When you collect a few more life experiences, perhaps get a decade of career under your belt, you'll learn how toxic it is when monocultures form. You'll learn about the blind spots. The exclusion. The lack of productive conflict from varying ideas.
And perhaps at that point you'll learn why "caring about people in tech" means caring that no people feel actively excluded from its prosperity.
Until then, your callousness makes you emphatically the sort of dime-a-dozen, utterly common, entirely unoriginal personalities that make me want to walk out of this industry and lock the door behind me forever.
> When you collect a few more life experiences, perhaps get a decade of career under your belt, you'll learn how toxic it is when monocultures form.
Perhaps when you collect a few more life experiences, you will realize that saying "When you grow up/stop being immature/a child/etc you'll share my opinion on X, Y, and Z" isn't providing any support for your positions, and even if you was, it is not an effective argument either.
> saying "When you grow up/stop being immature/a child/etc you'll share my opinion on X, Y, and Z" isn't providing any support for your positions, and even if you was, it is not an effective argument either.
To me that looks more like a literary construct (intended to make the argument more "beautiful", if that is the right word) rather than a logical construct. I read the "meaning" of their post as: "After I got some experience/a decade of career under my belt, I learnt how toxic ...". Except phrased in a more "literary" way.
That's fine. But it still doesn't attempt to show why it is toxic/bad/whatever.
If the point of discussions on hackernews is just to take a roll call of opinions, then the first two posts in this thread are on the right track. But if the purpose of discussions are to inform, and persuade, then I would say the posts failed miserably.
I personally would expect that the representation of a given gender, religion or race in an arbitrary body (a school, a company, an industry, a governing body, etc.) would pretty closely match the representation of the gender/religion/race/etc. in society at large.
The tech industry is clearly falling flat on its face when it comes to adequate representation of women.
Persuade:
Do you really need me to spell out why this is a good thing?
Why would you expect that? Statisticians and scientists have to go to great lengths to get samples representative of the population at large, and I hardly think a business or industry is a proper random selection.
I tend to agree with your view, though I'm curious if this assertion:
> the representation of a given gender, religion or race in an arbitrary body (a school, a company, an industry, a governing body, etc.) would pretty closely match the representation of the gender/religion/race/etc. in society at large
is necessarily true. I mean, how does one come up with a normative stance on the relationship between proportion in a group vs. global population? Given a perfect world free of discriminatory attitudes, would this principle naturally hold?
I doubt it, because the groupings you mentioned are themselves arbitrary. We could just as easily split society into tall people and short people.
The distribution of professional basketball players is always going to have more of the tall group than the short group, simply because the rim is arbitrarily at 10 ft.
If a particular ethnic group happens to be taller on average than another, it's likely they will be more represented amongst professional basketball players, all other things being equal.
What we want is not proportionate representation based on arbitrary groups, but rather the correct representation. We want the best basketball players to be playing basketball, because that makes it more fun for the rest of us to watch.
> What we want is not proportionate representation based on arbitrary groups, but rather the correct representation. We want the best basketball players to be playing basketball, because that makes it more fun for the rest of us to watch.
Let me reiterate what I infer from your words: 'black people are naturally more athletic, so they should keep playing basketball, and leave all that pesky business and government-running to white people.'
What!? Where did I say anything like that (I'm not even white, anyway, and I don't believe that regardless).
I was literally thinking about the Dinka tribe from Sudan (who are very tall on average) and the Pygmy tribes of the congo (who are very short on average). Google them for data.
Alternatively, you can look at the well-studied difference in height between men and women. Do you deny this exists?
I could have just as well used tennis, where the vast majority of top players are white or soccer (where there's a quite proportionate distribution within the countries that play). In tennis, the ideal height is between 5'10 and 6'2. If you are much shorter, you have a disadvantage in serving. If you're much taller you have a disadvantage getting to low balls.
What I meant is that it's highly unlikely that the particular set of characteristics that determine success in any endeavor will be spread evenly amongst arbitrary groups. It doesn't matter what those groups are. We want the best set of individuals for the job, whatever it is.
You hear from people who are physically handicapped that the thing they hate most is the contrast in treatment. They want to be treated normally.
A different person in a different perspective gets treated differently because they are viewed as different. A common complaint. Is he being empathetic or indifferent? I dunno, but it's hard not to say to yourself "Women are being treated differently, that is what is keeping them out, so I will endeavour not to treat them differently."
So essentially you're saying that wheelchair ramps shouldn't be installed because we need to maintain an ironclad everone-gets-exactly-the-same-treatment position? A ramp serves only a very select part of the population, therefore it isn't 'fair' and should be shunned?
Women are being treated differently, that is what is keeping them out, so I will endeavour not to treat them differently?
The flaw here is the fundamental flaw in libertarianism: there is no mechanism for evening the playing field. People who already have significant advantage get to keep their significant advantage. Being born into wealth doesn't just mean you have money - you also get a social network, plus you grow up learning about how to handle money and assets, amongst other things. Having classes intended to help people not born into privilege is about trying to level the playing field, not oppress the privileged.
Sometimes I wonder just how many of the vocal "how dare women get their own classes" crew have anything to do with providing education at all.
People are ignorant to the material effects of oppression. I'm not sure how sometimes, especially on hacker news, since everyone in this thread wouldn't start discussing some small aspect of a programming language they have never used. But if they wanted to, they would look it up and the contribute. When it comes to anything social and therefore political people are throwing words around and they do not even understand what they are saying.
Your ramp example is spot on. And to take it a little bit further. Some of the posters in this thread are at the top of the stairs, staring down at everyone who can't get up them AND refusing to help them. The fact that these people are validating these attitudes in a way that actually serves to destroy their own point just shows that people in this thread with these views have absolutely no idea what they are talking about.
If you are uninformed/ can't follow your train of though to its logical conclusions PLEASE do some reading.
At least with my own disability/disabilities, I much prefer people to act normally around me. I absolutely feel othered if people go on forever about it.
Able-bodied people can use ramps too. If I were in a wheelchair, I'd prefer my friends to walk beside me without talking the whole time about how tragically victimized I am by the existence of stairs and other devices employing 90 degree angles of oppression. I'd definitely be even more annoyed if "well meaning" "activists" tried to ban my able-bodied friends from using the ramps alongside me.
Also, you just compared the relative ability of men and women to succeed in the tech world as the former being like a person who can walk unassisted and the latter being like a person who is significantly crippled. Given that success in the tech world is largely due to mental ability instead of physical ability, you might want to find a different way to word it to avoid unpleasant implications.
I'm confused by the way you mention class privilege and then assume that somehow this means that women are disadvantaged. Women control 70% of global [consumer] spending. Are you proposing men-only scholarships to fix this?
>"how dare women get their own classes"
When even ACLU says you're on the wrong side of a civil rights issue, it may be time to reconsider your stance.
"Two centuries later, women -- who control more than $20 trillion or about 70 percent of global consumer spending -- account for only about a tenth of the voting power on the world’s key interest rates"
You seem to be ignoring a pretty big 'but' there. Plus its 70% of consumer spending, not 'global spending'.
Then you described someone in a wheelchair as 'significantly crippled'.
Also, this poster's reference to ramps and stairs was a metaphor - a tool for understanding. Not literal.
What I got from their comment was nothing you seem to have. I think they were saying that we need to understand the ways people are excluded, and support them.
I absolutely feel othered if people go on forever about it.
Where did I suggest this at all? You're projecting your issues onto me. I wasn't painting people with disabilities as tragically victimised or any of that other shit. I gave one example that happened to be about people with a disability, then talked about advantage and privilege as largely abstract concepts.
you might want to find a different way to word it to avoid unpleasant implications.
You might want to find a way to respond without putting words in people's mouths. The audience that would actually take what I said as saying that being a woman is a physical disability does not exist. It's a bogeyman used for arguments like yours. "But these hypothetical morons might take you the wrong way and take offense!". Well, if they do take offense, no harm done, because they're morons. You're also arguing from hyperbolic outliers - painting 'well-meaning activists' as the ones who fight to ban sharing the ramp (because that happens... how often?) rather than the ones who fought to have the ramp put there in the first place.
The irony is that you've just said you don't like people taking offense on your behalf, and yet here you are taking offense on behalf of these hypothetical morons.
Women control 70% of global [consumer] spending.
Yes, women do a disproportionate amount of shopping for staple items like food or clothing. This is not 'controlling the economy'. It's like saying that since most workers in hospitality are in their early 20s, this means that people in their early 20s know the most about fine dining, since they are the ones that handle the plates.
I'm confused by the way you mention class privilege and then assume that somehow this means that women are disadvantaged
This is a fair comment. I was responding to a comment about women with a more abstract comment about social advantage, using wealth as an easy example. It wasn't meant to be a causal relation.
>
You hear from people who are physically handicapped that the thing they hate most is the contrast in treatment. They want to be treated normally.
You also hear that they needed legislation to prevent employers discriminating against them and that the idea of reasonable adjustment was a powerful driver in in reasing employment among people with disabilities.
Hi there. I thought I would reply to your post in it's entirety, as a 'handicapped' person and as a person aware of why events like this are good, and not bad.
1) Check the origins of the term handicap - it is derogatory. I'm sure some people will call this OTT or political correctness but whatever. The term 'impairment' is a good choice, mobility impairment, physical impairment. To those reading this who think it is political correctness I will put it in hacker news terms: There are ways of referring to potential customers in a way that ensures nothing you say will stop someone using your service. Anyway, check this out if you are interested in that [1] - it is a history of meaning of commonly used terms used to refer to impaired individuals. I know this was not the main part of your post but I thought I might as well mention it. Disability studies is a growing field and might as well be promoted here.
2) In order for minorities, for instance disabled people, to gain equal rights - in this case equal opportunity of entry into CS fields, it serves the effort well to be a group of people. It brings confidence that you are right, that you must be taken seriously and that attention should be placed on the issue.
For instance. If I am in a wheelchair and I am being forbidden entry to a building because of no ramp, or if I am being mocked and belittled. These are experiences that non-impaired individuals can empathise with, but they have not experienced it. So if I have experienced oppression I want to talk to other people who have, figure out what is necessary to change it and build up a group of people that can symbolise to other impaired individuals that while they may have to put up with the shit they get from other people, it is those people that are wrong.
So, if you take out the oppression part and look at a different social experience it might become more obvious.
Lets say someone in your close family has died. Whenever it comes up with friends or acquaintances who you know haven't experienced it you might be met with pity, sympathy, apologies or whatever. It makes you cringe a bit because people skirt over the topic because they don't know how to deal with it. Then one time you are talking to someone and it comes up that you have lost a close family member and it turns out they have too, and in a very similar way to you. Not only do you instantly feel comfortable talking to this person about this topic because they have experienced it, you also get to discuss how everyone else is ill-equiped to deal with such news mid way through a catchup, or whatever.
What I am saying is that, in a field such as tech, I would not be surprised if women would feel most comfortable relating to women as it is something that defines their experience and they can relate to each other directly. So, having these female founders as proof, as encouragement and as a tool for not just solidarity amongst women in tech but ALL in tech (because think about it: how many non-gender specific founders conferences have been all men, without specified as such).
I think this is a good thing and I think that being indifferent to the problem is really not worth posting about on a forum. Good for you, you want everyone to be treated the same but you don't want to do anything about it. And you feel so strongly about it you decided to post it here (that is aimed at the guy you replied to, not you).
Change does not occur by ignoring difference. It requires being pro-active and the organisers of this conference and the females speaking at it are doing just that.
I appreciate the thoroughness of your response and would like to reiterate my apology[1] above. Engaging on the "handicap" angle as I did was insensitive and unnecessary. As you're someone with lived experience in that realm, I hate to have validated terminology that could be hurtful to you.
A fantastic explanation and I appreciate your measured tone against my own frustration.
It is absolutely fine! Seriously. Thank you for responding. I do not feel negatively toward you. It is not an individual problem. It is structural, which is why it should be combated as social groups (women, disabled, ethnic minorities).
You're sure busy on this thread for someone who claims not to have opinions or skin in the game.
> Is that misguided?
Completely.
Being a woman isn't having a handicap. Being brown isn't having a handicap. At least it isn't to my mind. Is it to yours?
When you go and talk to people who are women or brown or some intersection of these, one thing that's clear is that they feel much more comfortable when interacting with other folks whose lives and paths look like theirs. Their life stories are different from those most commonly represented, so increasing representation means finding people who can speak from a common perspective.
And that's before I even get into the patterns of harassment and aggression that are reported to me consistently from every. single. female colleague I know. That's before getting into the challenges female founders face in presenting their companies to a VC industry that's overwhelmingly male and therefore under-equipped to evaluate a huge swath of verticals and opportunities.
None of this is abstract. All it requires is knowing people who aren't young, white males.
> Being a woman isn't having a handicap. Being brown isn't having a handicap. At least it isn't to my mind. Is it to yours?
Is being handicapped a handicap? I can't walk. Am I handicapped when it comes to creating code, or starting an tech company? I'm not in my mind. Am I in yours?
> When you go and talk to people who are women or brown or some intersection of these, one thing that's clear is that they feel much more comfortable when interacting with other folks whose lives and paths look like theirs.
Good job of lumping billions of unique personalities into a single viewpoint. I'm sure some women and brown people feel that way. I'm also sure some women and brown people feel the exact opposite, and some women and brown people have an opinion that is neither of the two stated.
> And that's before I even get into the patterns of harassment and aggression that are reported to me consistently from every. single. female colleague I know.
Really? Every single female colleague you know consistently reports patterns of harassment and aggression? Did you ever consider that maybe your workplace is broken, and not society? Why isn't your workplace getting rid of the harrassors and aggressors, or taking any action at all to fix its obvious brokenness?
> All it requires is knowing people who aren't young, white males.
I'm not young, and I'm not a white male. But that's also irrelevant.
>When you go and talk to people who are women or brown or some intersection of these, one thing that's clear is that they feel much more comfortable when interacting with other folks whose lives and paths look like theirs.
I agree completely. I'm way more comfortable with my tech friends (of any race, sex, or ethnicity) than I am with people who have a single or multiple exterior characteristics in common with me.
It's HOW and WHAT you think that matters, not what you look like. Being subjected to the discriminatory policies people like you keep forcing on us "for [your] own good" only reinforces our desire to both perceive and be perceived for our minds, not our bodies. This was once readily available in tech; thanks to your efforts, it is now a much rarer experience.
How incredibly rude and condescending. Is there some good reason you chose not to include his whole statement in your quote?
If you have to misrepresent the views of those you disagree with in order to argue your own point, it might be the case that your own argument has no value.
Please, don't try insult people who say they are humanist rather than pro-male or pro-female. Not only is it offensive, but the very statement say that sexism is the only cure to sexism and anyone else are wrong, ignorant, and do not care about "people".
I would say that people that make such statement don't care how people feel. If you can't behave, do please walk out.
The amount of tone-policing you've received for this comment absolutely floors me. My perception from this thread is that men can say whatever offensive thing they want about women, but as soon as someone says something that might be slightly harsh in defense, suddenly people care about the tone of the argument. Suddenly you're "attacking."
I've noticed.
When you collect a few more life experiences, perhaps get a decade of career under your belt, you'll learn how toxic it is when monocultures form. You'll learn about the blind spots. The exclusion. The lack of productive conflict from varying ideas.
And perhaps at that point you'll learn why "caring about people in tech" means caring that no people feel actively excluded from its prosperity.
Until then, your callousness makes you emphatically the sort of dime-a-dozen, utterly common, entirely unoriginal personalities that make me want to walk out of this industry and lock the door behind me forever.
Good luck on your journey.