It depends on where you hang out. Some places are better than others, and some are even dominated by women. But in general, I agree. After a disturbing experience or two, I decided anonymity was simply easier than hassle. I suspect a lot of folks take this route.
Also, gender anonymity offers an additional freedom: in an age that points out and encourages women engineers and girl gamers, I would like to succeed or fail on my own merits. Anonymity guarantees that I do.
Hence, my current pseudonym, "Dove". It is believably feminine but not particularly so, and is about as non-stealth as I've ever been.
Well, as far as I'm concerned you're very welcome, whatever your gender. My curiosity was mainly in the ratio, not in identifying people, but I'm quite surprised at some of the developments in this thread. (in a positive way).
It shouldn't require you to be stealthy to be taken serious but I fully understand.
In my life at least one female programmer has had a pretty good influence on my development, here's to you Jenny Yip, wherever you are today :)
I'm part of a group of people that are involved with alternative energy, one of the guys there called himself 'fungus'. Everybody assumed him to be a male in is 30's, imagine the surprise when I found out he was a 13 year old whip-smart kid. Holding his own in a community where the average age is probably around 40.
If you're in that situation it's probably quite comparable to what you have to put up with. People will not give you 'full weight' because of who you are, instead of letting your creations stand on their own.
For a long time I thought about how to set up an abuse free forum, and my naive idea to require people to register with their real name went out the window when I realized that this guy, who is one of the best contributors there would not have joined at all.
Also, gender anonymity offers an additional freedom: in an age that points out and encourages women engineers and girl gamers, I would like to succeed or fail on my own merits. Anonymity guarantees that I do.
Hence, my current pseudonym, "Dove". It is believably feminine but not particularly so, and is about as non-stealth as I've ever been.