
Things men have actually said to me at tech events - colbyaley
http://leahweitz.com/things-men-have-actually-said-to-me-at-tech-events/
======
patcheudor
My daughter has been going with me to DEF CON since she was eleven. She's 20
now and this year at DEF CON while she was hanging out at a party with our
pen-test team an individual walked up and asked: "how much for the girl." I'm
honestly very glad I wasn't there to hear that. This whole behavior is
completely confusing. On what planet is that sort of behavior, even when
inebriated even remotely acceptable? It's degrading, unprofessional, and
frankly well beyond just being sexist. Maybe the guy just wanted to be punched
in the face?

~~~
a3voices
_Maybe the guy just wanted to be punched in the face?_

Because jokes justify violence?

~~~
jsmeaton
Touch the fire and get burned. Imply someones daughter is a prostitute to them
and I think a violent reaction might not be __that __uncommon.

~~~
ohnomrbill
To a3voices:

Violence occurs along a spectrum. Punching != trying to kill, in all cases.

~~~
a3voices
Well in some cases it could be considered a felony, and you could go to prison
for years, not to mention possible hospital bills and grief you caused the
person you struck.

~~~
babygoat
Not if I was on the jury.

------
sanoli
Everytime something like this comes up a portion of men will respond with
either "It's a public place, people are free to look at and talk to strangers,
etc" or "Men are like that, deal with it." Oh, and also the "It's no big deal"
rendered in so many ways. Here's a mental exercize for all the men who think
this way: You have to go to a conference, and the whole place is filled with
big, muscular, thug-looking men. You walk around and you notice they're all
staring at you. Every now and then when you stop, one or two will approach
you, and they will do it with _that_ look in their eye. You know, like you're
their prison meat. So the huge thug comes up to you and starts some small
talk, asks your name, what you do, if you're there by yourself, and then, you
know, he says you have a nice little ass, and wouldn't you want to go there in
the back with him. He's just talking, you know, didn't touch you or anything.
Plus, it's a public place. You're just unconfortable because he is a huge guy,
looks like a mma fighter, but, hey, he's just talking to you, saying he wants
to have sex with you. No big deal, right? You just deal with him and all the
others and won't make a fuss about this behavior, and I'm pretty sure you'll
attend all future conferences with a great mood and won't think there's
anything wrong with all the thugs wanting to have sex with you. Thugs are like
that. No big deal.

~~~
vonklaus
God, I am sick of this sterotype, everywhere I seem to turn people fall back
on that classic tech sterotype about everyone being a thuggish 6'4" homosexual
MMA fighter with an attitude like Pepé Le Pew.

------
tomlock
This article just plunged down the front page.

Calling out the jerks that think this isn't relevant tech material. Bullshit.
Tech culture is frequently mentioned. Articles about work-life balance don't
get downmodded this much.

~~~
tptacek
Two things are probably happening here.

First: there are people who flag these kinds of stories, for more than one
reason (some people, for instance, just don't want to see ugliness on the
front page).

Second: not enough people have upvoted the story to counteract the number of
comments on the thread, which is part of the signal HN uses to automatically
detect threads with flamewar characteristics.

~~~
tomlock
I +1'd your comment, but I think the algorithm hasn't worked in this instance.

The fact there would be a flamewar about someones experiences at a tech event
says more about the culture of tech than that article about michelin star
reviewers that is on the frontpage at the moment.

edit: But I did like that michelin-focused article :D

~~~
tptacek
Oh, I'm not saying it's working. I mean: this comment thread _is_ a full-on
unproductive flamewar, but I think the immune system on HN should probably let
this particular fever burn itself out.

------
latj
Why is it wrong to ask someone if they are technical?

Programmers, engineers, scientists go to tech conferences to talk about work,
projects, side interests. They dont want to get sucked into a sales pitch.

I especially dont understand why this would offend the author- the resume on
her website implies that she actually is more of a marketing person /
copywriter than a technical person.

~~~
bpchaps
Yeah, I don't really understand this, either.

Most of the sales folks (just look at her resume..) I've worked with 'look'
like a non-technical person. They absolutely look like they're trying to sell
me something - whether it's through mannerisms, appearance, attitude or way of
speaking. I'm going to ask them if they're technical if they're giving non-
technical vibes as they try to sell me a complicated piece of software. Why
wouldn't I? Why does it suddenly become sexist if she's a woman?

One of the most impressively technically proficient sysadmins I've ever worked
with was an extremely attractive, high-energy woman. She's often not taken
seriously because she's a woman. How does she prove her gender isn't a factor?
She does good fucking work and never, EVER, brings her gender into it because
it's not relevant. That's how gender equality gets solved, dammit.

I understand that she's basically being treated as a piece of meat at these
places.. But the focus of her article is that she's not being treated
seriously as a technical person at a tech conference, despite NOT being a
technical person! Fluff and more fluff.

~~~
glhaynes
_How does she prove her gender isn 't a factor? She does good fucking work and
never, EVER, brings her gender into it because it's not relevant. That's how
gender equality gets solved, dammit._

Gender equality would be solved if more women were doing good work while being
silent about gender inequality? I … don't buy it.

Gender equality gets solved by making gender inequality unacceptable. Men are
the primary imposers of inequality; it's our responsibility to fix it.

~~~
bpchaps
Sorry, should've been clear. It's one of the MANY ways to make it less
acceptable to be shits towards others based on gender.

Also, It's "our" responsibility to fix it? Can we let "them" help out with
fixing this, too? :)

------
tomlock
Something important to mention is that the author felt really supported when
her co-workers called out bad behavior. If you haven't already, maybe its time
to have a discussion about how your coworkers feel about these issues, and if
they have been effected. Make them know they are being listened to!

~~~
scottkduncan
This is how to bring about a tipping point - get men to recognize and call out
sexism. While this kind of behavior is sadly quite commonplace, attitudes and
behaviors can change quite quickly. Just think how much more common it was ten
years ago to have "gay" as a widespread pejorative - I almost never hear it
now. I think the rapid reduction came from straight people recognizing the
offense it caused and starting to call out people who used it.

------
jordanpg
On the other hand, I've worked with an astonishing number of men who live in a
state of rather tortured denial of the outsize challenges women face in the
workplace. I've even known a couple of women who deny it. It's even more
stupefying than those who insist that racism is a solved problem in America.

I'm not sure where it comes from. Personal experience, background must be
important factors. But it strikes me as a fairly activist, difficult position
to take. I think some of these folks think they are just fitting in by voicing
denial and anger about patently obvious forms of sexism. A lot of it comes
from political group identification, too.

~~~
arthur_pryor
"It's even more stupefying than those who insist that racism is a solved
problem in America."

disagree w/ that statement, in that i'd say it's equally stupefying. but yes,
otherwise totally agreed.

~~~
jordanpg
I hear you. It's hard to understand, but at least I can _imagine_ how someone
could reach that conclusion.

But I've known full well that men had a better deal since I was 10.

------
interpol_p
I work in a male-dominated office with only two women and have been trying to
share these stories with my coworkers at every opportunity. I can see it
_starting_ to make a difference. Just the other day one of my male colleagues
came up to me and said "I can't believe I used to think like that," referring
to a comment where a man justified sexist behaviour by calling it "normal."
There is such a long road ahead of us.

If you're looking for more stories of difficulties faced by women in tech, a
previous colleague of mine wrote this account of her internships and
university degree:
[http://words.samipeachey.com.au/?p=77](http://words.samipeachey.com.au/?p=77)

~~~
zxcvcxz
Sexism _is_ normal in our society. The top rated television shows are filled
with sexist and off color jokes, but you rarely see the feminists trying to
take down The Simpsons. So how can you take them seriously when they seem to
be focused on calling all programmers who aren't proactively brigading for
their political ideology a "racist" or "sexist" while not paying much
attention to the root causes of sexism?

The reality is that media from the 50's, 60's, 70's, etc was much more
racist/sexist than media today. Society _has_ come a long way. Society is
still progressing. Things aren't going to change over night. But the feminists
seem to suggest that things are getting worse or are worse now than they've
ever been.

~~~
interpol_p
In my post I suggested things are getting better, but we still have a long
road ahead. It sounds like you agree.

Jokes in TV shows are absolutely not what I am referring to. I am referring to
situations in which your colleagues — or even your bosses — make value
judgments of your person on the basis of gender. I am referring to what the
parent article and the article I linked directly confront.

------
sarciszewski
I always feel weird when I read (especially the comments on) stories like
this. Hearing folks who assume that, if a woman is at a technical event, she
is either incompetent, only there for the sake of her husband, or both, open
their mouths is irritating enough to witness as an outsider; I can hardly
imagine how annoying it must be to be the recipient of such baseless
disrespect.

Hell, I almost incited a screaming match at my last job because one of my
coworkers, who is a proud Republican, wouldn't shut up about politics and his
only criticism of Hillary Clinton wasn't that her opinions would have negative
consequences or her logic was poor, but because "she's got kankles". The only
reason it didn't escalate is because he ignored me. It still pisses me off to
even recall how stupid this was.

Maybe I've been fortunate enough to know plenty of great people throughout the
years, _not all of whom were men_ , that exuded technical knowledge and
practical wisdom.

How many infosec folks can, in the subject of cryptography, hold a candle to
Dr. Tanja Lange?

How many PHP programmers can hope to even _approximate_ the Herculean efforts
of Andrea Faulds to make PHP 7 something great?

We didn't get to where we are today, in terms of technological progress,
because sexist ideas or behaviors have any merit.

------
leeny
My personal favorite of the ones that I've gotten...

"Normally, when a woman is dressed like that, I'm paying her to whip me."

(What I was wearing included but was not limited to a leather jacket and black
shoes.)

~~~
dzhiurgis
Isn't that a self deprecating joke?

~~~
Archio
It's not at all appropriate in a business setting.

~~~
dzhiurgis
I guess it depends whether you see tech events as business setting or social
setting.

Also, wouldn't the aforementioned dress code be deemed inappropriate in a
business setting?

~~~
GFK_of_xmaspast
If you're there for work it's business. (and what's so inappropriate about a
leather coat and black shoes?)

------
nicolewhite
This is my experience as well. Often I'll be the most knowledgeable person at
our booth (for Neo4j) and people always look to my male coworkers when asking
questions.

And one of my personal favorites: "So I'm guessing you're in marketing?"

~~~
jsmeaton
This behaviour needs to change, it really does. But (ugh, here we go..) this
particular instance is probably learned behaviour from past conferences or
situations some people have been in. I haven't been to many conferences, but
there's been a few times where I've spoken to a woman at a booth just to be
passed off to someone else when I've asked technical questions. I'm finding
this happens less and less though. Really though, it doesn't hurt to ask the
question you want to ask first, even if you do end up having to ask it again
of someone else.

------
PhilWright
OP: Did you find that the age of the man made a difference?

So are older or younger men the worst offenders? I would like to think that
older man are worse and the younger generation are more aware and less sexist.
But maybe that is not the case.

------
blizkreeg
If male engineers had to endure similar stuff said to them, I wonder how
they'd feel - 'hey nerd', 'are you this socially awkward in every situation?',
'do you shower daily?', 'do you have any hobbies?', and the list goes on.

OP: I'm happy that your good experiences outweigh the bad ones.

~~~
PhilWright
Funnily enough I have noticed that this does actually happen. My current
position is at a company that works in the building industry and we often get
non-IT members of the company saying stuff like that about IT people.

But I don't think really compares to the sexism though. Being in a different
department means they do not have any actual control over us and we actually
make more money than other departments (not including management positions).
So I am sure it does not feel as threating and demeaning as the sexism
experienced by woman.

~~~
bpchaps
It definitely does. I'm 27, look 20, and work as a senior linux engineer at a
relatively high profile trading company. Until people see the work I do, they
think I've been hired entirely through nepotism. It's incredibly frustrating,
but I'm finally starting to "get used to it".

------
lxcid
Here's the part where I don't get it. Doesn't this happen to other industries,
like banking, politic, entertainment, etc?

The framing it as “hey tech, we have a sexist problem” is making it sounds
like there's no sexist problem in other industry.

I'm not supportive of sexism in the industry, but when it is framed that way,
a part of me just couldn't bring myself to align with it.

We can say, hey sexism is a society issue but we tech industry can do better
than others. We proud ourselves as the progressive front runner of
civilization, so let's make sure we show it.

If you remove [tech] from the title, this article will still make sense,
doesn't it?

------
mc32
Just a point about "taking pictures without my permission"

In public spaces there are few restrictions against this (ex. military zones).
In private spaces this can be regulated by the organizer, I believe, but that
prohibition must be posted. This is how the "street photography" gender of
photography can exist.

Now, to be fair, there are regulations against commercial use of photos from
"street photography" without permission. There you can sue for compensation if
your likeness was used to advertise and sell (selling a book with street
photographs does not require permission, as that is not "commercial use",
that's to say, it's "art")

It becomes an issue if the photographer videographer follows you and thus
engages in harassment (in some jurisdictions).

Remember that videographer who taunted people at an outdoor restaurant. They
had little recourse against him.

~~~
dllthomas
Something doesn't have to be illegal to be rude.

As to norms, there is a big difference between someone appearing in a crowd
shot or background, and someone being the sole focus of the picture.

~~~
mc32
The courts say otherwise see sole focus picture in case of Nussenzweig v.
DiCorcia[1]. If it were not possible, we would not have "street photography"
we would not have Robert Frank, Cartier-Bresson, Winogrand, Meier or Arbus.
Picture in question[2] We also would not have documentary photography.

Certainly it can feel rude to us, but the law allows it and moreover the
feeling of rudeness comes more from believing we "own" our likelinesses in
public spaces, which we do not. So, yes, I could feel intruded upon by a
documentary or street photographer, no question, but at the same time, they
have the right to take my picture, no question.

[1][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nussenzweig_v._DiCorcia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nussenzweig_v._DiCorcia)

[2][https://wmuphoto.wordpress.com/2014/02/07/nussenzweig-v-
dico...](https://wmuphoto.wordpress.com/2014/02/07/nussenzweig-v-dicorcia/)

If you disagree with the position, post a link to law which states otherwise.
There is lots of case law asserting the right of photographers to take
pictures unimpeded in public spaces.

~~~
dllthomas
I don't see your citations speaking to rudeness. Moreover, even if they did it
is not generally the place of the courts to dictate what is and is not rude. I
very much agree that this kind of photography is not _illegal_. In no way does
that mean it is not rude.

C.f. I can hurl a long stream of insults at you. Rude? Unquestionably. Legal?
Also unquestionably. On those grounds you could rightly complain, choose not
to associate with me, choose to avoid places I might go, tell others you find
me to be a rude person. You could not enlist the government to fine or
imprison me. What was being discussed here, before you brought legality into
the picture, was actions like those on the former list.

~~~
mc32
Rudeness is one of those things that's very unique to the individual claimant
and I think for art and expression in general, we tend to give the artist (in
this case the photographer) lots of leeway. I'm sure lots of religious people
would think my thoughts on religion are quite rude, but that does not and
should not deter my art or anyone else's art depicting religion unfavorably.

Basically, I don't want photography thrown under the bus on this one.

~~~
dllthomas
If you feel you need to do something people consider rude for the sake of your
art, you can do it and suffer the consequences. Those consequences should
certainly not extend to physical violence, should not extend to the
involvement of law enforcement.

You should be able to mitigate those consequences somewhat by treating your
subjects like people - explaining what you're doing, engaging with them
respectfully. They may still feel uncomfortable.

In this case, the person complaining felt violated, and that's not
unreasonable. She is plenty within her rights to complain.

~~~
mc32
>treating your subjects like people - explaining what you're doing, engaging
with them respectfully

No qualms with that --most experienced photographers will follow that advice.
Still, all photographers have the right to photograph in public.

A tiny minority of the time people don't give the photographer time to
explain, fortunately most times, people act indifferently, but sometimes
annoyed and self righteous and seldomly violent.

There is a misconception however, by some people, even the ones who are
agreeable that a photographer needs permission. It's simply not true. But yes,
I agree they need to respect people as much as they can. (if you're going to
photograph a man passed out in vomit for some kind of documentary, avoid
showing their recognizable face, for example, but that's not a fast rule.

~~~
dllthomas
_" Still, all photographers have the right to photograph in public."_

I've always agreed with that. What I have been saying is that there are ways
they can exercise that right that will be perceived as rude, and that that
perception is _definitely_ not made unreasonable by any absence of law on the
matter, and is often in fact reasonable.

------
toolz
Is this behavior worse than just being around a bunch of guys in general? I'm
not condoning the behavior, but we're all animals and sex is a thing - it gets
the best of many of us and we end up acting like baboons. I'm curious if the
tech industry is actually worse, because I would expect us to behave better
considering we actually give it a voice and properly label it as negative
behavior.

~~~
kajecounterhack

      I would expect us to behave better considering we actually 
      give it a voice and properly label it as negative behavior.
    

If only this were true. Apparently the greater (male-dominated) culture
surrounding technology doesn't dissuade this behavior enough.

    
    
      I'm not condoning the behavior, but we're all animals and 
      sex is a thing - it gets the best of many of us and we end 
      up acting like baboons
    

Despite your disclaimer this still echoes the "boys will be boys" sentiment,
one used to justify harm / mistreatment of women by dismissing their actions
as part of male nature. This is a lie and needs to change; individuals are
responsible for their words, actions, and any harm they cause.

~~~
CedarMadness
I don't think toolz was trying to say "boys will be boys", I think toolz was
saying we should try to fix society, rather than pretend this is only a
problem in tech

~~~
kajecounterhack

      I think toolz was saying we should try to fix society, 
      rather than pretend this is only a problem in tech
    

Who's pretending the problem is only in tech? Attacking the problem in our
industry is part of fixing society as a whole (it's a subproblem).

------
scintill76
> “He treated you so differently!” he said. “His whole tone changed!”

Depending on what was meant by "tone", this could be due to very deeply-
ingrained learned sociolinguistic customs. I don't mean that justifies it, but
it could be very subconscious, is not specific to "tech", and seems much less
offensive than some of the other examples.

To whatever extent men adopt a different tone when talking to women, it would
probably take quite a lot of conscious concentration to control, and
generations to eradicate (possibly never, if they can be picked up again by
watching our contemporary media.) So, I guess it's something to keep an eye on
and fix where you can, but not so simple as eliminating stuff like "They only
let you work here ’cause you’re hot."

Edit: tl/dr: If "tone" meant treating her like an idiot/non-technical, bad. If
it meant different pitch of voice and body language, not good per se but not
that bad either.

P.S. Actually, maintaining gender-based differences might be desirable. Women
probably don't want to be treated exactly like "one of the guys", right?
Modifying your message and presentation based on your audience is a part of
effective communication. If it's offending your audience, change that, but
maybe it's not a bad starting position.

------
rattray
Thoughtfully written, concise, and helpful. Thanks!

------
vonklaus
As coding and technology become more prestigous it will draw in the top female
talent that has been pulled into companies with much more societal respect.
Below is a list of a few companies that were built by a female founder/co-
founder. The unpopular view that this "problem", will fix itself, is somewhat
true in my opinion. There will be a day when a list like the one below doesn't
exist, there will be a single one. Females (and everyone really) realize tech.
is one of the most important components of the future and there are many
shows/movies/media that reflect this societal change.

Until then, if you think the world would be better off with more woman in
tech, help get young people excited about technology and entrepreneurship. The
ecosystem is primarily men who started companies internet companies in the
early days, which have splintered into tons of new ventures and startups
largely comprised of people from those companies.

The list below are great companies (well, a couple have rough patches but what
doesn't) and there doesn't need to be a qualifier like "woman" founded. Get
out there and kill it, and if you are out there be civil and rational in your
appraisal of others.

* Theranos, $9B Biotech

* Y COmbinator, >$4B VC/Tech

* Fanduel, ? Skill Based Wagers

* 23 & Me, ? Genetics

* Kabam, ~$1B Gaming

* CloudFlare, ~$1B Cloud/CDN

* NastyGal, ? Clothing

------
melindajb
There are a certain percentage of the population who are just assholes.

Let's assume for a moment that both men and women are assholes in equal
proportion, that say 10% of the population of either gender are assholes.

For a 50 person company, 80% male: 40 men total 4 male assholes 10 women 1
woman asshole

Take that ratio up to 90% male as many tech conferences are: 45 men of those
45 men, 5 will be assholes, rounding up 5 women 1 woman asshole

In that scenario there actually the same number of male assholes as ALL of the
women.

This is why changing the ratio of male and female matters.

~~~
melindajb
downvoted. ha. keep it classy, HN.

------
nitwit005
This suggests improving the ratio, but honestly, if the rate is genuinely 99%
good and 1% bad, then the truth may be that you're at a point where you won't
notice improvements.

Say we make a huge effort and halve the rate of such harassment. That's a
change from 99% good to 99.5% good. Will you notice the difference? Maybe, but
it's likely you won't. You're still guaranteed to have bad experiences at
regular intervals if you go to tech events.

------
mchahn
I was at at a conference recently (codeconf for github Atom) and I noticed
there were a number of women (30%?). I commented to a women next to me that it
was happy that there was such a good turnout of women. (I have been to many
conferences where there were none). She said she was there representing women
in technology and she did not give me a happy look. I thought it was an
improvement.

One step at a time.

------
ashwinaj
I don't understand why this is a tech industry issue? I can imagine this being
a problem in all industries (esp. finance). Douchebags aren't exclusive to the
tech industry.

~~~
beatpanda
Why is your first response to get defensive about the tech industry and not to
respond to the problem in the post? If its a problem everywhere, fine -- we
have a chance to make it _less_ of a problem in the tech industry than
everywhere else. Wouldn't that be something?

~~~
ashwinaj
I'm not defending anyone, my point is that this is a societal problem. How do
you propose to change people's thinking? People in the our (tech) industry
fight over coding standards, programming languages, frameworks etc.; good luck
changing their outdated views on something that's been ingrained for years.

------
anotherevan
Recollecting a few situations I’ve experiences in the workplace.

I remember in my first job out of uni (early 90s) our team was having lunch. I
don’t remember the discussion that lead up to it, but one of my fellow male
colleagues said there was no such thing as rape, because a women enjoy the sex
anyway. The only woman at the table just got up and walked away.

I must admit I just completely froze. I was just stunned that someone said
something so insanely ignorant. Being a shy young man at the time I really
just didn’t know how to react. Afterwards I did go check that my female
colleague was okay and express my disbelief at what happened.

That incident pretty much made me ready to believe any terrible story about
male behaviour.

§

At a software vendor’s offices for two days of training on their product.
Walking out of the training area, through the cubicle farm to use the washroom
facilities up the back, and seeing explicit pornographic images being used as
desktop wallpapers on employees’ computers.

§

One office I worked in, a female colleague had a beefcake photo as her desktop
wallpaper. Although I felt this was as inappropriate as say, a male employee
using a swimsuit photo, nothing was said, by me or anyone else.

§

At a conference, out getting coffee on a warm day and chatting with another
attendee. Four young women in smart business attire, including reasonably
tight skirts, walk past. This guy’s focus was completely lossed on the
conversation, coffee, sunlight, or me smacking him in the back of the head,
while he stared unblinkingly at these women until they went around the corner.
Ugh. [1]

§

Another job working in the city, the building across the alleyway from us was
an apartment building, and it appears several of the residents were young,
nubile, not fully clothed and forget to close their curtains.

Was not uncommon to look up from my desk and see two or three guys standing at
the window staring across. They were not actually licking the glass or
otherwise being a nuisance, and being a visually oriented young man myself I
understood the distraction it was. Still, I’ve always seem to have had more
self control then my contemporaries. Perhaps I just have enough blood in my
circulatory system to be able to power both brains at the same time.

§

Same job, Lotus Notes was used for email for the company. This had the feature
of replication for offline access and such. Male colleague, who was sharing
use of a loptop for email access with a female colleague when they were off-
site at the customer’s office, turns to her and asks, “Do you want me to
replicate your box?”

Absolutely innocent, but a contagious fit of uncontrolled giggles spread
around those within earshot. Aside from an observation or two that the enquiry
should probably have been phrased differently, nobody made any stupid follow-
up comments, and everyone took it in good humour for the unintentional faux
pas it was.

§

Last one, and my favourite. Dropping my librarian wife off at her workplace at
the start of the day. The library had just opened and about ten or so people
were drifting in. One of her colleagues was clearing the overnight returns
chute when she exclaims at the top of her voice, “‘Fantastic Sex,’ I was
looking for that last night!”

She looks up into the sudden silence were you could hear a pin drop, then
goes, “The book! The book! Someone wanted the book!” while waving the titular
tome.

§

[1] That conference was about the same time the “Shit people say to XXX” meme
was doing the rounds of the internet. At the time I thought it would be funny
to do a “Shit people say to programmers” version where every forth or fifth
one was, “Can you fix my computer?”

I also thought one on “Shit programmers say to women” where it would just be
five minutes of awkward guys staring at womens’ chests would be too
distressingly realistic. Apropos?

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framp
This happens everywhere. Tech is nothing different.

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zxcvcxz
I don't understand why the emphasis is on the tech community. If this were an
automotive convention it would probably be worse. A hansom male at a beauty
convention will likely be ogled by some of the women.

I also don't understand why feminists rarely attack mass media like the shows
they have on Fox and Comedy Central, which are probably much closer to the
root cause of "sexism" seeing as they make it seem like casual sexism is okay.

It's very hard to take the feminist seriously when their biggest enemy seems
to be the 2% of pasty awkward nerds who happen to make a cultural faux pas.
They weren't born sexist. They're victims of society. Blaming them is blaming
the victim. Most of them probably have not had much interaction with the
opposite sex and don't even know how to initiate conversation.

~~~
mcphage
> I don't understand why the emphasis is on the tech community.

Because that's the industry that the author (and presumably, most of us
readers) are in.

> If this were an automotive convention it would probably be worse.

Probably, but like... do you go to automotive conventions? I don't, so what
goes on in them is really outside of anything I know about or can change.
So... I'm not sure the relevance.

> Most of them probably have not had much interaction with the opposite sex
> and don't even know how to initiate conversation.

Well, hopefully some of them will read this article and find out some things
not to do.

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colbyaley
Why is this getting downvoted by mods?

~~~
Simulacra
Don't question the mods, they'll down vote you.

~~~
Simulacra
See?

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Simulacra
Things women have actually said to me a tech events after I said hello: "I
have a boyfriend." "Sorry, I'm waiting for someone." "My husband will be here
in a minute." -says nothing, pulls out her phone and pretends she didn't hear
me-

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hitekker
Possible band aid: a webcam at each booth, recording the entire conference
audio/video, which will then managed by the convention/conference organizers.
If sexual harassement is noted, the person who was harassed can go to the
organizers who can then review the recordings which they can then use as a
rationale to blacklist that person at their conference (but not at all).

Reasons why this might not be a terrible idea:

1) It's a public place and you are interacting, often times, with complete
strangers. While I can't speak for everyone, these social events make me be on
my best behavior, which is conveniently the same behavior I would have if I
were on camera.

2) By virtue of being handled by the conference organizers, one company won't
be singled out. One company recording people is strange, but an accepted
practice by a third party would be far more forgivable.

~~~
steckerbrett
That's going to be problematic, lots of people at conferences talk in low
voice about confidential things. Surely there's better ways to combat
harassment than pervasive surveillance.

------
buf
If 99% of males are decent as the article describes, all this does is creates
the illusion that all police officers are racist. It's only news because it's
sensational.

~~~
ianseyer
This is a terrible idea, and is basically like a cop out towards "I don't want
to have to think about this // it happens everywhere so stop talking about
it."

The community/work atmosphere around tech, and the implications that
atmosphere has on acceptance within the tech community, has direct
implications for the future of education and work within the field.

It's absolutely vital that people (especially women) have a relevant place to
discuss these things, so that people who read tech news are not ignorant to
the ongoing discrimination and oppression within the industry.

~~~
buf
If 99% of males are decent as the article describes, all this does is creates
the illusion that all police officers are racist. It's only news because it's
sensational.

~~~
ianseyer
Do you actually believe that 99% of males do not take particular actions
against women that could make them feel oppressed in some way?

