
A different take on sexism in IT - antirez
http://antirez.com/post/different-take-sexism-it.html
======
klodolph
> As a proof in the United States where politically correctness and protection
> of minority is a topic always over-discussed, the condition of women is
> worse than in North Europe, where such an obsession does not exist.

I don't really know how hard you can say "correlation ≠ causation" without
getting an aneurysm, but I'm scared to find out.

I mean, it's just so damn obvious. Let's suppose that sexism is more of a
problem in the US than in country X. Wouldn't you _want_ to talk about it
more?

Don't you think it suspicious that, say, people complain more about corrupt
local police in countries that have corrupt local police?

Don't you find it bizarre that people complain about the heat in places where
the temperature exceeds 35°C?

Isn't it fascinating that the people who complain the most about headaches are
the most likely to suffer from migraines? Obviously they should stop
complaining, it would make the headaches go away!

~~~
zerostar07
I think he is saying that PC doesn't help, not that things will be fixed if PC
is removed.

~~~
saraid216
Except that it does help.

~~~
zerostar07
I consider american PC towards women (or blacks etc) as a symptom. What makes
you think it helps, other than overstating the problem (which in itself does
not solve it)?

~~~
rmc
Political Correctness is great if you are a minority. It means you have
similar rights to the powerful group. As a gay man, I know I can mention the
gender of my spouse (male!) in a workplace environment without being worried
about being fired (say). Straight people have always (more or less) been able
to mention their spouse in the workplace without fear of repercussion. Now I
can too! Political Correctness means I don't have to watch every word I say in
the office! It's done wonders for my freedom of speech.

~~~
zerostar07
But PC is only the first step! The more accepting a society is, the less PC is
needed, because people embrace each other without a need for self-censorship
and no one is offended.

~~~
rmc
Yes that's the end game

------
ddellacosta
_I think it is always an error to talk about sexism, even when the root cause
is some asshole not respecting you because you are a woman._

This is backwards. The thing that we absolutely have to do--especially those
of us who are white males--is point it out when other white males are abusing
our privilege, and show that we won't tolerate a work environment where women
are not treated as equals. This is the single best, most powerful thing that
we can do to end this type of discrimination.

If a woman is expected to do something because she is a woman, if she is being
subjected to sexual harassment or threats because she is a woman, everyone in
the room has a moral obligation to point that out and nip it in the bud. And
it is important, actually, to point out _explicitly_ that you won't tolerate
it because you don't accept discrimination against women (or minorities, or
what have you). In person, in front of people, so everyone knows who you are
are and where you stand. This is called making the environment safe for people
to do their jobs; also known as having balls to do what's right.

Unless, of course, you like working in a sexist/homophobic/racist environment,
in which case let me know so I can make sure to avoid working with you in the
future.

I'm relatively new to HN, but I already have seen these kinds of tone-deaf
articles pop up over and over, and it's maddening, and absurd. Surely there is
something you people writing these articles could be writing about which is
more worthwhile than rehashing the right to be a sexist over and over.

~~~
saraid216
> I'm relatively new to HN, but I already have seen these kinds of tone-deaf
> articles pop up over and over, and it's maddening, and absurd.

You should read the comments, too. It will become painfully obvious why these
articles keep popping up. (Also note that this one was submitted by its
author.)

------
jamesmcn
I agree with the author that you don't want to "protect" women or other
minorities, you need to make a general effort to make your work environment
suitable for everyone.

That said, I can't think of an instance in the ~13 years I've been working
professionally where I have observed a minority in a tech company receiving
"special care or protection." This may happen in more traditional industries,
but my experience is that _everyone_ works their asses off. (My experience is
that minorities are often overachievers. I can't think of a single female
engineer who was a slacker. I can think of quite a few white males and one or
two South- and East- Asian male slackers. Ironically, when we start to see
female slackers, then we know that we are creating the right environment. And
can proceed to apply the same management tools that we apply to anyone not
pulling their weight!)

Today, software developers are in extremely high demand. There is no reason to
believe that women, african americans, or any other minority are fundamentally
less capable of being excellent engineers. So the question is: what are we
doing wrong as a society and as company creators that causes certain
minorities to be underrepresented in our tech companies? South and East Asians
appear to be well represented, so it is clearly not an impossible problem.

I welcome articles that help me better understand how to create a better
environment for capable engineers. There is a clear shortage of female
engineers, and there is an encouraging uptick of women speaking about the
problems and issues that cause them. The more we learn, the better we will be
at closing that gap.

------
spindritf
I'm starting to feel that this whole issue is being taken up by people who
were born too late for some actual struggle against sexism and racism. 50s are
over, women are not sent away by the bank teller and told to come back with a
husband, people who aren't white are not barred from employment, and almost
all that's left to "fight" against is unpleasantness and stupid jokes.

And so unpleasantness and stupid jokes are being fought, which makes it easy
and risk-free so more people join. Not to disparage the authors of those but
anyone can write a blog post and feel like they've done something.

ps. Your text requires some stylistic corrections, and it's not obvious what
you mean by "too easy" in the beginning.

EDIT: Thank you, rmc (below), for providing examples. That's what I mean --
unpleasant words is largely the extent of sexism nowadays, or even just
shortcomings of pop culture (like there's a shortage of those). And that is
met with major outcries, not to mention actual discrimination which is met
with million dollar lawsuits.

~~~
Cushman
Half of Americans are women. Half are men. Give or take.

83% of Congress are men.

60% of college graduates are women.

91% of inmates are men.

84% of single parents are women.

If you think all that's left of ten thousand years of systemic discrimination
is unpleasantness and stupid jokes, I just don't know what planet you live on.

~~~
herval
I'm not sure these numbers show anything but that men are more violent
(hormones and culture, maybe?) and women are more "attached" to their children
(a side effect for carrying one on her belly for 9 months, perhaps?)

~~~
revelation
And thats why we don't have equality. Men are violent and bossy, women are
nurturing and caring, let's parade tough on crime and the nuclear family.

~~~
rmc
It's funny how some "mass stereyotypes" (like "men violent, women nurturing")
tend to take longer to die. Let's look at some other "mass stereyotypes" that
are no longer so accepable to say in civil discource:

• Women can't do maths (like at all, their brains are tiny and incabable of
abstract thought) It's in the nature!

• Men can't look after babies, they'd probably hold them by their heads or
something! It's in their nature!

• Jews are only concerned with money, it's in their nature!

• Women lack the mental capabilites for politics and shouldn't be allowed to
vote, it's in their nature.

• Women are very emotional, and hence are unsuitable for high pressure jobs
(high level political leader, CEO, doctor, military commander), they'd just
have some sort of emotional break down when the going gets tough, it's in
their nature.

• etc. etc. (I haven't even touched on non-noble people, black people, LGBT
people, catholics, prodestands, muslims, etc. etc.)

All of these things have been said about natural differences between various
groups, mostly due to what we now realise as massive biases. When one says
"men are naturally violent" or "women are naturally caring", the burden is on
you to show how _this time_ it's different, rather than it being just another
(false) statement born out of bias. All these claims had some sort of evidence
behind them. The burden is on you to come up with a standard of evidence that
supports your biased claim, but doesn't show that women are incable of high
office (say).

~~~
herval
The "mass stereotypes" you're mentioning here are respectively called
"testosterone" and "oxytocin". It could be that, one day, someone is able to
prove that there is more to it, but I'm certain that obtusely comparing a
hormonal effect with "jews love money" won't help much...

~~~
zerostar07
Historically, a number of great cultures used Eunuchs, or people who weren't
allowed to marry in high-ranking offices (the Chinese, Byzantine, Ottomans,
and the Church). Apparently, good leadership is not tied to testosterone.

~~~
herval
I don't think I made or implied any such connection... The link in question is
that testosterone (both in males or females) greatly increases the propension
to violence in individuals (although it's not NECESSARY that violent
individuals have high levels of testosterone or that anyone with high levels
of it is automatically the Incredible Hulk)

------
saraid216
Again and again, people make the mistake of treating individual solutions as
similar to institutional solutions.

Sexism is not a topic you bring up in an individual setting. You are
absolutely correct about this. Women should live and die by their merit just
as much as men do.

But at an institutional level, this isn't possible. To exaggerate a little,
think of chattel slavery. Could you really say that chattel slavery would be
obliterated simply by not talking to slaves about chattel slavery? Of course
not; there are physical restraints driven by economic and political
assumptions about what would happen. Note that I'm only talking about chattel
slavery here, which today only exists in rare parts of the world; I am not
talking about racism.

We talk about sexism in IT because this is what needs to happen: people in IT
need to pause and think before making a sexist comment. They need to be able
to review what they just said in their minds and understand why a comment or
evaluation is sexist. They need to be able to do this especially when accused
of sexism. They need to understand that some behavior can be offensive and
that being civilized in part means that they make sure such behavior is kept
in check rather than spewed around flippantly.

That's why we talk about it. It's the same reason we tell you to comment your
code. You have to REMEMBER TO DO IT. Some of us are happy magical and already
do it as a habit. Others need the reminder.

I encourage you to explore
<http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Geek_Feminism_Wiki>

------
JohnBooty
The article's point is that we should stop thinking about things like
systematic sexism/racism and simply treat individuals equally and with the
respect that every individual deserves.

That's not wrong. Unfortunately, it's necessary but not _sufficient_ to combat
the problem of inequality resulting from sexism.

Yes, we should lead by example, and absolutely treat our female coworkers with
the respect they deserve simply because they're people, dammit. And if
everybody else did the exact same thing, yes, the problem would disappear!

However, that's not the world we live in. Not everybody is going to follow our
lead. And that's why each of us who is interested in ending this crappy state
of affairs can't simply do our part and then bury our heads in the sand. We
have to do MORE than our parts.

Not sexism-specific, but here's an example. I had a gay coworker a few years
back. Of course I treated him with respect. His orientation was a total non-
issue to me, not something I even thought about. But other coworkers said some
insensitive things, tossing the word "gay" around as a synonym for "bad" and
things like that. So I privately talked with a couple of them and, hey, let's
not do that, let's make ____ feel at home here. Not putting my coworkers down;
asking them to join me in doing something positive. And I made some progress
that way -- progress that never would have happened if I'd simply treated him
right and then buried my head in the sand.

(For the record, I'm not some wonder of workplace harmony. I screw up a lot.
About a decade ago, I was in a similar situation except _I_ was the
insensitive coworker. I learned from that situation. And frankly I wish I'd
been steered in the right direction sooner, though I can't blame anybody else
for my actions but myself.)

~~~
klodolph
> That's not wrong.

It is wrong. Sexism isn't a conscious choice that we can avoid on an
individual level. It's a collection of bad habits and systems of bad behavior
in groups. If you "stop thinking about things like systematic sexism/racism"
then they become invisible to you, and you will lack the power to do anything
or even articulate an argument about discrimination.

For example, if you treat everyone equally but don't think about sexism, how
do you stop someone else from doing stupid sexist things? How do you let them
know that it's not acceptable?

As an analogy, it's obvious that murdering people to steal their TV is wrong,
and we know that because we think about murder. If we never thought or talked
about murder, how would we know it is wrong? How would we catch murderers?
What should the punishment be?

It's not enough to _not murder_ people, we have to talk about murder, hire
people who catch murderers and put them in boxes, and think about how we can
prevent more people from getting murdered.

~~~
JohnBooty
Wow. Really well-said, and thanks for that reply. I'm going to use that murder
analogy.

Though I would hope that the rest of my post showed that my intent was not to
ignore this stuff, despite my poorly-worded sentence that made it sound like I
thought it was okay to stop thinking about it.

------
herval
"It's silly to try to protect all the minorities because they are minorities"

Although I share OP's thought that people should be treated equally, that's
just not what happens. We get examples every day, so trying to "solve the
problem" by not talking about it will only make things stay the same (or get
worse). It would be like pretending the elephant is not in the room as an
attempt to make it disappear...

------
herval
"Another naive way to consider the problem is to think that sexism is a state
of mind of men. Actually the problem is more complex than that, and a lot of
women don't consider themselves or other women as capable as men."

Actually it's more complex than that: a lot of women consider themselves
inferior because they have been trained to think like that. Sexism all the
way, in a cycle that is very hard to break. I do think that "being nice to
women" is a great first step to "break the ice" and guve those who want an
opportunity to "become equal"...

------
Scidomino
I disagree. If a bunch of people are facing the same problem a good way to
solve it is for them to join together and fight it collectively. Insisting
that women should play dumb when faced with sexism is just bad strategy.

------
dspeyer
This works on big things. Not so much on little, cumulative ones.

Why did A make a tasteless joke about B's outfit? Because he was nervous and
his dubious sense of humor got ahead of his judgment. But he didn't mean
anything by it and said he's sorry B feels that way. Well everyone says stupid
things sometimes. No actual harm done. B should lighten up, right?

That doesn't work.

<http://therealkatie.net/blog/2012/mar/21/lighten-up/>

Some things are problems only because they're part of a larger pattern. That's
when we need to think outside of the individual domain.

------
pothibo
Morgan Freeman nails it. Stop talking about it:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3cGfrExozQ&feature=relat...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3cGfrExozQ&feature=related)

~~~
angry_android
[http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/colorblind/201112/colorb...](http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/colorblind/201112/colorblind-
ideology-is-form-racism)

~~~
seliopou
Yep. General rule of thumb: If you're considering adopting a view that's held
by Stephen Colbert (the character), it's probably a bad idea.

------
antirez
I see many comments in this post where sexism is referred as "bad jokes" or
things like this. This is the smaller part, and the sole that you can address
with a campaign.

My point of view is focused on the sexism that is NOT blatant and obvious like
that. Examples:

1) The male boss promotes a male instead of a woman not based solely on merits
but for prejudice about the capabilities of women.

2) The male boss promotes a prettier woman worker even if another woman
deserved it more.

3) The female boss promotes a male because she feels (without possibly fully
understanding it) in competition with the pretty woman even if she deserved it
more.

There are a shitload of cases like this, and this is the _whole_ point,
because the bad jokes can be addressed directly: they may be unpleasant, but
there is an easy path to fight this behaviours. Instead the more subtle things
that prevent a carrier from having the same chances of everybody else is where
I would be more focused. And this stuff is not the one you can fight with
being politically correct.

~~~
whamill
Okay, so you have given a few examples of sexism.

So why do you think we shouldn't talk about this? Don't you think that what
you've just described, being more prevalent in the US, warrants the
discussion? Don't you think it's irrelevant and destructive to play the quote
at the end of your article telling us just to get back to work?

------
laurentoget
wow. way to go about ignoring and denying your privileges, mister straight
white man!

why on earth is that bigoted drivel on the front page of HN?

~~~
bromang
what about the absurd institutionalized privileges of minorities are much
larger in America?

~~~
kylebrown
They took errr jerbs? (hat tip, south park).

Are you talking about affirmative action or quota hires as an
institutionalized privilege of minorities? If so, then what about
institutionalized discrimination of minorities?(eg education of the average
black student at an inner-city school way underfunded, relative to the
majority).

Even most proponents of AA are ready to concede that it should be done
differently, but its not fair to rail against the evils of "reverse
discrimination" without at least acknowledging present-day, ordinary
structural discrimination.

------
antiterra
I'd really like antirez to explain his inclusion of a quote that implies his
entire article and the topic at large aren't even worth discussion. Randi has
been able to bravely endure incredibly cruel sexist treatment from various
online communities, some of which undoubtedly stemmed from pursuing interests
in male-dominated spaces. However, I don't think it's fair to say that every
woman can or should suffer such experiences with the same aplomb.

Edit: I have discussed this a bit with Randi, and there is indeed some context
missing that makes me understand where she was coming from in the original
quote.

------
arkitaip
You are seriously telling me that what made your female coworkers "deeply
upset" was the idea that asking to be respected as women and not things like
getting significantly less pay, sexual harassment and fewer career options?
Either you are not telling the truth or this is the most ridiculous case of
selective bias I've read on HN in a long time. Ask these female coworkers of
yours what bothers them the most, the fight for gender equality in the
workplace or getting paid less because they are women.

\-----

 _As a woman you want respect because you are capable and smart. Not because
you are a woman._

This is an really old and equally flawed argument that doesn't consider the
fact that men discriminate women based on their gender not their
individuality.

\-----

 _In the course of my life I started to develop an higher and higher
intolerance for topics like politically correctness and protection of
minorities unless this was clearly put in general terms._

Political correctness is a weasel word designed to avoid meaningful
discussions. By using it you've already made it clear that you have made up
your mind on a topic that you're ignorant about.

\-----

 _If you are an human being you need to be respected because you deserve
respect like any other. I don't care if you are black, white, yellow or woman,
you are an individual._

And yet you fail to see that individuals cannot fight centuries and millenia
of stereotypes, biases and general ignorance.

\-----

 _Similarly, I will not care who you are if you do something silly at work.
Nothing is more offensive for you than me being too easy with you because you
are part of some minority. This is, basically, a masked form of reverse-
sexism, and is deeply offensive._

No one is asking you to subsidize minority stupidity, so I have no idea why
you are bringing this up. Also, is this really a problem? People's work,
regardless if they belong to a minority or not, are held to a certain standard
and if they don't perform accordingly there are ways of remedying the problem.

\-----

 _In general if there is a problem at the work place between individual A and
B, I think it is always an error to talk about sexism, even when the root
cause is some asshole not respecting you because you are a woman._

This is a very convenient way of avoiding to deal with sexism and other
related issues. Imagine the guy who claims that he doesn't have issues with
woman despite countless cases of harassing his female coworkers, that he just
happens to have problem with individuals that always happen to be women.

\-----

 _Trying to protect women in tech since they are women is like moving a
cultural problem (the sexism) into an individual domain._

It's quite the opposite. You are so desperate to focus on individuals that you
refuse to acknowledge that minority and gender issues can only be solved on
higher level, i.e. group, company and society level. This is how we've managed
to get things like equal political rights; centuries of organizing and
fighting on higher social levels.

\-----

 _A woman in tech has nothing less than a male in tech, as such does not need
special care or protection. She needs to be respected as everybody else._

What does "less" mean? Woman are clearly more often harassed in the workplace,
they get less pay, etc, so obviously something isn't working. I'm not sure
that they need "special care" (nice pejorative term there) or protection by
manly men, but they need to be treated equally and currently that's not the
case.

\-----

 _Another naive way to consider the problem is to think that sexism is a state
of mind of men. Actually the problem is more complex than that, and a lot of
women don't consider themselves or other women as capable as men._

You don't explain the complexity of the situation but you're implying that
woman can be sexists too. Yes, that's obvious but doesn't change the fact that
men are far more likely to be sexists and woman far more likely to be
discriminated against.

~~~
LaGrange
"Political correctness"

I actually love political correctness, and people ranting about it always
appear to me as deliberately obtuse and trying to avoid responsibility for
behaving in certain ways.

Here's the thing: political correctness is not the same thing as Orwell's
newspeak. It's about being recognizing that certain expressions are hurtful,
and remaining conscious not only about what you want to say, but also what
will be heard when you say it. It's also about the idea that the original
author almost got, but not really: that maybe the divisive attributes
shouldn't be mentioned when they're irrelevant (though the author is certainly
wrong about gender's relevance. Yeah, it should be -- but it's not, and making
gender activists shut up won't make it irrelevant). It's about recognizing
that language actually shapes the social reality and the perception if certain
ideas (both desirable and not) are something acceptable (there's some neat
studies on how people choose their ideologies based on whether they perceive
them as socially accepted).

It's really sad that the concept ended up becoming a weasel word used by
bullies to say "this person just complained about me being a bully, and that
makes me feel uncomfortable".

~~~
tomp
I'm not an American, so I might not be familiar of all the ways one ought to
be politically correct, but let's focus on the one example that I do know:
_fat_ vs. _overweight_ or _horizontally-challenged_ or _[silence]_.

My main objection with the idea that saying that someone is fat will _hurt
their feelings_ or _make them feel bad_ is that no, it will NOT make them feel
_bad_ \- rather, it will make them feel _worse_ , because they must already
feel bad. If someone is fat and they are ok with it, they wouldn't be hurt if
I was pointing it out. It's just like I wouldn't be offended if someone called
me a _man_ , or _European_ , or _short/not tall_ , or _geek_ , because I'm ok
with all of those.

Therefore, based on personal reflection, I believe that people that get
offended by saying they are fat are people that don't like being fat. But in
that case, they _should_ be _shamed_ , in other words _encouraged_ to do
something about it, to make a positive change in their lives! I find the idea
that I should limit my own freedom of speech just so that other people can
continue living in ignorance, ridiculous.

~~~
LaGrange
Well, lets start with the fact that your personal reflection is bunk, and I'm
not an american as well, but culturally aware enough to know that the european
stereotype of Americans being really politically correct is actually present
in an american "Europeans are politically correct" version. Also,
"horizontally-challenged" is not something that really happens. Actual
political correctness is either saying "overweight" when it's relevant, or
keeping it to your own damn self when it's not.

Now, to the personal reflection — people might rationally know that it's no-
one's business how much they weight, but still be aware of the societal
perception of their looks. They might be still healthy people, and they would
be happy with their looks, but the reaction of society to their looks makes
them feel bad anyway, and one of such reactions is using expressions such as
"fat".

As for "shaming" == "encouraging," it's just not true, to avoid harsher
statements. In fact shaming is extremely discouraging to people, is mostly
done without awareness if the person being shamed can or wants to actually
change the state that caused shaming, and is just done to boost egos of people
doing the shaming. It's only use is in discouraging extremely unwanted
behaviors – such as, for example, shaming people whose looks don't conform to
your particular standards of beauty. Oh, and "positive change" might be
actually a load of bunk as well.

And, finally, as to the "keeping in ignorance" remark, it's an extremely
ignorant remark. For one, the "if irrelevant" is important here. My doctor can
still tell me that the recently acquired extra load on my joints is probably
contributing to my knee issues, interestingly enough without using the
expression "fat slob", and people can talk about oppression of people of color
in general or blacks, or immigrants in general or Mexicans in specific,
depending on how specific the issues in question are. The words become
"incorrect" when either used for no reason (why did you need to mention the
race of a person doing that annoyed you on the street, for example?), or using
the words that are racial slurs used specifically to offend.

~~~
tomp
I'm not running around calling overweight people fat and offending them...
It's rather neutral, really. Simply, when describing people, I might say
blond, if the person is blond, or I might say fat, if the person is fat.

Maybe if we all start saying what we think, either fat or overweight (I prefer
fat because it's shorter), and stop putting so much pressure on the issue, the
society would be a much better place to live. For fat people and others that
live "unconventional" lifestyles.

------
raganwald
The Keep:

<http://raganwald.posterous.com/the-keep>

~~~
graue
Your original, short comment seems much clearer about the point you're trying
to get across: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4597584>

~~~
raganwald
I agree! The trouble is, once i started telling the story as a parable, I got
emotionally involved in telling the town's story instead of using it as a
secondary device for making a primary point.

Thanks for the excellent feedback.

------
emehrkay
Is it wrong for me to assume that the author is a white man just by what he
wrote?

------
zerostar07
"It's silly to try to protect all the minorities because they are minorities"

That is silly. Societies are not made in heaven and are full of prejudices
against minorities molded through centuries of white male domination.

------
kenster07
To the ardent feminists, a simple question -- do you believe the world would
be a morally superior place if there was no biological distinction between men
and women -- i.e. there was only one gender?

~~~
natep
I think ardent feminists are focused on making realistic changes to reality,
i.e. working with the reality that we have a great diversity of sexual
identities, gender identities, and gender roles, rather than try to fight
against it. Fair treatment of women and minorities does not entail erasing all
differences until we are a uniform grey.

------
raganwald
[http://m.netmagazine.com/features/primer-sexism-tech-
industr...](http://m.netmagazine.com/features/primer-sexism-tech-industry)

------
sophacles
There is a lot of weird cognitive dissonance in this article. "Special
protection" is one of those vague phrases that can (and appears to be here)
used in a few different ways.[1] In some senses it is taken to mean "elevating
one group to have a higher privilege set and stronger boundary enforcement
than the norm". In other senses it is used as "stripping unfair privilege from
one group by a combination of positively asserting the rights for the
protected group and punishment for those who deny those rights or assert a
privilege for their group".[2]

This fuzzy, conflicting set of understandings leads to a lot of cases of
people talking past each other, and not really accomplishing anything. We
really need to stop using such terms in discussion and be a bit more specific.
There are good and bad examples of both meanings, and there needs to be frank
and open discussion, without reduction to overloaded and emotionally loaded
terms.

Similarly there is the problem of privilege blindness. Even if _I_ treat
everyone the same, or think I do, I may not be. This is a real thing - people
have notions of the right way to treat someone and they don't even notice that
it is absurd or privilege enforcing. For example: In college and for a short
time after, I worked at a bar as a bartender. My boss was a black man, the
owner of the business. I am a white guy, 10 years younger. People would come
in during closed hours with deliveries or job applications or sales pitches
and come to me first. I honestly didn't notice or think anything of it most of
the time, even when it was obvious when he was in charge (e.g. i was mopping
and he was counting out drawers). I would write it off as "oh they just don't
want to interrupt the boss" or other reasonable sounding explanations.

One day right before we started accepting a round of applications, he
mentioned this to me and I was a bit resistant to the idea that it was racial.
I offered the reasonable sounding thoughts and explanations. So we did an
experiment. Half the days I would do grunt work and he would do boss work, the
other half the days I would do boss work and he would do grunt work. In both
cases, a significant portion of the applicants came to me first[3].
Surprisingly, all groups of applicants (divided by gender, race,etc) displayed
this behavior. This is a case of privilege that is really difficult to see if
you think everyone is treated equally or think you do too. I seriously doubt
the applicants were racist (well most of them weren't), and I presume they
truly believed in equality and that they actively wanted to treat everyone the
same (evidence: how embarrassed they were when I pointed out who the actual
boss was). The privilege I had here, by being white, was that the default
assumption is that I was in charge.[3]

The point here is that sometimes, despite the best intentions, there are
societal/cultural assumptions that are ingrained to the point of invisibility
for those who are the norm. It is important to point these out and discuss
them, so that people can actively stop doing participating. I believe most
people don't want to be (. _)ist, but also that the just don't know when their
actions are conforming to it unintentionally.

I think that one thing this article is great for, is highlighting that. The
author obviously cares that everyone is treated well and equally. It would be
insulting to point out to him any of his actions as sexist, because he really
isn't.[4] Instead the better approach is to have discussions, which are
inherently uncomfortable, in the light of "here's a privilege or default
assumption that exists, here is evidence", and get the people with the
privilege to see it as existing at all. Once that happens, they will stop
asserting it on their own, because the don't want to be unfair or unequal or
whatever.

</unintentionally ranty post>

[1] Please note, that my definitions after this footnote are my understanding
of the scenario, if this is inaccurate please link me to sources with good
explanations!

[2] There is another commonly used understanding of this term, which is as a
code word for "I am about to say something that really is about protecting my
privileges", however I don't think the author meant this here.

[3] Later, after learning about various equality issues in a more formal way,
there were even more things that pointed out the privilege in this
situation... my boss was someone who could "pass" as white, I'm a guy who
dresses down and is generally scruffy, and so on. There is also a related bit
of privilege in this situation from when I was hired. My friend who hooked me
up with the lead and a good recommendation made sure to casually point out
that the owner was a black man. This priming was something that at the time I
thought nothing of, it was a bit of conversation about the environment, but in
retrospect, I probably would have made the mistake I described above without
that priming. No one ever casually mentions that the boss is white when
describing a job to a prospect.

[4] (._)ism implies the person actively wants to keep the targeted group in a
state of lower privilege. It is insulting to be called that when you actually
want the opposite.

~~~
cantastoria
Privilege is essentially a shaming tactic. It's proponents believe that they
can create a reverse social hierarchy by convincing those supposedly at the
top (straight while males) that every aspect of their lives benefits from a
social advantage they don't know they have. Thus straight white males are
encouraged to live in a constant state of paranoia and shame essentially for
being born. For those who accept this belief system, the only way to achieve
harmony with those around you is to actively "give away your privilege" which
is to say sabotage and undermine your own potential and achievements so that
other, less privileged persons may somehow benefit. How this should be done is
typically left unclear. As with most "social justice" belief systems the point
is to spread guilt and shame. Ultimately, this belief system just further
stigmatizes those that it seeks to help by not only classifying people by
race, class and gender but by states of privilege as well.

~~~
sophacles
No. Actually it is things that shouldn't happen in the first place. It is not
OK that everyone went to the white guy assuming he was the boss, no matter if
he was dressed like a bum and holding a mop or if he was counting out money
drawers while the black guy was holding the mop.

It is the cops showing up at the bar when it's mostly white people and being
polite and trying to figure out who the fighters were, but the same bar on a
different, calmer, night when its mostly black people just dropping tear gas
canisters on the crowd, and grabbing me, the one white guy and saying 'stay
over here out it's safer'.

It's me dressed like a bum with a mountain man beard being allowed into the
club, but my black buddy with a suit being told he was too dressed dressed
down for the dress code.

It the time the gas station cashier asked me to stay for a minute because some
black people were out in the lot filling their lexus.

It's the innumerable times I've been told to "level with me, $female_dev just
isn't that good is she", despite having written the entire codebase they were
complimenting me for.

It's the fact that I've never been stopped by the cops for looking suspicious
or being in the wrong neighborhood no matter what I am wearing or doing, and
no matter how illegal the contents of my pockets were.

Talking about privilege is not talking about undermining anything. It's not
about being shaming anyone. It is about real occurrences that happen daily, in
an era when people claim there is "no difference between anyone", yet
anecdotally and statistically it just isn't true.

I don't want to give away my privilege. I want the standards that apply to me
to apply to everyone. This is different. I don't want, nor think anyone should
start being hassled and denied more, I think that those who are hassled and
denied more for stupid reasons to not experience that. Period.

I don't want a reverse social hierarchy, I just don't want a social hierarchy
base on anything _other than actual accomplishment_. If getting there means
cutting some slack to someone who did a damn good job despite constant
unwarranted criticism, or an environment that pushes them to the outside, I'll
do it. It is a bigger accomplishment to do well when there are people actively
acting against you, than to do great when everyone is trying to help you.

