4 ms·

for the benefit of others could you outline what "set of assumptions" might get people fired? your post is incredibly vague...

• nrodhn 13y ago
  Sorry - I wasn't saying that I'm sure I did something I would have gotten fired over, the point was more that I don't think just any instance of sexism should be treated as a fireable offense, because sexist behavior can be unintentional and due to lack of experience. "Don't be sexist and you won't have problems" as the OP put is what I thought I was doing, but wasn't. My post is vague because it's about subtle behavioral stuff. Basically, when I interacted with male developers, my behavior toward them was based on projecting myself into them automatically. Like, say, the level of expectations I leveled against them, how competitive I would be with them, how aggressive I might be toward them was based on how I myself respond to being challenged and my own career path/experiences and things like that. I unintentionally behaved differently toward female developers (not necessarily worse actually, but differently) just because that automatic projecting would not happen, and it would end up singling them out. Learning about that has improved my interaction not just with women but also men, actually. I make a much bigger effort to learn about the individual now. I'm sure all this came a lot easier to others, or maybe they just had the right sort of experiences much earlier (I wonder if it would have helped if I had any siblings, say). But for me is something I can identify as "needed to learn that".