Women Engineers on the Rampant Sexism of Silicon Valley

https://www.wired.com/video/2017/06/women-engineers-on-the-rampant-sexism-of-silicon-valley/

by j_s • 9 years ago

34 36 9 years ago

Kenji2• 9 years ago

"There are these tiny microaggressions that happen when people know you're a person of colour, they wanna know your origin, they wanna know your [...], they wanna know a bunch of things about you that don't really matter when it comes to work"

Or maybe, you know, someone just tries to get to know their coworkers better with small talk, because getting along with people, being friendly and knowing a little bit about their background improves the interactions at work dramatically. I'm not gonna lie, calling this a microaggression alienates me deeply.

To be honest, I wouldn't hire someone who thinks they are being 'microaggressed on' when the most ordinary of conversations happen.

zorpner• 9 years ago

You don't sound particularly interested in understanding the perspective of others, but in the event that you are, this is a remarkably good analogy that may help you understand the reality of the situation: http://ask.metafilter.com/149204/creepy-filter-Is-it-normal-...

Kenji2• 9 years ago

I already know and read this link. That alone should prove that I am more than equipped to participate in this discussion and willing to understand other people's viewpoints. I regularly force myself to read opinions I strongly disagree with. In this case, however, my disagreement remains firmly.

613style• 9 years ago

I'm not sure how a barely concealed personal insult helps the conversation. Kenji is expressing a simple true fact: when we meet new coworkers and want to have a casual friendly conversation with them, the question, "So where are you from?" is the simplest and most normal of small talk. Someone interpreting it as a microaggression is a great indicator that they will be difficult to work with.

Freestyler_34• 9 years ago

I can understand that for people who draw attention with their looks it can be annoying if the attention is not just a look, but more than that. I don't feel bad for looking at good looking women at all.

Anyway back to the topic, how is it an aggression to have small talk. Is it really that if you have dark skin that people only have small talk about your origins? Why is it seen as a hostile thing? People can't handle that others are interested, do people rather have it that everyone ignores them, ban all talking to these people.

I guess if one wants, one can see evil in everything, but its a choice, and it doesn't mean its true.

Ever asked the same question back? "what are your origins?"

kleer0012• 9 years ago

I'm with you on this. Everyday people are curious and not trained in cultural hypersensitivity (ethnic/gender/women/etc studies) , nor are they out to get you or piss you off on purpose. Let's have some good faith here.

So, why don't we just be a bit non-violent about it all, accept people as they are, and address their curiosity instead of jumping down their throat about their unconscious ignorance? Eh?

If you want people to behave differently then they do naturally, then the onus is on YOU to educate the populous. And education is hella expensive. You'll need outreach programs, door-to-door, slaughtering those that don't follow your holy book, regicide, etc... /s

bovermyer• 9 years ago

For context, what is your race, gender, and economic background?

AnimalMuppet• 9 years ago

I think it may depend on how it's done.

If I have a coworker of color, and I want to find out where they're from because I presume they can't be from here, sure, they might be justified in considering that a microaggression.

If I ask where they're from because that's something people talk about, and I want to treat them like a human coworker rather than like a programming robot, hopefully they can tell the difference between that and the first reason for asking.

If they can't tell the difference, or if they've run into the first kind so often that even the second kind grates on them, fine, I'll not ask if they tell me not to. But I don't think it's objectively reasonable to assume that the second kind of asking is unwelcome.

(And yes, I'm well aware that people who are doing the first kind of asking are going to claim that they're doing the second kind of asking...)

daotoad• 9 years ago

So, I am a white dude who was pretty skeptical about the whole microaggression thing. But I changed my mind.

My girlfriend is biracial and just watching how strangers interact with her taught me a lot about the state of race relations in this country.

Microaggressions (I am going to abbreviate this as MA) are more like micro-transgressions. In the vast majority of cases, the people who commit MA are not seeking to hurt the recipient of the MA, they are likely trying to be pleasant and friendly. But there is something about the interaction where the person expresses a subconscious bias that the target is not normal.

A great example, is the question "What are you?" How often are you asked this question? Me, I've never been asked this outside of Halloween. My GF gets this question a lot, at the grocery store, at the dog park, etc. Why? What does it mean? Why is it hurtful?

The questioner never means anything bad by the question. It's honest curiosity.

Based on the conversation that follows (a nice chat about our respective ancestries) and the fact that I never get asked this question, they are really asking, "are you black, Pacific islander, asian, or what?" but have learned that that is a rude question.

Why is this an unpleasant experience? It is "othering". Yeah, what does that mean? Well, it means that it is inherently exclusionary. It means that the asker of the question sees you as fundamentally different. And not in a good "let's celebrate our differences"-way, but in a hidden-deep-in-our-limited-monkey-brain "is this person safe" kind of way. It means "are you going to mug me" and "do I have to worry about saying something racist that my white friends would give me a pass on". It means "Are you one of us?" with the presumed answer of "no". For most of us, all of this is subconscious.

People who get asked "what are you?" regularly know what the implicit questions are, even if the person asking them doesn't. They questions feel aggressive, but they aren't outright, in-your-face, aggression.

Ask yourself, honestly, when you meet a white person who speaks with a local accent, how soon do you ask about their heritage?

whitemale2• 9 years ago

What is your solution to this problem then?

djohnston• 9 years ago

It seems difficult to reconcile inclusivity with the inability to ask someone something as simple as where they are from. Not in a exoticized "Oh no, where are you REALLY from?", kind of way, but in the simple question about where you grew up, whether it's Chicago or New Delhi, kind of way. In a similar way, it seems difficult to debug a problem or help a coworker in a gender-blind manner, when subjectively speaking the wrong way places you at risk of being called a mansplaining sexist.

Exoticization and mansplaining are real phenomena, but so are misunderstandings and damaging accusations based on a lack of pre-established comfort zones with the employee. Less verbosely, if I just met you why would I know that such a question makes you uncomfortable? Should I just assume all brown people get skeeved out by that question and simply not ask them the same questions I ask my white coworkers? How is that inclusive?

vu2srk3• 9 years ago

I'm sorry you feel alienated Kenji. That was not my intention at all. There's more context in my comment above. If you have the time, do take a minute to read.

alexkadis• 9 years ago

There's an accompanying article[1]. It's all incredibly moving. Erica Baker said one of my favorite quotes from the video, "Everybody talks about diversity and getting people in the door. We measure those numbers. We don't really talk much about the inclusion part. What are you doing to make sure that everybody is included and feels safe and supported and valued in your organization?"

[1] https://www.wired.com/2017/06/women-engineers-rampant-sexism...

Freestyler_34• 9 years ago

I hear a lot of talks about people just being hired for diversity, that's not helping. (the talk and the action)

baron816• 9 years ago

I have to ask this, but isn't it possible that the media's obsession with sexism in the tech is backfiring? I think the best thing we could do to alleviate sexism would be to bring more women into the industry. How do we expect to do that if the impression they're getting is that it's filled with mysogynistic pigs and creeps? I'm not saying this stuff should be swept under the rug, but many tech companies have gone to great lengths to accommodate women (as they should), much more than in other industries dominated by men. If women continue to get the impression that the tech industry is hostile to them, then they're going to continue to prefer (possibly less lucrative) careers in other industries already dominated by women, which is just going to make the problem worse.

I know it sucks that women sometimes have to deal with people telling them how great it is that they're an engineer, or with people asking them about their family's background (I'm joking, I know it can be worse than that), but the tech industry can still be a really great place for women to work.

Mz2• 9 years ago

I try to talk about what can be done constructively to move things forward. I try to blog about such issues in an even handed way. My blog gets very little traffic.

Drama sells. You want traffic for your writing, getting up on your high horse and looking for the dirt will get more eyeballs than writing something more evenhanded.

Additionally, someone like you saying something that sounds very reasonable is just another way to signal that women need to shut the fuck up. If you really want to see progress on this issue without all the mudslinging, you could proactively try to engage women, promote their work, etc. But most men won't do that. I don't know why they won't do that. I have some guesses, but I don't actually know why.

As someone who tries hard to talk in an evenhanded way about these issues and tries hard to further a constructive path forward, I get really tired of hearing the kinds of criticisms you are making because it reads to me as just another means to preserve the status quo. You aren't likely to jump on the news that I am doing something different and excitedly start tweeting my blog posts or something.

So, since you probably won't do anything actually constructive, we all get to continue to sit around listening to women whine about the status quo because that is all that gets press right now. I wish to hell and back I knew how to get people to actually pay attention to the constructive stuff. I don't. So I muddle through as best I can, writing blog posts that hardly anyone reads and fantasizing that some day it will make a difference.

Edit: To the joker asking for my blog URL, if you are serious, it is in my profile.

kthejoker2• 9 years ago

Your blog URL please? Thank you.

whitemale2• 9 years ago

have gone to great lengths to accommodate women (as they should)

Why should they put more effort to accommodate women than they do to accommodate men, isn't that sexist?

tzs• 9 years ago

There are these tiny microaggressions that happen when people know you're a person of colour, they wanna know your origin, [...]

I ask white males such questions, and have been asked such questions as a white male. In environments where a significant fraction of the people do not come from there, asking where you come from is a normal ice breaker and opening to get to know someone.

If I avoid such questions when someone happens to not be white, will I be accused of racism? Someone could interpret that as me not wanting to get to know non-white people.

apeace• 9 years ago

The answer is to avoid such questions with everyone :)

This is a barrier I also had to cross as someone who is involved in a lot of interviewing (software engineers). I used to always break the ice with things like "Where ya from?" or "How long have you lived NYC?". To me it was natural to ask that when first meeting someone.

But over time I realized it makes some people uncomfortable. For example, someone with a thick accent (English is their second language) might take "Where ya from" to mean, "I noticed your accent, where is it from?".

As innocent as my intentions may be, I now believe it's not appropriate to ask questions like that during an interview process or at any time in the work place. Talk about movies, the weather, programming languages. If someone volunteers that type of information by all means engage with them.

And as an interview icebreaker just say, "It's so nice to meet you, we're glad to have you here. Should we get started?". Another one I now use is, "So what do you think of our office? Did you see all the snacks?".

Mythanar2• 9 years ago

Just wait a bit, and with the way things are going, "Did you see all the snacks?" will be declared the thought crime against fat people.

I prefer using the same language in interviews as we do in office. If the candidate gets offended, chances are, he would be offended on the first day on the job; better weed those out early.

bassman9000• 9 years ago

God forbid trying to socialize and learn a bit about your coworkers, or potential coworkers.

vu2srk3• 9 years ago

I was the one that said that in the video. Firstly - a disclaimer: a lot of what was said in the video are snippets taken out of context. But to be fair, we're in an era of fast media, and I understand why everything can't be published. I think Kayla did a good job with the edit, given it's a ~4min video. I think you make a very valid point about the fact that it's a nice ice breaker to ask someone where they're from. But you're speaking as a white male in America, and hence in the majority. For someone like me, who's from Chennai, India, I understand it's a great ice breaker - if the other person knew something about my hometown. Asking a person for the place of origin because they want to establish common ground is a great thing, but when ignorance and misinformation is in the mix - it can get tiresome. Most people know of India from media, which is not a great portrayal of my country. Eventually the where do you "originally" come from, is followed by "Did you have an arranged marriage" or "are you here on a visa". There are assumptions that get tied into my place of origin or color - that don't necessarily exist if I'm white. I've often times been asked about how long I've lived in America simply because people don't understand why my accent isn't more Indian. I did point out to Kayla that this is not something that happens in the tech industry alone. It happens everywhere - and as a foreigner I understand that's a cultural tax I have to pay. There's a reason I used the word "microaggressions" - it's because anecdotally, this is a perfectly fine thing. When added up, it can definitely take its toll. I don't think the answer is to avoid asking such questions - but to understand that people who're not familiar with a certain culture may be misinformed or carry biases that could put the person that's in the minority in a delicate situation. Just understanding that and acting accordingly should do the trick.

hjrnunes• 9 years ago

So if I go to Chennai, India, people won't ask me where I'm from?

Or should I fear death by a thousand micro-agressions?

How should the good people of Chennai act accordingly to the delicate situation they might put me in for asking too many where-are-you-from's?

edit: missing quotation mark

Women Engineers on the Rampant Sexism of Silicon Valley

Related Stories