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The author gives the impression that women were well represented in the beginning, but were pushed out. We can look at photos of programming teams in industry,

The author gives the impression that women were well represented in the beginning, but were pushed out. We can look at photos of programming teams in industry, going back as far as you like, even to the 50s, to demonstrate that that's a fantasy. You would typically see one or two women and fifteen men. There are graphs of "women in computing" over the years. It did indeed peak around 1982 and begin a long decline, but it was never as high as 50%. [1] shows it peaking around 35% and this is college majors not women actually working in computing. [1] https://i.pinimg.com/originals/3f/52/65/3f5265aeeb87fd2f96754230a889d34b.png https://i.pinimg.com/originals/3f/52/65/3f5265aeeb87fd2f9675...

AStrangeMorrow 5y ago
Interestingly my country (France) shows the same trend, but with a peak almost reaching 50%. It also shows that after that peak, the number of women in IT kept increasing then stagnated, while men exploded: https://imgur.com/a/gNHHIxm https://imgur.com/a/gNHHIxm (rehosted, original website is dead) This might be anecdotal, but I did an engineering school, CS/IT section. It was one of the very first school of my country to have a dedicated CS/IT program and diploma (the section opened over 50 years ago, 40 at the time I was there). A few hundred students each year. One of my teachers was one of the students dating from a few years after the section opened. He told us a few times that when he was studying, each promotion of the section was usually 50% men 50% women, sometimes more women even. When I graduated, it was close to 80% men. The nearby CS focused private school, where one of my friends was going, had 2 women for hundreds of men.
bsder 5y ago
> The author gives the impression that women were well represented in the beginning, but were pushed out. We can look at photos of programming teams in industry, going back as far as you like, even to the 50s, to demonstrate that that's a fantasy. You would typically see one or two women and fifteen men. It also gives the impression that "computer programmer" was a good job. It wasn't, by and large. There were a bunch of "keypunch operators" that were mostly women because of typewriter training. They were directed by a much smaller number of men who were the "programmers". There really wasn't any advancement for the women--it was just a slightly better secretarial job. As for the men, it required a 4 year degree (and associated monetary outlay for college) back when working in the steel mill or the automobile line paid really well. Men only flocked into CS/computer programming once the mill jobs got destroyed.
drewcoo 5y ago
If you're curious about what evidence people have contrary to your assertion, you could search the web. If yuo did you might find links like these: https://text.npr.org/357629765 https://text.npr.org/357629765 https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/recoding-gender https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/recoding-gender https://flowingdata.com/2014/10/30/decline-of-women-in-computer-science/ https://flowingdata.com/2014/10/30/decline-of-women-in-compu...
- UIUC_06 5y ago
  Funny that one of your sources (the NPR one) is exactly the same as my graph. Other than that, it's full of qualitative statements that give an impression the data doesn't support ("For decades, the number of women in computer science grew faster than the number of men, but then we get to 1984."). Yes, it was growing faster, but it never got close to parity. In fact, the graph in your flowingdata.com reference IS my graph.

AStrangeMorrow 5y ago

Interestingly my country (France) shows the same trend, but with a peak almost reaching 50%. It also shows that after that peak, the number of women in IT kept increasing then stagnated, while men exploded: https://imgur.com/a/gNHHIxm https://imgur.com/a/gNHHIxm (rehosted, original website is dead) This might be anecdotal, but I did an engineering school, CS/IT section. It was one of the very first school of my country to have a dedicated CS/IT program and diploma (the section opened over 50 years ago, 40 at the time I was there). A few hundred students each year. One of my teachers was one of the students dating from a few years after the section opened. He told us a few times that when he was studying, each promotion of the section was usually 50% men 50% women, sometimes more women even. When I graduated, it was close to 80% men. The nearby CS focused private school, where one of my friends was going, had 2 women for hundreds of men.

bsder 5y ago

> The author gives the impression that women were well represented in the beginning, but were pushed out. We can look at photos of programming teams in industry, going back as far as you like, even to the 50s, to demonstrate that that's a fantasy. You would typically see one or two women and fifteen men. It also gives the impression that "computer programmer" was a good job. It wasn't, by and large. There were a bunch of "keypunch operators" that were mostly women because of typewriter training. They were directed by a much smaller number of men who were the "programmers". There really wasn't any advancement for the women--it was just a slightly better secretarial job. As for the men, it required a 4 year degree (and associated monetary outlay for college) back when working in the steel mill or the automobile line paid really well. Men only flocked into CS/computer programming once the mill jobs got destroyed.

drewcoo 5y ago

If you're curious about what evidence people have contrary to your assertion, you could search the web. If yuo did you might find links like these: https://text.npr.org/357629765 https://text.npr.org/357629765 https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/recoding-gender https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/recoding-gender https://flowingdata.com/2014/10/30/decline-of-women-in-computer-science/ https://flowingdata.com/2014/10/30/decline-of-women-in-compu...

UIUC_06 5y ago
Funny that one of your sources (the NPR one) is exactly the same as my graph. Other than that, it's full of qualitative statements that give an impression the data doesn't support ("For decades, the number of women in computer science grew faster than the number of men, but then we get to 1984."). Yes, it was growing faster, but it never got close to parity. In fact, the graph in your flowingdata.com reference IS my graph.