the previous commenter used "woman" as an adjective when it is a noun. The proper use is "female."
  - Zigurd 8y ago
    Actually it is a correct use of "woman" as an appositive noun. It may be arguable if it is a desirable style, but it isn't outside of grammatical correctness.

swiley 8y ago

I understand the sentiment here but can we shut up about it for five seconds? As a guy I feel like I'm walking on eggshells every time I'm around women after reading enough of these. I feel like I'm going insane.

Zigurd 8y ago
In a word, no. How do you think the women in tech feel? So, yeah, you can relax. Right after that problem gets solved.
rangersanger 8y ago
As a dude I'm exhausted too. As a boyfriend and a son of a mother, I'm accepting that I'll continue to be exhausted by it until it changes. But, I'm not walking on eggshells. I'm having, and will continue to have debates with women, and more often than not, have my view expanded by the conversation. Things are changing, pretty rapidly. I hope the continue to change. Current situation is untenable for men and women, which is probably a societal improvement over situation way untenable for women. I'm also accepting that this is going to continue until men do a better job of policing men.
- SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
  I think it’s optimistic of you to think it’ll ever be “enough”. It’s a pendulum, not a scale, it never stops because things are even.

andreakate 8y ago

Can confirm. I have this thought about tech on HN about once a week. Though I will say this thread is relatively tame compared to others I've seen today.

nkurz 8y ago
What are your feelings the currently-top ranked comment suggesting that the Media Lab is damaging their engineering credentials by embracing social activism? If you are saying that as an engineering-focussed female undergrad this improves your image of the Media Lab, I'd be interested to hear more.
- PavlovsCat 8y ago
  I'm not OP, but why would an engineer write a "paper on the impact of #MeToo" that anyone would need to "trust" purely on the engineering experience of the author? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Media_Lab https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Media_Lab > Some recurring themes of work at the Media Lab include [..] designing technology for the developing world. What about this? Is this not also activism in a way? IMO, if engineers were just making little toys they in engineering clubs with no impact on wider society, sure, they could have no interest in human affairs for all I care. But insofar they want to draw from and impact on human affairs, they need to assume the responsibility they have anyway, if they accept it or not. From the 2017 award page: > Their work shows that science and scholarship are as powerful tools for social change as art and protest, and it challenges those of us in academia to use our powers for good. And again, this is really not a rhetorical question, what would a paper on "the impact of metoo" by an engineer even look like? Would there be a personal opinion in it somewhere, if not of the author then of "subjects", or would it be all "objective" and mathematical, employing "best practices" with no judgement calls in sight? I'm totally not seeing it, so my main "opinion" on that is surprise, and interest, like when a program exhibits a really odd bug where I don't even see how that part could possibly affect that other part. I don't have an opinion on it at this point like I would on a program feature because I can't even parse it as such. It seems like a category mistake, if that's the right term.
  - 8y ago