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It's not helping hands that's needed, it's the removal of factors that actively discourage participation in tech culture for arbitrary reasons of race, gender e

by badsock 11y ago

It's not helping hands that's needed, it's the removal of factors that actively discourage participation in tech culture for arbitrary reasons of race, gender etc. And it's not hand-wringing, it's anger at watching people who would otherwise be substantive contributors in a technical sense be subjected to abuse until they leave the field. I see the lack of diversity at these companies as a sign of distortion in the overall tech community - the reason they're having a tough time getting the diversity they want is because so many people have been discouraged long before they develop the chops to apply at a place like Google.

oldmanjay 11y ago
You neatly listed every talking point we've all heard a thousand times, but framing the debate using your preferred rhetoric doesn't address any of my points. The "removal of factors" is a helping hand. The expression of anger is the hand-wringing. And the lack of diversity is a lie - no engineering team I've seen lacks Asian and Indian men and women. Being discouraged to achieve your dreams is not exclusive to people of "color" (suddenly I'm transparent?) or the "minority" of women. Perseverance is a character trait that successful software engineers need. Giving up because there are barriers to success is a signal that can't be ignored, frankly.
- badsock 11y ago
  The way that women (for instance) are treated in tech forums is frequently outright abusive. My anger at that is not a talking point, it's real. And your last two sentences are the equivalent to "it's not a problem, tough it up", which is a big part of how things got this bad in the first place. The number of women in technical roles today at Facebook is 15%, at Google it's 17%. A similar figure from, say, IBM in the 1980s would be 35-40%. The genetic predispositions of women have not changed in the last 30 years, the difference is cultural. You feel that the way you'd like things to be is under "near constant attack". Good. Because the status quo in tech culture is far from meritocratic, and people who defend it clearly don't realize how much damage it's done, and how much talent we've wasted on its account.
twiceaday 11y ago
Your last point doesn't follow from the first two. You describe artificial barriers but fail to take into account job-specific differences that attract and repel certain genders and races. I think that the pushback on this topic is largely due to this last point. It is reasonable to expect equal opportunity but it is unreasonable to expect equal headcount.

by badsock 11y ago

oldmanjay 11y ago

You neatly listed every talking point we've all heard a thousand times, but framing the debate using your preferred rhetoric doesn't address any of my points. The "removal of factors" is a helping hand. The expression of anger is the hand-wringing. And the lack of diversity is a lie - no engineering team I've seen lacks Asian and Indian men and women. Being discouraged to achieve your dreams is not exclusive to people of "color" (suddenly I'm transparent?) or the "minority" of women. Perseverance is a character trait that successful software engineers need. Giving up because there are barriers to success is a signal that can't be ignored, frankly.

badsock 11y ago
The way that women (for instance) are treated in tech forums is frequently outright abusive. My anger at that is not a talking point, it's real. And your last two sentences are the equivalent to "it's not a problem, tough it up", which is a big part of how things got this bad in the first place. The number of women in technical roles today at Facebook is 15%, at Google it's 17%. A similar figure from, say, IBM in the 1980s would be 35-40%. The genetic predispositions of women have not changed in the last 30 years, the difference is cultural. You feel that the way you'd like things to be is under "near constant attack". Good. Because the status quo in tech culture is far from meritocratic, and people who defend it clearly don't realize how much damage it's done, and how much talent we've wasted on its account.

twiceaday 11y ago

Your last point doesn't follow from the first two. You describe artificial barriers but fail to take into account job-specific differences that attract and repel certain genders and races. I think that the pushback on this topic is largely due to this last point. It is reasonable to expect equal opportunity but it is unreasonable to expect equal headcount.