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What is the goal of this checklist, other than causing a series of individual guilt trips for a gender imbalance that results from societal factors and/or legit

What is the goal of this checklist, other than causing a series of individual guilt trips for a gender imbalance that results from societal factors and/or legitimate gender predispositions for/against our field? What are we supposed to do? Do these people think we don't wish there were more women in the field? Also, I'm sure the ensuing discussion is going to resemble at least three other HN discussions.

timr 17y ago
I think it's pretty obvious what the response is expected to be: you're supposed to have some awareness of the next time you're doing any of these things, and perhaps make a change in your behavior. I don't agree with every item on the list, but the point of the exercise is plain.
knowtheory 17y ago
1) i took a comment ( http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=624808 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=624808 ) by the poster, j_baker, and ran it through http://www.hackerfactor.com/GenderGuesser.html http://www.hackerfactor.com/GenderGuesser.html which came up on this thread: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=608057 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=608057 and the result came up most likely male (just a point of note). 2) I would surmise that the point of lists like these are to raise awareness of injustices or slights that are done, particularly ones that others may not be aware of, because they are not subjected to them. 3) You're a member of the community, can you really not think of anything you could do to make things different? Why not do something that bucks the geek/nerd stereotype? Why not help someone else do it? Why not encourage/help someone who's not a stereotypical nerd into the field? Why not just object to stereotyping of programmers? These aren't problems that are going to change immediately. Being reminded that there are still problems isn't a bad thing imo. Just as being reminded that people do care about the issue, and would like to make things different (as you have done). So the problem has been recognized. There is a will to do something about it. Let's do something. There are organizations like RailsBridge that are forming ( http://railsbridge.org/ http://railsbridge.org/ ). The ACM-W exists ( http://women.acm.org/ http://women.acm.org/ ). If you want things to be different, pick something to do and do it.
- swolchok 17y ago
  Re: 3, I don't think that the problems are at my age. They're at college freshman/sophomore and younger, when women decide to enter the field. By the time we exit college, there are hardly any women left to treat more equally.
  - knowtheory 17y ago
    I agree with your antecedent. It is true that i think a lot of the prejudice and abhorrent behavior takes place younger. There are a lot of people who don't make it through the weeders that should. However, i just can't fathom how it could be the case that there's nothing we can do about it, regardless of what our ages may be. Why aren't we addressing the pipeline into the industry? That can take the form of direct involvement with the lives of students (which is also something that should be undertaken carefully. My wife took programming classes in high school, and even her instructor for the class was creepy), or indirectly, again through trying to defeat the stereotypes about who is in our industry. And i think we need to broaden our perspective on where the feeder into the pipeline is. Why aren't we trying to get analytical individuals from other fields who already do train their students to think analytically?
    - swolchok 17y ago
      Why aren't we trying to get analytical individuals from other fields who already do train their students to think analytically? Probably because trainability of those folks would cause more "anyone can do it" sentiment, devaluing our skills. As to the pipeline, now you're calling for outright altruistic activism, not a change in day-to-day behavior at work. Also, if I set out to "encourage women in computer science", it would probably be perceived as "creepy".
      - knowtheory 17y ago
        "now you're calling for outright altruistic activism, not a change in day-to-day behavior at work" That makes me want to facepalm a bit. Do you work with open source software? Also, if I set out to "encourage women in computer science", it would probably be perceived as "creepy". Then don't. Set out to encourage students who are good at analytical thinking to get into programming, and keep an eye on equal promotion of the utility of programming (note, that programming is not the same as computer science. I've got a linguistics degree, and i am a perfectly competent programmer [okay, so yes, i 've got a minor in computer science too]).
likpok 17y ago
So, if you pay attention to history, you can see that there isn't actually a predisposition which affects this. In the 1980's, about half[1] of computer scientists were women. Now? 10-20%. Something is being done, and it is being done wrong. So it's not as simple as "They don't want to" or "Society makes them". [1] I believe it to be about half. However, it might be slightly more or less. Definitely far higher than today.
- ahoyhere 17y ago
  Based on what metrics? Where are your #s coming from? What are you defining as "a computer scientist"?
  - likpok 17y ago
    There was an article in the NYT (I think it may be mentioned above) that discussed this. It appeared on slashdot, and I remember being quite aggravated at comments akin to 'Maybe they just don't want to', as the article explicitly dealth with this. Also, I believe their metric may have been students, but I am not sure.
- msluyter 17y ago
  Here's an article from the NY Times that goes into this in some detail, although there appears to be no single compelling explanation: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/business/16digi.html http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/business/16digi.html One thing that the article notes is that women have achieved parity in other technical fields: "When all science and engineering fields are considered, the percentage of bachelor’s degree recipients who are women has improved to 51 percent in 2004-5 from 39 percent in 1984-85, according to National Science Foundation surveys." I find it rather hard to believe that software professionals are especially sexist compared to those in other engineering fields, thus I tend to think that other factors -- a reputation for grueling work hours, the "nerd factor", perceived drop in availability of jobs due to outsourcing, etc... -- are driving women away.
- Tichy 17y ago
  It could still be "they don't want to" - conditions in society might have chanced so that other options have become more attractive for women. Wasn't 1980 still a completely different time, when it was more typical for women to stay at home? In that case, it would be even more surprising if there was parity back then. I had the impression that a lot of women from Russia tended to be into technical careers, I wonder what was behind that. "Better" childcare (as in children being raised by the state)?

timr 17y ago

I think it's pretty obvious what the response is expected to be: you're supposed to have some awareness of the next time you're doing any of these things, and perhaps make a change in your behavior. I don't agree with every item on the list, but the point of the exercise is plain.

knowtheory 17y ago

1) i took a comment ( http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=624808 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=624808 ) by the poster, j_baker, and ran it through http://www.hackerfactor.com/GenderGuesser.html http://www.hackerfactor.com/GenderGuesser.html which came up on this thread: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=608057 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=608057 and the result came up most likely male (just a point of note). 2) I would surmise that the point of lists like these are to raise awareness of injustices or slights that are done, particularly ones that others may not be aware of, because they are not subjected to them. 3) You're a member of the community, can you really not think of anything you could do to make things different? Why not do something that bucks the geek/nerd stereotype? Why not help someone else do it? Why not encourage/help someone who's not a stereotypical nerd into the field? Why not just object to stereotyping of programmers? These aren't problems that are going to change immediately. Being reminded that there are still problems isn't a bad thing imo. Just as being reminded that people do care about the issue, and would like to make things different (as you have done). So the problem has been recognized. There is a will to do something about it. Let's do something. There are organizations like RailsBridge that are forming ( http://railsbridge.org/ http://railsbridge.org/ ). The ACM-W exists ( http://women.acm.org/ http://women.acm.org/ ). If you want things to be different, pick something to do and do it.

swolchok 17y ago
Re: 3, I don't think that the problems are at my age. They're at college freshman/sophomore and younger, when women decide to enter the field. By the time we exit college, there are hardly any women left to treat more equally.
- knowtheory 17y ago
  I agree with your antecedent. It is true that i think a lot of the prejudice and abhorrent behavior takes place younger. There are a lot of people who don't make it through the weeders that should. However, i just can't fathom how it could be the case that there's nothing we can do about it, regardless of what our ages may be. Why aren't we addressing the pipeline into the industry? That can take the form of direct involvement with the lives of students (which is also something that should be undertaken carefully. My wife took programming classes in high school, and even her instructor for the class was creepy), or indirectly, again through trying to defeat the stereotypes about who is in our industry. And i think we need to broaden our perspective on where the feeder into the pipeline is. Why aren't we trying to get analytical individuals from other fields who already do train their students to think analytically?
  - swolchok 17y ago
    Why aren't we trying to get analytical individuals from other fields who already do train their students to think analytically? Probably because trainability of those folks would cause more "anyone can do it" sentiment, devaluing our skills. As to the pipeline, now you're calling for outright altruistic activism, not a change in day-to-day behavior at work. Also, if I set out to "encourage women in computer science", it would probably be perceived as "creepy".
    - knowtheory 17y ago
      "now you're calling for outright altruistic activism, not a change in day-to-day behavior at work" That makes me want to facepalm a bit. Do you work with open source software? Also, if I set out to "encourage women in computer science", it would probably be perceived as "creepy". Then don't. Set out to encourage students who are good at analytical thinking to get into programming, and keep an eye on equal promotion of the utility of programming (note, that programming is not the same as computer science. I've got a linguistics degree, and i am a perfectly competent programmer [okay, so yes, i 've got a minor in computer science too]).

likpok 17y ago

So, if you pay attention to history, you can see that there isn't actually a predisposition which affects this. In the 1980's, about half[1] of computer scientists were women. Now? 10-20%. Something is being done, and it is being done wrong. So it's not as simple as "They don't want to" or "Society makes them". [1] I believe it to be about half. However, it might be slightly more or less. Definitely far higher than today.

ahoyhere 17y ago
Based on what metrics? Where are your #s coming from? What are you defining as "a computer scientist"?
- likpok 17y ago
  There was an article in the NYT (I think it may be mentioned above) that discussed this. It appeared on slashdot, and I remember being quite aggravated at comments akin to 'Maybe they just don't want to', as the article explicitly dealth with this. Also, I believe their metric may have been students, but I am not sure.
msluyter 17y ago
Here's an article from the NY Times that goes into this in some detail, although there appears to be no single compelling explanation: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/business/16digi.html http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/business/16digi.html One thing that the article notes is that women have achieved parity in other technical fields: "When all science and engineering fields are considered, the percentage of bachelor’s degree recipients who are women has improved to 51 percent in 2004-5 from 39 percent in 1984-85, according to National Science Foundation surveys." I find it rather hard to believe that software professionals are especially sexist compared to those in other engineering fields, thus I tend to think that other factors -- a reputation for grueling work hours, the "nerd factor", perceived drop in availability of jobs due to outsourcing, etc... -- are driving women away.
Tichy 17y ago
It could still be "they don't want to" - conditions in society might have chanced so that other options have become more attractive for women. Wasn't 1980 still a completely different time, when it was more typical for women to stay at home? In that case, it would be even more surprising if there was parity back then. I had the impression that a lot of women from Russia tended to be into technical careers, I wonder what was behind that. "Better" childcare (as in children being raised by the state)?