anonymous3821

14 ปีที่แล้วdiscuss

Correct me if I'm wrong, but men and women are not that far apart. We are all humans who love solving problems.

The ratio of men graduating with CS degrees to women is around 8:1 or 9:1. Do you honestly believe that our genetics are that different?

>> Given this, I'm not sure how you can claim that it's everybody's responsibility to push for more female coders.

Ok, since we can't prove identical dispositions and--who knows? maybe women are 8 times more unlikely to want to solve computer science problems--let's just disregard the imbalance and do nothing. Is that your philosophy?

[1] http://www.cra.org/uploads/documents/resources/taulbee/CS_De...

anonymous3821

14 ปีที่แล้วdiscuss

You don't need to be an expert to know that there's more to the situation than:

  On the internet, nobody even knows your skin color.

I agree with a lot of your points (Google's first search result wasn't the best study I guess :), but I don't think you've spent enough time researching the area to make broad statements:

  But I think there are plenty of ways around it, that are open to everyone.

Is that really true? I'm essentially trying to drive the same point home as anu_gupta.

anonymous3821

14 ปีที่แล้วdiscuss

You bring up good points as well, although I would disagree with one of your main assumptions:

"so there's no lack of inspiration" --> Really, can you point to the numbers?

anonymous3821

14 ปีที่แล้วdiscuss

Here's a question for you (no, it's not a rhetorical one--I can see the answer going either way):

Is it conference organizers' responsibility to mimic the current industry (in % minorities and all)?

Or, is it conference organizers' responsibility to lead the movement and adjust for where the industry should be?

If you answered yes to the first one, I would like to hear your explanation on who would be a better person to lead the movement.

anonymous3821

14 ปีที่แล้วdiscuss

  Do you really need permission to get into programming?

If this is the only factor that you think is stopping people from entering programming, then you're seriously mistaken.

A quick Google search brings up this: http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/hdh9/e-reserves/Williams_-_The_glass_...

Maybe also try watching this: http://www.missrepresentation.org/the-film/

A lot more happens behind the scenes than you seem to know (as indicated by your post.)

anonymous3821

14 ปีที่แล้วdiscuss

FYI: I don't think the OP was talking about physical barrier to entries. That's all the more reason why such a big disparity between privileged males and all other minorities in programming should be frightening!

anonymous3821

14 ปีที่แล้วdiscuss

Don't get me wrong, I love HN. I never thought I would have to write something like this.

However, HN is indeed a bubble. Any criticism of the community (like this one) will get voted to the bottom and never be seen. However, a quick look outside HN (e.g. on Twitter) will reveal that HN threads can often be nothing short of ruthless. Maybe it's just me, but I've seen a rising number of these recently (this one included).

anonymous3821

14 ปีที่แล้วdiscuss

These HN comments are some of the most disconcerting that I've seen in a long time. The amount of ignorance displayed in some of them makes me--a white male--question this community. I could only imagine what message they would send to a minority.

Here's my take on a few comments in this thread. (I don't mean to single anyone out.)

>>Imagine if people were criticizing a lineup because there were too many women.

If our society treated males and females equally, then this hypothetical would make sense. But in a society where females face discrimination their entire lives and barriers can often prevent from reaching their potential, I think such a hypothetical is silly to bring up.

It is everyone's responsibility to try to adjust for this inequality in society. That might include going out of your way as a conference organizer to encourage more qualified minorities to apply as speakers. As some HN'ers have brought up, quality will not be jeopardized in the process.

>>To pick out a single conference in our industry with this property is textbook selection bias [1] and doesn't demonstrate any kind of discrimination at all.

If you notice, no one (as far as I can tell) explicitly called this discrimination. There will always be people who question the validity of things like these, and why shouldn't there be? Conferences, if they did their share of work, should be able to hold up against arguments like these (if they're invalid).

Yes, statistically some conferences might have gone out of their way to find minorities and failed to do so. Looking at any single case, though, such a scenario is unlikely. One should not just say, "Oh, statistics show that this might happen by chance, and therefore no one should question the validity of the selection process."

>>The problem is statistics. If there are only a few women who are applicable - simply due to the sad fact that there are so few women in the field - then there will be a lot of conference where random selection will mean there are no women in the lineup.

Like before, the problem cannot be blamed on statistics. I don't believe that there will be a lot of conferences where no qualified women could present at. If they couldn't be found, I'm guessing that--most of the times--the organizers didn't look hard enough. This is just a guess, but I'm not going to assume the utopian society that others on this page have and say that everyone tries their hardest to attain diversity.

>> Dear God! As if it wasn't hard enough to arrange a conference, apparently you have to make sure to invite every minority as a speaker at that conference too.

Misunderstanding the issue at hand and making outrageous claims like these does not improve my opinion of HN.

>> I really hope the responsible trolls... [emphasis added]

Enough said. Calling people who raise valid concerns trolls (or muppets, like someone else did) is not respectful. The fact that such an ad-hominem attack on HN got upvoted to the top is shocking.

>>Why should that have been their goal? This isn't a conference about racial issues or gender issues.

Taken from the BritRuby's website:

  Our mission statement was to encourage Ruby developers to unite and
  create a community, which would allow such to network, exchange ideas
  and provoke innovation for the future of Ruby.

Britain has 51% women. Women are underrepresented in the Ruby community, but there is no reason why it should stay like that. Is not anyone's job to increase the percentage of female coders. It is everyone's.

HN user luigi says it better than I ever could:

  The act of organizing a conference makes one a leader for their
  technical community. We all know we have a diversity problem.
  And conference organizers are responsible for helping address
  that problem. Leaders should lead.

===========

If I were pg, I would close this thread before we make a fool of ourselves even further. People are seriously questioning this community and its views on gender imbalance in technology, minorities, etc. This is not an isolated case.