Great thinking. Perhaps its me but I know for me, a woman in software engineering, I constantly worry about what my name signals to potential employers. I wish

Great thinking. Perhaps its me but I know for me, a woman in software engineering, I constantly worry about what my name signals to potential employers. I wish my gender could be erased while being evaluated as I don't wish for it to be unintentionally or intentionally a factor in evaluating my job qualifications. Or the quality of any work I might publish online. No matter if it works out in my favor or not. I am kinda disturbed by the trend of LinkedIn profiles because I believe you are (apparently? I think...) encouraged to upload a picture of yourself. We did away with including a picture with your resume for a reason, now it seems to be coming back? Seems as if employer tend to hire "potental friends" over potentally over more qualified applicants [http://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2012/12/03/employers-hire-potential-drinking-buddies-ahead-of-top-candidates/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2012/12/03/employers-...] which I think is part of the gender/race/ethnicity divide. People want to surround themselves with others like them. As an aside, my experience seems to be that many employers of middle class jobs seem to expect candidates to come from a middle class upbringing and perhaps don't understand the opportunities that weren't available to some candidate due to growing up poor. Just my opinions and thoughts on the matter.