
This Is What Tech's Ugly Gender Problem Really Looks Like - caio1982
http://www.wired.com/2014/07/gender-gap/
======
orclev
It sort of annoys me how the article keeps talking about a gender problem in
"tech" and yet I see no actual mention of anyone technical in the entire
article (other than at least some of the people pitching). The article should
have been called the gender problem in venture capital. A angel investor or a
VC is not someone in tech, they're first and foremost all about business, just
because what your pitching is technical doesn't automatically transform the
situation into a technical one, it's still business.

My guess is it's a lot harder to pitch a story about business people
discriminating against women (classic glass ceiling story), than it is the
current fad of lambasting the tech sector as being misogynistic.

Edit: This may have come off as more critical of the article than I intended.
The article is good and does have a point, it just annoys me that it makes it
sound like tech is to blame when this is really just a facet of the existing
misogyny in business. Change all the occurrences of "tech" with "venture
capital" in the article and I'd have no problem with it.

~~~
PhasmaFelis
VCs are, to a significant extent, the gatekeepers who decide who gets a chance
to succeed in tech. Their policies may not dictate tech policies in general,
but they certainly have a real influence on them.

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dang
This post was (at one point) killed by user flags.

~~~
zorpner
And it's currently on _page 11_ of HN, killed just as thoroughly as if you'd
left it dead.

~~~
dang
> killed just as thoroughly as if you'd left it dead.

That's not true. A significant difference, after we unkilled it, is that
discussion could continue.

User flags cause an item's rank to drop; many flags at once make it drop a
lot. I know that some people feel that all user flags they disagree with
should be overridden, but it isn't that simple. For one thing, those people
disagree among themselves, and for another, the community itself is deeply
divided.

------
Zikes
Great article, and a refreshing take on the issue. I think Weinblatt's view on
the topic is spot-on. There shouldn't be women-specific investors any more
than there should be men-specific investors. Homogeneity is the right
solution, and hopefully we'll get there soon.

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JoeAltmaier
There may be an elephant on the table. Some people are not as aggressive at
promoting their company, their vision. These people will probably not convince
a VC to part with money. There may be a disproportionate population among
women. SO it would not be a gender problem, but it would look like one.

~~~
PhasmaFelis
That would indeed not be a gender problem. A VC outright saying "I don't
invest in women 'cause they have stupid brains" is pretty indisputably a
gender problem, though.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
People fasten on to all sorts of outward affects to explain their prejudices.
E.g. the VC may have noticed a correlation and erroneously deduced causation.
Happens a lot.

~~~
PhasmaFelis
That's true, but open misogyny is still a "gender problem" regardless of the
justification.

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izzydata
I find it very hard to believe that this supposed investor blatantly told her
that women are inferior and then she politely said thank you and left. I'd
have to see this in person to ever believe that actually happened. I'm willing
to believe it is some exaggeration after she was declined and now she is upset
and thinks it is because she is a women.

I'll probably get downvoted, but I'm just really skeptical of this story. To
be clear I have no problem with women and am a strong advocate of equality,
but this just sounds fake to make a point.

~~~
_petronius
Every time a story like this comes up, I see a lot of people rush to downplay
it as exaggeration, either in terms of the specific anecdotes related or in
terms of the frequency with which it happens. Part of that is an inherent
defensiveness about the tech industry being painted as discriminatory in this
way. I get that, I guess -- it's our corner of the world, full of people we
like, we generally like to assume that the people we work with, in addition to
doing good work, also treat people with equality.

It's also because the speaker, and a lot of people around the speaker, assert
(possibly correctly) that a) he (or she) does not discriminate against women
and b) none of his (or her) colleagues are likely to.

But that downplay, and that dismissiveness, is its own kind of discrimination.
Gender bias is not something that I have ever experienced as a man, and not
something I have ever seen in the small (usually gender-balanced) companies I
have worked in. But, just because I don't see it (I'm not the one getting
inappropriately hit on, or denied funding, etc.) doesn't mean it isn't very
real. Sure, based on all the information I have of personal experience and the
experience in the workplaces I have been in, this isn't a problem -- but of
course, it's completely solipsistic to argue that my experience is any
evidence of the wider state of things.

The shouting down of these stories is itself a worrying sign. If anyone feels
like the culture they work in is treating them unfairly, maybe we should
examine that closely, to figure out why they feel that way and what we (all of
us) need to do that they don't, rather than dismiss it as delusion or malice,
and in so doing free ourselves of addressing it.

~~~
foolrush
So well said, and utterly refreshing to read on HN.

The framing of all normative experience as male is one invisible aspect to
this that few are willing or able to see.

“Thus humanity is male and man defines woman not in herself but as relative to
him; she is not regarded as an autonomous being.”

[https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/ethics/de-
beauvoi...](https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/ethics/de-beauvoir/2nd-
sex/introduction.htm)

------
paulhauggis
"or every story you hear about investors behaving badly,"

Specifically with investors, how are you going to legislate against how
someone feels about investing their own money? If they don't want to invest in
a woman company, it's their right.

"Why do I have to go to gender-specific investors? Our company is pretty
gender agnostic, at this point."

Investors are very fickle with their money. The gender-specific investor might
have a higher rate of investing in women founded companies. You may not like
this, but it may give you a higher chance. There are also investors that are
biased against the type of company you have. Some refuse to invest in social
networking companies.

"When you’re a single mother, says Sheri Atwood, founder of SupportPay, it’s
even tougher to be taken seriously"

I don't think it's because you are a woman. An investor might think that you
don't have the time and energy to spend 100% on your company, which is true if
you have a child at home with nobody else but you.

"They saw that my being a woman and my age was an asset"

So you spend an entire article talking about how you don't want to be
discriminated against because you are a woman..and then conclude that you only
got an investment because you are a woman?! How about..they liked your
product/company idea and you and think you will succeed?Investors talk money.
They want to see an ROI.

"Now, we’re in a time where someone says something horribly racist"

Now we are in a time where you accidentally say something that is construed as
racist, and the Twitter mob gets you fired.

The Mozilla CEO even had to step down because he donated a few hundred dollars
to a campaign he believed in 10 years ago. If I would have gotten someone
fired at a christian owned company for donating to a pro-gay marriage fund,
there would be outrage.

It's outrageous to me that free speech is being eroded every day and the same
people that write articles like this about discrimination support it, because
it coincides with their beliefs.

~~~
justinpaulson
> It's outrageous to me that free speech is being eroded every day and the
> same people that write articles like this about discrimination support it,
> because it coincides with their beliefs.

Free speech is a right given by the government. It does not have anything to
do with your employer firing you for making a racist remark. How have any of
your examples expressed an erosion of freedom of speech? I see no mention of
the government arresting anyone for their comments.

~~~
streptomycin
_Free speech is a right given by the government._

That's not all it is. When you say "free speech" you mean "free speech with
regards to government censorship", but many other people just mean "free
speech" in general. Like, the ability to freely speak about something without
being harshly punished for that speech, regardless of who does the punishing.

~~~
justinpaulson
If people mean "the ability to freely speak about something without being
harshly punished for that speech, regardless of who does the punishing" when
they say "free speech" then they have no idea what they are talking about, and
they should be corrected. Such a thing does not exist, and it makes no sense.
You can not expect to freely bad-mouth your employer or make remarks that go
against an organization's beliefs without any repercussions from the employer
or organization.

~~~
streptomycin
That's not what I meant to imply. I think the problem is that I wrote
"something" and you are interpreting it as "literally everything".

Do I have the freedom to tell my boss to go fuck himself without facing any
consequence? Of course not. That doesn't mean there is no such concept as
"free speech".

I have the freedom to partake in many types of speech without fearing
substantial retribution. Some forms of speech are restricted by the
government, others are restricted by other things.

~~~
justinpaulson
There is a concept of "free speech" and it has nothing to do with your
employer. It is a freedom guaranteed against violation from the government.
That is all. Any other use of the term is inaccurate. If you mean to say
employers should let you speak your mind, then say that, but don't equate it
to "Free speech" because it is something totally different.

And you DO have the freedom to tell your boss to go fuck himself. The
government will not stop you and therefore you are free to do that. But, your
boss has the freedom to fire you for saying that as well. You are
misunderstanding what free speech, and freedom in general, is.

~~~
SamReidHughes
It obviously doesn't mean what you think it means, because people are using it
with a different meaning than what you'd like.

~~~
h_r
This line of reasoning remind me of new-age "theorists" talking about how
quantum physics supports their view. The fact that people use words
imprecisely or nonsensically does not somehow automatically make their
formulations reasonable.

~~~
SamReidHughes
Nobody is using "free speech" nonsensically or equivocally here. They are just
using a definition that justinpaulson doesn't like for some reason.

~~~
h_r
I disagree but it is tough to reach consensus on this without a real
definition being offered, and there was none.

You actually are free to express yourself however you like without violating
laws or the civil rights of others. All I heard in the way of a definition is
"... and I also want to be free of any consequences I really don't like.".
Well, too bad because that doesn't exist and asserting such a "freedom" isn't
much different than asserting that unicorns exist. It's a fantasy concocted in
your head, not a real thing.

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sp332
therogerwilco: No one called you a problem. Thanks for not being part of the
problem. Now can we stop ignoring the problem?

