
My experiences in tech: Death by 1000 paper cuts - tghw
http://juliepagano.tumblr.com/post/46206589124/my-experiences-in-tech-death-by-1000-paper-cuts
======
pifflesnort
Software has apparently become some sort of social cause, instead of an
engineering discipline, and my patience with this constant caterwauling about
it is at its end.

I too am dealing with death by a thousand cuts of unprofessionalism:

\- People swearing in presentations, and then people whining about swearing in
presentations.

\- Presentations that aren't backed by research or papers or anything of
particular __engineering __note, but instead are a platform for social
butterfly developers to build a larger popularity platform.

\- Conferences named after beer drinking.

\- Constant whining about some sort of offense that someone dealt you, or some
social situation that you were unable to handle like an adult.

\- Constant wheel re-invention of 1990s engineering dressed up in fancy
websites with funny names like "unicorn" or 'nyan rainbow cat daemon'.

\- Conference blow-ups about things that _SHOULD NOT MATTER_. Like dongles.
Multiple people losing their jobs and articles in CNN.

\- Drama-fests about workplace behavior, cancelled talks, "triggers", t-shirts
that make people cry.

I'm sick of this. _THIS_ is what a real conference with real papers look(ed|s)
like:

<http://static.usenix.org/events/usenix01/technical.html>

[https://www.usenix.org/system/files/tech-
schedule/atc12_proc...](https://www.usenix.org/system/files/tech-
schedule/atc12_proceedings_0.pdf)

Maybe this is just what happens when a fringe group like technology is re-
integrated into the mainstream, but I would like to go just one day without
hearing about some other act of stupidity, sexism, tweets, or social anxiety,
and instead focus on what actually matters, which is real, hard, respectful,
careful, and attentive _ENGINEERING_.

~~~
raganwald
_Software has apparently become some sort of social cause, instead of an
engineering discipline_

I liked this.

 _My patience with this constant caterwauling about it is at its end._

I didn't like this, because it implies that the problem is the caterwauling.
You then go on to make it clear that the problem is that people can't handle
the industry or the culture, not the industry or the culture.

Well, the correct way forward is for everyone to suck it fucking up and start
acting like adults, including respecting each other. Some of that includes
being less dramatic about problems, but there is also a HUGE responsibility to
eliminate those problems in the first place.

Absolutely nobody should be losing jobs over dongle jokes, but then again,
nobody should be making dongle jokes. This isn't an either-or blame situation,
just an observation that everybody wins if we don't make dongle jokes.

~~~
nhangen
'suck it fucking up and start acting like adults, including respecting each
other.'

Agreed.

'nobody should be making dongle jokes'

What have we come to where I can't sit with a friend and shoot the shit about
dongles? I can tell you that some of my best 'that's what she said' moments
were in the midst of another woman, who had some of the best of all.

~~~
drrotmos
'What have we come to where I can't sit with a friend and shoot the shit about
dongles?'

Well, it sounds to me like you've come to a professional environment, such as
a workplace, or a technical conference.

------
edw519
Being a software engineer means whatever you choose for it to mean to you.
Sorry to hear your choice of analogy. Not my choice for sure.

I'm not going to try to compare my pain with your pain or anyone else's; I
just want to say that I've been shit on by almost everyone important in my
life from the earliest age. But I found refuge in building software. It became
my escape from all the other pain. I found a way to tune out all of that and
focus on only 2 things: my customers and the tools they needed. And I found a
great equalizer. Not because I had anything to prove, but because I found a
natural solution: build what the customer needs and nothing much else matters.
Don't build what they need: same thing.

Forget about the conferences (you don't really need them anyway). Forget about
Facebook, twitter, Hacker News, reddit, etc., etc., etc. They're definitely
more of a distraction than a help. Learn how to separate issues from details
(it's amazing how little really matters). Try to tune out the negativity. I
know it's hard, but just think of it as "systems analysis applied to people".
Once you focus on what's really important to your customer, block out the
distractions, and build what they need, all the bullshit will fade into the
background.

Please don't allow your aversion to the negativity of others overwhelm your
love of building software. Let the love defeat the hate. I did and I know you
can too.

Best wishes and please keep us posted.

~~~
slewis
The blind-upvoting of celebrities on HN is sometimes appalling. This comment
totally sidesteps the point of the article. OP is not asking for advice.

You are not being helpful here. She clearly points out "That no matter how
tough I get, how thick my skin, the paper cuts still hurt." So telling her to
get thicker skin really just adds one more papercut to the pile (and the rest
of this thread will heap on a few more).

OP your post is well done and paints a clear picture. Hopefully you and others
like you will continue to inspire folks to change.

~~~
hacker789
He is allowed to share his life experiences and offer his advice to the
readers of an online discussion forum, even if the author of the article
linked at the top of the thread didn't solicit personal advice. He doesn't
need anyone's permission.

Women aren't fragile creatures who need constant protecting. The author of the
article is not your personal damsel in distress. She is a human who feels she
has faced challenges.

So is edw519.

~~~
rmrfrmrf
He's using his life experiences to explain how "if I can pull myself up by the
bootstraps, you can too." He's essentially denying her experience, and he even
implies that the two of them have had the exact same experiences in tech when
he says that death by 1000 cuts wouldn't be his choice of analogy.

~~~
mech4bg
I don't think he's denying her experience. I read it as advice on how to deal
with how things currently are.

The problem is change in the industry takes time, and so without changing how
she personally deals with things currently, she is going to continue to be
unhappy. Obviously this is a bad situation and we need to make things better
in our industry, but arcing up at people trying to help other people cope with
current conditions is hardly helpful.

~~~
rmrfrmrf
_> The problem is change in the industry takes time, and so without changing
how she personally deals with things currently, she is going to continue to be
unhappy._

Yeah, I'm not going to argue with an obvious concern troll. Next time, try to
be more subtle.

------
jhspaybar
Geez people, why can't we just take this as a moment of reflection. Read this
story and say "damn, that's not cool someone feels that way, I wonder what I
can do to make life better for the people around me?" It doesn't matter if you
think she's over-reacting, or thin skinned, or any other judgement you've made
of her after reading her post. Be a decent human being and realize that by
being aware, you can make our industry a better place to be for all people. If
you think she's just being "moody", there are plenty of guys who see and hate
this behavior of our industry and would love for the environment t to improve.
As someone who spent 8 years as a car salesman(a 95%+ male industry), the
vitriol towards and objectification of women in tech is just about as bad.
It's time to wake up.

~~~
smackmybishop
I want an example of a time when there was "vitriol" toward women in the tech
industry. I've certainly never seen it.

~~~
vacri
Were you away from HN during the "PyCon Event"? It was only a couple of days
ago, and was a startlingly clear example.

~~~
smackmybishop
I was here. "I'd fork his repo," right? That was "vitriol against women"?

~~~
wpietri
No, the vitriol would be calling her a cunt, threatening rape, doxing her,
threatening death, implying that she's hysterical, cheering her firing, etc,
etc.

I say that because the nice interpretation of what you say i that you
genuinely missed most of the story. But it's hard not to think you're just
being an ass.

------
newnewnew
One source of these "paper cuts" is that we live immersed in a highly sexual
culture. "Booth babes" are provided for men to oggle at tech conferences, but
the idealized female body is also used to sell beer, cars, and hamburgers to
us on TV. Cleavage shots are common on highway billboards. "Dongle" jokes are
on Family Guy, the Daily Show, HBO, CBS, NBC, and even PG movies (I remember a
penis joke in "Shrek"). When guys make sexual comments, they are simply
participating in the culture that they live in.

While tech has some attitudes that are undeniably sexist, comments that would
happen in _any industry_ are perceived as more threatening because the gender
ratio is so out of whack. If females felt safer in tech, then they wouldn't
notice as much the background noise of cultural hyper-sexuality.

It feels unfair or unreasonable to many men to check their American culture at
the door in order to make females feel comfortable in tech, which is the
source of the recent shitshow over PyCon. Most men are willing to fight
blatantly sexist shit - the groping and nasty comments reported from tech
conferences over the last few years. I am 100% on PyCon's side with the code
of conduct and support resources for women.

But males in tech simply don't know how to have a conversation without "that's
what she said". That's what they hear at night on "How I met your mother".

We have a sexually libertine culture. That is viewed as "progress" by some,
including many feminists, but it is not without costs. And there is no easy
way to silence it.

~~~
walms
I think this is a very important point. Why is it that we accept grossly
sexual comedy and imagery as means to advertise to the masses. Yet in the work
place this same culture is seen as totally unacceptable.

Personally I think we have gone way to far with what we accept in the media
and it's only getting worse.

~~~
sneak
> Personally I think we have gone way to far with what we accept in the media
> and it's only getting worse.

Personally I think we have gone way too far with what we deem "unprofessional"
or "inappropriate".

I'm with Louis CK when I find myself being offended by hearing some white lady
with nice hair saying the phrase "the N word" on CNN.

~~~
tiredofcareer
Not only that, I think Americans in particular are _way_ too prudish and
offendable when it comes to sex, and this starts bordering on religious
influence in my mind. I've had enough rodeos down this line of discussion to
know that this will be my only vague comment on these feelings.

I think that's the polar opposite view of walms's comment, but I might be
wrong.

~~~
walms
Not really the polar opposite, my personal views are that using human sexual
drive as a means of marketing and mass entertainment is corrupt on many
levels. But my point was more, the double standard is stupid. Why can we use
half naked women in the media but not expect men to think of women as sexual
objects? We are told they are all the time.

I'm not American so I can't comment on how prudish people are there, but I
think you are correct people do get offended way to easy. But we live in an
age that tells women to value them selves based on their sexual appeal and men
to value them selves on the sexual conquests. And saying that is wrong to me
has nothing to do with being prudish.

~~~
tiredofcareer
Initially read you as applying a prudish view to "sex sells" instead of
looking at it more academically, hence my comment. Thank you for clarifying.

We are in different paragraphs on the same page. Well written.

------
TillE
"Microaggression" is the accepted term for all those things that are totally
not a big deal and why can't you take a joke.

Very useful concept, particularly if you're not someone who has to suffer them
daily and can't understand why one individual little incident is still an
issue.

~~~
mynameishere
I've experienced things from women in the workplace that would have resulted
in _instant_ termination had she been a man. But men have a higher threshold
for not complaining about shit that doesn't matter.

~~~
vacri
So have I - I've had a morbidly obese Nurse Unit Manager with the hots for me
come in and lean all over me - heavy and annoying. My female tech lead
volunteered to provide evidence for a sexual harassment complaint if I wanted
to. (I'm male, the NUM was female)

I didn't want to. The NUM came in maybe three times a year, for only a couple
of minutes. It was just a passing discomfort, but the important thing is this:
I never lost tangible power. I didn't work in an environment where it was
commonplace. I never felt like I couldn't escape or verbally correct or even
physically overpower her if things went too far. There was never a culture of
undermining my power that it contributed to. I wasn't seen as more of a
'junior' because of it; it didn't diminish my status.

Separate to that, I wouldn't say men have a higher threshold for not
complaining about shit that doesn't matter. In some senses they do, and in
others they don't - the recent PyCon event showed vast amounts of men in tech
providing plenty of vapid, shrill complaints over stuff that really didn't
require that level of passion.

------
sneak
"The heavy drinking makes some of us feel unsafe."

Equating rape culture with alcohol-consumption culture doesn't solve the root
problem, it only alienates the vast majority of those of us who enjoy drinking
occasionally who have never raped or assaulted anyone ever.

The solution to "some people are alienated" is not "alienate the dominant
group right back".

~~~
newnewnew
The point of alcohol is to lower inhibitions. More Bad Things happen per
person hour under intoxication than sober, by design of the substance.

Recently, I've had the thought that feminists and hardline social
conservatives ought to find common ground around the alcohol/party culture.
Feminists should also ask themselves - for whom and by whom was this culture
made in the first place? Does it work in women's favor? It's unrealistic to
think that we can reduce sexual aggression while leaving this culture the
same.

I wonder what percent of sexual assault occurs while both parties are sober?

~~~
abstractbill
_The point of alcohol is to lower inhibitions._

So even when I'm at home on my own watching a great documentary on netflix,
and I have a beer or two, you're saying I can only be doing it to lower my
inhibitions?

------
RougeFemme
In one job, the women used to complain that the boss literally could/would not
hear the women when they spoke - at least when they were speaking seriously,
offering suggestions, analysis, etc. (He was great for sharing beers, shooting
the breeze, discussing current events, etc.) The other men always insisted we
were being paranoid/militantly feminist/attention-seeking, etc. One guy
finally "saw" it - but not until he had given his 2-weeks' notice. I guess
that's when he finally felt comfortable taking the blinders off - or finally
acknowledging what he had always seen. I used to say that even mosquitos got
more respect from our boss than we did, because he had swatted at them when he
heard them.

~~~
wpietri
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends
upon his not understanding it!" -- Upton Sinclair

Of course, when he said it, "man" meant "person".

To be maximally fair to the guys, this stuff is really hard to see. Part of it
is just that everything is hard to see unless it's somehow personal for you.
But the bigger part for me was that really seeing it required a trip down the
rabbit hole to seeing all sorts of privilege. All sorts of _my_ privilege,
really. Who wants to know that a chunk of one's sense of self-worth is false?
It's real work, and I feel lucky that my circumstances disposed me to seeing
it more easily than most.

------
coopdog
I don't think that "my wife doesn't understand why I like technology" is a
sexist comment. Substitute husband and it would read just the same.

~~~
rmrfrmrf
Haha, once again, the Geek Feminism wiki addresses this EXACT argument.

\-----

"Suck it up and deal" is a common response to examples of gender
discrimination. For example, suppose "Bob" asks "Alice" for an example of why
female students may feel unwelcome in computer science classrooms, and "Alice"
says, "Suppose you walk into a classroom and the first thing you hear is the
lecturer saying 'we need to make our systems so usable that even your mom
could use them'; would you feel more or less welcome?" It's common for "Bob"
to respond that he wouldn't feel unwelcome in such a situation if he were a
woman, because he would just suck it up and deal; after all, "Bob" would say,
computer scientists frequently use "so easy your mom could use it" as a
benchmark, and anyway, why would he let that stop him from being interested in
computer science?

As a rhetorical device, "Suck it up and deal" serves as a double bind: if you
fail to give examples of sexist comments or behavior, you're accused of
inventing a problem. If you do give examples, almost any example can be
dismissed as something women would be able to deal with if they weren't
oversensitive / overemotional / not really interested in technology anyway.

"Suck it up and deal" is also a convenient way of disregarding the emotional
labor required to, in fact, suck it up and deal (something almost any woman in
a technical career already does frequently just to get through the day), the
toll that such labor takes on a person over time, and the energy it drains
that could otherwise go into work. Like the Male experience trump card, "Suck
it up and deal" is a way for people who have never had sexist comments aimed
at them to deny the reality that such comments have an effect.

Source: <http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Suck_it_up_and_deal>

~~~
furyofantares
I have used the "mom" example a few of times. My mom is quite capable, so most
anecdotes I have of times I've gained insight into how people use computers
when they aren't familiar with them are of other people in my life. But I do
have a few anecdotes about her that I've used.

One day someone was Wrong On The Internet and I really wanted to make my point
and found myself making my point with a "mom" example that had never actually
happened with her. Initially it made me a little uncomfortable, and I thought
the discomfort came from representing my mother as less capable than she is.
But I figured I'm anonymous, and since I could be anyone,I'm not really
talking about my mom specifically. "My mom" could be any mom and I was
conveying something I figured might happen to lots of moms.

So I posted it anyway. It wasn't until later that I realized how extremely
obviously sexist and ageist it was. The ONLY reason I was using "mom" in that
example was to enlist the stereotype that older women aren't adept with
technology. That made me further realize that even when I was using true
anecdotes from my life, I was likely motivated to do so because enlisting the
stereotype strengthened whatever point I happened to be making.

When I read the girlfriend/wife line from the OP I thought the same thing as
many responders here do: There's nothing wrong with someone sharing a true
fact about their experience being in a relationship with someone that doesn't
care as much about technology. But that can still be sexist if you are
unknowingly choosing to share the fact because the point you are making is
made stronger by enlisting a stereotype that women don't care about
technology.

------
Sunlis
I hope you don't let your negative experiences push you away from working in
(software) engineering. The field in general is already over-saturated with
men and I could imagine it being an intimidating field to get into when you're
the only female programmer in the office. (My office of about 150 people has
only 2 or 3 female programmers, the other 5 or so women are payroll,
receptionist, etc.)

It's easy for us as men to feel welcome and comfortable in a group composed
almost entirely of men, and I suppose it ends up being sort of self-fulfilling
at that point to "keep women out", even if we don't all intend for that to
happen. I know that walking into an interview and sitting across from 3 women
scares me a little bit, but I can't even imagine how I would feel in an office
full of women; definitely out of place.

TL;DR: Please stick with it! The best way to help the female students and
interns to be more comfortable in the field is to get as close to a 50:50
gender split as possible.

------
nasloan
I don't know Julie much, but I have met her at least once or twice and have
seen her around the Pittsburgh software community events on several occasions.
As an organizer of the Pittsburgh Python group I feel a sort of camaraderie
with her and the other members of our little community. I can't truly
understand her experiences as a woman in this industry, but I know she is
hurting now, and I won't ever forget that.

These women are our people. They are tinkerers and geeks and perfectionists
and builders and creators and geniuses and artists. They are who we are and
who we aspire to be. There is plenty of imperfection to go around on both
sides of the gender divide, but what we all have in common is a desire to be
better... Better at our work or our craft, better at our fun. I think if we
took just a little bit of that energy and aimed it at being better at relating
to and respecting one another, we would all be better off.

We can make progress on this issue of sexism. We can start by practicing a bit
more professionalism, even when we think no one is watching. We can make
progress by thinking about others first when we think or act. We can make
comments with real value, rather than shock value. We can acknowledge that
there is no inherent connection between boldness and rightness. We don't need
to start treating women differently... We are already doing that and it is
only making things worse. We need to hold ourselves to a higher standard when
dealing with everyone.

What if we all went to work today and encouraged every good idea, and were
constructive toward every bad idea? What if we talked about software like it
was software, not a swimsuit model? What if we stopped being so impressed with
ourselves at every turn of off-color phrase, and started being impressed with
the great things that the men and women we work with are doing to drive our
products forward?

What if we spent just one week focusing on that. Maybe some of Julie's paper
cuts would get a chance to heal. Maybe then we would learn what we can really
accomplish together. Maybe we would never look back.

------
rmrfrmrf
This is a fantastic article. Of course, I'm disappointed (though not
surprised) that commenters here continue to deny this person's experience.

~~~
hsmyers
Actually given the norm for HN, this is pretty supportive and that is sad

------
birken
Treating coworkers with respect should always be the first responsibility of
all employees. Many of these situations you describe are gender
discrimination, but even at a higher level they are just an example of
coworkers not showing respect for one another. I've worked for 2 places in a
row where not showing respect for your fellow coworkers is literally a
fireable offense. These places exist. Many of the behaviors you mentioned in
your post would be so far over the line of appropriateness that it wouldn't
even been a question or issue. If you brought them up to your manager
immediate action would be taken.

So I'd encourage you just to keep looking if you continue to run into these
issues. All tech companies are not like this.

------
nextstep
Sounds like a shitty work place, and she was a woman. Those guys sound like
assholes. She should find another job; not everything in "tech" is like this.
I don't feel this way at my current position.

~~~
jpxxx
She should disrupt her life and tear down her most important professional
relationships to go somewhere that doesn't exist?

~~~
calinet6
I was in a negative situation at a workplace (despite being a straight male)
and yes, I did exactly that, and found a new job that was a hundred times
better.

Sometimes it's a good idea to leave and find something better. Sometimes it's
worth it to stay and try to change the situation. It's difficult to say when
each action is appropriate, but you can't say that either one is strictly a
poor choice.

In other words, yes, she absolutely should if it makes sense.

------
grannyg00se
" I’ve had people claim minority-only safe spaces are sexist. "

What is a minority-only safe space? Is it just a segregated area that implies
safety in homogeneity, or is there some other mechanism to ensure "safety"?

I can imagine segregating all of a particular minority into their own area of
the office for their own "safety". Hopefully that's not what this is.

~~~
juridatenshi
I was alluding to groups (in person or online) that are limited to only a
specific minority audience, usually with the intent of creating a space where
those people will feel safe to speak freely. For example, the Devchix mailing
list is only open to women-identified people.

~~~
tiredofcareer
Not trolling, I'm genuinely asking:

Would you consider it sexist if someone started a developer list only for
people that identify as male? Would you consider it racist if white people
started a conference where only white people could attend?

I can't make the leap to consider female-only developer lists not sexist or
exclusionary without setting aside hesitation regarding the concept since my
brain wants to consider it a double standard. Even in the face of privilege,
another concept I can't really wrap my head around, but which even daring to
question or seek explanation of inflicts the wrath of people who hate my
privilege. ( _Nothing_ has come easy to me in my white male life. Nothing. I
hate when people tell me I'm privileged, as it makes me feel like life is
pretty hopeless, given the painful career and personal life I've experienced
thus far. My life should be easier if I am privileged, right?)

As a man, I'd look down on a male-only mailing list, just like I somewhat look
down on female-only mailing lists. How about a mailing list for human beings?
I just don't get it. Why do we have to identify so hard with what we are?

Maybe I have a different perspective on privilege because I'm fat and ugly,
and only the attractive white men get it, or something. But seriously, if I
have privilege, how do I take advantage of it? Is there something I have to do
to make it happen? Because I'd sure like to see it since everybody tells me I
have it.

(I genuinely loathe "oh, you're a white male, life must be easy for you," just
as much as you surely hate people snubbing your gender. I wasn't born into
money. I wasn't born attractive. I wasn't born in a great town. I have a
felony conviction. This is my second career. I've had to claw my way to
success just like everybody else.)

\---

EDIT: Thanks for having a shot at this, men. I'm interested in OP's answer.

~~~
theorique
_Would you consider it sexist if someone started a developer list only for
people that identify as male? Would you consider it racist if white people
started a conference where only white people could attend?_

From the perspective of contemporary social justice theory, such things would
indeed be considered sexist and/or racist because they are used to support
privilege, whereas a women-only context or Black-only context would be used to
deconstruct privilege.

(Some people consider this standpoint is completely insane, while others
consider it a self-evident truth.)

~~~
tiredofcareer
You rephrased my comment's discussion of privilege and wrote it back to me.
The parenthetical is what I'm asking about.

~~~
theorique
My personal answer would depend on whether I were talking candidly with my
buddies at the bar, or taking a mandatory seminar in order to get rubber
stamped for "diversity education" for my HR file.

~~~
tiredofcareer
I'm intrigued that you'd give a different answer for each scenario.

~~~
theorique
You need to know your audience, and know what they are prepared to hear. No
sense in risking your career over a meaningless political point.

------
ikkyu
This isn't really a unique story. Understand that it sucks to be treated like
that but the same can be said about women dominant workplaces. Sexism and not
being taken seriously can be found everywhere. I've been called "sweetie",
"honey" with a demeaning tone on daily basis, I've heard about fucking so and
so and drama that goes with it, my opinion was dismissed and I was left out
from the "club" more times than I care to remember and females usually got
better treatment simply by being a female countless time.

This shouldn't be news, this is just life.

~~~
wpietri
I'm amazed that you can also experience painful discrimination and conclude
that nobody should notice that.

Isn't a better response to say that discrimination sucks, and that we should
work to end it everywhere?

As a guy in tech, I have it good. But I have never forgotten how, back in the
day, being a nerd among normal people sucked. That is part of why I work to
end sexism in tech.

~~~
ikkyu
We all have different goals and limited amount of time. I will speak up in the
case of injustice if it arises but it's not my duty to fight sexism, end world
hunger, fight for peace or adopt Nigerian children.

~~~
wpietri
As a guy, I think it _is_ my duty to fight sexism, because I have benefited
from it.

But even given what you say, it doesn't match with your earlier point. Saying
that sexism isn't news is to suggest that not only do you not want to talk
about it, but that we shouldn't either.

------
3minus1
Really well-written article. Thanks for sharing.

------
brucehs
I find this Scalzi piece a useful point of reflection:

[http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-
th...](http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/15/straight-white-male-the-lowest-
difficulty-setting-there-is/)

~~~
newnewnew
That's what we need, another article that treats all members of <class> as
piece of a homogenous whole.

------
wpaladin
I'm beginning to wonder if this is actually universal. I've lived and worked
pretty much all my life in India, and something like what the OP describes
would be pretty much unthinkable there.

Disclaimer: I grew up in urban and small-town India, in a lower middle-class
and middle-class environment. I have no first-hand knowledge of how it is in
rural scools. Also, anecdotal evidence, so feel free to take it all with heavy
dpo

Math and the sciences in school: Every memory of school I have has girls and
boys in equal measure doing well in math and science. The teachers's pets are
all the kids who do well in class, the well-behaved ones who were focused on
studying. In our early teens though, you could actually see the girls doing
better than the boys in every subject. This pattern continued through college
as well. Most guys handled this situation by relying on their female
classmates for notes and help with schoolwork. I did the same.

College: My engineering class had something like a 40% female to 60% male
ratio. This varied by specialization. The mechanical engineering department
had a grand total of 3 female students and a 100 male students. (This was
because Mechanical Engineering was perceived as something physically
demanding, and the jobs involved factory floors in far-flung remote towns and
villages.) The computer science department had somewhat more than a 50% female
student ratio. On the whole, apart from the Mechanical Engineering department,
every department was hovering around a equal distribution of females and
males. Note that this was not deliberate on the part of the administration.
Engineering school admissions in India are purely a function of score in
State-level and National-level entrance exams. For that matter, the faculty
was also a fairly even mix of male and female teachers.

From the OP's post : "At an old job, someone in authority pats me on the head
to dismiss an argument I’m making about something at work." In an Indian
setting, this would be near impossible because Indian culture is terribly
touchy about men touching women in general. So the condescension would
probably be expressed in some other manner, possibly verbal.

Plus, with close to half the employees being female, there's never really a
sense of female co-workers as a minority in the workspace. And even in the few
all-male teams I've been a part of, most of the men have spouses or sisters
who work in tech. This means that no one thinks of male techies as the norm
over female techies.

Conferences: Just like the workplaces, there's a good mix of men and women at
these. And alcohol is hardly ever an issue because no one serves alcohol at
these events in India, not even beer. It's a bit of a social taboo.

Another thing to note is that in India, engineering, and specifically,
software, is something of an aspirational field. It's considered one of the
most desirable careers, and everyone wants in.

------
andyl
I had a job where people were really mean to me too. It was like constant,
never ending pressure! One time I got fired, cause my boss didn't like me,
although he wouldn't say it to my face. That really hurt.

------
smackmybishop
Overdramatic paranoia. Get over yourself.

