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Women in Tech aren't a hive mind. Like the author states out everyone is different. Heck, there even differences in companies, regions, industries, ect. The rea

by alukima 12y ago

Women in Tech aren't a hive mind. Like the author states out everyone is different. Heck, there even differences in companies, regions, industries, ect. The reason I point this out is because these threads sometimes devolve into users taking one comment and using it to derail conversations. Like claiming that X is invalid because it can also affect men, therefore Y and Z are also invalid. I am a woman and recently moved from San Francisco to Portland. The tech community feels totally different here. I've gone to a few meetups and haven't dealt with any of the small (but annoying, insulting and constant) issues I'd learned to try to ignore in San Francisco. It's really re-energized my love for the industry and what I do. If I had taken this survey before and after my move my answers would have been drastically different.

marquis 12y ago
San Francisco in particular has really visible "bro" culture it feels to me. It's probably just a reflection of the kinds of perks the industry provides, and of the "gold rush" itself. Smaller cities have a far more inclusive experience, for sure. Watch a Bay area bus drop all its people on an evening, it's a bunch of young men pouring back into the city. Friends of mine who commute say no-one speaks to anyone, ever. I find that really sad and can certainly say if there were at least 30% women on those buses nearly everyone would know each other a little.
- Dewie 12y ago
  > I find that really sad and can certainly say if there were at least 30% women on those buses nearly everyone would know each other a little. Why?
  - alukima 12y ago
    Women are socialized to be more social. https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=women%20are%20more%20social https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...
    - Dewie 12y ago
      If you say so. In my experience women aren't any more social than men in a setting full of mutual strangers, which I guess these busses full of strangers are.
      - untog 12y ago
        I mean, the OP isn't saying so, they're point to a ton of evidence (admittedly, a Google link isn't the best, but). Countering with "in my experience" is just an anecdote.
        Dewie 12y ago
        Bullshit. When I replied to Akumi, there was no google-link; that was edited in later. Not that I would consider a google-link evidence of anything; the only thing that it is evidence of is what is "common wisdom". Secondly, a google search is different for everyone: mine showed a lot of links about how women are bigger users of social media, which hardly helps answer any questions in this context. Thirdly, the question is not whether they are more social in general, but whether they are more social in a context of mostly mutual strangers. Even though women might be more social in general, that doesn't necessarily imply that they are more social with strangers. I don't view the google-link as evidence; more like a way of saying let-me-google-that-for-you-(that wasn't so hard, was it?). You know... kind of like so many other "women are different from men" are "obvious".
  - marquis 12y ago
    I was speaking in regards to the tech buses, where you have the same people on board every day. It's a natural inclination for myself, and many other women I suppose, to build relationships with people I see regularly.
    - Dewie 12y ago
      So you would, for example, go up to someone that you see regularly but who you don't know and try to get to know them, either through some generic opener/remark/question or more bluntly ('Hi! I've seen you around here a lot lately and...). That doesn't really happen in my culture. People need an actual "excuse" to engage someone, like being at the same event or working together or practising the same sport. You can't just, you know, talk to someone because you want to be social for the hell of it - there needs to be some context. And happening to be in transit at about the same hours of the day doesn't qualify. This is how people in general are (here); both men and women. I guess you wouldn't like it here.
      - selimthegrim 12y ago
        Where is "here"?
        Dewie 12y ago
        The land of non-America (Norway to be more specific).
      - greglindahl 12y ago
        Half the people in this sub-thread think it's about public transit, and the other half are talking about the company bus systems that take tech workers from homes in San Francisco to jobs in the Silicon Valley. These company buses generally have a single drop-off point, and if you look at the top of the sub-thread, the bus is dropping "all its people". This is a long-winded way of saying that the excuse is that you work at the same company as the people you frequently see on the particular bus you ride most days.
      - yarou 12y ago
- alukima 12y ago
  The PDX Ruby meetup had so many women, the feeling was amazing! People were far more social before and after the meetup than anything I every witness in SF, and I try to go to 2-3 meetups a week.
  - aragot 12y ago
    You see, this is saying "women are more social". You didn't say it, but the next step is "Women are equally good to men about programming, plus they have the advantage of being social". Which makes me wonder: - As a man, am I just less clever? - Where will my job go, if women are apt to take over all our management jobs since they're smarter in relationships and equally good at technical stuff? - We all agree it's extremely bad when we hear: "Ah no, women aren't clever enough for programming", so what about the opposite? - Personnaly I have a terrible lack of confidence when it comes to certain tasks. When women experience it, we help them overcome it. Can someone help me also, even though I'm a man? Stereotyping women on being more social is just unfair, because while we think this way, we fail to see something positive in men. Edit: You're allowed to downvote, yes, but it would work on excluding me. If you want to do something good to society and something inclusive, you could rather add a comment attaching positive stigma to men, because we rarely hear positive things about men, and that's probably a key cornerstone of the resistence to helping women more.
    - rayiner 12y ago
      Women are more social, men are more represented among both geniuses and criminals. I think even among progressives the resistance to accepting the veracity of both points is halfhearted.
      - pron 12y ago
        > I think even among progressives the resistance to accepting the veracity of both points is halfhearted. That's because when it comes to society, data can sometimes be dangerous. Data tells us how the world looks, but whereas in nature the laws are fixed (or so we hope), society is very fluid. This can confuse people. Any data about society is a snapshot of current conditions: it doesn't mean that things have never been different or won't be different, and it most certainly does not tell us that this is how things should be (the latter is the biggest difference between the natural and the social sciences -- in nature there's only "is" while in society there's "is" and "ought" and the two are rarely the same; also, we have at least some power over the structure of our society, while changing nature can be tricky). This is why data means very different things in physics and sociology, and why -- at least by default, or until proven otherwise -- any sociological data should be understood as: this is how things currently are; should we try to change them?
- imanaccount247 12y ago
  What? Busses around here are pretty 50/50 and nobody talks to each other ever. That's not a male thing.
  - alukima 12y ago
    I think they are talking about tech buses, not public transit.
    - jeorgun 12y ago
      I don't think OP's "here" meant SF, necessarily; their point was that having more women on buses doesn't automatically translate to rich social interactions.

by alukima 12y ago

marquis 12y ago

San Francisco in particular has really visible "bro" culture it feels to me. It's probably just a reflection of the kinds of perks the industry provides, and of the "gold rush" itself. Smaller cities have a far more inclusive experience, for sure. Watch a Bay area bus drop all its people on an evening, it's a bunch of young men pouring back into the city. Friends of mine who commute say no-one speaks to anyone, ever. I find that really sad and can certainly say if there were at least 30% women on those buses nearly everyone would know each other a little.

Dewie 12y ago
> I find that really sad and can certainly say if there were at least 30% women on those buses nearly everyone would know each other a little. Why?
- alukima 12y ago
  Women are socialized to be more social. https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=women%20are%20more%20social https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...
  - Dewie 12y ago
    If you say so. In my experience women aren't any more social than men in a setting full of mutual strangers, which I guess these busses full of strangers are.
    - untog 12y ago
      I mean, the OP isn't saying so, they're point to a ton of evidence (admittedly, a Google link isn't the best, but). Countering with "in my experience" is just an anecdote.
      - Dewie 12y ago
        Bullshit. When I replied to Akumi, there was no google-link; that was edited in later. Not that I would consider a google-link evidence of anything; the only thing that it is evidence of is what is "common wisdom". Secondly, a google search is different for everyone: mine showed a lot of links about how women are bigger users of social media, which hardly helps answer any questions in this context. Thirdly, the question is not whether they are more social in general, but whether they are more social in a context of mostly mutual strangers. Even though women might be more social in general, that doesn't necessarily imply that they are more social with strangers. I don't view the google-link as evidence; more like a way of saying let-me-google-that-for-you-(that wasn't so hard, was it?). You know... kind of like so many other "women are different from men" are "obvious".
- marquis 12y ago
  I was speaking in regards to the tech buses, where you have the same people on board every day. It's a natural inclination for myself, and many other women I suppose, to build relationships with people I see regularly.
  - Dewie 12y ago
    So you would, for example, go up to someone that you see regularly but who you don't know and try to get to know them, either through some generic opener/remark/question or more bluntly ('Hi! I've seen you around here a lot lately and...). That doesn't really happen in my culture. People need an actual "excuse" to engage someone, like being at the same event or working together or practising the same sport. You can't just, you know, talk to someone because you want to be social for the hell of it - there needs to be some context. And happening to be in transit at about the same hours of the day doesn't qualify. This is how people in general are (here); both men and women. I guess you wouldn't like it here.
    - selimthegrim 12y ago
      Where is "here"?
      - Dewie 12y ago
        The land of non-America (Norway to be more specific).
    - greglindahl 12y ago
      Half the people in this sub-thread think it's about public transit, and the other half are talking about the company bus systems that take tech workers from homes in San Francisco to jobs in the Silicon Valley. These company buses generally have a single drop-off point, and if you look at the top of the sub-thread, the bus is dropping "all its people". This is a long-winded way of saying that the excuse is that you work at the same company as the people you frequently see on the particular bus you ride most days.
    - yarou 12y ago
alukima 12y ago
The PDX Ruby meetup had so many women, the feeling was amazing! People were far more social before and after the meetup than anything I every witness in SF, and I try to go to 2-3 meetups a week.
- aragot 12y ago
  You see, this is saying "women are more social". You didn't say it, but the next step is "Women are equally good to men about programming, plus they have the advantage of being social". Which makes me wonder: - As a man, am I just less clever? - Where will my job go, if women are apt to take over all our management jobs since they're smarter in relationships and equally good at technical stuff? - We all agree it's extremely bad when we hear: "Ah no, women aren't clever enough for programming", so what about the opposite? - Personnaly I have a terrible lack of confidence when it comes to certain tasks. When women experience it, we help them overcome it. Can someone help me also, even though I'm a man? Stereotyping women on being more social is just unfair, because while we think this way, we fail to see something positive in men. Edit: You're allowed to downvote, yes, but it would work on excluding me. If you want to do something good to society and something inclusive, you could rather add a comment attaching positive stigma to men, because we rarely hear positive things about men, and that's probably a key cornerstone of the resistence to helping women more.
  - rayiner 12y ago
    Women are more social, men are more represented among both geniuses and criminals. I think even among progressives the resistance to accepting the veracity of both points is halfhearted.
    - pron 12y ago
      > I think even among progressives the resistance to accepting the veracity of both points is halfhearted. That's because when it comes to society, data can sometimes be dangerous. Data tells us how the world looks, but whereas in nature the laws are fixed (or so we hope), society is very fluid. This can confuse people. Any data about society is a snapshot of current conditions: it doesn't mean that things have never been different or won't be different, and it most certainly does not tell us that this is how things should be (the latter is the biggest difference between the natural and the social sciences -- in nature there's only "is" while in society there's "is" and "ought" and the two are rarely the same; also, we have at least some power over the structure of our society, while changing nature can be tricky). This is why data means very different things in physics and sociology, and why -- at least by default, or until proven otherwise -- any sociological data should be understood as: this is how things currently are; should we try to change them?
imanaccount247 12y ago
What? Busses around here are pretty 50/50 and nobody talks to each other ever. That's not a male thing.
- alukima 12y ago
  I think they are talking about tech buses, not public transit.
  - jeorgun 12y ago
    I don't think OP's "here" meant SF, necessarily; their point was that having more women on buses doesn't automatically translate to rich social interactions.