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The organizations, communities behind those female dominated fields need to feel there is a value in increasing their representation of the male perspective. I
by grhino 16y ago
The organizations, communities behind those female dominated fields need to feel there is a value in increasing their representation of the male perspective.
I don't think communities feel that nursing or elementary school teachers are missing out on the male perspective.
Society is still exploring how to handle the wide variance in what individual women and men want to do with their lives, what men as a group and women as a group are culturally interested in doing, and what men as a group and women as a group are innately interested in doing.
- yummyfajitas 16y agoApart from a few activists, I don't think computing communities feel we are missing out on a female perspective [1]. But for some reason, this attitude is often a point of criticism by the activists. Why is that? (Incidentally, nursing does need men - a lot of men are uncomfortable having a woman assist them in personal care activities. More male nurses = increased patient satisfaction.) [1] Near as I can tell, the only place we could possibly be missing out is in some UX fields, and even there it seems that empirically-minded men are doing a good job (see: Facebook, Zynga, Apple).
- sp332 16y agoYou are definitely suffering from a lack of female perspective :-) Women are raised with different priorities and different habits of mind, different strengths and mental and emotional tools.
- yummyfajitas 16y agoThe communities that don't feel male teachers/nurses are important are definitely suffering from a lack of male perspective. That's the point I'm making - the moment you flip the genders in grhino's argument, you immediately get objections. (That said, in general I don't think gender balance matters much. Either women's different priorities/habits/strengths result in them producing good code, or they don't. It's only in unusual cases involving human interaction where it actually matters - e.g., doctors/nurses working on your privates.)
- grhino 16y agoThere are organizations that specifically encourage men to join nursing. http://dukechronicle.com/article/duke-receives-recognition-encouraging-male-nurses http://dukechronicle.com/article/duke-receives-recognition-e...