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> No, I am not taking responsibility for an imaginary problem. Are you claiming that the original authors daughter was imagining her classmates bullying her?

by lambda 13y ago

> No, I am not taking responsibility for an imaginary problem. Are you claiming that the original authors daughter was imagining her classmates bullying her? Are you saying that I'm imagining the fact that there are far more men than women in the programming profession? These aren't "imaginary problems". These are very real problems. Now, there may be some debate about exactly which behavior is problematic; some people have different standards. But you're not going to tell me that bullying someone and telling them to get into the kitchen is not a problem. > You are making the field off-putting to her, not the evil chauvinist boogeymen she has never seen. I'm sorry, are you saying that someone who's saying it's bad to push women out of the profession is more off-putting than someone in her class telling her to get into the kitchen and make them a sandwich? These are not "evil chauvinish boogeymen she has never seen", they are actual bullies in her actual class.

asdasf 13y ago
>Are you claiming that the original authors daughter was imagining her classmates bullying her? No, I am claiming that the problems the post I replied to was putting forth are imaginary. I am quite aware that bullying is a real problem. >Are you saying that I'm imagining the fact that there are far more men than women in the programming profession? No, I am saying that is not an indication of a problem, much less systemic oppression. There is a strong correlation between increased freedom to choose "non-traditional" professions and fewer people choosing them. More women worked "men's jobs" when they were told they were men's jobs than they do now that they are encouraged to seek those jobs. >But you're not going to tell me that bullying someone and telling them to get into the kitchen is not a problem. Stop presenting such a ridiculous strawman. You can read the post I replied to. You can see that it is clearly not the article. Your entire response is predicated on ignoring the context of the conversation and repositioning my post as being a response to something completely different.
- lambda 13y ago
  OK. Let's start from the beginning. The post you are replying to was a reply to the general tenor of a lot of posts, like yours, in this kind of thread. Posts which try to deny that there's a real problem, that the only reason that there aren't as many women in tech is that they have chosen not to. Anecdotes like the original article, as well as many others that have come before, demonstrate that there is a real problem. There is some seriously problematic behavior out there. Now, how much of the gender disparity in tech is due to these kinds of problems, and how much is due to simple self-selection? That's hard to say; there may be arguments either way. But that doesn't really matter; even if the entire gender disparity can't be explained by odious behavior, at least some of it can, because there are very clearly women who are being off-put by very obnoxious, sexist behavior. And furthermore, people are offput by defensive behavior, where tons of people come out of the woodwork and deny that there is any problem whatsoever. If you mention that some behavior makes you uncomfortable, and then a lot of people come out saying "there's no problem. It shouldn't make you uncomfortable. You just aren't all that into tech, you don't have thick enough skin" is that going to make you feel welcome and safe? He's saying that we need to stop being defensive about it, stop trying to deny that problem, and start taking responsibility for hostile and off-putting behavior. Taking responsibility can include not doing it ourselves, and can also include not treating it as if it's acceptable behavior, not turning a blind eye to it, and not denying that that it actually exists. So by telling him that he was discussing imaginary problems, you were doing exactly that. You were ignoring the actual, real, live example of the problem in the original post, and saying that what he was talking about is imaginary. That's why I brought up the original post; in order to claim that RyanMcGreal's problems were imaginary, you must be claiming that the original post is imaginary. Now, in other posts, you seem to be trying to make the distinction between bullying and sexism, brushing this off as mere bullying. What you've missed is that it can be both. There is racist bullying. There is homophobic bullying. There is sexist bullying. There is bullying just for the sake of bullying. Just because it's also bullying, doesn't mean that it's not sexist, and part of the pattern of behavior that drives some women from the field. Taking responsibility does not mean saying "oh, I'm an oppressor, thus I should be ashamed of myself." It means speaking up when you hear someone being harassed, it means stopping bullying that's going on right in your classroom (and being aware enough of your classroom to notice it going on), it means trying to understand why someone's upset or offended and try to think of reasonable, fair ways to fix that, rather than immediately jumping to the conclusion that the problem they are describing is not actually a problem. > There is a strong correlation between increased freedom to choose "non-traditional" professions and fewer people choosing them. More women worked "men's jobs" when they were told they were men's jobs than they do now that they are encouraged to seek those jobs. So, where is your evidence to back up this claim? It's a pretty strong claim, so you had better have some pretty good evidence to back it up.
  - asdasf 13y ago
    >Anecdotes like the original article, as well as many others that have come before, demonstrate that there is a real problem. Sure. And that problem is bullying. It has absolutely nothing to do with women in technology. Saying "imaginary problem X is totally real because real problem Y is real" is not logical. >He's saying that we need to stop being defensive about it, stop trying to deny that problem, and start taking responsibility for hostile and off-putting behavior And I am saying he is wrong. That's how it works, one person gives their opinion, and another person gives theirs. >It means speaking up when you hear someone being harassed, it means stopping bullying that's going on right in your classroom None of which has to do with the nonexistent "technology is full of chauvinists who scare women away" problem. >So, where is your evidence to back up this claim? http://www.dailymotion.com/playlists/user/BrainwashingInNorway/1 http://www.dailymotion.com/playlists/user/BrainwashingInNorw... >It's a pretty strong claim, so you had better have some pretty good evidence to back it up. Why don't you need evidence to back up the claim that women are avoiding certain professions because of sexism?
    - lambda 13y ago
      > Sure. And that problem is bullying. It has absolutely nothing to do with women in technology. Saying "imaginary problem X is totally real because real problem Y is real" is not logical. The problem is not bullying alone, though that is part of the problem. Something can be both bullying and sexism at the same time. Bullies will frequently reach for the strongest ammunition they can get, whether it's racist, sexist, homophobic, or any of a number of other ways to hurt their victims. Just because it's bullying doesn't mean that it's automatically not sexism as well. > http://www.dailymotion.com/playlists/user/BrainwashingInNorway/1 http://www.dailymotion.com/playlists/user/BrainwashingInNorw... Really? A video series called "BranwashingInNorway" about how there are a few people in Norway who are too politically correct to admit that there are some sex-linked behavioral differences? Did you have any particular evidence for your actual claim that that once it's no longer taboo women don't want to cross traditional gender lines any more that you wanted me to look at, or am I supposed to trawl through the whole four and a half hours? How about an actual reliable citation in an academic paper, rather than someone who's just trying to demonstrate that there are a few Norwegian academics who are a little too PC for their own good. > Why don't you need evidence to back up the claim that women are avoiding certain professions because of sexism? I do. There is plenty of evidence. For instance, the original post that this whole thread is about, though you choose not to believe it, or somehow are trying to classify it as not sexism. But there's plenty more as well: http://web.archive.org/web/20070503012914/http://headrush.typepad.com/whathappened.html http://web.archive.org/web/20070503012914/http://headrush.ty... This is a woman who was terrorized from showing up at tech conferences due to threats of rape and murder. Or how about this, a compilation of several sexual harassment issues that explain why Valerie Aurora, a Linux Kernel developer, no longer goes to certain hacker cons: https://adainitiative.org/2012/08/defcon-why-conference-harassment-matters/ https://adainitiative.org/2012/08/defcon-why-conference-hara... But OK, maybe you'd rather have statistics than anecdotes. How about this study which shows that women are more likely to leave fields which are more heavily male dominated: http://www.nber.org/papers/w15853.pdf http://www.nber.org/papers/w15853.pdf That, of course, doesn't address harassment directly, but the general sense of unease that being in a small minority can give you, which can drive you out of the field. I'm not claiming that the entire gender disparity in tech is due to harassment, or a poisonous atmosphere, or anything of the sort. What I am claiming is that it happens, it does drive some people out, and it's a bad thing. You seem intent on denying that there's any problem whatsoever.

asdasf 13y ago
You can't complain that my evidence isn't an academic citation, and then post even worse as your evidence. You are jumping to a conclusion, and I am saying the hypothesis you should be testing doesn't appear to be true. But since you skipped the testing the hypothesis step and went straight to a conclusion, you find this offensive and unimaginable. When you observe an uneven sex ratio in a particular field, you need to form a hypothesis to explain that ratio, and then test it. You can't just jump to "it is sexism" as a conclusion.
- lambda 13y ago
  What part of my evidence do you consider worse? The evidence of actual women who have avoided conferences because of harassment? Or you mean a paper that actually gathers statistics that demonstrate that women are more likely to leave male-dominated fields than ones which have a more even gender distribution? And half of what I was complaining about was that you linked me to a 4 and a half hour long video series, which from a brief glance at the first video, appeared to be some guy just trying to get some Norwegian academics to claim that both sexes are exactly equal, and then catch them out on that. I had no idea where to look in those videos for evidence of the actual claim that you made, that once a profession is no longer taboo for women to join, they have less desire to do so. Could you please tell me where in those videos to find that evidence? Or, since he doesn't seem to be doing any original research himself, just interviewing academics on a variety of topics, can you point out the research that he summarizes that contains this information? > When you observe an uneven sex ratio in a particular field, you need to form a hypothesis to explain that ratio, and then test it. You can't just jump to "it is sexism" as a conclusion. The paper I linked to did test certain hypotheses about why it happened, and one of them that it found evidence for is that the larger ratio of men in the industry leads to more women leaving; which forms a self-perpetuating cycle. You're right, this doesn't directly address sexism, but it does provide evidence for why there's an uneven ratio, and why it continues to be that way, even if more women enter the profession than before. > But since you skipped the testing the hypothesis step and went straight to a conclusion, you find this offensive and unimaginable. But it's not just the uneven ratio that we're concerned about. As I said many times, there may be multiple reasons for it; perhaps harassment is only a small portion of the reason. It is obviously a part of the reason; as I've pointed out, there is plenty of anecdotal evidence for that, of people who have been harassed out of the industry, or out of certain communities within it. But you're right, without a rigorous study, we don't know how much of an effect that is, versus other factors. The "offensive" part is denying that there is any harassment, and denying that men should try to stop it. There is harassment. There is behavior that makes women feel uncomfortable. Rather than being defensive and claiming that people shouldn't jump to the conclusion that sexism isn't the reason why there are few women in the field, why don't we try to not act sexist, stop sexism when we see it, actively try to eliminate at least that problem? Perhaps it won't lead to a lot more women in the industry, as they are avoiding it for other reasons. That's OK; we're still at least working to fix the sexism problem. Note that I'm not claiming that all, or even most, men in tech are sexist. I'm not claiming that there is a unique sexism problem in tech. What I'm saying is that there is sexism, that it does hurt real people, and so if you see it, you should do something about it.