6 ms·

To the Boys of HackerNews: I am a Male Founder who Codes but no one cares because there's too many of us and that makes us not at all interesting. Have women h

To the Boys of HackerNews: I am a Male Founder who Codes but no one cares because there's too many of us and that makes us not at all interesting. Have women have ever been robbed of being able to code like voting? Why does it receive so much attention? What adversity did they need to overcome to be where they are? Is it physical like someone who suffers from carpal tunnel syndrome or glaucoma overcoming their disability? Is it mental like someone who suffers from dyslexia mastering programming? Or was it political like a North Korean who discovered coding while facing imminent persecution for the forbidden knowledge? I know women who can code just like men and they are great at it but their gender has nothing to do with it, it's just their ability and strengths as developers. Does a person's gender really merit so much of our attention when the basis for the argument is as superficial as a binary label society have placed on people, never mind the the other categories of people that fall in between and who are shunned.

smtddr 13y ago
You sound like you don't believe there is any significant gender bias or sexism in the tech field. Is that what you think?
- ekianjo 13y ago
  And you think it's by putting every message under the "I am a woman, look, I can code too!" will actually change whatever gender bias there may be in a positive way ? On the contrary, I think it goes in the wrong way, by highlighting the wrong differences instead of the common points no matter the genders.
  - mercurial 13y ago
    Why not? This is an industry with precious few role models outside of heterosexual white males. Highlighting the fact that it is, indeed, possible to succeed in this field without being a member of this category is good, and encourages more diversity. It may even, you know, be a motivating factor for some.
- greenyoda 13y ago
  I'm skeptical that drawing special attention to female founders who are coders will reduce gender-biased behaviors. The most effective way of combating gender bias is for the people who run companies to stop tolerating that kind of behavior in their employees. Do you have an employee who makes disparaging remarks to another employee based on their sex? Then tell them to cut it out, and if they don't, fire them. Do your hire "brogrammers" who behave like frat boys at work? Then start hiring people who can behave in a civilized manner in professional environments. That's the only way that real progress will be made.
  - smtddr 13y ago
    I think the problem should be tackled from both sides. The people who already make up the tech field, mostly men, should absolutely behave in a professional(non-frat-boy) manner as you say. _AND_ everyone already in the tech field should let girls & women outside of the field know that they are welcome & fully capable of entering the tech field by showing more role-models and more blogs like this one.
ekianjo 13y ago
Probably because some women think they are ostracized because of their gender only, and not because of their skills (or lack of?). It's always funny to see these kind of gender kind of statements, you don't see the same thing with races at all like "I am Asian and I code" - I just find this line of reasonning by separating people with one criteria (gender/race/eye color/hair color/whatever) really preposterous, yet some women insist on seeing things this way.
- daleharvey 13y ago
  Your comment is fairly disgusting, it admits that women are ostracized in the industry but then implies its because they ... as a gender ... lack the skill to code. But the rest of the statement was ironic given recent popular story about the topic - http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2014/01/programmer_privilege_as_an_asian_male_computer_science_major_everyone_gave.html http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2014/01/...
  - ekianjo 13y ago
    Notice the question mark after the "lack of skills" - I'm just saying this may be one reason among others. Not everything revolves around gender.
    - daleharvey 13y ago
      Even accepting it as a questionable hypothesis is ridiculous. Everything does not revolve around gender, which is why a lot of people (not just 'some women') question why this industry revolves entirely around the male gender. Comments like yours help exacerbate that.
      - boyaka 13y ago
        Questioning about whether something revolves around gender is kinda making us revolve more around gender.
      - ekianjo 13y ago
daleharvey 13y ago
Every female would have had to get over the constant systematic assumption that they didnt belong in this field, from the culture being the only girl in the room / on the team / to the constant assumptions that they are in marketing at meetups and generally just reminded at ever step that they 'dont belong' You are right, it is not the level of oppression as seen in North Korea, but it is severe and blindlingly obvious, and by making that statement you are helping increase that hostility towards one gender, that isnt nice.
- peteretep 13y ago
  > Every female would have had to get over the constant > systematic assumption that they didnt belong in this field, > from the culture being the only girl in the room / on the > team / to the constant assumptions that they are in > marketing at meetups and generally just reminded at ever > step that they 'dont belong' Which they have in many more prestigious and traditionally more masculine fields, with medicine being the prime example.
- thisone 13y ago
  > to the constant assumptions that they are in marketing at meetups I often get "so, you're a designer?"
jmnicolas 13y ago
Yes exactly. I'm a bit fed up with people advocating more women in <insert male dominated industry here>. As far as I can tell these same people don't complain that teachers and nurses jobs are mainly occupied by women. Everybody seem to agree that a nursing job is not attractive for most men. Maybe the reason that women are few in tech is because these professions are not attractive to them.
- kaybe 13y ago
  I heard tons of people complain about that, though for other reasons - it would be really good for boys (and their social and academic performance) to have male rolemodels, the argument goes. Consider the reasons for non-attractiveness. In the case of nursing, it's bad pay as well, presumably. In the case of IT, the general unfriendliness is one reason, though there might be others. Shouldn't we just remove the removable ones? (I don't first-up reject the theory that there might be 'biological' reasons that apply to the majority of people, but we won't really find out until we try. And there will always be outliers.) (Why, you ask? So that when I walk into a room, I could be the boss too, and not automatically be tagged with 'secretary'. It's about status and power in the end, maybe?)
  - Zombieball 13y ago
    Just curious why you think nursing is bad pay? Or what do you consider to be bad? Where I live (Vancouver, BC.) entry level (students) pay for nurses is $50K/year. Average earnings for nurses I believe is on the order of $70-90K/year though.
    - kamaal 13y ago
      I think it is mainly because nursing isn't a 'career' kind of a job. You can make $50K an year, but 10 years down the lane, now what? While your engineering friend is aiming to sell his start up for some millions of dollars, your job doesn't even have the scope to even attempt anything like that even if you wanted to.
      - 13y ago
ps4fanboy 13y ago
While I agree with what your saying, the common man has only very recently and in most places 50 years more than the common woman been able to vote. It is a relatively new invention.
Zombieball 13y ago
Unfortunately I believe there are gender stereo types in our culture which make many men view women as inferior coders (both in the workplace situation and an interview environment) simply because they are female. A situation where I have experienced this first hand is where a fellow SDE (female) colleague by chance happened to sit at a desk next to one of the VPs at our organization. Many people instinctively thought she was the VP's assistant and spoke to her as such. She was a fantastic coder, had a PhD, but because she sat next to a man in a position of power was assumed to be an assistant. Not trying to sound like a feminist (I am far from one) but I believe what women are being robbed of is 'equality'. It is a real problem in our industry.
- JonnieCache 13y ago
  >Not trying to sound like a feminist (I am far from one) but I believe what women are being robbed of is 'equality'. Does not compute.
  - Zombieball 13y ago
    Haha, until this comment thread I don't think I ever would have written that sentence. Maybe I should go buy a bra to burn...
    - JonnieCache 13y ago
      http://www.snopes.com/history/american/burnbra.asp http://www.snopes.com/history/american/burnbra.asp
detcader 13y ago
Gender isn't "just a binary label," it's a system of normalized roles, and girls and women, historically and now, were/are steered to roles that involve carework, "womenly" professions, etc. In this system, women who find interest in coding, despite all the pressures to just stick to their role, need all the role models they can get. Could you tell me, did you read the article before making this comment?
theorique 13y ago
Bravo. What females need to realize is that they have the same God-given talents as anybody else (i.e. men). I know many girls who are great coders and can stand toe-to-toe with men in a coding throwdown. But they don't make their sex a thing that everybody else needs to recognize, they just get on with the job. You don't read/hear them blogging and whining about how hard they have it because they use their talent to overcome obstacles, not complain about them.

smtddr 13y ago

You sound like you don't believe there is any significant gender bias or sexism in the tech field. Is that what you think?

ekianjo 13y ago
And you think it's by putting every message under the "I am a woman, look, I can code too!" will actually change whatever gender bias there may be in a positive way ? On the contrary, I think it goes in the wrong way, by highlighting the wrong differences instead of the common points no matter the genders.
- mercurial 13y ago
  Why not? This is an industry with precious few role models outside of heterosexual white males. Highlighting the fact that it is, indeed, possible to succeed in this field without being a member of this category is good, and encourages more diversity. It may even, you know, be a motivating factor for some.
greenyoda 13y ago
I'm skeptical that drawing special attention to female founders who are coders will reduce gender-biased behaviors. The most effective way of combating gender bias is for the people who run companies to stop tolerating that kind of behavior in their employees. Do you have an employee who makes disparaging remarks to another employee based on their sex? Then tell them to cut it out, and if they don't, fire them. Do your hire "brogrammers" who behave like frat boys at work? Then start hiring people who can behave in a civilized manner in professional environments. That's the only way that real progress will be made.
- smtddr 13y ago
  I think the problem should be tackled from both sides. The people who already make up the tech field, mostly men, should absolutely behave in a professional(non-frat-boy) manner as you say. _AND_ everyone already in the tech field should let girls & women outside of the field know that they are welcome & fully capable of entering the tech field by showing more role-models and more blogs like this one.

ekianjo 13y ago

Probably because some women think they are ostracized because of their gender only, and not because of their skills (or lack of?). It's always funny to see these kind of gender kind of statements, you don't see the same thing with races at all like "I am Asian and I code" - I just find this line of reasonning by separating people with one criteria (gender/race/eye color/hair color/whatever) really preposterous, yet some women insist on seeing things this way.

daleharvey 13y ago
Your comment is fairly disgusting, it admits that women are ostracized in the industry but then implies its because they ... as a gender ... lack the skill to code. But the rest of the statement was ironic given recent popular story about the topic - http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2014/01/programmer_privilege_as_an_asian_male_computer_science_major_everyone_gave.html http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2014/01/...
- ekianjo 13y ago
  Notice the question mark after the "lack of skills" - I'm just saying this may be one reason among others. Not everything revolves around gender.
  - daleharvey 13y ago
    Even accepting it as a questionable hypothesis is ridiculous. Everything does not revolve around gender, which is why a lot of people (not just 'some women') question why this industry revolves entirely around the male gender. Comments like yours help exacerbate that.
    - boyaka 13y ago
      Questioning about whether something revolves around gender is kinda making us revolve more around gender.
    - ekianjo 13y ago

daleharvey 13y ago

Every female would have had to get over the constant systematic assumption that they didnt belong in this field, from the culture being the only girl in the room / on the team / to the constant assumptions that they are in marketing at meetups and generally just reminded at ever step that they 'dont belong' You are right, it is not the level of oppression as seen in North Korea, but it is severe and blindlingly obvious, and by making that statement you are helping increase that hostility towards one gender, that isnt nice.

peteretep 13y ago
> Every female would have had to get over the constant > systematic assumption that they didnt belong in this field, > from the culture being the only girl in the room / on the > team / to the constant assumptions that they are in > marketing at meetups and generally just reminded at ever > step that they 'dont belong' Which they have in many more prestigious and traditionally more masculine fields, with medicine being the prime example.
thisone 13y ago
> to the constant assumptions that they are in marketing at meetups I often get "so, you're a designer?"

jmnicolas 13y ago

Yes exactly. I'm a bit fed up with people advocating more women in <insert male dominated industry here>. As far as I can tell these same people don't complain that teachers and nurses jobs are mainly occupied by women. Everybody seem to agree that a nursing job is not attractive for most men. Maybe the reason that women are few in tech is because these professions are not attractive to them.

kaybe 13y ago
I heard tons of people complain about that, though for other reasons - it would be really good for boys (and their social and academic performance) to have male rolemodels, the argument goes. Consider the reasons for non-attractiveness. In the case of nursing, it's bad pay as well, presumably. In the case of IT, the general unfriendliness is one reason, though there might be others. Shouldn't we just remove the removable ones? (I don't first-up reject the theory that there might be 'biological' reasons that apply to the majority of people, but we won't really find out until we try. And there will always be outliers.) (Why, you ask? So that when I walk into a room, I could be the boss too, and not automatically be tagged with 'secretary'. It's about status and power in the end, maybe?)
- Zombieball 13y ago
  Just curious why you think nursing is bad pay? Or what do you consider to be bad? Where I live (Vancouver, BC.) entry level (students) pay for nurses is $50K/year. Average earnings for nurses I believe is on the order of $70-90K/year though.
  - kamaal 13y ago
    I think it is mainly because nursing isn't a 'career' kind of a job. You can make $50K an year, but 10 years down the lane, now what? While your engineering friend is aiming to sell his start up for some millions of dollars, your job doesn't even have the scope to even attempt anything like that even if you wanted to.
    - 13y ago

ps4fanboy 13y ago

While I agree with what your saying, the common man has only very recently and in most places 50 years more than the common woman been able to vote. It is a relatively new invention.

Zombieball 13y ago

Unfortunately I believe there are gender stereo types in our culture which make many men view women as inferior coders (both in the workplace situation and an interview environment) simply because they are female. A situation where I have experienced this first hand is where a fellow SDE (female) colleague by chance happened to sit at a desk next to one of the VPs at our organization. Many people instinctively thought she was the VP's assistant and spoke to her as such. She was a fantastic coder, had a PhD, but because she sat next to a man in a position of power was assumed to be an assistant. Not trying to sound like a feminist (I am far from one) but I believe what women are being robbed of is 'equality'. It is a real problem in our industry.

JonnieCache 13y ago
>Not trying to sound like a feminist (I am far from one) but I believe what women are being robbed of is 'equality'. Does not compute.
- Zombieball 13y ago
  Haha, until this comment thread I don't think I ever would have written that sentence. Maybe I should go buy a bra to burn...
  - JonnieCache 13y ago
    http://www.snopes.com/history/american/burnbra.asp http://www.snopes.com/history/american/burnbra.asp

detcader 13y ago

Gender isn't "just a binary label," it's a system of normalized roles, and girls and women, historically and now, were/are steered to roles that involve carework, "womenly" professions, etc. In this system, women who find interest in coding, despite all the pressures to just stick to their role, need all the role models they can get. Could you tell me, did you read the article before making this comment?

theorique 13y ago

Bravo. What females need to realize is that they have the same God-given talents as anybody else (i.e. men). I know many girls who are great coders and can stand toe-to-toe with men in a coding throwdown. But they don't make their sex a thing that everybody else needs to recognize, they just get on with the job. You don't read/hear them blogging and whining about how hard they have it because they use their talent to overcome obstacles, not complain about them.