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I'm just getting familiar with this drama, but to me, it sounds like pg was dropping responsibility for the lack of women founders. Eric asked him about YC doin

by ceol 13y ago

I'm just getting familiar with this drama, but to me, it sounds like pg was dropping responsibility for the lack of women founders. Eric asked him about YC doing more to attract women or encourage women founders, and he responded by saying, essentially, "It's not our fault, there's no way we could be biased, women who want to be hackers just don't exist," and passing the buck to middle school curriculums.

wvenable 13y ago
But isn't it entirely possible that he's right?
- halostatue 13y ago
  PG can be correct that “hacker-founders” (what YC looks for, AIUI) who are female may not exist in sufficient numbers to be visible to the YC process—and still be in the wrong because there is a strong gender bias against the production of female hacker-founders in our society. The question—as I read the articles surrounding this—was about the larger problem (of the continuing ultra-dominance of the tech industry by men) and what YC might be doing to improve the situation. (And the answer is…nothing?) The bias here is the same thing that keeps female participation in OSS horribly low: the “meritocracy” involved is inherently biased toward young males because of the way that our society works as a whole. YC can't fix this, but there may be things that can and should be done to improve how it handles that existing bias.
  - wvenable 13y ago
    Isn't that lack of female hacker-founders exactly what pg was saying? I don't understand how pg could personally be in the wrong about that. And this is exactly my point, pg is now vilified for what? Not doing enough? It's ridiculous.
    - halostatue 13y ago
      I think that what you're missing is that while the fact that there's a lack of female hacker-founders is true…only looking for hacker-founders further solidifies a blatantly sexist problem in the tech industry. So his statement is right—but the attitude is wrong and it is pure blame-shifting. Facts like this can be correct in the small, but wrong (not incorrect, but…ill-intentioned) in the large. The issue is about the larger problem, not the smaller problem. pg has been defending the smaller problem (the facts of the analysis) while ignoring the larger problem. At least in the articles I read this evening (I was on vacation last week when this apparently broken). It's a systemic/societal problem, and YC certainly can't fix it on its own, and has limited ability to fix it in any case. They started doing something different with Watsi…maybe there's something they can do different for female founders (as pg himself has suggested that there's another essay coming, plus some announcements from YC in that direction in any case).
      - wvenable 13y ago
        Looking for hacker-founders is what YC does. That is its reason for existence. It's not an employer. It's not a general investment firm. It's not a school. It invests in hacker-founders. PG expertise is hacker-founders. Only looking for hacker-founders isn't sexist, in of itself. If there is a larger problem in society, that's not really PG's domain of expertise and we shouldn't expect it to be.
        halostatue 13y ago
        I think you're missing the point that I'm making that only looking for hacker-founders (and landing mostly with young men) is sexist in and of itself because it both perpetuates existing stereotypes and reinforces sexist roles. Note that I'm not saying that YC should change its selection criteria—I understand what they're looking for and why. But they don't get to wash their hands of this societal/systemic problem and say that it's Just That Way. Change has to be proactive. YC is in a position to help make a difference. It has disproportionately large mindshare in the tech industry. Maybe it's next non-profit needs to be something to address the gender imbalance in tech.
  - theorique 13y ago
    So what could he / YC do? And what can they do right now? The main thing that comes to mind is to do some marketing outreach to diverse pools of potential techie founders (Ada Initiative, PyLadies, etc). Beyond activities like this, can pg or YC be held responsible for the preceding stages of the pipeline?
- ceol 13y ago
  Not really, no. Everyone is biased. The point isn't to eliminate them but to acknowledge them and understand how they affect you. Sexism in tech is a very large problem, and like every other large problem, it's made up of many small problems. I think it's silly for pg to claim that there's nothing YC can do to get more women founders. No one's asking him to fix the whole thing — only to explore some ways that he could do his part to fix his small problem and get some more women founders through YC.
  - wvenable 13y ago
    I think it's silly that you think pg is claiming there is absolutely nothing he can do. The problem is now that many many people are now reading as much as possible into everything that he saying. If he has an opinion, you don't know exactly what it is. But you'll analyze every word, every phrasing, and make up your own assumptions. That is all that is happening here.
    - ceol 13y ago
      The full transcript is at the bottom of the submitted article's page, and from the conversation, it's pretty clear that pg thinks there isn't anything he can do. When asked what YC could do to bring more women founders in, he says they don't exist and then says we need to start looking at middle school computer science curriculums. Those are two things he flat-out said; I'm not reading anything into it.
      - wvenable 13y ago
        I would say it's pretty clear that PG thinks there isn't any more he can do. Lets not assume that he's doing absolutely nothing now. I'll ask again: isn't it possible that he's right? There seems to be general consensus that girls do not get into computing science at a young age. So it makes sense there would be shortage of women with right ability at the right time for YC. There's nothing controversial about that. And short of inventing a time machine there isn't anything PG can do about that. I know a lot of women in computing and almost none of them started as young as my male peers. These women code and some started their own companies. But they didn't do it in their late teens or early 20's because they hadn't even discovered it then.
dmn757 13y ago
Why is it pg's job to encourage ANYONE to get into any given profession or area of study? How would you feel if, when you were a kid (or adult for that matter), someone came up to you and told you what you should or shouldn't be doing for a living. That one profession has less of your type so you should do that. Doesn't that seem a little ridiculous? There are plenty of jobs that have many more women than men. Do you see massive outrage because the workforce is lacking in those jobs? How about the hundreds of other fields that are male-dominated? Perhaps VC/Startups/Tech is an easy target because the field is so lucrative. The world needs less belief and viewpoint shaping and more free-thinking. Where this nonsense arises is when we put people into groups or they put themselves into groups. Be yourself.
- ceol 13y ago
  You seem to be conflating a lot of things. For starters, no one is saying it's pg's job. The interviewer asked him if he felt there was anything he could be doing to get more women into YC. Second, "encourage" does not mean "order someone to do something." No one is going to up women, putting their hands on their shoulders, shaking them, and telling them they must be developers! Instead, they're creating spaces that are welcoming and friendly to women. They aren't forcing them through the door; they're opening it for them and showing them all the delicious cookies inside. > There are plenty of jobs that have many more women than men. Do you see massive outrage because the workforce is lacking in those jobs? Yes. There are plenty of initiatives to get more men into nursing, fashion, and teaching. Just because you didn't take the three seconds to search for them doesn't mean they don't exist. You don't hear about them because, what a shocker, you aren't part of those communities. It's almost like you're on a website dedicated to tech culture or something!
  - dmn757 13y ago
    For starters, no one is saying it's pg's job. The interviewer asked him if he felt there was anything he could be doing to get more women into YC. Of course this is just my opinion, but to me the tone of the interview sounds as though the interviewer was suggesting that pg should be doing more, himself, to get more women into the field. Second, "encourage" does not mean "order someone to do something." No one is going to up women, putting their hands on their shoulders, shaking them, and telling them they must be developers! Instead, they're creating spaces that are welcoming and friendly to women. They aren't forcing them through the door; they're opening it for them and showing them all the delicious cookies inside. I never said "order someone to do something." In fact I specifically used the word "encourage," but I guess you can twist my words to try and further your agenda. Stating that you want to create female friendly spaces is inherently sexist. I don't know, I think we just differ philosophically and I am more of the mind that people should be friendly regardless of what/who you are. I just don't think that we need special programs for every single "group" that is not interested in something. Yes. There are plenty of initiatives to get more men into nursing, fashion, and teaching. Just because you didn't take the three seconds to search for them doesn't mean they don't exist. You don't hear about them because, what a shocker, you aren't part of those communities. It's almost like you're on a website dedicated to tech culture or something! As someone who originally studied to be a male nurse, yes I am aware of those programs. Please try to not be so condescending.

by ceol 13y ago

wvenable 13y ago

But isn't it entirely possible that he's right?

halostatue 13y ago
PG can be correct that “hacker-founders” (what YC looks for, AIUI) who are female may not exist in sufficient numbers to be visible to the YC process—and still be in the wrong because there is a strong gender bias against the production of female hacker-founders in our society. The question—as I read the articles surrounding this—was about the larger problem (of the continuing ultra-dominance of the tech industry by men) and what YC might be doing to improve the situation. (And the answer is…nothing?) The bias here is the same thing that keeps female participation in OSS horribly low: the “meritocracy” involved is inherently biased toward young males because of the way that our society works as a whole. YC can't fix this, but there may be things that can and should be done to improve how it handles that existing bias.
- wvenable 13y ago
  Isn't that lack of female hacker-founders exactly what pg was saying? I don't understand how pg could personally be in the wrong about that. And this is exactly my point, pg is now vilified for what? Not doing enough? It's ridiculous.
  - halostatue 13y ago
    I think that what you're missing is that while the fact that there's a lack of female hacker-founders is true…only looking for hacker-founders further solidifies a blatantly sexist problem in the tech industry. So his statement is right—but the attitude is wrong and it is pure blame-shifting. Facts like this can be correct in the small, but wrong (not incorrect, but…ill-intentioned) in the large. The issue is about the larger problem, not the smaller problem. pg has been defending the smaller problem (the facts of the analysis) while ignoring the larger problem. At least in the articles I read this evening (I was on vacation last week when this apparently broken). It's a systemic/societal problem, and YC certainly can't fix it on its own, and has limited ability to fix it in any case. They started doing something different with Watsi…maybe there's something they can do different for female founders (as pg himself has suggested that there's another essay coming, plus some announcements from YC in that direction in any case).
    - wvenable 13y ago
      Looking for hacker-founders is what YC does. That is its reason for existence. It's not an employer. It's not a general investment firm. It's not a school. It invests in hacker-founders. PG expertise is hacker-founders. Only looking for hacker-founders isn't sexist, in of itself. If there is a larger problem in society, that's not really PG's domain of expertise and we shouldn't expect it to be.
      - halostatue 13y ago
        I think you're missing the point that I'm making that only looking for hacker-founders (and landing mostly with young men) is sexist in and of itself because it both perpetuates existing stereotypes and reinforces sexist roles. Note that I'm not saying that YC should change its selection criteria—I understand what they're looking for and why. But they don't get to wash their hands of this societal/systemic problem and say that it's Just That Way. Change has to be proactive. YC is in a position to help make a difference. It has disproportionately large mindshare in the tech industry. Maybe it's next non-profit needs to be something to address the gender imbalance in tech.
- theorique 13y ago
  So what could he / YC do? And what can they do right now? The main thing that comes to mind is to do some marketing outreach to diverse pools of potential techie founders (Ada Initiative, PyLadies, etc). Beyond activities like this, can pg or YC be held responsible for the preceding stages of the pipeline?
ceol 13y ago
Not really, no. Everyone is biased. The point isn't to eliminate them but to acknowledge them and understand how they affect you. Sexism in tech is a very large problem, and like every other large problem, it's made up of many small problems. I think it's silly for pg to claim that there's nothing YC can do to get more women founders. No one's asking him to fix the whole thing — only to explore some ways that he could do his part to fix his small problem and get some more women founders through YC.
- wvenable 13y ago
  I think it's silly that you think pg is claiming there is absolutely nothing he can do. The problem is now that many many people are now reading as much as possible into everything that he saying. If he has an opinion, you don't know exactly what it is. But you'll analyze every word, every phrasing, and make up your own assumptions. That is all that is happening here.
  - ceol 13y ago
    The full transcript is at the bottom of the submitted article's page, and from the conversation, it's pretty clear that pg thinks there isn't anything he can do. When asked what YC could do to bring more women founders in, he says they don't exist and then says we need to start looking at middle school computer science curriculums. Those are two things he flat-out said; I'm not reading anything into it.
    - wvenable 13y ago
      I would say it's pretty clear that PG thinks there isn't any more he can do. Lets not assume that he's doing absolutely nothing now. I'll ask again: isn't it possible that he's right? There seems to be general consensus that girls do not get into computing science at a young age. So it makes sense there would be shortage of women with right ability at the right time for YC. There's nothing controversial about that. And short of inventing a time machine there isn't anything PG can do about that. I know a lot of women in computing and almost none of them started as young as my male peers. These women code and some started their own companies. But they didn't do it in their late teens or early 20's because they hadn't even discovered it then.

dmn757 13y ago

Why is it pg's job to encourage ANYONE to get into any given profession or area of study? How would you feel if, when you were a kid (or adult for that matter), someone came up to you and told you what you should or shouldn't be doing for a living. That one profession has less of your type so you should do that. Doesn't that seem a little ridiculous? There are plenty of jobs that have many more women than men. Do you see massive outrage because the workforce is lacking in those jobs? How about the hundreds of other fields that are male-dominated? Perhaps VC/Startups/Tech is an easy target because the field is so lucrative. The world needs less belief and viewpoint shaping and more free-thinking. Where this nonsense arises is when we put people into groups or they put themselves into groups. Be yourself.

ceol 13y ago
You seem to be conflating a lot of things. For starters, no one is saying it's pg's job. The interviewer asked him if he felt there was anything he could be doing to get more women into YC. Second, "encourage" does not mean "order someone to do something." No one is going to up women, putting their hands on their shoulders, shaking them, and telling them they must be developers! Instead, they're creating spaces that are welcoming and friendly to women. They aren't forcing them through the door; they're opening it for them and showing them all the delicious cookies inside. > There are plenty of jobs that have many more women than men. Do you see massive outrage because the workforce is lacking in those jobs? Yes. There are plenty of initiatives to get more men into nursing, fashion, and teaching. Just because you didn't take the three seconds to search for them doesn't mean they don't exist. You don't hear about them because, what a shocker, you aren't part of those communities. It's almost like you're on a website dedicated to tech culture or something!
- dmn757 13y ago
  For starters, no one is saying it's pg's job. The interviewer asked him if he felt there was anything he could be doing to get more women into YC. Of course this is just my opinion, but to me the tone of the interview sounds as though the interviewer was suggesting that pg should be doing more, himself, to get more women into the field. Second, "encourage" does not mean "order someone to do something." No one is going to up women, putting their hands on their shoulders, shaking them, and telling them they must be developers! Instead, they're creating spaces that are welcoming and friendly to women. They aren't forcing them through the door; they're opening it for them and showing them all the delicious cookies inside. I never said "order someone to do something." In fact I specifically used the word "encourage," but I guess you can twist my words to try and further your agenda. Stating that you want to create female friendly spaces is inherently sexist. I don't know, I think we just differ philosophically and I am more of the mind that people should be friendly regardless of what/who you are. I just don't think that we need special programs for every single "group" that is not interested in something. Yes. There are plenty of initiatives to get more men into nursing, fashion, and teaching. Just because you didn't take the three seconds to search for them doesn't mean they don't exist. You don't hear about them because, what a shocker, you aren't part of those communities. It's almost like you're on a website dedicated to tech culture or something! As someone who originally studied to be a male nurse, yes I am aware of those programs. Please try to not be so condescending.