5 ms·

Parts of what she wrote are similar to parts of what James Damore wrote, and he was fired for it.

by krrrh 6y ago

rednerrus 6y ago
Cancel culture isn't a real thing. /s
AussieWog93 6y ago
James Damore went a bit further than the author did. He also didn't take care to avoid offense and misunderstanding when talking about certain topics. For example, he mentioned that women, on average, have more neuroticism. He's technically correct in terms of the psychological definition of the word (women will, on average, experience higher levels of anxiety than men when exposed to the same level of negative stimulus), but he didn't consider the political ramifications of describing 3.5 billion people as neurotic. If a woman had written what he did, she would have been ripped to shreds also.
- StavrosK 6y ago
  > For example, he mentioned that women, on average, have more neuroticism. [..] he didn't consider the political ramifications of describing 3.5 billion people as neurotic. You're doing it too. If I say "men have, on average, more muderous tendencies than women", am I describing 3.5 billion people as murderers?
  - AussieWog93 6y ago
    You're technically not, but don't be surprised if people react as though you are.
    - StavrosK 6y ago
      Certainly, but I don't find the fault to be with the statement, but with people. Our inability to separate "inconvenient general fact" from "specific, personal insult to whole swathes of people" is one of the banes of modern discourse.
      - AussieWog93 6y ago
        Unfortunately, you're communicating with other people. Unless you find a way to magically stop people getting triggered, it's best to avoid certain trigger words and be careful when expressing certain points.
        Retric 6y ago
        Or actually educate people on both logic and reality. I realize it seems to be asking for a lot, but we can do better.
        plutonorm 6y ago
        I help them with exposure therapy.
        StavrosK 6y ago
        When you're the author, yes, absolutely. When you're a reader, absolutely not, you need to consider what the author is saying rather than what your personal feelings make you think he's saying. Each party must be responsible for their part, and while "he could have been more tactful" is valid criticism, "he shouldn't have offended people" is not. Just to be more tactful, I don't remember exactly what had happened with this whole thing, I'm only talking about this specific fact.
  - redis_mlc 6y ago
    In case you haven't studied evolutionary biology ... Women have ingrained neuroticism to protect themselves and their children. You can read about hypergamy and also shaming. Men have ingrained traits of provisioning and protection. Yes, that leads to murderous tendencies, especially against other tribes. That's part of nature in general. As a society, the US doesn't face any existential threats like war or famine, so we've turned inward against biology and against the nuclear family. Ironically, this is because the US has dominated the globe for 75 years, preventing large conflicts, and allowing the rise of coordinated Marxism. Most of the SJW drama would stop if somebody launched several ICBM's at us, then US women would be asking US men for a murderous, toxic solution - "do something, please!" But it will take an external threat to unite our society again. Until then, our society will resemble the fall of Rome. If you're interested in learning more, watch Dr. Victor Davis Hanson's lectures (military historian and policy advisor), or NTD Media (nee Falun Gong) on Youtube. Both are acknowledged as clairvoyants.
  - tomcam 6y ago
    Absolutely not. If you are talking about young men, you are stating a statistical fact. As a former young man, I would not be the least bit offended.
- lgleason 6y ago
  My wife was friends with Damore during the time of the memo, publicly stated she supported his views and was torn to shreds for it so you are correct.
  - tomcam 6y ago
    She is a hero. Please thank her for me.
- TeeMassive 6y ago
  > He also didn't take care to avoid offense and misunderstanding when talking about certain topics. I don't think it's realistic to ask people to walk on egg shells is realistic when misunderstanding and offensiveness are always in the mind of the audience and therefore can't be fully controlled. > but he didn't consider the political ramifications of describing 3.5 billion people as neurotic I think people working at Google have a basic understanding of statistical distribution...
sizzle 6y ago
What I never understood was if there are less female software devs simply because they genuinely value others things more in life than staring at pixels on a computer screen (e.g. raising a family) and if this is the case in other time intensive fields such as medicine and law? Biological clock and childrearing are well understood from an evolutionary perspective and are things that affect men disproportionately less. When the topic of gender diversity in tech comes up, why is this such a controversial point to raise or am I missing the argument for gender diversity in STEM fields? More women are graduating college than men are they not? Why are fields like Human Resources and Nursing dominated by women? Are there simply different skill sets that differ between men and women that we are not acknowledging? Anyone have any studies or data on this topic to explain why?
- arvinsim 6y ago
  The ironic thing is that the earliest programmers are women. I think I saw or read that the reason why there is such a gender disparity in programming is because programming was marketed as a male-oriented activity in the 80's. Sadly, I can't find the source for that anymore.
  - azundo 6y ago
    I heard it on planet money a few years ago: https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/10/21/357629765/when-women-stopped-coding https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/10/21/357629765/when...
    - arvinsim 6y ago
      Thanks, yes this is the source.
  - adwn 6y ago
    > The ironic thing is that the earliest programmers are women. That's not correct, or at least, very misleading. The "programming" which you're refering to, would be more precisely called "data entry" using today's terminology. The actual software development was done mostly by men, even back then. In the 60s/70s, when computers increasingly had proper input methods (screen and keyboard), the data entry part was swallowed by the development part, but the term "programming" stuck. What is today understood as "programming", has always been dominated by men. I don't know why that is, and I don't care to speculate, but the narrative that female software developers have been pushed out of the field is wrong.

Parts of what she wrote are similar to parts of what James Damore wrote, and he was fired for it.

by krrrh 6y ago

Parts of what she wrote are similar to parts of what James Damore wrote, and he was fired for it.

rednerrus 6y ago

Cancel culture isn't a real thing. /s

AussieWog93 6y ago

James Damore went a bit further than the author did. He also didn't take care to avoid offense and misunderstanding when talking about certain topics. For example, he mentioned that women, on average, have more neuroticism. He's technically correct in terms of the psychological definition of the word (women will, on average, experience higher levels of anxiety than men when exposed to the same level of negative stimulus), but he didn't consider the political ramifications of describing 3.5 billion people as neurotic. If a woman had written what he did, she would have been ripped to shreds also.

StavrosK 6y ago
> For example, he mentioned that women, on average, have more neuroticism. [..] he didn't consider the political ramifications of describing 3.5 billion people as neurotic. You're doing it too. If I say "men have, on average, more muderous tendencies than women", am I describing 3.5 billion people as murderers?
- AussieWog93 6y ago
  You're technically not, but don't be surprised if people react as though you are.
  - StavrosK 6y ago
    Certainly, but I don't find the fault to be with the statement, but with people. Our inability to separate "inconvenient general fact" from "specific, personal insult to whole swathes of people" is one of the banes of modern discourse.
    - AussieWog93 6y ago
      Unfortunately, you're communicating with other people. Unless you find a way to magically stop people getting triggered, it's best to avoid certain trigger words and be careful when expressing certain points.
      - Retric 6y ago
        Or actually educate people on both logic and reality. I realize it seems to be asking for a lot, but we can do better.
      - plutonorm 6y ago
        I help them with exposure therapy.
      - StavrosK 6y ago
        When you're the author, yes, absolutely. When you're a reader, absolutely not, you need to consider what the author is saying rather than what your personal feelings make you think he's saying. Each party must be responsible for their part, and while "he could have been more tactful" is valid criticism, "he shouldn't have offended people" is not. Just to be more tactful, I don't remember exactly what had happened with this whole thing, I'm only talking about this specific fact.
- redis_mlc 6y ago
  In case you haven't studied evolutionary biology ... Women have ingrained neuroticism to protect themselves and their children. You can read about hypergamy and also shaming. Men have ingrained traits of provisioning and protection. Yes, that leads to murderous tendencies, especially against other tribes. That's part of nature in general. As a society, the US doesn't face any existential threats like war or famine, so we've turned inward against biology and against the nuclear family. Ironically, this is because the US has dominated the globe for 75 years, preventing large conflicts, and allowing the rise of coordinated Marxism. Most of the SJW drama would stop if somebody launched several ICBM's at us, then US women would be asking US men for a murderous, toxic solution - "do something, please!" But it will take an external threat to unite our society again. Until then, our society will resemble the fall of Rome. If you're interested in learning more, watch Dr. Victor Davis Hanson's lectures (military historian and policy advisor), or NTD Media (nee Falun Gong) on Youtube. Both are acknowledged as clairvoyants.
- tomcam 6y ago
  Absolutely not. If you are talking about young men, you are stating a statistical fact. As a former young man, I would not be the least bit offended.
lgleason 6y ago
My wife was friends with Damore during the time of the memo, publicly stated she supported his views and was torn to shreds for it so you are correct.
- tomcam 6y ago
  She is a hero. Please thank her for me.
TeeMassive 6y ago
> He also didn't take care to avoid offense and misunderstanding when talking about certain topics. I don't think it's realistic to ask people to walk on egg shells is realistic when misunderstanding and offensiveness are always in the mind of the audience and therefore can't be fully controlled. > but he didn't consider the political ramifications of describing 3.5 billion people as neurotic I think people working at Google have a basic understanding of statistical distribution...

sizzle 6y ago

What I never understood was if there are less female software devs simply because they genuinely value others things more in life than staring at pixels on a computer screen (e.g. raising a family) and if this is the case in other time intensive fields such as medicine and law? Biological clock and childrearing are well understood from an evolutionary perspective and are things that affect men disproportionately less. When the topic of gender diversity in tech comes up, why is this such a controversial point to raise or am I missing the argument for gender diversity in STEM fields? More women are graduating college than men are they not? Why are fields like Human Resources and Nursing dominated by women? Are there simply different skill sets that differ between men and women that we are not acknowledging? Anyone have any studies or data on this topic to explain why?

arvinsim 6y ago
The ironic thing is that the earliest programmers are women. I think I saw or read that the reason why there is such a gender disparity in programming is because programming was marketed as a male-oriented activity in the 80's. Sadly, I can't find the source for that anymore.
- azundo 6y ago
  I heard it on planet money a few years ago: https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/10/21/357629765/when-women-stopped-coding https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/10/21/357629765/when...
  - arvinsim 6y ago
    Thanks, yes this is the source.
- adwn 6y ago
  > The ironic thing is that the earliest programmers are women. That's not correct, or at least, very misleading. The "programming" which you're refering to, would be more precisely called "data entry" using today's terminology. The actual software development was done mostly by men, even back then. In the 60s/70s, when computers increasingly had proper input methods (screen and keyboard), the data entry part was swallowed by the development part, but the term "programming" stuck. What is today understood as "programming", has always been dominated by men. I don't know why that is, and I don't care to speculate, but the narrative that female software developers have been pushed out of the field is wrong.