I've talked to plenty of women who have experienced discrimination. But I doubt any of them would post here.
Why? Well, look at your criteria. They have to "prove" themselves competent. And then they have to "demonstrate" discrimination. You've set yourself up as some anonymous internet judge of their qualifications. And of whether their discrimination is real enough. And who's the audience? A bunch of mostly-anonymous mostly-privileged mostly-dudes on a site where there is plenty of previous sexism. Gosh, sounds fun.
It is exactly nobody's job to prove this stuff to you. Sexual discrimination is pervasive in our society. No need to take my word for it; go read Everyday Sexism or Project Unbreakable. Or the many, many women publishing on this, both in tech and elsewhere. And if you'd like to question your own biases, go take the tests at Project Implicit and see how you do.
If you'd like to believe with no hard evidence that tech is the one special, magical place that is different, I'm not doing to try to talk you out of it. But if you're serious about preparing your daughter to work in tech, and preparing tech for your daughter, then I think you should question the assumption that, as we undo the effects of millennia of societal gender discrimination, the space around you just happens to be the one that has totally cleared that.
> as we undo the effects of millennia of societal gender discrimination
Can you talk about this every day discrimination some more?
History definitely shows women as being subjugated to men. But how is it possible then that a woman philosopher was so sought after both for her intelligence as well as her charm? How did Cleopatra come to be such an iconic figure in history? Clearly some women were able to make their marks on history.
Perhaps women were "subjugated" because technology didn't allow the literally weaker sex to leave the household as it does now. Having kids must have meant that one of the parents had to choose to care for the home since technology did not allow the household efficiency that it does now.
You have ignored the meat of my comments and picked a small chunk to seize upon, which is generally a bad sign for dialog. So, directly addressing your point:
Also, read the biography of any pioneering female in any profession at all.
And consider educating yourself a little further before floating hypotheticals. If I say, "Perhaps Microsoft dominated for so long just because they made a really awesome product that everybody loved," or "perhaps the intelligence agencies are really only collecting the data they need to keep us safe", people here on Hacker News would mock me for not having done the slightest homework. Yes, those are reasonable questions to ask. But they aren't good ones to offer in the middle of a serious discussion. At best, it forces other people to spoon-feed you basic facts if they want useful dialog. At worst, it makes you look like a troll.
I've talked to plenty of women who have experienced discrimination. But I doubt any of them would post here.
Why? Well, look at your criteria. They have to "prove" themselves competent. And then they have to "demonstrate" discrimination. You've set yourself up as some anonymous internet judge of their qualifications. And of whether their discrimination is real enough. And who's the audience? A bunch of mostly-anonymous mostly-privileged mostly-dudes on a site where there is plenty of previous sexism. Gosh, sounds fun.
It is exactly nobody's job to prove this stuff to you. Sexual discrimination is pervasive in our society. No need to take my word for it; go read Everyday Sexism or Project Unbreakable. Or the many, many women publishing on this, both in tech and elsewhere. And if you'd like to question your own biases, go take the tests at Project Implicit and see how you do.
If you'd like to believe with no hard evidence that tech is the one special, magical place that is different, I'm not doing to try to talk you out of it. But if you're serious about preparing your daughter to work in tech, and preparing tech for your daughter, then I think you should question the assumption that, as we undo the effects of millennia of societal gender discrimination, the space around you just happens to be the one that has totally cleared that.