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posted by Fnord666 on Friday May 11 2018, @11:11PM   Printer-friendly
from the controversial-topics dept.
Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Over the last several months, I’ve witnessed many controversial discussions among my friends, in my San Francisco community, and on online forums about James Demore’s memorandum. People of both genders are wrestling with the fact that fewer women go into computer science and trying to find explanations that balance their experience, empathy, and ethical aspirations. I’ve heard lots of good-intentioned people consider discouraging theories of biological superiority because they can’t find any other compelling explanation (like this post on HackerNews, for example). As a woman who studied computer science, worked at some of the top tech firms, and has founded a software startup, I’d like to share my take on why fewer women go into CS and my opinion on how to address the issue.

[...] I graduated from Stanford with a BS in Mathematical & Computational Sciences in 2015, interned at Apple as a software engineer, and worked as an Associate Product Manager at Google 2015-2017. In October, I founded a video editing website called Kapwing and am working on the startup full-time. Although I’m only 25, I’ve already seen many of my female friends choose majors/careers outside of STEM and have been inside of many predominately-male classes, organizations, and teams.

This article is one person’s humble perspective, and I do not speak for every woman in tech. But hopefully having the view of someone who has “been there” can help people trying to understand why there are fewer women in tech.


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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 12 2018, @12:45AM (8 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 12 2018, @12:45AM (#678639)

    You jest but dig deep enough behind the vacuous "diversity is our strength" rhetoric and these are the arguments you'll see emerging. I have no problem with employers using (typically misapplied) MBTI personality testing when hiring employees. That is the kind of "positive discrimination" I can live with. Extroverts, gossips and those who are simply not technically minded have no place on a software team. These are the primary consideration and no Stalinist quota system will ever produce a better outcome.

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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by KiloByte on Saturday May 12 2018, @01:36AM (4 children)

    by KiloByte (375) on Saturday May 12 2018, @01:36AM (#678649)

    This. I see that every top coder is asocial — if they don't have full-blown Asperger's, it's something close. Linus codes in a bathrobe and keeps badmouthing people. Hans Reiser, well you know. Those who do enjoy contact with people are CEOs and marketeers rather than engineers — ie, they deal with peddling bullshit rather than actually creating stuff.

    Thus, following the advice of this article is precisely the wrong way, if we want to have better software, that works more efficiently, gets implemented faster, is more reliable and bug-free. So what if even less women get employed coding it? I see no downsides other than hurting some ideologist's rhetoric. Proper asocial female hackers with Asperger-like behaviour exist, they're merely rare. Don't discriminate against those, and all should be fine.

    --
    Ceterum censeo systemd esse delendam.
    • (Score: 2, Insightful) by suburbanitemediocrity on Saturday May 12 2018, @02:16AM (2 children)

      by suburbanitemediocrity (6844) on Saturday May 12 2018, @02:16AM (#678664)

      Most top engineers I've known (around 6) has gone off on their own forming businesses to become rich. It doesn't pay well to be anti social.

      • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 12 2018, @11:21AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 12 2018, @11:21AM (#678775)

        Depends how you define "top".

      • (Score: 2) by KiloByte on Sunday May 13 2018, @10:08AM

        by KiloByte (375) on Sunday May 13 2018, @10:08AM (#679135)

        So they're not engineers anymore.

        --
        Ceterum censeo systemd esse delendam.
    • (Score: 3, Funny) by maxwell demon on Sunday May 13 2018, @05:33PM

      by maxwell demon (1608) on Sunday May 13 2018, @05:33PM (#679235) Journal

      Hans Reiser, well you know.

      Is this what you call a killer argument? :-)

      --
      The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 12 2018, @06:39AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 12 2018, @06:39AM (#678732)

    Your fear is showing, your asburger's, misogynist, Red Pillar, gamergater fear is showing. You have never spoken to a girl, have you? Are you afraid of child-support payments like they were some sort of cooties? Did it ever occur to you that women could be people, too? And even colleagues, friends, fellow citizens? No? Well, I guess we are just gonna have to bugger you, after the mandatory video-game Teabaggery, and voting for Trump. MAGAites!

    • (Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 12 2018, @02:14PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 12 2018, @02:14PM (#678825)

      Aristarchus, you've threatened to bugger just about everyone on this forum. I notice you've never threatened any of the ladies though. I think it's you who is afraid of women, you misogynistic pig.

    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Saturday May 12 2018, @07:34PM

      by Phoenix666 (552) on Saturday May 12 2018, @07:34PM (#678916) Journal

      Of course women are people, but men are not. They are not allowed to make mistakes, or to be awkward, or to be works-in-progress. They must only speak when spoken to, and shall answer only in the correct format, with the appropriate tone, and using acceptable body language. They shall observe the unwritten standards of proxemics when speaking. Micro-expressions must be suppressed, or there will be consequences.

      Men are not allowed to speak to women uninvited, but are also not allowed to not speak to women uninvited. If spontaneous gatherings of two or more men occur, a vote must be taken to elect emissaries to travel to the nearest woman and, after making sufficient placating gestures and executing proper salutations, invite her to join the spontaneous gathering to monitor the proceedings and make sure nothing untoward happens or that professional information goes un-shared.

      No man shall be deemed better at his job than a woman is at hers. No man shall be recognized for accomplishments unless an equal or greater number of women also be similarly recognized. Women cannot be faulted for any failure to meet standards. Men will be summarily fired for failing to anticipate how to exceed standards.

      This is the dystopia that this woman's male peers live in. But poor her. Poor, poor her.

      --
      Washington DC delenda est.