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Where do you think female interest in jewelry comes from? Are you implying that interest in jewelry is inborn in women? You are begging the question. The profe

Where do you think female interest in jewelry comes from? Are you implying that interest in jewelry is inborn in women? You are begging the question. The professor is concerned with general culture's image of women, which is perpetuated when female programmers are shown to be printing pink jewelry and perpetually enraptured by childish flowery borders. The existence of individual women who enjoy jewelry for the aesthetics are of no consequence to what the professor is concerned with. You are responding to an assumption that isn't there, but rather one you've imagined as a substitute for an understanding of the her social analysis. >"It says that the only way you can be interested in technology is if it is girly," said Wheat. "I'm very girly. My room is purple. I have floral bedding. I think I'll probably be a very feminine engineer. I just don't like the idea of being pigeonholed."

guard-of-terra 12y ago
"Are you implying that interest in jewelry is inborn in women?" This is an extremelly important question with regards to history of our species, so if you by some chance have an answer be sure to share it with us along with rationale.
- detcader 12y ago
  It's not. Such a thing would be impossible. Look up "gender socialization" and read about girlhood: http://www.metafilter.com/121190/teenage-girls-they-havent-been-living-theyve-been-performing http://www.metafilter.com/121190/teenage-girls-they-havent-b... http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/womens-blog/2014/jan/10/little-girls-deserve-better-toys-sexism http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/womens-blog/2014/jan... http://sodisarmingdarling.tumblr.com/post/34106027759/what-its-like-being-a-teen-girl http://sodisarmingdarling.tumblr.com/post/34106027759/what-i... http://rebeccahains.wordpress.com/2014/01/20/is-my-son-smart-is-my-daughter-skinny/ http://rebeccahains.wordpress.com/2014/01/20/is-my-son-smart...
  - guard-of-terra 12y ago
    The articles you quote, while flamebait, don't try to answer the forementioned question. As for "impossible" - why?
    - detcader 12y ago
      That women talking about being girls is "flamebait" says more about you than the articles.
  - spindritf 12y ago
    Why would a tendency to adorn oneself not be innate? Seems pretty universal to me. Why should nurture be the default assumption? I'm sorry but your answer is terrible, akin to "look up sexual selection and read about genetics."
    - detcader 12y ago
      "a tendency to adorn" is not the same as "a tendency to adorn oneself with jewelry", which is what I've been talking about -- are you talking to me? Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Why should the non-existence of God be the default assumption?
      - spindritf 12y ago
        Why is nature a somehow extraordinary claim and nurture is not? That was my question. "a tendency to adorn" is not the same as "a tendency to adorn oneself with jewelry" The latter is a subset of the former, OK. But I completely don't see the relevance.
        detcader 12y ago
        The most complex kinds of objects that chimpanzees craft are tools. To posit that a psychological propensity for pieces of jewelry (a human invention) is inborn in only women is extraordinary and reeks of post-hoc logic. To posit that it is cultural meme is obviously not. Do you not understand this intuitively? Are you being 100% honest with me?
        andrewflnr 12y ago
        I think you're fighting a strawman here. The "human invention" part is what led the other commenters to generalize from "jewelry" to "adornment", which is a more accurate expression of the idea anyway. In this theory, jewelry is only a close-to-hand vehicle for expressing deeper inborn urges, also satisfied by elaborate clothing, hairstyles, hats and head-dresses, war paint, etc. Further, it's not present only in women, it just seems stronger. Given the obvious morphological and other behavior differences between men and women, it's entirely plausible that such a thing could be inborn.
  - andrewflnr 12y ago
    I think what's happening here, and in a lot of other cases, is that culture [0] tends to sieze on real (in this case IMO) asymmetries (girls care more about appearance than men) and blow it far out of proportion. I'm not justifying it, not even close; I find it horrifying. I'm saying that it has a seed in reality, mixed with a freight of repression and poorly-handled social revolutions, a beautiful thing corrupted. You have to wonder, if not from some inborn difference, how did this vast asymmetry come about? All this to say, those articles are not evidence about any putative inborn interest in jewelry. They're perfectly consistent with either theory. [0] Yes that's a bit of a vague term. I take it to mean something like, "what everyone around you is saying/doing".
    - detcader 12y ago
      Should we assume that men have a natural tendency to cry a bit less because men cry less often? The articles are more strongly consistent with the theory of gender socialization -- that the media et al coerces girls to focus (obsess, kill themselves over,) appearance, and without it it would be impossible to say to what degree such a thing as actually "biological". The rational course of action is to assume an absence of such a theoretical reality until evidence is found, just as with anything.
      - andrewflnr 12y ago
        Yes. Men are more concerned with being/appearing strong, again, re-inforced and exaggerated by cultural norms. This also makes us tend to buy relatively useless tools/toys like power tools and big trucks, to make us feel strong. IMO this is a close analogue to the common female concern with aesthetic adornment. Women mock us, justifiably, for the dominance contests we like to get into, stemming from the same desire to be strong. Of course, women have their own analogues of our dominance contests. The deep fundamentals are the same, what differs is more our interpretation. Both sets of instincts stem from where we first look to power. Heck, they could just be subconscious logical deductions from the physical asymmetries between sexes, and the nature of our reproductive drives, but at that point the distinction almost doesn't matter, because it's still going to outlive any education campaign to stop it. This all seems obvious to me. We already have abundant evidence of a fundamental difference, it's all around us. It seems a more elegant explanation than all this madness occurring with no trigger at all, which is the view you seem to advocate. I don't know what else I can say.
andrewflnr 12y ago
It doesn't really matter why women like jewelry. It seems to me (as a man (with a sister)) that if it's not biological, it's sufficiently deeply ingrained as to make little difference in the short term. That's where they are today, so it at least makes sense to try to talk to them there. But I think you and I agree it should not be the central point. We've got to figure out how to teach math properly.
- detcader 12y ago
  Pop-up ads make sense too, don't they?
  - andrewflnr 12y ago
    In a sense, but that's a bad analogy. If you want to make unflattering comparisons to advertising, the general concept of targetted advertising is closer.
jorgis 12y ago
Passing out mirrors and nail files at a social event for women interested in programming is like passing out hammers and dimensional lumber at a social event for men interested in fashion design.
- jiggy2011 12y ago
  Probably more like passing out deodorant or shaving kits.
tzs 12y ago
> Where do you think female interest in jewelry comes from? Are you implying that interest in jewelry is inborn in women? You are begging the question I don't care where it comes from. Do you think that if a woman likes jewelry, she needs to justify it as some inborn attraction before it is acceptable?
- detcader 12y ago
  Your comments that "women at the mall seem to like jewelry" eminates the implicit assumption that this is a natural trend that will persist deterministically (as in, women who don't like jewelry are natural outliers). I am merely inquiring what that assumption is actually based on.
  - taeric 12y ago
    You are assuming the natural part. The original comment was simply about dominant view. Could it be that it is strictly societal based? Yeah, why not? Does that change things? Remember, the desire is to get women into technology. Not to change societal norms on anything else.
mercer 12y ago
I find that an important question to ask when it comes to these discussions is whether the goal is to be pragmatic toward reaching a specific goal or to be 'correct'. Another important question is asking yourself to what extent one can achieve both, as that would be preferable. I haven't spent a lot of time thinking about this, so I could be very wrong. However, I'm inclined to think that if the goal is to get more (young) women to work in tech, making things more 'girly' might not be a bad idea. Ideally this would not be necessary, and I don't consider the approach 'correct', but as one of the possible approaches it might be the most pragmatic. And there could be plenty of initiatives in parallel that take a more correct or ideological approach. This reminds me a bit of a workshop I heard about from a friend. It was a whiskey and wool event where participants would do whiskey tasting (with a Scottish-looking man guiding them), but also learn how to knit. The goal was specifically to get guys to try knitting, and it was very effective. These kinds of things can be fine, in my opinion, as long as they're not the only options. Then again, I'm not a woman, so I don't know if perhaps it's more offensive than it seems to me.

guard-of-terra 12y ago

"Are you implying that interest in jewelry is inborn in women?" This is an extremelly important question with regards to history of our species, so if you by some chance have an answer be sure to share it with us along with rationale.

detcader 12y ago
It's not. Such a thing would be impossible. Look up "gender socialization" and read about girlhood: http://www.metafilter.com/121190/teenage-girls-they-havent-been-living-theyve-been-performing http://www.metafilter.com/121190/teenage-girls-they-havent-b... http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/womens-blog/2014/jan/10/little-girls-deserve-better-toys-sexism http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/womens-blog/2014/jan... http://sodisarmingdarling.tumblr.com/post/34106027759/what-its-like-being-a-teen-girl http://sodisarmingdarling.tumblr.com/post/34106027759/what-i... http://rebeccahains.wordpress.com/2014/01/20/is-my-son-smart-is-my-daughter-skinny/ http://rebeccahains.wordpress.com/2014/01/20/is-my-son-smart...
- guard-of-terra 12y ago
  The articles you quote, while flamebait, don't try to answer the forementioned question. As for "impossible" - why?
  - detcader 12y ago
    That women talking about being girls is "flamebait" says more about you than the articles.
- spindritf 12y ago
  Why would a tendency to adorn oneself not be innate? Seems pretty universal to me. Why should nurture be the default assumption? I'm sorry but your answer is terrible, akin to "look up sexual selection and read about genetics."
  - detcader 12y ago
    "a tendency to adorn" is not the same as "a tendency to adorn oneself with jewelry", which is what I've been talking about -- are you talking to me? Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Why should the non-existence of God be the default assumption?
    - spindritf 12y ago
      Why is nature a somehow extraordinary claim and nurture is not? That was my question. "a tendency to adorn" is not the same as "a tendency to adorn oneself with jewelry" The latter is a subset of the former, OK. But I completely don't see the relevance.
      - detcader 12y ago
        The most complex kinds of objects that chimpanzees craft are tools. To posit that a psychological propensity for pieces of jewelry (a human invention) is inborn in only women is extraordinary and reeks of post-hoc logic. To posit that it is cultural meme is obviously not. Do you not understand this intuitively? Are you being 100% honest with me?
        andrewflnr 12y ago
        I think you're fighting a strawman here. The "human invention" part is what led the other commenters to generalize from "jewelry" to "adornment", which is a more accurate expression of the idea anyway. In this theory, jewelry is only a close-to-hand vehicle for expressing deeper inborn urges, also satisfied by elaborate clothing, hairstyles, hats and head-dresses, war paint, etc. Further, it's not present only in women, it just seems stronger. Given the obvious morphological and other behavior differences between men and women, it's entirely plausible that such a thing could be inborn.
- andrewflnr 12y ago
  I think what's happening here, and in a lot of other cases, is that culture [0] tends to sieze on real (in this case IMO) asymmetries (girls care more about appearance than men) and blow it far out of proportion. I'm not justifying it, not even close; I find it horrifying. I'm saying that it has a seed in reality, mixed with a freight of repression and poorly-handled social revolutions, a beautiful thing corrupted. You have to wonder, if not from some inborn difference, how did this vast asymmetry come about? All this to say, those articles are not evidence about any putative inborn interest in jewelry. They're perfectly consistent with either theory. [0] Yes that's a bit of a vague term. I take it to mean something like, "what everyone around you is saying/doing".
  - detcader 12y ago
    Should we assume that men have a natural tendency to cry a bit less because men cry less often? The articles are more strongly consistent with the theory of gender socialization -- that the media et al coerces girls to focus (obsess, kill themselves over,) appearance, and without it it would be impossible to say to what degree such a thing as actually "biological". The rational course of action is to assume an absence of such a theoretical reality until evidence is found, just as with anything.
    - andrewflnr 12y ago
      Yes. Men are more concerned with being/appearing strong, again, re-inforced and exaggerated by cultural norms. This also makes us tend to buy relatively useless tools/toys like power tools and big trucks, to make us feel strong. IMO this is a close analogue to the common female concern with aesthetic adornment. Women mock us, justifiably, for the dominance contests we like to get into, stemming from the same desire to be strong. Of course, women have their own analogues of our dominance contests. The deep fundamentals are the same, what differs is more our interpretation. Both sets of instincts stem from where we first look to power. Heck, they could just be subconscious logical deductions from the physical asymmetries between sexes, and the nature of our reproductive drives, but at that point the distinction almost doesn't matter, because it's still going to outlive any education campaign to stop it. This all seems obvious to me. We already have abundant evidence of a fundamental difference, it's all around us. It seems a more elegant explanation than all this madness occurring with no trigger at all, which is the view you seem to advocate. I don't know what else I can say.

andrewflnr 12y ago

It doesn't really matter why women like jewelry. It seems to me (as a man (with a sister)) that if it's not biological, it's sufficiently deeply ingrained as to make little difference in the short term. That's where they are today, so it at least makes sense to try to talk to them there. But I think you and I agree it should not be the central point. We've got to figure out how to teach math properly.

detcader 12y ago
Pop-up ads make sense too, don't they?
- andrewflnr 12y ago
  In a sense, but that's a bad analogy. If you want to make unflattering comparisons to advertising, the general concept of targetted advertising is closer.

jorgis 12y ago

Passing out mirrors and nail files at a social event for women interested in programming is like passing out hammers and dimensional lumber at a social event for men interested in fashion design.

jiggy2011 12y ago
Probably more like passing out deodorant or shaving kits.

tzs 12y ago

> Where do you think female interest in jewelry comes from? Are you implying that interest in jewelry is inborn in women? You are begging the question I don't care where it comes from. Do you think that if a woman likes jewelry, she needs to justify it as some inborn attraction before it is acceptable?

detcader 12y ago
Your comments that "women at the mall seem to like jewelry" eminates the implicit assumption that this is a natural trend that will persist deterministically (as in, women who don't like jewelry are natural outliers). I am merely inquiring what that assumption is actually based on.
- taeric 12y ago
  You are assuming the natural part. The original comment was simply about dominant view. Could it be that it is strictly societal based? Yeah, why not? Does that change things? Remember, the desire is to get women into technology. Not to change societal norms on anything else.

mercer 12y ago

I find that an important question to ask when it comes to these discussions is whether the goal is to be pragmatic toward reaching a specific goal or to be 'correct'. Another important question is asking yourself to what extent one can achieve both, as that would be preferable. I haven't spent a lot of time thinking about this, so I could be very wrong. However, I'm inclined to think that if the goal is to get more (young) women to work in tech, making things more 'girly' might not be a bad idea. Ideally this would not be necessary, and I don't consider the approach 'correct', but as one of the possible approaches it might be the most pragmatic. And there could be plenty of initiatives in parallel that take a more correct or ideological approach. This reminds me a bit of a workshop I heard about from a friend. It was a whiskey and wool event where participants would do whiskey tasting (with a Scottish-looking man guiding them), but also learn how to knit. The goal was specifically to get guys to try knitting, and it was very effective. These kinds of things can be fine, in my opinion, as long as they're not the only options. Then again, I'm not a woman, so I don't know if perhaps it's more offensive than it seems to me.