Coding Like a Girl

https://medium.com/@sailorhg/coding-like-a-girl-595b90791cce?source=email-2bdd02cf5da2-1425730391921-daily_digest

by aarestad • 11 years ago

115 161 11 years ago

mrits• 11 years ago

If you worked where I do (on Earth) you will be judged for your gender,age,race,education,social standing, where you grew up, hygiene, personality, religion, etc...

sergiotapia• 11 years ago

But let's all focus on one part of this multifaceted situation.

skj5• 11 years ago

Not sure if you're serious or sarcastic, but the fact that many problems exist is not a reason to avoid focusing on one of them :) if it were, nothing would ever get solved!

ncallaway• 11 years ago

I absolutely don't understand this argument.

Person A says "X is happens and is bad". Person B responds "X happens, along with Y, Z, and W." What is the objective of the argument presented by person B?

It doesn't refute or disagree with Person A in any way. Is the point to minimize or trivialize X because Y, Z, and W also happen?

Does the presence of Y, Z, and W mean we shouldn't make progress on X?

TazeTSchnitzel6• 11 years ago

To quote a tweet I read today:

  The only definition of Good vs Evil you really need:
  "Well that's just how the world is..."
  
  EVIL: "So there!"
  GOOD: "So let's change it"

https://twitter.com/arthur_affect/status/574082344073629696

the8472• 11 years ago

Is the point to minimize or trivialize X because Y, Z, and W also happen?

It may simply acknowledge that some imperfection will always be present and the cost (not necessarily monetary) of changing that may outstrip the benefits.

For example an extreme divide between the rich and the poor is an issue that many people dislike and would like to see addressed. But at the same time it's a necessary part of capitalism to let people accumulate some wealth. If you couldn't accumulate wealth there would be no incentive to provide better products or services than others. There would be no way of winning the game.

Another example would be the freedom of speech. Defending free speech also means defending some levels of speech you find morally objectionable. Even hate speech to some point. The cost of preventing that hate speech would be payable in freedom.

Similarly some low levels of discrimination will always exist, simply because preventing that would amount to mandating how people must think and how to make decisions. I.e. it would make discrimination a thoughtcrime.

Of course the question is where to draw the line

pavanky• 11 years ago

If X, Y, Z and W are the symptoms of the same underlying issue, then we should be treating the underlying issue not the symptoms.

kelukelugames3• 11 years ago

i opened this tab and today's dilbert strip at the same time. http://dilbert.com/strip/2015-03-07

acqq• 11 years ago

The previous one fits much better here:

http://dilbert.com/strip/2015-03-06

thomasmarcelis2• 11 years ago

One thing I don't agree with, how is the following feedback gender-specific?:

“Why are your slides so pink? It’s very distracting.”

“Stop pushing your hair behind your ear when you present. It’s very distracting.”

“Your voice goes up after every sentence you say.”

I feel like this is all valid feedback. Back in university we would also get feedback on our behaviour during our presentations or the look of our slides.

skj5• 11 years ago

Especially with the vocal comment, many people get annoyed with female voices when they're in a supposedly serious context. But the thing is that it's not actually some fundamentally annoying or distracting quality of the voice- it's that it's different from what they expect: a male voice.

"This American Life" had a great segment about this, targeting "vocal fry" in particular: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/545/i...

mgkimsal5• 11 years ago

Voices going up - as in, asking a question(?) - is annoying whether it's a female voice or male voice.

Mithaldu8• 11 years ago

High Rising Terminal is a thing and it has nothing to do with gender: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_rising_terminal

Edit: Heck, in the segment you link they even comment on the fact that the guy does it too, and it was one of the first things i noticed. Those are just valley people, that's it.

kelukelugames3• 11 years ago

I think vocal fry is pretty annoying period, but let's assume it is gender specific. That doesn't mean having poor inflection is a female only problem. Read any public speaking guide or speak to a speech coach, fixing rising inflection is one of the first recommended fixes.

If anyone is interested, I found this book very useful: http://www.amazon.com/Its-Way-You-Say-Well-spoken/dp/1609947...

partisan2• 11 years ago

I remember hearing this episode on the radio some time back.

I am blessed to have worked in places where I haven't been exposed to many people who speak this way. I am surrounded by women, to be sure, but they are worried more about doing a good job than by trying to sound like it by deepening their voices.

It's funny, my mom is a non-native english speaker, having been in the US for 30 years. She heard a few women talking the other day using a well practiced combination of up-talk and vocal fry. She later turned to my wife and asked "Why are they talking like that?".

I do think that you will find that different demographics are more likely to speak this way. It's not the blanket category of "WOMEN". It's likely, from my experience, to be white, younger, professional women, and then, as knock-on effect, women from other backgrounds who work with them. They are probably plugged into the monoculture, have a common vocabulary, and use their vocal affects and vocabulary to filter out people who are not of a similar mind.

It's like when the newscasters all started speaking the same way, emphasizing certain words, movements of the head, a unique cadence that would, in conversation, be considered bizarre.

Nowadays, you are likely to dismiss any newscaster who doesn't speak that way as an amateur or charlatan who is not to be trusted.

Just my two cents. Feel free to give back change.

belorn• 11 years ago

The claim that female voices has an effect on speaker quality should seem to be extremely silly for anyone who regularly goes to international conferences. I personally just happy if I can understand the words the speaker is trying to pronounce, and if the concept they are translating from their own native language matches the English words.

spcoll• 11 years ago

This feedback makes it clear that acting feminine is considered a weakness, instead of a strength. You shouldn't be ashamed to look beautiful, wear dresses and make-up, and present cute slides with a pink theme and occasional kitty picture.

This is what the whole "like a girl" is about: if you express your femininity in the things you do and the way you look, people associate that with incompetence.

TazeTSchnitzel6• 11 years ago

Exactly. If you were to make a stereotypically "masculine" presentation, you wouldn't get negative comments on it.

JDiculous6• 11 years ago

What you just said only applies to the pink slides comment. Excess fidgeting and uptalk are gender-neutral and make a presentation weaker whether you're male or female.

falcolas4• 11 years ago

Bright colors in slides, whether pink, blue, purple, or orange, is distracting in a presentation. It takes attention off the information being presented and puts it on the design choices.

Visual ticks - wringing your hands, messing with your hair, licking your lips - make you appear less confident, and has nothing to do with gender.

The vocal tick - making every sentence sound like a question - is distracting no matter who presents it.

These aren't gender specific criticisms in any way. Regardless, unless you're addressing a gender specific topic, why bring your gender into it in the first place? I'm interested not in the person presenting about algorithms, but the algorithms themselves.

A man would be rightly chastised for presenting a de-duplicaton talk with bright pastel blue slides, pictures of beer, and rubbing his forehead while presenting, why shouldn't a woman?

wongarsu4• 11 years ago

I don't think cute things are seen as sign of weakness. At least I haven't seen anyone complain that some octocat was too cute for a professional company like github.

PuffinBlue• 11 years ago

There are a lot of valid points in the article and I enjoyed it. These 'gender-specific' points are of course not gender specific at all though.

I've done a huge amount of presenting and briefing and so has my wife. We have both received feedback like this. Personal appearance, bearing, manner, speech patterns, intonation, inflection and even breathing noise let alone a million other things have come up in feedback for both of us.

The underlying point is it's possible to be an annoying presenter as a male AND as a female.

Thinking about it, I suppose much of what this article says also applies simply to 'those who don't look like they fit', regardless of their gender, such that if the article was about 'age' it would still be entirely valid.

I'll sign off by saying that if you really want prejudice, try raising kids as a full time Dad. If you think men can be bad with 'those that don't fit' then you are in for a shock compared to what women can be like!

pornel• 11 years ago

I think the objection was that it was feedback about how it was presented, not about what has been presented. It may be valid feedback, but not necessarily the most relevant one.

And I think she finds it problematic because women are more often openly judged by how they look rather than what they do, and this fits the pattern.

falcolas4• 11 years ago

Doing presentations in school is as much about learning to present as it is the topic of presentation. For many topics and audiences, how a presentation is made can be as important, or more important, than what is being presented.

pfooti• 11 years ago

The story I got from the article is (a) feminine presenters are more likely to get that kind of feedback, and (b) masculine presenters are more likely to get feedback on the content of the presentation.

gaius8• 11 years ago

The dress story vs jeans, would apply equally to a guy in a suit and tie vs a hoodie.

cezar_sl• 11 years ago

There was a story here a while ago, about a guy who got rejected at an interview because he went dressed in a suit and tie, and was deemed "not a good culture fit".

rjbwork6• 11 years ago

We actually had to let go the only person to have come to our interview in a suit and tie that we actually hired...there is not a good track record.

BSousa• 11 years ago

There is also someone either at YC or some other accelerator/vc that recently wrote in their blog that as soon as you go to an interview with a suit he will automatically pass as he doesn't believe you can be a techie. Having a hard time finding the post, but it was posted here on HN.

wodenokoto• 11 years ago

Which one can't program? Suit or hoodie? I often wear a suit or dress shirt and people don't assume I'm clueless to know about IT.

rjbwork6• 11 years ago

Suit and tie. You will be viewed with mistrust as a business type until you prove otherwise.

TazeTSchnitzel6• 11 years ago

Wait, are you saying the dress is too formal, or not formal enough?

rjbwork6• 11 years ago

Too formal. It's pretty well known that dev/nerd culture is very pro-casual and anti-formal. The reason for this, in my opinion, is because we are very much a "function over form" culture. People who might be trying to compensate for lackluster ability by impressing with their overly nice dress are usually initially viewed with mistrust.

kaybe• 11 years ago

Rather, wrong/non-ideal image. There is more than one dimension, especially when it comes to women's clothes.

spiffyman6• 11 years ago

I don't think that's true. You might get disregarded as a "business guy" if you show up to a meetup in a suit. But it's just as likely that people will just assume you're in financials. One of the better Python speakers I know of shows up everywhere in a suit. But women consistently report not being taken seriously when wearing dresses.

gaius8• 11 years ago

The key takeaway is, as soon as she dressed as a member of "the tribe" everything was fine. So that tells me it's something other than a gender issue.

bhayden• 11 years ago

I don't think a woman in a dress is analogous to a man in a suit.

Here is a woman in a dress, something she might wear to convention about programming if she wanted to wear a dress: http://dressforweb.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Korean-ver...

It's fairly modest and not loudly styled. This is not the same style of dress as a man wearing a suit. The equivalent for a woman would be this:

http://www.acrdepos.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/06...

or this, if you wanted a dress:

http://juegoskizi2.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/skirt-suit...

I do not thing most women would have an issue about assuming they aren't a programmer (any more than a man in a suit) wearing either of those two last things I linked.

spiffyman6• 11 years ago

I posted this on FB last night and had quite a discussion ensue. I really like what the author has to say about assumptions. As a user group and conference organizer, time and time again I have seen men approach feminine people in the crowd with these just terribly naïve prejudices. "Oh, you must be a junior dev." Or "Who are you here with?" We men should absolutely try to set these poor assumptions aside -- if not for better equality (although why not?), then because of the awkwardness that ensues when someone says "No, actually I'm giving the keynote" or "Yeah, I co-wrote that book." If you don't want to look like an idiot on the regular, don't go around the world thinking every competent person looks/acts/dresses/talks the way you do.

TazeTSchnitzel6• 11 years ago

Reminds me of how when a female singer produces her own music and has limited assistance from a man, reviewers attribute the entire thing to the man:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2015/01/21/bjork_pitchfo...

It's not even some malicious, deliberate assumption. People have been raised to expect that it is men who do the "real work", and pass over women without thinking about it.

JDiculous6• 11 years ago

Can someone explain to me why this is so horrific? When 95+% of music producers are male, of course men are going to assume that you're not a producer if you're female. When 90+% of developers are men, of course men are going to assume you're not a developer if you're a female. If I saw an extremely tall, handsome, well-dressed, and sociable man at a tech conference, I wouldn't take him to be a developer either. If you're a short white guy at an NBA event, people are going to assume you're not a pro basketball player. I'd imagine that the same thing holds true for men in female-dominated fields.

Whenever there's a tiny minority, people will make assumptions. As long as you're not overly zealous about your assumptions and willing to admit that you're wrong when told so, I don't see the problem. Realistically, there's nothing that will ever prevent people from making assumptions until the tiny minority stops being such a minority.

evincarofautumn• 11 years ago

This was surprising and saddening…these are the sort of artists that I thought people sought out because they do so much interesting stuff largely on their own.

I’ll admit I’m guilty of assuming Taylor Swift was merely a front for a pop machine, but that’s because I’d prefer to believe she’s a better person in real life than some of her songs would indicate.

jfc2• 11 years ago

That's really the core issue: too many people believe that they can evaluate a person's technical knowledge based on physical appearance, which ends up including gender, race/ethnicity, sometimes even religion (if the person is wearing religious attire).

It's just easier to get to know people instead of assuming.

Also: environments that are unpleasant/hostile/uncomfortable for "people outside the norm" make it difficult for such people to distinguish between sexism/racism/discrimination and legitimate feedback.

For example, playing with one's hair during a presentation is often a sign of nervousness, but it is also a signal that conveys that nervousness to the audience. Is it distracting to some degree? Maybe, but more importantly, it detracts from her authority. Still, I can see why she responded as she did--if you are constantly undermined, under fire or criticized for no good reason, it becomes difficult to filter out which criticism/feedback is actually useful.

Edited to add: Loved the artwork in that article.

falcolas4• 11 years ago

It's just easier to get to know people instead of assuming.

I hate to be the one to say it, but no, it's not easier. It's much more accurate, but it's not easier.

Getting to know someone involves overcoming biases, stereotypes, first impressions, and a lot of time. The payout from expending this effort is a much richer experience, but it comes at the cost of having fewer experiences.

I personally don't have the time or energy evaluate every person I meet with such scrutiny, and so I take shortcuts and evaluate them based on my experience with people superficially similar to them.

I'm not ashamed of that, it's part of being a human with a finite amount of time to devote to interpersonal relationships.

Bahamut4• 11 years ago

Or if one is going to make an assumption, err on the side of unoffensive ones. If there is a chance that it is offensive, don't verbalize it.

rfrey4• 11 years ago

I very much like this simple, civilized rule.

Some people may call that political correctness or something, but I call it manners.

kelukelugames3• 11 years ago

Any else reminded of PG's article on how showmanship is more important than logic in a talk?

http://paulgraham.com/speak.html

polarix• 11 years ago

Something is twisted in all these discussions of gender in tech, it really seems like we're just going around in circles over and over again. I've never read anything that felt like a particularly insightful explication of the cause here.

Is it possible there's something more fundamental in society that this phenomenon is merely a symptom of, and that the fix is not going to be something like "just challenge yourself to detect and resist unconscious bias"? Could there be something inherent in the structure of our framework of social interaction that incentivizes this kind of behavior?

TazeTSchnitzel6• 11 years ago

The gender issues in wider society are the same as those in tech, except tech has a toxic culture and a horrifically skewed gender ratio

falcolas4• 11 years ago

I've been in the tech industry, and worked with both women and men for 10 years.

I have never encountered toxicity in this industry.

The only place I encounter true toxicity is on forums, message boards and comments, and in these mediums the toxicity not at all limited to the technology industry.

It's also worth noting that the toxicity, even in these mediums, is limited to a tiny (but vocal) minority, in ratios of which correspond to the larger population's percentage of mentally disturbed individuals.

hasenj2• 11 years ago

Perhaps the average/typical "nerd" type male has experienced (either directly or indirectly) some form of rejection from members of the opposite sex sometime during adolescence and the rejection was mostly based on the type of person he is (i.e. computer nerd), so somewhere deep in his mind there lays a thought of "pretty/attractive/feminine girl" type being the polar opposite of the "programmer/nerd" type of person.

TACIXAT• 11 years ago

This is actually the first gender in tech article I've really liked. A lot of them off no solutions or advice, this one did. As for detecting and resisting unconscious bias, I've worked hard to lessen the anger I feel day to day and know it is possible to correct subconscious reactions.

Humans are awesome at categorizing information and making assumptions. I'm sure the ability to recognize patterns helped us to survive up to this point, but this skill isn't needed when having a conversation with someone. For the majority of us, our decisions are not life and death ones, we can take the time to disregard assumptions and learn specifics. I don't think it's the framework of our social interactions more so than it is just us. It's something we need to work actively to overcome.

Consultant32452• 11 years ago

Your appearance is a form of communication. If you communicate message X to me I'm going to respond accordingly to X until you somehow communicate you'd prefer response Y. As soon as you do I'm happy to adapt and give you what you want, but it's unfair to chastise me for giving you a response appropriate to X first.

grey-area2• 11 years ago

Assume people are as or more qualified than you.

I think this is a great rule to apply to your dealings with anyone of whatever appearance or gender - often our assumptions about people are wildly inaccurate (and we make hundreds before they've opened their mouth, and lots more after the first sentence). If they're not more qualified, they'll make it clear, and if they are more qualified/intelligent, maybe you'll learn something from them. You should always be prepared to learn from someone whoever they are, and never make assumptions about them based on gender, appearance, culture etc. it's not only rude, it's just ignorance. It is important to note though that just because this is a problem everyone faces in some small way on either side of interactions every day, it's one which women face to a radically different degree.

I recently had someone at work criticise a page as too girly to our team including women. The same thing has happened to women I know who are doctors, architects and lawyers - competence is questioned or undervalued simply because they're a woman. It's hard to know where to start in responding to comments like that, and it's still happening in 2015, so I find this #likeagirl campaign justified and timely. It's time for people to speak out whenever they see this sort of prejudice masked as concern or advice, and stop making the workplace such a hostile environment for women. I'd love to think that by the time my daughter grows up we'll be over this sort of thing.

It is really disturbing the number of dismissive and hostile comments we see on posts about women on HN. Most stories on this topic devolve into flamewars or at best are littered with negative responses saying this is a problem everyone faces or it's not really a problem at all. Good articles like this reporting personal experience widely shared deserve better. How can we change that?

Roboprog3• 11 years ago

This one is hard to remember. Thanks for the reminder.

I started a new job a few months ago. It took a while to get started on our new big project, but once we did, it was nice to see everybody on the team fall into a complementary niche. "Not same" != "not smart".

ghufran_syed• 11 years ago

In my experience recently in medicine (as a man), I've never noticed other doctors assuming lack of competence in female doctors, but did have female colleagues describe constantly being described as 'the nurse' by patients, usually by the oldest patients (who of course spent most of their life in a world where doctor=man, nurse=woman). Women's experiences of sexism and bigotry from male doctors when trying to 'break into' medicine over the last 50 years were pretty miserable on all accounts, but it feels to me like once the numbers of women in senior positions was high enough, the sexism pretty much went away: it's pretty hard to assume 'women don't know anything' when you've gone from utter ignorance as a medical student and junior resident to actually being good at what you do based on training and supervision from awesome female and male doctors in roughly equal numbers.

With regards to 'Assume people are as or more qualified than you', I think this is just basic courtesy. If there is no way of 'knowing' someone's knowledge or status eg by rank insignia, it always safer and much better received if you make a conscious effort to be wrong..in the right direction ie in the direction of more knowledge / status /experience. People are happy to correct you, but are often flattered: 'Are you the founder?'..'No, I'm actually the intern' , or 'are you the attending physician?'..,'No, I'm a med student' ends up being a much nicer interaction for all concerned than if you ask it the other way around, while still fulfilling the need to exchange useful information.

grey-area2• 11 years ago

Yes mostly assumptions would be made by patients or other professionals they interact with, not other doctors.

wyager• 11 years ago

90% of the complaints in the article have nothing to do with gender.

Putting obnoxious pastel colors in a powerpoint is bad regardless of your gender. Fidgeting while presenting is bad regardless of gender.

People tell me I don't look like a programmer all the time, mostly because I hardly ever wear branded t-shirts and shorts.

tzs• 11 years ago

I have been a TA for weekend workshops that teach women to code. My male co-TA’s constantly asked me throughout the workshop how I was enjoying learning to program.

This one confuses me. I would expect that at these workshops all the TAs are introduced to each other before teaching begins, and so if the male TAs are trying to be funny, this would stop after the second one does this and is dismissed from the event (I'm presuming that after the first one does it, she tells him that she does not find it funny, and so the second one constitutes harassment). This should not be happening constantly, and I'd expect word to spread so it no longer happens at future events.

If the TAs are not introduced to each other, and are not wearing prominent tags or something that identifies them as TAs (and the students are not wearing anything that prominently identifies them as students), then given that women are are very underrepresented among programmers and that women are massively overrepresented among the students (it's a workshop to teach women to code), then the male TAs are doing nothing wrong. TAs should be proactively asking students if they are enjoying themselves. Note that if they first asked if the person was a student, they would be kind of committing the "you don't look like a programmer" offense.

I find the second case hard to believe, because I doubt these workshops would be so huge that the TAs would not all learn who all the other TAs are when setting up before the students arrive, so what the heck is going on?

hippich• 11 years ago

May be this will be not very popular, but there are reasons males react this way to females in dresses in tech conferences. I agree that we all should have our mind more open, but by the age of ~25 we all got our stereotypes in our heads based on our family, sitcoms/movies, radios, school/friends, etc.

This is no different from assumptions based on race, age, or sexual preferences. Assumptions, wrong or right, are the way our mind optimize/systemize knowledge, and removing all assumptions whatsoever - I don't think it is good idea (if it would be possible.) I am afraid, there is no quick hack and culturally we as a whole should steer our perception. This is hard work which will take time.

Bahamut4• 11 years ago

I've been thinking about this problem some today - I have some girl friends who are talented and successful as developers, but their personas are drastically different from many men in the field. One is shy and soft-spoken, not aggressive at all, and she has been successful as a developer at Google for around 10 years. Another is very smart, but also someone who hates conflict. Both of these share a lot of interests in games & their music (one is in a video game music cover band that has performed at numerous conventions & concerts). They both are very much against brogrammer culture.

I think this article has some excellent advice - we should be considering what men & women say purely on merit, not who is most tireless in arguing a point, or emotional over a perspective - exploring the depths of what each person is suggesting is important. For those on the opposite end of a result, we need to show empathy towards them - they are still our co-workers. Otherwise, we are not putting them in the position to succeed, and are putting undue burden on other people's lives that often are not accounted for in performance reviews.

mgkimsal5• 11 years ago

A few random thoughts...

"Who are you here with?" might be indicating... what company are you here with? Are you with Google, or MS, or... whatever. "Who do you work for?" might be more appropriately direct.

I have a pink macbook. I wear pink headphones. You wouldn't believe the number of weird/sexist comments I get from time to time. Or maybe you would.

There was a piece floating around a couple weeks ago about women in tech leaving because they felt bullied out because they were women. While I don't doubt that can happen, the 'bullying' that was described in that article has happened to me - a male - at companies as well. It's more cliquish asshole group/hivemind behavior than it is sexist. I had multiple people chastise me that I was part of the problem because I was too blind to see it as sexism, and of course a male would simply ascribe this to asshole/politics in a company, vs sexism. Even though the exact same behavior (and outcomes) had been leveled at me, a male, apparently if the same behavior happens to a female, the motivation/intention must be sexism and dealt with through that filter.

rfrey4• 11 years ago

I'm sure the asshat behaviour you describe affected you as much as any individual woman is affected by similar behaviour. I know (in the abstract sense) the people you're describing and they make me mad.

That said, if the kind of behaviour you're describing affects women much more than men, can we still say there's sexism at work? Say I pull some statistics out of thin air: say 1 of 20 men get harassed like you describe, but 1 of 3 women experience it. Can we say there's sexism? If there is, can we address it or try?

You can say that women don't experience it more than men (that would be a surprising claim that would contradict a lot of evidence to the contrary, but it would be a valid criticism). Or you could say that they don't experience it to such a greater degree that justifies special attention. But I don't think it's a strong argument to say that men experience ass-hattery, therefore none of the ass-hattery directed at women is based on sexism.

(Edit: I don't mean to say the above arguments are your arguments - just that they would be legitimate arguments.)

mgkimsal5• 11 years ago

How do you define "affects women more than men"? More women are affected by it? Women are affected by is disproportionately, as a percentage of their office population? Some other measure?

Ahhh - you're talking about proportionality.

I'm still not sure, but would need to see concrete examples. The particular article I'd read, the 'examples' were "I wasn't promoted", "I felt bullied" and "my ideas weren't taken seriously". How about we just root out that sort of workplace psychopathy altogether, vs trying to have it affect fewer women?

FWIW, when I've seen that sort of psychopathy in person, it's been rather indiscriminate. The only reason it might have affected more women disproportionately is that there were fewer women to affect in the first place. 50% of women being affected vs 10% of men affected is somewhat leading statistic, when you realize that there are only 8 women but 40 men - same number of people are affected.

andrewl• 11 years ago

Richard Hamming discusses clothing, presentation, and the cost of not conforming to expectations in You and Your Research.[1]. It's not exactly analogous to what's described in the article, but related:

There are several paragraphs in that section, all worth reading (as is the entire essay).

[1] http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html

shawndumas• 11 years ago

"You should dress according to the expectations of the audience spoken to. If I am going to give an address at the MIT computer center, I dress with a bolo and an old corduroy jacket or something else. I know enough not to let my clothes, my appearance, my manners get in the way of what I care about. An enormous number of scientists feel they must assert their ego and do their thing their way. They have got to be able to do this, that, or the other thing, and they pay a steady price.

John Tukey almost always dressed very casually. He would go into an important office and it would take a long time before the other fellow realized that this is a first-class man and he had better listen. For a long time John has had to overcome this kind of hostility. It's wasted effort! I didn't say you should conform; I said ``The appearance of conforming gets you a long way.'' If you chose to assert your ego in any number of ways, ``I am going to do it my way,'' you pay a small steady price throughout the whole of your professional career. And this, over a whole lifetime, adds up to an enormous amount of needless trouble."

graycat2• 11 years ago

Gee, apparently it helps that I never saw Tukey, at least not in person! I heard about Tukey from (1) Tukey's lemma, equivalent to the axiom of choice, (2) convergence and uniformity in topology, (3) stepwise regression, (4) the statistics of power spectral estimation, (5) exploratory data analysis, and (6) the fast Fourier transform. So, with (1)-(6), I didn't pay attention to how he looked! But when I wanted to go for a Ph.D., I wrote him at Princeton, explained where my career had run into his work and asked if there was education for a career in such things. I got back a nice letter from G. S. Watson saying, "Yes" and claiming that Princeton was one of the best places for such work. I did apply to Princeton, and did get accepted, but I went to Johns Hopkins instead (my wife was already in her Ph.D. program there so that we wouldn't have to move!).

EGreg• 11 years ago

I remember the uproar about a guy was on the team that landed a spacecraft on a comet, but who then came out of his den with tattoos and a t-shirt that seemed to depict women clothed in lingerie engaging in BDSM. The accomplishments were brushed aside as the guy was reduced to a tearful apology.

I think both sexes should be able to wear whatever they would wear in real life. Depending on the job of course. But when programming, that seems reasonable. I would probably prefer a woman who presents as feminine, as a developer. Maybe that is because I am comfortable with traditional gender dress and think it looks better. But maybe it's because I think the nerdy dress is actually downplaying the feminine qualities in order to fit in with men. Either way, it seems anything you say on the issue can always be spun as sexist, because your preferences can be explained by a lifetime if conditioning.

Unmarried women out-earn men now, but the situation switches when they have children. Is this bad or good? That would imply a goal. For my part I don't understand why or when the goal became for "all women" to start knocking themselves out for 10 hours a day at a corporation and be paid more than their husbands who would share child rearing duties just so women could move up a corporate ladder. Since when is this forcefed as "success" to women? I think, if anything, the agenda itself is sexist. If some women want to do it, they can - there are plenty of opportunities for women who want to work long hours and engage in corporate culture. But in this economy, I think it's actually an exploitative myth being sold to men and women alike, and I don't think many women actually want to maximize their "success" in this dimension, once they consider the trade offs.

colund• 11 years ago

The more people emphasize the differences between men and women the less likely the bad stereotypes are to go away. People whine and repeat about gender differences.

I'd prefer we all just disagree when someone says something is girly. Man up and stand up for men and women's rights to be judged as people not gender without whining when someone fails to do so.

kj22• 11 years ago

I associate people who believe throwing or acting "like a girl" means doing it half-assed or terribly with people who are either uneducated, close-minded, or just plain assholes.

I understand there's a problem in our country, even in our whole world, but is forcing this down our throats the proper way to solve it? Is it solvable? Not to sound like an asshole myself, but with the route feminism is taking us, we're going to have people hand-feeding women who don't deserve to be in a specific role. I myself have specifically experienced such an event where my manager hired a woman because he said we need to hire one, not because she had experience that made her worthy. In fact she had far less experience compared to the other people interviewing. One of my best friends on the other hand is one of the most kickass programmers I have ever seen and everyone respects her for it. She works for her status, rather than feeding off of being a woman.

People shouldn't judge a book by its cover, as they say. That's what this is all about and I may have gone off-track. However, its also naive to forget or completely deny that people are inherently competitive. People like to boast about themselves, not others. Woman or man, work politics are something everyone has to deal with. It's wrong for someone to use a woman's gender against her competitively, but then again it's also wrong for a man to throw another man "under the bus" or take credit for someone else's work to get ahead. I hope that one day we can work towards being better to humans as a whole rather than better towards a specific gender or race. Maybe I'm an asshole, who knows. Maybe we are all assholes.

tymski• 11 years ago

“Why are your slides so pink? It’s very distracting.” “Stop pushing your hair behind your ear when you present. It’s very distracting.” “Your voice goes up after every sentence you say.” and comments rating my appearance.

My Technical Communications professor told me to not add flashy colors to my slides, be careful about too much distracting movement especially hand movements, speak consistently and wear clothing that doesn't distract from the material.

Either she is sexist towards men or this article is desperate. I think it might be the former, but I could be wrong.

dsugarman• 11 years ago

One category of reactions that I receive all the time as a programmer that presents as feminine is: No one believes I am a programmer.

To be fair, I am a guy and no one believes I am a programmer either. Going through YC, it took maybe 3 or 4 times of pg telling me to talk to my technical co-founder followed by me reminding him that it was me before he caught on. In my opinion, it can be a real strength to be different. Some of the most intelligent programmers I have ever worked with have been girls and I have fought incredibly hard to hire them and others on to our tech team only to be beaten by a tech giant who offer big premiums or more security when securing a visa. I know I am not the only one in this boat.

mgkimsal5• 11 years ago

I get that from some folks too - people say "oh, you don't look like a programmer-type". And I want to say "what does that sort of person look like?" but I also half-know what the stereotype is. None of the folks at our coworking spot who are in the software world fit that mold, but they all are programmers of some stripe. It's odd - I know very few programmers who fit the traditional visual stereotype - like, fewer than 10% in my circles. Yet it's still alive and strong...

wesleyy• 11 years ago

This same article was posted on r/programming yesterday (http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/2y4294/coding_l...). The discussion following was quite interesting, especially this one comment regarding the twitter exchange (http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/2y4294/coding_l...).

"I'm not trying to say the whole article is bad so stay with me here, but is it just me or does some of this just come off as negative thinking and negative assumptions? A few examples from the article.. I have been a TA for weekend workshops that teach women to code. My male co-TA’s constantly asked me throughout the workshop how I was enjoying learning to program. ... ....Apparently, presenting as feminine makes you look like a beginner. You were at an event to teach women to code. I don't know the specifics because I wasn't there however maybe the assumption should be that they just didn't realise you weren't a student? I can understand how that must be frustrating but why attribute it to what you were wearing? I feel like the author didn't go into detail here. In another section the author links to a photo on twitter[1] that makes it appear as a commenter is telling Casey Johnston to read her own article. Casey Johnston: So many “solutions” to the lack of women in tech don’t get at the actual problems… Tomas Sancio: @caseyjohnston read the full article. There's a chicken and egg problem w/ female tech role models. Men want to be the next Jobs/Gates/etc. When I first read this screenshot I took it for what it was. "read the article"... i.e. "I read the article" and that's exactly what it turned out to be when I found the tweets[2] . The author putting this screenshot of twitter in here I feel is simply misrepresenting the situation or hasn't researched into even looking at the full context? I have to admit i've only looked at this for 10 minutes, maybe I'm getting the wrong picture here, but from what i've seen it's a completely different story to the one shown on the author's page. I often read these gender inequality articles, however I am always constantly disappointed when things like the above are over dramatized, or I do additional research to only find out that the author is presenting an incredibly biased view of a situation. I don't want people to conclude that there is no gender inequality, however I feel that things like the above do not help get the point across. In fact I think they do the opposite."

logic404• 11 years ago

A couple years ago she attended a technical conference and on the first day, she wore a dress...wore a nerdy t-shirt and jeans instead, and she had a better experience that day. People assumed she was technical and didn’t dilute their explanations to her

I'm not sure this really makes the case that its sexism at play. For example, if a guy wore a suit and tie to a conference, people might assume he's not a programmer.

Isn't this anecdote evidence that its the clothes, not the gender?

c223• 11 years ago

Yeah, I don't get it. She keeps saying she's "presenting" as feminine and then complaining that people are basing their assumptions on how she presents herself. If more programmers wear pretty dresses maybe that look will become stereotypical of programming, but it hasn't historically been the case. If I show up at a tech conference presenting as a wrestler I might be displaying all sorts of macho manly cues but I stil wouldn't expect to be taken seriously without extra effort.

gaius8• 11 years ago

Another example, if a black person came to a tech conference dressed in a suit and tie, then the next day in jeans and a hoodie, and were treated differently, I don't think anyone would think it was a sign that the tech scene is racist.

stephenboyd7• 11 years ago

"If more programmers wear pretty dresses maybe that look will become stereotypical of programming, but it hasn't historically been the case"

She makes the same claim, but instead of accepting that she has to conform to style norms set by the opposite gender, she's trying to encourage more programmers to wear dresses and such, which should be perfectly respectable for a programmer at a conference.

stephenboyd7• 11 years ago

The author is trying to correct the problem that people dressing in a feminine way are not seen as technical. If people who wear business suits have such a problem, they're welcome to do their own advocacy.

rezistik2• 11 years ago

It's about identifying the problem though. Is it sexism, or is it general prejudice?

A dress is definitely more feminine, but it's also more professional. In the same vein, if you were a suit it would be more professional. My point is she was treated as less technical because people assumed she was. When she dressed in the "nerd uniform" people treated her like a technical member.

If that's the case then it isn't sexism, it's prejudice regarding professional appearance.

There is certainly sexism in the tech world but I don't think this is a great example personally.

datsun• 11 years ago

Agree. That's just stereotypes and I don't think it's exclusive to one gender. It's just that girls are much less common in programming communities

danielmiessler2• 11 years ago

I hear and feel the frustration, but it's misplaced.

If a man shows up to a tech conference dressed like the guys from Jersey Shore, he's going to be looked down on by everyone there. He'll be assumed to be part of the delivery people doing setup for the booths.

If he complains that he's a programmer and that he shouldn't be judged by his clothing, he will get mixed results.

It's true that if he turns out to be a nice guy, and a great programmer, then people will change their opinions of him.

But the one thing we cannot do is demand that the entire world see signals differently than they see them out on the street.

When someone dresses like the men on Jersey Shore, they do so because they are signaling certain things. They're signaling masculine power. Strength. Sexual prowess. Fighting ability. Etc.

Women who dress extremely femininely and girlishly are also sending signals that literally BILLIONS of people already know how to receive.

Don't be surprised when people interpret signals the way that is most beneficial to them in 99.9% of cases.

This is not a message that men from New Jersey or Women in general cannot be seen as programmers. It's a message that signaling matters, and we must be aware of what messages we're intentionally sending to others that we may need to overcome.

rfrey4• 11 years ago

I agree with everything you said, except the conclusion (that you led with.)

The OP said she wore a dress. Not "extremely femininely and girlishly". She wore a dress.

"But the one thing we cannot do is demand that the entire world see signals differently than they see them out on the street."

Apparently the entire world thinks wearing a dress is a signal that one cannot be a technical person. That's the point of the article.

danielmiessler2• 11 years ago

You missed the other cues in the article.

stephenboyd7• 11 years ago

"But the one thing we cannot do is demand that the entire world see signals differently than they see them out on the street."

We can work on it instead of trying to justify such a narrow conception of what a competent programmer looks like. We can and do make progress on how people interpret the appearances of others.

hasenj2• 11 years ago

Honestly? It sounds like she's asking for conflict.

It was then that I was 100% sure my dressing up wasn’t for him at all, I didn’t at all care if a partner disliked my dresses, or makeup. I was wearing them for me. And it was then, that I realized that continuing to wearing dresses just for myself was a totally valid way to say a big FUCK YOU to the patriarchy.

If I wore a suit to work just to appear/feel "elite" (i.e. of higher social status) about myself, I would totally not be surprised if my behavior is met with animosity from my fellow developers who mostly dress down or just dress casually.

But she did and wore a nerdy tshirt and jeans instead, and she had a better experience that day. People assumed she was technical and didn’t dilute their explanations to her.

So it's not about being a female developer, it's about the image you're presenting of yourself.

gaius8• 11 years ago

If a person is walking about thinking "fuck you" all the time then that's going to show in their facial expression, body language, tone of voice, general attitude... That's true regardless of gender. And over time its going to affect how others treat them.

pincubator• 11 years ago

Reminds me when I was an instructor for a grad course and showed up in a very trendy outfit to the first lecture (nothing weird or revealing, but nothing you would often see in a campus either -- full make up, high heels, ripped jeans etc.) and I can't forget the look in the student's faces. I was trying to explain an algorithm on the board, and all students had a look in their faces like "you can't possibly know about this". When the class is over and the professor of the next class showed up, he had a grin on his face like "you can't possibly teach a class". Fast forward to 2 weeks later, when I was overwhelmed with the exams and didn't give a single damn anymore, I just showed up with my sweatpants, a hoodie, and no makeup. Students were listening the class with full focus and I was well respected. Not sure what to make out of this..

The funny thing is: I am programming since I was 17, and spent most of my youth in full-geeky and nerdy outfits (aka, in "programmer" style). But after I come to my mid-20s I started to feel like "Oh, I didn't even wear a dress or a high-heel in my entire life!!!11". That's when I started to dress like a woman, and that's what happens :')

Roboprog3• 11 years ago

I think some of this has to do with age, as well.

As the middle age father of two twenty-ish daughters, one of which is VERY bright, and somebody with decades of work experience, I have met a number of very bright women, and I don't think I would discriminate against female coworkers.

However, if your peer group is twenty-something men, good luck getting them not to think of you as a twenty-something woman as a potential mate, at least from time to time, rather than "just another coworker". They might want to complement your dress or appearance due to ulterior motives. Not that they shouldn't be polite.

Please be sure not to mistake desperation for discrimination :-)

Disclaimer: some people are just assholes, sorry.

graycat2• 11 years ago

Three points that seem to say that the girls/women should do well in information technology:

(1) Advantages.

As I recall from K-12, college, and more, in several respects of talent, interest, diligence, psychology, socialization, etc., the girls/women (girls here and below) are, on average, significantly better than the boys/men (boys here and below). So, the girls have some significant advantages.

Of course, coding, information technology, computing, etc. consist of "clean indoor work, no heavy lifting".

With those advantages and the nature of the work, it would appear that any girls who want to do well in coding, etc. have a good shot, often better than that of the boys.

(2) Evaluation.

How to evaluate the girls?

As in the OP, is it important for the girls to wear pretty, feminine clothes versus nerd wear of worn jeans and T-shirts?

No. The main issue is getting the work done.

When I was a student, it seemed that the girls got graded on their work, not their clothes; when I was a professor giving grades, again the only issue for a grade was the work. Thus, it seems to me that, in the world of work in information technology, the easy, natural, obvious approach is just to evaluate the work, ignoring clothing, gender, etc.

(3) Writing.

In computing, we need to build on the work of others, but to do so we need a good description of that work. That is, we need good documentation.

Thus, to me, currently the main bottleneck to progress in information technology is bad documentation from poor writing. Since in school on average the girls were better at writing than the boys, I have to believe that girls can be quite welcome and do well improving the quality of the writing and, thus, help alleviate the bottleneck.

If my startup works, then I will have to hire, and I will expect a person who does some work will also write the relevant documentation. Here the girls should have an advantage.

Coding Like a Girl

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