
Ask HN: Equal treatment or robbing of feminity? - sensitiveqstn
A sincere question to female engineers and not only.<p>I&#x27;m having issues finding a comfortable spot in communicating with my female colleague. I sense that she is a bit unhappy that we are robbing her off her feminity with our &quot;equal&quot; treatment. But she is a bit (IMO, of course) of an insecure person and hence I may be just misreading something.<p>Since this keeps bothering me, I&#x27;d like to hear opinions from female engineers and others who found&#x2F;observed that balance. Where is the line? I don&#x27;t want to have cold professional relationship, I want to actually connect with everyone on the team.<p>To avoid any sort of flame here, I beg you to avoid any frustration venting here. Just advice.<p>Edit: of course, if you have good reads to point to, please share.<p>Edit2: I&#x27;m based in Northern Europe, but the environment is very international.
======
cimmanom
Female engineer here. What do you mean by "robbing her of her femininity"? And
how would equal treatment do that?

Damn straight I want to be treated as an equal. A professional relationship on
equal footing doesn't have to be a "cold" relationship. Why would it?

And yes, I'm highly tempted to vent here in large part because I really don't
understand this question at all.

Can you please explain further what you're trying to get at?

~~~
sensitiveqstn
Thank you for your patience.

1) Many women dress nicely. Some for themselves, some to impress others as
well, most to impress the opposite gender. I can't see myself complimenting my
female colleagues on the outfit, while I would definitely complement non-work-
related female acquaintances.

2) My colleague is a great engineer. Saying "You are a great engineer" is ok,
saying "You are a proof that girls can kick ass in engineering" I feel is a
no-no. In the first case I'm completely ignoring that she's a woman. And I
understand that it is ok, that the "you are a woman" prism should be out of
the optics.

I think that many women want to be seen as women at their workplaces, just
without any advances, condescension (mostly tech thing), harassment etc.
Firstly a professional, secondly a woman.

I hope this makes it clearer.. or am I just an unaware misogynist?

~~~
cimmanom
That you're asking rather than assuming is a good first step. I've been
meaning to give this the more thorough response that it deserves, but this
week has been crunch time. Just want to let you know that I do intend to
respond when time allows.

------
fiiv
Why does treating someone as equal make the relationship cold? You have this
with your male colleagues, right?

------
mping
What country are you? I find that sensitivity is highly cultural.

~~~
sensitiveqstn
I'm based in Northern Europe, but the environment is very international.

