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Catch-22: Tech Blogging As a Woman
- iamdave 14y agoWhere are the technical articles written by women? There are plenty of contributions complaining about oppression, while attacking men and claiming absurd stereotypes. Where are the technical contributions? I think the author does a great job starting out by highlighting her own contributions via the linked write-up on Git submodules, but beyond the first couple of sentences on the topic nothing, and spends the rest of the article on a tear about the he/she dichotomy in comments. While I can certainly understand the frustration when people get gender wrong, that seems to be the wrong place to focus on in this topic of women in tech. Is it possibly an indicator of the problem at large? Sure. Does it answer the question "Where are the tech articles written by women"? No. It does play right into the exact same mold the commenter was talking about, that set this entire entry into motion: There are plenty of contributions complaining about oppression...where are the technical contributions? Instead of highlighting great articles from the women in tech, or linking to other women in the industry with well trafficked blogs and talking about their contributions, the author fell right into the category that perpetuates this problem. Mind you, I agree that there is a rift that rises when people make the wrong assumption, but that's nil imo.
- vibrunazo 14y agoThe point is that she shouldn't need to point out individual contributions by women. Because you'd hopefully understand that women don't go out of the way and say "hey, btw, I'm a girl!". So you'd understand technical articles by women are plenty, but they're not immediately obvious. Because women are not trying to make it immediately obvious. Because the internet is supposed to be gender neutral. And hopefully, if you understand all that, you won't ask be asking "where are the technical contributions from women?" in the first place. So the question is mute, which is why she didn't answer.
- Arelius 14y ago> So you'd understand technical articles by women are plenty, but they're not immediately obvious. Actually, we have insufficient evidence to know that they are in fact plenty. However, we also have insufficient evidence to say they are rare. Also, I think you mean moot, not mute. ;)
- aiiane 14y agoThere are other articles that are meant to be lists of female tech bloggers, e.g. http://www.javaworld.com/community/node/3512/ http://www.javaworld.com/community/node/3512/ http://www.webteacher.ws/2010/07/06/10-terrific-tech-blogs-by-women/ http://www.webteacher.ws/2010/07/06/10-terrific-tech-blogs-b... This article is not one of them. Just because it doesn't answer the question the way you want it to be answered doesn't mean it's "perpetuating the problem". In fact, one of the indirect points of this article is that demanding lists of female bloggers in the first place is silly - who demands lists of male bloggers?
- Tichy 14y agoRegarding you last post: it seems curious that there are actually lots of decidedly female tech groups (like geek girls or whatever), whereas male only tech groups would probably be met with outrage. That said, personally I don't need a list of female bloggers.
- aiiane 14y agoBecause there's no need to create a space specifically to be occupied primarily by men - it already exists in the form of the entire field. The reason why groups devoted specifically to women exist is to provide spaces that aren't male-dominated, unlike most other spaces.
- wickedchicken 14y ago> the author fell right into the category that perpetuates this problem. You're missing the point of the article. The point is that if she does 'highlight great articles from the women in tech,' then she would be labeled a "female developer" instead of just a "developer." If she doesn't do this, then she gets labeled a male developer. She would like to be labeled "developer," but the two options she can see lead to undesirable outcomes. This has been said before, but the key thing to take away is the concept of "othering." The author would like to be seen as a developer, not a subcategory of a developer that is somehow different from the norm. Perhaps a better way to demonstrate is to take this to the extreme: "Instead of highlighting great articles from brown-eyed people in tech, or linking to other brown-eyed people in the industry with well trafficked blogs and talking about their contributions, the author fell right into the category that perpetuates this problem." Sounds pretty absurd right? Who cares what their eye color is. On the other hand, imagine if everyone got it wrong. Imagine if you had brown eyes but there was a 'default assumption' that everyone had blue eyes. You wouldn't want to make a fuss every time people got it wrong, for fear of being "that person" who is annoying and pedantic, and "hey, it shouldn't matter! Technology is eye-color blind!" But if you don't do it, it gets a little grating when EVERYONE assumes you are something that you're not. It's a catch-22. The solution is to remove the default assumption that developers are male. That is something that you, not the author, have to do.
- sliverstorm 14y agoImagine if there was a 'default assumption' that everyone had blue eyes. Maybe you just picked a bad example, but that would mean nothing to me. I actually generally assume brown eyes- but I don't have brown eyes myself...
- khuey 14y agoIt's a bad example because there's no history of discrimination and oppression against brown-eyed people.
- g544s 14y agoWhat is the OP's point? That people don't pay attention to the gender of the writer? If someone did a dedicated study about the last 6 months of top Hacker News and top r/programming articles what percentage do we think would be male authors? I would set the over-under at 95%. (Please don't point out that those audiences are sexist because the OP just showed that the readers don't pay attention to the gender of authors.) For the record I think there is sexism in tech but it mostly starts in jr high and high school - at least in the US.
- inopinatus 14y agoThe author falls into no such category, having clearly made a considerable contribution already. You've missed the point of the article. It doesn't set out to answer your quoted question with some faux-positive ra-ra laundry list of women's writing. Instead it unasks the question. On the other hand, you've exhibited a classic indicator of unconscious bias by assuming that a woman was complaining. Especially when, as in this case, she clearly isn't.
- rcfox 14y ago> On the other hand, you've exhibited a classic indicator of unconscious bias by assuming that a woman was complaining. Especially when, as in this case, she clearly isn't. "complain: to express dissatisfaction, pain, uneasiness, censure, resentment, or grief" If people can't disagree with you without being accused of bias at the drop of a hat, then we can't have a true discussion.
- inopinatus 14y agoI'm not sure why you're supplying a definition of "complain" except to confirm my point? Because none of those things are present in the OP. Recognising bias is important in gender discussions. It doesn't provide many truths but it reveals the falsehoods.
- clockstrikesten 14y agoThe stereotype is primarily accepted by two groups of males: 1. Men who believe women do not succeed in the tech world due to social pressures 2. Men who believe women do not succeed in the tech world due to differences that are genetic in nature For the second group, author Amber Yust only fuels the fire of the stereotype, because she was born a man. For the first group, using herself as an example of a woman succeeding in the tech world is invalid, because she was a man for most of her life and benefitted from all the consequent privileges. I find it dumbfounding that she wrote this article.
- roguecoder 14y agoShe is not presenting a story of "a woman succeeding in the tech world"; she is presenting a story of how everyone assumes anyone who writes a tech article is male. It is like the New York Times saying, "men invented the Internet", or all the people who have written, "Why are there no women programmers?" There are women programmers (22% in the US according to the Department of Labor.) There were women involved in the creation of the net (8% of RFC 1336). Just because there is not equal representation no excuse for erasing those that do exist. If you mentally turn everyone male unless they are speaking about gender it is unfair to then turn around and complain that women only ever speak about gender. When you were listening to them talk about other things it wasn't that they were men, it was that you assumed they were. That is all about you, and has nothing to do with the cis* status of the people pointing it out.
- danso 14y ago> Mind you, I agree that there is a rift that rises when people make the wrong assumption, but that's nil imo. It's possible you are very open minded in such a way that even though you don't "see" a group, and its accomplishments, you still consciously afford them the same benefit of doubt as you do for the majority group. Unfortunately, this is not a trait shared by societies and social groups at large.
- RegEx 14y ago> The catch-22 here is that if I choose to blend in, then people like the commenters above assume that everything they see was written by men, and use that as an excuse to dismiss the concerns of women in the tech industry Couldn't this be solved by a little 'about the author' section at the end of your articles? Pull in your gravatar and add a couple of sentences about yourself. Now everyone knows you are a woman, and you didn't have to change your background to hot-pink to do so! :)
- thetabyte 14y agoDid you read the article at all? Her whole point is that women should not have to do this, that they face discrimination if they do do this, and that we should refrain from assuming that if we don't see one of these, it's by a man. The problem isn't that they don't know she's a girl. It's that they assume she isn't one.
- RegEx 14y agoI actually did skip a paragraph on accident. > Sure, I could go out of my way to make it obvious that I’m a woman. I could put my name at the top of my blog or on my About page, or I could mention it in passing in my writing. That’s not something a male author has to do, though. Furthermore, doing so results in harassment and having my writing dismissed/trivialized/tokenized because of my gender. Hence why I don’t (or at least, hadn’t until this post).
- verroq 14y ago>Her whole point is that women should not have to do this, that they face discrimination if they do do this I don't think this point is correct. The technical nature of computer science/technology makes it easier to judge a work by its technical merits, not by authorship.
- thetabyte 14y agoYes, that's very true, it can be more easily judged by technical merits, but that doesn't necessarily mean it will be. Not to mention it invites less-than-appropriate or nice messages.
- verroq 14y agoMost of the time people use "he" when they don't know the gender of the author. It's not assuming the author is a man. It's a place-holder word in English.
- RegEx 14y agoI do this as well, simply because using 'they' in reference to a single person irks me.
- orangecat 14y agoIf it helps, singular "they" is a long-standing practice: www.crossmyt.com/hc/linghebr/austheir.html
- RegEx 14y agoOh, I have no opinion at all on its correctness, I myself just hate using the singular 'they' when writing a comment. Thanks for the link!
- danso 14y agoSo why use "he" when in contemporary usage, "he" almost always refers to male?
- RegEx 14y agoHonestly, because I'm lazy. Maybe I'll use 'they'. Maybe I'll use 'he'. Maybe I'll use both. If I'm not given the gender of the author, I'm just going to write what sounds right rather than take the time to make it gender-less. It's not like I would blatantly disregard the author's gender if it was provided, though.
- MBlume 14y agoHonestly, this is something you should get over.
- RegEx 14y ago> Furthermore, doing so results in harassment and having my writing dismissed/trivialized/tokenized because of my gender. Hence why I don’t (or at least, hadn’t until this post). I'd like to understand the severity of this issue. Can you provide examples of technical articles written by women that were dismissed due to their gender?
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- SoftwareMaven 14y agoWho are you telling to remember? Because if I was the author, who had shown she was creating things and trying to be known for that, I would be hugely offended at that kind of gender-stereotyped patronizing remark.
- aiiane 14y agoDid you even read the post? It doesn't talk about "looks" at all.
- clockstrikesten 14y agoThis was written by Amber Yust, who was born a man.
- rcfox 14y agoYou say this as if it were relevant...
- clockstrikesten 14y agoI fail to see how it's irrelevant. In this article, someone who was a man until a year or two ago used herself as the perfect example of a woman who succeeds in the tech world.
- rcfox 14y agoAmber is A) a woman B) working in the tech world C) successful. Chromosomes have nothing to do with it. Obviously, you know that what you're saying is hateful or you wouldn't have created a burner account in order to post it.
- clockstrikesten 14y agoChromosomes are directly responsible for most developmental differences between living creatures. If someone uses this fact to convince themselves it's why women aren't seen in the tech world, Amber has done nothing to disprove it. Amber has benefitted from male privilege for most of her life. If people believe male privilege, brogrammer environments, etc. are why women aren't seen in the tech world, Amber has done nothing to disprove it. She is literally the worst possible piece of evidence to use to disprove the stereotype. This is not a burner account and I am not transphobic.
- drivebyacct2 14y agoI can't think of someone more apt to share experiences and criticism about treatment of gender in an industry that someone who has literally experienced both sides of it first-hand. (edit: from an exterior appearance standpoint, obviously, but isn't that the very point of this discussion. People are inappropriately judged on their visible, expressed exterior gender rather than by the merit of their contributions?)
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- Tichy 14y agoInteresting, but a bit of a strawman: one comment dismisses complaints of women because he accuses them of not contributing anything of merit. That is of course flawed in itself, but it is just one person's comment, not a general attitude towards female bloggers. I also don't think that for example on HN it should be possible to "pay" with technical contributions for non-technical contributions, like, for every x relevant articles you would be allowed an irrelevant article. Ideally, every article should stand on it's own (probably not realistic, but an ideal to attain to).
- HarrietTubgirl 14y agoYou're not going to change this. Yes, virtually every great programmer or computer scientist is a male. So much so that we're all going to assume they're male, and when we see a female name (like "Leslie Lamport") we double-check to see if it's actually a female. This is just a normal tendency. We assume basketball players are over 6'3", we assume nurses are female. There are many stories of people overcoming discrimination (say, Indian immigrants being thought to be unfit for executive positions in Silicon Valley), and they make the current hot topic of women in tech look incredibly dumb. We're talking overt discrimination, not occasional pronoun misuse. Indians in Silicon Valley started a group called TiE to help establish a presence. Does it hurt for them to have labeled themselves as "Indus Entrepreneurs" and try to help each other? Doesn't seem so. So maybe the right way to overcome this "oppression" you feel is just to quit fucking bitching, put your head down and code, and maybe help a few other women out along the way when you achieve success.
- ben0x539 14y agoWow, rude. Your misogynist default behavior isn't the fault of the OP and kinda your own failing to overcome. The onus isn't on the oppressed group to overcome discrimination, it's on the privileged group to cut it out. And downplaying everyday casual sexism just because it's not literally witch burning anymore is a really privileged thing to do!
- gcb 14y agodilettantism is way easier than work. And recently may be as effective. Heck i usually get hundreds of upvotes just by pretending i have some knowledge. This one will skyrocket because i may be a woman. And maybe Indian.
- mkaltenecker 14y agoThis is how your comment reads to me: Misogyny is totally cool and you should never do anything to change it, not even write a harmless and polite blogpost. No, see, that's bitching. Mentioning a very clear and obvious problem is totally not cool.
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- wccrawford 14y agoIt's not actually a catch-22, it's just a shitty situation. Catch-22 means you can't do something without doing another thing first, but you can't do that first either because it relies on the thing you wanted to do in the first place. It's a closed circle with no way in. This, however, it's just painful. Women can't emphasize their gender without being ridiculed by assholes, but they can't hide it because they would then be helping prolong the ridicule for others. "You're either part of the problem, or part of the solution." Sitting back and doing nothing allows the problem to continue. I'm as guilty of doing nothing as anyone. I really don't care who wrote the article, only that it's a good article. If I see something techie don't by a woman, I generally think "Good for her" and then continue on with life. I don't assign any special weight to her words at all. They still stand on their own. On the other hand, my experience is that closed communities are a lot better about not discriminating. If someone says, "the op is a She", everyone apologizes, switches, and continues on. Open communities, where any asshole with a keyboard can leave a comment, tend to be slums. Assholes know they can post their opinions without censorship, so they do. Constantly. There's repercussions, either. As much as I like finding random stuff on the net, the only communities worth joining are the private ones. And there's precious few of those any more.