4 ms·

I wonder though, has he actually turned a statistically significant number of people off? Suppose field X had a crazy person so dedicated that he shot a US pre

I wonder though, has he actually turned a statistically significant number of people off? Suppose field X had a crazy person so dedicated that he shot a US president in order to send a message to a woman working there (far more than Weev has done). Suppose that pervert letters to women in field X were completely expected and commonplace, and had been for many years. Would women flee from X? Surprisingly, acting has no shortage of women. Pervs sending creepy letters is a topic of humor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmeh7EHpIE0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmeh7EHpIE0 Journalism has similar issues. Still plenty of women. Seems like there must be something else at play. [edit: replaced the word "anyone" with "a statistically significant number". This better expresses what I meant to say.]

empthought 12y ago
Idle speculation: tech attracts more than its fair share of introverts relative to those career choices, and for someone who needs just a little positive social interaction from time to time, the risk of extremely negative social interaction being the norm is too great.
- wpietri 12y ago
  This is definitely an issue. One of the people I mentor is a shy young woman. She will make an awesome developer. A few weeks back I had to sit her down and have The Talk explaining that if she rose to prominence, she could well be the target of hideous attacks where guys would have no problem at all. Her eventual conclusion was to stay in the field, but it was definitely something she had to weigh. I've talked with a number of women with established tech careers who have been questioning whether their work to get women into the field is even a good idea. Women drop out of the field at twice the rate men do.
  - empthought 12y ago
    This could be a third-rail question, but I wonder how that "dropout" rate compares to any arbitrary field when measured by the same yardsticks. Women are still the primary caregivers for 95% of infants born, and hence will always show up as more frequent "dropouts," so that statistic really needs to control for this factor somehow to be compelling. Without that control, the anecdotes are more convincing than the statistic, so why bother with the statistic?
    - wpietri 12y ago
      Today I've already answered my quota of anonymous dudes treating the possibility of an alternate explanation as proof that something can be dismissed. If you would like an answer to that question, perhaps you could research it all by your big-boy self? Alternately, you could have a lovely chat with the people elsewhere in this discussion who are insisting that we can dismiss this because anecdotes are worthless.
      - empthought 12y ago
        I don't see the advantage of trying to make a point with faulty or irrelevant evidence. But I did "research it all by my big-boy self" and discovered that medicine, investment banking, architecture, the Marine Corps, law, executive-level management, and higher education faculty of all stripes have similar imbalance of attrition. Allied healthcare professions, however, have an imbalance the other way -- male nurses leave the profession at a much higher rate. Maybe they're being hounded out? /s So thanks for taking the time to educate me; the imbalance is more likely one of "gendered work" and the issues with it, rather than trolls and misogyny specific to technology. I think the actual instances of abuse (of which there are many) are more compelling and require more attention and action than fluff statistics which, while concerning to feminism as a whole, likely have little to do with anything specific to technology.
        wpietri 12y ago
        I apologize for the tone. I had dealt with too many idiots making spurious, derailing objections to nitpicky points, and should have just shut my mouth for a while rather than assuming you were also derailing and taking irritation with them out on you. I'm sorry. The point of using that statistic for me is that I don't want women dropping out at a higher rate then men. (That investment bankers have an equal level of sexist shitheel behavior is not comforting to me. I have worked in finance, and I don't think that's an acceptable model for tech.) Your offered explanation, that women are the primary caregiver of infants, is still part of structural sexism. Past a period that civilized countries cover with parental leave, both parents are equally capable of caring for children. (My brother was primary caregiver for my nephew, so I've seen it up close.) I think your follow-up conclusion, that there's a single issue (gendered work vs misogyny), is a false framing. First, I don't think those are necessarily distinct. I see misogyny and abuse as part of the system of control that maintains gendered work. (As is male willingness to tolerate it. Note the all the male pearl-clutching that has taken place around codes of conduct.) It's similar to the way that police (and much of society) are more accepting of the rape of women who "dressed wrong" or were otherwise not following a very gendered code of sexuality. Second, even if they were entirely distinct, there's no reason to think there's just one explanation here. We're talking about the entire professional lives of millions of people with cultural factors going back thousands of years: it's inevitably complicated. There are likely many causes, many of the overlapping and reinforcing. The male-female ratio is very different in tech, and historically has gotten worse compared to other white-collar professions. The explanation can be gendered work and trolls and misogyny and a bunch of other things. Third, whatever the causes, the responses may be distinct. Having the rib platter every night for dinner may eventually cause a heart attack, but paramedics don't treat heart attacks with food. That actual mentors of women are seeing the instances of abuse and saying, "Whoa, maybe I shouldn't be encouraging women to get into the field," tells you that there's a relationship. > I think the actual instances of abuse (of which there are many) are more compelling If you think something is more compelling, that's great. You should run with it. As I said, other people right here in this thread find anecdotes worthless and demand stats. Not every sentence in every post has to be for you and you alone. > while concerning to feminism as a whole So this concerns me; it sounds like you're treating feminism as an other. Feminism is the movement that, for the last 150 years or so, has been trying to change the world from one where women are property to one where men and women are equal. Do you really not think people should be treated as equals based on things like gender, race, and sexual orientation? Because if you don't, a) well duh you don't like statistics demonstrating that women are not being treated equally, and b) I'm not sure why I should worry about your take on a particular statistic, because then we're back in the land of anonymous HN commenters nitpicking things that they were never going to accept anyhow as a means to derailing the discussion.
unimpressive 12y ago
Well to be fair, there the harassment comes from industry outsiders. Here a lot of people in the mob and part of the abuse are people who could be considered in 'tech'. That hurts a lot more than if it's just weird schizophrenics sending letters to the people they see on the telly. Further, we're not even really talking about pervy letters so much as dedicated campaigns to get people fired, etc.
wpietri 12y ago
It turns out he has actually turned someone off. Kathy Sierra is a fine example of that. Also, you are smart enough to know that "acting has no shortage of women" is a dumb argument. The question of whether the distribution of women in field X is affected by historical events cannot be determined only by looking at the current distribution of women in field X.
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  Ok, so the real argument is that a few weevs + mysterious unspecified historical circumstances is necessary to cause a shortage of women? Hmm, pretty hard to refute. There is a phrase to describe ideas like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong You are correct that he's turned one person off. Next question: has he turned off a significant number?
  - Alex3917 12y ago
    The whole argument doesn't really make a lot of sense because weev isn't even in the tech industry. As far as I know he's never even had a real job/startup, let alone one in tech.
    - yummyfajitas 12y ago
      Actually that's a fair point. Similarly, the teenage gamers sending penis pics to Sarkeesian are also not in the gaming industry - that's probably most closely analogous to a crazed fanboy threatening Roger Ebert for saying he doesn't like Vin Diesel. So the comparison to acting was more apt than I thought.
jxf 12y ago
That's survivor bias [0]. The point isn't whether there's still at least one woman in the field, or whether there's "plenty of women" (what does that even mean, anyway?). The point is whether anyone was stopped from entering the field at all. The ones who are still in the field are the ones most resilient to the abuse. But you miss out on the contributions of all the people who left and did something else. How much farther along might we be in software engineering, or sculpture, or architecture, or <insert your favorite field here> -- had the toxic environment not been present in the first place? [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  "plenty of women" (what does that even mean, anyway?). Not really sure - I don't personally view a lack of $GROUP as a problem. If you feel similarly then disregard my entire post - it's premised on the idea that the reader does view a lack of women as a problem. There are two claims here. One is that bad behavior exists. The other is that this bad behavior plays a significant causal role in keeping women out of tech. The latter is what I'm questioning. Since large number of women seem to want to enter acting in spite of it having a far worse reputation (never heard of a "casting couch" in tech), it seems that bad behavior alone is a poor explanation for the lack of women.
  - purerandomness 12y ago
    Basically, you want a formal proof that "bad behavior plays a significant causal role in keeping women out of tech" is a valid hypothesis? While scientifically interesting, I don't see the utillity for that, honestly. Do we really not agree that this has to stop? Does it really matter how many people harassment would keep out of the business? While skepticism has its place, harassment is not a technical, but a social problem, and I, for one, can bring up enough empathy to not need the scientific method to want to stop harassment. As to the casting couch, I don't know how it's where you live, but here in Europe, while everyone in the acting and music community is familiar with the term, the "casting couch" exists merely as a myth, not an actual thing preventing women to begin working in acting. Besides, the acting/music community is far beyond the 1/10 (or whatever) gender split in the tech community, so even if someone would try to establish the casting couch as a de-facto gate-keeping procedure, female members of the in-group would call it out, ending this phenomenon much sooner than would be possible if the gender gap in those communities were to be as it is now in tech. Even then, you wouldn't bring up statiscics how many women were entering the acting field by "passing" the "casting couch". So I'm confused and would like to know what your point really is.
dandelany 12y ago
In acting and journalism, the pervy letters come from people outside the community which, ironically, can strengthen the sense of community becase women have a common external threat which unites them. In tech, the letters come from within, often from "well-respected" members of the tech world. It's no wonder this has the opposite effect.
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  True - within the acting community there is primarily virtuous behavior. There is certainly no reputation for male gatekeepers within acting or music to perv on women trying to break into the field. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casting_couch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casting_couch
  - dandelany 12y ago
    You specifically referred to "letters", which is what I was responding to. Obviously the "casting couch" phenomenon is not a good thing, but it's an entirely different phenomenon from one's own community doxxing them and continually sending them abusive hate mail and death threats until they don't feel safe in that community anymore. Your sarcasm and tone are really unwarranted, and I'm surprised to see it from someone whose comments are usually informative, interesting and respectful.
    - yummyfajitas 12y ago
      You are right - my comment was a bit unkind. My general thesis is that bad behavior (of this sort) will not turn women away from a high status field and good behavior will not push women towards a low status field (e.g., mathematics, physics, computing to a lesser extent). If you want to construct a theory making fine distinctions between different types of bad behavior, I'd love to hear that theory carefully laid out.
vxNsr 12y ago
You're missing the point. We're not so much worried about "the industry losing brain power" but that collectively, as a society, we treat other human beings that way. No one should have to go through any of the things the OP writes about, and if it's happening in our community we have an obligation to find a way to stop it! I'm a guy and I'll admit, before I read that post, I thought that this whole gamergate thing was two sides over reacting and generally just being stupid. I'll also say that I'm not in the whole subculture, I have RL friends and spend most of my social life there, I occasionally drop into hackernews to catch cool articles... I'm often baffled by this whole subculture people talk about.
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  This is what I'm responding to: ...it's amazing how many women they've tried to turn off tech... This post is dedicated to all of the people that think...the gender disparity in tech is due simply to biology. I can disagree with this factual claim without taking a position on online mobbing. Since you seem to want me to take a position on mobbing: I don't like it much but I'm not sure how to prevent it without allowing the powerful to suppress speech they dislike.

empthought 12y ago

Idle speculation: tech attracts more than its fair share of introverts relative to those career choices, and for someone who needs just a little positive social interaction from time to time, the risk of extremely negative social interaction being the norm is too great.

wpietri 12y ago
This is definitely an issue. One of the people I mentor is a shy young woman. She will make an awesome developer. A few weeks back I had to sit her down and have The Talk explaining that if she rose to prominence, she could well be the target of hideous attacks where guys would have no problem at all. Her eventual conclusion was to stay in the field, but it was definitely something she had to weigh. I've talked with a number of women with established tech careers who have been questioning whether their work to get women into the field is even a good idea. Women drop out of the field at twice the rate men do.
- empthought 12y ago
  This could be a third-rail question, but I wonder how that "dropout" rate compares to any arbitrary field when measured by the same yardsticks. Women are still the primary caregivers for 95% of infants born, and hence will always show up as more frequent "dropouts," so that statistic really needs to control for this factor somehow to be compelling. Without that control, the anecdotes are more convincing than the statistic, so why bother with the statistic?
  - wpietri 12y ago
    Today I've already answered my quota of anonymous dudes treating the possibility of an alternate explanation as proof that something can be dismissed. If you would like an answer to that question, perhaps you could research it all by your big-boy self? Alternately, you could have a lovely chat with the people elsewhere in this discussion who are insisting that we can dismiss this because anecdotes are worthless.
    - empthought 12y ago
      I don't see the advantage of trying to make a point with faulty or irrelevant evidence. But I did "research it all by my big-boy self" and discovered that medicine, investment banking, architecture, the Marine Corps, law, executive-level management, and higher education faculty of all stripes have similar imbalance of attrition. Allied healthcare professions, however, have an imbalance the other way -- male nurses leave the profession at a much higher rate. Maybe they're being hounded out? /s So thanks for taking the time to educate me; the imbalance is more likely one of "gendered work" and the issues with it, rather than trolls and misogyny specific to technology. I think the actual instances of abuse (of which there are many) are more compelling and require more attention and action than fluff statistics which, while concerning to feminism as a whole, likely have little to do with anything specific to technology.
      - wpietri 12y ago
        I apologize for the tone. I had dealt with too many idiots making spurious, derailing objections to nitpicky points, and should have just shut my mouth for a while rather than assuming you were also derailing and taking irritation with them out on you. I'm sorry. The point of using that statistic for me is that I don't want women dropping out at a higher rate then men. (That investment bankers have an equal level of sexist shitheel behavior is not comforting to me. I have worked in finance, and I don't think that's an acceptable model for tech.) Your offered explanation, that women are the primary caregiver of infants, is still part of structural sexism. Past a period that civilized countries cover with parental leave, both parents are equally capable of caring for children. (My brother was primary caregiver for my nephew, so I've seen it up close.) I think your follow-up conclusion, that there's a single issue (gendered work vs misogyny), is a false framing. First, I don't think those are necessarily distinct. I see misogyny and abuse as part of the system of control that maintains gendered work. (As is male willingness to tolerate it. Note the all the male pearl-clutching that has taken place around codes of conduct.) It's similar to the way that police (and much of society) are more accepting of the rape of women who "dressed wrong" or were otherwise not following a very gendered code of sexuality. Second, even if they were entirely distinct, there's no reason to think there's just one explanation here. We're talking about the entire professional lives of millions of people with cultural factors going back thousands of years: it's inevitably complicated. There are likely many causes, many of the overlapping and reinforcing. The male-female ratio is very different in tech, and historically has gotten worse compared to other white-collar professions. The explanation can be gendered work and trolls and misogyny and a bunch of other things. Third, whatever the causes, the responses may be distinct. Having the rib platter every night for dinner may eventually cause a heart attack, but paramedics don't treat heart attacks with food. That actual mentors of women are seeing the instances of abuse and saying, "Whoa, maybe I shouldn't be encouraging women to get into the field," tells you that there's a relationship. > I think the actual instances of abuse (of which there are many) are more compelling If you think something is more compelling, that's great. You should run with it. As I said, other people right here in this thread find anecdotes worthless and demand stats. Not every sentence in every post has to be for you and you alone. > while concerning to feminism as a whole So this concerns me; it sounds like you're treating feminism as an other. Feminism is the movement that, for the last 150 years or so, has been trying to change the world from one where women are property to one where men and women are equal. Do you really not think people should be treated as equals based on things like gender, race, and sexual orientation? Because if you don't, a) well duh you don't like statistics demonstrating that women are not being treated equally, and b) I'm not sure why I should worry about your take on a particular statistic, because then we're back in the land of anonymous HN commenters nitpicking things that they were never going to accept anyhow as a means to derailing the discussion.

unimpressive 12y ago

Well to be fair, there the harassment comes from industry outsiders. Here a lot of people in the mob and part of the abuse are people who could be considered in 'tech'. That hurts a lot more than if it's just weird schizophrenics sending letters to the people they see on the telly. Further, we're not even really talking about pervy letters so much as dedicated campaigns to get people fired, etc.

wpietri 12y ago

It turns out he has actually turned someone off. Kathy Sierra is a fine example of that. Also, you are smart enough to know that "acting has no shortage of women" is a dumb argument. The question of whether the distribution of women in field X is affected by historical events cannot be determined only by looking at the current distribution of women in field X.

yummyfajitas 12y ago
Ok, so the real argument is that a few weevs + mysterious unspecified historical circumstances is necessary to cause a shortage of women? Hmm, pretty hard to refute. There is a phrase to describe ideas like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong You are correct that he's turned one person off. Next question: has he turned off a significant number?
- Alex3917 12y ago
  The whole argument doesn't really make a lot of sense because weev isn't even in the tech industry. As far as I know he's never even had a real job/startup, let alone one in tech.
  - yummyfajitas 12y ago
    Actually that's a fair point. Similarly, the teenage gamers sending penis pics to Sarkeesian are also not in the gaming industry - that's probably most closely analogous to a crazed fanboy threatening Roger Ebert for saying he doesn't like Vin Diesel. So the comparison to acting was more apt than I thought.

jxf 12y ago

That's survivor bias [0]. The point isn't whether there's still at least one woman in the field, or whether there's "plenty of women" (what does that even mean, anyway?). The point is whether anyone was stopped from entering the field at all. The ones who are still in the field are the ones most resilient to the abuse. But you miss out on the contributions of all the people who left and did something else. How much farther along might we be in software engineering, or sculpture, or architecture, or <insert your favorite field here> -- had the toxic environment not been present in the first place? [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias

yummyfajitas 12y ago
"plenty of women" (what does that even mean, anyway?). Not really sure - I don't personally view a lack of $GROUP as a problem. If you feel similarly then disregard my entire post - it's premised on the idea that the reader does view a lack of women as a problem. There are two claims here. One is that bad behavior exists. The other is that this bad behavior plays a significant causal role in keeping women out of tech. The latter is what I'm questioning. Since large number of women seem to want to enter acting in spite of it having a far worse reputation (never heard of a "casting couch" in tech), it seems that bad behavior alone is a poor explanation for the lack of women.
- purerandomness 12y ago
  Basically, you want a formal proof that "bad behavior plays a significant causal role in keeping women out of tech" is a valid hypothesis? While scientifically interesting, I don't see the utillity for that, honestly. Do we really not agree that this has to stop? Does it really matter how many people harassment would keep out of the business? While skepticism has its place, harassment is not a technical, but a social problem, and I, for one, can bring up enough empathy to not need the scientific method to want to stop harassment. As to the casting couch, I don't know how it's where you live, but here in Europe, while everyone in the acting and music community is familiar with the term, the "casting couch" exists merely as a myth, not an actual thing preventing women to begin working in acting. Besides, the acting/music community is far beyond the 1/10 (or whatever) gender split in the tech community, so even if someone would try to establish the casting couch as a de-facto gate-keeping procedure, female members of the in-group would call it out, ending this phenomenon much sooner than would be possible if the gender gap in those communities were to be as it is now in tech. Even then, you wouldn't bring up statiscics how many women were entering the acting field by "passing" the "casting couch". So I'm confused and would like to know what your point really is.

dandelany 12y ago

In acting and journalism, the pervy letters come from people outside the community which, ironically, can strengthen the sense of community becase women have a common external threat which unites them. In tech, the letters come from within, often from "well-respected" members of the tech world. It's no wonder this has the opposite effect.

yummyfajitas 12y ago
True - within the acting community there is primarily virtuous behavior. There is certainly no reputation for male gatekeepers within acting or music to perv on women trying to break into the field. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casting_couch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casting_couch
- dandelany 12y ago
  You specifically referred to "letters", which is what I was responding to. Obviously the "casting couch" phenomenon is not a good thing, but it's an entirely different phenomenon from one's own community doxxing them and continually sending them abusive hate mail and death threats until they don't feel safe in that community anymore. Your sarcasm and tone are really unwarranted, and I'm surprised to see it from someone whose comments are usually informative, interesting and respectful.
  - yummyfajitas 12y ago
    You are right - my comment was a bit unkind. My general thesis is that bad behavior (of this sort) will not turn women away from a high status field and good behavior will not push women towards a low status field (e.g., mathematics, physics, computing to a lesser extent). If you want to construct a theory making fine distinctions between different types of bad behavior, I'd love to hear that theory carefully laid out.

vxNsr 12y ago

You're missing the point. We're not so much worried about "the industry losing brain power" but that collectively, as a society, we treat other human beings that way. No one should have to go through any of the things the OP writes about, and if it's happening in our community we have an obligation to find a way to stop it! I'm a guy and I'll admit, before I read that post, I thought that this whole gamergate thing was two sides over reacting and generally just being stupid. I'll also say that I'm not in the whole subculture, I have RL friends and spend most of my social life there, I occasionally drop into hackernews to catch cool articles... I'm often baffled by this whole subculture people talk about.

yummyfajitas 12y ago
This is what I'm responding to: ...it's amazing how many women they've tried to turn off tech... This post is dedicated to all of the people that think...the gender disparity in tech is due simply to biology. I can disagree with this factual claim without taking a position on online mobbing. Since you seem to want me to take a position on mobbing: I don't like it much but I'm not sure how to prevent it without allowing the powerful to suppress speech they dislike.