Notes from UPenn's Forum on Brogramming and Sexism in Computer Science

by tessr • 14 years ago

82 91 14 years ago

driverdan3• 14 years ago

It was funny when it was just a joke mocking foolishness. It was no longer funny when people intentionally began doing it.

tessr20• 14 years ago

I agree 100%. It's a fantastic piece of satire. Now that people are going around boasting about how they go to parties with naked women? It's not so cool.

When you take into account that the Sqoot API Jam was very brogrammer-like, too (although they never used the term)... Well, that just underscores that a) People now want to be brogrammers and b) Brogramming is inherently exclusive to women.

dmbass2• 14 years ago

Brogrammers are the Jersey Shore of programming. A small, laughable, easily ignored minority of the population. They are a joke whether they take themselves seriously or not.

If you don't like them, spend your time with programmers who don't brag about sex parties.

And why do you want to be a part of brogramming if you hate it so much? (inferred from your comment on exclusivity to men as a problem)

parfe2• 14 years ago

A quick (but not comprehensive, conclusive, or popularly agreed upon!) guide for determining if you plan on doing something sexist, ask yourself:

    "Is this for Men?  Or is this for People?"

e.g. Advertising/Hiring "all-female servants" is for men. "Serving food and drinks" is for people.

Side-note: If you ever think to respond with "But what about lesbians?" you are attempting to justify something sexist. Start over and cater to People.

tessr20• 14 years ago

Yes! (And what about men who aren't interested in women, too?)

wpietri10• 14 years ago

For my fellow guys who may be unsure how to participate in discussions like this without looking like an ass, may I suggest:

Quora's discussion on "What things are most useful for men to keep in mind when discussing theories or topics relating to gender?" http://www.quora.com/What-things-are-most-useful-for-men-to-...

Ellen Spertus's classic "Why are There so Few Female Computer Scientists?": http://people.mills.edu/spertus/Gender/pap/pap.html

The handy "Male Programmer Privilege Checklist": http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Male_Programmer_Privilege...

"HOWTO Encourage Women in Linux": http://www.faqs.org/docs/Linux-HOWTO/Encourage-Women-Linux-H...

And that useful reference "Derailing for Dummies": http://derailingfordummies.com/

wpietri10• 14 years ago

Not getting the downvotes here. Anybody care to explain? I expected to have some of my more polemical contributions ride the vote rollercoaster. But as somebody who often wasn't sure how to usefully participate and who made a variety of mistakes in the past, I meant this to be helpful.

EDIT: Previously it was down to -3. Now it's back in the black.

tessr20• 14 years ago

well I upvoted you...

I'm beginning to think that HN is getting sick and tired of having to think about women in tech. What a burden!

astrofinch• 14 years ago

It's a lot of stuff to read?

I voted you up.

dudeguy9999• 14 years ago

It could be interpreted as "here are the thoughts you are allowed to think on this topic, according to the gods of PC".

agateform3• 14 years ago

I'm not sure but its possible people have downvoted your comment because of heavy feminist bias on some of the links. There are people that see a lot of hatred of man in feminism. This link might help explain why http://www.womenagainstmen.com/media/feminism-is-a-hate-grou...

pilgrim6892• 14 years ago

Brogramming and being sexist are two completely different things.

My girlfriend is also in the field of software engineering. Often times, we program together. However, on rare occasions I'll get together with my male friends one evening and indulge on Pizza Pockets and Python. We call it "brogramming" as self-mockery. I'm not being sexist; I'm hanging out with my buddies, and she completely understands that.

I don't like watching football with my male friends, so we code together instead. As long as we keep brogramming outside of work, it should not be thrown in the same basket as sexism... and it's ridiculous to propose that we abolish men wanting to sometimes code with men outside of work.

robee• 14 years ago

This is how I interpret it too. It's self-deprecating and ironic. It is a complex reference though, so its not surprising that some people misinterpret it.

AlexeyMK2• 14 years ago

I used to agree with you, and then I realized that when it comes to offense, there's no such thing as a misinterpretation. If somebody's offended by something, that's not your call to make. Certainly this can be reduced to absurdity (I'm offended you would make this argument about offensiveness!) but I don't think Tess & co are trying to be facetious here.

FWIW, I think brogramming is self-deprecating and ironic too, and not the least bit offensive. But Tess doesn't - and I respect that.

EDIT: You're not obligated to stop doing something simply because somebody thinks it's offensive. But it's kind of the polite thing to do.

wpietri10• 14 years ago

Nice straw man you've got there. Make it yourself?

The thing that they are referring to with the term "brogramming" is not a few guys getting together and coding for fun. Nobody is proposing that that feminism police come and kick in your door if more then 3 guys congregate in the same room with laptops and a bowl of Cheetos. So relax, you're safe. Safe enough that you can find out what they're actually upset about.

tessr20• 14 years ago

One of the points that I make in my post is that it's not up to YOU (or even your girlfriend) to decide what offends ME (or any other woman in CS). If you take nothing else away, please understand that.

With regards to "brogramming," I personally don't find the idea all that offensive. But there's a critical mass of women in tech who do, and I think that it's my responsibility--and yours--to respect that.

pilgrim6892• 14 years ago

My point is that I think your "critical mass of women in tech" are offended by sexism, not brogramming. Brogramming isn't sexist in itself, as I tried to illustrate. Hiring based on the brogrammer meme is sexist discrimination, though.

I respect that they're offended, I just don't think you've targetted the source of offense precisely.

ShardPhoenix• 14 years ago

That's fine if you also realize don't (in general) have the right to not be offended.

blahedo• 14 years ago

I'm going to frame this entire response in terms of watching football, because I want to be clear that it is not, here, the programming that is a problem, or even relevant.

If you hung out with your friends (who all happen to be male) to watch football, that's not necessarily sexist. (1)

If one of the friends brought along an out-of-town friend (who was a football fan, and male) one week to hang out and watch football with all of you, and you welcomed him in for the week, that's also not necessarily sexist. (2)

If one of the friends brought along an out-of-town friend (who was a football fan, and female) one week to hang out and watch football with all of you, and you objected that she wasn't part of the group and you like a time just with friends to hang out, that's still not necessarily sexist. (3)

But if (1), (2), and (3) all pertain, then we have a pretty clear case of sexism, I'd say. Maybe you'd think (1) and (2) pertain but not (3); but if you go around calling the weekly group "boys' night", then (3) is pretty strongly implicated, and if one of the group was thinking about bringing along his (female) friend, he might decide to just skip that week or not invite her, because that wouldn't make sense for something called "boys' night", right? Or maybe he'd bring her along, and someone would make a comment like, "guess it's not 'boys' night' this week, ha ha, I guess some girls like football too" thus calling attention to her sex and re-emphasising that she's weird and exceptional.

As soon as you take a bunch of friends hanging out---which is, at least presumptively, not a sexist activity---and slap a gendered label on it like "boys' night", or "brogramming", you know what? It's probably become a sexist experience. Even if that was not intended and even if you don't think it is.

stale20002• 14 years ago

Is the stereotype of the frat boy, or tradition "bro" offensive? Not as it applies to technology or brogramming, but just as it exists by itself, or as it relates to Greek culture. Does it discourage women from joining Greek organizations, and is therefore discriminatory or offensive?

IMO, it doesn't discourage women from joining Greek organizations, as there is a corresponding Sorority girl stereotype and culture that is completely different from the frat bro stereotype.

To bring this back to the topic, I believe that the brogramming stereotype may only be off-putting to women as there doesn't currently exist a corresponding "programmer girl" stereotype that is completely different from the male-focused ones and is also a stereotype that women might aspire to be like.

As such, I don't think telling people to get rid of there new meme, because its off-putting to women, is going to be very effective (I mean, just look at how long people have been trying to get rid of the nerdy CS major stereotype), but starting your own "coding girl" stereotype just might.

Bryan

wpietri10• 14 years ago

So in brief, your theory is that the best way to reduce sexism is to accentuate gender stereotypes?

stale20002• 14 years ago

Stereotype was probably a bad choice of words on my part as it has inherently negative connotations. What I'm saying is that there doesn't currently exist a Computer Science "image", or idea of what it is like to be a Computer Scientist, that is friendly to women.

I'm just using the logic behind how it would be ridiculous to say that the frat boy image is putting women off from joining Greek organizations (beyond having to interact with them), as most women who are thinking about joining a sorority probably aren't worrying particularly much about becoming a frat boy.

hackinthebochs3• 14 years ago

The point is that attempting to get rid of all behavior that may fit a stereotype is a futile effort, so why not attempt something that might actually work?

wmf• 14 years ago

I suspect that many people are offended by bros, especially the bros who don't grow out of it after college.

driverdan3• 14 years ago

Like most stereotypes both frat and sorority stereotypes are offensive, as are the people who intentionally try to fill them.

arjunnarayan4• 14 years ago

Wait, there's something _offensive_ about frat boys who enjoy being frat boys and intentionally go out to find like minded individuals to do said things with? And by being frat boys I mean lifting weights, drinking copious amounts of alcohol and playing beer pong. Sure, you don't have to take part, but what's offensive about that?

tessr20• 14 years ago

That's a good idea. Will look into it, see if I can start something spontaneously... (;

But no--I really wish there were, and I think there will be plenty eventually. In the meantime? I think it's worth writing down the ways that college students, male and female, feel about these issues.

xenophanes4• 14 years ago

All this talk about "Don't do X, it's sexist" or "Don't do Y if it's for Men not People" has a negative focus: what not to do.

And then punishing offenders instead of helping them learn better. People don't learn by punishment. (See: Karl Popper.)

At best, this gets people to hide overt problems. It sweeps problems under the rug without getting rid of them. People will still think sexist thoughts, then add self-censorship on top of that.

Real solutions will come from discussion of better ways of life and thinking: what to do instead. And how to characterize this by what it's about rather than a list of things excluded. Life needs a whitelist more than a blacklist.

tessr20• 14 years ago

I think there's something to be said for faking it until you make it, in this case.

IF men in tech learn to "hide" their sexist thoughts, this will help women in tech feel more comfortable and will thus encourage more of them. And then they will show men how competent women can be in CS, sexist stereotypes disappear because they aren't true at all anymore, etc. etc.

I know this is an optimistic oversimplification, but you get the idea.

xenophanes4• 14 years ago

I don't think that works. We've had a lot of (unintentional) "fake it until you make it" with anti-semitism at various times in various countries, but it has never solved the problem. (Example: France during/after the French Revolution.)

PS I don't agree but I don't think you should be downvoted.

tessr20• 14 years ago

You know, I think I understand you better after rereading this a few times.

Do you have any suggestions on how to help people (men) understand these issues?

(That IS what the forum was supposed to be. Not a punishment.)

xenophanes4• 14 years ago

Maybe not exactly what you asked, but:

There was a recent example where people got really offended by the idea of female beer servers. And the people behind the ad got punished by sponsors pulling out.

Are men not supposed to find that sexy? Are they supposed to find it sexy, but pretend they don't? Does everyone know it's sexy, but it's just taboo to appeal to this preference in advertisements?

Seems like they are either being asked to change or hide their sexual preferences. And just not talking about it is no solution.

So, should men in general change their sexual preferences? Well, I'm happy to go with "yes" on that one. And women should too, in my view. But that's an advanced topic and I wouldn't expect most people to agree with me without discussing a bunch of philosophy and stuff. (See more details below.)

I think most anti-sexists would not agree with my perspective on this topic. I think most of them have inconsistent ideas. When you're doing advocacy but have inconsistent ideas, it's not going to work out so great.

What kind of inconsistency? Liking regular attitudes to sex in some contexts, but then not liking some of their consequences in some other contexts. And not recognizing that these are linked.

It's not at all easy to divorce sexual preferences from sexism. One of the many consequences of ending sexism is that everyone would be bisexual (or asexual). If you're not bisexual (or asexual) then you're sexist! Maybe you won't agree with that but there are plenty of smaller issues that are pretty easy to agree on. If you look at the large majority of common sexual fantasies, they involve some amount of gender stereotypes like a strong man or a pretty woman. The beer related ad basically communicated "hey guys, we'll have pretty women near you", it was appealing to a very mainstream preference.

Tons and tons of women have rape fantasies. And tons and tons of men have nasty fantasies too. In that context I'm not going to get very mad at men for beer server preferences, it doesn't seem all that important to me.

Do anti-sexists want everyone to give all that stuff up? Drop all gender stereotypical sexual fantasies? Drop most (all?) sexual fetishes? Maybe become bisexual or asexual?

I don't think so. They want to keep some of that stuff but a limited amount.

But rationally you can't just stop half way, arbitrarily, and avoid the full consequences of your ideas. What's the argument for partially rejecting sexism? Some kind of practical argument? Well, that's not so bad but when you look at it that way you'll see it in a new way: the sexists and anti-sexists are both partial sexists, who draw their line in the sand a little different (not even very far apart, from my perspective). Then they fight over where the line should be (they both agree on tons of stuff that is and isn't OK, but then there's a small category where they squabble). And there's no principled arguments to determine this because it's just an arbitrary part-way line determined by practicality, cultural norms, fads, etc... Both sides look a bit dumb to me: mostly agreeing and then arguing over small details with no principles to determine who is right. If you're going to take some "practical", unprincipled approach, at least try to be really tolerant of people who do something similar but not quite the same, since exactly how far you go is arbitrary you really shouldn't start a witch hunt over it.

Most people, including most anti-sexists have no clue how to replace all their sexual preferences with new ones created according to modern rationalistic, progressive standards. More generally, little understanding of how to change their personality (let alone change it safely and rationally). And honestly most people shouldn't try it. They will make mistakes and mostly do worse than the (partially sexist) traditions they're currently adhering to.

Yet the anti-sexists demand the "sexists" change their personalities and sexual preferences, without providing the philosophical knowledge of how to do such a thing, which neither side has.

I also don't think it's fair to blame men in general. All this stuff is part of gender roles and lifestyle traditions that both men and women participate in. Just as one example, many women want the man to take lots of initiative and kiss her without asking. But they don't want to be kissed by men they don't fancy. And they don't want to send clear signals. The woman's passive role and the man's active role go together, and combined with the lack of clear communication on both sides, you get false positives where women get kissed who don't want to be. Men get blamed for this by the anti-sexist crowd, and sometimes fired, but it looks to me like it's a consequence of both the male and female behavior. There's no straightforward way for men to unilaterally fix it: if they act less like "alpha males" and do more "beta" behavior (like asking permission to kiss a woman or passively waiting for a lot more evidence to go by), they will have a worse shot with most women.

parfe2• 14 years ago

Ah yes, the ol' "You're being negative by pointing out the negative thing I'm doing!" argument.

Anyone trying to point out a hurtful behavior is being positive. They're trying to help you not hurt other people. You telling someone they should be nicer when you're being a shitheel is a privileged behavior. "Sorry, but you're not being nice enough so I refuse to listen. I might be sexist, but you hurt my feelings by pointing it out!"

Grow up.

temphn• 14 years ago

Let's start with some facts.

FACT: Men and women have significant, measurable neurological differences[1].

FACT: These differences are measurable before birth[2].

FACT: Men and women show large, reproducible differences on average in tests of visuospatial ability, differences that can be mapped back to the brain[3]

  Men consistently outperform women on spatial tasks, 
  including mental rotation, which is the ability to 
  identify how a 3-D object would appear if rotated in 
  space. Now, a University of Iowa study shows a connection 
  between this sex-linked ability and the structure of the 
  parietal lobe, the brain region that controls this type of 
  skill.

  The parietal lobe was already known to differ between men 
  and women, with women's parietal lobes having 
  proportionally thicker cortexes or "grey matter." But this 
  difference was never linked back to actual performance 
  differences on the mental rotation test.

  ...

  "Differences in parietal lobe activation have been seen in 
  other studies. This study represents the first time we 
  have related specific structural differences in the 
  parietal lobe to sex-linked performances on a mental 
  rotation test," said Tim Koscik, the study's lead author 
  and a graduate student in the University of Iowa 
  Neuroscience Graduate Program. "It's important to note 
  that it isn't that women cannot do the mental rotation 
  tasks, but they appear to do them slower, and neither men 
  nor women perform the tasks perfectly."

There are literally thousands more studies of the deep rooted genetic, neurological, and endocrinological differences between the genders on pubmed.org. These differences manifest before birth. And this research is what your tax dollars pay for. It is just young earth creationism to postulate that evolution did not happen, or that biological gender differences do not exist or are somehow disconnected from their real world consequences.

One of the consequences is that in any niche which requires cognitive or physical activity, we should not expect an exactly 50/50 distribution of males and females. Interests differ. Abilities differ.

The religious outcry against stating these basic evolutionary facts got Larry Summers ousted as the President of Harvard in 2005. You simply cannot state these facts and retain your job. And the irony of all ironies is that those who drove the President of Harvard from power will insist that they are actually the oppressed, rather than the powerful.

That's the root of the matter here. The ostensible evil of the term "brogrammer" rests upon the tacit desirability of having a 50/50 distribution of women in programming, which in turn rests upon the presumption that it is even possible to achieve this equality given biological constraints, constraints that are obvious upon a cursory skim of the relevant literature. We are just not blank slates to be blasted clean and remade by ideology.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/Female-Brain-Louann-Brizendine-M-D/dp/...

[2] http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-10/uu-spb102309....

[3] http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-12/uoi-sdo121708...

wpietri10• 14 years ago

There's nothing wrong with stating facts. The problem comes when people state facts in a way that implies some political or ethical conclusion that isn't justified. Like Larry Summers did.

You correctly complain about the moralistic fallacy, which is where people assume that the world must be way X because it's how they'd like it to be.

But you do that while committing the naturalistic fallacy, which is the assumption that what's natural (or what currently exists) is what's right.

And of course, you also highlight a very small number of facts, ignoring the millennia of oppression of women, biased educational systems, and a lot of cultural pressure that keeps women away from STEM fields. So what you're engaged in isn't some rational analysis of a problem; you're just using a few small points of data in isolation to justify your predetermined conclusion.

driverdan3• 14 years ago

What? Who said anything about evolution or achieving a 50/50 female/male split in the industry?

pemulis• 14 years ago

The root of the matter isn't some egalitarian desire to have a 50/50 gender distribution in tech. It's about acting professional and not making your female colleagues feel uncomfortable or alienated.

AlexeyMK2• 14 years ago

I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on genetics; FWIW, I know that (1) the % of women programmers has gone down since the 50s and (2) in Israel, where I grew up, the % of women programmers is substantially higher. As an exercise, though, I'd like to accept your point and explore its repercussions.

Even if women are and will remain a minority for whatever reason, that doesn't mean we should be dicks to our colleagues. My intuition is that most damage being done is not malicious; I don't think programmers as a community are mean-spirited or misogynistic.

Tess has already made the relevant points about over-sensitization and the relative nature of offensiveness. Ultimately, it's up to you to figure out to what extent you are willing to be conscious of the effect you have on those around you.

tessr20• 14 years ago

Well said. Thank you.

flatline• 14 years ago

FACT: the number of women in CS has been dropping for decades. The prevalent reason for this appears to be "cultural biases that discouraged girls and women from pursuing a career in the field" [1].

There have been several high-ranking HN discussions over the last few days on this topic, all of which revolved around women in the field feeling ostracized and even harassed by their male colleagues. There is absolutely no need to draw in a spurious evolutionary argument to explain this trend.

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/16/business/16digi.html

katane2• 14 years ago

You are linking low number of CS freshwomen to being harassed by male colleagues. The problem of that argument is obviously that the earlierst most people would be exposed to such an environment is _after_ college.

So maybe its not culture in programming, but culture in society that is to blame here.

dinkumthinkum2• 14 years ago

I hate to be inflammatory but this is just stupidity masquerading as an evolutionary biology diatribe. No one is talking denying evolutionary theory; methinks thou doth protest too much.

I don't think a bunch of script-kiddies that learned a web framework and now think they are the second coming of Peter Norvig or Dennis but with the added benefit that they can "get naked chicks" are necessarily very high on the evolutionary ladder. Sorry to burst your bubble. I know a couple women PhD students that are brilliant Operating Systems researchers and work almost exclusively in the Linux kernel. They are not whipping RESTful CRUD apps with the Web framework du jour.

FACT: all this jibber jabber about evolutionary biology is completely irrelevant and just misses the point in a rather insidious way.

agateform3• 14 years ago

Is there a relation between visuospatial ability and programming ability?

You should check out Top Secret Rosies documentary (its on netflix). They were the pioneers of computing.

As for the reason there are less woman in tech... This article might be interesting http://blog.jolieodell.com/2010/09/07/women-in-tech/

fourk• 14 years ago

I feel like I'm missing something here. Why would someone (of any gender) feel like they're missing out due to an inability to fit a stereotype melding douchebag frat boy with programmer?

It's sad to me, because there are so many much more worthy things for us to aspire towards, as software developers, than some stereotype based around degenerate behavior.

dantle• 14 years ago

I actually wonder if the brogrammer faces more discrimination than the female programmer. Who would want to hire a loud drunk frat boy to program for their Fortune 500 company?

tessr20• 14 years ago

See, this is the thing. Startups are now using "brogramming" as a recruiting buzzword (including one I interviewed with--though I dropped out partway through the process because I accepted an offer elsewhere).

wavephorm• 14 years ago

I coudn't even finish the article, it just sounded like a bunch of whiny nagging.

tessr20• 14 years ago

This actually is less "Tess writes about brogramming" and more "CS students (of ALL genders) got together and talked about it."

So maybe you're just getting old and out of touch?

sbarron• 14 years ago

What does the poster's age have to do with it?

edwinnathaniel• 14 years ago

As a group of Computer Scientists, Software Engineers, Developers, we seem to try hard to be "accepted" by the public.

Why is that?

Ever since a very long time ago, we want to be acknowledged and to be put in pedestal. Be it the word "prodigy", "young hacker", "talented nerd", "millionaire boy" or something along that line....

davvilla• 14 years ago

Hahaha that's so cool. Thats my laptop right there!

dinkumthinkum2• 14 years ago

It just makes me think of non-technical programmers that recently started programming after watching a few screencasts of "pick your 'hip' web framework" and now consider themselves to be uber-hackers or something.

nhashem• 14 years ago

I find the "brogramming" thing fascinating because I've never actually met anyone that has called themselves "brogrammer" non-ironically or non-satirically. My best friend's cousin is from Long Island and he has cousins that call themselves "guidos" and intentionally live up to every Jersey Shore stereotype because they legitimately think it's cool. My experience is only anecdotal, but I've yet to meet anyone who has actually used "brogramming" as a serious label for themselves.

My own personal theory is that there are two collective phenomenon at play here:

1) There's a self-cyclical force here where some people think brogramming is a label some people use non-ironically, so there are things like marketing materials developed specifically for it, which by definition will be exclusionary and sexist. This material further spreads the idea that "brogrammers are real" and everyone gradually forgets that nobody is actually this ridiculous.

2) There is a fear among programmers that our wonderful merit-based community accepting of all genders, cultures, and creeds -- which it is, really -- is going to turn into Phi Delta Toolbag overnight. For a lot of us, myself included, we've never been one of the "cool kids" and found computers and technology a much better fit for our introverted personalities. And suddenly these pink popped-collared polo shirt sunglass-wearing monsters are going to take that away from us.

Anyway, I understand why the women at UPenn would be offended by the "brogrammer" term, sometimes you just don't want to be associated with a term even if it's satirical. But are there actual brogrammers out there being sexist, or is this an overblown issue?

tessr20• 14 years ago

LOL @ Phi Delta Toolbag.

So, here's the thing. I touched on this (but now I'm wishing I'd emphasized it more).

Brogramming is moving away from satire. There are actually people who want to be brogrammers, just like there are actually people who want to be guidos. Now, almost everyone I know is proud to NOT be a brogrammer (I think some people slyly enjoy the label, but that's another issue).

I would also challenge your idea that our community is accepting of everyone. I think we are in theory--certainly, we all want to be--but there's little things that happen. IMO, the stuff that's been surfacing this week has always been here. It's just people are getting called out on it now.

And, btw, thanks for such a thoughtful comment.

ckwang2• 14 years ago

"LOL @ Phi Delta Toolbag."

I would think that's pretty offensive to anyone who's in any sort of "* Phi Delta *" fraternity. In a thread that touches on the offensiveness of stereotypes and subsequent alienation, the irony of both the comment and your LOL reaction should be pointed out. As far as "thoughtful comment" goes, there certainly wasn't much thought put into the phrase "Phi Delta Toolbag".

vecter• 14 years ago

Did you pick Phi Delta Toolbag on purpose, or was it a random name you drummed up? Curious b/c I'm a member of Phi Delta Theta.

padraigm• 14 years ago

Even if no one is actually that ridiculous, sexism (often the unintentional and ignorant variety rather than the intentionally malicious one) is fairly rampant in programming circles. That's something we fix, and the first step is to make everyone recognize the problem.

arjunnarayan4• 14 years ago

> As I see it, women are put off by “brogrammer” for two reasons. Some women would say that dichotomy of “programmer” and “frat bro” leaves women out altogether. If you’re not a nerdy boy or a brogrammer, where do you fit in? Others see the brogrammer meme as taking the most “masculine” aspects of the discipline and emphasizing them (think chugging Red Bull, pumping iron, eating steak and “getting” women). Is this really what we should be doing when women are already so underrepresented?

I think the author is misreading the entire "movement" by first assuming the false dichotomy she stated, that I've quoted above: that computer science is for the two exclusive groups of "nerdy boys" and "brogrammers". First, the entire meme is mostly satire making fun of bros. Because, hey, easy targets, right?

Second, whatever serious brogrammers there are isn't out of nerdy guys coming out of the woodwork and embracing a culture of bro-ing. I know and socialize with a fair number of self-proclaimed "bros". Whatever non-satire based brogrammers exist, they come from a realization on the part of the bros-who-formerly-did-not-program --- that programming is a useful skill. So a lot of bros who previously took Econ classes and lined up for the investment banking recruiting sessions are now learning how to program and spending more time in the CS department.

I don't think this is something to be "offended" by. If what you're offended by is bro-culture (and yes, I will be the first to say that there are sometimes troubling things about a frat-culture that sometimes objectifies women --- the "brogramming" session cited where recruiters were trumpeting the existence of naked women at parties _is_ offensive.), then decry those bros that _do_ do things that marginalize various groups. But there are plenty of bros who do nothing worse than consume copious amounts of alcohol on friday night, play games of beerpong late into the night, wear popped collars, get excessive tans and lift a lot of weights (which is how I've met most of my bro friends, seeing as I do find some of those activities pleasurable). It's not all Mike-The-Situation out here, and you can empirically verify this fact by walking down Walnut Street on a Friday Night as the frat parties are in session.

But as a computer scientist who has all too often seen too many groups excluded from this beautiful subject --- I'm mostly troubled by this blogpost --- as it is an attempt to marginalize a group of different people (bros) who seem to have taken to learning more computer science. I want more bros in computer science. more women, more goths, more emos, more whatever-stereotype you have in mind. And if they want to brogram, let them.

tessr20• 14 years ago

Nice point. I, too, think that CS stands to benefit from more diversity, of all kinds.

I find it interesting that you assumed that by "some women" I meant "me." These are not actually my views, exactly, on brogramming. If I were the only woman in the world, I wouldn't consider "brogrammer" offense. I agree--most of them are pretty harmless. Blah blah red bull.

But there ARE a significant number of women who ARE offended. And I don't think that you, or me, or anyone else, should tell them to not be offended by it. We haven't had their experiences, you know? Even as a woman in tech, I don't understand the full range of female experiences and perceptions.

arjunnarayan4• 14 years ago

I stand by my point that your ire is misdirected.

Here's how I see it:

1. Bros be bro-ing, with alcohol and weights. (not sexist)

2. Bros decide to program, bringing with them their bro-baggage (not sexist).

3. This becomes a meme: brogramming (not sexist).

4. Douchebag recruiters capitalize on latest meme in sleazy fashion, advertising "naked women" (definitely sexist).

5. Some women (ok, more than just you) and all reasonable persons are (rightfully) outraged at that blatant display of sexism.

I still don't seen anything offensive about brogramming itself --- insofar as brogramming consists of bros who like to program. If assholes are going to make sexist remarks/be sexist, you are entirely justified in calling them out for those vile acts, and I will happily join you in doing so. But your blogpost reads like a witchhunt against bros for... being bros.

petercooper• 14 years ago

It is interesting watching this discussion play out.

I've been wondering whether people are put off becoming musicians/writers/artists due to others having sexist stereotypes in their material. We don't seem to see the same widespread demands for apologies and desistance in those fields (consider the amount of songs talking about "bi^ches" and the like) - or do we? But then I realized that we have seen racism (and homophobia) become taboo in pop culture and the arts, thankfully, yet sexism is still a free for all. Why?

As idiotic as "brogramming" is (IMHO) and as much as I think software development should be a semi-academic, tight-knit discipline with progressive and respectful norms, many of these things causing offense seem to be misjudged attempts at injecting pop culture. "Brogramming" is on par with the group "LMFAO" in terms of stupidity and tact, yet LMFAO are not called upon to apologize or up their game to stop offending people. Why? (Differing standards for pop culture celebrities vs professionals, maybe? But are some developers also pop culture celebrities? Tricky.)

Bear in mind this is just armchair sociological analysis, and no opinion of mine can be derived from these questions (well, other than that brogramming is a bit silly and that I think we should all treat each other with the respect we'd also want to receive) :-)

gt384u• 14 years ago

Never did I expect to have this discussion about "brogramming" as a legitimate phenomenon. My knee-jerk reaction is to lament that this is a misunderstanding of language/culture and that is why we can't have nice things, but that's just simple of me to think so. Clearly the cultural angle of this is much more interesting if a large group of reasonable, intelligent people in the software community at large can arrive at such a broken state of affairs.

I took it for granted that the portmanteau of "bro" (never a positive adjective in my corner of the world, e.g. "Ugh, the bar upstairs was full of bros, so we left") and "programmer" was something that was obviously poking fun at (among other things) the social life of the archetypical awkward, introverted programmer.

With the above in mind, I truly adored the satire of brogrammer when I first came upon it. I would have never thought of it being exclusive towards women because, frankly, all of the women in computer science I've ever worked with have been not only good computer scientists, but also properly well-rounded individuals able to comport themselves with other human beings without being painful to be around who never ever EVER desire being a Brogrammer and would be offended to be called as much.

I kind of laughed brogramming off early on in the genesis of the phenomenon when I saw people behaving like they were taking it seriously. My thought was they were using an ultra-mock seriousness in the furtherance of humor. Think of your favorite comedian looking you square in the eye and telling you that, say, they think babies are delicious for breakfast on toast.

The discourse on brogramming sort of percolated over time, then I distictly recall that I saw a post from someone in (Malaysia, maybe?) here on HN where they were referring to themselves as a Brogrammer on their website's bio, and I took it to be either someone who had the misfortune to lose something in translation, or that I misunderstood that they too were in on the joke, as it were. I know when I try to understand humor in French or Spanish I lose a great deal of the nuance and have to resort to fairly broad humor when I communicate in those languages. As a consequence, I tend to avoid trying to be funny in anything other than English. It's for the best.

Then I saw articles popping up in the media about Brogramming as cultural phenomenon and I took it to be the standard sort of journalistic fare where a cultural phenomenon that gets reported on is either wildly misrepresented or turns out to be patently false. Anyone remember "toothing" [1] from early-mid 2000's? Just think how much serious play that got in the news. So much so, that I'd be shocked if there weren't a substantial number of people who tried it out of curiosity.

And now I'm discovering that Brogramming isn't a self-deprecating joke that I've been sharing with nearly as many people as I thought. I'm not sure if this would really happen, but I'd be eager to hear from journalists who reported it as phenomenon, startups and recruiters who chose to use it as recruiting pitch, or someone who internalized Brogramming as aspirational lifestyle. I'm just confused.

At any rate, I give up. No joke is worth the shitty feelings and exclusion and hurt and animosity that I'm seeing being identified now as coming out of brogramming as meme.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toothing

tessr20• 14 years ago

I loved it, too (see: https://twitter.com/#!/temiri/status/117771875618263040) and I wish it hadn't shifted the way it has. But it has.

useflyer• 14 years ago

As a once upon a time finance guy who made the transition to web designer / founder, I have the following observation:

Wall street was the hot go-to destination, and it was as 'bro' as it got. The never-ending conversation was "can women fit in on Wall street?"

Now SV is the hot go-to destination, and its getting 'bro'. The new conversation is "can women fit on in SV?"

redthrowaway3• 14 years ago

>Why is “brogrammer” offensive, anyways?

Because it denotes retards trying to pass themselves off as qualified. Just as "humbers" would denote unqualified plumbers trying to ply their trade, or "barpenters" would denote something similar. "Brogrammers" isn't offensive because it's sexist; it's offensive because it's idiotic.

Notes from UPenn's Forum on Brogramming and Sexism in Computer Science

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