I am interested in an open dialog. I am a female programmer and I greatly appreciate the efforts to get female programmers in the field. I currently work with all males. It is harder to relate to males in a lot of ways for me, but I do really enjoy programming. The reality of the workplace seems that you need to have allies. But a lot of people make their allies with people they can relate to really easily. I'm essentially saying it's harder to make allies for a minority. This issue has caused me at times to want to move to another field or workplace. I stick with it because I like to program, I want to learn, it's a high paying job, and because I have a lot of student loans. I have spoken to other women about related issues, and it seems to be a common concern. Thus, while some women quit to raise children, it seems as though the high rate of women quitting tech jobs and not staying in the field could be correlated (with causality) to women not having allies in the workplace of tech companies. Thus, the company itself makes itself the allie, by ensuring that the efforts are made for women to not be a dramatic minority. If this effort was not made at my previous company, I think I would have left the tech industry a while ago. It was the female friends I had at my last job that gave me the comradery to make the job a place where I belonged. I hope this post gets received with openness.
Interesting perspective. To me that aligns with the idea that having allies is important. It has just seemed harder to make allies when it's not someone I can easily relate to
I'm addressing that there are women who don't quit for kids but quit to go to another field where they are not a minority. I agree there is nothing you can do to give someone an alternative to compete with someone who doesn't have kids if they want to have kids more than they want to be able to focus on their job. There is the option the man could raise the kids, but it won't change the several months that a woman will have to miss too bear them, unless they got a surrogate which not everyone is willing to do.
I became friends with every female there was in my group at my last job. I appreciate your honest and, to me, new perspectives, but I see it as less of an individual issue and more of a group issue. I do agree this is an issue facing any minority. I do see it to be harder for programmers to find people outside of programming to relate to, so that would apply to men as well, but I'm strictly just addressing the issue of corporations employing programmers at this point. And I'm sorry you had to conform to those things you didn't like. If it's worth anything, I always found guys who didn't like sports to be fun and interesting
That's a good suggestion, thanks. I think that is something I could do as an individual. For a tech company, if they are trying women to join to get diversity because they have correlated that with innovation, they may want to make it so that women don't have to do more than men in order to make friends. That would make it a place where everyone has to make a more similar effort in order to have allies
I have read the original article. I wouldn't have felt informed enough to reply on this thread if I hadn't. Programming cannot always be a social experience, as he said. People only pair program when it makes things more efficient, which is more common with a new hire or just for a small time until an agreement on a crucial aspect of the code is reached. It's also sometimes more commonly used when forming a new scrum team. At the end of the day, pair programming can be inefficient. The social aspect may help females make allies with men, thus promoting more females being happy in tech jobs and not leaving, but I don't think it would necessarily attract females just by the pure nature of it being social
Can you tell me if there is research showing that this is causality and not just correlation? Might it be possible that the more educated a woman is, the more likely it is she is a minority in her workplace? From my viewpoint, Google is trying to fix this by making is so that highly educated women employed by them work at a place where they are not a minority (much of Google's workforce have master's degrees and some phds).
Also kindof funny, but isn't keeping women in that box keeping men in the box of having to provide in order to keep a woman they love? I just don't understand why men don't see the benefit they get from women being promoted to work in high paying high stress jobs. While I see what you're saying where women have an opportunity to quit and men would be likely to have that less frequently, not everyone needs a job as high paying as a tech job. Some people just wantt one. They want the opportunity to make something or change something. Programming is fun and can provide something more stimulating for the mind than a lot of other things. So if women want that but they want to enjoy comradery at the workplace the same way men in tech jobs can, then why would the company not promote that if they want to get women on board for the sake of innovation due to diversity. I'm not sure if I'm making sense any more cause it's late an I've been talking about this all day, but I'm pretty sure there's some basis in reality in what I'm saying. Google's policies are helping people. And the main reason they would silence someone by firing them is so that they can get more women to know that they won't be treated as if they are incapable simply based on the knowledge that they are biologically a woman in their workplace. I personally would be stoked to work at Google after this because I now know Google does not support people saying I am less capable than a man purely based on the fact that I'm a woman. Defs rambling that this point but that's all I got left. I am a programmer, and just because someone's says women are biologically less inclined to be capable of programming doesn't mean it's true
I wasn't saying it was funny as in humorously wrong, I was saying funny as in a unique viewpoint that made me laugh. I'm not saying men are keeping women in a box, I was just more off the cuff saying abstractly that having expectations for women doing these things is the same thing that will cause men to have to be the one who works in a female/male relationship.
I don't think it makes a good person for a woman to leave as soon as she makes more. I think there are lots of women who wouldn't do that and if they do then that is sexist.
I read the memo. I don't really want to get into trying to determine how much he meant of what. Its just rough to imply that female coders are scare even in part due to biological predisposition to be worse at it than men. Maybe you don't think he was saying that at all. And if not, then okay. To me it seemed that he was and that's the point I take biggest issue with. If you don't think he was saying that and that's why you support the article then I guess we have some common ground there. If you do think he was saying that and agree it is true, then that is what I find hard to understand
I don't think of it as their only way into a relationship.
You are inferring just as much as me to say that that is not the argument be put forth. It was ambiguous. But I don't understand why everyone in support of the memo only sees the word "preferences" and not the word "abilities" in his memo. He said both. That does not mean that he possibly only meant one. It means that he meant both. He said both because he meant both. And if he didn't mean both then he should retract the "abilities" from his memo.
The article implied that women are biologically inclined to be less capable than men at programming. Hard to stomach as a woman programmer. To think so many people supported that. Maybe a lot of the support was for different parts of the article. But it doesn't change that the basis for his arguments included that women are biologically less likely to be good at programming. It made me feel like there are a lot of people who would not respect me as a programmer purely based off the fact that I am a female. I guess there is good that can come from open dialog in response to something that hurt, but I think that is only the silver lining. Anyway, I definitely agree that men should be able to freely pursue any career or path they want as well. I think if there are certain fields that men feel alone in they should do everything they can do raise awareness and maybe someday some company will for a female for talking shit on males being biologically less capable at something. I'm sure that happens right now in court for custody with arguing for a father being a better caretaker. And I think that's fucked up. But I don't think that means that somebody arguing women are less capable at programming on the basis that they are women isn't fucked up. The men's and women's advocacy efforts are pretty similar there just are different hurdles to overcome. To me, this article written by the Google employee is one of those hurdles for women. I'd be glad to talk about any that you think are hurdles for men
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I am interested in an open dialog. I am a female programmer and I greatly appreciate the efforts to get female programmers in the field. I currently work with all males. It is harder to relate to males in a lot of ways for me, but I do really enjoy programming. The reality of the workplace seems that you need to have allies. But a lot of people make their allies with people they can relate to really easily. I'm essentially saying it's harder to make allies for a minority. This issue has caused me at times to want to move to another field or workplace. I stick with it because I like to program, I want to learn, it's a high paying job, and because I have a lot of student loans. I have spoken to other women about related issues, and it seems to be a common concern. Thus, while some women quit to raise children, it seems as though the high rate of women quitting tech jobs and not staying in the field could be correlated (with causality) to women not having allies in the workplace of tech companies. Thus, the company itself makes itself the allie, by ensuring that the efforts are made for women to not be a dramatic minority. If this effort was not made at my previous company, I think I would have left the tech industry a while ago. It was the female friends I had at my last job that gave me the comradery to make the job a place where I belonged. I hope this post gets received with openness.
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Interesting perspective. To me that aligns with the idea that having allies is important. It has just seemed harder to make allies when it's not someone I can easily relate to
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I'm addressing that there are women who don't quit for kids but quit to go to another field where they are not a minority. I agree there is nothing you can do to give someone an alternative to compete with someone who doesn't have kids if they want to have kids more than they want to be able to focus on their job. There is the option the man could raise the kids, but it won't change the several months that a woman will have to miss too bear them, unless they got a surrogate which not everyone is willing to do.
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I became friends with every female there was in my group at my last job. I appreciate your honest and, to me, new perspectives, but I see it as less of an individual issue and more of a group issue. I do agree this is an issue facing any minority. I do see it to be harder for programmers to find people outside of programming to relate to, so that would apply to men as well, but I'm strictly just addressing the issue of corporations employing programmers at this point. And I'm sorry you had to conform to those things you didn't like. If it's worth anything, I always found guys who didn't like sports to be fun and interesting
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That's a good suggestion, thanks. I think that is something I could do as an individual. For a tech company, if they are trying women to join to get diversity because they have correlated that with innovation, they may want to make it so that women don't have to do more than men in order to make friends. That would make it a place where everyone has to make a more similar effort in order to have allies
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They had incentives for hiring women
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I have read the original article. I wouldn't have felt informed enough to reply on this thread if I hadn't. Programming cannot always be a social experience, as he said. People only pair program when it makes things more efficient, which is more common with a new hire or just for a small time until an agreement on a crucial aspect of the code is reached. It's also sometimes more commonly used when forming a new scrum team. At the end of the day, pair programming can be inefficient. The social aspect may help females make allies with men, thus promoting more females being happy in tech jobs and not leaving, but I don't think it would necessarily attract females just by the pure nature of it being social
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Can you tell me if there is research showing that this is causality and not just correlation? Might it be possible that the more educated a woman is, the more likely it is she is a minority in her workplace? From my viewpoint, Google is trying to fix this by making is so that highly educated women employed by them work at a place where they are not a minority (much of Google's workforce have master's degrees and some phds).
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Also kindof funny, but isn't keeping women in that box keeping men in the box of having to provide in order to keep a woman they love? I just don't understand why men don't see the benefit they get from women being promoted to work in high paying high stress jobs. While I see what you're saying where women have an opportunity to quit and men would be likely to have that less frequently, not everyone needs a job as high paying as a tech job. Some people just wantt one. They want the opportunity to make something or change something. Programming is fun and can provide something more stimulating for the mind than a lot of other things. So if women want that but they want to enjoy comradery at the workplace the same way men in tech jobs can, then why would the company not promote that if they want to get women on board for the sake of innovation due to diversity. I'm not sure if I'm making sense any more cause it's late an I've been talking about this all day, but I'm pretty sure there's some basis in reality in what I'm saying. Google's policies are helping people. And the main reason they would silence someone by firing them is so that they can get more women to know that they won't be treated as if they are incapable simply based on the knowledge that they are biologically a woman in their workplace. I personally would be stoked to work at Google after this because I now know Google does not support people saying I am less capable than a man purely based on the fact that I'm a woman. Defs rambling that this point but that's all I got left. I am a programmer, and just because someone's says women are biologically less inclined to be capable of programming doesn't mean it's true
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I wasn't saying it was funny as in humorously wrong, I was saying funny as in a unique viewpoint that made me laugh. I'm not saying men are keeping women in a box, I was just more off the cuff saying abstractly that having expectations for women doing these things is the same thing that will cause men to have to be the one who works in a female/male relationship.
I don't think it makes a good person for a woman to leave as soon as she makes more. I think there are lots of women who wouldn't do that and if they do then that is sexist.
I read the memo. I don't really want to get into trying to determine how much he meant of what. Its just rough to imply that female coders are scare even in part due to biological predisposition to be worse at it than men. Maybe you don't think he was saying that at all. And if not, then okay. To me it seemed that he was and that's the point I take biggest issue with. If you don't think he was saying that and that's why you support the article then I guess we have some common ground there. If you do think he was saying that and agree it is true, then that is what I find hard to understand
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I don't think of it as their only way into a relationship.
You are inferring just as much as me to say that that is not the argument be put forth. It was ambiguous. But I don't understand why everyone in support of the memo only sees the word "preferences" and not the word "abilities" in his memo. He said both. That does not mean that he possibly only meant one. It means that he meant both. He said both because he meant both. And if he didn't mean both then he should retract the "abilities" from his memo.
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The article implied that women are biologically inclined to be less capable than men at programming. Hard to stomach as a woman programmer. To think so many people supported that. Maybe a lot of the support was for different parts of the article. But it doesn't change that the basis for his arguments included that women are biologically less likely to be good at programming. It made me feel like there are a lot of people who would not respect me as a programmer purely based off the fact that I am a female. I guess there is good that can come from open dialog in response to something that hurt, but I think that is only the silver lining. Anyway, I definitely agree that men should be able to freely pursue any career or path they want as well. I think if there are certain fields that men feel alone in they should do everything they can do raise awareness and maybe someday some company will for a female for talking shit on males being biologically less capable at something. I'm sure that happens right now in court for custody with arguing for a father being a better caretaker. And I think that's fucked up. But I don't think that means that somebody arguing women are less capable at programming on the basis that they are women isn't fucked up. The men's and women's advocacy efforts are pretty similar there just are different hurdles to overcome. To me, this article written by the Google employee is one of those hurdles for women. I'd be glad to talk about any that you think are hurdles for men
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