5 ms·

Whenever people get outraged about things like this, it interests me. I like looking at attractive women. I like programming. Would it be possible to have an ev

by ellyagg 15y ago

Whenever people get outraged about things like this, it interests me. I like looking at attractive women. I like programming. Would it be possible to have an event where I could program and look at attractive women at the same time? Or does enjoying seeing attractive women in public make me a bad person? As a man, is this my original sin? In fact, I've even been known to flirt with attractive women in public--perhaps even servers at restaurants and events. I've dated many women I've met this way. Is it ok, when I'm eating and drinking, but not when I'm programming? Sorry, but I don't think this is as cut-and-dried as the pitchfork brigades here make it seem. In my world, there isn't a bright line between "professional and sexless" and "fun", with programming strictly under "professional and sexless". Obviously there's a conflict here. I don't know what the right balance is, but I cringe every time men are screamed at for not hiding carefully enough that they like sex, as if it's mens' faults that women are powerfully interesting to them in a biologically mandated and different way than vice versa. While I'm at it, I might as well mention that I very much doubt the dearth of women in technology is because men are sexual predators. Medical doctors have been mostly men, and, in my experience, exhibit pretty much the same desire for women as tech people, but that never stopped women from flocking to become nurses. As you well know, doctor/nurse fraternization is a time-honored pursuit. There is one big difference between the two groups, though, in that doctors are considered by women to be higher status than technical men. I've noticed that behavior which is welcome from high status men is often labeled "creepy" when exhibited by low status men. Edit: I notice that people have latched onto the doctors thing which is bizarre inasmuch as it strengthens my point. I worded it the way I did on purpose, "have been", with an idle thought to making a point about the inroads made by women, but was too lazy to look up the percentages. The fact that the male/female ratio of doctors has improved so much is a tribute to the fact that women have no problem succeeding in a previously male dominated industry if it caters to their interests. And if you don't think the medical profession was a good 'ol boys club, or think that systematic "awareness raising" was the cause for the improvement, I'm afraid you're not too familiar with the history and dynamics of that industry.

ceejayoz 15y ago
> Medical doctors have been mostly men, and, in my experience, exhibit pretty much the same desire for women as tech people, but that never stopped women from flocking to become nurses. Oh, honestly. Institutionalized sexism sure as hell made it quite difficult for decades (if not centuries) for women to become doctors.
dmor 15y ago
I don't think there is anything wrong with appreciating and looking at attractive women, that isn't sexism. The problem here is marketing the event with "perks" that put women in a submissive position to men by default. Its not going to create an environment when female developers want to come hang out and hack, because it leads to those awkward "Are you a beer girl, are a coder?" conversations. FWIW you can totally look at attractive women while programming, without objectifying them at a hackathon -- that's what the Internet was made for.
tptacek 15y ago
What the hell are you talking about? Medical doctors are not "mostly men". Roughly 50% of all medical students are women, and current trends have women overtaking men in the profession long term. "I very much doubt the dearth of women in technology is because men are sexual predators". Sheesh. I agree. Comments like this do the job just fine, too.
- stevenpworrel 15y ago
  I'm a doctor and the profession is still quite dominated by men. The women are far more likely to fill primary-care specialties while the good-ol-boys dominate ortho/neurosurg/EM/plastics and most of the internal medicine subspecialties. The women in my specialty (ortho) tend to lean toward the masculine side (in personality). A lot of it is about fitting in.
  - tptacek 15y ago
    Which sentence did I write that is actually wrong? I'm glad to have another doctor writing here, but (respectfully) I am not particularly interested in how "masculine" you think women in your specialty tend to act to fit in. The statistics do not appear to back up the argument the previous poster made.
  - jballanc 15y ago
    I don't doubt what you say, but medicine (like most highly-skilled professions) has a long lag time. I would wager (without looking it up) that the median graduation date for practicing doctors today is around 1990. A beter indicator of current trends would be to look at medical school enrollment.
- yummyfajitas 15y ago
  "What the hell are you talking about? Medical doctors are not..." He is talking about the past, as indicated by his use of grammatical tense: "Medical doctors have been mostly men..."
  - tptacek 15y ago
alinajaf 15y ago
> Would it be possible to have an event where I could program and look at attractive women at the same time? Or does enjoying seeing attractive women in public make me a bad person? As a man, is this my original sin? No, I don't think it's wrong to program and look at attractive women at the same time. I also think that dating/flirting at work is mostly harmless. That has little to do with the above described situation though. What they manage to do with just that one line is alienate anyone that doesn't have the same sexual preferences to you. If they had left gender out of it and just had attractive staff of both sexes, then to me it wouldn't offend anyone (though it would seem as you say, a little bit out of place).
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
rauljara 15y ago
The marketing material assumed that the people reading it would be heterosexual men, and gave no consideration to the idea that a woman might actually want to attend an event. Finding women attractive is not a sin. Assuming the whole world should revolve around what you find attractive without giving any consideration to the other half of the world's population is sexist. Not "I hate women" sexist. Just "women don't really qualify as people the same way men do in my mind, and no I've never really thought very hard about it" sexist.
- toomuchtodo 15y ago
  Tech population =! world population. To not recognize that the tech population is dominated by men is to put your head in the sand. I like to code, I like to look at scantily clad women, and I fully believe they're just as equal as men. EDIT: Downvote away. You don't have to believe in fact for it to exist.
  - msbarnett 15y ago
    > To not recognize that the tech population is dominated by men is to put your head in the sand. To not recognize that advertising tech events that female programmers do not feel comfortable attending because they do not want to be treated like subservient beer-wenches is partially responsible for the continued decline of women in the tech industry is to put your head in the sand. That's what people are taking issue with here. No one is putting you on trial for liking to look at scantily clad women. Trying to make yourself into some kind of martyr for "finding women attractive" movement misses the point so thoroughly as to defy belief.
  - natep 15y ago
    So, the tech industry is dominated by men, and this announcement was intended for the tech industry, so it's fine by you that it was addressed exclusively to men? It's OK that any techy woman reading it might stay clear so that they are not mistaken for being a server and/or don't have to put up with sexism like this? In what other situations do you not feel that the minority do not have rights?
ry0ohki 15y ago
I'm a strong believer that evolution/sex are the primary drivers for almost everything we do in life. The outrage in the comment thread here is part of the "pretend it's not like that" mentality. I'm sure the marketing people here senselessly thought "hey we want lots of programmers, most programmers are guys, what do guys like, girls!". I'm not offended by this, but it is clear they are alienating women (and homosexual men). If it was reversed; "lots of hot men serving beers", guys probably wouldn't be in a rush to show up either.
- kpanghmc 15y ago
  It's not just that women reading this flyer wouldn't be interested in showing up, it's that they are instantly reminded of how the programming world perceives them and their place in the industry. It reminds them of the sexism they've endured their entire professional careers and it reminds them of how little has changed. "Lots of hot men serving beers" isn't a very comparable example because male programmers haven't been discriminated against (at least, not professionally). A better example would be if the flyer were changed to "lots of Mexicans serving beers" or "lots of African Americans serving beers". Wouldn't that offend you even if you were able to somehow derive how the marketing people arrived at this approach?
jballanc 15y ago
> Or does enjoying seeing attractive women in public make me a bad person? As a man, is this my original sin? If you cannot understand the difference between admiring attractive women while programming, and listing "Women" as a "Great Perk" you need to have a serious conversation with yourself. > Medical doctors have been mostly men, and, in my experience, exhibit pretty much the same desire for women as tech people, but that never stopped women from flocking to become nurses. What decade are you living in? You should check the current demographic breakdown of doctors, lawyers, scientists, and programmers. I'll give you a head start: one of these is an outlier.
marcusf 15y ago
For me, there's so much viscerally wrong in this comment I'm just flabbergasted. I wrote a long reply and erased it. I think I'd rather just leave you with a cultural observation. Americans tend to mired in sexism to a much greater extent than for example Sweden, where I'm at. The above comment would simply not be made by a professional in Sweden. I guess we don't equate sexism and fun to the same extent some americans do, nor is the female body under the same bizarre governmental scrutiny (abortion, an issue, honestly?). That there's a link doesn't seem entirely implausible.
- dudeguy999 15y ago
  Bizarrely, many Americans cling to the quaint notion that murder is wrong. We have a long way to go to catch up to progressive Europe!
  - marcusf 15y ago
    It's always befuddled me that when it's a woman making a conscious choice about her body or when two men wants to marry the small government party see no issue with injecting themselves into peoples lives. Also, it's slightly ironic to compare the american view on murder with a european view when you're the ones executing people.
    - dudeguy999 15y ago
      On the issue of abortion, you can't see the other side at all? At the least, you're preventing a human life from happening. That doesn't give you cause for thought and reflection? Call it what you want, but if your mother had an abortion you would be dead. The opposition believes that nobody has a right to make the conscious choice to kill another human being. That sounds like a reasonable place to start. I'm consistently dismayed by the amount of intellectual and moral atrophy displayed in discussions of politics.
      - marcusf 15y ago
        I've honestly tried hard to understand the other side, but no, I cannot. First of all, I don't see what gives you the moral prerogative to make that choice for a woman. Secondly, I don't believe it's a human being yet (we're not talking the 38th week here). If my mother had an abortion I would not be dead right now, I would have never existed at all. I would be a non-event. And I'm fine with that. On the flip side, how about contraceptives? If removing a fetus after 4 weeks is murder, how about birth control pills? Or emergency contraception pills? Arguably, they kill as well?
oomkiller 15y ago
The problem here is not that most men are attracted to good looking women. The problem is that they made it a marketing point, which is blatant objectification. "Booth babes" aren't even advertised like this.
jsavimbi 15y ago
> perhaps even servers at restaurants what a tool.
maukdaddy 15y ago
If you would spend 5 minutes thinking instead of playing the victim, maybe you could see the rediculousness of what you're saying. As you well know, doctor/nurse fraternization is a time-honored pursuit. Do you live in the 50s? Do you think real life is Grey's Anatomy??? The doctor/nurse dichotomy that exists today is a result of VERY powerful, and very wrong, sexism. For decades women were relegated to the role of a nurse in a subordinate position to a doctor simply because they were women. Beyond the blatant sexism, there exists a tremendous power play where the man is in a position to dictate what a nurse does, how her career progresses, what kind of roles she gets assigned to, etc. Unlike TV, in real life nurses don't get into the field to fuck every doctor they meet. They go into nursing because they want to save lives.
oconnore 15y ago
> I like looking at attractive women. I like programming ... As a man, is this my original sin? That is not the issue. The issue is that attempting to herd software developers with promises of attractive females is tasteless, exclusive and offensive to decent people of both genders.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
Confusion 15y ago
Or does enjoying seeing attractive women in public make me a bad person? It does if that hobby is so on the forefront of your mind that you would organise for them to be present at a specific public location and you feel this is such a perk that you should use it as an advertisement to attract others to come look at those attractive women. It does if, while describing the situation at an event involving people of all creeds, you draw attention to the fact that the presence of a part of those people is considered a treat, independent of their ability. Replace 'female' with 'midget', 'gay', 'asian' or 'leather clad' and ask yourself that question again. Personally, I like looking at attractive leather clad asian gay midgets. That does not mean it's proper to collect a few to staff a programming event, because so many of us enjoy looking at attractive leather clad asian gay midgets.
marshray 15y ago
sexism != sexuality
psykotic 15y ago
> I like looking at attractive women. I like programming. Would it be possible to have an event where I could program and look at attractive women at the same time? I like custard. I like meat. Would it be possible to have a dish where I could eat meat and custard at the same time?

by ellyagg 15y ago

ceejayoz 15y ago

> Medical doctors have been mostly men, and, in my experience, exhibit pretty much the same desire for women as tech people, but that never stopped women from flocking to become nurses. Oh, honestly. Institutionalized sexism sure as hell made it quite difficult for decades (if not centuries) for women to become doctors.

dmor 15y ago

I don't think there is anything wrong with appreciating and looking at attractive women, that isn't sexism. The problem here is marketing the event with "perks" that put women in a submissive position to men by default. Its not going to create an environment when female developers want to come hang out and hack, because it leads to those awkward "Are you a beer girl, are a coder?" conversations. FWIW you can totally look at attractive women while programming, without objectifying them at a hackathon -- that's what the Internet was made for.

tptacek 15y ago

What the hell are you talking about? Medical doctors are not "mostly men". Roughly 50% of all medical students are women, and current trends have women overtaking men in the profession long term. "I very much doubt the dearth of women in technology is because men are sexual predators". Sheesh. I agree. Comments like this do the job just fine, too.

stevenpworrel 15y ago
I'm a doctor and the profession is still quite dominated by men. The women are far more likely to fill primary-care specialties while the good-ol-boys dominate ortho/neurosurg/EM/plastics and most of the internal medicine subspecialties. The women in my specialty (ortho) tend to lean toward the masculine side (in personality). A lot of it is about fitting in.
- tptacek 15y ago
  Which sentence did I write that is actually wrong? I'm glad to have another doctor writing here, but (respectfully) I am not particularly interested in how "masculine" you think women in your specialty tend to act to fit in. The statistics do not appear to back up the argument the previous poster made.
- jballanc 15y ago
  I don't doubt what you say, but medicine (like most highly-skilled professions) has a long lag time. I would wager (without looking it up) that the median graduation date for practicing doctors today is around 1990. A beter indicator of current trends would be to look at medical school enrollment.
yummyfajitas 15y ago
"What the hell are you talking about? Medical doctors are not..." He is talking about the past, as indicated by his use of grammatical tense: "Medical doctors have been mostly men..."
- tptacek 15y ago

alinajaf 15y ago

> Would it be possible to have an event where I could program and look at attractive women at the same time? Or does enjoying seeing attractive women in public make me a bad person? As a man, is this my original sin? No, I don't think it's wrong to program and look at attractive women at the same time. I also think that dating/flirting at work is mostly harmless. That has little to do with the above described situation though. What they manage to do with just that one line is alienate anyone that doesn't have the same sexual preferences to you. If they had left gender out of it and just had attractive staff of both sexes, then to me it wouldn't offend anyone (though it would seem as you say, a little bit out of place).

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

rauljara 15y ago

The marketing material assumed that the people reading it would be heterosexual men, and gave no consideration to the idea that a woman might actually want to attend an event. Finding women attractive is not a sin. Assuming the whole world should revolve around what you find attractive without giving any consideration to the other half of the world's population is sexist. Not "I hate women" sexist. Just "women don't really qualify as people the same way men do in my mind, and no I've never really thought very hard about it" sexist.

toomuchtodo 15y ago
Tech population =! world population. To not recognize that the tech population is dominated by men is to put your head in the sand. I like to code, I like to look at scantily clad women, and I fully believe they're just as equal as men. EDIT: Downvote away. You don't have to believe in fact for it to exist.
- msbarnett 15y ago
  > To not recognize that the tech population is dominated by men is to put your head in the sand. To not recognize that advertising tech events that female programmers do not feel comfortable attending because they do not want to be treated like subservient beer-wenches is partially responsible for the continued decline of women in the tech industry is to put your head in the sand. That's what people are taking issue with here. No one is putting you on trial for liking to look at scantily clad women. Trying to make yourself into some kind of martyr for "finding women attractive" movement misses the point so thoroughly as to defy belief.
- natep 15y ago
  So, the tech industry is dominated by men, and this announcement was intended for the tech industry, so it's fine by you that it was addressed exclusively to men? It's OK that any techy woman reading it might stay clear so that they are not mistaken for being a server and/or don't have to put up with sexism like this? In what other situations do you not feel that the minority do not have rights?

ry0ohki 15y ago

I'm a strong believer that evolution/sex are the primary drivers for almost everything we do in life. The outrage in the comment thread here is part of the "pretend it's not like that" mentality. I'm sure the marketing people here senselessly thought "hey we want lots of programmers, most programmers are guys, what do guys like, girls!". I'm not offended by this, but it is clear they are alienating women (and homosexual men). If it was reversed; "lots of hot men serving beers", guys probably wouldn't be in a rush to show up either.

kpanghmc 15y ago
It's not just that women reading this flyer wouldn't be interested in showing up, it's that they are instantly reminded of how the programming world perceives them and their place in the industry. It reminds them of the sexism they've endured their entire professional careers and it reminds them of how little has changed. "Lots of hot men serving beers" isn't a very comparable example because male programmers haven't been discriminated against (at least, not professionally). A better example would be if the flyer were changed to "lots of Mexicans serving beers" or "lots of African Americans serving beers". Wouldn't that offend you even if you were able to somehow derive how the marketing people arrived at this approach?

jballanc 15y ago

> Or does enjoying seeing attractive women in public make me a bad person? As a man, is this my original sin? If you cannot understand the difference between admiring attractive women while programming, and listing "Women" as a "Great Perk" you need to have a serious conversation with yourself. > Medical doctors have been mostly men, and, in my experience, exhibit pretty much the same desire for women as tech people, but that never stopped women from flocking to become nurses. What decade are you living in? You should check the current demographic breakdown of doctors, lawyers, scientists, and programmers. I'll give you a head start: one of these is an outlier.

marcusf 15y ago

For me, there's so much viscerally wrong in this comment I'm just flabbergasted. I wrote a long reply and erased it. I think I'd rather just leave you with a cultural observation. Americans tend to mired in sexism to a much greater extent than for example Sweden, where I'm at. The above comment would simply not be made by a professional in Sweden. I guess we don't equate sexism and fun to the same extent some americans do, nor is the female body under the same bizarre governmental scrutiny (abortion, an issue, honestly?). That there's a link doesn't seem entirely implausible.

dudeguy999 15y ago
Bizarrely, many Americans cling to the quaint notion that murder is wrong. We have a long way to go to catch up to progressive Europe!
- marcusf 15y ago
  It's always befuddled me that when it's a woman making a conscious choice about her body or when two men wants to marry the small government party see no issue with injecting themselves into peoples lives. Also, it's slightly ironic to compare the american view on murder with a european view when you're the ones executing people.
  - dudeguy999 15y ago
    On the issue of abortion, you can't see the other side at all? At the least, you're preventing a human life from happening. That doesn't give you cause for thought and reflection? Call it what you want, but if your mother had an abortion you would be dead. The opposition believes that nobody has a right to make the conscious choice to kill another human being. That sounds like a reasonable place to start. I'm consistently dismayed by the amount of intellectual and moral atrophy displayed in discussions of politics.
    - marcusf 15y ago
      I've honestly tried hard to understand the other side, but no, I cannot. First of all, I don't see what gives you the moral prerogative to make that choice for a woman. Secondly, I don't believe it's a human being yet (we're not talking the 38th week here). If my mother had an abortion I would not be dead right now, I would have never existed at all. I would be a non-event. And I'm fine with that. On the flip side, how about contraceptives? If removing a fetus after 4 weeks is murder, how about birth control pills? Or emergency contraception pills? Arguably, they kill as well?

oomkiller 15y ago

The problem here is not that most men are attracted to good looking women. The problem is that they made it a marketing point, which is blatant objectification. "Booth babes" aren't even advertised like this.

jsavimbi 15y ago

> perhaps even servers at restaurants what a tool.

maukdaddy 15y ago

If you would spend 5 minutes thinking instead of playing the victim, maybe you could see the rediculousness of what you're saying. As you well know, doctor/nurse fraternization is a time-honored pursuit. Do you live in the 50s? Do you think real life is Grey's Anatomy??? The doctor/nurse dichotomy that exists today is a result of VERY powerful, and very wrong, sexism. For decades women were relegated to the role of a nurse in a subordinate position to a doctor simply because they were women. Beyond the blatant sexism, there exists a tremendous power play where the man is in a position to dictate what a nurse does, how her career progresses, what kind of roles she gets assigned to, etc. Unlike TV, in real life nurses don't get into the field to fuck every doctor they meet. They go into nursing because they want to save lives.

oconnore 15y ago

> I like looking at attractive women. I like programming ... As a man, is this my original sin? That is not the issue. The issue is that attempting to herd software developers with promises of attractive females is tasteless, exclusive and offensive to decent people of both genders.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

Confusion 15y ago

Or does enjoying seeing attractive women in public make me a bad person? It does if that hobby is so on the forefront of your mind that you would organise for them to be present at a specific public location and you feel this is such a perk that you should use it as an advertisement to attract others to come look at those attractive women. It does if, while describing the situation at an event involving people of all creeds, you draw attention to the fact that the presence of a part of those people is considered a treat, independent of their ability. Replace 'female' with 'midget', 'gay', 'asian' or 'leather clad' and ask yourself that question again. Personally, I like looking at attractive leather clad asian gay midgets. That does not mean it's proper to collect a few to staff a programming event, because so many of us enjoy looking at attractive leather clad asian gay midgets.

marshray 15y ago

sexism != sexuality

psykotic 15y ago

> I like looking at attractive women. I like programming. Would it be possible to have an event where I could program and look at attractive women at the same time? I like custard. I like meat. Would it be possible to have a dish where I could eat meat and custard at the same time?