It makes me sad to read this stuff, but a genuine question for other male readers. Have you heard of, or come into contact with any of this abhorrent behavior that's mentioned? I have never seen it anywhere I worked, or heard of that sort of thing through word of mouth, but obviously that's a terrible sample set.
My experiences related to women in tech:
* Everywhere I've worked, it's been a boys club, but we'd LOVE to hire more women. Frankly, hiring is hard in general. When women have come in to interview, I can't speak for others - but I know in the back of my head, my biggest concern is, "Make sure you interview with the same standards as anyone else, but make sure you don't have some subconscious bias because she's a she."
* There are probably good female engineers, and not so good ones. One of the few "not so good ones" I know of (doesn't mean she'll never improve, just at the time) had to be super carefully managed out over a long time. There was no unceremonious firing, that's for sure.
* Is there even a "women in tech" problem? Or is it just "women in the workforce, no matter the industry"? The kinds of ridiculous behavior women are describing in these articles sound to me like they could happen in finance, sales, marketing, HR, or anywhere.
* On any of the open source mailing lists I'm on, I've never seen anything remotely close to, "Your pull request sucks you whre, try again". Are these just the mythical basement dwelling trolls of Slashdot lore reaching out privately via email?
Most of the engineers I know in tech are decent, upstanding guys. If anything, I feel like if any of us was pulled aside by a female co-worker and she described shenanigans of the sort I read about in these articles, we'd probably jump to their defense in a heart beat, almost maybe too easily.
What have the rest of you experienced?
*
Edit: I left the above (my OP) in tact. After re-reading it, and some responses, it's become clear to me that it gives off an air of, "I don't believe these reports", and that's not really what I intended.
I suppose my main point was that no, I haven't experienced it, and I think that's exactly what these women are saying - Just because you haven't seen it, doesn't mean it's not there. So really, despite getting some up votes, I think I missed the boat.
I was curious if others on my (the male) side have in fact seen it, but what does that tell us? Probably not much.
You won't see most of these incidents, because harassers do it when there are few witnesses. Ask your female colleagues for their stories. They all have them.
So how does this fit with your "Most of the engineers I know in tech are decent, upstanding guys." - it fits perfectly. Clearly you know some who aren't decent. It only takes one to harass, and he can harass a large number of women; in fact the pattern is commonly to try it on with every woman, but in a way that leaves it as he said/she said.
This is why "not all men do this" is such a weak-minded response. Don't let it slide. Your second guessing of women in your first point, and your "too easily" in the last indicate the problem too. Women who report harassment often get laid off or managed out afterwards, even when they have got the harasser fired. It is a very high risk thing for them to do, and your "not all men" attitude is a key way that harassers are sheltered.
@danilocampos - I think it matters for getting to a solution. If there's something inherent in tech, or its male work force that makes the problem worse, then knowing that might help get at the root of the problem a little faster.
We already understand the roots of the problem quite well... comparing to other industries won't make much difference.
1. Male-dominated environment, women are a significant minority.
2. Inexcusable tolerance of sexist behavior - not calling it out when we see it.
3. "Why are you blaming me? I'm not one of those guys. Men might listen to you if you'd just stop the blanket accusations." (extra credit: count how many comments on this thread can be reduced to that sentiment.)
"Have you stopped enabling sexism in tech?". That's what most of the replies sound like to me. Sort of like "have you stopped beating your wife?". Hard to come up with a good response without looking guilty isn't it?
it should be noted that pointing out #3 doesn't make it an invalid point, and it certainly has nothing to do with why the issue exists in the first place.
And after the umpteenth time of someone telling me I'm a terrible person ... I decide to be terrible by not caring about it anymore.
This is why your attitude is actively hurting you. It's driving away people like me, who actually agree with the basic premise that women should be treated equally.
Being part of of the problem (that is, tacitly consenting to bad behavior by staying silent and not confronting it directly) does not make you a terrible person, or even a bad one. It just means that you are part of the problem.
The thing is, you can't expect a cookie for not doing terrible things. Not doing terrible things is the absolute minimum that is expected of you as an adult member of society. Only doing the bare minimum doesn't make you a good person or a bad one, but it shouldn't really be surprising that the great majority of people who are merely not doing terrible things have an inertia that keeps things from improving, and are thus part of the problem.
Logically speaking, since folks with your attitude are a large part of the reason people like me don't bother, wouldn't that also make you, and your actions here, a part of the problem?
And wouldn't that imply the solution is to stop doing what you're doing?
Let's just say that your retort, "well I would have helped if only you didn't make such a big deal about it", is awfully convenient as an excuse to do nothing (and is very nearly the same as the 'tone argument'). Because, of course, if no one makes a big deal about something, that also provides an excuse.
And thankfully that isn't what I said, because I agree that would be a ridiculous argument.
What I said is that after getting blamed constantly for no other reason than being born with a cock I've stopped caring what the people doing the blaming think.
Another way to look at it is like this:
Men are not stupid. They know if they've been sexist or not. When you blame them for shit they know they are not involved in, it means they cannot trust you when you blame other men for shit they didn't witness.
How can I be more clear about this? You are not a terrible person, and are not to blame.
Being part of the problem, or more precisely, part of a problematic system) does not mean that the problem is your fault, or that you have a duty to fix it.
Congratulations, you have met your basic societal obligations. You are off the hook. You are free to look the other way rather than confront or condemn sexism when you encounter it, in person or online.
That's black/white thinking. Folks do a lot of things in a lot of spheres. Not doing one terrible thing doesn't imply they're doing nothing else at all.
Take off the blinders - there're a lot more issues in the world than this one. Lots of people just don't have the emotional energy to invest in all of them, or even in very many of them.
That article doesn't seem like retaliation, it seems like a response. JAH herself has responded to that article and simply said the things mentioned aren't relevant and only brought up because she was female.
Minor nitpick: I went back to find the links in the article, and it wasn't clear on the first read that the 'this is what happens...' sentence was a whole slew of individually linked words.
I feel strongly that we shouldn't allow ourselves to forget about the "death by a thousand cuts" aspect either. Even the "decent, upstanding guys" (a cohort that we are presumably a part of) are most likely responsible for a papercut or two (I certainly am). And these papercuts are just as profound a barrier in impeding progress in this area than the readily noticeable offenses, in my opinion.
> "not all men" attitude is a key way that harassers are sheltered.
I'm not sure that this makes sense. Saying that someone's behaviour is unusual - not typical of most men - does not sound like sheltering them. Most men don't harass women, ergo the men that do are a minority whose views and behaviour are out of step with their peers. I think we need to say this more.
You read the story of a range of women from across the industry, said you haven't had the experience these women have had, and then explicitly asked men for their opinions. See if you can figure out the bug here.
* "We have this problem with our iOS app."
* "I use Android and have never seen this. Any other Android users encounter this?"
I came here to say something similar: that the same action or speech can/will be interpreted very differently based on a whole slew of factors, including gender, ethnicity, or just plainly being different people to begin with. What appears "okay" or "benign" or "in jest" can certainly not be the case for a colleague, whichever gender they may be [1].
In fact, I'd argue that it's hard to perceive the inappropriateness of our own actions in the moment. It's much easier to notice the possible auxiliary effects of our past actions when reflecting on them at a later time. Frankly, I can think of any number of things that I've said or done in the recent past that may have made my female friends and colleagues twitch an eyebrow, but didn't elicit an explicit response because they've learned to just deal with it and let it go, having been in a boys club for so long (one started her career in investment banking). And I'd consider myself to be fairly self-aware of these issues, and yet I've admittedly failed many times over.
edit: and frankly, how many of us voluntarily and regularly look back at our past week/month to think about the ways in which we've failed ourselves and our own principles in this area? We may review the ways in which we failed in our job capacity and reflect on how we can improve, but I think the frequency with which we do the same for our social interactions is much lower.
[1] In fact, I think "I was just kidding" is one of the lamest excuses for actions that at times clearly are not thus.
Many women ask that more men would stand up for them. I think that many men would if they actually saw something occur, but many just don't see anything.
In my own career I have only once seen anything that even looked like harassment or discrimination, and that was almost 20 years ago. It does not mean that I question these women's experiences, but I do think it means that the "bullies" know that what they do isn't accepted by their peers. And hopefully that means that speaking up more when these things occur would make a positive difference.
Woman developer here. That's the one piece of advice I give to men who ask what they can do to help. I've had way more men come to me privately after an incident to apologize for being a witness and saying nothing than have actively stepped in to stop what was going on. I wish it were the other way around.
why should they? I mean that honestly because context matters.
Why didn't you say something? Why should they be expected to step up and say something if you yourself are not willing to (was it a superior, for example?). Was there some brouhaha in which they sat silent while you had to defend yourself?
And why not ask them if you can submit their name to HR as a witness to the behavior instead of getting disappointed in them for not doing it themselves?
At the end of the day, the only person who is ultimately expected to stand up for you, is you. It's that way regardless of gender.
edit:
I still don't understand why HN allows replies to some posts and not others, but to respond to the post below me.
Because it's unfair to ask a man to put themselves at risk protecting a women when she, herself, refuses to put herself at risk. This isn't about male vs female, this is about a person putting themselves at risk for another person, and the fairness of it.
I think expecting a male to put himself at personal risk for a women who won't put herself at personal risk is unfair.
We have no context, we don't know if the person in question doing the injustice was superior in the company, or not. All we know is person A did something bad to person B, and person C did nothing about it.
Why shouldn't we ask my person B did nothing either?
I don't agree with mreiland about not sticking up, but I also want to point out something important that I get the impression that many feminists miss: That men in general have more power than women in general does not mean that all men have power, or that even most of them are in a position of power.
This is true, but in a male dominated environment, there are usually men who have more power than women and if they don't use at least some of their power to support the cause of equality, they are supporting the status quo.
you think the male should put himself at risk of being fired because the female may get fired if she does it?
That's not equality, and I would defend anyone who stays quiet in such circumstances. Don't ask the random male to go to bat for you if you're not willing to do it yourself. Common sense.
No, everyone else is confusing an entire gender with a person.
It is not fair to ask person A to put themselves at risk for person B when person B is not willing to put themselves at risk for themself.
This isn't about gender, if it were two men, no one would blink twice at me asking why the software dev didn't put themselves at risk. But because we have a social expectation of protecting women, even by women themselves, people expect the male software dev to put themselves at risk for the female software dev, even if the female software dev is not willing to put themselves at risk.
Anil - I'd have expected a bit less snarky of tone from someone so public, but I'll try and answer you anyway:
Yes, I asked other males what they've seen. You can't change reality. Our industry is about as male as the army. I could probably have counted the females in my computer science program back in college on one hand.
I'm just wondering if it really all is as behind closed doors/hidden as is implied, or perhaps I just haven't come across it. People talk. They meet up in bars. I hear all sorts of things from other people in the industry over FrieNDA - though I really haven't heard many stories like these.
Honestly wasn't trying to be snarky -- it may just come naturally. (Would also separately argue I'm not particularly well known on HN.)
If "our industry" is defined as the technology industry, it's actually far less male than the army; We just insist on not counting the women who frequently lead efforts around communications, corporate development, design, marketing, office management, and other essential parts of the business. And even within engineering-focused disciplines, there used to be far more women involved but the number has been going down in recent decades.
But the question all of us men have to ask ourselves is: Why do you need another source. You had a whole range of people already telling you what they saw, and you're looking for people who by definition would have less information about this topic to provide their opinions. Why do you think that's the case?
It's not a question of sources, it's a question of being able to identify the thing when it happens. Women have no problem in identifying it, because it's directed at them. Men might have a problem identifying it, for various possible reasons. I think the poster you replied to was asking for opinions from other men about what they see happening in order to understand what kind of stuff is visible to men.
I have the same problem - I can't recall seeing anything that would qualify as harassment in any of my workplaces, and I would like to know if that's because I'm failing to see it, or if there's another reason.
Why should he be less snarky? After all, the tech industry supposedly loves straight-talking engineers like Linus Torvalds who don't beat around the bush and tell people bluntly why they're wrong - so much so that we even let them get away with gratuitous personal insults and misguided arguments.
Whenever a geek says how much he loves unvarnished communcation, what he means is that he loves sending it - the same people regularly hit the roof when they receive it.
That's not the logic. It's more: "I'm an iOS user and every time an Android device is on the network my phone crashes." * "I use Android and have never seen this. Have any other Android users seen this?"
You bring up an interesting point, which is visibility. All of this stuff absolutely happens, but a _lot_ of it goes unreported. This leads to a situation where if you're 'on the inside,' you see and hear about it all the time. If you're not, then you don't.
Generally, when I say "women have informal networks where they share stories of abuse to help other women be cautious around certain actors", there are two reactions: A nodding head, or a 'what the fuck?'
Also, the natural tenancy for those with an engineering mindset to subject all things to skepticism, is a problem for minorities, and partly due to the visibility problem you mentioned.
Yes, as a white male I see it constantly. I worked for what I would consider one of the best for women in tech (ThoughtWorks) and even there you see this stuff. So much more in other places.
> Most of the engineers I know in tech are decent, upstanding guys. If anything, I feel like if any of us was pulled aside by a female co-worker and she described shenanigans of the sort I read about in these articles, we'd probably jump to their defense in a heart beat, almost maybe too easily.
So here's the thing: most guys everywhere are decent, upstanding guys. Don't think that MVC is writing this to slander decent, upstanding guys. But being decent and upstanding does not make you aware of all forms of harassment and discrimination, and you can still do harm without meaning to or being aware that you're doing it. It's important to talk about the experiences of women in tech, to talk with women in tech and understand what their concerns are, not because they want to beat you over the head for being a bad person, but because you just don't see it. I can never have the experiences of a woman in tech - I'm not one. That's why it's so important to listen to what they are saying.
And reading articles like this (as much as our initial inclination may be to avoid looking at them) makes us reflect on the ways that we as decent, upstanding guys have missed the mark in the past.
I've seen/heard of harassment'ish inappropriate comments made by a colleague and let it go unreported. Didn't even talk to the guy in person in private to subtly suggest that his behavior may be making our female colleagues uncomfortable. I made various subconscious excuses to myself for being a bystander, and by doing so I was contributing to the prolongation of the problem.
Even if you place the 'me' of today in the shoes of myself back then, I'm not confident that I'd be able to stand up for my female colleagues for all the reasons that both men and women typically give for just letting things slide. I'm honestly ashamed of this fact, and hope I can slowly be more courageous in this regard.
Thanks for your honesty. It's hard to be courageous, whether you're the victim or the bystander (since it means you put yourself at risk of being the next victim, yes?). But it's not impossible, so let's all try to remember that.
a genuine question for other male readers. Have you heard of, or come into contact with any of this abhorrent behavior that's mentioned?
Why do you need a "male reader" to confirm this to you? Your question reads thus: 'I can't believe this if I only hear it from a woman-- is there a man in the audience who can confirm this?'
To turn it around a bit, why do you find these stories unbelievable & why do you need a man to confirm their veracity?
I don't find the story unbelievable. I like to believe that whom I choose to keep as my friends and colleagues is a reflection of myself, and I aspire not to be sexist or bigoted towards any minorities. Those of my friends I've spoken to about this who are women engineers haven't experienced anything to the degree I hear about in the articles (but they still acknowledge biases against them or annoyances in the conduct of their peers).
But this is an endemic problem. Are the male colleagues I have part of the problem and I am simply failing to realize it? Have I done a good job of choosing colleagues who don't behave that way? How can I know?
The phrasing was very poor. A "Could men here share their own observations?" would have been very different, but as phrased, it's asking if male witnesses of sexist behavior even exist.
Whether intentional or not, it's a dismissal of the female point of view.
Perhaps the question is more along the lines of "Men are being called upon to act against this discrimination, but I as a man have never seen it. Other men, what about you?"
In which case the gender of the audience is important to the question. For example, while women might see it all the time, if there are no men present other than the offender, the "ordinary" men would never see it and never have the opportunity to act.
Personally I can say it can be frustrating when you are damned (as a group) for not acting, when you as an individual have never to your knowledge witnessed the event.
Why you appear not to believe them (I can't know your beliefs I can only guess based off the text of your comment):
1. Has any man here "heard of, or come into contact with any of" any of this behavior?
2. Personally, "I have never seen it anywhere I worked, or heard of that sort of thing through word of mouth..."*
These statements suggest strong skepticism. Analogy: "Has anyone here actually experienced or come into contact with Climate Change? Personally I have not, nor have I ever heard of anyone having experienced it..." <-- this suggests the speaker doesn't believe climate change is real. This is what your comment suggests about the issues described in TFA.
*Yes I know you mentioned the "terrible sample set" but that doesn't un-ring the "I'm skeptical" bell.
It's not actually about skepticism, I think. It's more like this: some companies have so few women that there's no visible sexism! The kinds of incidents described in the OP don't happen because there are no women for them to happen to. The GP imagines that, if there were more women in his workplace, everything would continue as it is now except there would be more women. This is not an absurd expectation. But if we take the OP at face value (which I do) then we have to conclude that lots of women are facing harassment or other problems. We need to figure out if we're not seeing it because it's not there, or we're not seeing it because we have a blind spot somewhere.
The GP is asking other men how they feel that their workplaces handle these things - does it happen there, how frequent is it, what do people do about it? If you've never actually dealt with this kind of situation personally, it can be quite hard to imagine it happening - it is the sort of thing that any decent person should find abhorrent, and yet it does happen.
My perspective is kinda similar to the GP's - I've worked in male-dominated environments, I have never seen any harassment (although I have seen some obnoxious men) but this is because there are no women on my team to begin with! I have in the past pushed for specific outreach to female user/developer communities and have been disappointed by the lack of results this has produced.
I definitely have encountered men who hold overtly sexist attitudes - not many, almost certainly a minority of men I've worked with. As my career has progressed and my influence has increased, I've had to use it to counteract those opinions at times. It's just really difficult to work out how much of the problem is something I can directly control, and I think that's why the GP is asking the kinds of questions that he is.
> Have you heard of, or come into contact with any of this abhorrent behavior that's mentioned?
Yes.
White, privileged male.
I was attending Pycon 2013 in Santa, Clara. I had just spent the lunch hour with a good friend and his acquaintance, X. As we were leaving X decided it was an appropriate time to quietly share his views about women in tech with me. I was mortified at that moment and promptly exited the conversation without addressing X's comments to me.
I've felt terrible about that exchange ever since.
Thank you for your honesty. As a woman, I tend to respond to these situations in the exact same way - out of shock and mortification. But that's exactly why this behavior can continue. So together, let's speak up for ourselves, for others, and for what is right.
If you're not seeing it, it's statistically highly unlikely that you're not coming into contact with it. Reading and understanding feminist perspectives can help you become more observant. Hacker News provides plenty of opportunities for practice identifying hostile-to-women comments.
If you're not hearing about it through word of mouth, then it could be that you don't talk to a lot of women in tech, or don't talk to them about these issues, or you aren't fully hearing what they're saying. It could also be that they don't feel comfortable in discussing them with you. Look at your language and behavior and think about what could be sending unintentional messages that cause people to steer clear from this discussion. How many can you spot in this post, and in your reply to Anil?
If, in posting something out of concern, and in trying to understand something better, I still am going to get chastised for "doing it wrong", then it really is an uphill battle.
It is an uphill battle to become aware of the blinders and unconscious habits we all have. I was making suggestions (not chastising) assuming that you really are trying to understand, and are willing to make the effort even if it's challenging.
This uphill battle is becoming easier and easier, as evidenced by how many men are coming forward here to share their experiences and support. If you feel chastised, it's likely because, in the face of an overwhelming amount of data and evidence, your statements read in the vein of incredulity and dismissiveness rather than 'concern' and 'understanding.'
> If you're not seeing it, it's statistically highly unlikely that you're not coming into contact with it.
May I ask on what evidence you base this assertion? Note that this is a much stronger claim than just "harassment happens"; you're claiming that, more likely than not, it is also happening in my organization.
Most women in tech I know have multiple examples of stuff like the authors describe happening to them. Multiple guys in this thread confirm that yes, it happens and is observable.
Remember that the authors weren't only talking about harassment. And of course that doesn't mean it happens in your organization, but you can also see and come into contact with it elsewhere -- conferences, networking events, online discussions, etc.
If an overwhelming majority of observers report something happening frequently, and a relatively-small percentage report not seeing it, then what would you conclude?
That said, I'm not sure I can remember the last time a woman told me she doesn't see it happen.
> Most women in tech I know have multiple examples of stuff like the authors describe happening to them. Multiple guys in this thread confirm that yes, it happens and is observable.
To reiterate, what you've demonstrated is that there are N anecdotes of sexual harassment in the industry, for some N > 0. (Set aside M anecdotes of men and women who have not personally encountered such a thing.) You have not demonstrated that "it's statistically highly unlikely that you're not coming into contact with it."
Let's keep this discussion factual and avoid inflammatory hyperbole, please.
I've worked with women my whole life in tech. I sit right next to one currently and she's an awesome talent and from what I can tell is an equal member of the team. I do see some passive things like their opinions not being heard as much and I think that has almost as much to do with how they speak (not with confidence) as it does their gender. I try to make a point to listen more carefully and help promote the ideas of my female coworkers when they are good. I've never seen nor heard of any of the more overt things mentioned in the blog post like being groped or anything of the sort. Probably the worst I've heard is the guys lamenting that there are no women on the team and commenting that they can't find women interviewees that have the skills required for the type of project we were doing.
I have left a company because they flat-out refused to consider hiring women for coding jobs, with the CEO saying that women are too fragile for critical roles.
This kind of idiocy is relatively common in UK executives, as a fairly large chunk of them went to exclusive private boys schools and so never had to really deal with women as equal peers until adulthood.
Wouldn't they get that exposure during university though? I certainly had long-held views challenged and changed during my time in college, where I was exposed to a much larger spectrum of the population compared to my predominantly Caucasian, upper-middle class upbringing.*
* I briefly attended a UK postgraduate institution.
Was at Cambridge. There are no male-only colleges and two (iirc) female only colleges. Can't speak for Oxford, but I suspect a similar situation.
That being said, I'm not sure what the gender ratios are at the historically all male colleges. Perhaps they are not close to 50:50 (apparently this is the case with US business schools, where the ratios are often 65:35, and often have a bro/fratty feel to them)
It makes me sad to read this stuff, but a genuine question for other male readers. Have you heard of, or come into contact with any of this abhorrent behavior that's mentioned?
I've been out of college for about 6 years now. The worst I even encountered professionally was a joke shared in a group of 3 or 4 dudes about women drivers. I remember it well because it was so incongruous with everything else I've seen. There was also a booth babe at a conference I went to, and everyone I spoke with (including staff) considered it at the very least tacky. There were blog posts about harassment at that conference, but I never witnessed any nor did anyone in my group of friends, acquaintances and colleagues attending ever speak of being uncomfortable there.
I hear about more harassment towards the women I'm friends with after any given night of drinking at bars than the total I've ever heard from them about work.
> I hear about more harassment towards the women I'm friends with after any given night of drinking at bars than the total I've ever heard from them about work.
Do you mean from men at bars in general? Or are you talking about when they're out with coworkers/other people in the industry?
I mean randoms on the way to/from/at a bar. Yeah, there are co-workers and other people in the industry around, but we also go drinking with a bunch of teachers too. They're not the problem.
The more overtly unwelcoming behavior seems to crop up outside of the office at networking events and conferences (and IRC and twitter and the bottom of this page).
I will point out that of the various direct and second-level managers I've had since entering the industry in the early 2000s only three (out of a total of fourteen) were minorities.
For the record (Twitter was a poor medium for explaining this) I also have no beef with you - I just unfollowed because practically, seeing Shanley's tweets in my feed just makes my life less good by rubbing in my face that such people exist and have influence in the world. I can't do anything about the fact that people choose to follow anger, hatred and fear - but I can at least opt out of seeing those followers across my path.
The mute feature isn't quite enough for this, since naturally people who follow Shanley will tend to retweet other related topics that have the same tenor. So unfortunately the best thing for my blood pressure is to simply unfollow people who have joined this movement.
Which is all a big shame, because I am a fervent believer in equality (gender or otherwise), and am just as violently opposed to people who discriminate against or insult women just because they're women as Shanley is. However, I am equally hostile to people who discriminate against or insult men just because they're men.
The article itself mentions disliking engaging with moderate voices as an attempt to silence more strident voices, and I get where that's coming from, but some of the people with more strident voices are hate-filled hypocrites.
I see no harm in promoting the thoughtful stuff (like this article) and ignoring the angry noise.
I don't think anyone should be forced to listen to anything they don't want to. I'm just adding some context, not making a value judgement. I block the hell out of people on Twitter.
As an aside, Twitter's new-ish mute feature solves that problem. If someone you don't like is being retweeted by someone that you do, you can mute the person being retweeted without affecting the other content from the person you follow.
I've seen those kinds of more extreme articles (and writers) on modelviewculture before, so I think it's fair to judge a publication by what it publishes. And some of these talking points were adopted by ultra-feminists.
Somebody stating their views based on past experiences interacting with the community the authors are part of is something other readers might be interested in. See the post by "226jg5" below.
If you don't believe the article deserves the association, please elaborate on why that is the case.
One of the many problems feminism has faced is the lumping in of extremists with more moderates with all sorts of other splinter views; it's to be expected that your work may face the same criticisms.
There is no "ultra-feminist movement"; feminism is an umbrella term for a multitude of movements across time and geography. Each movement is understood within a context, and some take more time to understand than others. I would suggest the book Gender Inequality by Judith Lorber as a starting point.
Funny, I live with a college-age daughter who is an outspoken and studious third-wave feminist, and has been politically active since she was ten years old. She doesn't talk about radfem at all, or anything close to the "ultra-feminist" caricature. The third wave feminism I listen to constantly is about correcting the limitations of second wave feminism (Gloria Steinem style) and expanding our awareness and acceptance of more fluid gender roles in today's society. Nothing radical about it.
You're misinformed. "Radical" in "radical feminism" doesn't mean, has nothing to do with, "ultra"; it means a very specific strain of ideas, far from third-wave feminism.
Most people who feel animosity to feminists are attacking a caricature of them that can't be said to meaningfully exist. It also usually involves a misclassification of anger at a bad situation with 'hate.'
The fact that you can read something like this article and connect it to anything hateful, let alone angry (it's not either) shows why many feminists get frustrated even talking about inequality: people aren't listening to what's being said, their demonstrating faulty thinking and prejudices, often while denying they exist.
Read through https://twitter.com/shanley - give it a good hour. You'll come out thinking that you've experienced an alternate dimension, in which all men are evil, all women are victims who need to fight against the oppressor, and the only way forward is some kind of violent revolution, probably accompanied with mass executions of some sort.
Yeah, and every time someone like you objects to them, moderate feminists spring forward to insist that they're "straw feminists", that you imagined the whole thing, and that even thinking such feminists exist proves you really just have an axe to grind against feminism. I've even been accused of attacking a straw feminist for (accurately) criticising the views of someone who was incredibly popular amongst that group of feminists for exactly those views. Even if only a small proportion of feminists hold fucked up views, almost all of them are part of the problem by shielding those extremists from criticism.
Anyway it is important to recognize that you can advocate for gender equal rights without labeling yourself "feminist"—or allowing feminists to force that baggage-laden label upon you against your own will.
As another guy in tech I share your experiences. I have never witnessed anything like what was described in that article and I have been working in tech for around 10 years now in a very diverse workplace.
I also know of at least 1 woman who if she was a man would have been fired long ago yet she stays on because managers are basically afraid to fire her.
I'm not saying these problems don't exist, I just find it hard to believe they are as widespread as is claimed. I know many women in tech and not one of them had a problem finding a job which is a good thing. This is my personal experience so make of it what you will.
A bug report with no evidence or sources making claims that cannot be verified by the readers. I could just as easily say I am being terrorized by my Female boss and shut down any women who disagree using your argument.
Male here. Yes. Many many times. If anything, this is a very conservative report.
I'm guessing that you've seen it, too. Probably you didn't notice it, because it wasn't directed at you, and everyone in the room was also pretending it didn't happen.
> Make sure you interview with the same standards as anyone else
Reading these open letters, isn't that The Wrong Thing? "Promote the fuck out of diversity" (from the OP) sounds as if we should strongly prefer female programmers, with a bigger focus on a healthy team than on skills alone. (Also related: http://readwrite.com/2014/01/24/github-meritocracy-rug)
I'm genuinely curious because my experience is the same as yours (= nothing bad happened), but it dawns on me that I am now considered a part of the problem. :|
I've seen some milder forms of it. As a team lead about 20 years ago, one of my guys started going on about the virtues of the "cheesecake" in the game we were working on. In the middle of a meeting between him, myself and our other coder who happened to be female. She got really quiet, and I said something to him along the lines of, "Oh, come on, man," and moved the meeting along. Didn't really address it beyond that; my own social skills weren't up to taking it further, and I didn't notice any more like that for the remainder of the project.
Mostly, though, the shops I've worked in haven't had these issues, at least not anywhere that I could see them. Women seem to have been well integrated into our teams when there were any.
I think that a lot of the behavior mentioned in the letter is stuff that no-one wants to work with. Guys who will act weird with a co-worker because they're (female/minority/disabled/whatever) are good people to avoid for professional reasons; it implies numerous faults in character and understanding, and no good excuse for them.
My experiences related to women in tech:
* Everywhere I've worked, it's been a boys club, but we'd LOVE to hire more women. Frankly, hiring is hard in general. When women have come in to interview, I can't speak for others - but I know in the back of my head, my biggest concern is, "Make sure you interview with the same standards as anyone else, but make sure you don't have some subconscious bias because she's a she."
* There are probably good female engineers, and not so good ones. One of the few "not so good ones" I know of (doesn't mean she'll never improve, just at the time) had to be super carefully managed out over a long time. There was no unceremonious firing, that's for sure.
* Is there even a "women in tech" problem? Or is it just "women in the workforce, no matter the industry"? The kinds of ridiculous behavior women are describing in these articles sound to me like they could happen in finance, sales, marketing, HR, or anywhere.
* On any of the open source mailing lists I'm on, I've never seen anything remotely close to, "Your pull request sucks you whre, try again". Are these just the mythical basement dwelling trolls of Slashdot lore reaching out privately via email?
Most of the engineers I know in tech are decent, upstanding guys. If anything, I feel like if any of us was pulled aside by a female co-worker and she described shenanigans of the sort I read about in these articles, we'd probably jump to their defense in a heart beat, almost maybe too easily.
What have the rest of you experienced?
*
Edit: I left the above (my OP) in tact. After re-reading it, and some responses, it's become clear to me that it gives off an air of, "I don't believe these reports", and that's not really what I intended.
I suppose my main point was that no, I haven't experienced it, and I think that's exactly what these women are saying - Just because you haven't seen it, doesn't mean it's not there. So really, despite getting some up votes, I think I missed the boat.
I was curious if others on my (the male) side have in fact seen it, but what does that tell us? Probably not much.