
What Happens to Us Does Not Happen to Most of You - RMarcus
https://www.sigarch.org/what-happens-to-us-does-not-happen-to-most-of-you/
======
reuven
These stories upset me deeply. But as much as they upset me, they surprise me.
And that's because until it was just recently, after 20+ years in the computer
industry, that I discovered how pervasive such behavior is.

I'm not happy that such stories take place. But I am happy that a growing
number of women are telling their stories, shocking those of us who were able
to be blissfully ignorant of what was going on, and forcing us to realize just
how poorly our female colleagues are sometimes being treated.

Let's even assume that 90% of the time, things are great for women in high
tech. How many women are willing to put up with even 10% (or even 1%) of their
time dealing with such behavior? I'm not sure if I would. And then we wonder
why so many women aren't interested in technology careers, or leave after a
short period of time.

I hope that these stories eventually end. But in order for them to end, we
need to hear more of them, to realize just how bad things are, and to make it
completely unacceptable, in every way, for things to continue as they
currently are.

~~~
curtis
> _... things are great for women in high tech._

Why do so many people keep insisting on believing that the problem is specific
to the technology fields? Women face these kind of problems _everywhere_ that
they have to interact with men.

~~~
mcguire
Because tech is new and likes to think of itself as better than that.

"Look, we were harassed and discriminated against all through high school! We
would never treat anyone like that."

------
evrydayhustling
During my PhD work I often accompanied my advisor in presenting her lab's
research (not only or even mainly mine) to interested companies and
governments. She was an incredibly accomplished, tenured faculty member who
had pulled together a massive research team (and budget) at a top research
University. I was a 22 year old white guy with a BS. But many many times, I
found government and industry types addressing comments, questions, and even
follow-up requests almost exclusively to me.

I tried to imagine what it was like to tough out that culture back when she
was a grad student or junior faculty, long before this was a even a major
topic of discussion. I wussed out of the grind I would have faced as a junior
faculty, even sporting all the right aesthetics. To those who have stuck it
out against major challenges: you are tough as nails, you are improving the
system, and it is noticed by and impacts more people than you think.

------
MollyR
I don't like how they buried what I consider the lede.

"For the authors of this article, each negative story is overshadowed by
dozens of positive experiences, where someone went out of their way to offer
support, provide opportunities, and encourage us."

I think this matters to encouraging both women and men. Yes, jerks exist.
Sometimes its good people having bad days, some people are monsters hiding
under a veneer (ex Hollywood's Weinstein).

We need to stop dehumanizing each other, and understand all humans have the
full expanse of positive and negative emotions.

Most people in technology are not bros, sjws, ceos, and whatever.

They are just people trying to get by.

~~~
huebnerob
Does it matter to a woman whether their harasser is a "real" bad guy or
they're just accidentally doing a good job at playing one? The idea that us
'good' men can have a bad day, misstep, or misinterpret things is definitely
true, but the following idea that it some how disqualifies the action as
harassment is very much not. If you don't want to be put in a bucket with
Harvey Weinstein, then you need to realize that everyone has the capability to
be the villain sometimes, and if you've found yourself toeing that line, you
need to strongly consider what brought you there and you need to make amends
in the right way.

~~~
ethbro
I believe parent comment's point was that there's a difference between "Every
man in comparch (or insert field here) is Harvey Weinstein" and "x% of men in
comparch are y% of Harvey Weinstein" realities.

With substantially different suggestions on how to make things better for
each. (Respectively, 'murder all the men' and 'be aware of and active against
misogyny and sexism around you')

------
sweden
I just wish that when people talk about these stories, they would highlight
the country where they are writing them from.

As someone living in Europe (who lived and worked in one of more country),
some of these "cultural" aspects against a certain gender feel so much out of
place. In particular, expecting someone who is pregnant to quit the job is
just unthinkable. Most engineering work places in Europe expect the person to
take paternity/maternity leave and take care of the children but the job will
be secured.

I'm not saying that gender descrimination doesn't happen in Europe but I feel
that the US have a lot of more of these extreme and ridiculous scenarios.

~~~
strictfp
Speaking as a Swede, that is not entirely true in my experience. It's still
expensive for employers and they don't like hiring women who will soon be
pregnant.Or their men for that matter, but those are harder to spot :) I have
female friends who changed jobs just before getting pregnant or visibly
pregnant, and those employers were not happy.

~~~
TomMarius
Well I'm going to play the devil's advocate: How would you feel about looking
for an employee for months, spending tremendous amounts of money on recruiting
them, training them afterwards, only to find out that they're not going to
work for you for several years and didn't even mention that, possibly messing
up your financial situation, screwing up any long term planning, etc? How do
you feel when someone takes an unplanned vacation (and that's just for a few
weeks)?

The other cases of harassment are terrible. But I can sympathize with the
managers/business owners on this one - not that I support them. I see their
point.

~~~
carlob
How do you feel doesn't go into it. You probably feel like shit, granted. But
we as a society have decided that it's more important that women can feel at
least a little bit safer having a family as well as a career and we've
regulated this so that they can be protected from losing their job.

In some more advanced countries than the US or Papua New Guinea there is even
mandatory paid leave, go figure.

As an exercise you can take the pregnant woman in your example and replace
with a cyclist in a bike accident or someone who was just diagnosed with
cancer.

~~~
TomMarius
Reaction to your edit with a cyclist, I have no idea how that relates to this
case. That's an accident, something that no one knew will happen, and everyone
understands that. On the other hand it doesn't seem nice to purposefully not
tell someone information that might be extremely important to them and might
even mean if they do or do not lose their business.

~~~
carlob
Pregnancies are not all exactly planned…

~~~
zaarn
And pregnancies don't happen out of the blue either.

------
abacate
There are a lot of disturbing things in these stories, but I also see a lot of
remarks about situations that have a number of alternative explanations
besides sexism.

For instance:

> Noting how if two women are talking to each other at a conference, it
> becomes highly unlikely any guys will walk up and join us. If three women
> are talking, forget about it.

Yes, indeed, and there are a number of reasons for this. From my point of
view, I would avoid approaching a group of women talking by themselves since
I'd be the odd one out.

> My “mentor” told me he had never worked with a woman before and wasn’t sure
> how to talk to me. I suggested he try talking to me like a person.

Depending on the tone, it may mean something completely different than what
you are trying to say.

In fact, to me, it looks to me like he was talking about an insecurity he has,
and it's not directly related to you... and you are tagging this as sexism.

Long story short, there is a clear line between acceptable and unacceptable
behaviour, and that is respect. It's clear that this line was crossed in a
number of times in these stories, but just because you are in a position where
you didn't like something doesn't mean the line was automatically crossed.

~~~
colanderman
> From my point of view, I would avoid approaching a group of women talking by
> themselves since I'd be the odd one out.

That _is_ exactly sexism – the subtle, insidious kind that us men tend not to
even notice. You _aren 't_ the odd one out; you and them are all professionals
at a conference.

That many men – the majority of attendees at most tech conferences – make
decisions like yours is a major reason why it is more difficult for women to
advance in tech fields than men. Behavior like this is exactly what people
mean when they talk about "patriarchy". That it's subtle and "innocent" – "I'd
be the odd one out" – is what makes us not recognize it in ourselves.

~~~
nitwit005
> That is exactly sexism – the subtle, insidious kind that us men tend not to
> even notice

Suppose there is a group of girls at a high school is approached by a single
guy that doesn't know them. What is the odds of being welcomed into the
conversation without any questioning looks? At least at the high school I went
to, it'd pretty low odds. As a consequence, guys learned not to do that.

That stuff carries forward, even if the situation has changed somewhat. You
have a population of men trying to be polite. They're not going to approach
groups that have given them negative feedback before, because they don't want
to be a jerk.

~~~
deanCommie
Once again: "you and them are all professionals at a conference."

You aren't in high school.

You aren't facing a clique of girls who happen to all live in the same
neighborhood and have radically different interests likes and dislikes from
you.

You're facing a group of top industry professionals self-selected from around
the region/country/world (depending on how large/prestigious of a conference
it is).

And the fact that you don't understand this distinction, the fact that you
think it's legitimate for a man to categories "groups of women" as "cliques of
mean girls" from high school onwards without reflecting or reevaluating the
changing circumstances is why society (and more specifically YOU) still have a
long way to go to understand what sexism is and is not.

~~~
nitwit005
Kindly think a little deeper into what you're reading instead of leaping to
insult people.

There is a difference between explaining why people do things and approving of
it? I was literally explaining why the "insidious" sexism existed. I even
quoted what I wanted to elaborate on.

------
shorttime
As a man, I'm clueless on how to help. I certainly don't make any comments of
similar nature or perform actions described in the stories.

However, if I were to observe such an event happening, I'd be frozen. One half
of me thinks, the woman is an individual and can stand up for herself. If
she's uncomfortable, she'll say or do something. She's of equal standing.

The other half of me, I feel like I should say something. But by doing so,
that asserts my male patriarchy views, protecting women from the danger. Women
wouldn't be considered an equal in this scenario.

~~~
DoreenMichele
_As a man, I 'm clueless on how to help._

The single most powerful thing you can do is engage women as serious
professionals.

My biggest frustration is not with the guys who want to talk to me to hit on
me. It is with the countless others who will not engage me in a substantive
manner for fear of it being misconstrued. They de facto leave me alone with
the creeps, trolls and assholes and are, on some level, equally guilty of
treating me as nothing but a vagina. It gives far too much weight to my gender
and far too little to my education, skills, competence, interests and
character.

Whether a man is talking to me solely in hopes of a hookup or avoiding me for
fear of offending or something, he is equally guilty of treating me like the
single most important thing about me, the thing that drives all social
decisions, is what bits are between my legs. This is the essence of sexism.

~~~
msie
_Whether a man is talking to me solely in hopes of a hookup or avoiding me for
fear of offending or something, he is equally guilty_

I have a problem with that statement.

~~~
matte_black
Agreed, there is no way the guilt there is equal.

~~~
DoreenMichele
Your statement and the one above are part of the problem, not part of the
solution. My mind boggles that you are fine with arguing that your guilt is
lesser, thus somehow apparently okay in your mind.

This is exactly why progress is so painfully slow. For every one man pushing a
woman into the river to intentionally drown her, a thousand more stand idly by
and say "Not my problem" and then worry vastly more about defending their
right to do nothing than about the injustice they witness daily.

~~~
matte_black
If a woman wants to come talk to me as a professional, I’m all for it. I love
it when women take initiative to come talk to me, and not in some creep way
like people may think, but rather because it instantly makes me a lot less
anxious. I can’t be readily accused of hitting on her if she came to me first.

However, I can probably count on one hand the number of times a woman has come
up to me in my professional career to talk to me about anything of
professional significance.

Every time I approach a woman first however, there’s always an anxiety that
I’ll be perceived as a creep, trying to play a really long game of hooking up
with her. I know women must think this, because I constantly hear their
stories about the various ways men hit on them in nearly any situation, and
there always seems to be a bit of an awkwardness that isn’t there when they
approach me first.

And if the woman I approach happens to be attractive and younger than me? It
looks real bad. Indeed, if someone could have any reasonable doubt that my
professional conversation with a woman is anything more than platonic, I would
be uncomfortable in that conversation. Men would look at this and think “Yea
he’s probably trying to get with her”.

I do not get the same anxiety when talking to a woman with her husband or
boyfriend, or a woman who is much older than me, or homosexual women.

The thing about standing by and saying this is “not my problem” is that it
really isn’t my problem. My problem is completely different from yours, even
though it’s in the same domain, and nobody helps me with it either. As a basic
straight white male, I’m a dime a dozen and if I voice any kind of problem the
response is to go fuck myself.

This has nothing to do with you being a woman, there are also men with
problems that I do nothing for. It’s nothing personal, it’s just business.

------
kelvin0
As a man I have no equivalent experience, so it's very difficult to judge.
However, being in a mostly male environment the probabilities of encountering
a 'dick' are very good. Should all 'dicks' be sent to the gulags? How can we
stop them becoming/acting like 'dicks'? Enact tougher 'dick' laws?

I really don't understand how this could ever be resolved. Talking about it
seems like a start, but it really makes me feel like I am part of the problem
as a man, and I don't feel this is positive tone to this conversation.

Help?

~~~
mkeedlinger
Being a man does not make you a part of the problem any more than being a
woman makes you a victim. The behavior is what's bad, not being a male. This
thought process is actually what we are trying to battle: being of one sex or
race does not make you inherently better or worse than anyone else.

I hope that there is a positive to find: that socially we can empower those
who would otherwise be victims through our support. I'm not sure what exactly
that looks like yet, but we're figuring that out. We're talking about it.
That's positive :)

------
mirimir
It's depressing that I remember exactly this shit from my time in US academia.
Not about me, being a man, but what I saw, and what my woman friends shared
with me. I recall a woman who didn't get tenure, because she was the only
woman in the department, and had no friends to support her. I recall female
grad students who were sexually assaulted by their advisers. Some of whom were
on my thesis committee, and were great mentors. It's just so fucking sad that
it's still so common, decades later :(

------
itissid
I think there are two broad camps of thinking processes, one that fits people
into stereotypes and does system 1 type of thinking. This camp believes in
built in traits _always_ lead to certain biases. They perpetuate those biases
as well. While its true that exposure in young adulthood to certain things
leads to bias to a certain extent, the main driver is _YOU_ , your camp, which
created those biases. Remember all those women that dropped out of the
Software workforce in the 70's? Someone _MADE_ those conditions happen.

The lack of understanding that those biases _can_ be reversed is what needs to
be corrected. This is the other camp, the camp that understands this and
proactively fixes things, that needs to be made bigger.

I think, such things start very young. They starts in pre-schools where girls
are given a doll and boys are given the lego blocks or children are not
sensitized to color of the skin issues.

~~~
gowld
> Remember all those women that dropped out of the Software workforce in the
> 70's?

What's this?

~~~
toyg
A lot of the early CS-related workforce was actually made of women, because
dealing with mainframes was originally seen as an extension of typing and
shorthand (secretarial work traditionally reserved to women) with some math on
top. Sometime around the early '70s / early '80s, the field morphed into the
male-dominated world we see today.

This has been discussed on HN in the past, usually in threads about female CS
pioneers working at NASA and so on. I believe the consensus is that there
wasn't a single individual cause for the change, but rather a number of
conditions changed around the same time, discouraging women from CS-related
jobs.

~~~
Trundle
The field morphing in to being male dominated and the existing women dropping
out are two different things. Sure, what you're saying has been discussed
plenty on HN. As far as I know the other posters statement hasn't.

------
EGreg
Many of these experiences are definitely ranging from unfortunate to terrible
for women trying to simply have a productive career in a made dominated
workplace.

I just wanted to make a simple mathematical point, which the article kind of
alludes to: the more X-dominated a field is, the more you would have run-ins
with X, and thus more stories of inappropriate behavior by X.

I wonder what stories guys have of joining female-dominated fields. Are they
called the token guy? Do women make sexual remarks about them? The degree to
which the answer is "yes" will be greatly affected by the imbalance in the
first place. The bigger it is, the more likely they are to bump up against
something bad in everyday life.

Not saying we just have to accept this. Just saying we have to understand that
no matter how much we all personally make an effort to act better, these
stories will continue. So don't beat _yourself_ up over it and continue to
treat everyone as a fellow human being. And don't take it as a criticism of
all men.

The same phenomenon happens if you turn on the news and see crimes and murders
all the time. That doesn't mean the city is overrun by crime but rather that
the stories merited special attention. It doesn't mean YOU necessarily have to
constantly keep in mind not to rob or murder someone.

------
mcguire
Kathryn McKinley:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathryn_S._McKinley?wprov=sfla...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathryn_S._McKinley?wprov=sfla1)

------
hungerstrike
Sounds like excluding people who get offended at every little comment is a
better way of dealing with things.

------
purplezooey
_A man I thought was a trusted colleague thought my first conference was the
right place to make an agressive pass._

Who tf are these people?

~~~
cmsonger
It's a fair question, but if #MeToo has done anything it's been to highlight
that a reasonably high percentage of men will misuse positions of authority
for sexual reasons.

The answer is: some of our colleagues.

------
IntronExon
The comment section on this one is both depressing, and utterly predictable.
The brigading, the “but’s” and the use of the article as a flimsy ideological
springboard to make really asinine points. It’s good to see people expressing
their dismay and surprise too, and hopefully over time those voices will
become louder.

We’re still a ways from an article like this being met with something more
constructive than the usual deflections, excuses, and ideological fights.
We’re still stuck with arguments that wouldn’t have been out of place during
various civil rights and suffragette movements.

It’s coming though, and I for one can’t wait. It’s just sad that we’re missing
out on the talents of many women who make a rational choice to avoid STEM and
it’s frequn toxic culture of asocial/antisocial asses. It’s sad that a site
full of bright, educated poeple can still so frequtmly come off as a pack of
deflecting, equivocating, terrified boys. Everyone involved deserves better
than this.

So speak up, take a risk, and most of all act like and be someone that other
people know would stand up for them. Be the kind of person who an absuive
prick would never think of saying or doing what’s described in this article,
around. Talk to and listen to your coworkers, and try to have some ideals
beyond personal advancement.

------
saas_co_de
I don't think the tech industry can really change unless it makes gender
balance a priority.

How many tech CEOs will stand up and say: "I have an 80% (or 90% or a 100%)
male tech team because there are not enough qualified women to achieve gender
balance."

No CEO will be caught dead saying that explicitly but they are saying it
implicitly every single day with how they are staffing their companies.

From reading HN it seems like a large percentage of people here _believe_ that
the gender gap is due to a qualifications gap and they might dump on people
like James Damore for being dumb enough to say it in public but most of them
believe it and the way they act shows it.

The bottom line is that if you are not achieving gender balance on your teams
what you are telling women and what you are telling the world is that you
believe men are superior to women and that women are not qualified for these
jobs.

Actions speak louder than words and as long as the actions of companies and
individuals reflect this attitude no amount of words is going to change
anything.

Achieving gender balance in tech is possible and is only a matter of choice.

There are more than enough qualified women to fill tech jobs in roughly equal
proportion with men.

It doesn't happen because (among other reasons):

1) The people doing the hiring are overwhelmingly men and set rules and
standards for hiring that discriminate against women

2) Companies believe that young men are more profitable employees and so they
do nothing to seriously discourage discrimination

Unless this changes the experience of women in tech will be a negative one.

All a woman has to do to know that she is undervalued and seen as an inferior
is walk into a company that has a overwhelmingly male tech team and that is
most of them.

~~~
mkeedlinger
While I can't speak for others, I'm not sure that most people here think there
is a gender gap because of inability on the part of women, but instead maybe a
difference in general interests between the sexes.

I'm also not so sure about your claim that "there are more than enough
qualified women to fill tech jobs in roughly equal proportion with men." I
rarely have the chance to talk to women who are similarly interested in
computers, and at my university there are very few women who are in any of my
CS classes, despite that I feel that those who are there feel welcome
(hopefully. I am not all-knowing, this is my best guess).

I think a better solution to the problem than pressuring people into hiring
women simply for the virtue of being female and aiming for 50% would be to
call sexism what it is. Call out when people who do the bad of hiring a less
qualified man instead of a woman (this is a contrived example, hopefully
you're understanding my point).

Solving sexism with more sexism probably won't work.

These are my honest thoughts, hope that's ok.

~~~
saas_co_de
> I rarely have the chance to talk to women who are similarly interested in
> computers

This is probably true, but the idea that you have to be "passionate about
computers" to do the job is one of those things that men have made up to
exclude women.

In order to have gender equality you have to identify these areas of gender
difference and eliminate them from hiring criteria.

> pressuring people into hiring women simply for the virtue of being female

That is the mischaracterization that everyone falls back on. They assume that
if you have a gender balanced team it is because you hired people "because
they are women."

That logic implies that those women are not qualified for the job and that you
could never build a gender balanced team with qualified women.

Until we make gender balanced teams the norm people are going to keep thinking
like that, which is why it is so important to take corrective action.

~~~
mkeedlinger
> the idea that you have to be "passionate about computers" to do the job is
> one of those things that men have made up to exclude women.

I didn't say that they need passion. I am saying, however, that I am less
likely to go into medicine because I am not interested in it. Maybe the same
could be the case for women? (meaning, if there is a general trend that less
women are interested, then less will join said field of work, because it is
their choice not to).

> That logic implies that those women are not qualified for the job and that
> you could never build a gender balanced team with qualified women.

You have a good point. This sentence does have a negative connotation as you
say, but it is not exclusively said. Could it also be possible that a push to
hire more females (explicitly because of needed gender balance, something that
is, in my opinion, contrived) has happened enough recently that people's minds
go there first?

> Until we make gender balanced teams the norm people are going to keep
> thinking like that, which is why it is so important to take corrective
> action.

Interesting point. I'm not willing to say you're wrong, because you might be
right. I'll admit, I thought that less women graduate with CS degrees than men
though. Am I wrong? If not, how do we get more women to enter that major? And
what if they don't want to simply because they're not interested?

edit: I appreciate that we can talk about this btw, and that you seem to
respect my opinion. I think this is a valuable part of this discussion.
Thanks.

~~~
saas_co_de
> thought that less women graduate with CS degrees than men though

This is absolutely true but it is also true that there are many successful
people working in the tech industry at all levels with very little formal comp
sci education.

If men can get software engineering jobs with no formal comp sci education,
which they certainly can, then the fact that there is an imbalance in degrees
does not mean that we have to have an imbalance in employment.

The low representation of women in CS at university level needs to be
addressed as well but the best way to do that is by making software
development a job that women want and believe that they can succeed in.

People go to college to get training for a career and so if women feel like
software development is a profession that excludes women they aren't going to
waste their time and money training for it.

"the percentage of CS-degree holders who were women peaked in the 1980s at 34%
and has been on a downward trend ever since, even though women currently earn
57% of all undergraduate degrees."

[http://newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/cracking-the-code:-why-
aren...](http://newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/cracking-the-code:-why-aren-t-more-
women-majoring-in-computer-science)

The fact that there has been a sharp decline in female participation in CS in
just the past few decades demonstrates that this is a temporary anomaly and
not some "fundamental difference between genders" and further demonstrates
that large changes are possible with the correct policies.

