Gender Gap in Computer Science Growing

EReidJ writes "Looks like finding a compatible girl geek in the computer profession is becoming even harder, as an already wide gender gap among Computer Science majors is becoming larger. From the article: 'A Globe review shows that the proportion of women among bachelor's degree recipients in computer science peaked at 37 percent in 1985 and then went on the decline. Women have comprised about 28 percent of computer science bachelor's degree recipients in the last few years, and in the elite confines of research universities, only 17 percent of graduates are women [...] The argument of many computer scientists is that women who study science or technology, because they are defying social expectations, are in an uncomfortable position to begin with. So they are more likely to be dissuaded from pursuing computer science if they are exposed to an unpleasant environment, bad teaching, and negative stereotypes like the image of the male hacker.'"

Comments

Good!

[JPamplin]

Who needs yucky girls anyway. Cooties! ;-)

Re:Good!

[diersing]

Lets face chicks just aren't willing to go to the extremes of getting degreed to find new and innovative ways to download pr0n, they're just wired differently.

Re:Good!

[wcleveland]

circle circle dot dot, now i've got my cootie shot... bring on the babes!

Re:Good!

[stupidfoo]

Hmmm... I've never heard that before.

Does it work?

Re:Good!

[Speare]

I mis-read the blurb as "So they are more likely to be dissuaded from pursuing computer science if they are exposed to an unpleasant environment, bad touching, and negative stereotypes like the image of the male hacker."

Re:Good!

[mrtroy]

On a serious note, How are so many girls getting out of the kitchen? And maintaining jobs while pregnant? And getting jobs while barefoot?(haha)

Consider that 50 years ago, women were second class citizens. That is less than a generation ago.
So lets stop wondering why there aren't many women in CS, and lets start looking at the big picture, things have drastically changed in society. Of course there will never be "equality", because of people's interests in careers. I bet there aren't nearly as many men in certain positions because of personal preference too.

Re:Good!

[Anonymous Coward]

Consider that 50 years ago, women were second class citizens. That is less than a generation ago.

No, that's actually more than 2 generations ago (and close to 3). (Unless, your mom and dad are 50 years older than you.)

Re:Good!

[drpentode]

Works better than a condom.

Unplesant environment

[winkydink]

Like how many male computer geeks lack the social skills to interract with the opposite sex and mistake friendly interraction by female coworkers as "interest" in something more.

Re:Unplesant environment

[rocketsled]

WHAT DO YOU MEAN LACKING SOCIAL SKILLS, my 20 sided die guides me with any social situation.

Re:Unplesant environment

[xIcemanx]

http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2003/20030630l. gif It's sad that people like that exist in my CS department. We have people search on Facebook for female CS majors and then poke all of them in hopes of a relationship. Rather than, actually, you know, talking to them in class.

Re:Unplesant environment

[IAmTheDave]

Seriously!

For fucks sake, I am so tired of this pandering if certain things are not entirelly, totally equal. Wait - only 48% of people in profession X are female? Well there must be some gender bias! Quick, admit more women into universities into these studies! Quick, discourage males from being allowed to propigate such a gender biased view of things!

Maybe less women WANT to go into CS! Listen, there is, and will always BE, fundamental differences between the sexes, between the way the mind works, between general interests. Yes, there is overlap, but the majority of young boys don't want to play with Barbies in pink dresses. Does that indicate some gender bias? Sure... is it wrong, bad, or need to be corrected? NO! It's nature, just let it be already.

Re:Unplesant environment

[xIcemanx]

I don't think it's a 48% difference here. I think such extreme differences can't be explained by an X or Y chromosome - it's symptomatic of an overall negative CS attitude towards women as a whole that needs to be fixed anyway. There's nothing fundamentally male about CS - it's just we discourage women from doing it, thereby robbing ourselves of potentially valuable talent.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Billosaur]

Like how many male computer geeks lack the social skills to interract with the opposite sex and mistake friendly interraction by female coworkers as "interest" in something more.

As far as I can recall, they never offered "Etiquette for Geeks" as a part of the Comp Sci curriculum when I went college, but then again that was back in the age of the dinosaurs (the DEC-10).

Social skills isn't that big a factor. I find very few of my programming peers who fit the "geek programmer" stereotype. Plenty of us are married, have houses and families. Mind you my wife is not a tech-head and we don't discuss my work in-depth, but she could probably understand it. Geeks aren't going to find women on the Comp Sci track anyway; they'll do a better job impressing the bubble-head peroxide blondes who talk into their mouses.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Andrewkov]

Women are too smart to want to go into IT.

Re:Unplesant environment

[IAmTheDave]

I fail to see how we (humans) actively discourage women from entering the CS workforce. It's true that some IT professions have gotten a reputation as existing as a couple of overly obese 35 year old virgins in a server room without windows, but I'd like to see an example of someone (overtly or not) saying "women should not do IT" or "you as a woman do not want to enter into the IT world." Obviously it doesn't have to be that forward, but actively discouraging women, and women being discouraged by an untrue or outdated stereotype are two different things. A positive eduactional campaign may be in order, but anything more than that - actively recruiting women just to close the gender gap that may or may not be simply the nature of things is unnecessary and unfair to those men that actually WANT to do CS, in my opinion.

Re:Unplesant environment

[WalksOnDirt]

I think it's more a negative women's bias towards CS. I think most of us try to encourage women to get into CS, but it's still not enough to get them to get them on board.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, I usually feel that I'm unattractive frequently enough that I don't mistake friendly interaction as sexual interest. I know that people pounce on females with interest in the sciences because they're comparatively rare, and that the prospect of a peer that shares their interests is enticing to them, but I don't think that stems from an absence of social skills. Perhaps you're just equating not being an asshole with having social skills, which is decidedly not the case. There are many areas in courtship where being an asshole is an important social skill.

No, when you don't have social skills it manifests more like confusion and shame. Think of it like illiteracy, where the person cannot understand or relate to the subject matter and is excluded from the benefits of proficiency.

There are of course instances where not having social skills can result in an accumulation of torment and create desperation. In that state one might be so eager to find some sort of social comfort as to immediately frighten off other parties. That's close enough to what you mean, but the process of reaching that state is more complex than just a lack of social skills.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Hannah E. Davis]

Unfortunately, it also goes the other way around -- if a male geek is just ineptly trying to be friendly, a female co-worker might misintepret it as interest. Because, y'know, if a guy is trying to talk to a girl as an equal or even as a friend, he obviously just wants in her pants! Especially if she's ugly and he's already found himself a cute geek girl. Yeah, really.

Of course, if the girl has any kind of brain in her, she'll just talk to the guy, say "Sorry, I'm not interested" and whether he was actually interested or not, that will be the end of that. It's always worked for me anyway (when dealing with both geek and non-geek guys).

Re:Unplesant environment

[keraneuology]

Couple the declining quantity of women in CS studies and the overwhelming majority of women in college in general and a pattern begins to emerge. Anybody who can't read the numbers is seriously deficient in critical and analytical thinking and doesn't belong in CS studies in the first place.

But the bias concern is only applicable to gender stacking towards more men: women outnumber men by far in nursing, education and womens' studies yet nobody makes a peep about the inequities involved (or outright discrimination).

Re:Unplesant environment

[Enigma_Man]

There isn't specifically a sign somewhere saying "Women shouldn't do CS" but there are a lot of social pointers towards "women shouldn't do technology". Boys are (often, typically, not always of course) encouraged to play with things like Legos, GI-Joe, Toy Trucks, etc; while girls are encouraged to play with barbies, dolls, and the like. I don't think that's a bad thing, it's just how our society is these days. I think that because of those things, people's interests are pushed more towards that general area, art vs. science if you will. If you grew up on a farm, you'd be more inclined to be a farmer when you were older. It's just a matter of circumstance.

-Jesse

Re:Unplesant environment

[Anonymous Coward]

There's also something of a feedback loop in evidence here. "Computer geeks" lack the social skill sto interact with the opposite sex because there are often very few learning opportunities for those geeks to have picked up those social skills within the population of their daily interactions.

When I was at UofI champaign in the late nineties, the percentage of females in the Comp Sci program was probably hovering around 20% for the freshman classes and then would decay toward 10% by the fourth year.

Now, it's true that the ratio of females at the entire university was closer to parity, and that the "computer geeks" just needed to venture outside of their comfort zones in order to interact and learn those skills of social interaction. It doesn't change the the existence of that particular feedback loop.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Angron]

That's actually just a trait of males in general (though more pronounced in those who don't interact with women very frequently). Men are generally far more likely/women are less likely to interpret niceness as sexual interest.

Re:Unplesant environment

[NetRAVEN5000]

http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2003/20030630l. gif

Ouch. That's harsh.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Pxtl]

Enough that a clever girl can get through a comp eng program without ever having to write a line of code if she plays her cards right - at least at the school I went to.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Pxtl]

That's a good point. Walk into a comp-sci class and ask around. You will be hard pressed to find a single guy who wouldn't like more girls in his class - even ugly ones. The repulsion problems don't seem to start in the working world. In undergrad, most guys are more than cooperative to female classmates. Occaisionally pathetic and creepy, but cooperative.

I think it starts younger. Raise girls to be princesses and moms, and you get women who's highest goals are domestic crap and social climbing.

Buy your girls lego. It can be pink, but it still has to have wheels and jet engines.

Re:Unplesant environment

[jacksonj04]

*Stands up and applauds common sense*

Re:Unplesant environment

[NetRAVEN5000]

"Boys are (often, typically, not always of course) encouraged to play with things like Legos, GI-Joe, Toy Trucks, etc; while girls are encouraged to play with barbies, dolls, and the like."

No, they aren't. It's just that it's assumed that guys are going to prefer trucks, dinosaurs, or army men or something, and that girls are going to prefer dolls and play makeup. And usually, that's the way it is.

It's instinct - females are typically gentler and more nurturing, and males are typically rougher. That's why if a boy is all alone, he's more likely to play with Ninja Turtles or GI Joe than Barbie and Ken, and why if a girl is all alone she'll probably prefer to play mother to a doll than pull out a bucket of plastic army men and stage a battle.

Not that boys would never play dolls if that's all they had - but if you've ever seen boys play with dolls, they're more likely to play with the Ken doll and race around in the sports car than play with Barbie. Same with girls - seems like if you give a girl a Ninja Turtle she's more likely to make it into a nurturing creature than a crime-fighting superhero.

Not that it's sexist or anything - that's just the way it is. Guys and girls are different, that's all.

Re:Unplesant environment

[jasonwc]

You're assuming that women are choosing not to enter Computer Science because they simply have less interest in the area. While this may be, it doesn't explain the whole story. There are many areas where women show great interest and are still denied equal access. This, and not women's waining interest in CS most likely explains the decline in female CS majors. The legal profession is a good example of the discrimination the poster is referencing. Over the last few decades, women's enrollment at law schools has expanded dramatically. Most law schools now have equal or higher enrollment of women than men. I don't believe this can be fully explained (or explained) by greater interest in the Law on the part of women. Rather, Law Schools have made efforts to make the environment open and inclusive. While women faced discrimination in the 70s and 80s, Law schools now provide a far more equal teaching environment. Yet, despite this increase in enrollment, women attorneys have been leaving the field. While nearly 50% of new associates are women, less than 10% of partners are female. This can't be blown off as being due to lack of interest. Associates at large firms put in 60+ hours a week, and are surely commited to the responsibilities of partnership. Despite this, men are dispraportionately chosen for the highest paying positions. As in CS where women are often not given the same opportunities or support from faculty which is predominantly male (in CS I believe 80-90%+ if my memory serves me correctly), and thus decide to enter other fields, women are finding that Law firms that are willing to hire them as associates, are refusing them the higher paid and more prestigious partnership positions, and thus are also seeking to either leave the field or to start their own firms. The "Old Boys Club" is still alive and well in the United States. It's too easy to ignore these issues, and say that women are simply not interested, but this is an oversimplification of the issue. And as to your statement about boys not wanted to play with barbies- do you think this could possibly be caused by the fact that girls are socialized from birth to act in a manner that is appropriate for their sex? Their rooms are adorned in pink, they are given pink clothing to wear to seperate them from their male coutnerparts, and they are shown dolls and makeup as proper means of entertainment. The fact that we live in this society doesn't mean that is in any way natural, neutral, or necessary. We push girls to act a certain way, just as we push boys to act in a certain manner. Then we justify their inculcated differences as "natural". Jason Wittlin-Cohen

Re:Unplesant environment

[maddskillz]

I agree. I don't see a gender bias, just not many women interested in IT. Why is this wrong, other then it makes it hard to hook up with a coworker.
The only thing I dislike more is having to see another study every month, stating the same obvious thing. I hope people don't get paid to do this

Re:Unplesant environment

[jythie]

Eh, the social constructs of gender are differnt, but biologically? The differnces in brain structure are pretty minor... I would be hard pressed to take seriously a paper that tried to say 'plays with technology' is something biological. Social however. I can recall my niece LOVED trucks, legos, etc,.. untill she hit school and got slammed with gender muck.. within a few months all of a sudden she was wearing dresses (a first) playing with dolls and unicorns.... Sure, it is the 'way it is', but tradition is NOT an exuse to continue something.

Re:Unplesant environment

[jasonwc]

Sorry, for the crappy formatting. I accidentally chose HTML formatting. Here's a readable version:

You're assuming that women are choosing not to enter Computer Science because they simply have less interest in the area. While this may be, it doesn't explain the whole story. There are many areas where women show great interest and are still denied equal access. This, and not women's waining interest in CS most likely explains the decline in female CS majors.

  The legal profession is a good example of the discrimination the poster is referencing. Over the last few decades, women's enrollment at law schools has expanded dramatically. Most law schools now have equal or higher enrollment of women than men. I don't believe this can be fully explained (or explained) by greater interest in the Law on the part of women. Rather, Law Schools have made efforts to make the environment open and inclusive. While women faced discrimination in the 70s and 80s, Law schools now provide a far more equal teaching environment.

  Yet, despite this increase in enrollment, women attorneys have been leaving the field. While nearly 50% of new associates are women, less than 10% of partners are female. This can't be blown off as being due to lack of interest. Associates at large firms put in 60+ hours a week, and are surely commited to the responsibilities of partnership. Despite this, men are dispraportionately chosen for the highest paying positions. As in CS where women are often not given the same opportunities or support from faculty which is predominantly male (in CS I believe 80-90%+ if my memory serves me correctly), and thus decide to enter other fields, women are finding that Law firms that are willing to hire them as associates, are refusing them the higher paid and more prestigious partnership positions, and thus are also seeking to either leave the field or to start their own firms. The "Old Boys Club" is still alive and well in the United States. It's too easy to ignore these issues, and say that women are simply not interested, but this is an oversimplification of the issue.

  And as to your statement about boys not wanted to play with barbies- do you think this could possibly be caused by the fact that girls are socialized from birth to act in a manner that is appropriate for their sex? Their rooms are adorned in pink, they are given pink clothing to wear to seperate them from their male coutnerparts, and they are shown dolls and makeup as proper means of entertainment. The fact that we live in this society doesn't mean that is in any way natural, neutral, or necessary. We push girls to act a certain way, just as we push boys to act in a certain manner. Then we justify their inculcated differences as "natural".

  Jason Wittlin-Cohen

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

Raise girls to be princesses and moms, and you get women who's highest goals are domestic crap and social climbing.

I think that's a completely false dichotomy. My wife is one semester away from her undergraduate degree - dual math/cs (I got a math degree with a cs minor). Her highest aspiration is to make babies and teach them algebra before she teaches them to read. But this doesn't preclude eduation at all - for her it's just another incentive.

Your attitude (don't take this too personally) has gotten so annooying that I'm extremely close to carrying around a 2X4 just to whack people over the head with when they say it. They ask me about what my wife is studying. I say "dual comp sci/math". Then they say "what does she want to do". I say "she wants to start a family". They say "Oh, then why on earth is shy taking such hard subjects?" That's when I restrain myself from yelling any of a variety of answers like "I don't know, because she likes the damn subjects?" or "Holy crap, you're right! What *IS* she doing outside of the kitchen?"

Why is it that we have this awful attitude that being a mother is somehow this dead-end proposition that requires no job skills? Sure, biologically making a child may require no skills, but educating and raising said child is not only one of the most demanding but in my opinion the most noble "careers" any one - man or woman - can choose. Sure, I have a career, but when the little ones come around I guarantee that being a good father will be #1 to me - not climbing the corporate ladder. I work 60 hours weeks in a full time and two part time jobs now specifically to get as secure as I can financially just so that I can have more time and freedom to spend on my family when we have one.

And my wife is doing the same thing that I'm doing financially from an education standpoint. I want to be able to provide financial independence to my family and she wants to be able to teach our kids valuable skills (which apparently are going to include both multivariate calculus and C programming) and encourage their interests - no matter what they are. The more my wife knows (she also plays guitar and piano and went to a high school focussing on humanities were she was the valedictorian) the better able she will be to give her kids that much of a boost in their own educations.

And on a final note - being a mother is not the end of your education either. My own mother dropped out of college to have her family. Not what I wanted my wife to do, but the point is that she went back to school recently and finished her BA. Now she's almost done with her masters, and when if she wants she's in a fine position to get her PhD as well.

I'm not going to say you can be a mother and a corporate VP at the same time, but I AM going to say you can be a mother and also be well educated and have an impact outside your own household.

-stormin

(PS, my wife is way smarter than me)

Re:Unplesant environment

[CAIMLAS]

the majority of young boys don't want to play with Barbies in pink dresses.

Sure they do. Where have you been? I played with barbies all the time. If by "play" you mean "incinerate with an acetylene torch".

Re:Unplesant environment

[ChocoBean]

You have just rolled a 1

8D better luck next time?

But seriously, are other girls that turn-offed by role playing games? I, for one, think they are cool. If only I had a female elf character piece though. T_T

Re:Unplesant environment

[cerelib]

I am not trying to discredit your argument, but you might be addressing a different or more specific issue. The numbers you gave about female lawyers are probably affected by the discrimination women face after leaving to have and take care of children and then trying to return. These women are usually never able to compete again with associates, men and younger women or women who have made the choice to not have children, that are still able to put in that 60+ hour work week. This is prominent in the corporate world also. But I think it has less to do with general sexual discrimination towards women and more to do with the highly competitive nature of these areas. Is that unfair? Yes, but ask those people putting in the 60+ hours and gunning for the partner position and they might tell you that it is completely fair. I am sympathetic to both sides, but it might be time to realize that having children and leaving work to take care of them( the women who leave for a month to have a baby and return to work are a different category ) is a life altering choice and one can't expect everyone to stop and wait for them. If a working couple decides to have children, one of them might have to make this choice, but it does not need to be the mother. That last part is what we as a society need to accept if we are to attain a greater gender equality.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

You should check out an article at the Escapist Magazine discussing gender differences from an evolutionary pyschology standpoint. I'm not going to try and tell you it's in any way definitive, but I think it demonstrates a rationale framework for a biological basis for gender differences.

Women in Games, by Chris Crawford
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/issue/17/3

You've go to remember that individual variation will be greater than group variation, and I definitely think that we sometimes use tradition to override individuality (and that's a bad thing). But to say that "it's just arbitrary tradition" doesn't really make sense: where do you think tradition comes from? Traditions evolved with society, and I think that both society and, therefore tradition, are essentially products of evolution.

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[Chris Burke]

Feh. Have you dug around the many articles about women in computing here on /.? You can find plenty of men expressing the opinion that women should not enter software or engineering, because they "have different interests" or "aren't as capable at math and logic". Is the Dean of a major university saying exactly that not overt enough for you? Just because you won't hear that expressed in the halls of your workplace due to fear of reprisal doesn't mean the sentiment doesn't exist and that it doesn't enter in to hiring decisions.

So combine this active discouragement with the not overt but quite obvious to someone sensitive to them factors such as lack of female role models or even peers and I'm not surprised at all at the widening gender gap.

The problem with actively recruiting women is that we can't because they aren't there due to the problems above. The only part of the gender gap that "may or may not be simply the nature of things"* is the tendency of a privileged group to feel threatened by and try to exclude another group from joining and possibly stealing their privilege. Justifying their exclusion as being the natural state of things is absolutely classic.

* By the way, good job not being over or anything in your discouragement of women; just leave it open to debate like a good reasonable engineer. I'm sure no mere female will catch it and determine that the male establishment feels she doesn't belong. Is this what you meant by not actively discouraging?

Re:Unplesant environment

[zerocool^]

Hey!

I'm not 35!

Re:Unplesant environment

[ottothecow]

My school lists 7 people on facebook as both female and computer science concentrators (out of 106).

Of those, Two are freshman (bound to change to something else...at this school) , three are grad students (they dont really count for this article do they), and I am pretty sure one of them is an attempt at an AI facebook bot (and is listed as staff).

That leaves one female computer science major who is actually the point where the school allows you to declare.

Of the two freshmen, one isnt bad looking but in all of the posted pictures, she is in a group of people all dressed in drag and the other freshman is listed as a lesbian. The older undergrad however is kinda cute and has electronic gagets stored in her cleavage in a picture...

Re:Unplesant environment

[jasonwc]

I understand your position and I think that is one source of discrimination. However, from my numerous conversations with female attorneys, I have been told that this is not the only discrimination they face. As you state, I agree that women who decide to leave the workplace to care for their children for several years are put in a very difficult situation and are in essence giving up the opportunity of partnership. I also think that it is unacceptable that women are expected to make this sacrafice, while men are not. Women who don't have children are seen as being cold and uninterested in a family, and those who decide to work despite having kids are considered bad mothers. The same stigma does not apply to men.

Having said that, many women choose NOT to have children and still face discrimination. The female attorneys I have spoken with describe the situation as this: Female associates are held to different standards than male associates. Men are expected to be rutheless and ambitious, while women who act in the same manner are considered bitchy. This attitude is reflected in sex discrimination claims when women sue who are denied partnership. Secondly, women are held to a higher standard than men. It is not impossible for a woman to become partner but she has to be more devoted than a man, more intelligent, work longer hours etc. In addition, she has to act in a more deferential manner so that she is not seen as as bitchy, while being aggressive enough so she is seen as highly competant. Because of these higher, and discriminatory standards, it's generally very difficult for female associates to become partners.

Jason Wittlin-Cohen

Re:Unplesant environment

[ChocoBean]

I agree with you.

My mother never bought me barbies or whatnot because given the choice of books, lego, and playdoh or Princess Blank Barbie Set, the former always wins. It might be because I already have books, lego and playdoh, and knowing that I already like those, having more sounded better. The barbies and stuff caught my eye too, but I think I'm terrified of life-like baby-shits-her-pants dolls, maniquines and such, so it probably was never a fair contest to begin with.

It wasn't until much later when I began school with other girls that I got weird looks for not having Barbies and not knowing pop culture symbols and references. But by then it was too late, and here I am, a rpg-playing, video-gaming, girl programmer...hmmm.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

Your post is a pretty good example of why not to trust statistics. You jump straight from the different statistics for male and female lawyers to conclusions as though the correlation between gender and salary is causal. You have to do a lot more work to get there.

Personally I think there's a lot of uncertainty here. For example you just assume that since women are willing to work 60 hours a week they must be just as motivated as men to go for partner. I don't think that's obvious at all. What about women who want to be mothers?

I also think that the whole "society tells women to play with barbie dolls" thing cuts both ways. Now society, instead of telling girls to play with barbie dolls, tries to tell young women that they can have a career and be a mother too. I believe that this is just setting women up for failure and dissappointment. This just sets women up for feelings of conflict and guilt and inadequacy when they can't live up to the mythical "do everything" mom. Plus I've always been saddened when I talked to girls my age or a little younger (in college or just graduated) who have this glow in their eyes that they're going to really *do* something - they're going to have a *career*!

Who the Hell talks like that? I'm not saying you shouldn't be excited about your career, but women are being sold a bunch of horseshit here. A career means welcome to the 9-5 grind. A career means a cubicle. A career means having to accept the authority of some corporate boss. That's what a career is. Sure, not all careers suck, but by and large Dilbert is what a career is, and yet women are being sold on this idea of a career as the path to fulfillment, enlightenment and self-actualization. What a crock!

It's this awful Orwellian lie that somehow becoming a cog in some corporate machine is the straight and narrow path towards really being someone. What it really is amounts to nothing more than a materialist, consumerist trap for women as well as men. It's the basic Tom Sawyer painting the fence story - and yet the vast majority of people, men and women alike, are lining up to trade their toys for a chance to whitewash the fence.

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[Scarletdown]

but if you've ever seen boys play with dolls, they're more likely to play with the Ken doll and race around in the sports car than play with Barbie.

Ah, they would more than likely have GI Joe kick Ken's ass (mounting his head on a plaque for the trophy room), and then get it on with Barbie, at least until an 82nd Airborne GI Jane or a Cy Girl arrives, then Babs would be kicked out on her ass in favor of the more able-bodied gal(s). ;)

(http://systems.figures.com/archives/images/08/370 08.jpg http://www.mwctoys.com/images/review_shadow_3.jpg http://www.mwctoys.com/images/electra2.jpg http://i16.ebayimg.com/03/i/03/f5/59/82_1_b.JPG for examples)

Re:Unplesant environment

[Peter La Casse]

Social skills isn't that big a factor. I find very few of my programming peers who fit the "geek programmer" stereotype. Plenty of us are married, have houses and families.

I think a critical component of the "geek programmer" stereotype is adolescence. How many of the married-housed-familied geeks that you know are under 22? How about above 30?

Lots of adolescents don't know how to tell the difference between polite behavior and romantic interest. To an adolescent male not currently in a romantic relationship, the infatuation threshold is ridiculously low, I've observed. Geeks have a prolonged adolescence, leading to the stereotype, but even geeks tend to grow up sooner or later, explaining your observations.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Enigma_Man]

Oh, by all means I did not mean to imply that the differences were only societal-based. I believe that there are definite and obvious differences between men and women, at both the physical and psysiological levels. I was just replying to the (grand)parents about that specific thing.

-Jesse

Re:Unplesant environment

[NetRAVEN5000]

Just because your niece changed doesn't mean there is a problem - change is normal. And it's also perfectly normal for kids to want to fit in with the rest of society.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Hannah E. Davis]

People keep telling me that I'm being denied equal access to something (I don't even know what) in computer science... but I have yet to see any such denial.

I have never seen any "No Girls Allowed" signs on classroom doors, I have never had a mark taken off for anything other than a mistake, and I have never even been excluded from a predominantly male study group or other social gathering because of my gender. What more can I ask for? I'm treated as an equal, and the presence of dangly bits between the legs of most of my professors certainly isn't enough to magically make me unable to get a degree or succeed in the field.

I'm sure that at least a few girls at some universities do get discriminated against, but that doesn't mean that it's happening everywhere. Perhaps we should start dealing with the isolated incidents rather than scaring girls away from the field with tales of glass ceilings and rampant sexism.

Re:Unplesant environment

[jasonwc]

The studies I cited did provide some evidence why discrimination was the lilkely explanation for the differential enrollment figures in CS. I just don't have access to the studies at the moment, and unlike some on Slashdot, I don't want to just make stuff up.

See http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=171601&cid=142 93261 for my reasons for believing that discrimination is a factor in the differential employment of women as partners in law firms. It's based on discussions I've had with female attorneys, who I believe are accurately reprenting their experiences.

Jason Wittlin-Cohen

Re:Unplesant environment

[xIcemanx]

51/420 undergrad female CS majors here. That's much better but still pathetic.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Seumas]

Wow. What dreamland are you living in? First off - don't shit where you eat. That means don't try and pick up on the chick down the hall in the other engineering group or anywhere else in your place of employment. Idiots.

And frankly, why would you want to try and make a work relationship "something more" with the hags that are in this industry? Eew. Raise your standards. You might want to check where you're working, too - if you think the environments in the tech industry are harsh toward women. There are plenty of women in the company I work for and a lot of them in the tech areas - many are sustaining or developer engineers on major products. Others are in tech support or QA. All of them are comparable to their male counterparts and treated accordingly. Some are great. Some are bad. Some are lazy. Some work hard. Just like the guys. And nobody treats them any differently because they're a chick. So really... stop making shit up just to promote a newspaper.

And, finally, who cares if a chick is a "computer science geek". If you're dating a girl because of what she has a degree in - you need to check to make sure you haven't lost your testicles.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Peter La Casse]

Yet, despite this increase in enrollment, women attorneys have been leaving the field. While nearly 50% of new associates are women, less than 10% of partners are female. This can't be blown off as being due to lack of interest. Associates at large firms put in 60+ hours a week, and are surely commited to the responsibilities of partnership. Despite this, men are dispraportionately chosen for the highest paying positions.

Part of the reason for this (but only part) is that some women choose to prioritize raising a family over their careers. When that happens, it's ok: it's her decision. (It's also ok for a man to prioritize raising a family over his career.) Until the day comes that men choose homemaking as much as women, this will necessarily lead to unequal numbers of men and women in jobs that require excessive work. Therefore, uneven numbers are not in and of themselves evidence that discrimination is taking place.

In this case, I fully agree that there are glass ceilings in some law firms. But if they all disappeared, we'll still see fewer women than men as partners in law firms.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Starbreeze]

It's geeks like that who ruin it for us girl geeks. Marrying non-techies, shame on you ;)

Actually its funny, even in Silicon Valley, I have a hard time finding someone techy enough to keep up who is also single and attractive. I was at a shindig at SF City Hall Friday night and someone asked me *why* I'd want to date someone in the same field. Perhaps because previous non-techie boyfriends see me doing anything on the laptop (I'm on call sometimes afterall) and assume I'm just playing computer games and ignoring them.

Re:Unplesant environment

[IAmTheDave]

Why is it that we have this awful attitude that being a mother is somehow this dead-end proposition that requires no job skills?

This is (dare I say it) at least partially the fault of the women's movement. It's the same pendulum swing that all issues go through - from one extreme to the other.

Things start out with there definately being a gender bias in everything - down to denying women the right to vote. Women's suffrage comes along, gains traction, gets the right to vote, and keeps on moving (rightfully so.) But as every movement has, certain radicals decided that not only should women have equal opportunity and equal pay for equal work, but that the traditional roles of the female were to be shunned. Now that the opportunity to have a career existed, women chosing not to do so were holding the movement back, and were themselves the product of a still-unbalanced culture.

Whether or not culture still does favor men over women in the career/pay department is not the debate here - I think that we're at least starting to see the pendulum swing back towards center again. Women go to college in droves - to most young people, there is no understanding of a gender bias in continuing eduacation at all. Women are executives and CEOs, and are starting to have real representation at the top of the ladder. What this means is that said pendulum is now free to swing back, and people can start realizing that it's choice that was lacking before. Now a woman can choose her path - career, stay-at-home mother, or even both, and it is that choice that we support.

It's true, there is no more nobel a calling than motherhood. There is a reason that no matter how a child was raised, most would instantly kill or be killed for the welfare of their mother. So now women have true choice, and people will hopefully stop judging so harshly for any choice, be it stay-at-home mother or career woman. And like your wife, that choice can be mutually exclusive from the level of education or intelligence a woman may possess or strive for.

Re:Unplesant environment

[lubricated]

>> Then they say "what does she want to do". I say "she wants to start a family". They say "Oh, then why on earth is shy taking such hard subjects?"

This suprises you. how about this.
You need to grow up and realize that most people expect you to get a job doing something related to what you are studying. Especially if you are studying something considered hard. Sounds like your wifes goals has nothing to do with that advanced calculus she's taking. I doubt she will be teaching it to her kids.

Re:Unplesant environment

[sp0rk173]

I'd say a more noble calling than motherhood is running an abortion clinic.

Re:Unplesant environment

[tie_guy_matt]

I figured out a long time ago that if you find a woman in a science type field that isn't already married, or has a bf, then chances are that there is a reason why. They have the pick of any nerdy guy they want, so chances are that they have already gone for someone else. If you are still single try going for a women in a non-science field. Yes they wouldn't talk to you in high school but soon they will realize that you make more money than someone with a non-geek major, you are probably going to be handy fixing things around the house (just don't insist that everything is a hardware problem,) and your kids are going to be smart too. BTW I married a someone with a journalism degree -- and I am probably not one of the guys that a geek girl, who can pick any geek guy she wants, would end up going for.

Re:Unplesant environment

[lubricated]

>> Lots of adolescents don't know how to tell the difference between polite behavior and romantic interest.

show me one adult person that can.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Pxtl]

Umm, yeah, but there are also a lot of girls who grow up with baby dolls and have elevated motherhood as their only calling. No interest in any intellectual pursuits at all. They want kids because they grew up wanting kids and prince charming. /married to a mathy

Re:Unplesant environment

[Joe Tie.]

I'm getting pretty sick of hearing this from the media as well. I'm getting even more annoyed that tech sites are covering it. It's such a weird subject in the first place. On the surface it makes nice little sounds of people worried about sexism. Once one reads a bit more though, these stories usually turn out to be the main souce of it. "We're a bunch of men who think we know better what any particular woman wants out of life than she does. So get on with that job you don't like, because we said so!"

Re:Unplesant environment

[DavidTC]

The only thing that should actually scare girls off is that girls get too much personal attention from attention-starved guys.

And this is entirely a problem of female making. If women avoid nerds, than the few women who venture close to nerds are going to have to put up with a disproportional amount of attention.

A solution is simple: Nerdy women need to start helping nerdy guys hook up with other women.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

Actually you are wrong - at least as far as the education field goes. In many parts of the country they are really trying to recruit male teachers...

Re:Unplesant environment

[deKernel]

Anybody can read the numbers. Your problem is that you can't understand what is behind the numbers. Did you not only read the parent post but really understand it. I think not. Please re-read.

Re:Unplesant environment

[jasonwc]

The problem is that women are in essence given the choice of having children or a good career with advancement opportunities. Men aren't required to make this choice- they can have both. While it is true that women can have kids without staying home and that their husband can stay home with the kids, this doesn't happen for several reasons. First, there is a social stigma against women who have children and use day care rather than staying home with the child in his/her infancy. Secondly, and more importantly, very few men are willing to stay home with the kids and sacrafice their career. Society doesn't expect them to do so, and by and large, they aren't willing to. Women on the other hand, are expected to have children, and to stay home and care for them. The choice women make to have children and to stay home, and to care for their children isn't made in a void. Societal pressure and the unwillingness of men to take equal parental responsibility accounts for much of the decisions that we view as reflecting women's true will. We should recognize that societal discrimination affects the choices people make.

Re:Unplesant environment

[GebsBeard]

You've clearly never worked as an OBGYN or Surgery nurse.

Re:Unplesant environment

[gnud]

But to say that "it's just arbitrary tradition" doesn't really make sense: where do you think tradition comes from? Traditions evolved with society,
And then society changed. A bit quicker than the traditions, who are still catching up.

Re:Unplesant environment

[onkelonkel]

I think you are deliberately misrepresenting what has been posted here.

As far as I can tell what some people have posted is "maybe some women don't go into engineering and IT because they aren't interested or lack the aptitude".

Nobody here has ever said that women SHOULDN'T go into engineering or IT.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Hannah E. Davis]

Or just not worry about it :P

All my friends are male, and although some of them will jokingly hit on me from time to time, I have a sense of humour so it doesn't bother me. In fact, I'd rather have a guy make inappropriate jokes around me, as he would with his male friends, than guard his tongue purely because I'm a woman.

Re:Unplesant environment

[gnud]

And there you have it: discrimination. Why does society value nurses less than some sleazy marketing CEO?

Re:Unplesant environment

[drinkypoo]

We actively subconsciously push women away from IT roles. First, we (as a gender group) tend to be amazed when a woman exhibits computer skills. This is the kind of thing that encourages women at first (wow, if I know something about computers, guys will be impressed?) and pushes them away after that (wow, you mean if I act like I know anything about computers, guys will mob me and never let me have a moment's privacy?)

The way we picture people governs how we treat them. When people are treated some bizarre way, they tend to not want to invoke that reaction.

Re:Unplesant environment

[lahvak]

I know that this seems to be very rare and unpopular attitude these days, but when I went to college, me and most of my colleagues studied math because we liked it, we were interested in it, it was fun, and we were good at it. Of course, we sort of hoped to get some sort of math related job, but that was mostly because that way we could continue doing what we were good at and what we liked, and be payed for it.

Some of my friends from college have math related jobs, just like me. Some of us do use functional analysis, measure theory, PDE's and whatnot on daily basis. Many of my former colleagues have jobs that have very little to do with math, at least with the kind of math we studied. Some are in IT, some in banking sector, some are lawyers, even few politicians, but all of them tell me that the time and effort spent learning advanced math was not wasted for them. Even though they never use any of the stuff they have learned, they acquired skills that are very useful for their jobs.

Even though the lady that is the subject of this conversation most likely won't teach advanced calculus to her kids, she undoubtedly will teach to them her love of learning, intellectual challenge and curiosity, and appreciation for knowledge. I think that's the best we can give to our children.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Ironsides]

How many men are elementary teachers? I can think of only a few. Is this an example of a gender bias againts men?

Re:Unplesant environment

[cbreaker]

I definately agree with your sentiments here. I believe it starts at the very beginning like you said - baby dolls, barbies, pink flowers, pretty pictures, clothes, and new shoes. For boys, it's trucks, construction toys, dirt, video games, and Big Cool Stuff.

It's pretty easy to see how that upbringing impacts the desires of these kids when they get to the workplace. Building things, playing video games, and thinking about how stuff works the whole time boys grow up does lend itself very easily to tech fields and they're corresponding degrees.

I don't think it has that much to do with any "stigma" of computer geeks or what-not. It seems to me that would be something easy to say to gain controversy. In real life, I don't see it. I'm a big time computer guy for sure, but I think I'm a fairly normal guy. Pretty much everyone I work with has wives. There's a token nerd here and there but we're just guy working. Where's the stigma?

In the actual workplace - not just how many people got degrees - I think the disparity is even greater. I've worked at a half dozen companies and visited many more IT departments over the past 10 years, and the ratio of women to men is no more then 10% if that. I'd like there to be more, personally. Some of the best IT people I've met have been women. And dammit, it would finally shut up these studies. WE KNOW!

Re:Unplesant environment

[mollymoo]

There's nothing fundamentally male about CS - it's just we discourage women from doing it, thereby robbing ourselves of potentially valuable talent.

If you can accept a strong geek Asperger's/Autism correlation, you automatically accept a gender correlation too (as Asperger's/Autism is more prevalent among males).

Re:Unplesant environment

[Anonymous Coward]

I fail to see how we (humans) actively discourage women from entering the CS workforce.

You're flat out lying. Of course you know how institutional sexism works because you benefit from it all the time. You've just decided for yourself to pretend it isn't really there, and are now defensive about it.

Re:Unplesant environment

[drinkypoo]

God I hate the fervent normalization element of our society, why can't I be accepted for being different?

Gah, who the fuck cares? If people make assumptions about what's going on in your head, why would you want to invest time in them anyway? I've finally reached the point where I consider time without an SO a good time to brush up on my masturbation skills and read a few good books, maybe concurrently. And I actually am with someone right now (spent less than a year of downtime this time, yay.) It really is true that if you can't be happy without someone, you can't be happy with anyone.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Cerberus7]

Your post is worthless without pics for the rest of us.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Lumpy]

it really goes deeper than that. my 13 year old daughter has a strong interest in going into Computer Science. I keep trying to discourage her interest because of my Experience in the field and re-direct her to a field where she will always be highly desired and can almost write her own offers.

I work in IT and IS. and honestly anyone else in the field will admit that it sucks. Bad hours, Bad treatment from Management as you are looked upon as a liability and not an asset. The market is FLOODED with halfwits and certification holders that really can not do the job which makes it even harder to get the interviewier to even see your resume in the flood of 1000 for that single position.

I keep pointing her to engineering. A female engineer can almost walk into any engineering firm and say "give me a job at X salary" and they will get it. (Yes this is close to truth. I have 2 brothers and 2 nephews in the engineering world and a woman will get top billing for a job above a guy simply because they are extremely rare.)

I would never wish a life of Computer science upon my children. It is heading to become the Foundry job the 21'st century.

Luckily she also shows interest in chemistry and Physics as well as engineering. I still teach her programming because I believe all children should understand how to program in at least 1 high level language and understand basics of how a computer works to graduate middle school.

CS plainly sucks right now and it will not get any better.... Not in an information society.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

I've read at least one study that says if you compare carefully enough (eg never married men to never married women in the same career field) women have been making more than men since the 1950s.

I'm not saying that 1950s was the height of equal rights by any stretch of the imagination - but what I do believe is that we're becoming hopelessly mired in a web or fruitless argument over whether or not we're equal in region A or equal in region B. Two problems with this: 1 - I think it's really tough to nail down "equality" or ascertain the drivers for it (too often it's asssumed that any difference between men and women is automaticaly discrimination against women) and 2 - since equality of opportunity can be tricky to measure we end up measuring outcomes. This lends itself to shoddy fixes when there is a discrepencey (eg admit woefully unprepared minorities to college programs in order to meet quotas rather than actually address inadequacies in the public school systems) and is a fundamentally bad idea anyway - since we want a meritocracy in most situations.

What you have, I believe, is women radicalizing the feminisnt movement in a naked power grab that has nothing to do with bias or equal rights. And the sad thing is that this power-grab only makes it harder to determine when and if there is a genuine problem.

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[vishbar]

I don't know about that.

At my school (University of Pennsylvania) there's a major called Digital Media Design. This stresses more of an 'artsy' approach to computers with classes in fine arts as well as a hefty contingent of engineering courses. A bunch of girls in my CSE classes are girls, just not CSE majors. I'd say that over half of the DMD people are girls.

Maybe it's just me, but does it seem like girls aren't majoring in CSE because there are other, more specific majors that may include CSE, but fit their need better?

Re:Unplesant environment

[Kiffer]

unless I roll a 1 I am set

A 1 is not an automatic failure for skill checks http://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/usingSkills.htm#s killChecks

um... never mind.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

Cleary the term "liberal arts education" is not in your vocabulary. The truth of the matter is that institutions of higher learning were not, in fact, founded as a way to simply increase the wage-earning power of those with degrees. For several hundred years these insitutions existed primarily for those who already had wealth.

The idea you're espousing as "mature" is, in fact, the sad state of affairs reached when education and learning become not ends in and of themselves but merely means towards the greater end: pursuit of the almighty dollar. Just because you have no conception of eduation other than as a commodity doesn't mean that no one else does.

It's people like you who have no concept of the traditional purpose or history of higher education that make me wish that CS programs would just spin off into trade schools. If you think that going to college is ust about getting a job you should head to some technical institute where you belong.

I'm not saying that a liberal arts eduation (which is what she and anyone else with a non-engineering undergraduate degree is getting) should not be practical - just that education should be valued for what it is and not just for what it can get you.

So the truth is that I'm not, nor did I ever say that I was, surprised at people who think it's waste of time to learn difficult subjects for some reason other than financial gain. I just find such people excessively narrow-minded and shallow.

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[Billosaur]

It's geeks like that who ruin it for us girl geeks. Marrying non-techies, shame on you ;)

What can I say? My first girlfriend was actually a Comp Sci major and she was a damned sight smarter than I was. I liked her but I lacked the emotional maturity to handle the relationship (ask my wife and she might tell you that emotional maturity still seems to be lacking ;). I never found another woman like her and noted that very few women made their way into the tech pool. So, I branched out.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

I completely agree that someone are taught by society to not care about intellectual concerns. And that some are further taught that if you're going to be a mother you don't need to be educated. I'm not so much as saying that this is not so as just saying I wish it wasn't.

My wife and I rent out one of our rooms to a girl like this. She's clearly bright, but for whatever reason she spends her time acting stupid - especially around guys. I don't know who taught her that this is what guys want, but I do know that the type of guy who wants a submissive, stupid, doe-eyed girl who will simper and say "you're so smart" is not the kind of guy worth getting.

But as long as we treat women as victims of societal conditioning in all cases, how are we going to change things? If the argument goes - "giving your daughter a barbie will make her think nothing matters but popping out babies" then I think we have a bigger problem than the specific conditioning. The bigger problem is that we treat women as passive creatures that can be so easily trained.

Sure, societal influence can be powerful, but I believe that by overemphasizing this influence we actualy feed the root problem: treating women as powerless victims. I wish the young girl we rented a room out to would knock it off with her insipid dumb-act. She's actually got an acidic wit that can make people feel very stupid, but for fear of not geting a man or whatever, she hides it whenever possible. It's a big waste for all concerned. But the answer is not to train her to act another way, it's to empower her to quit being trained at all.

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[jasonwc]

You are absolutely right. Some men would want to stay home with their children but may shy away from doing so because of the scorn that they would inevitably receive. I sympathize with these men; sexism hurts both men and women. Yet, it's still true that most men simply do not want to stay home with their kids, and feel that their wife, and not they should be doing so.

Jason Wittlin-Cohen

Re:Unplesant environment

[zephc]

"Hello Fry. It's a . . . [rolls dice] pleasure to meet you." - Gary Gygax on Futurama

Re:Unplesant environment

[ottothecow]

Get a facebook account and you are free to join in.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

No prob - I will put you in touch with my grandmother. A lady simply doesn't do that kind of thing you know...

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

There's a danger here. If we change traditions before we understand their origin, impact and function we may do serious damage. If traditions are the result of evolution, and I believe that to some extent they are, then saying "society's changed, time for traditions to change to" is akin to saying "well, our habitat has changed, so I guess we don't need this limb anymore" and whacking off our right hand.

I don't think we do enough thinking about what traditions mean and where they come from. We just act as though they are arbitrary and that's the end of it. Take cloning for example. The move from sexual to asexual reproduction isn't just automoatically wrong because it's "not natural", but at the same time it's not automatically OK because to say otherwise is arbitrary either. The fact that humans reproduce sexually has deep implications for us as individuals and as a society that I think we would do well to understand before we rush blindly into the future just because we can (just as an example).

You can tell the guys who favor cloning are nerds at heart because they want to take stuff apart before they know how to put it back together.

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[J.R. Random]

I see no reason at all why a 28% (or less) female presence in computer science couldn't be due to intrinsic differences in male and female interests. Go to any horse barn where horses are kept as a hobby (rather than for work, as in an Amish barn). I guarantee that fewer than 28% of the horse riders are male. The one or two men you might find took up riding because their wife or girl friend already did. You'll find it hard to convince me that this is due to invidious social conditioning. After all, such media depictions of horse riding as there are tend to be masculine -- John Wayne, the Marlboro man, and all that.

On the other hand, if you ask editors of classical music recording review magazines, such as Gramophone, Fanfare or American Record Guide, what percentage of their subscribers are female, I'm quite certain it will be well below 28%. This is despite the fact that there is no social conditioning whatsoever that pressures boys (rather than girls) to take an interest in classical music. Quite to the contrary, any boy who has such an interest knows to keep it to himself if he doesn't want to get beaten up as a wimp.

People are the way they are despite social conditioning, not because of it.

Re:Unplesant environment

[blitz487]

Why is it that we have this awful attitude that being a mother is somehow this dead-end proposition that requires no job skills?

Because being a parent is the most natural (I didn't say easy) thing in the world. It requires no talent or skill beyond what we are pretty much all born with. If that were not so, the human race would have died out a hundred thousand years ago. I've never seen any evidence that highly educated or skilled people make even slightly better parents.

Re:Unplesant environment

[EraserMouseMan]

Personally, I like it when a woman expects me to act like a man - whatever that means to the particular girl. I've known a few girl geeks and they were totally cool. They seemed to thrive being around all guys and teasing us and such. But they were good programmers too. There wasn't a guy in the room that resented that.

Girls thrive on having their female support groups. If a girl isn't comfortable around guys they won't dare join a CS major where they are the only girl in the class unless they are a special type of girl. This type of girl makes no bones about the fact that she is a girl and she's a darn good programmer too. And she demands respect for it. But she loves doing that. Most geek girls like it when the male geeks respect her for acting like a woman but also gives her the respect the deserves for being a good programmer too.

If people start this affermative-action crap to get more females in the profession they will lose all credability because, "The only reason you're here is because the university/company HAD to hire a woman."

Don't rob the good geek girls of their respect by promoting any sort of artificial advancement for women in the tech fields. If a woman doesn't want to be in an all-male field then just respect that decision. If she does then give her the respect she deserves there also.

Re:Unplesant environment

[MetaPhyzx]

It's geeks like that who ruin it for us girl geeks. Marrying non-techies, shame on you ;)

Actually its funny, even in Silicon Valley, I have a hard time finding someone techy enough to keep up who is also single and attractive. I was at a shindig at SF City Hall Friday night and someone asked me *why* I'd want to date someone in the same field. Perhaps because previous non-techie boyfriends see me doing anything on the laptop (I'm on call sometimes afterall) and assume I'm just playing computer games and ignoring them.

Try as i might through the years, I've not found an abundance of "geek girls" who aren't either guilty of the same lack of social skills (or tact) as geek guys, or ruled by a (and I hate to put it this way) social "preference" that excluded me as an acceptable dating partner (mainly race, possibly cultural). It's a trip to hear anyone decry the lack of available "attractive" people, and know they deem your available, attractive ass as unacceptable to bring home.

It's just as hard to find a person with balance. Hence, I've never dated a person with a CS or other IT background. Sometimes that's a blessing. Sometimes it's not. My educational background was arts (English Lit major) related, but I was always a "geek". So, most I've dated have come from that background. Add to that, I'm a single dad approaching mid 30's... finding an accepting or similarly circumstanced intellectually well-rounded geek girl is slim to none. Oh I'm sure eventually I'll find someone (and so will you); I'm just stating and acknowledging that it's tough.

Re:Unplesant environment

[lahvak]

Wow! Great idea! I must suggest that to my daughter! As a matter of fact, now I know what to give her for christmas.

Re:Unplesant environment

[pocopoco]

Scientific American actually had an entire issue on the gender difference. The whole toys thing was addressed in one of them. They had a study where baby monkeys were given their choices of toys without any society pushing its values on them. Turns out the male monkeys like "spatial" things like balls and toy trucks that moved while the female monkeys preferred dolls. Most the other articles similarly had a lot of science indicating strong biological differences.

Re:Unplesant environment

[bnenning]

Is the Dean of a major university saying exactly that not overt enough for you?

If you're referring to Larry Summers, that's a misrepresentation of what he said. His claim was that *on average*, men are more interested in technical fields, and there's strong evidence that this is true. (Whether it's due to biological or social issues is a separate matter). That in no way implies that any particular woman is unqualified for technical work, only that a disparity in gender ratios is not automatic proof of discrimination.

The only part of the gender gap that "may or may not be simply the nature of things"* is the tendency of a privileged group to feel threatened by and try to exclude another group from joining and possibly stealing their privilege.

I'm pretty sure the majority of male IT workers would be quite happy to have a higher percentage of females around.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Chris Burke]

No, I'm not misinterpreting. It is the difference between those two statements that I am looking at.

"Women SHOULDN'T enter engineering because they aren't interested or lack the aptitude".
vs
"Women CHOOSE NOT TO enter engineering because they aren't interested or lack the aptitude".

Both statements represent a male-held negative stereotype of women in CS. The only difference is passive vs active. "I don't want them to enter" vs "I am happy with them choosing not to enter". Both express the end result -- fewer women in CS -- as being the result of the nature of women, rather than the opinions of men. In terms of discouraging women from entering this male dominated field, what exactly is the difference? Either way women are hearing men tell them that they are not going to be as successfull, merely because of their sex. Either way the woman is going to feel the men will be less inclined to view them as successfull, regardless of their actual accomplishments. Either way I would not trust this man to make fair hiring decisions.

Active vs. passive isn't the difference between sexism and not sexism.

Re:Unplesant environment

[lubricated]

>> You need to grow up and realize that most people expect you to get a job doing something related to what you are studying.
> The idea you're espousing as "mature" is, in fact, the sad state of affairs reached when education and learning become not ends in and of themselves but merely means towards the greater end:

No, the idea I'm espousing is that just as you have pointed out this has become the norm, therefore people expect this. It is not unatural for someone to be surprised when an accounting major becomes a chemist.

>> It's people like you who have no concept of the traditional purpose or history of higher education that make me wish that CS programs would just spin off into trade schools. If you think that going to college is ust about getting a job you should head to some technical institute where you belong.

It's people like you that can't grasp that they are out of the mainstream. They act shocked that the world doesn't revolve around their ideals. Believe me I wouldn't be where I was today, if I didn't believe that an education is more than just about getting a job.

>> So the truth is that I'm not, nor did I ever say that I was, surprised at people who think it's waste of time to learn difficult subjects for some reason other than financial gain. I just find such people excessively narrow-minded and shallow.

Yeah, that's alot more shallow then wanting to hit people with a 2x4 that expect math majors to do actual math.

Re:Unplesant environment

[labnet]

Sure, the boys club exists to a certain extent, but its much less prevalent (at least in Australia)
My wife was a lawyer, as is her sister.
My wife left law because She didn't like it.. in fact She said it was in part because She was a woman.. but not for the reasons you might initially think. It was the emotional pressure coming from her clients not the male lawyers. She said the male lawyers in the firm can generally emotionally isolate themselves. (That said there was another fem lawyer in Her firm that thrived on the emotional pressure, so its a generalisation). Also her Sister has recently been made a junior partner (30)... but her sister often works 30 hour days... Also... many women leave law to go have kids and raise a family!!

So in summary, I think workplaces are becoming less stereo gender typed, and more performace based.
Women are generally more intutive/sensitive, and perhaps don't have as much longevity in emotionally combative environments. Don't flame me.. I think its a great thing that women are the more nurturing.. the world needs it, and that doesn't in anyway reduce value or worth, nor does it apply to all.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Pro777]

And not just human that show this preference for toys.

http://www.physorg.com/news8902.html

Studies have shown that even monkeys of either gender show a pronounced and measurable preference for what we generally consider 'boys' and 'girls' toys.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Anpheus]

You mean differences akin to "I have a penis." Because that's a pretty extreme difference. Look! I HAVE NO BOOBS! How is this possible when it's just a small difference such as a lack of a chromosome!?

Re:Unplesant environment

[HeyLaughingBoy]

It's true, there is no more nobel a calling than motherhood

Change the "motherhood" to "parenthood" and I'm with you. Fathers often get short shrift as the ones who get to do the fun stuff after moms do the hard work, but there is a significant number of us who are true co-parents.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

This logic is totally wrong. If you're gauge of being a good parent is just SURVIVAL, than sure, anyone can be a parent. But humans are social animals, and we exist in a society. Raising a child is a little more complex then meeting basic biolgical requirements.

When animals raise their offspring they don't just feed them - they also TEACH them. This is the key aspect of parenting that requires skill and dedication. The most important things to teach are not, by the way, scholastic subjects. Things like emotionl maturity, responsibility, and communciation skills are first - and you don't need a degree to teach those.

But the more valuable skills you can teach your offspring, the better parent you are.

And as for "I've never seen any evidence that highly educated or skilled people make even slightly better parents" I'm pretty sure you could find some if you wnted to. You just need to define the criteria for being a better parent. If education or earning potential of offspring is your criteria, then there's overwhelming evidence that successful parents raise successful children better than unsuccesful parents (eg poorly eduated, and poor parents).

Measuring emotional health would probably be a good indication as well. But look, this is really too obvious to require much evidence. Parents pass on their genetics AND their behavior (good or bad) to their children. Abuse is cyclic, SO is absence of abuse.

If you thnk that someone who is completely emotionall underdeveloped and a generally unsuccessful adult will have the same chance of raising a well-adjusted child you're nuts.

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[bnenning]

It's geeks like that who ruin it for us girl geeks. Marrying non-techies, shame on you ;)

Supply and demand is still way in your favor. Whether any of the supply appeals to you is another matter.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Chris Burke]

If you're referring to Larry Summers, that's a misrepresentation of what he said. His claim was that *on average*, men are more interested in technical fields, and there's strong evidence that this is true. (Whether it's due to biological or social issues is a separate matter).

Bull-cocky. He explicitly referred to intrinsic -- meaning biological -- differences in aptitude being dominant over social and discriminatory factors. The relevent statement from his speech:

"So my best guess, to provoke you, of what's behind all of this is that the largest phenomenon, by far, is the general clash between people's legitimate family desires and employers' current desire for high power and high intensity, that in the special case of science and engineering, there are issues of intrinsic aptitude, and particularly of the variability of aptitude, and that those considerations are reinforced by what are in fact lesser factors involving socialization and continuing discrimination."

I'm pretty sure the majority of male IT workers would be quite happy to have a higher percentage of females around.

Sure, "around", but how about "competing for promotions"? If the women were around but in a non-engineering capacity would these male IT workers care?

Re:Unplesant environment

[Jakeypants]

"a server room without windows"

A slashdotter's wet dream - a server room with no Windows boxes.

Re:Unplesant environment

[qray]

It's not society, its wiring. My daughter doesn't like anything Barbie. And it really hasn't much to do with society or her environment. She's pretty good with Lego's but she's still no where near my son's ability and we've encouraged both the same. They are quite different in many ways and little has to do with how they have been treated.

This idea that genders only differ in anatomy is a farce. The brains are just wired differently. And sure there are exceptions in each gender that are wired less like the average.

What's really sad is that a women feels less of a value to society when she chooses to stay home and make her children a priority. The time my wife has spent with our children will have much more impact to society than anything I've done or probably will do in my tech career. Yet somehow my career is perceived as "more desirable".

So given the difference in wiring it's not surprising the bias in the numbers toward me. I would hope in this day and age that no women would be blocked by bias from entering any field. In my 20 years I've never even heard anyone one mention "lets not hire her, she's a women". And I've worked in many different companies. And I have worked with a number of women from managers, to developers, to QA. And I have been responsible for hiring women

So I just don't see a bias early on keeping the girls from science/math class, nor later on, keeping them out of the field.
--
Q

Re:Unplesant environment

[keraneuology]

The schools may have male teacher recruitment programs but the concept of male-friendly recruitment programs at the universities is still extremely foreign. (Not to be confused with minority recruitment programs which happen to include males with certain skin colors). There are all kinds of "let's get women enrolled in _______" plans - at Harvard, for example, but nary a "let's get men enrolled in _______" anywhere.

Re:Unplesant environment

[gnud]

I agree. I did not mean to imply that traditions must be changed *now*, but I believe that they slowly are. Take public opinion on gay marriage, for example. Compare numbers from 100 years ago, and today.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

So let me get this straight:

I say a lot of people do X, and that it annoys me.

You say that I'm dumb for not expecting people to do X. Right off the bat I'm confused. I never said anything about surprise.

So I respond, basically, "I know a lot of people do X. And it really pisses me off for these reason: " and I give you a list. Again - I've said nothing about surprise or what most people do. I'm just stating what I think and giving you the reasons.

And your response is "It's people like you that can't grasp that they are out of the mainstream".

Well, Holy shit - I'm out of the mainstream. That's the best damn argument I ever heard in my whole life. Dude, why do you even bother to think if this is what's going to be the result? I mean you invent this "surprise" issue out of nowhere and then you invent this idea that I'm not aware that I'm not in the mainstream. I've given no such indication and what's more: why the Hell should I care? Maybe you base all your opinions and beliefs and ideals on the mainstream, but I like to do a little thing called "thinking for myself".

I'll see if I can simplify this for you.

It's not a question of me being annnoyed that people are surprised that my wife is picking a diferent area than her major (your accountant to chemist example). I'm annoyed that people assume that if you're not going to be a mathematician it's a waste to study math or comp sci. This implies that the only reason to study something difficult is to use your degree to get a career. This in turn implies that learning has no intrinsic value. THAT's what I dislike - and from what you've written you don't believe it either. Why did you start arguing with me again? I think you maybe read something into my post that wasn't there, or you're just having a really bad day.

But you've pretty much totally lost any semblence of a coherent point. You're angry that I'm not in the mainstream (or at least you seem to be angry about it) and yet you're not in the mainstream either. So are you just angry that I don't roll over and accept that my ideas aren't in the mainstream? Is that what I should do? "Oh no, not everyone thinks like me! I should keep my opinion to myself until it's popular again!" Maybe that's not what you're saying, but since what you are saying amounts to little more than "I don't like what you wrote" I can hardly be faulted for being a little puzzled by the vemon that accompanies your inane babblings.

In any case you've pretty much proved that to the extent that your education was intended to teach you to think critically or logically (and to the extent that these posts are a valid measure of your ability to do so) your education was basically a complete failure. If you had the capacity to reason effectively you wouldn't have had a problem with what I said in the first case, and would have come up with something more effective for arguing against me than just that I'm not in the mainstream.

Really, you call that an argument?

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

LOL!!!! You are sooo silly! What you just said proves the opposite of your point. "Media depictions of horse riding tend to be masculine." Maybe the ones you were exposed to - but what about Black Stallion, Black Beauty, My Little Pony, Barbie's horses (unicorns, pegasus, whatever in pink), Misty of Chincoteague (and subsequent books), the two or three horse centered series for young girls (Thoroughbred, Heartland, Phantom Stallion etc.) and about a hundred other such things. As for movies - more recent than John Wayne even - All the Pretty Horses, the Horse Whisperer, Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron, and Dreamer. Seriously - go to amazon and search for horses and see how many things that come up are marketed towards females versus males. Where I was raised in Virginia it was kind of assumed that every girl about the age of ten was going through a horse phase.

As to "On the other hand, if you ask editors of classical music recording review magazines, such as Gramophone, Fanfare or American Record Guide, what percentage of their subscribers are female, I'm quite certain it will be well below 28%." You are quite certain based on what facts? That is a fairly weak argument... Last time I went to the symphony the audience looked pretty well mixed to me... Come up with some actual numbers and I will discuss that set with you.

Re:Unplesant environment

[h4ck7h3p14n37]

I don't think it's a 48% difference here. I think such extreme differences can't be explained by an X or Y chromosome - it's symptomatic of an overall negative CS attitude towards women as a whole that needs to be fixed anyway.

Perhaps women are avoiding degrees in computer science because of the associated stereotypes (long working hours, no social life, pasty skin)? Maybe they'd rather spend time with their family and/or children versus slaving away at a keyboard all day and night?

I can't remember the source at the moment, but I recall reading an article a few weeks ago that discussed how there were still proportionally few women in the upper echelons of business when compared to the number of women graduating with advanced business degrees. The cause? Good 'ol boys clubs? Nope. Glass ceilings? Wrong. Oppressive working environments? Nuh uh. It's very simple really, women were staying at home to raise their children.

Until staying at home to raise children is as valid and accepted a choice for men as it is for women, I wouldn't expect to see too many women in professions that require long working hours away from the home.

Re:Unplesant environment

[rikkards]

I would say it depends. From my observations the typical female out there is not your typical geek. Mind you due to exposure to geekish roles through work/school they have become more common. But still, I think you could say that your typical female, non-geeky males and some geeky ones as well, myself included as my tastes changed when I discovered girls (no offense meant), would not be into role-playing games.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

Well, we agree in principle but disagree in application! I guess I just can't leave well enough alone. I just happen to believe that the sexual revolution and the growing acceptance of gay marriage are perfect examples of changing traditions that we don't understand for the worse.

Take marriage. I believe that families are important, and that it takes two parents to raise kids optimally, and that divorce is generally a bad thing. Nothing really groundbreaking here. But I also believe that traditional norms about sexuality - basically retaining virginity until marriage - act (or I should say acted) as significant bolstering agents to strengthen marriages in society. (Full disclosure, I'm 24, married, and was a virgin until marriage).

I think the evidence bears me out. Couples that cohabit before marriage then get married are more likely to divorce than virigins that get married. They're more likely to cheat on their spouses after marriage. And they are report lower levels of satisfaction than the virigins that got married.

There are a variety of reasons the I believe play into that factor: but the result is (in my opinion)pretty clear. Politics and philosophy trumped both tradition and empirical evidence. The drastic increased rate of divorces mirrors our growing sexual openness as a society: as we toss out our traditions we're handling sexuality worse, not better, than before.

OK, now I'm totally off-topc and my wife wants her computer back!

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[harumph]

you don't have any kids, do you.

Re:Unplesant environment

[ivaldes3]

I used to think the same way about gender roles and children before I became a parent. Now I know that much of the behavior is hard-wired. We don't 'push' girls and boys to act a certain way. They do so naturally. My boys from a very early age were fascinated by heavy construction equipment and choo-choo trains without any prompting from us. We actually had some dolls in the toy box mix and they have absolutely no interest in them. The little girls across the street of the same age are totally in to dress up and dolls. They have a very ignored toy train in the house. We took the boys and the girls to an ice-cream store, (we are talking 2-3 year olds here way before any meaningful socialization). The boys are under the table, running around, yelling and throwing things, the girls are primly, quietly eating ice cream in their pink outfits. You can say what you want about our parenting styles but I know without a doubt that these behaviors are genetically determined.

-- IV

Re:Unplesant environment

[Thornkin]

"And as to your statement about boys not wanted to play with barbies- do you think this could possibly be caused by the fact that girls are socialized from birth to act in a manner that is appropriate for their sex? "

Jason, is it fair to conclude that you've never raised children or at least that you haven't raised one of both sexes? There are obvious differences between boys and girls from a very early age. As a father of both a daughter and a son, your statement rings disconnected from reality. Girls are attracted to pink and dolls and dressing up without any help from their parents. Boys are attracted to trucks and guns without any help from their parents. From a very early age girls take a greater interest in social interactions--including appearances than boys. Boys are generally much rougher than girls. John Stossel did a report on this some years back. One example had children of about a year seperated from their mothers by a glass partition. The boys pounded the glass to get to their mothers. The girls tended to sit down and cry. We're wired differently (insert hypothesis why here).
      Why is it that we must find few women in CS as a problem? There are few men in, say, nursing. Is that a problem? Not necessarily. If a group is self-selecting toward or away from a particular profession, why do we insist denying that?

I'm sure there are exceptions to these examples but it holds for the majority of the group.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

I think that attitude is a little unfair personally. I shouldn't have to demand respect or work harder to get it just because I am a girl. Why should I have to be "a special type of girl" to work in your field?

BTW - it isn't a matter of "promoting any sort of artificial advancement" it is a matter of removing artificial barriers to women entering the field. And listen to yourself - you don't think that there are artificial barriers in the field that need to be taken down when you refer to it as "an all-male field"? Attitudes like yours are part of the problem...

Re:Unplesant environment

[onkelonkel]

Well said!

"Both express the end result -- fewer women in CS -- as being the result of the nature of women, rather than the opinions of men"

If I may parse "the opinions of men" as meaning a male-dominated field consciously or unconsciously erecting barriers to keep women out, well that might be true. It does cause one to ask why other formerly male dominated fields such as medicine, business or law, are at or more than 50% women entering, while IT steadfastly hovers at the 10% mark. You would have trouble convincing me that male IT people are vastly more sexist than say male lawyers.

As for "the nature of women", if we can't even discuss the _possibility_ that fewer women than men are interested or have the aptitude for IT without being labeled sexist or being accused of contributing to the very problem we are seeking to solve then we lack the intellectual integrity to ever find the answer.

If we try to "fix the problem" without an objective analysis of its causes, we run the risk of on the one hand wasting time and energy trying to dismantle non-existent barriers to entry or on the other hand of wasting time and energy encouraging women to enter a field that they may not like or be good at.

Let me also state clearly that I am talking about women as individuals here, blessed with reason and the ability to make rational choices.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Pray_4_Mojo]

Did you go to Pitt too? Hehe.
Pitt's CompEng program is the largest school in the College of Engineering (at pitt, obviously). About 550. And out of that 550, about 35 were girls. At least that was the satistics I heard from department staff I met with while involved with the IEEE.

A lot of the girls COULD hack it. But there were a few who were getting by on their looks.

As for thoughts towards inequality, I just wonder why I can remember the names of the girls who were nothing but project burdens, but I can't remember the names of any of the countless male engineers that I ran into that, even after 3 years of programming classes, couldn't code a damn thing in java.

So part of the problem is that since there are so few women entering into these programs, they are much more visible. Think about it, you're in a room with 50 people. 3 are tall blondes, and the other 47 are just brown haired guys with glasses wearing a black t-shirt (maybe with a "no i won't fix your computer slogan"), jeans, and sneakers. Who do think is going to stand out? And who's going to be the topic of scuttlebutt more?

I remember reading somewhere that some private schools started segregating math classes by sex. They found that women, when in a group by themselves, did better at Math. They were more inclined to ask questions, work together in groups, admin difficulties grasping the material or just plain speak up when they saw the teacher make a mistake. Throw back in the guys that make "knowing the answer" a competition and the girls go back to being mute.

Re:Unplesant environment

[pondyprem]

Well,

I'm thinking of University montreal medical school. More than 70% students in medical and nursing school here are women.

How about remove gender bias there?

- Well, I'm not interested in altering, i'm using the above statement to drive through the point that "removing gender bias" is itself unnatural. Its nonsense to make a nursing course 50-50 or medical course 50-50!

Point: neither feminism nor male chovenism helps in furthering of science

Prem

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

Ummm - that would be because such programs aren't needed at the university level. I want you to think about how many of your teachers - real live tenured ones here, not GAs and what not - during your post-high school education were male, now do the same excercise and think of the number were female. Now compare the two numbers. (Sorry for making the assumption that you went to University, I apologize if I am wrong.)

Need more proof, in a National Study of Postsecondary Faculty: "There were several differences between male and female faculty members in the levels of faculty outcomes such as salary, tenure, and rank. Female full-time faculty averaged lower salaries than male faculty by about $10,000 [...] They were also less likely to be tenured (42 vs. 66 percent) or to be full professors (15 vs. 39 percent)." http://nces.ed.gov/programs/quarterly/vol_2/2_2/q4 -4.asp#H1

Re:Unplesant environment

[Beyond_GoodandEvil]

Of course you know how institutional sexism works because you benefit from it all the time.
Oh my God you're right! Did you hear? They beat the women in Kumar! Perhaps your perceptions are not valid, and you need to reset your prejudice threshold a little higher before you scream sexism at a gender disparity, or do you think men should likewise get special encouragement to go into nursing.

Re:Unplesant environment

[mclaincausey]

What the hell are you talking about, all the women who have been involved in CS are complete hacks, going back to Ada Lovelace through Grace Murray Hooper and Adele Goldberg... What a bunch of losers!! Why would we want them contributing?

On a serious note, the feminine mind is different than the masculine one, and sometimes offers a unique perspective. I think we should welcome and encourage more women to become involved, if they are so inclined.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Peter La Casse]

I can, at least some of the time, which is sufficient to satisfy the stated requirements.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Bob Uhl]

A married man posting that he's never found another woman like his first girlfriend (who's not the woman he married) may be lacking things other than emotional mturity:-)

Re:Unplesant environment

[bnenning]

Bull-cocky. He explicitly referred to intrinsic -- meaning biological -- differences in aptitude being dominant over social and discriminatory factors.

That was the second of his three reasons. The first, which he placed the most weight on, was differing levels of desire to work in "high-powered jobs". He also specifically mentions differences in preferences relevant to engineering positions.

in the special case of science and engineering, there are issues of intrinsic aptitude, and particularly of the variability of aptitude

In many traits, including IQ, men appear to have a higher standard deviation than women. (This makes sense if you think about it; there are fundamental evolutionary reasons why it's better for nature to "gamble" with males than with females). So if you're looking at Nobel prize candidates, you may be 4 standard deviations out for males, but 5 for females. If you want to dispute the premises that's fine, but Summers's conclusions follow directly from them. (And if you do reject the premises, I hope you it's for a better reason than not liking the consequences). And again, this does not mean that any specific woman is incapable of being at the top of any field, nor does it justify sex discrimination.

Sure, "around", but how about "competing for promotions"?

Why would it be worse to compete with females than males for promotions?

Re:Unplesant environment

[UserGoogol]

Many computer geeks lack the social skills to interact with anyone. I think the real problem is that girls are more encouraged to be social than men. (Although I don't know if this is cultural or genetic. Probably a combination.) Thus, women are more likely to be non-dweebs, and therefore be more likely to not want to hang out with a bunch of dweebs, therefore be more likely to not be willing to be Computer Science majors.

Re:Unplesant environment

[BorgCopyeditor]

Both express the end result -- fewer women in CS -- as being the result of the nature of women, rather than the opinions of men.

You have won Slashdot. Care to play again? [Y/N]

Re:Unplesant environment

[J.R. Random]

I said subscribers to classical music review magazines, corresponding to collectors of classical music. It is true that attendees at classical concerts (and for that matter, performers) are much closer to 50/50. And I suggest that you contact the publishers of Gramophone or Fanfare if you have any skepticism about how their subscriber base breaks down.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Peter La Casse]

The problem is that women are in essence given the choice of having children or a good career with advancement opportunities. Men aren't required to make this choice- they can have both.

I disagree. It is possible for a woman to have children and a good career with advancement opportunities; it's simply harder, because there are fewer men willing to be primary caretaker for the children. (More than one might think, though.) If a person (man or woman) wants to have children and a good career, they should find a mate willing to take care of the kids (or choose a field that allows both.)

Furthermore, it is simply not true that fathers are not responsible for taking care of their children or that they are free (as far as society is concerned) to ignore their child-rearing responsibilities. It is a problem that some people think this, though.

More women than men choose to be homemakers. If they are forced to do so, then there is a problem, but thankfully that's uncommon. Much more common is the case where someone wants to be a stay-at-home parent *and* a successful career person, and that's hard regardless of gender.

I think that a person's view of what "society says" is subjective. Frankly, I don't really care what people in general think, so that may be why I don't see a huge problem in this area. I don't care if someone looks down on me for doing something that used to be reserved for women. If someone does care, and feels forced to choose a certain career path because of it, then maybe the problem isn't 100% with "society". Do what you think is right, not what you think society says you should do. In other words, maybe the problem is that women don't have enough balls. Seeking consensus (an activity traditionally associated with women) is fine, except when it leads to an incorrect action.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

Great ignore all of my points that have evidence and tell me to go look up your evidence for you. I don't think so...

Re:Unplesant environment

[Grishnakh]

I don't think women should go into engineering or worse, IT, if they're smart. Not because of aptitude, but because it's a crappy career field. There's lots of better-paying places to pursue a career these days, where the job will be more stable, more family-friendly, have shorter working hours, have a much longer career lifespan, etc.

Maybe women aren't going into CS because they're (in a practical way) smarter than men! They see how this career field has gone down the tubes, and they're opting for better choices. For instance, if you go to pharmacy school, you can expect a starting salary of $80k! And you don't have to worry about being laid off, with the aging American population becoming more and more dependant on prescription drugs, and you don't have to worry about your job being outsourced, because you have to have a pharmacist at your local drug store to dispense your drugs, not on another continent. You can't say all this about CS, IT, engineering, etc.

I think males go into CS more because they're not very good at long-term thinking, and just pick something they're interested in instead of something that's a good all-around career choice.

Re:Unplesant environment

[jasonwc]

And the 2-3 year old girls "in their pink outfits" expressed a desire to be clad in pink? Even if they did go to the store and select a pink outfit, this wouldn't necessary reflect a neutral choice as from a very early age clothing is seperated by color - pink for girls, blue for boys. Also, rowdy behavior by boys is fairly accepted. If a girl acted in the same manner, she would be seen as a tomboy and would probably be more harshly punished.

Despite what I have argued previously, I'm not saying girls and boys have no innate differences. I just think we overlook the power of socialization. They would probably behave differently in a neutral society, but to what extent, no can can say for sure.

Jason Wittlin-Cohen

Re:Unplesant environment

[jasonwc]

I didn't say that men don't have child rearing responsibilities. I simply stated that their societally accepted responsibilities to their children are not equal. Women who have children are expected by many, even today, to stay home and care for their children. If they don't, they are seen as poor parents. Perhaps women should simply ignore society's demands and do what she wants, but this isn't always so easy. These views can hurt women in the workplace.

No such stigma applies to men. Even the way we describe men and women professionals is different. We don't refer to male professionals with children as "working fathers", nor do we say that they are "juggling their profession and their work". A male professional's family life is largely seen as irrelevant to his work. A woman professional with children on the other hand is often referred to as a "working mother" implying that she has the dual responsibility of child reering and work. Does the father have some responsibility to care for his kids? Absolutely. Is his responsibility equal? No. When both spouses want to pursue a career, the mother is often expected to sacrafice her career because she made the choice to have kids. Once this choice is made, there is some expectation that she be the one to sacrafice. I wish more men wouldn't think this way, and that society wouldn't look down upon men that stay home with their children, but we can't ignore the reality of today.

Jason Wittlin-Cohen

Re:Unplesant environment

[Chris Burke]

If I may parse "the opinions of men" as meaning a male-dominated field consciously or unconsciously erecting barriers to keep women out, well that might be true. It does cause one to ask why other formerly male dominated fields such as medicine, business or law, are at or more than 50% women entering, while IT steadfastly hovers at the 10% mark. You would have trouble convincing me that male IT people are vastly more sexist than say male lawyers.

You parse correctly. As to why these other fields are different... The first answer is that IT is a much newer profession than medicine or law. Travel back in time to the 60s and 70s, and you absolutely will see women in medicine struggling to break into a workplace whose established (male) members don't think they belong there. Same with business and law -- remember the 'glass ceiling'? It took decades for women to break through to the point where a CEO being a woman isn't by itself a news item. As for law -- another poster pointed out that while the number of women entering law as associates is very large, the number who are becoming partners is still a tiny proportion compared to men, and some women are leaving the field as a result. Perhaps there is something genetic that makes women good associates, but not partners, at a law firm! *snort*

So is IT a more sexist field than medicine or law? In some ways, yes, but not any more so than when women were first trying to work their way into those fields. It's not so much more sexist as less mature. Give it time. I'm both dismayed and encouraged by the fact that the arguments why women aren't equally represented in IT mirror the same ones used in medicine, business, and law. Dismayed because sexism from decades ago is being repeated verbatim, encouraged because it has been overcome before. So over time I'm hoping that these ideas will fade out as more women show with their lives that this isn't true -- but in the meantime I mourn it not happening earlier because the women who could show this are discouraged from doing so by the men who believe they can't.

As far as discussing the "nature" of men and women. I'm happy to do so in an environment in which there is not a presumption of inferiority and a presumption that this nature trumps the behavioral aspects that are quite evident. Whenever someone wants to bring in "biological" differences into the equation, it's so that they can prove that the social differences we see are in fact the result of biology, so there is no reason to try to address the social issue. If it wasn't just the centuries-old argument that "disenfranchised group X is so because of their nature" even as X changes from place to place and time to time. If it was ever not the case that the person bringing biology to the table had this as their not-so-hidden pre-conclusion, I would be more willing to discuss it.

As it is, I hear are a bunch of male IT workers saying "It's not that we discriminate against women, it's that they're biologically inferior for this job!" Nothing like proving yourself wrong with your own denial, eh?

Regardless of what you think of biology, the social barrier clearly exists and thus it is not a waste of time to try to dismantle it.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Siobhan Hansas]

Girls are attracted to pink and dolls and dressing up without any help from their parents.

Yeah. That's right. Girls are genetically attracted to pink. There must have been huge stretches in our evolution where females being more attracted to pink than males was essential to the survival of the species.

Well that's a little hyperbolic. But your statement is open to at least a little ridicule. If you were truly able to interact with your children without gender bias you're a very remarkable person. Studies have shown that adults interact with babies they believe to be girls differently from babies they believe to be boys, regardless of the actual sex of the baby. And parents describe their female children from birth onward as smaller, more passive, prettier, and less active than male children regardless of objective measurements. (Rubin, 1974 among others, and more recently confirmed by Sweeney and Bradbard 1988, among others).

I don't deny there are differences between boys and girls. I just don't think we know which of those differences are down to nature and which nurture. [And I'm not sure it's possible to find out in an ethical way.]

In any case, the main issue is: Why is it that we must find few women in CS as a problem? There are few men in, say, nursing. Is that a problem? Not necessarily. If a group is self-selecting toward or away from a particular profession, why do we insist denying that?

It's a problem becauses people self selecting away from a profession for reasons other than their lack of fitness for that profession will leave us with, overall, worse computer scientists (and nurses) than we could otherwise have.

On a general level for our society as a whole, that means we don't have the best people in the best jobs, which leads to a lower quality of life overall. On an individual basis people could well be happier if they had a more even playing field for developing their careers in.

And for women in particular, that selection process currently tends to lead them into less well paying jobs which can lead to a greater concentration of poverty among older women than in the population at large. Since you imply you're the father of a girl, you might want to be a bit more concerned about that.

Re:Unplesant environment

[keraneuology]

And what, pray tell, are 13 year old statistics supposed to prove about today's environment?

Generated from the 1993 National Study of Postsecondary Faculty (NSOPF:1993), the analyses presented in this report are based on U.S. citizens with faculty status at 2- and 4-year (and above) institutions who indicated that their primary activity in the fall of 1992

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

Dude, what are you smoking? This is an old and boring game.

1. Find some statistical differences between genders/race, etc.
2. Now pick the gender/race that is being oppressed.
3. Concoct the theory for why their position is evidence of oppression.

Note the orders of steps 2 and steps 3. That's where all the fun comes in.

I can only assume your previous bit about a "dean at a major university" was directed to what's-his-face at Harvard. In a meeting where the topic "why aren't more women in math/science classes" came up he said "gee... maybe women are just different and don't like them?"

How the Hell is that biased? If that's sexism rearing it's ugly head, then you're conclusive evidence that the medicine is worse than the sickness.

What if, and this is just a quesiton, what if women really don't like CS as much in general? The really scary thing about you is that your politics take precedent over questions about reality. That's like someone debating about what the answer to a math question should be instead of doing the math.

You seem to think that if a man ever tells a woman she's going to be less successful at something because she's a woman that this is sexist. But the fact is that, whether that's rude or not, SOMETIME'S IT'S THE TRUTH. In the real world where the rest of us live, men and women have different body shapes. A woman has wider hips for childbearing. Men have narrow hips. This means men can run farther and faster then woman. So if you take a bunch of guys and a bunch of girls, get them ready to race, and then tell the girls "anything guys can do, girls can do better" you might as well tell them "it's OK guys, 2+2=5 if you really want it to".

You're so caught up with the bogeyman of repressive patriarchy that you can't just see what all the rest of us on planet earth have noticed: men and women are different. When we say "you know, maybe women don't like math in general" it's not some hidden agenda - passive or aggressive - to keep women out of CS. It's actually a geuine question. We know we're different phsiologically. We know those differences extend to the brain. We know that numerous studies have shown that under the most controlled of circumsmtances gravitate towards different types of tasks and different methods of problem solving. Given this load of evidence it takes a truly dogmatic, knee-jerk reaction to be able to see past the blindingly obvious to find yet more evidence of repression where there really is none.

In my mind the real sexism is your sexism. You're the one that wants to take a male-dominated subject (CS) and use that as the criteria for judging the "success" of women. You're the one that says that if not enough women are in the CS field they are not succesful. Might as well pretend that men and women have no physical differenes, draft a few women athletes into the NBA and then hold them to the standards of Kobe Bryant or Shaq. That's fair, right? Let's just not pay attention to the fact that a slam dunk is something you hardly ever see in the WNBA and it's something you see every night in the NBA. While we're at it, let's see if we can get a few women track stars and suit 'em up for the Superbowl and see how long they survive before being crushed to death. At least we'd be treaing them equally though, right? They'd gasp their last as equals on the field of sports.

At least that's how you might see it. The rest of us would see it as a couple of 300 pound behemeths reducing a few women to pulp in a grossly unfair contest that pitted men in their strenght (bashing each other with sheer weight) against women out of their element.

No one is arguing that women (or men) should be restrained in their "element". I don't think we know what that element is. We don't know what differences there are between men and women exactly. But only ignorant fools pretend their are none. Let women and men do what they like. If there is genuine repression, then we need to stop it. Just as we did when

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

Thanks for clarifying some of this. I hate it when people bend over and just take it because it's the PC thing to do. Larry Summers asked questions, put forward a few hypotheses, and we shouldn't be browbeaten into submission and not asking or contemplating the issue because it's not the politcally correct thing to do.

It's the same as the religious right trying to squelch reasoned ethical debate on stem cell research or abortion. It comes down to rejecting the argument becuase they don't like the conclusions - and they don't like the conclusions because they would disrupt the politically accepted dogma. There's no reason to tolerate their knee-jerk extremism any more than there is to allow creationism to be taught in school.

Leave dogmatic politics - and dogmatic religion - out of science.

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[jasonwc]

Thanks for the citation. I'll be sure to check out the study myself. It's also nice to have at least some support in this argument.

Jason Wittlin-Cohen

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

What's more sexist:

1 - Being impressed that a girl shows a high aptitude, and interest in, coding?

2 - Assuming that whether we're impressed or not will determine (or at least largely influence) the career path of said girl?

It's time to stop treating women like herd animals or robots. Believe it or not, I doubt their entire world revolves around what we, as men, think of them. When my wife was in elementary school the teachers would let the young boys take advanced courses, but wouldn't let her take advanced math because she was a girl. THAT is sexism, and no girl should have to put up with it.

But on the other hand it didn't determine her future. She cared about math as much as any geeky guy and didn't just crumble and give up math. She taught herself algebra in elementary school and eventually got a full-ride academic scholarship to her current university.

All this hyper-emphasis on women susceptibility amounts to greater and more damaging sexism through condescencion and lowered standards and expectations than anything else. Teachers who refuse to teach girls math are isolated and rare - there's always going to be some idiot. But I'd rather my daughter have a 1/10,000 chance of getting an asshole teacher (which I and my wife can deal with) than have to face the systematic discrimination of having entire universities and corporations grant her special favors because of her sex, and because maybe they haven't met their quota of girl CS majors for the year.

Lowering expectations and standards and treating women as cattle that can be funnelled from one major or another without any innate characteristics or desires or aptitudes of their own is NOT an answer to sexism - it IS sexism.

-stormin

Re:Unplesant environment

[mdwh2]

It's kind of circular - if there was more of a balance in male and female, then male geeks would have better experience if interacting with the opposite sex.

It goes further than that too - all of the alledged examples of guys stalking, being persistant, mistaking friendly interaction, or girls complaining of too many guys after them - that would go too if it wasn't so hard for a guy to find a girl in his workplace or social circles. (And to be honest, I disagree that geeks are more likely to mistake friendly interaction - non-geeks tend to be very persistent at chasing girls, whilst geeks if anything are more likely to be shy; the problem is that with so few girls, they often end up taking any opportunity they can.)

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

I'd say a more noble calling than motherhood is running an abortion clinic.

How is this funny?

Don't even ask. Just let it go away. Anyone that thinks abortion is funny is, in my opinion, borderline sociopathic and probably enjoys jokes about Hitler's birthday, Jews is ovens, infant rape, and anything else considered socially taboo.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Vicissidude]

Women are the caregivers in the societies of the world. Men are the protectors. Given the fact that there are no neutral societies for your hypothesis to be tested, that in itself points to something other than socialization going on in children.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

Sigh - that was the first study I found - here are more recent ones, like I said though - think back to your own experiences:

From a 2000 article: "[Male] dominance is still strong in particular fields, such as college-level teaching. Today's professors continue to be mostly men. According to a recent AAUP survey, 39 percent of undergraduate faculty in the U.S. are women -- well shy of the 58 percent female student population." http://www.virtuallyadvising.com/content/wic/02stu dentbody.shtml

"Four out of five full professors are males, more male professors (72%) are awarded tenure than female professors (52%), and for the last 30 years, full time male professors have consistently earned more than their female peers." From: United States Department of Education. National Center for Education Statistics. (2000). Digest of Education Statistics, 1999. Washington, DC: Office of Educational Research and Improvement.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

No. Men aren't elementary schools because they actually, of their own free will and volition, choose not to.

You see men aren't afraid of women. If they walk into a class of women they are just fundamentally so strong and independent that they stay there. Whereas men, on the other hand, using only passive sexism can divert women away from CS career in droves.

Furthermore only women are so weak-minded that if you give them a doll it determines their entire career path. Men are stronger in every way. That's why we have to have long-ass discusssions about how unfair CS is to women, and about what we (as men, coincidentally) can do to make it fair. And how the poor women are living out the instructions implanted into them by soceital conditioning while we as men, being the only truly sentient humans, are not constrained by such limitations and can therefore see the path to bring women to the promised land. We use our superior vantage as free agents to survey the land and determine for women that, although they may think that they want to be a mother or an author or a poet or a an entrepenour or anything else, that those desires are merely the reverberating effects of soceital sexism. It is our obligation to tell them what they really want - which is to have 51% representation in the CS field. It is only right for them to have what is fair, and it is our duty as feminist men to see that they get what they need - not what the they think they want.

Who says chivalry is dead?

-stormin

(If you can't detect the sarasm, I can't help you. And if you can't find this logic mirrored in posts scattered throughout this topic... I still can't help you.)

Re:Unplesant environment

[Vicissidude]

It's a problem becauses people self selecting away from a profession for reasons other than their lack of fitness for that profession will leave us with, overall, worse computer scientists (and nurses) than we could otherwise have.

No, the problem is when you start pushing the people who are the least likely to go into a certain profession and not the people who are most likely. We have a "leave no one behind" mentality in modern education, which is all fine and good when it comes to basic skills. But, you should never ignore the students who are the most likely to enter the major, which is what appears to be happening.

We've already seen it in the push to get women to enter college, which used to be predominantly male. Now, female students at universities outnumber male students 2-1, except in computer science. So now, the perceived problem isn't that there are too few male students entering college in general, but too few females entering computer science. This "problem" is so out of whack as to be completely ridiculous. And so by focusing on getting women into computer science, something they don't want to do, we have overall computer science enrollments going down because we've ignored the men.

Had we not left behind the boys in our push for children to go to college overall, then computer science enrollments would not have gone so far down in the first place.

If the problem is getting good mathematicians to go into computer science and women are choosing not to go into math nor computer science, then our job is only to take away any disadvantages they may have. We should not be changing anything for their advantage.

Pushing one sex for an advantage over the other is sexist. And it's still sexist if the one you're pushing the advantage for is a girl.

Re:Unplesant environment

[BitchKapoor]

Tell me about it. I'm *gasp* an attractive(innate looks, physical supremacy, well groomed and dressed) geek, but also very socially inept. I lead girls on all the time without even noticing until it's too late and the girl's feelings get hurt. I also *always* assume that when a girl is being freindly to me, that's all it is, even though I have been informed otherwise after they get pissed at my obliqueness and tell me. I'm just messed up I suppose. God I hate the fervent normalization element of our society, why can't I be accepted for being different?

Dude, me too! Why is it that no one ever seems to realize our type exists?

Re:Unplesant environment

[ivaldes3]

If you have children, then you'll understand. -- IV

Re:Unplesant environment

[keraneuology]

think back to your own experiences

Physics: 100% of professors were male. English: 100% were female. Humanities: about a 50/50 mix. Psychology: about 50/50 with men tending to show up somewhat more frequently in abnormal psych and women tending to gravitate towards developmental/childhood psych. While I didn't take any of the "family science" classes, I was vaguely aware that they were close to, if not exactly 100% female.

According to the US Census bureau (2004 numbers) found at http://makeashorterlink.com/?J3881275C:

• 6.2 million teachers in the US, 71% of whom are women
• 3.1 million elementary/middle school teachers, 79% of whom are women
• 98% of preschool/kindergarten teachers are women (you work on increasing the % of male preschool/kindergarten teachers above 2% and I'll start to worry about increasing the % of women undergrad college instructors above 38%)

Elementary/middle school teachers aside women enjoy majority employment in every category except for postsecondary where they claim 46% of the positions:

59% Secondary
46% Post-secondary
87% Special education
67% other

So let's see... we can accept the figures from the US Census bureau or we can go with the numbers that appear on the same page as the articles "Why I Hate Men (column on why women's studies is cool)" and "Where Boys Need Not Apply", writing about "Meredith College, one of four women's colleges in North Carolina". (By the way... could you please remind me how many male-only colleges there are in the United States?)

Re:Unplesant environment

[mj2k]

This entire article is a load of BS... I'd give an arm and a leg to have _one_ girl in my CS classes, and most guys in CS would do the same! Hell, I would give just about anything to meet _one_ female every semester in a class... And don't give me the "you should try going to parties" routine, I go to LAN parties every other week, why just last month I kicked this girl's ass so badly at quake, that after cussing at her for being an f*ing n00b, she began to cry... Afterwards I offered to give her lessons on strafing in the privacy of my home, and she still wouldn't go for it... Damn female... and they say I have problems with social interaction...

Re:Unplesant environment

[BitchKapoor]

There's also something of a feedback loop in evidence here. "Computer geeks" lack the social skill sto interact with the opposite sex because there are often very few learning opportunities for those geeks to have picked up those social skills within the population of their daily interactions.

I certainly agree.

When I was at UofI champaign in the late nineties, the percentage of females in the Comp Sci program was probably hovering around 20% for the freshman classes and then would decay toward 10% by the fourth year.

Unfortunately, the ratio has since further decayed to less than 10% in the incoming freshman class. The numbers aren't publicized, but I've informally heard that that's about where it stands. It's significantly higher for graduate students, due to their mostly international composition.

Now, it's true that the ratio of females at the entire university was closer to parity, and that the "computer geeks" just needed to venture outside of their comfort zones in order to interact and learn those skills of social interaction. It doesn't change the the existence of that particular feedback loop.

Woah... scary idea. Actually, I'm just so busy, and CS is physically isolated at the north end of the engineering quad. Yeah, I know, excuses, excuses.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Schraegstrichpunkt]

The assertion that the statement, "Women choose not to enter engineering because they aren't interested or lack the aptitude." implies the statement, "I am happy with them choosing not to enter." is crap. The former is an explanation of an observation, while the latter is a statement of emotion.

Re:Unplesant environment

[eh2o]

What concerns me is the broader trend of women shying away from the analytical diciplines (math, cs, physics, etc). Not particularly because they should be entering those fields for a career but because these fields are representative of an important skill to develop that is really essential regardless of what field one eventually works in. And, noting that this trend is not universal (e.g., consider Indian women in Math/CS) its clear that this trend is a result of social bias. Even if one does not consider the morality issue (e.g., fairness, equality of power, etc), we should be concerned about this because it indicates that our educational system is substandard and therefore producing a workforce which is less than ideal.

So why does nobody make a peep about male discrimination? Society generally seems to prefer a "minimax" approach to dealing with inequity compensation. i.e., the people with the biggest problem get dealt with first (at least with respect to the "event horizon" of a given society which may be blinded to the suffering of certain subcultures or outsiders). While it undoubtedly indicates some sort of inequity, it is hard to argue that the lack of men in nursing or as english professors represents any kind of serious socio-economic problem.

In my opinion gender inequities in both directions are likely related to a common underlying issue. How this is dealt with might be analogous to trying to solve an equation with respect to some variable; you can start on either side, so you start with the one that intuitively looks like it will get you to the answer fastest. I think that translates to a prioritization of the "women's perspective" since it is really a bit more obvious how to proceed and the results have a clear and immediate payoff.

Re:Unplesant environment

[pembo13]

it's symptomatic of an overall negative CS attitude towards women as a whole

I haven't noticed any overall negative attitude, maybe you are hanging with the wrong type of people.

Re:Unplesant environment

[keraneuology]

And, noting that this trend is not universal (e.g., consider Indian women in Math/CS) its clear that this trend is a result of social bias.

Interesting point I had not previously considered... what is the male/female breakdown among Indian students in math/cs?

What concerns me is the broader trend of women shying away from the analytical diciplines (math, cs, physics, etc). Not particularly because they should be entering those fields for a career but because these fields are representative of an important skill to develop that is really essential regardless of what field one eventually works in.

I disagree - within the US economy analytical disciplines aren't nearly as important as they once were. Science jobs are being outsourced like crazy: which profession is HP more likely to lay off - an engineer or an accountant? If you worked for any Bell Labs-like environment today, would you have more job security as a physicist or an IP attorney?

Re:Unplesant environment

[Peter La Casse]

Women who have children are expected by many, even today, to stay home and care for their children. If they don't, they are seen as poor parents.

I agree with the word "many", but I do not agree with the word "most" as it applies to "seen as poor parents", and I think the word "most" is required to justify the conclusion that this is what "society" believes. I think that most people don't look down on a father who is primary caretaker of his children, except inasmuch as society looks down on child-rearing in general (considering it "not a job" etc.) I do think that most people would consider a couple to be poor parents if there is no primary caretaker for their children.

When both spouses want to pursue a career, the mother is often expected to sacrafice her career because she made the choice to have kids. Once this choice is made, there is some expectation that she be the one to sacrafice.

I do agree that that's the most common expectation. I think that this expectation is based on the widely-held belief (which I happen to think is true) that women tend to be better at raising children than men. There is, of course, great individual variation in the relative abilities of different people, and just because I'm better at something than my wife doesn't mean that I should be the one to do it, but it's fair to say that if I am better at doing it, then the outcome will be more optimal if I'm the one who does it, so if it's important, most people would expect me to seek the optimal outcome by doing it myself.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

I love how you ignore my Deparment of Education Stats...

Re:Unplesant environment

[ladyeyes]

Essential Manners for Men: What to Do, When to Do It, and Why by Peter Post -- available through Amazon and in most decent bookstore chains

I picked this up to have a laugh at a book written by a MAN about manners. I ended up being extremely impressed by how easy it read, how much work had gone into asking women what mattered and why, and how it really did try to focus on useful things. This is not the "how to address a letter to a visiting dignitary" book, but has really useful things like how to handle introducing your girlfriend/date/intended to your family members and how to handle some of those "loaded questions" that women are so good at asking.

And any geek worth his salt can read this many words in an afternoon or evening. ;-)

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

Ok - now that I have cooled down from how you have twisted around my statistics - I would like to point out two things. The first is that when you are talking about how people perceive an issue - you include articels like "Why I hate men" along with your hard core statistics. I didn't qoute a fluff article to you. Secondly - YOUR OWN STATISTICS PROVE MY POINT. This whole discussion was about the reason that there aren't people recruting for male professors at the college/university level like there are the other levels. Your own statistcis point out that there are more men at that level!!!!! So why should they be specifically recruited for - it isn't needed...

Re:Unplesant environment

[keraneuology]

I love how you ignore my Deparment of Education Stats...

Go back and re-read. I didn't ignore them, I discredited them because they are 13 years out of date and no longer relevant. I then provided figures that reflect the realities of this century.

If you want to use statistics from previous centuries may I suggest any from the 14th through the 19th?

Re:Unplesant environment

[keraneuology]

The first is that when you are talking about how people perceive an issue - you include articels like "Why I hate men" along with your hard core statistics.

Did you fail to notice that the source of YOUR statistics included those articles on the same page? Your source was biased and suspect; no reasonable person on the planet would ever consider them to be reliable.

I didn't qoute a fluff article to you.

No, you used statistics from a web site that featured such mysandric fluff.

Secondly - YOUR OWN STATISTICS PROVE MY POINT. This whole discussion was about the reason that there aren't people recruting for male professors at the college/university level like there are the other levels. Your own statistcis point out that there are more men at that level!!!!! So why should they be specifically recruited for - it isn't needed

4% is probably close to being statistically insignificant and will fluxuate +/- a point or three within every given delta t.

Re:Unplesant environment

[PantsWearer]

You do realize you don't have to date someone in your own field just so that they'll be able to understand you, right? After basically exhausting the potential pool of women in my CS department (yes, CS women can be as emotionally impaired as their male counterparts), I met and marriage a woman who went on to get her PhD in physics. She may not be in my field, but she's more than bright enough to at least get the gist of what I'm talking about.

She can also keep up her end of the conversation when anything science related comes up and our conversations about science aren't limited to just computers and what computer scientists may or may not know about science. Of course, if we start talking about great literature, we tend to bog down since we're both a bit clueless, but I'd prefer that to a blind stare when I bring up the latest digital paper technology.

Re:Unplesant environment

[dptalia]

I was working in tech support (ugh) once when I got this call from a guy who spent 40 minutes explaining his problem - trying to fax with a non-fax modem. When I explained why it wouldn't work his comment was "I waste my time talking to a woman!" and hung up. I'm sure his kids are interested in IT.

Re:Unplesant environment

[dptalia]

I must agree with you. The best thing most of us can contribute to the future of humanity is our children. You spend 40 years in a career and what do you get? Retirement, but all your products don't matter anymore. Raise a great kid, and they will affect far more people that anything you built will.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

Not those - these from 2000 and 1999 - "Four out of five full professors are males, more male professors (72%) are awarded tenure than female professors (52%), and for the last 30 years, full time male professors have consistently earned more than their female peers." From: United States Department of Education. National Center for Education Statistics. (2000). Digest of Education Statistics, 1999. Washington, DC: Office of Educational Research and Improvement.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Maitri]

Let's go back to the original argument - you said:
"...women outnumber men by far in nursing, education and womens' studies yet nobody makes a peep about the inequities involved (or outright discrimination)."
To which I replied:
"Actually you are wrong - at least as far as the education field goes. In many parts of the country they are really trying to recruit male teachers..."

Your response to this went something to the point of but not at the college level. I said that such programs aren't needed at the college level because male professors aren't a significant minority there like they are in elementary schools and are in fact generally a majority. You slammed my statistics and then provided your own which prove the exact same thing.

The article I quoted to you was specifically about the way people perceive the issue of gender biases in school. It included such "mysandric fluff" (which you should have spelled misandric btw - if you are going to try to use the term at least spell it right) because that is how some people perceive the issue. Some people study what people think. Since you claim to have taken some BA type courses - you should understand this. Just because it studies such things does not mean that it is in itself misandric. And yes, I did know those articles were there I just didn't have a problem with them because of how they were being used - as published examples of other's views. BTW - in case you missed the fact - the article was written by a man and was about reverse discrimination against boys - why the hell are you asking if I read it? You obviously didn't. (http://www.sadker.org/primer.htm)

I refuse to continue this discussion any further because what I said has been backed up with several different examples of statistics - including your own. It is a stupid argument to begin with and I was stupid for getting sucked into having it with you. I am not going to raise my blood pressure any further by dealing with people who want to argue the points of an argument instead of looking at the main issues that were under discussion (and have already been proved at this point).

Re:Unplesant environment

[keraneuology]

You really need to stop cutting and pasting from web pages. I strongly urge you to try reading the documents you cite.

You say: "these from 2000 and 1999".

The document says: data as of "Fall 1992".

I told you that the data was 13 years old and you respond with the publication date. What does that prove?

And your data itself is incomplete: you post the interpretation of "Four out of five full professors are males" and in the fall of 1992 this was true. HOWEVER - the significant data would include the averge time employed of those at the rank of professor. The devil's in the delta - compare the average time since bestowment of professorship of women then compare those numbers with the count of men awarded professorship during that period of time. Cross-tab with years of experience. Then we'll talk.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Busy]

As I see it, the joke isn't so much about abortion than it is about people sucking in general. I think the poster is joking that it's noble because it's making less people, therefore improving the world.

That's my take on it. Don't mod me troll.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Chris Burke]

The assertion that the statement, "Women choose not to enter engineering because they aren't interested or lack the aptitude." implies the statement, "I am happy with them choosing not to enter." is crap. The former is an explanation of an observation, while the latter is a statement of emotion.

Bull, read the posts. Every single one says "Women choose not to enter engineering because they aren't interested or lack the aptitude, therefore I do not see the lack of women in engineering as a problem" i.e. they are content with the situation. It's not logic connecting the two statements (so your logical fallacy link is useless), it's the posters themselves connecting them.

Re:Unplesant environment

[Chris Burke]

Dude, what are you smoking? This is an old and boring game.

What would I have to smoke for you to make sense?

1. Find some statistical differences between genders/race, etc.
2. Now pick the gender/race that is being oppressed.
3. Concoct the theory for why their position is evidence of oppression.

No, but nice try. The evidence of oppresion is the very real attitudes of men in CS towards women in CS, the most immediately available evidence being this very slashdot discussion. Even if the numbers of men and women were equal, those attitudes would still be evidence of sexism because they are. The disparity between men and women is evidence that the sexism has had a negative effect on women in CS.

You seem to think that if a man ever tells a woman she's going to be less successful at something because she's a woman that this is sexist. But the fact is that, whether that's rude or not, SOMETIME'S IT'S THE TRUTH.

Since when is women being less competent at computer science THE TRUTH?! Huh? Point me to the research! Last I checked, we had some indications that men and women had different distributions in some basic cognitive skills. Nothing I've heard of has tied that to high-level skills which require the combination of many cognitive abilities, such as computer science.

So unless you've got that proof -- and I noticed nobody else in the thread claiming the same thing you are presented any -- then it is NOT a case of a man just telling a woman THE TRUTH, it is a case of a man telling a woman his own prejudiced view of what he believes should be THE TRUTH, which is that women are inferior at [thing man cares about]. Which is called sexism.

Your whole counter-argument is based on the straw man that I don't believe men and women can be different. Yet you base this on me not agreeing with you that this completely unproven difference exists. The assumption that it does exist, that the difference is as obvious as differences in height, is sexist.


In my mind the real sexism is your sexism. You're the one that wants to take a male-dominated subject (CS) and use that as the criteria for judging the "success" of women. You're the one that says that if not enough women are in the CS field they are not succesful.

Ha! Another hilarious strawman, Mr. Women Can't Do CS But You're The Sexist One. I don't feel any need to judge women on general "success", or that such is defined by their presence in CS. I do feel that there are many women who could be and want to be successfull in CS but are discouraged by the sexist attitudes which presume without proof that women are inherently inferior at this job -- because I've met them. Thus I feel both that these women, and the CS industry, are being denied opportunities. Just like I don't think women need to be CEOs to be "successfull", yet I think it was really sexist and stupid and harmful when men did their best to prohibit women from becoming such.

Which is what really amuses and dismays me about your argument. It is the exact same argument that was used to argue that women couldn't make it in medicine, law, and business -- women can't do the job, and heck, I bet they don't even want to! Eventually attitudes changed both causing and caused by increased participation by women, until today you'd look like a real idiot suggesting that women are inherently inferior doctors.

Might as well pretend that men and women have no physical differenes, draft a few women athletes into the NBA and then hold them to the standards of Kobe Bryant or Shaq.

Yes, your straw man is in full blossom now.

Do you seriously think that differences in CS ability are as obvious and measureable as differences in height, weight, athletic ability? Do you honestly think the genetics that determine height are of the same complexity as those producing a brain that can even begin to think about a topic such as computer sc

Re:Unplesant environment

[sp0rk173]

And you, sir, are correct! It's also a joke about people taking life far too seriously when we're all actually just conduits for energy transfer and vehicles for the proliferation of entropy.

Re:Unplesant environment

[theStorminMormon]

Part 1: Intro

We have a fundamental misunderstanding here that I think I understand now. It goes like this: You have an argument in your head (argument A), but you actually only stick the very tip of it in your post. This tip, taken in isolation, consists of argument B - not an incomplete version of A, but a separate argument altogether. Since I'm not a mind-reader I only see B, and I attack B for reasons that you will soon understand. But you actually see A as my target (which can't possibly be my target, no one knows A but you at the start of our debate). So in turn you see my counterarguments as ineffectual (straw men) insofar as they fail to address A. Furthermore you need to fill in the gaps in my argument to make it even relevant to A and the obvious fill-in-the-gaps happen to be even more ridiculous than my straw men. And so now you're happily and contendedly attacking your own construal of my argument. But the fact is that if you realize that you only actually COMMUNICATED B, and that I was responding to what you communicated and not what's in your head, then my arguments hold up fine (there are no straw men) and there are no gaps that need to be filled with straw men of your own.

Part 2: A vs. B (and proving B wrong)

This is what you actually wrote in the post I initially responded to:

"Women SHOULDN'T enter engineering because they aren't interested or lack the aptitude".
vs
"Women CHOOSE NOT TO enter engineering because they aren't interested or lack the aptitude". ...Either way I would not trust this man to make fair hiring decisions.

This is what you communciated, it's argument B. Argument B boils down to this: Believing that women are less apt at activity X implies sexism. Since you listed no distinguishing characteristic or feature for engineering you gave me no reason to believe it was anything but a general difference between men and women. Written logically you have: W -> S (where W is "believing that women are less apt to do a general activity" and S is "sexist").

Your actual argument is stated much later in the most recent post:

THIS is the reality you are ignoring:
1) Many men in CS hold sexist attitudes toward women in CS, believing that women are inherently inferior to men at the subject.
2) Women are discouraged from entering the field by these attitudes.

This argument is completely different from B, and we'll call it A. Now I'm not responding to A when I write my replies, I'm responding to B. And the problem I have with B is specifically its generality. My whole beef is that your argument (for you did write it) means that ANY difference between women and men that makes women less apt that a man notices makes that man sexist.

All I have to do to prove that this statement is wrong IN GENERAL, is find an element w that is a subset of W, such that w & ~S. I went straight for the simplest: men and women have different physical characteristics that bestow upon men in general a greater aptitude for, to pick one of my examples, professional basketball. So there's my w: women have less of an aptitude for playing in the NBA then men. I think we can all agree that this is not sexist - it's just realistic. So there I have my w & ~S. This is sufficient to prove that ~(W -> S) for all w in W.

Case closed: I've just proved B wrong in general.

Part 3: Where Have All The Straw Men Gone?

A straw man is when I say you think something that you don't (usually that is similar to what you do believe) presumably for the purpose of burning the straw man and claiming to have won a debate. The trouble here, however, is that while you may not have intended to put forward argument B - you did. The words are there, the logic is complete (if fatally flawed) and so when I went after it I was not creating a straw man. I was, as it turns out, using a straw man but not one of my creation: one of yours. If you don't believe argument B, then it can't be helped that I THO

Re:Unplesant environment

[ChocoBean]

Yeah I think so. I remember one time I walked into a Games Workshop just to browse and look at the figurines and play settings they have there, and a "helpful" clerk comes up and says "looking for something for your boyfriend today?". I don't know if it was an insult or a pick up line or just genuinely helpful thing to say, but I took a small bit of offense. I get the same type of "help" in plastic model shops and other "hobby" type places. Makes me wonder if other girls have no hobbies then...?

Summary

[gunpowda]

Looks like finding a compatible girl geek in the computer profession is becoming even harder...

Does it help that the summary itself contains a male-point-of-view sterotype?

Re:Summary

[eosp]

this is /. ...what were you expecting?

Re:Summary

[Anonymous Coward]

(Most) guys like to form relationships with women.. yeah, I guess in politically-correct la-la land, this natural instinct is considered a stereotype. Sheesh.

Re:Summary

[Xiver]

Your right. You should contact the thought police immediately. (800) 386.2277.

Re:Summary

[Peter La Casse]

Looks like finding a compatible girl geek in the computer profession is becoming even harder...

Does it help that the summary itself contains a male-point-of-view sterotype?

It's only a male-point-of-view stereotype from a stereotypical-male-point-of-view. Non-stereotypical-male points of view recognize that more people than just heterosexual males are interested in finding "compatible girl geeks".

Re:Summary

[EReidJ]

I suppose you're right, actually. I just sort of tossed off that comment because I know the great majority of people who read /. are guys, and this is often a source of humor and tirades. So yes, I posted it from my point of view (and I'm not in the computer industry), but what other point of view could I have?

Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[precize]

"During my freshman year in the computer science department, there were more guys named David than there were girls."

Re:Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[brontus3927]

I think anywhere you go just about, there will be more males named David than females named David. No big surprise there. :)

Re:Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[Rakshasa Taisab]

Yeah, but the blame is entirely on the parents. Gender equality should extend to the naming of their child.

Re:Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[CommiePuddin]

I once dated a girl named David. Best seventeen seconds of my life.....

Re:Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[grazzy]

You surely mean d4vid.

Re:Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[BigZaphod]

Well that makes sense... I've never known any girls named David, either.

Re:Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[vertinox]

Best seventeen seconds of my life.....

You mean the time it took her to realize she answered your question: "Will you not not go out with me?" incorrectly

Re:Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[Elad Alon]

No, he means the time it took him to realise she was in fact a he. Then again, knowing that, do we trust he could read the time correctly?

Re:Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[FleaPlus]

You surely mean d4vid.

Or Da5id. ;)

Re:Best quote on Comp. Sci. gender gap

[grazzy]

Hmm, thats what i meant really, guess it's re-reading time ;)

Trinary

[Anonymous Coward]

Just as the hard-wiring of binary mathematics spun the entire twentieth century about a simple yes-no axis, the invention of the three-state switch promised to revolutionize twenty-fifth century computing. After all, with three states (negative, positive, and null charges) on nanoswitches, computers could now think in terms of yes, no, and maybe, greatly humanizing their internal logic.

This would have brought many, many more female engineers into the field of computer science (hence accelerating the pace at which computers could do useful things besides transmit, compress, and enhance pornography), except that the same abbreviational logic that turned "binary digit" into "bit" turned "trinary digit" into "tit." This nomenclatural error set computing back nearly three hundred years, and two entire generations of promising computer scientists were lost trying to keep abreast of bad puns.

-- The Tayler Corporation. "Plotting to take over the world since 1998"

Re:Trinary

[damiceious]

The only "intuitive" interface is the nipple. After that, it's all learned.
(Bruce Ediger, bediger@teal.csn.org, in comp.os.linux.misc, on X interfaces.)

You don't need to meet a cs girl

[Anonymous Coward]

Meet a bio girl, have her become a doctor, and spend your days changing diapers and compiling the latest ubuntu release.

Re:You don't need to meet a cs girl

[RatPh!nk]

Seriously good idea. Everyone wins. Too bad more people can't take it seriously.... Fanning the flames of the rat race to get a job so you can afford to put your kids in daycare is one of the silliest logical exercises I have ever seen people engage in.

Re:You don't need to meet a cs girl

[Infernal Device]

I didn't realize "winning" involved changing diapers - it seems mutually exclusive.

Re:You don't need to meet a cs girl

[DistantShadow]

Meet a bio girl, have her become a doctor

The funny thing about this is that I'm a CS guy, and my wife is a bio girl...with a PhD. Even more amusing is that, in my experience, this pattern is quite common. I'd say at least 50% of the women my wife has worked with (researchers in various biology/chemistry fields at multiple research universities) are involved with tech guys (CS or some other form of engineering). So, all you single geeks, don't give up! There is a female bio geek waiting for you somewhere.

-ds

Re:You don't need to meet a cs girl

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Only because you forget about what happens right after you change the diaper- or at least does with my 2 1/2 year old. He jumps up, puts his arms around my neck, says "Daddy, Horsey" and away we go. *best* feeling in the world. Sex just isn't complete until it eats up the next 18 years of your life.

Re:You don't need to meet a cs girl

[dr_dank]

I didn't realize "winning" involved changing diapers

Of course it does, theres a prize inside each one. Phew!

/holds nose

Re:You don't need to meet a cs girl

[zerocool^]

I was just going to reply... You've described my life plan!

Currently:
Married
18 month old kid
SysAdmin at Virginia Tech.

Wife:
Applying (fingers crossed) to Vet School at VT.

When wife gets out of vet school:
Vacation
Be Mr. Mom
Maybe go part time after we pay off the student loans
Maybe go to Cullinary School

~Will

Re:You don't need to meet a cs girl

[Pray_4_Mojo]

Thankfully, with the rise of telecommuting, geeks will make great stay-at-home dads.
I love how my workplace let's me do that.

Now I can't wait for the day for my wife to come home from the office and give me a black eye because Dinner wasn't ready when she got home....because I was totally owning in Half Life 2.

Gender gaps elsewhere...

[zubernerd]

I've noticed whenever I hear about a gender gap study or story, the gender gap is a about a shortage of women in good, clean professions with upward mobility and high pay. I've never hear or seen a story about a shortage of women in garbage collecting or ditch digging, or other lower pay and often "dead end" jobs. I've only seen one female garbage collector ever, out of dozens of male garbage collectors, in the various places I've lived.

P.S. I have nothing against garbage collectors... they just happen to be the most visible "down and dirty not high paying" job I can think of. They do a great service for us, I'm not putting them down. I would like to see more women going into CS as well. I'm just pointing out something I've noticed.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[RingDev]

Garbage collectors also get paid pretty well, probrably (depending on municipality) comprably to most custom business software developers.

-Rick

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[rAiNsT0rm]

I'm not sure if you are aware or not but here in PA, A "Waste Engineer" - read garbage man - makes a comparable salary as me... a Network Administrator for a mid-sized bank. They even have better benefits. You'd be surprised at the average garbage man pay, I know I was when a buddy of mine went into the business straight out of High School and is a rich bastard while I have student loans and a stressful job.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[camt]

Actually, the garbage collectors where I used to leave (suburbs of Chicago) make 80K+/year. It may help that it is heavily unionized there. It is a down and dirty job that nobody wants to do, so it pays well.

Your point is valid, though.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Anonymous Coward]

I've seen plenty of female "garbage collectors." Just go people-watching at the mall and observe the type of men that attractive women are attracted to :)

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Mr. Slippery]

Garbage collectors also get paid pretty well

They also have one of the most dangerous (your garbage collector is much more likely to be killed on the job than a cop) and important (along with your plumber, your garbage collector is more responsible for increased life expectancy than your doctor) jobs around.

Somewhere around here I have an old Fenton comic strip with dialog like this: "Did you know a garbage collector makes more than I do?!" "Then get a job as a garbage collector." "Are you kidding? You couldn't pay me enough for that kind of work!"

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Austerity Empowers]

It is a pretty physically demanding job, and while I'm sure many women out there CAN do it, I'm not sure that they'd WANT to do it, and be in shape for it. It's one thing to get up and do some extra push-ups to keep up with the men in the fire department...it's another to go throw trash in a truck. Saving lives and putting out fires is a lot more motivating than waking up at 5am to go lift 1000 30lb+ trash cans over your head.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[just_another_sean]

That's an interseting observation and after reading your post I have to agree. I also notice a distinct lack of gender gap articles in things like nursing. You don't see a lot of "out of X nurses graduating this year only 2 were men" articles floating about the news...

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[CastrTroy]

Also, they rarely ever talk about the lack of men in female dominated jobs. Some of these fields are pretty stable, and growing. Think of nursing, daycare, and many other female dominated professions. Maybe it's just that women aren't interested in computers, just like men aren't interested in taking care of children.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Surt]

I think the central prejudice operating here is two-fold:
a) prejudice based assumption that girls don't like icky (hence, no one expects girls to go into waste management)
b) prejudice based assumption that CS is not icky from a rational person's perspective (have you looked at who works in this field? ick! no wonder girls won't go into the field!)

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Minna Kirai]

along with your plumber, your garbage collector is more responsible for increased life expectancy than your doctor

Nope. The fact that you HAVE a garbage collector is important, but the skills and qualifications of that individual are not.

Both plumbers and doctors have more difficult jobs, as measured by the percentage of the population competent to fill that role.

If 50% of the country's garbagemen exploded tommorrow, the vacancies could be filled within a month. Medical professionals are not so easy to replace.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Red Flayer]

"You don't see a lot of "out of X nurses graduating this year only 2 were men" articles floating about the news..."

That's because the gender gap in nursing is disappearing. It's only news when the gap is increasing.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[milimetric]

1.) as someone else already pointed out, CS does not make nearly as much money as it did when women were going into the profession.

2.) garbage men make a LOT of money relative to me, a lowly programmer. They can have sallaries of around 80,000 and their work schedule is very nice.

3.) I think this whole issue is moot because it's not how many women are going into CS it's how many attractive women are going into CS. From experience, almost all the girls at my college going into CS as a serious career were really hot. So... what's all the fuss about?

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Gulthek]

A better "down and dirty not high paying job" that you should be able to think of is retail employee (i.e. not a manager, of course most managers could also be included in that description).

Or, sadly, community college professor.

Or grade school teacher.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Hektor_Troy]

No, I think part of the problem comes from "OMG HE TOUCHED THE CHILD!!! CHILD MOLESTER!!!" type reactions from certain people. It's so bad in some places, that men can't even take the boys to the bathroom of fear of the repercussions.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[CastrTroy]

Actually, i've heard about this. My GF works in daycare, and although nobody has reactions like you mentioned, parents do think it's a little weird, and sometimes have a few issues with male daycare workers. I wonder if there's any statistics showing how many men are child molesters compared to women, and if their fears actually do have any justification. Not that it matters, since they do a police check before they let you work in daycare. At least in Canada.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[srock2588]

"From experience, almost all the girls at my college going into CS as a serious career were really hot"

What! That's crazy. Have you accurately defined 'CS Hot', because if you drop those so called 'hot' CS girls into a large Psychology lecture, I believe you will change your mind. Being hot next to the other 4 girls in your 80 student lecture is not enough to qualify.

Or you attend Bizzaro University where all the Playboy College Edition entries are pulled straight out of Discrete Math.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[CoderBob]

Considering the shortage of nurses here in the States, I'd say that that the news wouldn't care if the nurse was male, female, or a tranny, as long as they were qualified nurses.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[milimetric]

oh, believe me i've been in these so called psychology lectures. I've seen these so called "hot" girls. Somehow, a girl's ability to talk about Turing machines and concurrent programming makes me ignore the fact that they don't have fake nails, colored hair, 4 inch heels, breast pumps, make up and an eating disorder. Call me crazy but I like my women real.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[thegarbageman]

If 50% of the country's garbagemen exploded tommorrow, the vacancies could be filled within a month.
Seriously? If half of the country's garbagemen exploded, not only would the vacancies go unfilled but the rest of the garbagemen would quit.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[swillden]

Garbage collectors also get paid pretty well, probrably (depending on municipality) comprably to most custom business software developers..

I think this varies wildly, depending primarily on whether or not waste management is unionized. Garbage men don't make much in the places where it's not unionized. My brother in law threw garbage for 15 years ("threw" is the terminology, even though the last five of those years he drove an automated truck) and he never made more than $16 per hour. His working hours were insane, too, typically 14 hours per day, six days per week with no paid vacation and lousy benefits. He stuck with it for so long only because with all of the overtime pay he made better money than he could get elsewhere given his lack of post high-school education.

In the end, they canned him because he was the highest-paid guy they had and they could replace him with kids for $8-$10 per hour.

He got a new job as an explosives handler for Thiokol, preparing the explosives charges for air bags. Although the hourly pay and benefits are better, he makes less money because he doesn't work overtime.

Bringing this back on topic, more or less: There were no women at all in the waste management company, and the only women in his current job are office workers. All of the explosives handlers are men. I should ask him one of these days if his employers ever tried to recruit women in order to increase their workforce diversity. He'll get a good laugh out of it.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[jellomizer]

NY state Law. Male Daycare workers cannot change a babies diper of any sex. That is simple sex descrimation in a liberal state. As well it is a basic job of a daycare worker.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Quaoar]

And the jobs that women "dominate" tend to be some of the lowest paying. My mother works at a daycare center, and she barely gets above minimum wage in the state, despite the fact that she has years of experience, loves her job, and does it very well. Nursing is one of those jobs where the demand is high because the amount of work required scares most people away. They earn a fairly decent salary, but you can't tell me they get even close to what the PhD's working right next to them earn (who, as far as I'm aware, are mostly men).

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Markus_UW]

Actually, my friends and I call this the 'Engineering Factor', where the longer you're in a technical program (i.e. Engineering, CS, etc..) the lower your standards for physical beauty become and the higher esteem you grow to place on the minds of the women... Either that, or it's just maturity kicking in... not sure about that one... I had the worst of both worlds of insufficient females in class with Computer Engineering, but in all my wisdom, I made the decision to switch to Chemical Engineering and haven't looked back (way more girls, and way less messed up math -- both plusses).

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[CastrTroy]

That really depends on where you work. In Canada (ontario at least), daycare workers can make as little as $8 an hour (minimum wage) to as much as $20 per hour, depending on which daycare they work in, and what responsibilities they have, such as being a head teacher. They also may get benefits, and often get lots of vacation and sick time, as their work as stressful, and being around sick kids all day tends to make you sick more often. It's only 2 years of college, and if you like the work, it isn't all that bad. Many daycares also provide 2 free snacks and a healthy lunch each day, because they are feeding the kids anyway.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[drinkypoo]

It's just because you're not getting laid, or otherwise are suffering from low self-esteem. That makes really scary women/men/whatever look much more attractive. The more I get, the more picky I get. The less I get, the more likely I am do to someone I regret.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Shadow99_1]

Strangely I've seen thsi directly... I once worked in retail and when I did I 'had the nerve' to tell a cutomer that he had a cute little daughter (which to me was a complement)... She was like 6 & loved to interrupt us when he was askign questions, so I made the comment without thinking... Suddenly he was yelling at me for being a pervert and demanding to talk to a manager...

My manager was about as confused as me, but I had to promise to never ever say such a thing to a cutomer again... When did guys become automatic perverts for such simple comments...?

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Mr. Slippery]

Both plumbers and doctors have more difficult jobs, as measured by the percentage of the population competent to fill that role.

That's a interesting measurement of the difficulty of a job.

Very few people are competent to, say, be a starring movie actor, while the government will take just about anyone to be a soldier. Are you saying that it follows that Tom Cruise has a more difficult job than some poor schlub getting shot at in Iraq? Not saying that, loopy as he is on the whole Scientology thing, Tom doesn't work hard on his craft and all, but still...

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Mr. Slippery]

So, this crazy website's definition of "acceptable risk" is zero casualties?

Slightly under one death per 100,000 per year is not zero casualties.

Keep dreaming, you crazy libs.

Keep making stuff up and lying, you crazy cons.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[drsquare]

A dustman is just an example. There aren't many women factory workers, miners, bricklayers etc. but no-one complains about that.

It seems it's only unfair if women can't get clean, high-paying jobs.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Minna Kirai]

Are you saying that it follows that Tom Cruise has a more difficult job than some poor schlub getting shot at in Iraq?

It does. "Difficulty" != "risk" != "importance", although those factors do inter-relate in various ways.

But yes, to simply wait around to soak up bullets is pretty easy, although highly risky (and not at all, in the context of USA 2005, important)

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Pray_4_Mojo]

I'm not sure if you are aware or not but here in PA, A "Waste Engineer" - read garbage man - makes a comparable salary as me... a Network Administrator for a mid-sized bank. They even have better benefits. You'd be surprised at the average garbage man pay, I know I was when a buddy of mine went into the business straight out of High School and is a rich bastard while I have student loans and a stressful job.

Not to mention in PA, a garbage collector (who makes more then a network admin) only works 3 days a week. I think they're 12 hour days (36 hour work week). So they make a lot more per hour then entry level or mid-level coders.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Neoncow]

You have to say it with a lisp and a wristflick. "OMG, your daughter ith thoo cute!"

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Senzei]

Seriously? If half of the country's garbagemen exploded, not only would the vacancies go unfilled but the rest of the garbagemen would quit.

Actually it would be harder than just replacing half the country's garbagemen, you would also have to hire on extras to clean up not-so-lucky garbageman chunks.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[toddestan]

Yeah, but they also have access to a nearly endless supply of free, slightly out of date computer hardware. :)

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[Markus_UW]

W00t! go ChE.. Chemical Engineering all the way! Yeah, I must agree, the "Fem" Eng girls are what it's all about.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[doombob]

Actually, This Lady appears quite adept at collecting garbage.

Re:Gender gaps elsewhere...

[maggard]

Care to provide a citation of this 'fact'?

Money

[mumblestheclown]

Is it sexist to mention that as computer science is no longer the gateway to financial riches that it was once seen to be (new motto: "we outsource you") that more people who would not otherwise be drawn into it, well, don't and that this might have something to do with it?

Those numbers can't be right

[Chemisor]

28%? Come on! Which university did they go to? Some girls college, no doubt. In my graduating class there were two women and a about a hundred men, so that works out to two percent or so.

Re:Those numbers can't be right

[RingDev]

My Comp Sci Assoc program started with ~40 stundents. I think there were 5 girls. We graduated 2 years later with 7 students, only one of which was a girl. That's about 12.5% enrolment and 14% graduation.

-Rick

Re:Those numbers can't be right

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Yeah, I went to a large, engineering university. The gender ratio was worse than that for the entire student body, and much, much lower in the hard sciences.

Re:Those numbers can't be right

[GreaterThanZero]

Right...so...better tell the article authors. Your one school proves that their numbers gathered from across many schools is incorrect.

My school, estimate about 10%. And I should know, I notice the other brave souls in class who are in it with me. We live in a high-tech-company city, so higher numbers than some other school elsewhere shouldn't be surprising. Hearing 28% doesn't surprise me, there's gotta be girls down near Silicon Valley who see where the action's at. Their interest in CS will be welcomed there, just as it is here.

Re:Those numbers can't be right

[keezer]

There were a few females in my Engineering Math and Computer Science major. I don't recall any in my graduating class that spoke an Indo-European derivative language as their primary language.

Re:Those numbers can't be right

[srock2588]

The above entries follow my general findings, but it is not only CS that suffers. All the engineering departments were basicly the same scenario. Again, this is from a big ass research University in a big ass tech market (DC).

Last count was in Discrete Math, 80 students registeres, 50 in lecture, 8 girls, 3 spoke english as a primary language, 1 was white. Diversity, I guess.

GO TERPS!

And to think that...

[lampiaio]

The very first geek was a women...

Re:And to think that...

[geoffspear]

Umm, no. Babbage was certainly a geek.

So was Aristotle, for that matter.

Re:And to think that...

[ajwitte]

s/geek/programmer and s/women/woman and you might be on to something...

Re:And to think that...

[91degrees]

Ada Lovelace was a complete fruitloop. She had a highly overinflated opinion of herself, and didn't create nearly as much as she was given credit for. Read The Cogwheel Brain by Doron Swade. It has exceprts from letters where she gushes about her on genius.

If you want a proper early female geek I'd suggest Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper. The "inventor" of the software bug. There were probably a decent number working in Blethcley park during the Second World War.

As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

Like how many male computer geeks lack the social skills to interract with the opposite sex and mistake friendly interraction by female coworkers as "interest" in something more.

As a geek girl myself, I'd put it a bit above half. sucks.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Austerity Empowers]

As a geek girl myself, I'd put it a bit above half. sucks.

As a geek guy, I'd put it a bit above 95%. You only hear from the ones brave enough to come forward.

Speaking of which, what are you doing Friday night?

Re:As a geek girl...

[GreaterThanZero]

I hear ya. It's better sometimes, it's worse others, it depends on the particular environment.

I was on my university's Computing Science IRC channel at the insistence of one of the CS majors. Another chatter asked me to introduce myself, so I said I was just a typical (insert university here) CS student. Then the insistent friend pointed out that I was among the 10% or so in CS courses who lack a Y chromosome. Then the conversation went something like this between he and I

Me: jesus him. stop outing me.
Him: haha well you're not exactly 'in the closet'.
*buncha closet jokes*
Me: i find that in most online areas is it preferable to go as long as possible without revealing i'm female. it's ridiculous.
Him: "Do you have breasts?" "yes" "with a matching vagina?" "yes" "YOU ARE INTERESTING CONVERSATION. I MUST PAINT YOU."

sad thing is, he's dead on about those situations. :)

Though I'll grant, everyone WAS cool with it and he wouldn't have outed me if he thought they'd be assholes.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking of which, what are you doing Friday night?

Going to recompile the Linux kernel and fix the m0n0wall issues. Just like any other Friday night. You?

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

will you marry me?

Re:As a geek girl...

[Total_Wimp]

As a geek girl myself, I'd put it a bit above half. sucks.

So how many, after you politely say no, persist in their pursute? I can understand why a woman would be upset by persistant unwanted attention, but I've never understood why women so often are upset by unwanted attention that goes away as soon as a negative answer is given.

Yeah, the guy is creepy/ugly/smelly/whatever. But what on earth is wrong with him asking, "will you go out with me," even if he does so ineptly while looking at his shoes the whole time? Unless women want to turn things around so they do all the asking, they're going to have to put up with saying "no" evey now and then to someone they don't like. They should get a grip and not act like it's their right to not be asked in the first place.

Put another way, if a good woman wants to get the attention of a good man, why would she be surprised when every one else pays attention to her as well?

TW

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is, they don't ask. They stalk you. They hang around drooling, mumbling into their smelly tshirts. They pester you. You ask them to go away because you are trying to get work done, and they don't.

It's repulsive, harassing, and beyond irritating.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep. I'm a female nix admin...a real rare breed, apparently. top it off with I'm a minority (hispanic) AND an army vet and sometimes I feel like a club of one.

I've had managers tell me during interviews "wow! we've never had a girl work here before!" Then there's the programmers who see me as a challenge...and the ones who want to show me basic stuff. There are programmers I've worked with who couldn't talk to me face to face...then the ones who came by asking me to fix things just so they could watch me bend over. after 10 years of this I'm getting tired. I've been considering making a career change.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Austerity Empowers]

How bout's you put that on your tricorder, there's a Star Trek convention in town and I have a Deanna Troi outfit just for you!

Re:As a geek girl...

[cheezit]

At a bar? Sure. At work? Check your HR manual, it will probably help you understand the difference.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Eli Gottlieb]

Instead of just changing careers and leaving those obnoxious guys obnoxious, why not teach them some social skills? It can be done, I assure you.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Total_Wimp]

The problem is, they don't ask. They stalk you. They hang around drooling, mumbling into their smelly tshirts. They pester you. You ask them to go away because you are trying to get work done, and they don't.

It's repulsive, harassing, and beyond irritating.

Yeah, stalking and harrasment suck. I appologize for my gender and peer group. My comment was just meant to point out that I've seen many women interpret plain ol' interest by a guy as harrasment and not even have the guts to tell the guy to go away.

Sure, it sucks for the dude to be told to back off by the girl. It sucks far worse if his boss has to tell him the same thing and he never even knew there was a problem. But if you already told him to take a hike and he didn't, maybe he needs to learn the hard way. Speaking as a boss myself, if I knew someone was told "no" and they persisted, I'd have no problem showing him the door.

TW

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

It makes my day when a man shows interest in me, no matter how creepy/ugly/smelly/whatever he is. A compliment is a compliment regardless of who it comes from, and I certainly don't think any less of the guy for asking me out. Any girl who acts digusted or angry is putting on a show.

However, it's interesting to note that, of the men in my engineering classes who asked me out or asked me to have sex with them, 100% ended up pestering me day after day, or tagging home after me like a little lost puppy, even though I reminded them every time that I had a boyfriend. I had to resort to being mean and nasty in order for them to leave me alone. I probably just attract the weirdos, but it seemed like the male geeks were either too shy to do anything or went way overboard.

Now that I'm working, the male geeks still ask me out but politely drop the subject when they find out I'm not available, and become great friends in spite of it.

So I chalk it up to guys maturing at a slower rate than girls, geeky or not.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Total_Wimp]

At a bar? Sure. At work? Check your HR manual, it will probably help you understand the difference.

HR manuals rarely say people can't date. If they don't say that, they almost never say person "A" can't ask person "B" out. The notable exceptions are where bosses and subordinates are involved or sometimes when people work in the same department.

Ask yourself this: If you liked they guy, would there be a problem? If the answer is "no", then that should also be the answer if you don't like him. If you're honestly telling my that you'd say no to that great guy in accounting that you've been talking to at lunch then you get a total pass (assuming both of you are "on the market"). But if you'd say yes to him, then you at least owe everyone else the courtesy of saying "no" before you make a federal case out of it. It's not fun, but it's the right thing to do.

TW

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anitra]

Yeah, it sucks a lot. They give a bad name to the ones who actually do the work.

When I was just starting in CS, I was having trouble with an assignment, and my boyfriend offered to do it for me. Hell no! I had to explain to him that I was struggling through this because I wanted to understand it. I didn't want to simply pass the class.. if I just wanted to pass classes and get some random degree, I would have gone into a liberal arts field.

Re:As a geek girl...

[shaitand]

I can't believe I just heard a woman in IT spread a false sexist statement about different rates of MENTAL maturation between the sexes. Females typically begin puberty earlier than males, the difference ends there.

Re:As a geek girl...

[cheezit]

Point is, if you see no distinction between the workplace and a local meat market, you're going to get into trouble eventually. Guys "on the make" can act like real dorks. A little judgment can go a long way.

Re:As a geek girl...

[guaigean]

As a geek girl myself...

Is this a Turing test in action?

Re:As a geek girl...

[guaigean]

and become great friends in spite of it.

That's because he's hoping to stand in line as a friend, thinking that he may have a chance later. Unorftunately for him, and most of our geek brethren, it will only ensure his future failure by placing him in the friend category.

Re:As a geek girl...

[theStorminMormon]

Dude... women mature faster in pretty much every way. You just didn't notice this becase you weren't mature enough to appreciate the differences at the time it was happening.

Some things are just too obviously true to be sexist.

-stormin

(mangled Harry Potter quote for good measure->)

Ron: No one could have that many emotions at once! They'd explode!
Hermione: Ron, just because you have the emotional content of a teaspoon doesn't mean everyone does.

Re:As a geek girl...

[guaigean]

Speaking as a boss myself, if I knew someone was told "no" and they persisted, I'd have no problem showing him the door.

There's a big difference between persistence, and crossing the line to pyschopathic behavior. Persistence can pay off, so long as it involves a respectful interaction between the participants. More than one marriage has formed after the guy being turned down first, but often we geeks lack the social skills to notice the difference between a "Get the hell away from me you creepy smelly dork!" and "I'm saying no, but I just want to see how much you like me." Don't try this at home (or work) if you aren't fully aware of the difference.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Austerity Empowers]

Never on a first date.

Re:As a geek girl...

[cbreaker]

Ohh give me a break. What's wrong with asking a woman or man out from work? I'm serious.

And how the hell are people supposed to meet each other? At the bar? Is that the only place people meet these days? Sounds pretty silly to me. Plus, I don't want a "club chick." You know, they kind that hangs out at the club every weekend. Obviously, not every girl at the bar or club will be a "club chick" but usually the ones that aren't come with a few friends. Do you know how hard it is to approach a girl that's sitting with two of her friends?

I see nothing wrong with asking someone out at work. It's not harrassment if that's what you're getting at. Persisting and not taking no for an answer, yes. But just asking once?

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

By the power vested in me as the Anonymous Coward, I hereby pronounce you husband and wife.

You may now send smilies at each other.

Re:As a geek girl...

[middlemen]

how do u know it is not a desperate geek guy masquerading as a geek girl?

Re:As a geek girl...

[Shadow99_1]

I've known tons of immature girls (I'd call them women, but they dont' really act liek it, so I'm not going to call them that). Blanket statements suck. As your own quote goes, don't fit everyone into your mold of how everyone is....

Re:As a geek girl...

[tsa]

No, it's an anonymoes coward replying to herself.

Re:As a geek girl...

[drinkypoo]

Interestingly enough (to me) I have just finished sexual harassment training (stupid name; should be sexual harassment sensitivity training or something) and you can definitely ask someone at work out. What you cannot do is ask them again after they turn you down, or suggest that if they go out with you, it will help their career, or if they turn you down, that it will hurt their career. It's not harassment until you know it's unwanted (this is true of all harassment) and you can't know it's unwanted until you're told, so you get one shot at asking out a coworker... Make it a good one.

Re:As a geek girl...

[RevRa]

As a geek girl myself, I have to disagree with you. I think there are entirely too many factors to consider when making this kind of statement. A lot of the situation depends on where you live and what kind of environment you work in.

I live and work in Phoenix Arizona USA and I work in an organization with thousands of geeks from both ends of the spectrum. Hardcore nerds who write obscure code all day, to technical project managers who do mostly paperwork, fill out request forms, and assign projects to sysadmins.

I work with, and talk to lots of nerdy/geeky guys and gals who seem able to differentiate between friendly chat and an interest in having a relationship. From what I've found here, there are plenty of nerdy guys around here who are capable of communicating in an effective manner, and are perfectly acceptable mates for nerdy women.

There are lots of excessively flirty guys for sure, but most of them can take a subtle hint that you're not interested. They're socially stunted sometimes, not mentally retarded.

Also, lets not forget that many nerdy women are the same way. I find it excessively difficult to relate to and talk with other women who aren't technical. I don't really have much in common with them. I find making small talk to be quite tedious when some non-technical co-worker wants to blather on about her -precious- toddler, and all I'm thinking about is the lan party tonight where I'm going to frag the crap outta' the guys in BF2.

Lots of that social akwardness starts to fade away as we get older though. I'd say by the time most geeks hit 28-29, they're getting a better handle on life and have more experience with social situations. Just my observation though.

~k

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think it actually works that way. I know lots of girls who hooked up with their male friends, and really, it's the best way to go if you're looking for a strong relationship. Of course, you also run the risk of ruining a riendship that way.

Re:As a geek girl...

[lonesome phreak]

Indeed...the Ladder Theory once again!

Re:As a geek girl...

[lonesome phreak]

uh-huh. Never heard of the Ladder Theory, have you? read it here then tell us what you think off all the guys hitting on you!

Re:As a geek girl...

[coaxial]

This comment reminds of this Electrical Engineering girl I knew once. She one time said, "Sometimes I wish everyone would stop trying to hit on me." She was right. Everyone was trying to hit on her.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Hannah E. Davis]

Maybe this is just because I'm not particularly attractive (bad skin, bad hair, small breasts, etc.), but I've never had that problem.

Ok, so there were a couple of guys in highschool who remained obsessed with me after I turned them down, but they weren't particularly creepy about it, and I was at least as bad back when I was lonely and desperate for even a tiny bit of male attention, and the vast majority of people manage to grow out of that phase sometime in university if not before.

I've found that guys (geek and non geek) will, by and large, at least grudgingly accept it if I turn them down firmly. It helps if I'm willing to be friends with them too -- often the best way to cure a guy of his obsession is to let him see who and what I actually am. I'm no innocent and perfect angel: I'm just a regular geek with plenty of faults of my own.

Re:As a geek girl...

[mmdog]

Let's see, 100% of the guys you turn down don't seem to get the message - perhaps you aren't actually turning them down? Anything less than a direct "No thank you, I'm not interested in you" is just an invitation for them to keep asking.

Re:As a geek girl...

[theStorminMormon]

Blanket statements suck

Hmm... I'm not sure if that's a tautology, a contradiction, or just plain irony.

I really don't mean to be harsh but I can't state emphatically enough how many things are wrong with this position.

Men are taller than women. It's just a fact that, as a group, guys are. It does no good to say whether or not this generalization sucks. That's like saying that it sucks that 2+2=4. Whether or not it sucks it's just the way it is.

So we have two options of handling these kinds of differences. If we think that differences are bad and scary and inequitable then we can shout as loud as we want and pretend they don't exist. We can pretend that guys are not actually stronger then girls, or that girls aren't socially smarter than men. We can obfuscate, complain, and trash anyone who makes the mistake of pointing the obvious out. But this is at best living in la-la land and at worst dangerous. When we have to lower standards so that we can hire enough women firefighters I think we've just gone to far. As my mum said (in reference to rules changes that said instead of a fireman's carry dragging a victim down the stairs was sufficient to become a firemen) "Who are these stupid feminists? I don't want some 5'2" woman dragging me out of the building, I want a 6'2" giant to carry me out!"

Sure, some men are 5'2". And there are some women who are 6'2". But how many of either do you know? And how many women do you know that are 5'2"? Or men that are 6'2"?

Look, the reason I say "I don't want to be harsh" is that I understand what it is that you don't like. You don't like it when people use a generalization to apply it unfairly to an individual. That's discrimination - and in many cases it's mean, evil, wrong, etc. But trying to make discrimination go away by trying to outlaw generalizations is like trying to make electrocution go away by outlawing electricity. It would be stupid to try and in the real world it's not possible anyway.

-stormin

Re:As a geek girl...

[GirlGeek12]

What totally kills me is the shallow nature of men in this business. I have been in IT for over 5 years now. I am an actual hardware tech, you think there isn't a lot of women in IT, well most of the ones that are, they're programmers. I don't know how many times people have looked at me and said "You're in IT, you sure don't look like you belong in IT". I was looking for a new job and was approached by 4 different companies at a job fair looking for a Sales Person. I laughed and asked if they had any tech jobs open. Their mouths dropped. To survive I have had to basically take a lot of crap that is not necessarily justified. I have been propositioned on numerous occasions because a woman couldn't quite possibly have a brain for IT! I have a Bachelors and graduated with honors. I was also head cheerleader in high school. I am not the stereotypical geek. I have to know more and resolve more problems than the other techs just to be taken seriously. And I wonder why there isn't more of us in this line of work? I've become one tough cookie!

Re:As a geek girl...

[TerranFury]

>My comment was just meant to point out that I've seen many women interpret plain ol' interest by a guy as harrasment and not even have the guts to tell the guy to go away.

I've actually had this happen. Just once. Actually, it was worse than what you describe: What I thought was simple general-purpose friendliness was interpreted as sexual advances.

I went to a party with a girl, who ran into a friend of hers who I didn't know. I was introduced to the friend, I assumed, simply because that's what people do to be polite. I tried to be friendly to this new person but didn't think I showed any particular interest. I found out much later that apparently she did, and that she'd told another friend of hers that I'd been hitting on her and otherwise paying her unwanted attention. That shocked the hell out of me. I thought I'd hardly said more than hello.

That made me angry for a couple of reasons. First, that someone would think of me in those terms at all -- I aspire to be a good person, and have always thought that that was the impression I gave. Second (this is the tiniest bit contradictory), that, if she did think that I was making advances, that she was offended by them (why, what's wrong with me?). And third, because I felt that I had to change my patterns of behavior with other people as a result: I began to get the paranoid thought, "I cannot say 'hello' to other people. They will translate it to mean, 'I would like to sleep with you.'"

I've told this story to a few other people in a self-questioning way, and have only received comments to the effect of, "Don't worry; you don't come across that way." But what would I expect people to say? You can't trust people not to tell little white lies to you.

So anyway, I figured I'd post this story, at the very least, as a demonstration that the issues that everyone seems concerned with run in all sorts of directions.

Re:As a geek girl...

[rikkards]

It isn't the asking that is the problem. It is the people who go out for a while and then go through a bad break up. It can cause some serious issues with the office dynamics. If someone leaves the office for another job it isn't so bad but if they have to work together it can get pretty hairy. Plus then you have the people who take sides. Granted you would expect people to have some sort of maturity but looking at how much cash divorce lawyers can bring in, there are lots of people who can't handle the situation rationally.

Re:As a geek girl...

[bleckywelcky]

By "great friends", do you mean listen to you whenever you have something to complain about, bend their schedule around to do things with you, give up their saturday afternoon spent recompiling kernels to have lunch with you, and pay for more than 50% of the stuff along the way? Good friends ... right, they're still hoping for something and getting used along the way :\

Re:As a geek girl...

[Beyond_GoodandEvil]

It helps if I'm willing to be friends with them too -- often the best way to cure a guy of his obsession is to let him see who and what I actually am No, the guy is still probably thinking he can nail you.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Hannah E. Davis]

Maybe, but if he's not bugging me about it, why should I care?

However, I've noticed that most of the geek guys who have been attracted to me in the past weren't really attracted to me, just some idealized version of me... and when they finally realized that I was just a regular socially-inept and rather unattractive geek girl, they stopped bothering me and found someone more suitable.

Re:As a geek girl...

[kjots]

It is kind of like getting a job. Most people do not get jobs through classified ads, job sites or cold calling. Most get jobs through networking. Same with finding a new girlfriend.

Exacly what industry are you in? I never received a job through "networking", I got them by flooding the market with my resume until I get a job interview and then quietly explaining that they should hire me because I'm the best bloody programmer they're likely to find in a very long time.

If I had to rely on my "networking" skills to find a job I'd be living under a bridge by now.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Polyhymnia999]

I agree completely. As a grrl geek myself, I have a strong geeky circle of friends, male and female. Since they came to realize (after a few years and a few reminders) that we are neither alien nor predator, we're all having a lot more fun AND being a lot more productive. Nothing like getting good beta feedback from someone who literally experiences the world from a different perspective, and can communicate in technical terms. We even celebrated a few geek mergers and the birth of a couple of MiniGeeks this year.

Re:As a geek girl...

[LordKazan]

Riiight.. i once dated a girl i worked with.

All the bosses knew we were dating, and we were often found off task out of our area when we had little or nothing to do - they didn't farking care.

Re:As a geek girl...

[MaidMirawyn]

Yeah, the guy is creepy/ugly/smelly/whatever. But what on earth is wrong with him asking, "will you go out with me," even if he does so ineptly while looking at his shoes the whole time?

Umm, in my case, how about the fact that I am married and wearing the requisite ring? It's amazing how often I get hit on in geeky locales-sometimes with my husband only a few feet away. (It's a widespread phenomenon, afflicting most of the married female geeks I know.)

Of course, I can think of several possible explanations. #1: He didn't notice the ring because he was staring at my chest or his feet. #2: He saw it and didn't get it. (But how oblivious can you get?) #3 He saw it, understood its signifigance, and thought, "Ehh, what have I got to lose?"

Frankly, none of these leave me inclined to spend any time with the guy, even as a friend. Remember, a smile and common courtesy do not a come-on make. And guys, check for the wedding ring!

Re:As a geek girl...

[mikek3332002]

But trying to make discrimination go away by trying to outlaw generalizations is like trying to make electrocution go away by outlawing electricity. It would be stupid to try and in the real world it's not possible anyway.

Just like the RIAA or MPAA suing potential customers to stop pirates, it's not possible and it'd be stupid to try.

Re:As a geek girl...

[speculatrix]

as an engineer who's only ever worked in male dominated industries, I found many of the women to be cautiously aloof (except the unattractive ones). over time, and especially once I was married, I found many to be more friendly. I put this down to several reasons:

• my improved social skills
• my not being interested (or desperate!)
• an increasing (but still small) number of women in these jobs

a friend of mine once found that he was able to make friends with women much faster by wearing a wedding ring even tho' not married.

Re:As a geek girl...

[theStorminMormon]

Personally, I have to say that I find it highly amusing when extremely nerdy guys hit on my wife (either in front of me or otherwise). She's a comp sci / math major and damn attractive (if I do say so myself) so it's really inevitable. And I guess since she's fairly young (21) and looks younger they just don't think to check for the ring. Sometimes I'm around to watch, other times she tells me about it when I get home.

I take it as a compliment to my good taste - and she takes it as a compliment too. :-)

-stormin

Re:As a geek girl...

[Total_Wimp]

#2: He saw it and didn't get it. (But how oblivious can you get?)

A)Guys do forget/don't notice. A beatiful woman in our HR department was recently complaining about one of our temps asking her out to lunch. She said, "didnt' he notice my wedding ring?" My reply was a surprised, "when did you get married?" She got married more than a year ago and I hadn't realized it despite the fact that I had been working with her on hiring for a couple of months. Mistakes do happen and I sure would hope the woman would accept an "oops!" and let me get on with my day. (BTW, ignoring the chest comment, is it just possible the guy was so awestruck by your beauty that he forgot to look? Was he too charmed to notice the rest of the world? When a man is in the presence of a charming/beautiful woman, details like the current month, the english language and sometimes the existance of night and day have been known to escape him. I hope you would see that as the compliment that it is.)

B)Expecting that a creepy/ugly/smelly guy _wouldn't_ also be oblivious is kind of a stretch. Anyone who has a pony tail with a gotee and superhero t-shirt should also get a pass. High waters. Pass. I think you get the point. It's not a personal affront to you that the guy is too socially inept to notice your ring.

C)I've know several women to wear rings on their ring finger even though they're not married. There are a variety of reasons, but it usually just turns out that they like that ring on that finger. My current girlfriend is one of them. This subject was even featured on an epsisode of MASH where Hawkeye liked a woman but didn't want to be a home wrecker. He found out later that the ring was a family heirloom and they, ehem, got along just fine after that. Once again, it's not a personal afront to you if they ask and don't know.

I appreciate that you're not on the market and don't want to spend all your days fending off would-be suiters. I also understand that your husband got you a rock that should be blinding and emasculating to any man who would dare look at you. I even acknowledge that you probably shouldn't be spending a great deal of time with guys who've asked you out. Your husband would likely frown on this method of gaining new friends. But the real reason most of these guys asked you out is because they liked you and didn't notice the ring. It's a compliment.

TW

Re:As a geek girl...

[Hast]

I've seen this happen to female friends of mine.

Been out at a club a group of people and some drunk guy wanders up to one of the girls and says something. Naturally since it's a club it's impossible to hear anything so she leans closer and braces herself on him (it's a crowded dance floor and people are getting shoved around). So the guy comes back several times and asks her again.

Afterwards she (and the other girls) are really annoyed by the creep (well he was a creep, even I as a guy'd say that). So me and the other guys have to explain that if you are going to expect any results you have to control your body language.

Don't get closer to him. Don't fucking touch him (unless it's to violently apply your knees to his groin if he's really not getting it) unless you want to entice him. Don't smile or shrug unless you want him to hit on you. Give him a stare of death and mouth "Oh I hope you didn't try to hit on me". Unless he's really drunk he'll get the idea. Or his friends will get the idea and drag him off once he's made enough of a fool of himself.

To the grand-parent: If all the guys you say no to are pestering you afterwards then go take a course on how to show body language. I bet you can learn this at any decent (female, if you prefer it that way) self defence class, a normal martial arts group or just join an amateur theatre group. You quite apparently need to be more assertive with how you tell people off. And let me be clear. Be particularly clear to the guys you actually care about. No need to be mean, just assertive.

Feel free to be mean to the creeps.

Re:As a geek girl...

[theStorminMormon]

Woohoo a nomination.

Just for clarification, what exactly are you angry about?

Are you angry that I think girls are socially smarter than men, or that I think it's clearly proven? If the latter, then your anger is misplaced. I don't think it's clearly proven, just believe it to be true and generally (not universally) accepted. If you're angry that I think that, well, that can't be helped.

But lest you think that I'm just pulling stuff out of my ass to annoy you, here's an article for your reading pleasure. It presents a logical argument, based in evolutionary psychology, for my conclusion that as a group women are socially smarter then men. I didn't say proof: "socially smart" is a lot harder to measure than "physically strong", but I don't want you to leave with your impression that I'm just disguising my opinion as accepted scientific fact.

Chris Crawford, Women in Games: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/issue/17/3 [Escapist Magazine]

As for the inherent contradictions in posting the most subtle and simultaneously stupid posts you've come across, I'll just chalk that up to your clearly highly emotional state.

Please tell me one thing, however. You say "it works", but I'm not sure what you mean. What do you take my objective to be? If I'm trolling, then I would want a flamewar not a+5 moderation. Do you think I'm just out for the mod points? I guess I can't convince you that I don't care about those, but I'm really not sure why you're so riled or what you think my insidious scheme really achieved.

-stormin

Re:As a geek girl...

[BitchKapoor]

However, I've noticed that most of the geek guys who have been attracted to me in the past weren't really attracted to me, just some idealized version of me... and when they finally realized that I was just a regular socially-inept and rather unattractive geek girl, they stopped bothering me and found someone more suitable.

So true. A good bit of the idealization probably has to do with them not being used to dealing with girls. Some of them second guess negatively, too, like assuming you don't know what you're doing or that you don't like them. Oh, and after seeing your other post, I'm sure you're exaggerating about your unattractiveness; everyone has their little idiosyncrasies.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

Heh, ok, as a geek guy who's always been rather shy (although less so nowadays), I've dated 3 "geek girls".

#1 - we used to go out to the bar after work (a whole group of us from the office) shoot pool, have fun, etc. A few times we'd leave and go to the diner together, or she invited me and this other guy we worked with, and his girlfriend, over for dinner... one night we went out, with a couple friends, they left earlier but her and I were talking, actually I was telling her I was interested in this other girl at work, and she said "you shouldn't date her, you should date me"...

#2 - she got hired as a temp, and we worked together for like 5 months, she had two kids, got a full time job with benefits (which she wanted for the kids - good mom, good choice), so I took her to lunch for her last day... and we wound up making out in the park after lunch and...

#3 - met her 1st day on a new job, she was desktop support, thought she was gorgeous, but somehow got the impression she was married. ok, she was seperated... but we became friends, and one october night working late she was 'cold' and I gave a good backrub I guess.. and... lets just say I could make her 'melt'. ;-)

I've never been the most 'forward' person, but all my relationships have started as friendships, not all friendships have become more, and it wasn't neccesarily my goal for them to become more, but all based on whether its 'clicked' between us or not. When its become more, we both felt it and took it there, when it didn't.. I'm still friends w/ most of them, ex-GF or just friend.

Having been on the opposite side of things, and having had a girl virtually *stalk* me, I know how ugly that can be. I'd rather have some good female friends (they have no issues with telling me what they think of any girl I'm interested in) than try and ask a girl out purely because 'she's cute'. Mindless, I've though every girl I've gone out with was 'gorgeous' (although I could show you pictures and I'm sure you might say their 'just ok', we all see things through our own eyes, filtered through our brains)...

But hey, I'm a romantic... I have to have a mental connection with a woman before I can carry the physical for more than a weekend (ok, I've a couple flings that I'm not exceptionall proud of).

Re:As a geek girl...

[Prune]

There's a good bit of truth to that site, but too much simplification and generalization, as well as some bias suggesting that he hasn't slept with that many women. One implication is that if you don't possess the money/status/looks you don't have a chance. The fact is that you can make up with all those things by personality/behavior -- which is something that can be faked until you learn to do it really well. I speak from experience, as I'm a regular looking guy that is, by the fact of posting on Slashdot, a geek. I used to be shy and never approach women, but then I met the right people to teach me and now I've been with more good-looking women than I could have previously thought possible. The fact is, a man's behavior speaks tons to a woman's subconscious, and it's much easier to modify than looks and riches. The trick is finding the right advice, and being persistent with practice until you get it working and becomes a second nature. I'm surprised more geeks haven't figured this out, given their brain power resource, and getting laid more, enriching the gene pool with their 'smart genes'.
There has been a recently published book that looks into actual organizations of people that study and discuss how to get women. It's worth looking into, though I would take everything in it with a grain of salt; I know personally people that use such methods, but I don't think it's the best way to go at it. It's too convoluted and, er, sneaky; what I'm talking about is learning to behave like the guys that are naturally good at this.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Prune]

What the... I guess there's no way to go back and change that to "Anonymous"? I have a feeling this is going to come back and bite me some day, what with all the political correctness bullshit

Re:As a geek girl...

[Anonymous Coward]

I never received a job through "networking", I got them by flooding the market with my resume until I get a job interview and then quietly explaining that they should hire me because I'm the best bloody programmer they're likely to find in a very long time.

Ok, other than that should between start & end "MASSIVE-EGO" html tags, I will tell you that I left my job of 14 years for a little .com, where my boss really *liked* me, in fact my interview I didn't say "I'm the best", he asked a few specific questions I didn't know the answer to, but I knew the concepts and I knew where to look and I guess came across that I could learn anything... I eventually left because I was working 80 hours a week and had no life, not because I didn't enjoy the work, it was very challenging, I liked the job, I liked the people, I just had no life... I had talked to some people back at the old job, and that boss knew what I was capable of, and created a position to hire me back...

And then after he retired, they brought in a new boss, who didn't like me, I knew the writing was on the wall and started looking... the boss from the .com had since moved someplace else, I was talking to him and he wrangled a position for me there where I'm pretty well respected now. I still have contacts at other places from the old jobs, if I was looking again I certainly would contact other people and at least let them know I was "in the market".

I'm not neccesarily saying that I wouldn't also be getting my resume out there and looking, but I would wonder about anyone that bills themself as "the best damn programmer you'll ever find", because truthfully if someone said that to *me* in an interview, I wouldn't hire them. I have an old friend who was looking for a job, we had an opening, I said "they're really good" (and they are), and my boss's reply was "if you say so, they're hired". He'd never met them, but he respected me, so he respected my opinion (and they've worked out really well).

If I was out interviewing, would I be saying "I'm great!" which is what you seem to be playing, no... I'd be saying "I'm well rounded, I have 20 years at this, a lot of skills, and I can pick up new things really well." But then again, I also have the concept that an interview is as much for me to learn about them as it is for them to talk to me. I interviewed at once place while 'looking' to leave that .com, I walked in the door and met the person that would be my 'manager', I thought "pretty stuck up", I met their boss - the director - who showed me the 20x20 room with 40 'consultants' crammed into it (I would have been a real employee) - and after 15 minutes thought "real bastard", and then I met the VP of IT, who gave me a 45 minute spiel about how wonderful he was, and the great job he was doing, and I thought "stuck up a**hole"... and 2 days later they offered me like $10K more than the .com, and I said I had a few more interviews lined up so I wasnt going to decide for another week or so, and a couple days later they called and said "we can increase the offer!", and I said I still had another interview to go on, and two days after that they were practically begging me to name my price and come work for them. I didn't. I'd rather work someplace where I'd be happy, than be someplace working for bosses that would make me miserable but making more money.

Do I have experience? yes. Am I good at what I do? I think so, yes, and I've proved it to my bosses over time, by doing good work. Would I bill myself in an interview as "the best in the world"? god no. I have 20 years of experience, I like learning, and I'm willing to jump in and do what it takes. I'll let them decide how good they think I am. Having done interviews, if you walked in with that "I'm the best you'll ever find" attitude, I'd probably walk you out the door 15 minutes later.

Re:As a geek girl...

[cheezit]

Did I say it is always verboten? No, I didn't. And "asking once" seems okay to me, long as any new female doesn't have to put up with a similar question from every single other guy on the team. And how would you stop that from happening?

My point was that the original poster sounded hard-up and like he was hitting pretty hard on everything with two X chromosomes. The HR manual doesn't say he shouldn't ever ask someone out, but if he is really acting like Leisure Suit Larry at work then he should be looking at what the HR department *might* say if he keeps it up.

I've got no problem with people going out at work, but I wouldn't choose to do it myself (then again I'm married). I can sympathize with the guys talking about where to meet women---I don't have that problem, I can see it would be a pain.

I worked with a guy who was married (mail order bride, I think) with a small child, but would hit on all the new women in the office---really obnoxious stuff, and persistent, and clueless. Eventually he started aggressively pursuing a very nice woman who happened to be 110% lesbian. Just goes to show, let your little friend do *all* your thinking and your whole self will be looking for work.

Re:As a geek girl...

[cbreaker]

Again, being persistent, sleezy, and unprofessional is always unacceptable. The original poster didn't say anything like this. You jumped on him saying "Ohh well, read the HR manual and figure out the difference."

You've backed out of your statement, so at least some of our posts have had an impact on you.

Re:As a geek girl...

[plate of felt]

Right... Which is why I now refuse to date any guy who isn't at least five years older than me. Especially guys who are in IT. From my experience, many tech guys mature even slower than non-tech guys...

Re:As a geek girl...

[pembo13]

Why is it that supposed female slashdotters are posting anonymously?

Re:As a geek girl...

[richlv]

well, this seems to be another situation that is propelled by current culture.

we supposedly are more open towards sexuality than previous generations, but i believe we have been only oppressing it more and more.

this is lead by most religions and especially american christianity, where a view of a naked breast is far worse than a view of a human being killed, sliced and whatnot.

frustration, lack of sexual activity can be very demoralizing, it induces aggressivity - and most humans don't even know what causes their anger or disappointment in most everyday situations.

this "prohibition" on sex has lead to massive explosion of porn industry. supposedly sex should be a normal activity - you don't see many animals gathering around a drawing of a naked of their kin, do you ? they just "do it".

i believe most (if not all) of the people have some sort of a psychological trauma in this regard (i sure have one...) - how freely can you talk about it ? how freely can you talk about it with the opposite gender ?

thing that is considered similar to eating (regarding biological activities) for every other species on the earth is a taboo for humans, so that single 'hello' can be interpreted as !horror! harrassment (southpark reference : sexual harrasment - panda !) and girls get all those geeks snuffing around instead of finding out their chances in a more direct way and doing something more useful if there are none :)

Re:As a geek girl...

[earthstar]

How nice it would be ,if there was a tiny icon near the user name in a comment,that says Male/Female!!

Re:As a geek girl...

[rahrens]

I disagree with your characterization of the previous post. He was relating his experiences in a post online. As you said, it really IS "just a post on Slashdot..." Such shortcuts, omissions, and runons are considered ok for online posting. Otherwise, posting could take all night! Nobody's going to issue a grade (other than karma!) so why worry about it. Look to yourself, and let others do the same. Don't flame someone because of their delivery - look to the content!

Re:As a geek girl...

[rahrens]

D) They notice the ring, and don't care, because often the ring doesn't mean enough to the woman, either, and she'll take him up on his pickup line. For some men, it's like gambling. All it takes is the possibility (supported by the rare instance of success) that he'll win. And if he hits on enough beautiful women, sooner or later he'll win, statistically. So to him, it's worth it to look like to a jerk to all the rest.

Re:As a geek girl...

[greenrd]

I found out much later that apparently she did, and that she'd told another friend of hers that I'd been hitting on her and otherwise paying her unwanted attention.

Perhaps she was just puffing up what had happened to make herself sound more interesting? Perhaps she was a psycho? Who knows.

Re:As a geek girl...

[dptalia]

They do? I'm oblivious..... I never noticed! Or I'm hideously ugly. Nah, can't be that!

Re:As a geek girl...

[dswan69]

It should be simple, a particular task requires certain characteristics. If a job requires you to be big and strong, then it should be open to anyone who is big and strong regardless whether they're male or female.

Re:As a geek girl...

[theStorminMormon]

In general I agree.

If hiring for the fire department was gender blind you'd expect to find a very high ratio of men to women because the requirements involve physical strength (which men have at higher rates than women).

By contrast nursing, which may focus on nurturing and multi-tasking in ways men aren't as inclined towards or good at, would have a higher proportion of women.

This is the case and so I say that, in general, things are fine. But some feminists on this board think that there are no physiological differences and thus would interpret both of the examples above as sexism (though since they tend to think only anti-women sexism can exist the would say that women are being denied jobs in fire departments and forced to work in the nursing field). Others would say that the differences are societal, not biological, and that therefore the #s need to be changed to erase inequities in society.

I think they're generally nuts and that their nannyism is degrading to women and dangerous to liberty - but that's just me.

-stormin

Re:As a geek girl...

[greenrd]

About one supposed female slashdotter is posting anonymously. There are many genuine reasons why she might want to be anonymous.

Re:As a geek girl...

[Mark-Allen]

As an "old man" from the days of iron core memory, it might be have been the same then (1974). My first job was in IT Operations in the US. I dated a very nice young girl who worked in "data entry" (don't ask). After a few months, there was an opening in Ops and she asked me if I'd put in a good word for her to the Ops Manager. Knowing her apptitude in IT, I said sure. And a week later she got the job. But the Ops Manager made sure we worked different shifts. :( A month or so later, we split up but I always thought she was great for the job. And she was.

In the next few months I dated a girl who worked as a waitress in a local bar, but was interested in computers. She also asked me for a recommendation to the Ops Manager. I thought why not? She had always found my "geek talk" fasinating. And lo and behold, she was also accepted. And after a few months she was going great as a shift supervior.

30 years later, I hope they made the right choice because I thought they would be good. Not because they were 'grrls' but because they seemed to really like working in IT.

I have never thought IT was 'gender-related'; only mind-oriented. There are those who find IT interesting and those who don't.

Moving to Europe, I've found that the percentage of IT personnel that are female to be, at most, 25% of the total and that's a quick calc. In the UK, it's a bit higher. But on the continent, it's still quite low.

So, now 30 years later, I find it disappointing that not more young ladies have not taken the path in IT. IT is interesting, challenging, changing, and certainly innovative.

If you're female *and* in IT, I salute you. Thanks for making the industry even more interesting.

Note: my wife is only somewhat interested in IT... but then again, she's Swiss, so she finds banking more exciting. :)

Mark-Allen

Re:As a geek girl...

[DocScience4]

There's a big difference between persistence, and crossing the line to pyschopathic behavior. Persistence can pay off, so long as it involves a respectful interaction between the participants. More than one marriage has formed after the guy being turned down first, but often we geeks lack the social skills to notice the difference between a "Get the hell away from me you creepy smelly dork!" and "I'm saying no, but I just want to see how much you like me." Don't try this at home (or work) if you aren't fully aware of the difference.

There's some trial and error to this, as long as you are respectful and polite (consider it debugging you dating skills, which should provide abundant opportunities.)

I dealt with this by taking no for an answer, dating other people, and being polite with a respectful distance to anyone who'd rejected me. Best to move on, though it takes some "hard knocks" to drill some of this into our brain, especially if our debugging skills are dogged.

I finally got to the point of not pursuing at all, since I think some of the "no, but how much do you like me?" ones were just attention whores. I dated someone briefly that I worked with that I really liked and was disappointed when she suddenly changed her mind early on and didn't want to date anyone she worked with.

I understood but was disappointed. I was nice to her at work with no overtones.

She changed her mind a short time later. We've been married for nearly 20 years.

Sometimes people need to figure out what they want. Best to go about your business while they do. YMMV.

Re:As a geek girl...

[renoX]

Ahem, while it is well established than men have (in average) higher physical strength than women (anyway the sex type average doesn't matter, only individual capabilities matter), where are your proofs that women makes better nurse than men? They 'multitask' better? So what?

It is well established than on average men are better at using maps (something with the way to do rotations in the head), but it doesn't makes men better drivers or better explorers: there is much more to the task than simply reading a map!

Re:As a geek girl...

[drinkypoo]

Aside from my other comment in this part of this thread there is something else I feel I should add - if you decide at work that after work, you will go to the bar, then the bar is considered an extension of work and your employer can get in trouble for not dealing with any sexual harassment directed at you from another coworker, or vice versa.

It's also considered fostering an inhospitable work environment to tell someone that they should do something (like go out with the work crew) because it's a "tradition" or similar. Apparently, that's considered peer pressure.

I hate this shit as much as the next person, but you might as well be armed with knowledge...

Re:As a geek girl...

[theStorminMormon]

I don't have proofs that women make better nurses than men. I haven't seen any proof of that question either way. So, in light of the absence of proof (and until we get proof) which do we presume?

1 - that the discrepency in hiring (be it CS or nursing) is a result of discrimination on the part of the hirers or current people in that career (active discrimination, if you will)

2 - that the discrepency in hiring is a result of preferrences of the women that are placed there by societal conditioning that is harmful (more subtle, passive discrimination)

3 - that the discrepency in hiring is a reflection of the general preferences and aptitudes of men and women that are in turn the result of evolutionary specialization

I can't prove that #3 is right. If I could, I wouldn't be having this argument, I'd be publishing papers or linking to published papers. What i can do (and am doing) is present my reasons for being skeptical of 1 and 2 and indicating especailly that #2 entails its own form of even more insidious discrimination while arguing that #3 is more probable.

I consider it logical that women, who in the homo sapien species have evolved as primary care givers of infants that are helpless for longer than any other species, are biologically better suited to care-giving tasks as a group. This involves multi-tasking because young children need watching after for so long that there may be many successive childbriths before the oldest children are even basically self-preserving.

Men, on the other hand, are genetically predisposed to hunting - which involves more physical speed and a different skill set.

These divergent natures are not the result of societal traditions, by and large they are the CAUSE of societal traditions. As we become self-aware and societal we have increasing power to override our genetic predispositions - and that's fine. Perhaps in time they will fade.

All I'm saying is that at this point in time men and women are specialized towards different types of tasks, and that we should not be surprised to see this reflected in their career preferences and other modern behaviors. Furthermore, the true sexism is the sexism to say that men's specializations are superior. In other words, women need to be equally represented or they are somehow not as empowered as men. I find that stupid, counterprodctive, and sexist.

If any individual woman desires to be a CEO, comp sci major, not have a family or whatever that's terrific. Individual variation is greater than group variation. Some women would make better hunters and some men would probably make better caregivers - these are exceptions that prove the rule. But we shouldn't force individual women to act in ways that they are not individually disposed and I think it's a waste of time (and insulting) to try and coax them to do so.

-stormin

Re:As a geek girl...

[renoX]

Blah, blah.. No proof, only wild assumptions.

When one doesn't really know, one should better avoid making such empty assertions especially this strongly, that's how you get all sorts of disastrous strong belief..

Re:As a geek girl...

[SpecBear]

I once had a conversation that went something like this:

Her: "Boys mature much more slowly than girls do. I just can't connect with guys my own age, we just don't have enough common ground. I won't even consider dating a guy unless he's a few years older."

Me (after looking around the table): "Then why are almost all of your male friends about the same age as you are?"

It's not about maturity, it's about socially conditioned gender roles.

Re:As a geek girl...

[theStorminMormon]

So... am I to understand that any comment on any issues that doesn't include proof is worthless?

Re:As a geek girl...

[theStorminMormon]

it's about socially conditioned gender roles.

I just think we tend to put WAY too much emphasis on society. It's like society becomes this monstrous force we can pin anything on.

I don't so much object to any specific instance of it, I just think our quickness to write off so much as "society's fault" is demeaning of both personal responsibility and individuality on the one hand, and is rather sexist on the other. Just because we talk about girls getting the short end of society's stick more than boys. And in general we talk about girls being victims WAY more than we talk about boys being victims.

While in some cases this is true, I think that our society is equitable enough that unless we balance our victim-talk, we end up doing more harm talking about how helpess and victimzed girls are then good. We perpetuate theh very thing we'd like to get rid of.

Finally, when we say "it's society's fault" we never think about what that means. That's like saying "what does the elephant holding up the earth stand on? another elephant". What is society? Why does it have the gender conditionin that it does? It's not like society just popped into existence ex nhilo one day. We evolved and so does society - we should address that intead of acting like society is the black box where all inquiry ends.

-stormin

Egads, not back to this again are we?

Re:As a geek girl...

[renoX]

Well empty affirmations do not worth much in my book.

God exist. Women/Men are better at XXX because it is their nature. etc..

That's with this kind of mindset that women were forbid to vote, racism and religions works, they rely on 'obvious' strong affirmations. Bleh.

Re:As a geek girl...

[theStorminMormon]

Blah blah blah.

I'm not saying women/men ARE better at CS, I'm saying they are better at certain things and CS may or may not be one of them. I'm not the one saying we should just except empty assumptions for or against. Take "God exists" for example. In my opinion you can have very good reasons for believe for or against - or you can have stupid and shallow reasons for believing for or against.

What I'm really advocating isn't a certain position, it's just open mindedness and reason instead of dogma and assumption.

-stormin

Re:As a geek girl...

[BrenBren]

This was a pretty even-handed description. I wish I had mod-points. :)

-Bren

Re:As a geek girl...

[Hast]

Is running away good enough body language?

Well, you know how dogs tend to chase anything that is running away?

Seriously though, perhaps you should ask some guy friends for hints? As I wrote in my long rant above these girls I know couldn't see what they were doing wrong neither. (They didn't exactly try run away though.)

Good luck though, it sounds like a pretty bad situation for you. I hope you manage to make them get the point.

Back in college...

[steveo777]

My first class in Assembler/Cobal (assembly code-fun, COBOL-like getting teeth pulled... throught the cheek). The professor walks in. Doesn't even say his name. Looks around the classroom. Says:

"There aren't any women in here."

Uhhh

[oman_]

Think this might have to do with the fact that after the dot com crash computer science was no longer viewed as the way to ensure a profitable career?

I have met VERY FEW women who actually LIKE programming among the women professionals I've met.

Re:Uhhh

[MobyDisk]

Think this might have to do with the fact that after the dot com crash

That's what I thought, but the submission says the peak was in 1985. Maybe we just need more Matthew Broderick movies to entice the females.

Re:Uhhh

[Zordak]

That point of view is sexist, politically incorrect, and probably absolutely true. All of these "gender gap" studies (in any field) seem to start with the premise that every field of work should have basically a 50/50 gender split. I think that is patently absurd. The differences between men and women extend beyond just plumbing. My personal experience is fewer women enjoy computer science -- not because they're uneducated or incapable, but because they simply prefer to do something else. Should we be trying to force them into a field they don't enjoy just because it conforms to the way we think things should be? I think our loftiest goal should not be to promote a 50/50 gender split at all costs. Nor should it be to exactly match the demographic for any other group. It should be to make the profession available to anybody who cares to pursue it. If that means that only 1/4 to 1/3 of the profession is composed of women, as long as that reflects the actual number of women who wants to do it, there's nothing wrong with that. If we try to artificially inflate the number to 50% just because we arbitrarily decide that's what it should be, we end up with a lot of women in the field who would really rather be doing something else.

Re:Uhhh

[Hannah E. Davis]

*raises hand* ME ME ME! Ok, so I'm not a professional yet, but I enjoy my programming courses and generally get good marks in them. That's gotta count from something, right?

Re:Uhhh

[Sax Maniac]

No, that makes too much sense, it has to be a conspiracy!

If it's not exactly 50/50, then it's not because less women are interested in computers.

No, it's because the dominant, repressive, patriarchal society is forcing females to not be interested in computers, via systemic direct conditioning and discouragement towards such roles, and indirect systemtic persuasion to other existing genderified normative roles (e.g. "Your hair looks nice today" really means "You and your entire gender are physical objects whose sole role is to provide sexual services, and you should not learn to read"), to keep them having successful careers in order to force them to stay at home so they can be slaves.

[shudder] Wow, how do people write like that and not be joking?

Re:Uhhh

[Aranel Alasse]

It [our loftiest goal] should be to make the profession available to anybody who cares to pursue it. If that means that only 1/4 to 1/3 of the profession is composed of women, as long as that reflects the actual number of women who wants to do it, there's nothing wrong with that.

I agree. I'm also glad that my employer attained the lofty goal of making the profession available to me (a female computer programmer).

I know I went to an unusual (and small) college, as far as the ratio of guys to girls is concerned (about half of us CS majors were female), and I often heard that we were an unusual CS department, but it didn't truly phase me until after I graduated and was looking for a job. Finally I came to the realization that I was in the minority, but thankfully, I never suffered because of it. The first place I interviewed at hired me--which I'm very grateful for, but I still think is weird, because I'm the only girl in a department of 14 of us.

Some days, I think to myself, "Wow. If I didn't REALLY like what I do, I'd probably be miserably lonely."

(Other days, I think to myself, "I'm glad I'm the only female, because then I don't have to compete with anyone."--And I'm NOT talking about competing for the guys (I'd never date/marry anyone I work with), I'm talking about competing with any other girls in the sense of annoying competitions regarding appearances and other sorts of materialism. It's very freeing, sometimes, to be the only girl.)

I think one of the things I really liked about my college was that I didn't feel like I had to be a geek/nerd (take your pick) in order to be a CS major (although, I felt like I could be, if I wanted to be). I think (but I'm not sure, since I'm just speculating) that I would have felt more pressure to be geek/nerd-ish if I had gone to a bigger, more gender-lopsided school.

I think it mostly comes down to personality type (I'm an INTP personality type), and perhaps girls are less inclined to be of the personality type that enjoys things like programming.

Oh well. *shrug* I just enjoy doing what I do. And I'm glad my employer is ok with the fact that I'm a girl.

Re:Uhhh

[PureCreditor]

Affirmative action is just the same way to artificially inflate different demographics to pursue a 100% match between student population and general population, regardless of the qualifications.

Look at UC Berkeley's admission stats. Once affirmative action was struck down, percentage of whites stayed just about constant, blacks went sharply down, and Asians shot up, indicating that that gap of Asians (or any other group) has been artificially suppressed in the name of affirmative action and anti-discrimination.

And there's no such thing as over-represented minority. If asians represent 20% of the best talent pool, then let their performance and achievement speak for themselves, not their ethnicity.

Re:Uhhh

[CAIMLAS]

Don't let anyone tell you otherwise: the people (women and stupid men, mostly) that bitch about "gender gap" do not want equality.

If they wanted equality, you'd see studies like this done about fields like plumbing, carpentry, construction, and other "unskilled" jobs. You don't see this kind of thing about a (technical) field like massage thearapy or salon duties (both of which pay pretty well) - because women already have the majority in fields like that. What the bitches that trump stuff like this really want is to trump men financially - to "wear the pants", if you will - and their behavior shows it. Women like this are simply bitter hags that have a bone to pick - and likely a full skeleton of bones in the closet.

Re:Uhhh

[yahyamf]

All of these "gender gap" studies (in any field) seem to start with the premise that every field of work should have basically a 50/50 gender split. I think that is patently absurd.

I completely agree. Why else would the creater (or nature for you atheists) make two sexes? They're meant for different purposes. Saying men are superior because they're better an engineering makes no more sense than saying engineering is superior to day care/child rearing etc. Both are required for a health society. What we need to do is to stop denigrating the types of work women commonly do and respect them for doing it. Women in the West are typically ashamed to admit they're housewives, fotunately this is not (yet) the case in most of the Islamic world. Maybe that's why 4 out of 5 converts to Islam in the US are women.

Re:Uhhh

[dptalia]

Hey, I like programming and I'm female! And I'm damned good at it!!! But, I have to agree with you. With one other exception, all the women programmers I know aren't enjoying themselves.

Re:Uhhh

[zerofret]

Let's see For the most part, the ladies are choosing career paths other than computer science and all indications are that they are doing this of their own free will. Likewise a larger percentage of men are selecting computer science as their freely choosen career field. All this free will stuff is screwing up the 50/50 split demanded by political correctness.

So now that we've identified free will as the culpret behind the problem, what do we do about it? There are a couple of possible "solutions".

1. We draft large numbers of females into computer science, even if they wish to do something else and have little aptitude for the computer science field.
2. We cap the number of males allowed into the profession, even if that means excluding men with a great aptitude and desire for a career in the field.

The second option wouldn't work because that would simply gut the profession. The first option wouldn't work either since someone with no desire to be in the field will be pretty much useless anyway.

Maybe what we really need to do is to finally realize that there is no problem here. Nobody is being forced into or out of the profession on the basis of gender. People are simply exercising their God given right to choose their own path in life. The fact that a smaller percentage of women than men find personal fulfillment in the computer sciences is just one of those things that is neither good or bad, it just is.

Stinky-pants

[visionsofmcskill]

Maybe the thought of an exciting career working closely with balding, over-weight, potato-chip eating, diet dr pibb drinking, socially inept, 12 hour funk from working without moving, and red-stapler asking, porn addicted 90 pound eye-glass wearing (weird foreign accent too?) wimplings isnt exactly the ideal or "cool" environment with mass appeal to the females.

Im sure there's always that 19% whose intrests in computer science balenced with their ability to tele-commute are powerfull enough to overcome any obstacle. Even being harassed into wearing their hair like Leia.

--not that programmers are ALL like the above, but its a pretty tough image to beat, mainly because theres is a substantial segment of programmers who do unfortunately fit the bill.

Re:Stinky-pants

[ryry]

over-weight ... 90 pound ... wimplings

Man I sure am glad I chose an English degree over CS ...

Re:Stinky-pants

[Rary]

In my experience, what you just described is actually the minority of cases in professional IT. The guys who fit that description are largely the basement-dwelling 1337 h4x0rz, whereas the guys who actually find employment in industry tend to (have to) have social skills.

Don't forget that thanks to the dot-com boom, working in IT became fashionable, so that everyone from all walks of life wanted to get in on it. As a result, the old school computer nerds now work side by side with the jocks who beat them up in high school.

Re:Stinky-pants

[just_another_sean]

"with balding, over-weight, potato-chip eating, diet dr pibb drinking, socially inept, 12 hour funk from working without moving, and red-stapler asking, porn addicted 90 pound eye-glass wearing (weird foreign accent too?) wimplings"

So which one are you?

Re:Stinky-pants

[lrucker]

Been doing this for over 20 years, never met anyone even close to that description. I know that's supposed to be the media stereotype, but other than the red-stapler guy in Office Space, I'm not even sure that's true - the Lone Gunmen are my first thought when I think of geeks on TV. (The actors were at the Mac OS X ship party, and fit in perfectly)

Re:Stinky-pants

[Surt]

I think he meant for you to parse '90 pound glasses' as the type of glasses being worn.

I could be wrong, though, there are plenty of over-weight 90 pound wimplings in CS for sure. In English of course they'd be under-weight 70 pound wimplings thanks to the lower pay making excessive snacking prohibitive.

Re:Stinky-pants

[Pray_4_Mojo]

I've attended lectures from a professor who's work is partly responsible for RFID.
Everyone is really wow'd by his smarts.
One day, he just stood up and said, "You know what is the #1 valuable asset to success in this business? The one thing that CEO value the most?"
We all listened intently.
"Social skills."
He went on to list other attributes. Technological Skills (i.e l33tness) was #3 or #4.

Again, with your boss or CEO, YMMV, but now that the idea that LIMITLESS TECHNOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE is just an outsourcing contract away.

CEOs with Tech backgrounds might diagree. And that's okay, I disagree. But I still make it a point to communicate to my PM in as friendly and straight forward as possible.

Would you want to be a female in a CS class?

[rAiNsT0rm]

I know in some of my college classes at Penn State the rare female CS student would be in class and the oogling and 6th grade antics were in full force by the oh-so-suave geeks surrounding her. No wonder no chic wants to be in CS.

Re:Would you want to be a female in a CS class?

[jimbolauski]

The fact that being in CS classes is hard on a female is nonsense. Fist they can get any guy to drop what their doing and help them at a bat of an eyelash. Second any attractive femal will be hit on in class, it just so happens that most CS majors are socialy inept an have no A game, it's painful to watch at times. If women avoided learning because they were getting hit on then they would not finish highschool unless they were very unhot. Most hot girls are good at getting what they want and don't mind being hit on to get it and only the smart ones figure this out and enter the field.

Re:Would you want to be a female in a CS class?

[lrucker]

they can get any guy to drop what their doing and help them at a bat of an eyelash

Why didn't anyone tell me that when I was in school?

Just kidding. Where's the fun in letting someone else solve the cool problems for you?

Re:Would you want to be a female in a CS class?

[ChocoBean]

Fist they can get any guy to drop what their doing and help them at a bat of an eyelash.

while i understand where you are coming from on the bigger picture of your post, ironically you sir, have just demonstration gender discrimination

When a male student is asking another male student for help on some class work, we all assume that things are hunky-dory and normal. But when a girl is getting help people immediately assume that she's using her gender to get what she wants. We think that it would be harder for a guy to get help than a girl.

now, I don't know if statistically that is true most of the time, but the fact that we often immediately assume that it's "easier" for girls is precisely the problem. If I'm asking for help I would want to be thought of as having worked just as hard as my male counterparts, and still failing to grasp some idea, then asking a classmate. I don't want to be perceived as being some lazy bimbo who just wants to get through CS school without having to write a line of code.

Sir, I'm not attacking you, just merely pointing out that gender stereotypes DO in fact, exist.

Women are more sensitive to guys

[ackthpt]

The smell impending doom of the tech job market and flee to other fields.

You can tell, you know. You can tell because they don't have caved in foreheads from beating them on the wall everytime someone takes a techy for granted.

"hey, I know it's 10 minutes before 5 and it's a friday before christmas, but could you do this urgent pile of work while the rest of us bugger off to our last minute shopping and holiday parties? i knew i could count on you. there'll be a little something extra in your pay packet this month (a candy cane)"

No shit, Sherlock!

[Gogo0]

...are in an uncomfortable position to begin with
REALLY??

You mean being oogled by obese sweaty men who all wear spock ears to work and tell jokes in binary put women in an uncomfortable position??

Re:No shit, Sherlock!

[ajwitte]

I prefer my jokes in octal, you insensitive clod!

CS-related fields booming

[datawar]

There's still plenty of girls graduating in fields around computer science: communication majors going into human-computer interaction, science & technology studies majors studying the social impact of computing, etc. Information science and other "not-just-techie" graduate fields around the country are around 50/50 by gender. These girls may not care about programming the "best" distributed computing platform ever, but you can be sure they know more about what one means in society than the majority of techies.

Re:CS-related fields booming

[GreaterThanZero]

In addition to "hear, hear" I'd just like to add that at my school, a CS major is required to take a course called "Social Implications in Technology" (I think). I'm a CS minor (Cognitive Science major), and that was one of the best courses ever. There should be two of those courses, one in the first two years and one in the last two.

It went into the whole thing of technological utopianism (hooray, no more bugs!) to the disenchantment and complete rejection of a technology (oh shit, DDT kills animals) to not even seeing any benefits anymore (he mentioned something about how in one area, having a light spraying of DDT on the (inside?) walls of a house was beneficial and not really harmful -- I think for bugs or something -- but EVERYONE thinks DDT is still completely terrible so it's completely rejected).

Sorry. Just had to mention that if I had the will/drive, I would totally do social research with regards to technology. I think it'd be cool to study girl gamer/geek habits/reactions/anything someday. (don't take that in a creepy way -- I'm a girl, I wanna know how I tick too)

Re:CS-related fields booming

[srock2588]

I apoligize in advance for this post, but I am bored at work with source code on my screen.

Are the dollars I make as a programmer generating the tax dollars that would fund your 'social research', because seriously, that ain't adding to the GDP. I think everyone in the social sciences should be forced to pass at least 1 required engineering course, that will learn'em what real work is.

That post is brought to you from 4.5 years of building hostility towards those who graduated with a 3.8 but still had enough time to go drinkin 5 nights a week and attend half your classes stoned. Damn you Business School and Psychology Department!

Re:CS-related fields booming

[One Div Zero]

Here, the government and history majors drink 5 nights a week, write their papers at the last minute, get a 3.8 GPA, and each run some sort of student group on campus. Then, they get out of school and have a leg up over the rest of us for having a high GPA and "leadership experience."

I guarentee that the rich and famous of my graduating class will not be the engineers. It'll be the ones who ran for Student Assembly (which does nothing and barely meets), ran the Museum Club (wtf is that? We have a museum?) and still had more fun than you did.

Re:CS-related fields booming

[One Div Zero]

What's really scary is, I think I know what school you go to. I think I've had classes with you. So much for the pseudonymity of Slashdot.

Re:CS-related fields booming

[JasonY1982]

I would have to agree that CS related fields are more appealing to women and are closer to the 50/50 split, but still far from equal. As as fairly recent college grad I would have to say in the courses I took that were more towards IT services, consulting, IT project management were probably around 30% women. However, in all my classes that were strictly programming like Java or C# there were about 2-5 girls in the class when I was a senior. That was down from the amount of girls who enter CS related majors as a freshman and switch to something else.

Another thing I noticed was the women in many programming courses sometimes get 'pushed' aside by male programmers who want to take control of the group project or code everything themselves. They then end up doing the UML or other documentation that accompanies the actual app being developed. That isn't the best experience and can lead to a decline in female graduates from CS majors.

Re:CS-related fields booming

[srock2588]

Agreed, which is why they can all go to hell.

On the upside, those degrees almost always require graduate work which I hope is gruelling and painfull. At least I gets paid now.

Re:CS-related fields booming

[datawar]

I hope you realize you must die now...........

MRS Degree

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

So they are more likely to be dissuaded from pursuing computer science if they are exposed to an unpleasant environment, bad teaching, and negative stereotypes like the image of the male hacker.'

I don't know if the number is statistically significant, but from my own anecdotal experience I know a number of women who went into CS because of the gender difference and because they were more interested in finding a financially stable husband than in learning about computer science. I know several women who became engaged and/or married and then switched degrees or dropped out. I imagine the same is true, in reverse, for certain fields dominated by women. I know at least one guy who joined the cheerleading squad to meet women.

Re:MRS Degree

[Nightlily]

That's amazing. Most of the female students I know in computer science are there to learn. Several of us women in computer science are already married and didn't need to go into CS to meet men. I will go even farther in saying if I was single, I wouldn't date any of my fellow students.

For the record, I have one semester left until I complete my MS in computer science.

Re:MRS Degree

[cecille]

I'd hardly say that's the motivation in most cases. I really doubt that girls are fleeing out of high school and getting into whatever program they can find that will net them a husband and then transferring out. Joining the cheerleading squad is hardly the same as getting yourself into a four-five year degree just so you can find a husband.

Oh, and incidentally, I AM a girl in comp eng, and I did meet a nice comp eng boy during my undergrad. It happens. I find comp sci students and engineering students often date within their programs becuase they are so many classes together and becuase they understand (and probably share) your odd schedule and workload. Now I'm back in grad school, and I don't think I could be loving it more - I really am a computer geek at heart. <sarcasm>Oh, but sure glad I found that boy, 'cause otherwise it really wasn't worth it.</sarcasm>.

Re:MRS Degree

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Most of the female students I know in computer science are there to learn. Several of us women in computer science are already married and didn't need to go into CS to meet men. I will go even farther in saying if I was single, I wouldn't date any of my fellow students.

I agree that most women are probably in classes to learn, rather than to meet someone. What I was saying was that there is some percentage for whom that is not true and that percentage may or may not make up some of the discrepancy that explains why more women drop out of CS. I imagine this is true in any field where one gender is under represented. Anecdotally, I know one young lady who went into CS because she wanted to go to a particular university, but they did not offer interior design and she thought one of her brother's friends in CS was cute. I know another person who told me she went into the field because it was interesting but said she probably wouldn't finish because she planned to get married and become a home maker. Try not to take either my anecdotes or this possible explanation as a personal attack. It is just one possible explanation.

Re:MRS Degree

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

I'd hardly say that's the motivation in most cases. I really doubt that girls are fleeing out of high school and getting into whatever program they can find that will net them a husband and then transferring out. Joining the cheerleading squad is hardly the same as getting yourself into a four-five year degree just so you can find a husband.

Perhaps not, but a significant number of people go to a college or university because it is expected of them. A non-consequential number either do not have any real plan for their degree when they start school, or have an idea that does not require a degree. Believe it or not, but a significant portion of the population (especially among those that can afford a higher education) still adhere at least somewhat to the belief in an atomic household, with a stay-at-home parent. For the record, I am not one of them. Nonetheless, in my experience it is possible that this could make up a significant portion of the discrepancy in the percentage of male and female students that graduate with a CS degree. When faced with a more or less arbitrary choice, it is conceivable that a person might choose the one that offers them the best prospects for meeting someone. It is, after all, one of the primary themes and behaviors of our species.

Re:MRS Degree

[drinkypoo]

What I find amazing is how butt-hurt women get when you make a non-generalization generalization. Even when you include a disclaimer saying "this is what I've seen" women will jump all over the conversational grenade screaming.

I bet the numbers are higher than you think. Most guys who take home ec classes in high school are there for one reason, and no one thinks that's unusual or surprising or needs to be defended or decried...

And I think so many people in like courses date because they have common interests that bring them together. The vast majority of my girlfriends have not ever been employed in computer-related disciplines and the one who was... well, she was the worst woman I ever tried to make a go of it with. Fucking psycho, serious anger problems, and no social skills to speak of. Needless to say I am no longer looking for geek girls, but if one drops in my lap, I might give her a shot. Well, were I single.

Re:MRS Degree

[cecille]

ok...well then let me just come back and tell you what I'VE seen. The females in my program (comp eng) are just as intelligent and dedicated as any of the males. I have yet to see anyone net themselves a man and then run fleeing from the department. Engineering (and comp sci for that matter) are not really easy programs to get into, and at least in canada you need to start planning your course path in grade 10 to get into the correct stream for a university program. When I started the university entrance average was hovering around the 90 mark with scholarships and funding starting higher than that. Five out of the six required grade 13 courses were set as pre-req's for the program, all with pre-requisites starting in grade 10. I worked quite hard in both high school and university to get the marks required to get the funding and scholarships I needed to get through school, as did most of the other people in this program. This wasn't just a last minute choice, nor do I think it could be for a lot of the people in this field. You don't just wake up one day and think "gee, there are lots of hot guys in engineering...maybe I should do that".

And yes, sorry, I do find it a bit insulting when someone insinuates that my degree would be worthless unless I had found a husband to top it off. Yeah yeah, you're just talking about what you've seen, but you offered it as a reason that women go into tech fields. For a lot of people that's really not true at all. That WAS a generalization - taking a small sample of what you've seen and suggesting that it might be widely applied to a majority. You can preface it all you want with "this is only my observation", but that doesn't make it any less a generalization. If you really thought it wasn't univerally appicable, then you wouldn't have posted it.

I know you're just trying to talk about what you've seen, but when you throw your own observations out in a public forumn, you have to realize that there are people out there who will disagree. And sorry if the fact that I disagree with you is insulting, but you must have expeceted it since you already know that "women will jump all over the conversational grenade screaming".

Re:MRS Degree

[drinkypoo]

The funny thing is that it wasn't even my statement, it was someone else's. Thus you clearly haven't been paying very close attention. By the way, I address both men and women in this same snarky tone :D

The fact is that some people do things just to get laid, to net a mate, whatever. It doesn't have to be a majority or even much more than "statistically significant" to be worth relating.

find one, they're worth it

[LABob]

Geek girls are _amazing_ in bed. It's like Technical Sex 101 ;)
 
They're good with math too!

Re:find one, they're worth it

[szo]

They're good with math too!

Now that's good to now :)

It's not just schools...

[vontrotsky]

Open source software is even more heavily male dominated than academia. The Debian women project has some ideas about why this might be and how to fix it. (http://women.alioth.debian.org/faqs/)

Or Maybe....

[Wicked187]

The females just have more common sense and realize that CompSci is a dying degree that is better served by more specialized degrees in eiterh CompEng or InfoSys.

And it will continue to grow

[drsmack1]

You know, Men and Women are different. Why is that so complicated? In my IT career I worked with about ten different women who had equivalent jobs as I and I have had some contact with probably a hundred others. In that time I have found 1 (one) who I thought *really* understood the finer details of the job. In almost all cases the women would gravitate towards the administrative side of things; paperwork, organizing, etc...

As a electronic technician in the USAF (METNAV) I found the same thing - except it was worse there. They just were not interested in the real nuts and bolts of our job. Again they would gravitate towards the administrative parts of our job.

That is just *my* experience. I'm sure that many of you will site a exceptional woman that you know and project her as the norm.

Re:And it will continue to grow

[cecille]

oh please...yeah, every woman you've ever met is an incompetant moron. And every male is god's gift to programming. Just LOOK at your post - it's rife with negative stereotypes about women in technical fields. And we're wondering why women don't feel comfortable going into technical programs? Look no further.

It's not just this post either. I can't tell you how many patronizing comments I got during my undergrad. Male students who would make these degrading comments about women and computers. Meanwhile I'm pulling off 90's and they're barely passing. Talk's cheap. Just because you say women are stupid and ignorant about tech stuff doesn't mean it's true.

Re:And it will continue to grow

[drsmack1]

*I* was just relating *my* experiences. Are you a better judge of what I have experienced in my life?

Or maybe...

[Arthur B.]

... we could accept that men and women are different in nature, very different and that men perform better on technical skills than women, period. It's called specialization, it goes back to the beginning of life and there's nothing sexist to it. The social pressure justification seems a little far fetched, for the sake of correctness. Women perform much better than men in a wide variety of intellectual activities, I'm not implying any kind of superiority, I am just saying the obvious. P.S. Counter-example are pointless because this is of course a general trend and applies on average.

Re:Or maybe...

[datawar]

It's both sexist and constraining to what it means to be a "computer scientist". You can't just break CS down to "manly" and "girly" parts because it is huge field with an incredible variety of things you can do. You don't even have to know how to program to be in a CS program (thought it's uncommon) -- you can be a theorist. Or you can be Anyway, there's so much to computer science that's it's just ridiculous to think it's something "masculine" or "feminine".

Re:Or maybe...

[Arthur B.]

I didn't break it into parts. When I was referring to other fields I was thinking completely outside of computer science. I am a theoretical computer scientist so I know what it's about. In classes of pure CS there were maybe a 2% girls, most of the time lagging behind. You're saying there are so much field in CS it's "ridiculous to call it masculine or feminine"? Urrr actually I am going further than this. CS as a whole is small enough to make this statement accurate, but I think it could be extended to things that needs an analytic mind. I'm not stating something binary here. I say there is a natural masculine bias in analytics task and a natural feminine bias in holistic tasks.

Re:Or maybe...

[datawar]

Well, I'm a guy studying the "holistic" side of CS -- information systems, software architecture, human-computer interaction, etc. I think then the problem is framing computer science as an "analytical" field... Sure, I trudge through the various theory and low-level classes with the rest of them (yes, I program all the time, and program well), but 50+% of my classes are cross-listed and engage a variety of disciplines, which have been traditionally gender-neurtal (as of the last 25 years at least -- psychology, sociology, etc.). I think if women can comprehend and support a complex socio-biological system (e.g. nurses), they can comprehend and support a complex socio-technical system (e.g. software engineer).

Maybe the field of "information science" that is springing up in many schools will help that. Yea, you still need to take a nice helping of the technical classes, but you also get to take many humanities and social science classes.

(Not that I'm knocking on the analytical side of CS. It's fascinating, and important, and it's great that there are people doing it. I don't think that it's not a mostly-male field either, but you have to start the cross-over somewhere...)

Re:Or maybe...

[Hannah E. Davis]

We just have to make sure that we remember that these are indeed averages. I am one of those female counterexamples of which you speak, and it gets kind of irritating when people act as if I'm overcoming great hardships by going into computer science... even though I'm really just a regular geek (yes, complete with bad social skills and a worse fashion sense) who happens to have a second X chromosome instead of a Y chromosome.

I think we're a lot better off just avoiding/ignoring the gender issues and letting people go into whatever field they want. Girls like me will end up in computer science because that's where we want to be, and "average" girls (along with "average" non-geek guys, for that matter) will not.

would be interesting to compare to other measures

[buddyglass]

I'm curious to know whether the gap in CS degrees awarded mirrors the gap in mathematics performance at the high school level. Or, for a more direct comparison, the number of passing grades on the Computer Science Advanced Placement Exam per year awarded to men vs. women. Poor teaching and other college-related factors may be a contributing cause, but I think the bulk of the gender gap is manifested way earlier than the university level.

Respect

[mister_llah]

Well, first let me say that I feel lucky, at my university, there is about a 10% female population in my CSCI classes.

Now, that being said, I have seen most women being viewed as technically inept. I have a friend who is working towards her masters in computer science who complained, quite frequently, that her classmates (entirely male) were not taking her seriously.

Could it be that our own geeky superiority complexes are keeping us from having the joy of female company? Something to think about before you suggest that a girl can't code.

Re:Respect

[Andrewkov]

Those girls probably thought they were signing up to be CSI's.

Re:Respect

[Scoth]

There's a woman I work with who can hack'n'crack with the best of them who gets the "Okay, this is a mouse..." treatment every time someone new starts up in tech support, takes a shine to her, and tries to impress her. Needless to say they never get very far with her :) Although her being married might have something to do with that too...

She plays a mean game of CS too. Totally cleans my clock, though I play rarely enough that I've never had the practice to get beyond mediocre.

Re:Respect

[CastrTroy]

It's not that she's a girl, it's that she's a person. Many computer geeks think they are all that, and won't take anybody elses opinion, regardless of their gender.

Re:Respect

[cecille]

It's not just CS guys...when I was in my undergraduate I was a TA for a first year computer course (intro to computer applications). It used to be this bird course (all word/excel crap), but the prof really beefed it up, and we started teaching basic UNIX, html and css and some access database stuff. Not rocket science, but definately more than a lot of the students had seen before (or probably even cared to see in the course). Well, sure enough, I come in on the first day and there's a guy sitting in the second row mouthing to his friend about girls and computers like he's some kind of computer god. I'm doing the lab and he's making comments. Well, fast forward about 30 minutes and I look over and he's looking really confused...I go over, and he's not even in the right program, but he's still trying desperatly to follow the lab. He was lost right from the start, but wouldn't ask. I hope it really hurt his big ego when I fixed his stuff up in like 2 minutes, and I hope it hurt even more when he had to come find me at the end of the lab to figure out what he had missed.

Re:Respect

[NitricEster79]

Ok did you consider the simple fact that the majority of women are technically inept? I work in a call center for a cable company. About 70% of the calls are women calling in. Female calls usualy go smoothly because they call up asking for me to help them with their cable box that is now fried...because almost half of the cable boxes we ship out are crap anyway. Women want you to tell them what to do and when to do it when it comes to repair problems...because all their life they have been told they don't know what they are doing and they simply don't try to figure it out because...well they where told they don't know what they are doing. Guy calls go a lot differently. A guy calls up only when he is fairly sure what the problem is already...even if the guy is talking rubbish lingo that he picked up from some tech somewhere...he is still so sure of himself that he is right. When you tell the guy to do something...he does something else because he's a guy and he must know what is wrong. While our minds maybe made differently there is simply no reason why a women can not do this job just as easily. Regardless if it's because the women doesn't "want" to do it or not...those ideas where put in her head by our society. As far as the geeks asking girls out because they think a girl is interested when she isn't. What planet are you on? You can tell when people like you and when they don't...it is an inate human ability. IF a guy asks, it's the girls job to define the relationship in what she is comfortable with. If a girl asks...the guy will probably just use her for sex regardless of how he feels about her :-) So, in my personal opinoin...it's better this way. If a girl gets hit on by guys she actually acts like she likes and she keeps having to say no...she might want to reconsider the possibility that she is the one that is to socialy inept to give guys the right cues....because it's their job just as much as it's the guy's job to pick up on those cues. my $.02

Re:Respect

[ClockChaos]

As a female, I experienced a similar chip-on-the-shoulder of always having to "prove" I could program with the rest of the guys in undergrad. Not a very good experience at all. Still, I liked programming enough to pursue a Masters in a related subject at MIT, where pleasantly, the stereotype did not follow me. I wonder if perhaps this was because I was no longer on the pure CS track? Or perhaps when you're at a university focused on math and science, the general assumption is that everyone is on the same level?

It's funny because the whole reason I pursued CS to begin with was because of the positive experience I had in high school. Again, it was a math and science high school so perhaps when schools specialize, the gender bias is neutralized when it comes to CS.

Fast forward seven years out of school and I'm happy to say I'm still programming and have bright colleagues who are women. I experience none of the stereotypes like those from my undergrad days. I love programming, but the painfulness of my undergrad experience make me loathe to recommend the major to any of my younger female relatives.

It makes me sad when I look back on how discouraging my undergrad experience was, and how easy it would have been to simply switch out, even though deep down I really enjoyed programming. I think a lot of the guys then didn't realize when they were being patronizing or demoralizing to female classmates around them. They were just geeks being geeks and it's easier to not be afraid of a girl when you assume she's dumber than you.

That's not to say I didn't ever run into gals who did fit the stereotype. In fact, I always inwardly winced when I came across another gal who did because I felt it perpetrated the stereotype to my detriment. And part of me always wondered if perhaps they had caved to the pressures of the stereotype? These were smart gals, but their lack of self confidence when programming and second-guessing themselves might've killed otherwise good instincts.

C'est la vie. :(

Few things

[AutopsyReport]

So they are more likely to be dissuaded from pursuing computer science if they are exposed to an unpleasant environment, bad teaching, and negative stereotypes like the image of the male hacker.

What makes you think that women (and men) entering other disciplines don't face the same environments? How is a woman entering Computer Science any different from a man entering Women's Studies? The irrelevant stereotype of the male hacker, bad teaching, has absolutely no correlation with the lack of women entering computer science because this is true for every single discipline known.

For some real experience, in my fourth year of my CS degree, there is all of two women that are graduating. Yes, two women, out of a hundred guys or so. But I don't attribute that to what this article purports is the cause -- no, I think at some point women make decisions for themselves and realize they aren't interested in computer science. I think this theory of mine is called 'common-sense'.

Re:Few things

[ClearlyPennsylvania]

But people need encouragement. If someone is never pushed towards the sciences, they will likely never even consider it. And that doesn't mean that they wouldn't be great at it. I'm a woman in computer science and while I don't really mind the stereotypes, they are very real. When I tell people that I'm a software engineer, they're literally shocked. If I tell them that I work for Microsoft (I don't work there now, but I used to), they assume that I'm in a less technical position (recruiting, marketing, etc). Now, if people make the assumption when they meet me that I couldn't possibly be technical, do you think all stereotypes are dropped as soon as I say that I'm a software engineer? I don't think so. In fact, at a previous internship, my mananager's manager tried to prevent me from being hired for a full-time position by lying on my reviews - despite having a ZERO interaction with me, and despite my direct manager fighting him on it. I didn't want to believe it at the time, but I've had a number of people confirm that this guy was known to be sexist. Now, tell me: if you have a bunch of people discouraging you or belittling you - sometimes even discriminating against you - and very few people encouraging you (and those who do encourage you because you're female and not because you're smart), you think that wouldn't decrease your ambition? Consider, additionally, that women are generally less confident and less aggressive than me. Oh, and incidentally, parts of Asia (China, I believe) have a 50/50 ratio. And, as far as "thinking for themselves," recall that law school used to be male dominated and now it's female dominated. Back when it was male dominated, someone could have also said that "women just don't like law," but that's apparently not the case. Stereotypes and discrimination are very real and they do discourage women.

Negative stereotypes

[Cutterex]

"...negative stereotypes like the image of the male hacker."

It must be the popularization in the mass media of conversations like:

• The Trinity? Who cracked the IRS d-base?
• That was a long time ago.
• Jesus...
• What?
• I just thought... you were a guy.
• Most guys do.

Easy solution...

[Ostien]

#include woman.h
and hope you don't get a compile error

MMmppphhh

[NitsujTPU]

Not to sound like a jerk, but lets throw it down like this.

I'm a fairly successful person (so far), in computer science.

People graduating from my current institution can expect to make about $70k a year with a Masters. A high number of people in engineering here leave to do something other than engineering, when they discover that they will be paid more in other fields (a friend of mine who is becoming a banker will start at $120K/year.

So, while there is a gender gap, one has to ask if telling women to go into computer science will be at all good for their careers. Certainly a certain percentage of all people would like to go into computer science, out of a genuine love for the field. I fall into this group. I hope that all women who fall into this group, do so. I would advocate, however, that we stop trying to push our kids into this field out of a perception that it will somehow make them successful.

Lets break down the facts. Even in the dot-com boom, the jobs that paid the most did not require degrees in computer science. It doesn't take a thick book of credentials to become a web hacker. Go to a web shop, and ask the people working there what their credentials are.

Now, go to any business, and ask their IT people what their credentials are.

There are a lot more of those people, and they only get paid marginally less than programmers. The programmers are in a very very tough job market, so mostly only good ones get jobs programming anywhere (though, there are notable exceptions, of course), and they're overqualified for networking.

As a programmer, without a masters, I made $40k a year. Does it sound like your daughter couldn't make more with a degree in marketing or accounting?

Now that we've got that one solved, you have to ask if pushing kids into the field is a good idea. Only a few of them actually like it, to the rest, even a bachelors is a hellish workload in a field that they dislike. Go ask your marketing student how many all nighters they pull a week. In the atrium here, students write things like "Why don't they let me sleep!!" on the whiteboards... and those are the undergrads, us grads are off in our offices or labs.

So, fine... perhaps we need to make sure that the women who want to be here get here. I am a hearty, strong advocate of THAT, but before you send your daughter off to some brainwashing session that says that she needs to become an engineer, remember that it's a person with an MBA who will be her boss, not someone with a degree in engineering.

Re:MMmppphhh

[Scoth]

It's funny you mention this. When I was growing up in the 80's I was always into computers, and people would go on about how rich I'd be as a programmer. Now here I am on the cusp of figuring out what I want to do with the rest of my life and programming isn't quite the glamorous setup it was made out to be. I often wonder if jobs like programming were originally expected to become/stay something of an elite job, but ended up being something everyone and his brother dabbles in. As it ended up I enjoyed the hardware/networking side far more than programming, but I still get sympathetic responses to mentioning what I like now.

Ah well, so goes life I suppose :)

Re:MMmppphhh

[recharged95]

If bankers are starting at 120K, then there is something wrong with our profession, heck, we are writing the software that basically makes a banker obsolete...

( 'banking' legally of course, hmmm ;) )

Re:MMmppphhh

[NitsujTPU]

Haha. I'm flamebait? Get over it! Want more fuel for the fire? I started at a software company 4 years ago. I know only 2 engineers there who still want to pursue engineering. Everyone else is getting MBAs. The comany finally caught on that they were going to lose their entire workforce and promoted a few people, but when I left, a nice 25 year old woman was starting out with an MBA from a teeny tiny not elitist at all college, and was making more than the Senior Software Engineers and Senior Systems Analysts were, after about 20 years in the field.

Go send your kid into engineering. Getting those top jobs is a 2 percenter thing, at best. You're just lining your kid up as outsourcing fodder if they don't actually like the field.

Let them do something that they like.

If it's engineering, well, go them. The M.Eng class here is something like 30-40% female, just looking around the lab, and we're a top school.

Re:MMmppphhh

[Surt]

Anyone going into CS should be willing to move to silicon valley. You can add $50k to your salary levels, and while you'll pay through the nose for your housing, you'll also be able to easily max out 401k retirement investing, and that has a pretty amazing payoff in the long run.

Re:MMmppphhh

[ThaFooz]

Anyone going into CS should be willing to move to silicon valley. You can add $50k to your salary levels, and while you'll pay through the nose for your housing, you'll also be able to easily max out 401k retirement investing, and that has a pretty amazing payoff in the long run.

Agreed, one should really be willing to move to where the industry is. But Silicon Valley is not the only tech center in the US. Boston is probably [a distant] second in that department given the number of tech jobs and universities... the pay is similar but the housing/transportation situation isn't quite so rediculous. There has been a lot of IT growth in SoCal & the Beltway as well, and a reasonable amount in NYC. Outside that though, I imagine it would be tough.

Re:MMmppphhh

[ipfwadm]

As a programmer, without a masters, I made $40k a year. Does it sound like your daughter couldn't make more with a degree in marketing or accounting?

Interesting... with a bachelor's in CS, after working for about 3 years full-time, I make between $65k and 70k. My girlfriend, who has a bachelor's in accounting, has worked full-time for 2 years, and she makes between $40 and 45k. As for hours, I invariably work 40 hours a week, except for maybe two or three weeks a year that I work 45 or so. She works between 40 and 45 hours a week all year, except for busy season, when she works between 55 and 60 hours a week, including Saturdays. Needless to say she's looking to get out of public accounting, and at the moment is looking for an auditing job with the state.

Re:MMmppphhh

[ThaFooz]

Forgot about Seattle :P
I hear it's quite MS-centric though, so nevermind.

Re:MMmppphhh

[trout0mask]

Yes, true. But sort of orthogonal to the thrust of the article, which it sounds like you would agree with. We have this data -- women's interest in computer science is dropping off rapidly.

The questions that raises are: What does that mean? Do we care? and If so, what do we do about it?

Your answers seem to be that it means what it means (that less women are in computer science), that we shouldn't care, and that we shouldn't do anything about it. You're probably right, in that increasing female enrollment in CS for its own sake is not something most people care about. But there are other valid interpretations of the data, and they imply other things.

The article claims not that declining numbers of women is bad on its own, but that it is bad because it signals a general decline in CS interest. It is important, they argue, because there are so many tech jobs being created that companies will have no choice but to outsource. That doesn't mean we should care yet, because those outsourced jobs are for people who chose a different career - they are talking about outsourcing the jobs of imaginary programmers. But somebody definitely does care about that. The proposed solution is an implied suggestion that CS classes be better taught; less technical details, more problem solving and engaging ideas. I'll buy that, as long as the students have the chance to learn those technical details somewhere when they need them.

I would take it a step further. It's not just colleges that are doing a bad job of engaging students; it's the whole school system. When I was in high school, I wanted to take a programming class. But there were only two: Basic and C. And Basic was a prerequisite for C.

Most high schools teach writing at a useful level. If they have the resources to teach programming, why not teach computer science at a useful level? The only high school appropriate program that I know of is the teachscheme thing, but I assume that if there were more interest there would be more appropriate textbooks and curriculums. If we want more, better computer science graduates, we need to start engaging them as soon as possible and teaching them the things that are really important.

Of course, that just means more competition for me. So hooray for declining enrollment.

Re:MMmppphhh

[Surt]

I didn't mean to slight other tech areas, mostly just to point out that the OP's salary levels seemed excessively low to me. And of course since I went with silicon valley, i'm not exactly sure if Boston etc really offer competitive salary. Of course, as much as I dislike the bay area, you'd have to pay me even that much more to live in Boston/Beltway/NYC (mostly due to weather, and in NYC you have to deal with new yorkers). SoCal is nice, but I haven't seen a huge demand there yet (when recruiters start begging me to move down there as opposed to begging me to move laterally in the bay area, i'll consider it). So far SV just has by far the best deal in terms of product of salary and quality of life (for me ... obviously people enjoy different things).

Re:MMmppphhh

[NitsujTPU]

Yeah, my company wasn't the greatest place on the planet to work. I think that mileage varies from company to company.

My ex-gf who is an auditor bought a house her first year out of school, in a good area.

Re:MMmppphhh

[NitsujTPU]

True enough. I regretted posting that after I did so.

Re:MMmppphhh

[ThaFooz]

Fair enough, the OP's numbers were low, but for entry level with zero experience, I don't think they were absurdly low. I'm actually from the Boston area, and I've toyed with the idea of moving to the Bay... but based on my own salary and the numbers I see floating around Craigslist & Monster and the like, it doesn't look like I'd be gaining or losing much $ either way (I'm mostly a Java & Database guy, not too far out of college). Lifestyle-wise, trading in my snowbard, Sox/Patriots/Celtics, and public transportation for warmer weather and generally friendlier people is a tough call for me.

Either way, I couldn't agree more that one should be willing to move to where the industry is. And I also agree that it would take a mighty sum of money for me tolerate New York :P

Re:MMmppphhh

[Surt]

Well, I can't offer you your favorite sports teams, but people drive to their snow sports from the bay area every weekend. In fact, it's popular enough that a lot of people like to get an early start on friday to dodge the snow sports traffic. For public transit ... yeah you're pretty much out of luck. The bay area has some, but it doesn't go enough places yet.

So what?

[cmorriss]

This is ridiculous. Yes, 75% of people in computer science are men. So what? What percentage of teachers are women? What percentage or care takers are women? I don't hear people screaming of a gender gap in those or other professions where men are less inclined to have careers.

Let's face it. Women are different and in general not as interested in the science of computers. Note, that I'm not talking about all women, but simply a greater percentage than men. It's reality. Let it go instead of forcing some women into a field in which they're not comfortable just so we can feel better about some meaningless percentages.

Re:So what?

[ClearlyPennsylvania]

You sure about that? Parts of Asia (China, I believe) have 50% women. 20 years ago, when law school was dominated by men, could you have said "men are more interested in law - look at the percentages in law school!" Why do you make the same argument about computer science? http://www.glaak.com/Default.aspx?b=1dfdb56c-f693- 481f-9b64-59487b18e198Here's a blog from a woman in computer science who talks about her experiences.

Thoughts of a guy on seeing a girl in his CS class

[xIcemanx]

public cells woo(Girl g) {

if (g.hotness > -10) {
  while (true) {
    hair.smooth();
    lysol.spray(armpits);
    mouth.stammer();
    mouth.tellJoke(lameBinaryJoke);
    if (g.noticesYou()) {
      return semen;
    }
  }
}
   

Women out of the kitchen and into the lab

[mclaincausey]

Caveat: the following comes with a massive grain of salt, as it is speculation and generalization:

I was thinking about the dearth of women in science just the other day. I think, as has already been concluded and probably supported, that the difference stems at least in part from the fact that women from a very early age are treated differently. This treatment includes not just how they are treated in the classroom, it also includes what is expected of them. Boys get mechanical toys, erector sets, legos, and other toys that encourage engineering and scientific tendencies. Girls get dolls and other toys that encourage maternal and domestic tendencies. It could certainly be looked at as a chicken-and-egg argument, but perhaps we could start to remedy this phenomenon by encouraging women to build and experiment at a younger age.

It's also evident that girls and boys emulate the people around them, so a more stimulating, interactive and intellectual environment at home could be a boon for either gender.

Re:Women out of the kitchen and into the lab

[jamesshuang]

Have you ever considered that that is true because girls enjoy dolls more? My parents have always purchased legos and stuff for my sister because I enjoyed them when I was young. She never touched them. Went straight for the dolls even at 6 months old. Eventually, we just gave up and bought her dolls and stuff. Given a choice between legos and a hairtie, it's not even a question what she'll pick, even at the youngest of ages. It was very interesting actually - when she was 1 month old, we put a few objects in front of her - a book, a makeup kit, a screwdriver, a doll, and a calculator. She reached for the book first. We predicted that she'll be very scholarly, and even at 9 years old, she still likes books. On the other hand, I picked up the makeup kit... :-p

Re:Women out of the kitchen and into the lab

[cavemanf16]

I know you asked us to take your comment with a big grain of salt, so here's my salt:

Why is it that so many people assume kids are just little dumb animals running around all the time? (Granted, some of them with dumb animal-acting parents also tend to run around ACTING like a dumb animal... but that's a different topic.)

Children, even the very very young ones of 2.5yrs old and just barely speaking coherent sentences are just extremely inexperienced humans. Sometimes they will AMAZE you with their grasp of what you consider to be very tough social construct topics... like racism, addiction, anger, war, etc. Why is that? Because they are JUST INEXPERIENCED PEOPLE. Sometimes their comments about such things are cute or funny because they misinterpret what an adult said and used that as the basis for the incorrect reasoning of their comment, but sometimes they have just enough information to logically conclude some really profound stuff. Yes, ones environment can certainly shape experiences in ones life, but it doesn't dictate who we are as people entirely.

My point is that little boys like to play with toy tractors, and Lego's, and play sports, and blow stuff up because they just find that fun. Little girls like to dress up their Barbies, and play house, and cook with their moms because they just find THAT stuff to be fun. I have seen two children, one a boy, and one a girl from the same family and similar in age that will behave VERY differently about certain things. The girl will get upset about a grass stain on her dress and want her mom to wash it ASAP, while the boy is too busy running around kicking and throwing balls and getting muddy to even obey his mom when she wants him to come back to her to get some of the dirt brushed off of him. The girl is interested in talking and being "made over" about how pretty she looks in her new outfit, while the boy is interested in having you play "catch" with him. This all comes from observing children UNDER THE AGE OF 5! (and from multiple families with young kids)

Girls and boys are different! OMG, what a revelation! And each of us is unique, so sometimes guys will want to be in fashion design, and sometimes girls will want to be demolition engineers. Who cares?! We should be more happy when we're more unique than most people in our "profession" or "position in life" and don't want to follow the herd, but instead we think there should just always be 50/50 equality in everything. (But guess what? That doesn't even happen physically in nature since the mix of men to women is 49/51 or something like that.)

Just trying to provide some perspective on environment dictating who we become.

Re:Women out of the kitchen and into the lab

[mclaincausey]

Err, what do you think I meant by "chicken or egg proposition?" I'm questioning how much of this is nature and how much is nurture, and your entire post completely begs the question based on assumption of the former. You don't know in what measure those behaviors are inherited and in what measure they are learned. If children are as brilliant as you say, then they are brilliant enough to observe the way their gender behaves. Children are impressionable, so it's a short step from those observations to behavior. The point is that it is always assumed that those behaviors are to be expected along the lines of gender, and that nature AS WELL AS nurture play a role. We can't do anything about the nature part (and of course shouldn't want to), but we certainly can do something about the nurture part.

I can cite an example to help clarify. My nieces have very different characteristics from one another. The elder niece has strong nurturing and maternal tendencies. She was playing with dolls tenderly since she was just a few months old. Her younger sister plays with dolls, but does not show them the same regard. She appears to have more athletic inclinations, and also is good at building structures (not to mention tearing them down!), both of which are traditionally masculine enterprises, and I suspect the main reason she plays with dolls is because her sister does, and because her parents provide them. When she gets older, she should be provided with an erector set or other structural toys, beacuse she has shown some characteristics that might indicate an engineer's mind. Many parents would not provide this, and therein lies the problem I'm talking about. The genders are different and THANK GOD for that! But girls and women should feel comfortable pursuing traditionally male-dominated callings.

Sometimes they will AMAZE you with their grasp of what you consider to be very tough social construct topics... like racism, addiction, anger, war, etc

That's an outlandishly hyperbolic statement. A 2.5 year-old has impressed my many times, but never by making some sort of sage analysis of racism, addiction, anger, or war. I've never seen a 2.5 year old chair an AA meeting or provide grief counseling, and I've never seen one negotiate a treaty. The insight you get from a child of that age might seem brilliant, but that's because a lot of these things can be reduced to very simple terms, and they are very simple little people: they haven't been trained to be dogmatic, limited thinkers yet (hopefully). This doesn't make them multidisciplinary geniuses. I've heard fairly deep philosophical insight from a uniquely brilliant 4.5 year old, however.

but instead we think there should just always be 50/50 equality in everything.

Dude, you're setting up a huge strawman there. Where did I say there should be gender equality in every profession? I'll wait for you to find it...

Oh, couldn't find it? That's because I never said that. I said that I thought women were being culturally dissuaded from the sciences. There will likely never be a 50/50 gender split in the sciences, but there should certainly be more than 17% representation, as my field stands today per TFA... and I'd wager if you compared the number of women in science in the US versus other industrialized countries, that you might find a lower percentage. If I'm right about that, then it's very likely culture that accounts for the difference.

Yeah, but...

[ratajik]

I've found that a rather large number of people I've worked with as IT people didn't originally get a degree in IT. At least those in the business world. So basing a % on what Major a person gets might not be, for IT at least, very meaningful.

'Course saying that, just looking around I DO notice a lack of girl geeks... so they may be right :)

Dude. Women don't like being treated as objects.

[MondoMor]

They much prefer a procedural approach.

obligatory

[Anonymous Coward]

I put women in uncomfortable positions all the time.

Bah-dum dum, tshhhh!!!

Career Goals

[PingXao]

The 21-30 age group is looking for more than intellectual challenge when they pick a career. Some goals that go beyond this are: glamor, fashion, job security, good-looking members of the opposite sex, influential go-getters, big Buck$, etc. I think comp sci is probably the last career choice you would make if you were looking for any of these things in your early career. Certainly the outsourcing trend has diminished at least the perception that computer programming is a career choice with a bright future. Sure, the best won't have to worry. Despite the outsourcing of late there is still demand for good people right here in the good ol' USA. For those who cannot rise to that level, the number of good-paying jobs with a stable future and room for growth is being reduced. On many levels this is just more supply and demand.

Negative Stereotype!?

[Eli Gottlieb]

Excuse me, but when did the male hacker become a negative stereotype? Someone's confusing Slashdot's nerds for ESR's hackers, at great expense to available females everywhere.

Re:supplies-are-limited dept.???

[dadragon]

You mean to say that no people are supplies? The word supply is defined as something filling a want or need.

If a company wants IT staff, any potential IT staff members are supplies, regardless of gender.

A Bigger Tragedy

[nate nice]

Is that there is a decline in men enrolling in Women's Studies degrees.

The point is, often girls like certain thing and boys like certain things. It has nothing to do with a social standard or any other kind of garbage these people make up to get grants. It has to do with the same reason more men are found roaming around best buy looking at electronics than girls.

Why do we constantly have this mission from some groups to force 50-50 on everything? Why is it that we have to take natural patterns out and force things on people. So now what, if a girl wants to study CS they make it free to encourage more girls to do it? Who cares who studies it! Race and sex don't matter!

On these same grounds have you seen any studies advocating to get more boys in school? The numbers are going way down for males while females continues to rise. Why don't we see a coalition focused on getting boys into colleges. Especially white boys who are showing the sharpest decline in enrollment?

Sure I'm going overboard here but my point is this: It's not a *problem* that fewer girls are going into CS. It's a fact. And that's all it is. They make guesses as to why and this is fine but do not try and manipulate things and make them unfair for everyone else to strike some unnatural balance. To me, it's irrelevant if fewer girls are going into engineering and CS programs.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[jcr]

Is that there is a decline in men enrolling in Women's Studies degrees.

Maybe they get turned off by the male-bashing they see in the first class they attend.

-jcr

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[HumanTorch]

Why do we constantly have this mission from some groups to force 50-50 on everything? Why is it that we have to take natural patterns out and force things on people. So now what, if a girl wants to study CS they make it free to encourage more girls to do it? Who cares who studies it! Race and sex don't matter!

Exactly. Sounds like some kind of communist centrally planned educational system to me.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[jasonwc]

You're assuming that women are choosing not to enter Computer Science because they simply have less interest in the area. While this may be, it doesn't explain the whole story. There are many areas where women show great interest and are still denied equal access. This, and not women's waining interest in CS most likely explains the decline in female CS majors.

The legal profession is a good example of the discrimination the poster is referencing. Over the last few decades, women's enrollment at law schools has expanded dramatically. Most law schools now have equal or higher enrollment of women than men. I don't believe this can be fully explained (or explained) by greater interest in the Law on the part of women. Rather, Law Schools have made efforts to make the environment open and inclusive. While women faced discrimination in the 70s and 80s, Law schools now provide a far more equal teaching environment.

Yet, despite this increase in enrollment, women attorneys have been leaving the field. While nearly 50% of new associates are women, less than 10% of partners are female. This can't be blown off as being due to lack of interest. Associates at large firms put in 60+ hours a week, and are surely commited to the responsibilities of partnership. Despite this, men are dispraportionately chosen for the highest paying positions. As in CS where women are often not given the same opportunities or support from faculty which is predominantly male (in CS I believe 80-90%+ if my memory serves me correctly), and thus decide to enter other fields, women are finding that Law firms that are willing to hire them as associates, are refusing them the higher paid and more prestigious partnership positions, and thus are also seeking to either leave the field or to start their own firms. The "Old Boys Club" is still alive and well in the United States. It's too easy to ignore these issues, and say that women are simply not interested, but this is an oversimplification of the issue.

And as to your statement about boys not wanted to play with barbies- do you think this could possibly be caused by the fact that girls are socialized from birth to act in a manner that is appropriate for their sex? Their rooms are adorned in pink, they are given pink clothing to wear to seperate them from their male coutnerparts, and they are shown dolls and makeup as proper means of entertainment. The fact that we live in this society doesn't mean that is in any way natural, neutral, or necessary. We push girls to act a certain way, just as we push boys to act in a certain manner. Then we justify their inculcated differences as "natural".

Jason Wittlin-Cohen

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[jasonwc]

Sorry, this was actually in response to http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=171601&cid= 14292348

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Vicissidude]

Ya know, all my math courses were taught by women. In every single course as I moved up to calculus, fewer and fewer women stayed to the next level. There was no discrimination. The girls had role models that the boys didn't. The girls got extra encouragement that the boys didn't get. The girls simply were not interested. CS is very related to mathematics. In many ways, CS is applied mathematics like engineering is applied physics. If you want to address why girls are not interested in CS, then you have to address why they don't stay in math in the first place.

Your writing on law really doesn't pertain to this discussion. First off, law is a significantly different field from CS, with a whole different set of social views, ideas, ideals, expectations, and culture. The geek culture alone is enough to turn away most 18 year old female students.

Further, the problem with promotion that you address in your writing is different to problem of attracting women to the field in the first place. And that can be addressed by more than just calling it a boys network. If you compare the careers of men and women in their 20s, you find that they are equal. What happens in their 30s? Generally, the men and women get married and then the women get pregnant. Then generally, the men focus on their careers while the women focus on the family. The woman may leave the workforce altogether. Or, she may stay. If she stays, it's rare that she'll continue to put in 60+ hours a week like her male counterparts. Either way, women do not continue putting in equal work, and so they do not get equal pay nor promotions. It is the rare woman, who does not follow the general "rules", who earns her position amongst the partners.

As for the socialization argument, that is just complete nonsense. Give a two year old a set of matchbox cars. The two year old boy is going to be running around everywhere with that car, sputtering car noises, and crashing that car into every other matchbox he sees. The two year old girl will take the big, medium, and small cars and rename them "daddy car", "mommy car", and "baby car". At two years old, this is not socialization.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[jasonwc]

See http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=171601&cid=142 93633. I respond to your point about women choosing to have children and leave the workplace. I agree that many women make this choice, but there's more to the issue.

Also see http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=171601&cid=142 93261. In it, I explain why women choosing to leave work and have children does not explain the vast difference in the number of female and male partners - 9 to 1 or more. This does account for some of the difference, but female associates are given different and discriminatory standards that require a higher level of competancy and motivation to achieve partnership. This view that all or most women decide to leave work to care for their children also leads to discriminatory promotion practices as employers assume that female employers are going to have kids, even if they have no intention of doing so.

As to your view about socialization, my own experience contradicts your view. My parents never pushed my sister to play with barbies or dolls. For the first few years of her life, before she entered school and was influenced by her peers, she played with toy trucks and trains, and had no dolls. When my parents took her to a toy store, they let her choose what she wanted without influencing her decision- and the toys she chose are considered to be for boys. As soon as she entered school, she began desiring dolls and Barbies. I think it's pretty reasonable to assume this was caused by socailization from her peers.

Likewise, one of my Professor's children was brought up in the same environment. Despite the fact that he was a boy, he played with barbies and other dolls for years. Don't ignore the power of socialization. Just becuase it's so widespread and seemingly inocuous doesn't mean it isn't there. Also, check out Foucault's writings.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[thesandtiger]

There are two broad classes of reasons more women don't go into computer science:

1) "Natural" reasons - fundamental differences between the sexes that are caused by differing neural wiring. Women tend to be superior at multi-tasking and social processing, men tend to be superior at narrow-focusing and logical processing. I use the word "tend" and that's all the soft soaping I'm gonna do.

2) "Artificial" reasons - things like hostile work environments and so on. I am specifically thinking of places where it is considered a given that a female will by default be less capable than a male. Ex. Female network administrator being given "easy" tasks despite demonstrated competence, while guys are given more "manly" and difficult tasks despite not being terribly competent. Or just nasty social shit like horny geek dude mistaking friendly chat for something more. Which happens anywhere, not just in CS, though I will say that it seems to be a bit more blatant in the geekly circles - which is a blessing and a curse, I suppose.

The question isn't "What can we do to get more women in CS?" That's putting the cart before the horse - that's assuming that more women want to be in CS, that there's a real benefit to more women being in CS. The real question that should be asked is this - what's the percentage of women that would be in CS and similar fields in the absence of those artificial disincentives? If it is much different, then that indicates that there are things that could be changed - the dreaded sensitivity AKA "Don't be a patronizing asshole intent only on her boobs" classes, and shit like that. If the percentages aren't all that different, well, then, it's just the way things are.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Maitri]

"The point is, often girls like certain thing and boys like certain things."

Why do you think that is? Is it maybe because little girls and little boys are told from an early age what is and isn't appropriate for them to play with? Walk into any toy store and tell me that girls aren't being programmed by what they are supposed to want to being playing with. Maybe you don't find aisles and aisles of pepto bismal pink morally repugnant but I do. Do you honestly think that such programming stops with childhood toys?

I am so sick of people saying that the whole anti-female bias doesn't exist anymore. I decided computing wasn't for me when my highschool compsci teacher seemed to think that he needed to come over and give me extra help and make sure to reexplain what he had just said but with extra little words this time because he wanted to make sure I could "keep up" with the rest of the class. He helped me so much, whether I wanted it or not, that I can't honestly claim to have done any of the work for that class.

As it is, in the science field I am in, I feel the need to NOT be girly or express my more feminine side because if I do then I don't get taken seriously by my peers. As if whether I wear a skirt and pink shirt or jeans and a ratty sweatshirt affects my logic abilities. I was also told I couldn't pole vaule in highschool... btw - I am only 25, I am talking the fairly recent past here when things like Title 9 were supposed to have taken care of crap like that.

Given my personal experiences, it really irritates me when people say things like what is on the forum. For example: girls aren't equally interested in computers! What kind of shit is that? Maybe we aren't equally interested because people like you have been telling us that for years! Or because when we do express an interest we get treated as inferior students even when we aren't. Most of the people on here seem to be pretty proud of their intelligence - how would you like to have yours questioned at every turn because of a one chromosome difference? If there were a difference in the number of men and women in a field and I felt like there was nothing holding one of those genders back from joining the field then I wouldn't have a problem. But I really don't believe that is the case.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Vicissidude]

So, we are arguing whether your claimed 9-1 difference between men and women in law is due to:

Women being unfairly held to a higher standard in law.

-Or-

Women having children, therefore either dropping out of the workforce or cutting back work hours.

Frankly, I see the second scenario far more often than the first. Women may feel singled out due to their sex, that doesn't necessarily mean they are. You are talking about the top positions in these firms. Any position of that magnitude is going to be extremely difficult to attain. If any candidate becomes too ruthless or ambitious, then they will be looked upon negatively. Certainly, women may be considered bitches. But, men will be considered assholes. If you want to be liked and you want to be successful, then it will be much more work. It sounds like the men just want to be successful and don't care about being liked.

Even so, this concerns promotion more than getting women into computer science (not law!) in the first place, which was the whole point of the article.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[DianeOfTheMoon]

Your writing on law really doesn't pertain to this discussion. First off, law is a significantly different field from CS, with a whole different set of social views, ideas, ideals, expectations, and culture. The geek culture alone is enough to turn away most 18 year old female students.

I think that perhaps a better correlation to look at is women business owners...

As of 2004, half of all businesses in the US were owned by women. Good figure, right? However, only 8 Fortune 500 companies are run by women...and those that do receive substantially less pay than their male counterparts.

Now then, until the 50% study was released, people were always saying that women had no interest in running a big business, that they "just didn't think that way" or that it was a difference in how they are constructed. But now, there is no real excuse...women are largely barred from the top levels of established companies, left instead to work as "lesser" folk.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[DianeOfTheMoon]

As for the socialization argument, that is just complete nonsense. Give a two year old a set of matchbox cars. The two year old boy is going to be running around everywhere with that car, sputtering car noises, and crashing that car into every other matchbox he sees. The two year old girl will take the big, medium, and small cars and rename them "daddy car", "mommy car", and "baby car". At two years old, this is not socialization.

Actually, from doing lots and lots of gender research, I can tell you that by the age of two, a child will know, on a basic level, what a boy and a girl is, what they are expected to be, and which one they are.

Believe it or not, that actually is socialization.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Vicissidude]

As of 2004, half of all businesses in the US were owned by women. Good figure, right? However, only 8 Fortune 500 companies are run by women...and those that do receive substantially less pay than their male counterparts... women are largely barred from the top levels of established companies, left instead to work as "lesser" folk.

The problems with promotion are different from the problems of attracting women to the field in the first place, which you appear to confuse by comparing different numbers. You also seem to have ignored my other arguments for why women do not generally progress to high levels in the work force.

For promotion, the vast amount of female workers at some point go off and have children. They either drop out of the workforce entirely or they scale back the amount of effort they put into work compared with men or childless women. If you do a fraction of the work, then you get a fraction of the pay, benefits, and promotions. That is not sexist.

Further, I have heard arguments that powerful women say, "Men are expected to be ruthless and ambitious, while women who act in the same manner are considered bitchy." What that leaves out is that those men are also considered assholes. Yes, getting to the top means you have to step on some people. Women seem to want to be both successful and liked. Their male rivals however, just want to be successful. Women may point to the extra work they have to do to be both successful and liked as a form of sexism. But, it's not considering that it's self-imposed.

Me: Ya know, all my math courses were taught by women. In every single course as I moved up to calculus, fewer and fewer women stayed to the next level. There was no discrimination. The girls had role models that the boys didn't. The girls got extra encouragement that the boys didn't get. The girls simply were not interested. CS is very related to mathematics. In many ways, CS is applied mathematics like engineering is applied physics. If you want to address why girls are not interested in CS, then you have to address why they don't stay in math in the first place. Your writing on law really doesn't pertain to this discussion. First off, law is a significantly different field from CS, with a whole different set of social views, ideas, ideals, expectations, and culture. The geek culture alone is enough to turn away most 18 year old female students.
You: Now then, until the 50% study was released, people were always saying that women had no interest in running a big business, that they "just didn't think that way" or that it was a difference in how they are constructed. But now, there is no real excuse

Again, you are confusing promotion with attraction.

Yes, I said girls are not interested in math. You want to argue with me? Then, look at the statistics. It may be a generality, but it's true. The only qualification that I would add would be to say American girls are not interested in math. Or, western girls are not interested, considering that their eastern counterparts do show interest in math.

If you want to call it sexism, then you have some work to do. My teachers were female, all the way through calculus. And, in fact, most teachers are female. Girls are given tons of extra encouragement to succeed academically that boys do not receive. This includes encouragement in mathematics. And again, I would point to the success of the asain female in western classes as evidence that sexism does not exist in the American school system, or is not as prevalent as people like yourself would suggest.

(And, I might point out, that extra encouragement given the girls that is not given to boys could be seen as reverse sexism.)

If anything, it is our culture that turns girls away from mathematics and computer science. I brought up the disdain for geek culture as one source as to why girls may not like mathematics and computer science. I never said women weren't "constructed" to perform mathematics, as you seem to insinuate.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Vicissidude]

Given that we see these roles mimicked the exact same way in completely different societies, that would suggest something other than merely socialization.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Anne Thwacks]

The only agenda I have is to be treated like a human being.

Forget CS in that case. There is NO chance of being treated as a human being in CS, whatever your sex.

I have asked loads of women, and none said they would be interested in a job that requires them to concentrate on a single problem for days, let alone months. That is why there are few women in Science or anything technical. Women are musch less likely than men to put up with a job where they are treated like robots. Most think its preferable to marry or get pregnant and live at someone else's expense.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Pray_4_Mojo]

Look, after hearing 20 million odd /.er's bitch and moan about how BOYS AND GIRLS are different, I'm going to put it to bed FOR EVERYONE.

If we don't keep our ratio a perfect, utopian 50/50, there might not EVER be another Female Captain on Star Trek.

And really, after considering what a fine show ST:Voyager was, we all know what a great loss that would be.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[ciggieposeur]

Who cares who studies it! Race and sex don't matter! ...
To me, it's irrelevant if fewer girls are going into engineering and CS programs.

In Meritopia where you think you live, race, gender, orientation, and ethnicity don't matter. Here on planet Earth, they do matter for the simple reason that as human beings we participate in human society and the time spent at work accounts for about 25-40% of our lives. I for one do not want that time spent in some Bizarroland where otherwise intelligent engineering types insist that the Way It Is Now really is the Way It Was Always Meant To Be. Talk about irony.

Here is one of many problems with increasing gender/race/etc. gaps in professions: it leads to stagnant work environments that undermine any semblance of merit-based promotions. Everyone in the company suffers when every manager thinks and acts the same and mentors/promotes only those people who are the physical reflection of their younger selves. This particular problem is real and easily measured: what percentage of non-white, non-male, non-straight, etc. people that graduate in profession X manage to reach the higher rungs, and how quickly do they do so compared to their white/male/straight/etc. peers?

Most of these kinds of problems have an insidious aspect that makes them hard to deal with: they can exist and have dramatic effect even when all decisions look fine at the local level. This is how person A (white, male, ME) can get a 20% salary increase in 36 months yet person B (black, male, a good friend of mine) can get only a 10% increase and be told "you need to do better" -- for work of equal difficulty and similar levels of success. I needed to do better too, but for "some reason" my manager didn't see that as a reason to withhold financial incentive. My friend later discovered that almost every black person in the facility faced similar issues year in year out. This despite the annual "diversity awareness" drives, and this was also a (ahem) Fortune-10 multi-national that we all recognize.

Since this is Slashdot, let me go further with a programming analogy:

You are responsible for maintaining an end-user application that runs on your customers' servers. Your customers insist that on many of their deployments the product is slower than it should be, sometimes unusably so. Your response is that you've never seen a problem in your development sandbox and back that up with data from several excellent profilers and debuggers. It must be PEBKAC, and management should trust you because you have a CS degree. Customers continue to complain, so someone with a Human Factors degree is brought in to examine the product. Instead of trying it out on their own development sandbox, they monitor the application directly on the customers' boxes. They sit back and watch the customers as they actually use the product, and they write a report detailing the procedures the customers are following and the actual outcomes. With this data they show that the customers are indeed seeing the problems. You immediately follow the procedures, but to your surprise you get the acceptable speedy behavior on your development box.

What do you do now? Do you argue that the outcomes didn't actually occur, that the code can't possibly do what it is in fact doing? Or do you look somewhere new? If you are familiar with the "mysterious bug that only appears for customers" then you know how easy it is for trivial, invisibile things to have large consequences later on.

Talking about society issues from an analytical perspective is often like being the developer who thinks every problem can be isolated and solved with good profiler/debugger. The problem itself is the way we think about the problem, and if we can't directly experience life outside our own upbringing (whatever that may be) then we have to take on a measure of faith what other people say. If women enrolled in CS programs say that they experience gender bias, and that it involves a lot of direct but non-verbal signals, then we have to accept that as fact and try to deal with it.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[808140]

This is not the case. There's a great deal of variation in gender roles across societies. The vast majority of the world's societies are patriarchal, which in all likelihood can be attributed to the importance of superior male physical strength in the time those societies were forming. But not all societies are patriarchal -- I lived in Polynesia for some time as a kid, and let me tell you, social roles are not the same across cultures.

Even within patriarchal societies, cultural roles and norms vary wildly. Travel more.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[808140]

I was a math major at UC Davis, which at the time had a very strong math department (I chose it over Berkeley for this reason). The vast majority of guys dropped out of math when we got to upper division. Not because they're less able at math, I don't think, but rather because most of them were science majors and basic, applied analysis (the sort you get in lower division math courses) was all they needed for their major.

In General Topology, on the first day of the class, there were about 20 people enrolled, all math majors, of course. At that point we had a 60/40 ratio of women to men -- all of my difficult upper division math classes were female dominated, although I understand that was less the case in applied math (I majored in pure math). On the day of the final, there were 5 people, including myself, and there was only one other guy. 4 girls, 2 guys. Who got the only A in the class? A girl. General Topology is beautiful but really, really hard if you've never taken topology before.

I took the graduate level abstract algebra sequence, too (Math 250ABC at my school). Who taught it? A woman. About half the class was female. Oops.

I will admit that the only fields medalist in our department, Bill Thurston, who revolutionized hyperbolic knot theory, was a guy -- but otherwise, women were very well represented in our department, and at the undergraduate level at least, they positively kicked the pants off of their male counterparts.

So apparently we have conflicting anecdotes. Were you a math major? Or were you a science major who took one or two upper div classes and then moved on to Physics or CS?

In undergraduate math classes, only a very small number of participants are actually math majors, because almost all technical majors require math. All majors require some math. I tell you, the minute we passed Math 108 -- the only upper division class required by our department for CS majors -- we went from 80% male to 60% female.

Something to think about.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[808140]

I only took one Women's Studies class -- it was upper division -- and it was very hard for me. I was the only guy, I got bashed constantly -- men this and men that, blah blah blah blah. It was a horrible, horrible experience.

But I learned more in that class I think than in almost any other class I've ever taken. I wouldn't consider it as a major -- but it's definitely worth taking one course and taking it seriously, to the end.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Maitri]

They told me if I wanted to "play around with it" they would let me but that I wouldn't be allowed to compete (which is still illegal if there is no girls area they are supposed to let you compete against the guys) because there were no other girls in my district. Funny thing was that there were no other guys pole vaulting in the district either - the boys team went straight to regionals. (I ran cross country with some of the pole vaulters so I found that little fact out - those guys also said that there would be girls for me to compete against at those levels.) I decided I didn't want to deal with patronizing and antagonistic coaches and joined a different after school group.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Vicissidude]

Sounds like your program was an aberration. That is not surprising given the policies of certain universities in actively recruiting women and minorities in certain programs, despite the illegality of outright quotas. Further, the fact that your school was in California, known for its support of affirmative action programs, only solidifies my opinion.

I went to UW a few years ago for my CS degree. Half of my classmates were foreigners. And half of the foreigners were women. Just a few months ago, I attended a CS class in a different University. All of the students were white, presumably American. And there were only two women in the class of about 30. What accounted for the difference? UW actively recruits women and minorities, especially in the programs that are traditionally overrepresented by white males.

If you want true statistics for the number of women who take math courses, then you have to look at national numbers. Local statistics can and are skewed by local policies and recruitment strategies that attempt to rectify the national statistics.

Something to think about, indeed.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[Vicissidude]

Yes, there are differences between societies. However, matriarchal societies are extremely rare. The vast majority are patriarchal societies. And in that majority, we see basically the exact sames roles mimicked across the vast majority of societies.

Re:A Bigger Tragedy

[jcr]

I learned more in that class I think than in almost any other class I've ever taken.

Sounds like your other classes weren't nearly challenging enough.

BTW, if you'd like to read a rebuttal of the male-bashing you were handed, pick up a copy of Rene Denfeld's The New Victorians. It's probably the most effective shredding of the current "feminist" establishment I've seen to date.

-jcr

Numbers seem to be transposed

[aalobode]

I have heard these statistics before, but they (c. 28% and 17%) apply to women in grad school and in bachelor's programs respectively (not the other way around, as in the original posting).

Someone has to look at why, despite all the incentives for women to enter computing as Bachelor's candidates, so few of them actually do. More importantly, is the recruiting process and its incentives misdirected?

The graduate school proportion is skewed by the many women from "third" world countries -- they have no incentive program, and they have to struggle against far greater odds than their American sisters. So, it may be that American women choose not to enter the profession. If that is true, then it would be a feature of the empowerment of women, although undoubtedly unintentional.

Most women don't play video games either

[digitaldc]

The two must have something in common.

Changing views

[SmallOak]

One impression I have is that in the 70's CompSci was viewed more as a 'humanities'. In Canada is was either part of the Commerce or Math faculties. There seemed to be more interested in the theoretical aspect. It was a lot smaller and had more of a community fell.

How is the gender ratio for those graduating or entering Biology and the Sciences?

Remembering Grace Murray Hopper - A Legend in Her Own Time
http://inventors.about.com/od/hstartinventors/a/Gr ace_Hopper.htm

Balancing Work and Family

[dc_genevieve]

While society has changed drastically in the past few decades, the mother is still the primary caretaker in most families. A large percent of IT jobs require significant amounts of overtime and/or odd hours, neither of which are conducive to raising a family (not that there aren't plenty of women who somehow manage it). Perhaps that has something to do with the gender gap. That being said, I enjoyed working in a predominantly male environment. I did leave because of the overtime; I wanted more free time because I am also a part-time student.

A female perspective

[Hannah E. Davis]

One thing that I'd like to know is why there seem to be quite strong racial elements to the gender gap as well. I'm in Computer Science at UBC, and there are a lot of girls in my classes... but at least 90% of them are Chinese. It seems that among the Asian students, there's barely any gender gap, but female students of other races (eg. myself -- a white girl of British descent) are much more rare.

The reason I'm asking this is that the Chinese (and the inhabitants of at least a few of the other East Asian countries) seem to have figured out something that us Westerners haven't. The only explanation that I can think of is that the Chinese (at least appear to) obsess less over what gender dominates what field.

I don't know about other girls, but I get kinda irritated when people, be they men or women, exclaim "Good for you!" or "You go girl!" when I mention my major, as if I'm overcoming some incredible hardship by just -- get this -- interacting to guys and *gasp* doing my coursework without female encouragement!

I also get sick of people going on and on about how comp sci is desperately lacking in women and it's masculine and discrimination is rampant and hard for girls to get into and blah blah blah... and then they wonder why the hell girls are being driven away from the subject "despite" all that advertising. I mean, seriously: do you think you could get more men into nursing by saying something like "Nursing: not just for girls anymore! Not girly at all! You won't be laughed at for doing it! Trust us!"? So why does anyone think that strategy would work on women?

Oh, and incidentally, as a 3rd year student, I have never been harassed, excluded or otherwise treated in a negative manner based on my gender. I have never felt that I was intruding into any kind of boys-only club, and I have never found myself wishing that I had more female friends to talk to. Oh, and my grades are pretty decent too (with the notable exception of math, but I've always been weak in that area).

Re:A female perspective

[NitsujTPU]

You rock.

I think that the a big element of this is the era that we're from is a different era (I'm a male grad student at the moment).

One of my advisors that I have been fortuate to work quite closely with feels that women arediscriminated against. I have to wonder how much of the difference, however, is the difference in experience between our generation and her generation (not quite 20 years difference).

Re:A female perspective

[HungWeiLo]

There are definitely racial elements to this. In most Asian cultures, education is of foremost importance. For many people (speaking from the Chinese perspective, but this also definitely applies to almost all other Asian cultures), majoring in a "slacker" major simply is not an option from the parents' perspective (art, music performance, history). The only accepted areas of study are the ones that have been proven to provide both financial stability and prestige (doctor, engineer, etc.) Of course, this effect is compounded by the fact that many first-generation immigrants are intimidated by language and cultural barriers, and professions like engineering (a decent living where possibly only minimal language skills are needed) are especially attractive. Of course, this is starting to change as more Asians are more assimilated into American and Canadian societies, there is a shifting trend of Asians participating in "less traditional" fields like law and politics (and music performance) as something to do for a living. I myself almost started at Julliard for music performance until I got sick of the competitive bullshit and went for engineering instead.

Re:A female perspective

[sunwolf]

I'm in Computer Science at UBC, and there are a lot of girls in my classes... but at least 90% of them are Chinese.

I'm a Chinese American high school senior applying to colleges...and you have just convinced me to pony up the $100 application fee for UBC!

Damn these raging hormones...

Re:A female perspective

[lrucker]

I'm female. I started college in 1983, and I never noticed any gender bias.

Re:A female perspective

[enos]

Just a random thought, but I wonder how much that has to do with communism. In the eastern european countries at least, the gender gaps were much smaller just because the communists did make things a lot more equal (everyone suffers equally, blah blah blah). The majority of the doctors I went to as a kid in Poland were women. Lots and lots of women scientists.

Re:A female perspective

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a great comment. I'm a Chinese guy, but US citizen now. All my cousins (all female) are still in China though. The way I look at it, it's a cultural thing. There is a HUGE difference in the fundamental career outlooks of Chinese people and Americans. The fact is, CS (and science / tech in general) doesn't get any respect in the US. I'm a CS major, graduating 2006. I've got a job offer for 85k next year. I'm not doing too bad for myself. But whatever your position is, as a CS person, you are socially classified as a geek. At my school, University of Virginia, being a rich frat boy and having a future in investment banking or law gets you a lot further status-wise even though you may not necessarily be paid more. It's just the way Western societies have been largely static for centuries now--people idolize artists, entertainers, businessmen. Rapid technological progress and the careers associated with it is a new phenomenon, and the Western mind hasn't really adjusted to that yet as far as I can tell. So CS people are relegated to nerd status.

The difference in China is that as a new society (not in the sense that China is new, but in that the current Chinese society is the result of extreme social revolution) -- Chinese people are very much in tune with what is practical for getting ahead, both as a country and individually. There is a combination of old Confucian elements and government direction stemming from revolutionary ideology here. In China, there is no such thing as a 'nerd.' There can't be, because science and technology is considered the career path of choice, much like law school is in the states. In China, it's in fact the 'arts' majors who are looked down on.

Look at where the politicians from the US and China come from. American politicians are mostly law school graduates who studied history or english or god knows what in undergrad. The top leaders of the communist party in China are almost all engineering graduates.

So basically yes, the parent is right-on. Chinese girls are in fact much more inclined to study science and tech because that's what's expected of them. And in my opinion, if this trend continues, we will see the consequences a few decades down the line in the form of a growing East-West technology gap. A society which respects litigation and playing the stock market more than science and technology won't stay ahead too long.

Re:A female perspective

[ShadyG]

Oh, and incidentally, as a 3rd year student, I have never been harassed, excluded or otherwise treated in a negative manner based on my gender. I have never felt that I was intruding into any kind of boys-only club, and I have never found myself wishing that I had more female friends to talk to. Oh, and my grades are pretty decent too (with the notable exception of math, but I've always been weak in that area).

Yes, but Math is Hard!

Re:A female perspective

[Nightlily]

You have been very lucky. I wish I could have said in my 3rd year at college that no one had treated negatively due to my gender.

However there are a few notable differences. I am an American and attended American universities. My undergrad studies were done at a liberal arts college and I am currently finish my MS at a mid-sized university in the American midwest.

I don't think the work is more suited for one gender or another. I point out to my male colleagues that early programming was primarily done by women. If they don't believe me, I ask them to do some research.

Re:A female perspective

[Hannah E. Davis]

Calc 3 certainly is. I have a final on it tomorrow morning, and I can barely do the practice questions.

I don't think that has anything to do with me being female, though. I find math hard because... well... it just is hard for me. I can never remember the formulae, I make stupid arithmetic errors all over the place, and I keep deriving when I should integrate (and vise versa). I know plenty of girls, many of whom are also comp sci majors, who find the same material easy, and plenty of guys who I can count on to share my pain.

Re:A female perspective

[genessy]

"Here, here!" from a fellow IT geekess. The largest problem I noticed was that the girls that were in my courses really had no love of computers at all. I'd rather see few women than see women just in it for the "money" or attention that working in a male-dominate field will get you. I do the work and I love what I do.

Re:A female perspective

[dezert_fox]

While Asians may not care if you're female or not, they do care if you're in a field which is percieved as job-oriented. You'll find asian girls in CS in many cases because of parental pressure forcing them away from other fields (say, things like anthropology) which they may be interested in but which don't lead to careers.

Re:A female perspective

[Surt]

A better question might be whether you have ever been treated exceptionally at all (positively or negatively) based on your gender. A lot of women find both sides equally unappealing, and simply wanted to be treated neutrally. That can make comp-sci unattractive for many women as well (say women who dread being drooled over by their 90% male classmates).

Re:A female perspective

[darkmeridian]

There was a great book called "Patriots" covering the Vietnam War from both sides. The strangest thing I remember were the women snipers the Vietcong fielded to devastating effect against American troops. Would Americans ever put women in the field? Probably not. But then, not to be too political about it, current American enemies cut heads off, what would they do with a captured woman? Anyway, I think proper gender roles are deeply inculcated by society.

Re:A female perspective

[txgunslinger]

The thing that gets me is that it's not people in technical fields that care...most of us don't care who you are or where you came from. I personally don't give a flying crap if you're a 9000 lb hermaphrodite named Menke who eats only what you can kill in the supply closet. The only people who care are government extremists, feminists who believe equality means numbers and not oppertunities, and the people that were too stupid to pass exams to get into the field in the first place. Soon these people will insult well trained, intelligent women everywhere by proposing that qualifications for men and women should be different in order to get more females interested.

Re:A female perspective

[Quantum Skyline]

I'm curious...what do you think about the attempts (in Ontario at least, I can't say for BC) to make engineering look more attractive to women?

For example, the Ontario Society of Professional Engineers has the Go Eng Girl program that is supposed to reach out to girls in grades 7 - 10. One of the big things they want to do is lower math and science requirements because most women don't seem to like math and science (not my words, don't flame). Girls can then swap out a course they don't like for another, more 'softer' course when applying for university.

In my experience (I'm a guy), every girl I've talked to who's applying to university doesn't want to go into engineering. They'd rather save the world by going into life science or take hybrid programs like biomedical computing.

Re:A female perspective

[Shao Ke]

My wife is Chinese and has several advanced degrees (CompSci and Nuke Engineering). She is currently working in SQA but has practically no interest in the hard sciences.
Says her parents and her government coerced her into studying these things. She thinks many Chinese study engineering type fields in the US because other fields would be harder to break into.

Re:A female perspective

[torokun]

There are so many Asians because their parents give them a limited choice of 'successful' careers to choose from, and they go along. It's a cultural thing - subsuming one's desires out of respect for one's parents or family... It screws with their heads a lot of the time though, especially for 2nd or 3rd generations. It's also about the respect given to those with high levels of education in Asian cultures.

After they become sufficiently Americanized, many of these people stop forcing their kids to to be doctors, lawyers, or engineers. The general American population is more interested in doing something that at least somewhat appeals to them, and can also make them some money.

But they generally don't choose a career just because of the prestige or money, which many Asian families DO do.

Re:A female perspective

[Anonymous Coward]

Static for centuries? That is a bizarre or at best naive statement. There has been radical social change since the industrial revolution, far greater than what has happened in even China.

Re:A female perspective

[fliptout]

Reading your comments, I'm curious how long you have been in the USA.
I am in a similar situation as you- American engineer living in China (I will not become a Chinese citizen though :P ).

You bring up some interesting points, however I would like to offer some counterpoints.

If I was to tell some random person in the USA that I am an EE, that would probably earn me some respect. People know that engineering is not easy.

Secondly, if you are suggesting that Chinese are more open to rapid technological change.. well, I disagree to say the least. It seems rapid right now because they are making 100 years of advance in the space of decades.. And it is due in large part to opening to outside, market forces.

Thirdly, while arts majors may be looked down upon here, at least they are doing something they are good at.

Which brings me to my last point- there are many people studying engineering here who should not be studying engineering. Many engineering students I have met here don't want to do it and really do not have an aptitude for it. To say that politicians here are technically savvy because they got an engineering degree 40 years ago is absurd.

When I hire somebody for my company here, I will only hire from the very best technical universities, because, in my experience, a lot of the engineers here are crap.

But, hey, you can say that about any place. :D

Re:A female perspective

[petantik f00l]

This is quite true.

I'm studying computer and electronic systems at strathclyde. this involves both eee and cs classes. in the first year in the eee classes the gender mix girl/boy was 5/150 and in cs 8/90. in 2nd year this stayed the same. In my current year there are some asian exchange students which added 5 girls to the eee classes and 5 girls to the cs classes there are actually more girls than boys from within the exchange groups.

however, 3 girls dropped out from the eee classes if those exchange students weren't here we would only have 2 girls in the eee section.

I think there is a cultural reason/bias applied to Engineers in the US and UK which basically boils down to "an engineer has dirty overalls covered in oil and always has a monkey wrench handy". If these technical qualifications were more highly regarded by the public and by the government then maybe more women would go into these fields and be successful. This last point can also be applied to men

Re:A female perspective

[Hannah E. Davis]

I'd rather see programs that reach out to kids in general, not just girls. Maybe I'm just weird, but the only time that I feel discriminated against is when somebody assumes that just because I have a vagina, I need some kind of special treatment and I can't possibly succeed on my own. It's like... "Oh, you're just a girl. Don't worry, I understand that you can't do that hard math! Here, you can do an easy course instead!"

My highschool actually tried to set up an all-girls programming class one year. I doubt any girls signed up. The whole concept was incredibly sexist and smacked of segregation -- the implication was that us poor stupid little girls just couldn't handle having big smart intimidating boys around, and that we needed extra time and attention if we were ever to learn the terribly difficult concepts involved in programming "Hello World" in Pascal.

If people want to reach out to girls, they need to reach out to boys too. You can't teach people about equality by treating either gender as if it needs special attention.

Oh, and incidentally, I do hate math, I just don't think it would be fair for the powers that be to allow me to do softer courses because of my gender. I'd rather suffer through calculus, possibly even failing it (which is quite likely given how unprepared I am for my final tomorrow morning), than do a bird course and graduate with a degree that is somehow less valid than that of a male student.

Re:A female perspective

[Monkelectric]

In the most base terms programming is applied mathmatics, however, the best programmers aren't great at math because programming is a *LINGUISTIC* exercise. People who can think structurally and algorithmically while still being creative are the ones who really go on to be the best programmers.

So anyways, survive calculus somehow and you'll probably go on to be a great programmer. If you aced calculus Id tell you to look for another profession.

Re:A female perspective

[frank_adrian314159]

I can never remember the formulae, I make stupid arithmetic errors all over the place, and I keep deriving when I should integrate (and vise versa).

So do I. That's why there's lookup tables, Maxima, Mathematica, and Matlab.

I'll also say that math becomes a lot more interesting as you get away from application and into proof. And I say that as a practicing engineer who has never had to prove a theorem as a part of my work. Will I ever use the Bolzano-Weierstrass theorem? Not likely. But its application leads directly to several important system stability criteria. And understanding how the proof works reveals a beauty that is hidden if you only see the application's rules.

So it's not a big deal if you have a hard time with math right now. It won't impact your engineering career. You'll have plenty of procedures, tables and tools to help you out with the grunt work. But I'd recommend that you keep peeling away at the onion, if only for aesthetic reasons. And I'd give this advice to any prospective engineer.

Re:A female perspective

[audi100quattro]

It's not so much that males are discriminated against, but women are given preferential treatment when they apply, to encourage them to take up engineering... A girl applying to umr[.edu] gets close to a full scholarship [$9k/yr], when male freshmen don't have it nearly that easy. We do have our share of the obnoxious male population, but then the scholarship isn't that bad either, and it doesn't get any better at UIUC, until you go to UofC or something.

Our ratio is 4:1 girl. We have every engineering major, including nuclear, but a very small humanities program. There'll be like 9 Humanities majors, 100 Science majors, and close to 500 engineering majors at our graduation. That's 9+60+50 girls respectively. We have this girl to guy ratio thing the worst in the country. We're the ones rated 1st or 2nd worst university by the students in the US News survey.

This isn't just a CS problem, this is a problem across most engineering disciplines. My linear system class in EE had 1 girl! The last year that the $9k/yr in financial aid (I know this from talking to the provost) has been offered to ALL girls, it got better, but then it always gets worse during the spring semester, noticeably so. It's hard to recruit women to do engineering. Women are either being socialized [thought a certain way to think] way too early, or it is nature, which might seem like the case in the US, but I'd argue the same about women in India too. That's just me.

Some women, I know 2, have copied their way through the 4 years of an undergrad degree, and gotten jobs way too easily, again compared to men. Their jobs are way too easy to be called CS jobs. Something is keeping women away, and it isn't the lack of jobs, and opportunity at the university level.

Re:A female perspective

[Hannah E. Davis]

I definitely agree with you on that.

When I code, it's certainly not the mathematical part of my brain that I'm using -- I view it more as an art. The similarities between writing a program and writing an essay are just so obvious to me that I can't understand why so many people refuse to acknowledge them. Sure, for some people coding is purely mathematical, but a lot of us really don't do it that way. To me, it requires too much creativity (even when much of the structure is pre-defined) to think of it as anything other than a linguistic exercise.

Re:A female perspective

[audi100quattro]

You are so correct about the last point...

Arts majors shouldn't ideally be looked down upon, but if they're looked down upon in the US, what chance do they have in a country like India or China. Parents actively discourage their kids from doing arts in those countries.

Re:A female perspective

[audi100quattro]

Whatever is tried, needs to be tried earlier, if 7-10 isn't early enough, it's definitely too late by the time a woman gets to university to get her to change her mind or do it for the money.

Re:A female perspective

[VGMSupreme]

Why is it when racial/cultural aspects of people obtaining CS degrees are brought up, no one mentions the African American community? I mean, we are out there. Heck, I am one of them now, coding away at a space tech company out in CA.

Do people also feel that African Americans, along with females, do not really fit the mode of being a CS person?

Re:A female perspective

[lahvak]

People who can think structurally and algorithmically while still being creative

And what do you think math is about? It's true that some areas of math (geometry, topology, analysis) require great deal of what I would call "visual imagination", or "geometrical thinking" for lack of any better term, but areas like algebra, logic, set theory etc. pretty much fit your description.

Re:A female perspective

[woolio]

I noticed that many of the girls in my high-school graduating class went into Chemistry/Chemical Engineering/Bio-*** Engineering. (But not ECE)

I don't believe math skills are the factor keeping women out... For example, my wife is an EE (!!), but she still thinks spending the whole day typing a program in a closed room is a waste of one's life... She would prefer to be interacting with people, going places, etc, etc... To her, that is more interesting.

To some extent, I think women tend to be slightly more social than guys... (I gather they form more close-knit relationships with their female friends than most guys do with their male friends) [at least those born in the US].

CS and/or IT is not a very social field... (Social is not "hey you, can you fix my computer?") Wheras, I've noticed English/Humanities classes tend to be centered more around group discussion/interaction than individual calculation. (Yes there are some seminar courses in grad Enginnering, but they are relatively few).

Lowering high-school math requirements for women in Engineering is just a big mistake... (high-school math is already too far behind in the US). When these women get far into their BS/graduate studies, they will likely feel they aren't prepared for the math and just change to another field. As it is, high-school math does not prepare students well for engineering. (For me, Calculus I was optional [and taught in a worthless manner]!?!??!?!?! WTF?!!!)

If some women don't like science/math, then they shouldn't go into fields that make heavy use of such... But if the reason that they don't like it is that science/math is not "women's work", then society (not the school requirements) needs to change.

Re:A female perspective

[aralin]

I went to Computer Science course in a prestige university in Eastern European (formerly communist) country. Out of 120 students enrolled into the program, 4 were women. There were about 15 in math major. Out of these most ended in either financial math or statistics departments, none in algebra, functional analysis and other more theoretical departments. There was also a teaching major math/cs, which had more than 50% of women enrolled. Coincidentally the student with highest IQ I met at this university was a girl and math major. I am not making any conclusions, just presenting facts.

Re:A female perspective

[matthaak]

It's just the way Western societies have been largely static for centuries now... Rapid technological progress and the careers associated with it is a new phenomenon, and the Western mind hasn't really adjusted...

China may be advancing on the US, but only economically, and not because it is somehow more willing to embrace science and technology. Even if science and technology were the issue, how exactly can one look at the last few centuries of Western scientific progress and changes in daily life and say that it has been "largely static"?!

Chinese people are very much in tune with what is practical for getting ahead, both as a country and individually... A society which respects litigation and playing the stock market more than science and technology won't stay ahead too long.

I agree the Chinese may be more practical about getting ahead and that this could be the reason China is advancing its economy as it is. But Americans have their reasons for being impractical. We so deeply cherish our legal system and stock markets because these institutions preserve and promote individual rights and freedoms, which we see as more important than anything else.

The Chinese conception of individuality - rooted partly in Confucianism, as you noted - does not place the same premium on personal rights and freedoms as the Cartesian conception. An interesting argument could even be made that the Confucian conception may prove in a global economy to be the more practical of the two. And an even more interesting argument could be made that the Confucian conception is inherently more gender-neutral than the Cartesian.

These issues have nothing to with decade-long trends in science and technology, though. They are fundamental values that will differentiate our great societies for many centuries to come.

Re:A female perspective

[mclaincausey]

That's a very good observation about race that hadn't occurred to me. That somewhat supports the point I've made elsewhere that a lot of this is cultural.

Re:A female perspective

[Morgalyn]

As a female engineer (a computer engineer, at that!) I find these sorts of programs humiliating. I was asked to participate in one while I was still a student, and agreed to attend the conference without knowing too much about it. It ended up being a giant handholding session for elementary and middle school girls, where they told them plenty of things that weren't true. The 'panelists' (I was one) were expected to give happy answers to all the questions. When asked if I had ever had to deal with someone treating me poorly because I was female, I gave the honest answer and was immediately shushed (I once interned at a facility full of old white guys who pretty much just wanted me to make their coffee, not help them with their code). A large part of the conference focused on all the 'cool free stuff' women can get for entering as an engineering major. The whole thing was pretty terrible, especially since most of the girls attending didn't know what computer engineering was, but the conf spent more time talking about stuff they could get instead of about what it was about.

ANY sort of discrimination (whether in someone's favor or against) only serves to perpetuate any gaps that might be involved. I can't see anyone feeling good about themselves and their degree if they achieved it by switching out classes for 'easier' or 'softer' classes. There is nothing inherently different, intelligence-wise, between an intelligent female and an intelligent male - the only difference is in preference.

I'm probably biased, though. I'm one of those raving lunatics that gets pissed off when they come out with pink versions of otherwise gender-neutral equipment, "for girls".

Re:A female perspective

[Hannah E. Davis]

I've often wondered why there were so few black people in comp sci (I can think of only three or four that I've seen in my classes), but I just figured that it had something to do with where my university was. Vancouver is predominantly Asian and white, with some poorer areas dominated by First Nations people because of all the reserves near by, and to my knowledge, there isn't a very large black community here.

In any case, I certainly don't think that skin colour is going to change your ability to code any more than the presence or absence of a penis might.

Incidentally, what is the correct term for people of dark skin colour living up in Canada? I've been told that some people consider the word "black" racist, although I'm not sure why, given that "white" seems to be ok, and I have no idea what would be better. "African" doesn't seem ideal, given that many have lived in Canada for more generations than my family has (I'm a first generation British Canadian), and likewise, "African Canadian" doesn't include people who aren't actually Canadian citizens.... and "Person Of Dark Skin Colour Who Is Probably At Least Distantly Descended From Africans" is a wee bit long.

Sorry for getting off topic, I'm just curious :)

Re:A female perspective

[VGMSupreme]

In general, it is usually safest to go with "Black" in my opinion. African-* just leads to people thinking you are too PC or something. I personally don't care as much what I am called, so long as the N-word is not said.

I don't know, many people just assume that black people do not enter the technical field as much cause of the stereotype of us being more physical-mind (ie. Sports, construction, etc.) I have an interests in computers, I went and persued it, graduated, and enjoy it. I build my own comptuers, even if I still install Windows (but I do it properly, keeping security in mind). I am working on having *nix installed on at least one of my machines, and I run a web/ftp server with PHP/Perl/MySQL backend. Yet, I am told I am not black becuase I am into those things and those things are considered non-black.

I am not sure if females are treated the same way as well, but if they are, then it is a really stupid notion to be upset over. People do what they want to do cause they enjoy it. If women, blacks or whatever want to do CS, let them do it and enjoy it. Don't harrass them into joining the major only to set a status quo.

Re:A female perspective

[davidgay]

Just a random thought, but I wonder how much that has to do with communism. In the eastern european countries at least, the gender gaps were much smaller just because the communists did make things a lot more equal (everyone suffers equally, blah blah blah). The majority of the doctors I went to as a kid in Poland were women. Lots and lots of women scientists.

Yes, and I'm reliably informed that in Bulgaria at least, they had to use affirmative action to ensure there wasn't a gender gap in universities. They made the exams harder for the women, my wife still complains about it ;-)

Re:A female perspective

[Hannah E. Davis]

People keep telling me that, but if it was, why haven't I flunked out yet? I find that I have a knack for programming and usually get high marks (ie. 80s, 90s) in courses that require a lot of it despite my usual inability to attain high marks in math courses. Indeed, I sometimes find that the math nerds will come to me for help on coding assignments, just as I will ask them for help when I forget how to integrate or derive something. Some people view computers as an unpleasant tool with which to do fun things with math, and others view math as an unpleasant tool with which to do fun things with computers. I fall into the latter category.

Of course, comp sci isn't all programming, just as it isn't all math, but coding is something that I'm probably going to be doing a lot of when I finally graduate.

Re:A female perspective

[Hannah E. Davis]

I honestly don't know if people consider me less feminine for doing computer science. They seem to view me as more sane than "normal" girls and less obsessed with "girly" things like jewellery and makeup, but I don't think any of that makes me less of a girl... just less of a stereotypical girl.

I'm just a bit different, and I like being this way.

Re:A female perspective

[aeoo]

I'm of Russian descent (culturally), and I have to tell you, right on! :) Great comment there. When I was in the USSR (which no longer exists as such), there was no concept of a "nerd" at all. It was a wildly different thing for me to learn about "nerdiness" here in USA. In fact, I still don't associate mentally myself with nerds, although some people probably think I am (and I don't mind it either, although I don't encourage it). The whole "nerd" stereotype is really really lame, if you ask me, and it exists solely in USA, as far as I know. Where I came from often what would be called a "jock" and a "nerd" here would very OFTEN be the same person. It would be quite common that the person is doing very well athletically AND intellecitually, and there was no stigma against either. In other words, athletes were not automatically considered dumn and smart people were not automatically considered weak.

Re:A female perspective

[InakaBoyJoe]

I was your TA at UBC. The reason is simply that UBC stands for "University of a Billion Chinese" -- as anyone who's been there knows. The proportion of Asian women in computer science is roughly the same as in any other science major at UBC.

That being said, I'm glad UBC's copious efforts to promote gender inclusiveness seem to be paying off.

Re:A female perspective

[808140]

Everything you say is true, but I'm not sure that I agree that it's productive on a social level. The argument you're making against attempts to be more inclusive of women in CS or wherever are essentially the same arguments that people make against affirmative action -- and they make good points.

However, just as with affirmative action, there are clearly pros as well as cons. Some other posters have noted that "there are lots of girls in my CS classes, they're just all Chinese" and similar comments. Now, I live in China, and lots and lots of girls here are CS majors. Quality-wise, they vary just about as much as the male population does, which shouldn't surprise anyone, because as you yourself noted, possession of a vagina doesn't mean you're any better or worse at math & CS then possessors of a penis are. Some people who obviously don't spend much time around Chinese have suggested that perhaps it's because the Chinese aren't as patriarchal -- but it's very much a male-oriented society. So what gives? Why is CS an "acceptable" and even "popular" field for women in China?

I think there are two issues here. One is that during the Communist period, equality for women was one of the big pushes in this country (and I'm sure this is equally true in the former Soviet Bloc). The result is that while a tremendous gender bias still remains, respect for women (at least on a superficial level) is much more ingrained, and there is generally much less chauvinist posturing. Now you are strong and thick skinned, but discrimination and bullying weighs in on most people, and even if nothing is overtly said -- look at how incredibly sexist much of Slashdot is. I think this is one issue -- a pervasive and open lack of respect for women in these fields (and elsewhere) undeniably exists in the west.

A second reason is that in the US at least, intelligence is not looked upon very highly. My sister scored 1550 on her SATs and lied about her scores to her friends. This sort of behaviour is sadly all too common, and is not at all limited to women -- the vast majority of "geeks", regardless of gender, suffered social ostracization during their pubescent years. There is a large amount of evidence that girls in the west are more susceptible to peer pressure on average than boys (probably also a result of the expectation that women be submissive). This in itself is enough of a problem, but it's clear to me that at the root of this the social stigma on intelligence is really to blame. Lots of smart kids in the US avoid particular courses of study because of the social stigma attached to them. Let's face it, there's not a dearth of normal, well socialized guys in CS courses either.

In China, though (and I understand in Russia as well) people who are good at math and science, regardless of gender, are looked up to by their peers -- to be good in these courses means that you are intelligent and intelligence is valued. It's funny because in my experience, culturally at least, Chinese men (from China) are more threatened by intelligent women than even western men are, but despite this, an overwhelming cultural and social devotion to intelligence produces an incentives mechanism that encourages everyone to get involved in "difficult" courses. This includes women.

I don't think there's any point in denying that having more women involved in CS would be a good thing, if only to help socialize the males -- many guys on Slashdot are nice people who mean well, but it's clear that they don't spend a lot of time around women and often make incredibly insensitive comments that pigeonhole women into exactly the stereotype that would have people like yourself getting your nails done 24/7 and constantly saying things like "Like, oh my god! I like totally want to get that new dress at <whereever>!"

Do you like that stereotype?

I know a lot of geek girls, and many of them begin to build an alternate identity for themselves where they begin thinking of themselves

Re:A female perspective

[Hannah E. Davis]

Well, normal girls do drive me nuts, I'm not going to deny that, but I have no problem with the smart ones coming into CS... as long as they drop the dumb act.

The reason being that having our ranks swelled with girls who actually DO think/talk about nothing but getting their nails done and buying designer clothes is just going to strengthen the current stereotype, and if they also refuse to write good code (on the assumption that it might make them look too smart), they'll just encourage more people to think that women are innately bad at technical disciplines.

I remember in highschool, in my programming class, there were a couple of girls who were, in theory, quite intelligent. Both were in the gifted program, as I was, but... let's just say that you'd never know it from talking to them. Unfortunately, I think they also failed that class because they didn't do the work, they didn't try, and instead of doing well and lying about it as your sister did, they just intentionally did badly. All they did every class was giggle amongst themselves and, in the cutest voices they could manage, ask the most mind-numbingly stupid questions and beg the people around them to help them with their work.

We need more smart people, be they men, women or something in between, and it doesn't really matter to me how they dress or act as long as they're willing to do their best. If they're not, even if the stupidity is just an act, I honestly don't think that they belong in the field.

Re:A female perspective

[urbanRealist]

I laughed.

Re:A female perspective

[Poleris]

"I don't know about other girls, but I get kinda irritated when people, be they men or women, exclaim "Good for you!" or "You go girl!" when I mention my major, as if I'm overcoming some incredible hardship by just -- get this -- interacting to guys and *gasp* doing my coursework without female encouragement!"

followed by...
"You rock."

dot dot dot

Re:A female perspective

[NitsujTPU]

Ok, so, the point is, that she's willing to say "hey, this didn't happen to me, and it annoys me that you assume that it does."

That's a strong stance, thanks.

Re:A female perspective

[Sage Gaspar]

I would just ask you to be careful about how you use mathematics.

In every field of study, there is the robotic, procedural aspect, and then there is the creative aspect. Undergrad Calculus courses are to mathematics as paint-by-numbers is to art.

Real research mathematics is about imagining a logically consistent world that may be as dissimilar as you want from our tangible experience and poking around inside. Results are judged on their utility, but they're also judged on their unexpectedness and the elegance of their proof. As Hardy said, "There is no permanent place in this world for ugly mathematics."

Re:A female perspective

[Poleris]

I just thought the irony was funny.

Re:A female perspective

[NitsujTPU]

It was :-D

I'm just sleepy, and hacking at a late assignment. Puts a dude on edge :-P

Re:A female perspective

[alienmole]

We need more smart people, be they men, women or something in between, and it doesn't really matter to me how they dress or act as long as they're willing to do their best.

That makes sense, but it's not what this sort of social policy is aimed at. You're objecting from the perspective of an individual, intellectually gifted woman, that you don't like being tagged as needing special attention because of your gender. And of course you don't need that attention, because you're unusually smart. But not everyone who does the equivalent of a bachelor's in CS is that smart, and social policy aimed at leveling the playing field for women in CS and other technical fields isn't aimed at "smart people" other than the average college level, bachelor's (sic) degree students.

You mentioned in an earlier post the implication that "poor stupid little girls just couldn't handle having big smart intimidating boys around" -- but that's exactly what research seems to have shown, in general: that most women (at least women raised in the U.S.) will avoid situations in which they have to compete with "intimidating boys". You just happen to be an exception. In this context, reaching out equally to boys and girls misses the point -- if the boys naturally create an environment that's unattractive to girls, you have to do something to even the playing field if you want anything to change.

Those airheads you're concerned about are a product of an imbalanced system, and change has to start somewhere. Of course, I'm not claiming that every affirmative action measure taken in favor of women is perfectly optimal, but I do think you should recognize that actions being taken to address pervasive influences that affect women's life choices don't necessarily have to make sense in your individual case, but can still make sense for society as a whole.

Re:A female perspective

[zerocool^]

At my school, University of Virginia, being a rich frat boy and having a future in investment banking or law gets you a lot further status-wise even though you may not necessarily be paid more.

Come on down to Virginia Tech for grad school, we don't have any of that bullshit down here. Just plenty of chicks, 17 bars within 3 blocks of campus, and a football team that isn't coached by someone who every year consistantly squanders the best recruiting class in the nation on a 3-4 defense. Plus, a lot of respect for CS and engineering students, and a small measure of contempt for people who major in finance, business management, economics, etc. And we have no delusions that our competition is Ivy League. We'll take care of you.

*sing-along*
The UVA Guys are so trendy
To games they wear shirts and ties...
but they'll
NEVER GET DRUNK AND THEY'LL NEVER GET LAID
'Till they transfer to Old V-P-I.

Re:A female perspective

[zerocool^]

Dude.

1 to 30. Not 5 to 150. How are you going to make it in CS if you can't reduce your fractions!?! ;)

Re:A female perspective

[petantik f00l]

I was also trying to give a general number of students in class. hey, surely those who read slashdot can do the reduction in their head while reading

Re:A female perspective

[TheWormThatFlies]

But then, not to be too political about it, current American enemies cut heads off, what would they do with a captured woman?

Haha. This is somewhat off-topic, but come on. Being raped is worse than having one's head cut off?!* And therefore putting women in the field would expose them to a simply unacceptable risk, compared to the ordinary, pedestrian risk of getting shot, blown up, otherwise horribly maimed or decapitated that male soldiers currently face?

I keep hearing this rationale for keeping women out of the nastier, more gory parts of the military, and I have always found it rather bizarre.

* I will concede that having one's head cut off and being raped is worse than just having one's head cut off, but only marginally.

Re:A female perspective

[Chabo]

After doing a course on Russian culture...

Nowadays the work ethic is present much more among women than men, mostly because of the system under communism. If you're registered to work, then you're not a "parasite of the state." If you have a job, you get paid. If you actually do your work to the fullest extent, you're just stupid.

Meanwhile, Stalin encouraged women to stay at home and raise families, so they were not really a part of the work force during that time. Because of that, they never really picked up on the aforementioned work ethic, and they tend to work harder than most of the men. I believe at least 60% of new businesses now are started by women, and that doesn't even include the sucess rate of new ventures. I'd bet that figure would be higher.

and compared to the work world...

[filesiteguy]

It might be interesting to note that in my IT shop - roughly 150 programmers and analysts - a little under half are women. In fact , several management positions are held by women. In fact we made two hires the other week for vacant positions, and both were recent female CS grads.

Just an observation. Of course, I don't actually have a CS degree either...

Where's the link?

[Jose]

Where's the link between "the computer profession" and having a degree in Comp. Sci.?

most of the people I know (admittadly mostly men) in "the computer profession" do not have comp. sci. degrees.

There are many paths into working in this industry, a degree in comp. sci. is only one of them. The smartest people I know do not have a degree, much less one is CS.

The problem is earlier not later in life.

[Joffy]

I once told my female boss, "besides you, there are no women in IT, and you yourself don't even have an IT related degree, you just kinda fell into your 'manager of IT people' position." She got really mad. I now work with all female techs. (I'm glad I lost that argument!!) But they don't even read slashdot!!! Computers are work, not a hobby! They don't have cleverly named computers laying around like Ol' Sparky. Sure they can build their own computer. But they don't have the same passion for it/IT. Sure I know girls that play video games and build their own computer, but usually thats where it stops. You don't see that deeper, I just want to know how it works, kinda interest. I mean you can raise a kid around a mechanic, and he will usually really like cars. He won't say his dad made him like cars. I think the way we raise girls makes them less interested, and thats the main problem. If we raised females a little differently, (could already be in the works, takes 18 years for a girl to make it to collge obviously) they may actually care enough about C.S. to persue a career in it. I think the days of no girls allowed are over, and I've seen a ton of guys jump the CS ship for a less math intensive IT degree. Raise a girl to love math and don't make her feel she can only be a math teacher, and watch what happens.

American cultural thing?

[Anonymous Coward]

From my experience, even the 17% figure quoted is an exaggeration. Particularly at the graduate level -- my estimate would be that about 5% of MS/PhD candidates in Engineering and Computer Science are women. Out of this 5%, about 90% are Indian or Chinese/Asian women. So American women comprise such a miniscule percentage as to be practically invisible. The only reason they even appear to have some presence in academia is due to quotas.

All this leads me to question whether the American "culture" suppresses technical aptitude and ambitions of their women. My conversations with a American female faculty member (at a prestigious Engineering institution) appears to confirm this. She claimed that all through her life, her peers, parents, and even professors told her openly about the futility of being a woman in engineeing.

Not Just Computer Science

[iamlucky13]

Since this is Slashdot, the bias is to be expected and I'm not bothered by it, but I want to point out that the gender gap exists beyond just CS majors. Look at electrical, civil, and mechanical engineering graduate statistics, too. I don't have any references, but it's easy to tell just from looking at my graduating class, which was about 80 percent male. And, of course, it's not just my school either. Attendence at ASME and SAE student and professional events is overwhelmingly male, too. And it shows at my job. There's probably about 30 people on my floor, including only 5 women, who I believe are mostly technical writers rather than engineers.

We are told that this is a problem, and to some extent, I agree. Sexual harassment or gender bias is obviously out of line, and we should not be creating an environment such that our coworkers feel uncomfortable, but some work guys simply tend to be more interested in. If a woman is more interested in the workings of the human body than how to program computers or (in my case) build forklifts, let her go study biology, chemistry, or nursing (majors which seem to have as many or more women than men). We don't need to BS people into thinking they'll like spending 8 hours a day debugging code or playing with hydraulic oil, just so the statistics impress Oprah or Hillary Clinton. Some women will like CS or engineering, some won't.

Of course, there is the question of why women often don't want to do the same things as guys, and any implication that women are fundamentally different from men different in their interests or the way they think will inevitably be called sexist by someone. Some times I get the impression that the thoughts of the politically correct mafia can be summed up as, "We have to have equality, and by golly, we're gonna get it even if the only way is to make everyone equally miserable."

Re:Not Just Computer Science

[SmallOak]

But I can't find a pattern:

Also if women and men do think differently, maybe we are missing out on a lot of possible solution to problems in Comp Sci because of the lack of women?
I'm just asking here, I don't know.

I know a lot of Iranian women that are programmers yet that is a very patriarchal society. Look at accounting, I've always seen a lot of women in that profession yet is about as far from the "nurturing, communicative" stereotype as I can think.

Try Biology/Chemistry departments for geek girls

[ttys00]

I graduated with two girls from a class of 100 or so, and neither were proper geeks. They did their best to ignore the rest of us smelly types.

If you're looking for geek girls, try biology or chemistry departments. Many more women there than CS departments, they are extremely clever, and usually are still geeks. Plus, they find it hard to get a decent man who isn't afraid of a woman being smarter than them.

Lets turn this around

[russ1337]

Completly made up:
Annon writes "Looks like finding a compatible guy knitter in the knitting circle is becoming even harder, as an already wide gender gap in the loom room and its becoming larger.
From the article: 'A Globe review shows that the proportion of men picking up knitting needles peaked at 3.7 percent in 1985 and then went on the decline. Men have comprised about 2.8 percent of knitters in the last few years, and in the elite confines of large industrial wool shops, only 1.7 percent of new knitters are men [...]
The argument of many Yarn barns is that men who 'pick up sticks' are defying social expectations, are in an uncomfortable position to begin with. So they are more likely to be dissuaded from pursuing this needlework craft if they are exposed to an unpleasant environment, bad teaching, and negative stereotypes like the image of the old granny sock knitter.'"

Be careful what you wish for

[Cally]

On my first day in $newjob, during the walk round and wave at people stage, I spotted this absolutely gorgeous geek girl. Looks a bit like Anna Friel... check. Big row of books on RDBMS and .NET on her desk... check. less than immaculate personal grooming (implying a focus on the important things in life rather than trivialities)... check. No current boyf - apparently, check. At this point our eyes met, electricity or chemistry (whichever you prefer) happened, and silent communication occured! Every time I met her for the next few weeks/months, this silent eye-contact stuff happened. (Oh yes, I'm in my late 30s, BTW, so I know the difference between straightforward eye-contact and the "take me, I'm yours" sort.)

Of course, as a true geek, there was SFA I could do about it except slide further and further towards despair as the disappointment and disinterest grew in her with every day that passed without my asking her out for a drink or something. Now, almost a year later, I try to avoid her whenever possible as even a glimpse can push me into a seriously pissed off mood for the rest of the day. Ah well... I've a Linux and BSD based home network to play around on, a bottle of single malt and half an ounce of decent skunk; all far, far more accessible to me than this woman.

So, men, be careful what you wish for unless you're able to do something about it. Women, although the range of intelligent, creative, amusing and sensitive blokes working in the field of IT is great, and they're almost all available, uh... well, forget that. Just get in there and take your pick. We're almost all available, and even allowing for the high prevalence of social inadequates like me, there are still many more desirable single men in this field than probably any other...

*sigh*

Re:Be careful what you wish for

[Cyphertube]

So basically, you acted like somebody with no self-confidence and think that it's awful having her around?

Never mind that your avoidance screams gender discrimination.

Let's have a pity party!

Re:Be careful what you wish for

[Valafar]

Let me get this strait... You are old enough to know the difference between "Straitforward eye-contact and the "take me, I'm yours sort), but you're still so lame that you can't even talk to her? Additionally, after NOT talking to her for a year you're in such emotional despair that even the sight of her ruins your entire day? That's pretty sad, but all is not lost...

Here are some small bits of advice:

1) Get laid. Pay for it. There are escorts everywhere. Don't think of it as being desperate, think of it as job training. You're learning how to talk with women, how to touch them, what they like and what they think about. Escorts are perfect for this. They also have the side benefit of making you less desperate for sex and human interaction which women can detect from a mile away. As a bonus, they don't care if you make mistakes. You're learning from a professional and in fact you should tell them exactly that. "Hi, I'm really uncomfortable around women, and I don't get laid and I'm not good at releationships and I need help." Lastly, don't listen to anyone (including "Mother Culture") who says that paying for sex is bad or immoral. There's a HUGE difference between meeting an escort and picking up a street walker.

2) Talk to people. It takes practice but you can do it. Talk to everyone. Start off slowly, say hello to EVERYONE you see, man or woman, ugly or hot. Conversations are easy, because most people will do the talking if you let them, you just have to initiate the callback function. Here's how it works:

      You: "Hi! How are you? How was your ?"
      Them: "Hi! It was great. Blah blah blah."
      You: "Oh, really? That's really cool. What did you think of "blah blah blah"?

They'll take over the conversation and you just have to listen to what they are saying and be truly interested. Think of it as a science experiment. You're studying humans and everything that they do. Ask pointed questions about whatever they are talking about to keep the conversation going. When you hit the "uncomfortable silence" phase of the conversation, just say "Well, good to see you; I've got a lot of work to do." And walk away. You can always excuse yourself. Another great one is "Well, I don't want to keep you. Talk to you later".

3) Go talk to that girl. Make up your mind that you're going to do it and just do it. Don't think, don't plan and for gawd sakes don't work out how the conversation is going to end before you even have it.

3a) Say hello to her, ask her how she is doing. Tell her that you think she's an interesting person and it seems like you have a lot in common. See if she'll go to lunch with you. As you said, she's a geek girl, so you know that you have plenty to talk about. If asking her to lunch is too hard, start simply.. Tell her you're going to grab some lunch and ask her you can pick her up something. You'll have the benefit of having an excuse to talk to her, you'll know a bit more about her (what she likes to eat) AND she'll probably feel obligated to eat with you in the lunch room (or whereever).

3b) After having a conversation with her a few times, tell her most of the truth. Here's how it would go:

          "You know, I've been interested in talking to you for a while, but I'm such a nerd I couldn't get up the nerve to do it ."

And she'll say:

          "I wonder what took you so long. I've been giving you eyes for a while... Of course, I'm a dork too and couldn't come talk to you; I was too afraid."

Life is too short to freak out over something that never happened or something that "could have been"; Seize the day!

GOOD LUCK!

Re:Be careful what you wish for

[multipartmixed]

And if all that doesn't work, just tell her your penis is sore. Maybe she'll offer to rub it.

Re:Be careful what you wish for

[Cally]

Well, er... yes. What's your point?

Re:Be careful what you wish for

[Cally]

OK, I appreciate the thought :) but... (1) I've actually had relationships before, you know, full on proper living-together type relationships. They've all been fucking disasters in the end, which is (and perhaps I should have made this clearer) why I'm not pursuing this woman at all.

(2), I'm pretty much past the crushing social phobia whereby I was unable to talk to people... it toko years of therapy and antidepressants, admittedly :), but I'm fairly OK in that respect, modulo enforced socialising anyway, which I can't stand.

(3) It's not that I can't talk to her (indeed I have done, many times, indeed worked with her on occasions) - in fact I get the impression she finds it harder to talk to me than vice versa - it's that I choose not to (except for work purposes of course.) There are men where I work with a reputation for lechery, and I have no desire at ALL to be held in contempt by many people in the way that they are.

Re:Be careful what you wish for

[Valafar]

Heh! Well then, perhaps someone else will find that advice useful. I apologise for misinterpreting your post. Regardless, don't EVER give a flying fuck what people think about you. If being interested in women you work with is lechery then the people you work with are too christian for their own good or they've got sticks so far up their asses they need to have them surgically removed. :-)

It never ceases to amaze me how people judge other people based on what "Mother Culture" tells them is OK. People as a herd dislike or think ill of others because they do something they are "supposed" (according to society) to find reprehensible, when the reality is that everyone is doing it and not talking about it. (with the exception of those people who actually bought the party line and think everyone else is towing the line as well). That doesn't mean that everyone is or should be a moral vacuum but holy crap, a little self-actualization and honesty would go a long way.

Here are my favorite "stigma's" that everyone is doing:

1) Masturbation: Almost without exception every guy (and a vast majority of women) masturbates, so why do people pretend like it's socially reprehensible? Why does it matter?

2) Porn: Pornography isn't a billion dollar industry in the United States because only people in California are buying it. People are totally fascinated with sex and the visual stimulation from watching sex, but still it's Taboo. What would happen if it weren't so socially repugnant? Would MORE people buy porn?

3) Drugs: Especially Pot. I know more people who smoke pot than don't, or have at one point in their lives smoked marijuana, yet we still have a "war on drugs" and it's EVIL (tm.)

Oh well... /end rant.

Re:would be interesting to compare to other measur

[NitsujTPU]

At my high school, the valedictorian and salutatorian were both female, as were most of the top 10 students.

I scored top in the American High School Math Exam, tied with one other male, but I was only in the top 1/3rd of my class, not top 10. I also had top 10 SAT and PSAT scores, aptitute tests... IQ tests. Guidance even came and asked me why I wasn't top 10 (probably figuring some sort of abuse or drug use or something).

Simply put, the teachers never saw me in the smart-clique, and so never decided that I was a smart student.

More women go to college as undergraduates than men, and I think that this actually extends to graduate school as well.

So, if anything, this phenomenon is QUITE specific to technical fields, because to assert that high schools are somehow shortchanging women is a tired argument that looks at a non-existant problem. If you want to solve something, look at the REAL numbers and figure out what the REAL problem is, not some politically correct BS spewed forth from someone who isn't even interested in what the real numbers are.

Girls != Computers

[bzaks]

Honestly, speaking as a computer science major, I've found that most girls don't see things in that binary mind set that most (as I can see) computer skills really require.

Works both ways

[lrucker]

Speaking as a girl geek, there've been several occasions where guys have expressed "interest in something more" and I've obliviously mistaken it as mere friendliness.

For example, I didn't realise till the next morning why I got to monopolise the prototype Mac that Apple brought to the computer club in early 1984. I was too interested in the computer to even notice.

Maybe women see the men in IT and ...

[joelsanda]

... run the other way.

You know...

[Pantero Blanco]

If someone avoids the field for idiotic and childish reasons likes the ones other posters are suggesting, the field doesn't need them. CS doesn't need people who are in it primarily for money instead of for the love of what they do, or who'll back off of it because "their coworkers are weird".

One poster in a previous story about this said that a female friend had told him she wouldn't take CS classes because "the room smelled bad". Do you really think she was interested and would've made a contribution to science if something that little could push her away?

Re:You know...

[thesandtiger]

Depends on what you mean by "their co-workers are weird."

I've had (and am a) "weird" co-workers in the sense that I read strange things, listen to strange music, make dumb jokes that are funny only to people who are up on highly specific nerdly things" - you know, harmless geekery.

But I've also had the lovely experience of getting a call at midnight at my supposedly unlisted phone number phone from a co-worker who was being rather over friendly, would drop comments about how easily he could get at my "private" information, and would demonstrate his geek skills by casually mentioning events from my past that happened, somehow, to get documented on the web (like, discussions I've had with people via usenet etc). He never asked me out or tried to get anywhere with me - I think he really was just doing this stuff to try to show off, with no malice - but it was fucking stalker-level creepy. I handled it by telling him that I wasn't amused, and that I'd appreciate it if he'd respect my privacy or at least stop telling me about his exploits. (And it worked - he stopped telling me about it, whether or not he actually stopped doing it)

There's regular weird and then there's "You're vaguely creepy and I think you might have bodies stacked up in your basement" weird. Fuck em if they can't deal with the former, and people shouldn't have to deal with the latter.

Re:would be interesting to compare to other measur

[NitsujTPU]

Don't believe me?

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/features/july-de c02/college.html

We offer: uncertain futue and discrimination.

[SSalvatore]

The offer for women in CS is basically the following: that of a career which *seems* (emphasis on appearance) to be shrinking *and* where you will be discriminated due to your gender.

No wonder women are choosing other careers.

Yet another unsolvable contradiction of this intrinsecally falocentric economic system: capitalism.

Re:you guys act like...

[Cyphertube]

Honestly, I find CS to be ridiculously boring, which is why I wasn't intrigued by it, why my wife wasn't intrigued by it, or frankly anybody I know. (Even those I know with CS degrees didn't find it too fascinating.)

It's a good point there are a lot more things than simply being a code monkey. (Which is what most CS majors I've met end up doing.) Most people I've met with degrees in information science have been women. Engineering seems to be male heavy, and the most successful UI designers I've known were women.

Why not look at other incredibly boring number-crunching degrees? Economics, accounting, etc.? I would even expect them to have higher percentages of women graduates, since those jobs actually can have some real interaction with people, even as interns.

The sad fact is that most CS students who aren't double-majoring tend to be antisocial, which real difficulties dealing with people. Given that women tend to be more social, and that they tend to be more women at colleges these days, it really points out how awful the career field is presented in the long run.

(Were I ever to take a pure coding job, I think I'd have to kill myself.)

Re:Try Biology/Chemistry departments for geek girl

[russ1337]

I studied engineering upstairs from the hairdressing school. Thats where we wanted to be.
One guy picked up 'human form' drawing (required for entry to the fashion design course) just to meet the ladies. It worked. He was the only straight guy in the class. And why not.

Two thoughts

[duffbeer703]

1. Americans don't take CS courses anyhow, and the asians and eastern europeans who do tend to come from male-dominated societies.

2. CS degrees are less and less relevant to working in an IT environment or even as a developer. Most IT tasks and many programming tasks don't require the rigorous education in mathmatics that a CS degree gives you.

Personally, I feel that CS enrollment problems says more about the relevance of the degree than anything else.

Re:Two thoughts

[Psychedelic_Bard]

Americans don't take CS courses anyhow, and the asians and eastern europeans who do tend to come from male-dominated societies. Actually, Asia and Eastern Europe are far less male-dominated than the US. I suppose it has something to do with Communism and how it encouraged equality between the genders long before it was embraced here. In fact, pretty much all the women who study CS in my university are either from Asia or Eastern Europe.

Re:Two thoughts

[mattwarden]

As a CS student who has just finished going through senior-year recruiting, I have to second this note. When seeking the "good jobs", I was at a disadvantage because my degree was CS and not MIS (MIS is much much less intense technically). The only thing that saved me was my GPA and the fact that I had Psychology as a second major, which I guess was good enough to substitute for the business training and/or prove that I can be social.

Anymore, programming is a manual labor. Programming is to IT as construction is to architecture. If you want to be an architect, I would suggest something other than CS.

Re:Two thoughts

[duffbeer703]

The comment wasn't intended to be bashing women or their intelligence. In general, women are less attracted to math and engineering for cultural and possibly physiological reasons. But math & engineering != IT, or intelligence for that matter.

I'm an IT manager at a fairly large IT organization, and I have about 12 direct reports, who are a mix of programmers, database specialists and "advanced" PC analysts who do alot of customization and deep troubleshooting. 7 men, 5 women.

Of the men:
4 have BSCS degrees, (1 has a MS as well)
2 have a degrees in biology and chemistry
1 high school diploma, and rose up the ranks from tape operators or installers

Of the women:
2 have degrees in liberal arts
1 BS in physics
2 never finished degrees and rose up the ranks from clerical/admin titles

In my experience, with my people, the women have generally been better at paying attention to detail (patch management, report writing, system administration) and getting the techs from different groups together and working. The guys seem to enjoy troubleshooting, low-level programming and the technology factor more.

Again, those are 12 people at one place, but I think that men and women bring different skills to the plate, and that those skills complement each other.

I also have a BSCS, and all of us agree that studying math, discrete structures, compiler design, etc contribute almost nothing to our jobs. If I had to do it all over again, I would have majored in physics, history or classics and minored in CS or MIS.

I met my first one yesterday

[ServerIrv]

Yesterday I was at a coffee house with some people from my church, and I met my first female CS major. I'm part of a church of around 13000 people, and she was the first one I had ever met from my church. I've been a member of this church for the past 6 years. When I asked her what she did, and she told me she was a CS major and a developer, I was caught completely off guard. I wasn't expecting CS at all. We of course talked about the gender gap, and how it can be tough for females in the CS field. Sarah, if you read Slashdot, you rock.

Salary is Not the Issue

[Flwyd]

My university graduated more CS majors after the dot com crash than before it. Partly this was due to general growth, partly it was due to a major decrease in demand for programmers without a degree, party it was due to laid off tech professionals going back to school. But I didn't meet anyone who dropped out of the CS department because prospective salaries were lower. There were only a few girls in my freshman year CS classes and there was about the same percentage during my senior year. (If I recall, there were 7-10 girls in my 100+ person senior projects class, which everyone had to take.)

There are broadly two reasons to pursue a computer science degree. The first is because the pay is good. The second is because the student loves problem solving, abstract and applied math, and making computers do cool stuff.

Geeks usually don't care about social stigmata, negative stereotypes, or lack of hygene associated with a subject field as long as they get to play with stuff they think is cool. The important question is this: Of the girl geeks (and there are many), why aren't there very many girl *computer* geeks?

(One could an analogous question: Of the boy geeks (and there are many), why aren't there vary many boy *knitting* geeks? I don't know if the answers are similar.)

Re:Salary is Not the Issue

[orasio]

(One could an analogous question: Of the boy geeks (and there are many), why aren't there vary many boy *knitting* geeks? I don't know if the answers are similar.)

I actually have a friend who does knit and is male.
Some guy in an apartment in front of mine uses a mechanical knitter, but that would count as self-employment other than an interest, of course.
I even learned the basics of knitting, because it seemed interesting. I didn't actually knit anything, but I care enough to look into it.

Re:Salary is Not the Issue

[jayed_99]

I'm actually a male that knits.

Mod parent insightful

[lrucker]

Maybe my experience wasn't typical, but I'm female and I never got any sense that I wasn't wanted in CS.

Re:Mod parent insightful

[TheLink]

Personally I think people are making a big fuss over the wrong thing. If someone is really interested in something they won't get discouraged that easily.

I'm not in the US, but from what I hear it seems that in the US, it's common for male geeks/nerds to get discriminated against in high school (even physical abuse). But they still go do geeky stuff anyway.

Still, if this is true, it's not a good culture to have. Over here if you're a member of the chess club, or computer club it's not something you'd need to hide from anyone. People who do well in exams/tests don't get picked on negatively etc.

Avoiding a "loser" culture is important, since nowadays one has to be competitive with the rest of the world. Not just the rest of the class.

Nowadays the barriers of entry to the IT world are much lower. Computers and internet connections are much cheaper nowadays. Even if you don't have a formal CS or IT degree, if you're good enough you can prove it. I doubt most developers in the OSS projects care whether you're male or female.

But similarly that means a programming or CS-related job is easier to send to another country than a nursing job.

So it may be a smart move by girls to avoid Computer Science!

Re:Mod parent insightful

[dptalia]

Neither did I. Maybe that I wasn't wanted because I'm loud and obnoxious, but never because I'm female. Once I was discriminated against because I wasn't jewish, but again, never because I was female.

My College CS Professor

[mkw87]

I have to taken one actual Programming class (C++) for my Mechanical Engineering degree (BA), and my teacher was a female. I found it kind of odd, but she knew her stuff. It was really funny that the only female in my class was the teacher though.

Chauvinist response -- but maybe true

[dada21]

Here's a response that'll tickle the feminists. Babies make IT a bad business for women.

I own an IT company. We've hired women in the past. We've tried to get younger females with good brains to get into the computer science market and attend colleges and programs. Yet we've seen a very high quitting percentage over the past 10 years, and so have almost all of my competitors (who I'll get beers with).

The number one reason why women have left my industry has been child-rearing. If you're a guy, try leaving the business for a year or two, and see how competitive you are when you get back.

Many women I know today (younger ones, 18-25) seem to actually be thinking of babies, whereas when I was 18-25, most of my gal pals were thinking of becoming lawyers, doctors and, yes, even engineers. Maybe society is feeling a change back to the "old bad ways" of women raising kids and men working. I'm not saying this is the best or the worst way to live, but I don't have kids so it doesn't affect me, really.

Expect to see fewer women in the market place for a decade, either way -- in IT our in other industries.

Re:Chauvinist response -- but maybe true

[paulbd]

I'm a guy. I'm a software engineer. I left the business for a lot more than 1-2 years so that I could raise my daughter. I'm back in the business, and I have people falling over themselves to hire me. Google call? check. Microsoft? check. various startups in the valley, even though i live in philadelphia? check.

the difference? once my daughter was in preschool, i got pretty serious about writing pro-audio software for linux, and giving it away. result? a couple of paid trips each year to europe to talk about my work, the respect of geek hackers everywhere and hopefully soon some real cash from various companies who want to use my work.

What does my case prove? Nothing, other than that having children has no particular meaning for a person's ability to continue functioning as a productive, skilled software engineer. It might be involved in that process for some people, and some of them might be male, or female (and in this age, perhaps even both at the same time).

And yeah, ok, so I made a million or two from being the #2 hire at amazon.com, but that has little do to with the story :)

Re:Chauvinist response -- but maybe true

[Anonymous Coward]

pompous ass. god, what a braggert you are.

could you BE any more fixated on yourself?

Re:Chauvinist response -- but maybe true

[dada21]

You are a rarity.

I make more money doing less work as I push my value more by not pushing my value more. I also am an anarchocapitalist, so I hold different beliefs than the typical "I know economics and I learned it in college!!!" professional. My life revolves around time preference, not what I think people other than myself should be paid.

I know I could raise a kid and not lose a cent of what I'm worth -- but I value myself properly. Others run around thinking they're making real money while not really offering their customers (who would be their bosses if they're salaried) a return on the money spent on their labor. If I charge someone $1000 for something, they better see an immediately or short term gross return of $2000 on that labor. That is how you know you are worth what you command -- people see a return on the money spent.

This is also why I see such failures in the IT business in the US. So many people do work for $30 that can be performed internationally for $5. Is it bad for business? No, it is great for business -- it opens up doors for people to earn $60 for new work in the same time they used to charge $30. We just have people who don't want to continue building their personal value and their business value.

Good post, glad you're a success. Get a prodigy to mentor to, you'll see your knowledge passed on.

Re:Chauvinist response -- but maybe true

[Quiet_Desperation]

Is it the old bad ways if it's what they want to do? It isn't like all the hard won oppurtunites are going to go away. It's just another option.

You don't have kids, so why "dada21"? The artform? Just curious.

Re:Chauvinist response -- but maybe true

[paulbd]

the original poster appeared to me to be claiming that people taking time off to raise children (possibly the most fundamental task most of us will ever do) automatically terminates their utility as software developers etc. the original poster is wrong. my post wasn't trying to say any more than that.

Re:Chauvinist response -- but maybe true

[metamatic]

I left the business for a lot more than 1-2 years so that I could raise my daughter.

once my daughter was in preschool, i got pretty serious about writing pro-audio software for linux, and giving it away. [...]

And yeah, ok, so I made a million or two from being the #2 hire at amazon.com, but that has little do to with the story :)

On the contrary, it has everything to do with the story. If I had a couple of million I'd retire, create free software and other work, and give it away, and maybe I'd then get big offers from people like Google and Microsoft too. But since I don't have the millions, I have to work a regular job, and that doesn't leave much time and brain power left to write major applications and give them away.

Similarly, it was the millions that gave you the luxury of quitting work to raise your daughter. Very few people have that amount of luck or privilege. For them, balancing work and child rearing is a major issue, and giving stuff away to get people interested in hiring them for lots of cash is a chicken-and-egg problem.

Re:Chauvinist response -- but maybe true

[paulbd]

i beg to differ. when i quit working to raise my daughter, there was absolutely no expectation that amazon would ever pay off. we relied and planned to rely on her mother's income as a science researcher. it was really very suprising when amazon did as well as it did. i left amazon when there were only 8-10 employees, and the company was still trying to figure out how to raise enough cash to keep operating for another year.

OR maybe girls by don't like / aren't good at CS?

[DoofusOfDeath]

If anyone has figured out how we can decide the nature / nurture issue without performing experiments that are generally considered immoral, let me know.

But until then, I consider it perfectly plausible that there's just something about the trade girls tend to be bad at or not enjoy, regardless of enculturation?

I'm not trolling, I'm just trying to be open minded and scientific about this. I haven't seen evidence that the "nature" / "bell-curve" type hypotheses have been eliminated. We need to follow the truth wherever it leads.

And with unofficial quotas

[Maxo-Texas]

The 28% of the females entering the field are going to get 50% of the promotions so they are "equally" represented in management.

At one company I worked for 100% managers were female. 45% of group leaders were female and 100% of the "business analysts" were female. Among the males, 60% were ethnic in some fashion or another. Meanwhile, the programming staff was about 80/20 male/female and 40/60 caucasian/*. I think out of a couple hundred people there were 5 white male management and most had been promoted over 10 years previously.

It took me a while, but I finally realized there was no way in hell I was going to get promoted there.

* Asian, Black, Indian, Philipeno, Russian.

women write 28% of software, but use 50% of it

[cristij]

I agree that more women should go into programming, but not because the current situation is unfair towards them. I think that personal preference and ability contribute more to the current situation than stereotypes or discrimination. However, I think design of software packages may suffer from the lack of input from women. I think that men and women interact differently with a computer. Currently since most of the coding is done by men, interfaces and features are probably written for a male user and women's productivity suffers when using those programs. A woman's touch to interface design could do a lot in making the program better usable by other women.

Re:women write 28% of software, but use 50% of it

[doombob]

I'm not a fan of people saying that interface design needs "a woman's touch." I've designed a number of websites that some of the bosses have said could use a woman's touch (even thought the women here were not web designers by trade). When we've gone back and changed things from the way I did, the customer has come back and said they like a different version, usually one that I have put together. Which by the way - I have a very artistic eye and am pretty good about design, layout, graphics, etc. Oh, but most of the customers we deal with in websites are - you guessed it - WOMEN! Good interface design has everything to do with knowing your audience, just like any form of communication. Just because a woman will be using an interface, doesn't mean that a woman needs to design it, as long as the communicator respects his/her audience.

Maybe women are smarter

[beforewisdom]

Maybe outsourcing the the decline in QUALITY I.T. jobs is inflating the gender gap.

So what...

[betelgeuse68]

Another politically correct story. 99% of chicks don't dig computers... not the aspects that tend to attract 99% of males to the field.

Chicks like their shoes, guys their TVs, this is the same script, different actors.

Who freaking CARES?

Yin and Ying.

-M

28%? 17% luxury!

[dougmc]

Back at UT, when I got my degree in physics, if I recall correctly the graduating class was about 20 ... all guys.

When I got my degree in astronomy, the graduating class was six ... all guys.

all engineering and physical sciences

[peter303]

The article says that this condition and change is occurring in all phyisical sciences and engineering fields, not just computer science. "Tech is out" since the dot.bomb.

Re:all engineering and physical sciences

[fastgood]

"Tech is out" since the dot.bomb

According to the introduction, they are talking about a key event happening 20 years prior to that:
The peak male to female ratio of 5:3 for students who decided upon their college paths in 1980.

Those women matriculated in 1981, during a period of the infamous 69-cents-on-the-dollar pay;
entering one of the sparse professions where their gender had very little influence on earnings.

Today there are moany other choices for a field of study (that avoid blatant salary discrimination)

aw man...

[Cryptnotic]

Too bad I didn't get the "+1 Informative, -1 Flamebait" mod.

What is essentialism?

[Inoshiro]

Essentialism is saying women aren't as good at math, or that all black men have big penises.

Essentialism is still a lie. I don't know why intelligent people can let themselves be deluded into thinking it's true. Shame on you and shame on the moderator who gave your talk a mod point.

"Essentialism and society

Essentialist positions on gender, race, and characteristics, consider these to be fixed traits while not allowing for variation in the group or individual. Contemporary proponents of identity politics including feminism, equality for gay people, and anti-racist activists generally take constructionist viewpoints. However, these proponents have taken various positions including essentialist ones. Prejudices such as racism, sexism and anti-gay bias may be based on an essentialist view, such as the view that all people of a particular race inherently possess a particular negative characteristic."

Read more at Wikipedia.

Do you honestly think that women are bad at math because they were built that way, or is it because of years of gender stereotyping, starting with what colour clothes the parents put on the baby right after birth?

Essentialism is the lie that African Americans are born dumber than whites because they have a lower IQ, rather than looking at the distribution of income and social equality that those people have (Bill Cosby may be rich, but most black folk are still way below the poverty line; in Canada, replace African American with Native to get the same effect).

"In feminism, Yashar Keramati understands that essentialism constitutes that women have pre-determined characteristics. This goes beyond simple body parts, those being the vagina and the penis. Rather, this means that women are born 'emotional,' 'inferior,' 'irrational' and so on. Therefore, essentialism could circulate false information about women which results in lowering their status. Though this necessarily depends upon the value judgements a society adheres to. It also depends upon the supposition that these qualities are negative and don't possess the ability to be sublimated -- just like the lower qualities in the male sex. Essentialism can also be taken to an extreme by characterizing different races in such a way -- though it is true that every school of thought is subject to distortion."

Essentialism is what Hitler used as justification for putting Jews and Gays and other undesirables into furnaces. To say you support this point of view is carte blanche for a return to eugenics and all the other madness that implies.

Re:What is essentialism?

[drsmack1]

So, everyone is born the same?

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/Jennnife rRobackMorse/2005/11/28/176881.html

Re:What is essentialism?

[Arthur B.]

The point is not here. The absence of women in CS and analytical fields it a fact. If you don't agree on that stop reading. I am offering the most simple explanation. I fully realize it might not be the only explanation, and it being simple does not make it true, but at least it is still a good theory -it's easily refutable -it provides a good explanation of the observed phenomena -it doesn't contradict other verified theories

Re:What is essentialism?

[Chris Burke]

Essentialism is the lie that African Americans are born dumber than whites because they have a lower IQ, rather than looking at the distribution of income and social equality that those people have (Bill Cosby may be rich, but most black folk are still way below the poverty line; in Canada, replace African American with Native to get the same effect).

or better yet, compare to other socio-economic situations outside of the U.S.

All these studies are done in order to prove that social differences are, in fact, essential. Yet they are always done within the society that has these social differences! Show me one study which is done in a culture in which white people are an oppressed minority who were slaves a hundred and fifty years ago, and only attained full civil rights less than fifty years ago, and compare I.Q.s, and then I might think they're on to something.

Until then it's racism posing as science to prove that they aren't racist.

Re:What is essentialism?

[emAugust]

It is an undeniable and documented trend that african's have more fast twitch muscle than europeans. This is neither better nor worse - it is simply an evolution suited to different situations. It also should ne said, that this is not a rule, but once again a trend. It is a difference and there are multitudes of these differences everywhere. Should we ignore positive or neutral differences so as to allow ourselves to ignore culturally 'negative' differences as well? It's not saying women aren't as good as men at math universally and totally. It's entertaining the notion that perhaps as collective biological groups women on average are not as good as men at math. There is a large difference between that sentiment, and a blanket statement.

Re:Thoughts of a guy on seeing a girl in his CS cl

[andyatkinson]

I think you should double check your order of evaluation. You have the hair-slicking and armpit-detoxing before the girl notices you. Now don't get me wrong, there are Computer Science kids that talk to themselves, mumbling something about WoW, big O notation, or whatever, but most would wait until g.noticesYou() is true before entering the loop. Hopefully most would know when to break the loop, but that is another story.

hmm, procedural...

[CaptainPinko]

well considering geeks' intentions it's probably a safer bet than treating them functionally...

Thanks so much.

[Inoshiro]

After seeing comments like this that imply women are born stupid, I'm glad to see that a balanced opinion can be moderated up on Slashdot.

Maybe someday we can stamp out the rampant ignorance that leads to such gender disparity in some fields!

Re:Thanks so much.

[Arthur B.]

I'm sorry I fail to see how I held such an opinion. If one thing is certain it's that your opinion is certainly NOT balanced.

Girls don't like tech

[qray]

Just goes to show that girls never really liked tech. They were more interested in the money.
--
Q

Re:you guys act like...

[Prophet of Nixon]

My job has degenerated into a pure coding job, and I'm considering it.

Re:Which puts them at a huge disadvantage

[MaggieL]

Unfortunatly the only thing inferior to a typical undergrad CS student's social skills are his programming skills.

"It wasn't about what I thought it would be"

[SuperBanana]

Is that there is a decline in men enrolling in Women's Studies degrees.

"A D in Women's Studies?"

"It wasn't about what I thought it would be."

(The American President.)

Seriously, I can think of nothing more dead-end than a career in "Women's Studies". I've met a couple of women who have majored in such feel-good careers (my personal favorite was the one whose major was "women and sustainability") and are rather pissed with themsleves for doing so. They're usually working secretarial/data entry/retail jobs, and very disenfranchised.

University Gender Gap

[SWroclawski]

When there are more women than men in US univerties (57-58% of college atendees are women) then why are we so concerned here?

Clearly there are more women getting higher education then men, so why does this one small area of university study matter?

Another relevant comment in a geek trade rag ...

[SABME]

The most recent issue of the IEEE newsletter ran a story about the gender gap in engineering schools, and I thought the writer hit the nail on the head with this observation (paraphrased from my memory of the original):

Besides the social stigma, why should a female seek to start a program of intense and difficult study to be rewarded with a career that offers long hours, stressful situations, and uncertain prospects for steady employment?

Who cares?

[SomeGuyTyping]

really, does anyone give a s#!t if there are less women in the CS field?

No, actually it has nothing to do with that

[Marx_Mrvelous]

Nope, it doesn't. General CS admission dropping may be an effect, but why would the *ratio* of men to women drop? You provide no clear explanation to why this would be.

Your second statement is more telling. How are women treated (or raised) differently, that they don't seem to like pogramming as much as men? Somewhere there lies the real answer.

Maybe the average girl doesn't like the experience

[vlad_petric]

As a society, we have to make sure that girls aren't dissuaded/stereotyped-away from pursuing a CS career. However, if they choose not to pursue such a career, I don't think that's a real problem.

Here's my 2-cent theory: studies have shown that the average female has a vocabulary that's twice as large as the one of the average male (interestingly-enough, starting with a very early age). Of course, this is just an average, it's very easy to find people that do not match the average. IMO, this difference simply makes the average woman more inclined to pursue careers which involve communication. In IT, most of the work is just between you and the computer, there's little human interaction going around.

girls of cs!

[nester]

http://girlsofcs.com/

8)

Is it possible?

[VikingDBA]

Is it possible that women simply don't like computer science as much as men? What about the possibility that what ever it is that seems to draw the geeky or otherwise more socially challenged among us to this field is not as common among women. I am not saying that there aren't geeky, socially challenged woman out there. One of my daughters is a geek girl and is looking to enter engineering as a freshman in a year next year. I am just saying that less woman seem to be so challenged. I would also guess that science minded woman are more likely to enter a profession where they can directly help people such as being a doctor.

Women Smarter than me?

[onkelonkel]

I have never met a woman smarter than me. (I know, I know, it sounds very egotistical, but still true). I have met some very smart women, but smarter than me? Sorry no. Do they exist? Undoubtedly; but they are very very rare. On the other hand, I have met a number of men smarter than me. In fact, I have encountered men so smart that I felt like a Cro Magnon standing next to them. My theory is that men have a flatter IQ distribution than women (ie squashed bell curve) The average man is about as smart as the average woman, but at the very extreme end of the curve there are many more super-genius men than women. (Probably true at the other end of the curve also ie more sub-moron men than women)

17% seems high...

[AmazingRuss]

...I had to mentor a couple freshmen for a Computer Engineering course...the class had about 200 guys in it, and one girl...who was also the only black person in the room.

All through my college career, there have never been more than 1 or 2 females, if any, in any of my tech classes, which have between 20-30 students.

One of my professors was always encouraging us to take something in the Agriculture department...he said the hog butchery class he was taking was FULL of chicks. That mental image makes me contemplate a lifetime of celibacy.

Re:17% seems high...

[shish]

Indeed; I've been checking out universities to apply to over the past couple of weeks -- going to open days, there are only one or two girls in a group of 30-50 :(

because

[the0ther]

of shallowness mods will love this /who cares

Re:Unpleasant environment

[pen_named]

I disagree, actually. I'm new to the official declaration of a CS major, but I've been lurking on the edges of techie-hood for quite some time. I remember walking into my first 2600 meeting in Dallas, TX, and the following hacker party... and I couldn't get the guys to talk to me. It was ridiculous. Yes, I didn't know as much as they did, but I was absolutely dying to learn. While I am most willing to entertain the possibility that this is not a boys club everywhere, in many places, it is.

I am fortunate that the head of the CS department at my university is an extraordinarily boisterous lady. The entry level courses are taught with the specific intention of recruiting new majors. (In my second or third week or class I walked up to my professor (who is also the head of the department) to ask a question, and she didn't ask me if I was a CS major. She simply told me that I was. As though this was obvious and I should stop pussy-footing around with this undeclared major business).

One of my programmer friends is a transsexual, and she was wondering aloud to me the other day if some of her position and esteem as a programmer are leftover benefits from having been male. (In which case, she ought exploit them for all they're worth.)

By and large, the CS majors in my classes have been wonderful, welcoming and helpful. The CS people I have met in the world at large do not have nearly so pleasant a distinction in my mind.

The head of the CS department pointed out to me that it was part of the geek meritocracy--the guys won't talk to you until you prove yourself, and then you won't be able to get them to go away.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Kris_B_04]

I've been programming since high school (86-87).
I am
1. Not overweight. (120 pounds)
2. Not ugly. http://www.heartlandsi.com/HeartlandServices/IT.as px (yes, the only girl here though)
3. Not bi or lesbian (although the way men are, I have certainly considered going the other way, especially after dumping my last boyfriend -- in October)
4. Definitely not transgendered

Okay, so, am I a geek then? I call myself a geek cuz I would prefer to be in front of a computer than at some party somewhere. I do okay in social situations, but I do not enjoy them.

Yeah, I was not popular in school, but I didn't turn to computers, I turned to books. Computers weren't available to me until the middle 80's and even then, my favorite escape was a good fantasy Sci/Fi book. (aha! Another Geeky thing! I suppose I shouldn't mention that I never missed a Doctor Who episode while I was young?)

A few years ago, I just finished updating myself by getting a a second degree from Devry Online. There were a LOT of females in the online environment. There were at least 5 in every class and most classes had about 10 people.

I love my job. I love programming.

It's really sad that we females have to be stuck into a stereo type just to be good at something that is normally reserved for Geeks. In fact, I would have to say that I have met few "Geeks" as defined by Caspian, I have met many handsome, interesting, fun and exciting men who are in the computer field.

So, you don't want anecdotal evidence to the contrary. Why? Do you feel the need to justify yourself and your loneliness and don't want anyone to argue with you? What makes you the expert on the females in this field? Just because you don't happen to be someplace that is open to hiring females and to giving them a chance in what is still considered "a non-traditional" field for females?

I am not a feminist. I just happen to be happy what I'm doing. Programming. I did not go into this field because there are so few women. I did it because I enjoy it. I was always really good at it and loved the challenges that came from something that changes nearly every day.

I'm me, and I resent this and many of the other comments within this discussion.

Thanks for listening,
Kris (That girl in IT)

PS
I just gave up my moderation of this discussion to post this.

Why is this a negative stereotype?

[akad0nric0]

negative stereotypes like the image of the male hacker

How is this a negative stereotype for women? Perhaps a bit exclusionary, but it doesn't degrade or otherwise oppress women... And besides, isn't being a hacker, in the larger social context, a negative stereotype in and of itself? Why would women want to be associated with a stereotype that, in current pop-culture terms, implies illegal activity?

That said, you can't deny the gender gap in and of itself. I simply dispute this as a factor.

the obvious...

[CAIMLAS]

Not to point out the obvious, but the obvious in our world is sometimes overlooked for politically motivated reasons these days.

The obvious conclusion is that there are less women in CS these days because the benefits are less than the penalty. In other words, the main reason there were more women in IT during the dotcom boom was because there was less competition amongst employees (in a mathematics-dominated field), and the field was seen as immediately beneficial and growing. Anyone with a modicum of technical or mathematic ability got into IT/CS because even those that were not the "best and brightest" in mathematics could get jobs in the field. (This is further illustrated by the supposed sallary gap between men and women in technical/CS fields: quite simply, the women pick the jobs that are less technically challenging, and thus pay less.)

Women, being the sensical (and sensual! but that's something else entirely) creatures that they are when it comes to something as unemotional as picking a career, saw the obviousness of the situation: unless they really liked mathematics, there was little incentive to go into CS.

There's also very little "staying power" in the skills acquired with a CS degree (theory aside - most employers don't seem to give a damn about anything but acronyms anyway), and for many women who were intent on getting married while they are still able to have children fairly comfortably, the payoff of a CS/IT degree was further decreased: you can't really jump back into the field after having and raising kids like you can into something that's less skill-based and more theory-based, like business or management.

Anyway, flame on. FWIW, I'm a guy who happens to be not so mathematically inclined, and I've changed my degree from CS for this very reason as well (the technical ability reason, not the childbirth reason).

Re:the obvious...

[Aceticon]

I suspect males, being in average more logically giften but less socially gifted than females (i might be stereotyping a bit here), will take more shit (read overwork in both school and work) than women.

Or turning things around, it's more likelly to find males willing to put up with lots of work for little respect/rewards (except personal satisfaction) than it is to find females.

Putting this together with the current lack of respect/admiration in the Western society for Engineering occupations in general (by comparisson with, for example, Law or Management), it might explain a lot.

As a side note, i went to a technical (read engineering) university (about 7 years ago), and at the time ALL degrees had a higher proportion of males than females, and the vast majority had a 2 to 3 or worse ratio. Come to think of it, CS wasn't even the worse off (in my own classes, for electronics engineering, we had 3 women out of 40 pupils)

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Caspian]

You must be living in a wholly different segment of the IT world than I am.

Then again, most of the geeks I've met have also been furries, so my perception of geeks has probably been twisted by that. Among furries (90+% of the serious ones are geeks), most females indeed fit the stereotype I mentioned.

Easy problem

[Explodo]

Women are, on average, more social creatures than men are. I think we can agree on that. In my 10 years of professional experience writing software, I'd say that the VAST majority of people that I've worked with have all the personality of a sack of flour. I'm a social person. I've gotten to the point where I've seriously considered changing careers just so I can be around people who have personality. I worked at a company where beers were provided FREE after 5 on Fridays. Good beers! Any beers you asked for! I love beers and I couldn't bring myself to go to that after the 4th time or so. It was just too painful to be around such a large group of people who had so little personality. Now, I'm not a social butterfly, but I like to talk to people. Maybe the reason that women aren't going into CS is the overwhelming lack of personality they encounter in professors and fellow students in school.

Re:Easy problem

[tuxette]

I worked at a company where beers were provided FREE after 5 on Fridays. Good beers! Any beers you asked for!

Holy shit, what company is this? *updates CV* :-P

Sadly this is not the most inviting of professions

[wintermute42]

Since 2000 the computer industry has changed in many ways. In a tight job market interviewers can get away with grueling interviews. These interviews are not pleasant for anyone, but may be particularly unpleasant for women, who face hours of being grilled by interviewers who are likely to be entirely male.

At one time the "Microsoft Interview" was largely confined to Microsoft. This style of interview can be characterized by hours of being asked to solve technical problems, frequently by writing code on a white board.

While one or two interviewers asking this sort of question might be justified, five hours or more of this style of interview resembles hazing more than anything else. The "Microsoft Interview" is no longer limited to Microsoft. A number of companies, including nVidia and Google use this style of interview. In fact, as far as I can tell, this style of interview is becoming accepted practice.

This interview style is justified by those who use it by the claim that it recognizes "people who are really smart". In practice this interview style only works if the company has a vast sea of candidates to draw from. Without such huge numbers entering the maw of this process, no one would ever be hired. Frequently you can't even get an interview without a solid background of accomplishment. Then on top of this, you must survive the interview process.

An interview process of this kind rewards people who think rapidly on their feet and don't suffer from "stage freight". I've known women who are more than up to this kind of interview, but I have to wonder if these obnoxious interviews are yet another barrier to women in engineering.

Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[mathmathrevolution]

Man, there sure are a lot of self-hating Geeks on Slashdot. Anytime the subject of "that other 50% of the population" comes up, there's invariably +5 modded comments about how pathetic all the Geeks are. If you guys spent the time you spend on slashdot beefing up your skills with women and exercising, you'd probably find some chick. Fact of the matter is: women over the age of 25, are desperate for intelligent, nice, financially stable men. Younger than that, women are still looking for traditional masculine stereotypes. If you're young, you may need to hold out for a little while. Sorry. In the mean time, you can 'comfort' yourself with the fact that men are declining in every subject other than computer science. This is leading to an over educated female population. And when these women move from college girls to yuppies, they're going to realize they want somebody more intelligent, less volatile, and more succesful. And when they don't find any of those guys, they're going to settle for you.

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[Surt]

That was brilliant, well deserves a +5 funny, but I think the mods stopped reading before the last 6 words.

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[SeattleGameboy]

Strange, I guess my experience of my good-looking roommate who made less and dumber than me who was dating 3 or 4 girls at a time, while I spend most weekends by myself is just an anomaly. Funny, he probably dated 60 or 70 girls over a couple of years (compare to 2 or 3 for me). But I guess just that was statistical blip. I mean, c'mon, the fact that all of my tech geek friends who made 6 figure salaries pretty much struck out at every bar and parties (while jocky non-tech (albeit good looking guys) guys made out like a bandit has to be false, right?

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[pingrequest]

What is funny about this... is that people modded this insightful (well it is) but it's really another slam on Geeks which makes it ironic, and very funny.

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[meinders]

But... but... I don't want to be just SETTLED for!

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[drsquare]

Fact of the matter is: women over the age of 25, are desperate for intelligent, nice, financially stable men.

Over 25? Can you say 'mutton'?

Anyway, what makes you think we're intelligent, nice or financially stable? I'm unintelligent, unpleasant and broke.

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[mathmathrevolution]

I said Geeks will have successful relationships when they get older. I said nothing about Geeks getting treated like rockstars at the local bar. If you're a Geek, I don't know what you're doing trying to hook up at bars anyway. Women that will go for geeky men generally don't go to bars. Women that go to bars are generally looking to have sex, which is probably what you really meant when you said your roommate "dates" 60 to 70 women a year. If you want to have lots of sex with women you meet in bars, then you've got to sculpt yourself like a manwhore and develop a routine of superficial bravado.

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[Prune]

women over the age of 25, are desperate for intelligent, nice, financially stable men

They are looking to these men for relationships, not sex. Useful fact: married women tend to (unconsciously) to be most fertile when cheating on their husbands. I don't have the reference underhand, but feel free to do some Web searching. I'm a geek, and I found that if I behaved like a geek, I got women looking for commitment; when I learned to behave like an alpha-male, after much practice, I got women that wanted sex. And the fact is, you can sleep with much more good-looking women in your lifetime if you concentrate on short-term, sex-based relationships.

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[urbanRealist]

Dude, I think I've been through your town! Hicksville, right?

Here in DC, there's no shortage of muscular, buff, intelligent, nice, financially stable men. None of them are the software developer geek that I am. While I'm sure they don't all get laid, the ones I see with girls have beautiful women at their sides.

From the way you tell it, there's no competition out there. I'm sure that may be true where you live, but here, the MBAs get the hotties.

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[Magius_AR]

Fact of the matter is: women over the age of 25, are desperate for intelligent, nice, financially stable men. Younger than that, women are still looking for traditional masculine stereotypes.

Sad, but true.

We "intelligent, nice, financially stable men" get the privilege of having a girl after she's already been used by a significant portion of the horny, lowliest, creepiest male population out there...ya know, when she's also approaching her more desperate and less desirable "degrading looks" period. And we're supposed to view this in some sort of positive light? Like "sure, she let the scum of the earth have their way with her in her prime for 7+ years, but CHEER UP, you got the discarded remains in the end, right?"

Pardon me if I don't vomit in disgust.

And women wonder why they get treated like objects. After 7 years of THAT kind of treatment at the hands of women, I want to treat them like the objects they deserve to get treated like...after all, it's the life they CHOSE for 7 freakin years.

From the pen of a cynical, bitter, nice guy that has no problems in the confidence, manners, or hygiene department.

Re:Even self-hating geeks will get pussy someday

[Nephroth]

Ya got that right.

Functional is fine...

[Darius Jedburgh]

...but just be careful about the side effects that might arise from using moands.

s/moands/monads/

[Darius Jedburgh]

Goddamn slow fingers!

Why Only in Computer Science?

[onkelonkel]

Anybody care to speculate why this only happens in IT (and maybe engineering in general).

In the 20 years after the end of World War 2 there was this huge social shift and women started to enter traditionally "male dominated" fields in ever growing numbers. In 1950 my local Uni had less than 10% women in the schools of Science, Law, Commerce (Business), Medicine and Engineering. Comp Sci would have just been starting then but no doubt would have had less than 10% Women. Now Science, Law, Commerce and Medicine are 50% women or more, but Comp Sci and Engineering are still around the 10% women mark.

Now if systemic discrimination, sexism and male attitudes are to blame, why wouldn't these negative factors also be present in all the other schools at the university. I'm not saying there is no sexism in IT and engineering, but are the lawyers that much less sexist than the engineers? I kind of don't think so.

So what is the cause? I don't think we will ever know, until we are willing to look at non-politically-correct reasons such as;

Women aren't interested in computers as much as men are?

Women aren't smart enough (OMG did he really say that!), or more precisely, enough women aren't smart enough?

Re:Unpleasant environment

[pen_named]

Yay for you and your wife!! There ought to be more people like you in the world.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Caspian]

Also, importantly, "in the computer field" != "geeks".

IT managers are not geeks.

Virtually anyone with "MIS", "IS" or "IT" in their title, as well as virtually any CxO (e.g. CTO, CIO) is not going to be a geek. They aren't as hardcore into computers as true geeks, most run Windows exclusively, and many scoff at both Linux and *BSD (as well as Mac OS X, which they view as a failure because it's failed to achieve the 97% market share of Windows).

The same is true (for obvious reasons) of virtually anyone with an MCSE and, more broadly, for virtually anyone with "A+" or other certs.

Virtually none of the most brilliant geeks I've met have had any sort of certification (except sometimes Brainbench, which of course is a joke), and virtually none have had "MIS", "IS", "IT", or any of the CxOs in their job title. Most true geeks are programmers, systems administrators, network engineers, or the like, and I challenge you to find attractive, exciting, well-adjusted people in that crowd. (N.b.: I am in that crowd myself, of course ;))

And the most brilliant geeks tend to have bizarre personal habits. Witness RMS, for instance. One of the most brilliant geeks I've ever met was a furry with a fetish for muscular anthropomorphic dogs. This guy could quote you the specs on 70s-era computers at the drop of a hat.

In my experience, the more high-powered the geek, the more bizarre the person. YMMV, of course.

Stop obsessing.

[tnk1]

Everytime I see a story like this, the question is answered before the end of the article.

Why aren't there more women in CS? Because they don't want to be in it. The question we may want to be asking ourselves is why we obsess about it. Yes, I know that we're all look for some way we can look "inward" and try and correct our "gender bias". That MUST be the only reason women don't want to be in this business. Just like I don't want to be a nurse because it's a "female" job. It has zero to do with low pay, long hours and changing bedpans. Nope. Not at all.

The reason for women not being in CS is because of the pay, hours, and the social issues. It is, perhaps, possible that we could change the social issues by some introspection, but the question is: why bother? If we're doing it to gain a "female perspective" on programming, then the fact is that any benefit from that is going to be found and cause a change by itself. A change, I might add that would have little or none of the downside of being an "affirmative action" situation. Which is to say people with talent being looked down upon, and people with no talent looking for an easy ride. If there is a benefit to having women in CS because they are women, then someone is going to realize it and capitalize on it and when they are successful, others will follow suit or be left behind.

If there are active harassment situations and artificial barriers to females who actually really like programming and want to be CS people, then that needs to be dealt with. But if we just want females because we think it's a good idea, then perhaps it isn't such a grand idea, especially if you have to prod females towards it with juicy incentives unrelated to a natural interest for CS. Never develop a program based on a nebulous concept about what has value without being able to demonstrate that value.

Re:Sadly this is not the most inviting of professi

[tuxette]

In a tight job market interviewers can get away with grueling interviews. These interviews are not pleasant for anyone, but may be particularly unpleasant for women, who face hours of being grilled by interviewers who are likely to be entirely male.

So?

My personal experiences with interviewing is that women can be just as evil, if not more evil, than men, in interview situations. As for interviews where you have to take tests, write code, solve problems - so what? Why shouldn't a company be allowed to ask an applicant to prove what they claim to be able to do? I thought that kind of thing was expected in this day and age...

If obnoxious interviewers are such a career barrier, then you probably have no business having a career in the first place. And you know what? Sometimes the answer they are looking for is "now you're out of line, you asshat!"

My 2 cents.

[Bezben]

Regardless of whether it is or not, the tech industry is viewed as being very unsociable. That's more of a problem for women than men.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Caspian]

I meant no personal offense to you, by the way; I don't know what your job title is. You may be a geek, but I can almost guarantee you that your manager is not. (You mentioned "IT". "IT" usually seems to be a code word for "Microsoft's Unofficial Evangelical Corps" nowadays.)

For the babes

[sgt scrub]

It will level out. The only reason I went into IT was to meet all the babes.

Re:For the babes

[TooCynical]

Hmmm... the only reason I took CS classes was to pick up guys ;o) who knew I would end up spending 20 years working in IT...

Or maybe...

[manthrax3]

They're just not interested. A similar article might read:

"Gender Gap in Social Work Widening"

People are interested in different things. It's "OK".

compatible geek girl?

[asv108]

"Looks like finding a compatible girl geek in the computer profession is becoming even harder,"

The last thing most geeky people need is a partner with the same type of personality issues. People who have the typical geek personality traits (ie socially awkward), would be much better off pairing up with a normal extroverted girl.

Re:compatible geek girl?

[tuxette]

The last thing most geeky people need is a partner with the same type of personality issues.

I wouldn't exactly say that, but for me, it's nice having a partner who does something completely different than I do. We are able to talk about work without having to deal with "the same old shit" for starters...

Re:compatible geek girl?

[Anonymous Meoward]

Actually, being married to a "geek girl" is rather nice.

Both of us can talk about our jobs, and not spend two hours explaining terms to each other like "kernel trap", "TCP syn-ack handshake", "spanning tree protocol", or "auto-boxing".

Both of us can look at trends in the marketplace, and make recommendations for each other's careers. (She went for her MBA, and I followed suit one year later.)

Both of us can decide what each of us want to do with our lives, and know the other will have a valuable opinion.
And both of us can discuss those social issues with each other, and try to work through them together.

Having common interests outside The Job helps, of course, but when you find a geek girl, you usually find an intelligent, opinionated individual who forces you to work through life's issues as you would any engineering issue: with creativity, wit, and determination.

My $.02, YMMV...

Re:would be interesting to compare to other measur

[cecille]

How about going the other way too? I don't know about anyone else, but I just came back to grad school (same place as my undergrad). My undergrad classes were usually pretty male-dominated (me and 1 or two other females), but now I'm finding my classes are bordering on 50-50. It's a way smaller sample size, but it seems like just about every girl in undergrad went on to grad school.

Excuse for geek joke

[AlvySinger]

Two computer science students, both male, are talking: CS Student 1: Oh! Guess what happened to me this morning! CS Student 2: What? CS1: I was walking through the park and this woman cycles up to me, stops, removes all her clothes, throws herself to the ground and says: "Take whatever you want" CS2: Gosh! What did you do? CS1: I took her clothes. CS2: Good call - you already have a bicycle, don't you.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Kris_B_04]

LOL
Thanks for clarifying that it was not a personal offense.

I was reading all the replies and you just happened to be the "lucky" one I responded to...

Kris

Not all it's cracked up to be...

[bobalu]

I remember this girl who worked in Ops, and after a sweaty encounter would light up a cig and say something like "hey, so whaddaya think of those new disc packs, eh?".

Not exactly "Sin and the City" material.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Kris_B_04]

My job definition is programmer.

I LOVE Macs and plan on owning one again soon...
I also am dying to learn Linux...
sadly, though, I am one of those "underpaid" programmers. We are a small company though...

And my IT manager is a geek. He used to be just a network admin who happened to be at the right place at the right time. He is a good person, though, and I really enjoy working with him.

Exciting, well, depends on what excites you, I suppose. Learning new stuff, finding new exciting programming tools, that excites me. :) I can find a lot of people in the programming / IT world that still knows more than me, and I love learning new stuff!

As for well-adjusted, you are right, few IT people like Social Situations. The rest of our company don't understand us and we are all classified as "Weird", I just happen to be a weird female. I was a novelty at first, but now I'm weird just like everyone else. *grin*

Kris

There's a huge gender gap in prison too!

[Glomek]

I wonder what's going on there!

A couple thoughts

[suitepotato]

Why do we have to measure the gender representation in every frigging thing? When was the last time you saw any industry association actively discourage women from being techs? When was the last time you saw politicians in government actively discourage women from being techs? Never. For crissakes, we blew up a couple on a space shuttle to get techie women out there in the news. Women are constantly hounded to think with their brains and not emotions, to be more technical and mechanical, to be more like men.

Maybe they DON'T WANT to be more like men. Maybe some things just happen not to interest them. If they want the job and can do it, fine. If they don't and don't give a rats butt and want to be competitive figure skaters or race car drivers or the next big Food Network star, whatever. Their choise. AS INDIVIDUALS.

In the name of women's lib and equality and all that, we treat women equally alright... EQUALLY IDENTICAL. We judge them as a group because they have a uterus as the feminists say who in keeping with their station as a key portion of modern society's Irony Deparment do much to keep up this nonsense (okay, split hairs between the gender feminists and equity feminists if you want). This is part of the problem of focusing on an idea of diversity which seems to be no less group judgemental and defining than the old sexist or racist ideas of the past and is even more stiflingly Borg-like because it is place beyond question in an embrace of holy effrontery (I don't recall racists and sexists of old being afraid to argue their stupid ideas with differently minded peers but the political correctness brigade has managed to embrace more racist and sexist and more repugnant results than was ever possible before because they put their idiocy beyond question on the level of faith where their quintuple standards are only challenged by the truly foolhardy looking to be tarred and feathered as racist or sexist even if the one questioning is non-white or female).

Howabout we treat women like INDIVIDUALS and let them make their own damn decisions as individuals as to what they want to work in and at? Is that so hard?

Of course, I know what the point of the post was. I'm not dense. It's worry about not enough geek chicks around to finally get laid with someone who relates and doesn't think you're strange for reading old issues of Byte with the reverence once reserved for holy writings and getting orgasmic over thinkgeek's latest product line. Get a clue guys. You're being incredibly sexist by thinking the girls have to come over to your field and relate to you. You need to pull your heads out of the system and learn to relate to those women. Whatever it is that they do. Treat the women like specific people for crying out loud. Not a set of boobs in a geek slogan t-shirt.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Anonymous Coward]

>1. Not overweight. (120 pounds)
>2. Not ugly. http://www.heartlandsi.com/HeartlandServices/IT.as px (yes, the only girl here >though)
>3. Not bi or lesbian (although the way men are, I have certainly considered going the other >way, especially after dumping my last boyfriend -- in October)

Are you crazy ?? Admiting you are a single geek women on slashdot. Anyways, since no one has kept up the tradition ......here it goes

You are beuatifull will you marry me ?

There! Thanks for posting your picture again :)

Girls, Math, and Consistency

[XLawyer]

Every article that bemoans the lack of women in computer science classes seems to quote at least one person who says that the problem is that the classes overemphasize math and technology. The implication, of course, is that women don't like math and technology, or possibly that they aren't good at it. Or maybe both.

I don't know why women tend to avoid computer science classes--or, for that matter, classes in math and many sciences. It seems likely that the reasons include a cultural subtext that says that math is just for boys and the large numbers of male nerds who lack interpersonal skills. Innate differences between boys and girls may also be a factor, or they may not be; I don't feel qualified to have an opinion.

The inconsistency bothers me, though. It seems that if you complain about the hostility of computer science classes to girls, you are free to imply that girls and math don't mix. But if you explicitly say the same thing, even as one possibility that ought to be examined, you will be tarred and feathered, as Larry Summers will be the first to tell you.

Correlation does not imply causation.

[Xiver]

Ninety percent of teenagers that commit suicide have parents that own toasters. Its sad, but true. You may be asking yourself what toasters and teenagers that commit suicide have in common. Well, they don't have anything in common because its just a statistic, just like the gender gap. Just because some field of study is slanted towards some race or gender does not mean that there is some weird social prejudice or conspiracy going on to keep it that way. The only way to get more females interested in computer science is to start making females that find computer science interesting. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to become an expert at something that you don't like to do. In our generation it is mostly males that enjoy the kind of work that computer science offers, in the next generation is might be just the opposite, or it might get worse. I seriously doubt any effort we put toward changing the layout of computer science, to attract women, would be worth the cost. On a side note I'm not sure I'd really be interested in dating / marrying a women in the same field of study as myself. Its difficult enough as it is to move out into unfamiliar territory, but if my wife didn't come from a different background I probably would not have learned to really appreciate some of the other fields of study. I was a computer science major and my wife was a dietetics major, now she is going back to school in nursing.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Caspian]

All of these are just general observations. There are exceptions to every rule. You're your own person, I'm my own person, but there are trends. Every individual has to be judged on their own merits, but that doesn't mean that general statements like "most of the most hardcore geeks were picked on a lot in school" are false.

I'll put it to you this way. One of my ex-bosses was obsessed with finding a replacement for me who had all the talents of a geek but none of the liabilities. She wanted someone who looked good in a suit (be it a skirt suit or not), could relate to businesspeople and business culture, and yet could hack code like a geek.

Eventually she was forced to give up looking. And this was in NYC, where there's certainly no shortage of geeks or of stylish/"presentable" people. The shortage of stylish/presentable geeks (again, not Windows-hugging "IT Manager" types) is quite obvious.

There might be a few-- of either gender-- but they ain't common.

Re:No... It is all environmental

[vertinox]

we could accept that men and women are different in nature, very different and that men perform better on technical skills than women, period.

I know plenty of woment who are technicaly apt as or moreso than me when it comes to computers. They are a rare beast (don't tell them I said that) but usually are the girls who did not wish to be girls.

I wouldn't say genetic, but more social. These girls tended to read more than be into social things and often perferred arts over standard. They were either a only child or were the only girl in the family of boys (hence being tom boy).

If we took girls and from day one didn't give them dolls but instead war toys and playstations and treated them indistinguisble than boys then they would behave accordingly.

If we give them this Paris Hilton, diamond rings mean love, and they should bread children crap then that is how they are going to act.

This girls all know how to install an OS, fix a registry, play video games, and like Harry Potter for some reason. (I don't know why they all like Harry Potter but they do) some of them even play online games such as WoW and every now and then they'll be a jem and like Halo more than me (you just have to look harder men! don't give up on the first lady that'll sleep with you! find one that will play Halo with you, whoop your ass, and then sleep with you!)

As an individual they can overcome this... Not to say some of you guys should overcome sports, porn, and plain ignorant behavior but I'm just saying I think it is more social than genetic.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Caspian]

You are very lucky. In my entire career, I've had all of two managers who knew diddly-squat about computers. One was an old networking geek (or the like) and the other was a Mac geek.

Without exception, evreyone else I've worked under wouldn't know a ThinNet connection from an elephant's trunk.

Can't beat em?

[Myria]

I couldn't ever get a date as a geek guy so I became a geek girl. That's one way to solve the problem =)

Melissa

Computer science less useful than it once was

[Junks Jerzey]

Now this is heresy, but bear with me.

Computer science, as a pure subject, isn't the same as computer programming, and it certainly isn't anywhere near the same as "doing useful things with computers." If you're wanting to write a better blogging tool or pretty much anything that's works with the web, then you don't need computer science. What you need is some time, some books, good tools and libraries, and a solid idea. That approach will take you down some paths that will irk the uber-geeks of computer science. PHP? Python? Perl?You'll make money with them, but you'll lose years from your life discussing it on Slashdot. Even if you want to be out there, writing code in Lisp or another esoteric language (which is often a poor idea, because of the lack of standard libraries), then you still don't need to major in computer science to do so.

The bottom line is that just because the gender cap is widening in computer science, doesn't mean that it is widening across technology in general.

boys vs girls

[Starbreeze]

These types of articles only seem to fuel the boys vs girls attitude here.

I'm the only white chick on this whole floor in anything remotely technology related. I was the only girl at all in my 2000 graduating class to get a Bachelors of Science in CS or CIS. So what? Yes, some men get defensive about my presence, others couldn't give a rats ass what gender I am as long as I make shit work. That's life. I guess you just accept it, adapt, and try to grow a thicker skin.

Assembly.....

[In Fraudem Legis]

I wonder if there are any hot chicks with assembly skills out there... :P

Forgetting something?

[PHanT0]

What about all those e-mails telling them that their equipment just isn't big enough?

And one more...

[Just Some Guy]

Male high-functioning autistics (read: stereotypical computer nerd) outnumber females by somewhere between 2.3:1 and 4:1. Seems like nature dictated that there will be more hard-science major men than women.

Individuals vary considerably, of course, but those statistics seems to correlate rather well.

Re:would be interesting to compare to other measur

[buddyglass]

I never said the problem wasn't specific to tech fields. The fact that more women are going into undergraduate programs is a well known fact. Apparently, it's true at both ends of the quality spectrum too, given top schools are having to invoke affirmative action-esque policies just to get a student body that's approx. 50% male. The above does not imply, however, that girls aren't short-changed at the junior high and high school levels. It may be the case that girls and boys are shortchanged, albeit in different ways. Know why I think more girls are getting into undergrad programs? Based on my own experience in high school, it's because, as a group, they have better study habits and are willing to spend more time doing what it takes to get good marks in high school. Note that I'm not making a value judgement on the relative "worth" of "what it takes to get good marks in high school". I can't say whether this deficiency among boys has its basis in an underlying neurological difference or whether it's the result of popular culture, but for whatever reason, boys (at all levels of ability) seem to goof off and underachieve to a greater degree than girls.

Re:Thoughts of a guy on seeing a girl in his CS cl

[PureCreditor]

actually this program is buggy when hotness is = -10, cuz there's no else clause on what to return.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Caspian]

By the by, pardon the defeatist tone of my posts. For the record, I'm not trying to disparage women. Quite the opposite. It's men I can't stand. It's men who established the "jocks come first" social order in the United States, which has caused such incredible suffering for so many innocent young geeks.

Look at a culture like Japan. In Japan, intelligence is more widely seen as a virtue and not a "weirdness" to be made fun of. The result? The Japanese (of both genders) are famously good at math and science, and they have a wonderful gender ratio among their technology enthusiasts. Here in the United States, technology is still seen as more of a "male" thing; in Japan, women are more likely than men to be heavily into digital communications technology.

All as it should be, of course. Women are natural communicators; the average male (or so it seems) can't muster a three-syllable word except for, of course, "quarterback" or "basketball"...

Glad I've got my geek girl

[CompMD]

I'm proud (and lucky) to have caught a girl with an MS degree in engineering and an affinity for FORTRAN programs. She also gets carded going to R-rated movies. I'm not letting this one go anytime soon.

Unlocking the Clubhouse

[Anitra]

I urge anyone reading this thread to buy and read Unlocking the Clubhouse, which containes analysis of a study done through several hundred interviews with Carnegie-Mellon CS undergrads.

Lots of women drop out of CS because they feel like they need to be "perfect" to compete with the guys - even if they're already getting better scores than the guys. Most women in CS also don't have the same background with computers coming in to college that their male counterparts do. They probably had access to a computer, but most male CS majors already had their own PC for years before starting college.

The "socialization" (if you can call it that) in the CS world also discourages women. Even if they're not being drooled on or ignored by the guys, they're often looked down on, as if they were stupid. (Because every guy knows that having a vagina means you can't understand electronics.) They also feel that they have to be geeks and talk about nothing but computers - they see that kind of passion in the guys and figure that they have to be just as single-minded if they're going to succeed. Some simply give up and slip back into the "expected" role of women: "I don't understand these 'computer' things, they're so complicated. Can you help me?"

When I read this book, I kept saying, "That's me! I thought I was the only one!" In talking to the (few) other female CS majors I knew, I found that they felt the same way.

In a perfect world, I imagine that there would still be more men than women in CS, but it would be a much closer gap (maybe 60/40 or so). I don't pretend that this field is interesting to everyone, but there are so many girls out there who would love to try it if they could do it without becoming a "nerd". It's not that the field intentionally pushes women out, it's just that they're wired differently, and express their interest in computers differently; and because there are so many men in the field, these views are in the minority.

Re:Unlocking the Clubhouse

[Kris_B_04]

You sound awfully bitter...

I don't feel the same, and I've been programming off and on since 86-87. I am now a full-time programmer and loving it!

I took classes to update my knowledge base a couple years ago, through Devry Online and many times at least half of the classes were females!

There is hope!! :) Maybe the online world will make a difference!!

Kris
(That girl in IT)

Re:Unlocking the Clubhouse

[czas]

As another geek girl, I totally agree with the post above (although I have not read the book mentioned).

I went into computing after a first degree in languages and what I found hardest was being looked down by male students who thought I probably had no idea of programming or anything related to IT. Only after I passed my first examns and did a couple of projects, they understood I was as good as anyone and I started to make friends. But the first 3 months were hell: I hardly had any support from other students.

Why did I not go into computing straight after school even if I had great marks at maths and science? Because I though I wasn't good enough, specially in comparison with male students in my class who seemed so confident. I knew my good marks were the result of hard work and I thought this would not be enough, that to be a computer scientist or an engineer you had to have some "natural talent". I later understood you must feel naturally inclided towards scientific subjects but working hard can take you pretty far ...

Re:Unlocking the Clubhouse

[Anitra]

I'm not bitter - in fact, I enjoyed my last year and a half of college much more than the earlier years, because I switched to computer science for that last year and a half. I ran into very little discrimination or unwanted attention, but I was very intimidated by my classmates who ate, slept, and breathed computers and the "geeky" lifestyle. I was (and still am) angry at the girls who played up the "dumb chick" angle to get guys to do their work for them, but I guess that will happen in any male-dominated field.

A little of my bitterness comes from the real world after college, where many people automatically assume that my husband knows more than I do, even though we have the same degree. But if someone asks him a question that's in my field of knowledge, he directs them over to me, self-deprecatingly (he tells them I'm smarter than he is).

I am so grateful to my parents, for constantly reinforcing that I could do anything I put my mind to, and encouraging me to go as far as I could in math and science. Most of my highschool friends did not get the same encouragement, for whatever reason.

At least

[achat987]

We've got the meebo girls. AJAX Girl is holdin' it down!

So now we have the statistics to prove...

[rwyoder]

...that women are smarter than men!

Another girl geek over here

[BethanyBoo]

While I'm not a computer science student, I am majoring in Information Systems which faces the same gender gap. I'm actually in a scholarship program called Center for Women and Information Technology. I can definitely see why there's a gender gap. I'm doubted ALL the time by guys who think they're geekier/better programmers/whatever. I'm often the ONLY girl or one of very few in my classes. I can see how that could be intimidating for some people, however for me, it's just more incentive to kick ass in my classes.

Re:Another girl geek over here

[Kris_B_04]

That is sad that they actually had to create a scholarship program for Women in IT.

And Kick some ASS!! :)
You GO girl!!

Kris
(That girl in IT)

Re:Unpleasant environment

[IAmTheDave]

and I couldn't get the guys to talk to me.

They were scared. It's not often they're in the presence of a bonafied female.

Good god

[clydemaxwell]

the only time I see gender bias play out is subconsciously -- the guys I work with are alright, and they wouldn't ever actively deny a job to a woman, but when all they joke about is women and sex and sex with women etc etc ad infinitum.. it's bound to have a mental impact on the way they view women. I'm just sad that, as a junior sysadmin, I have no hiring say. On the flip side, the only women we have (government job -- they transferred. in case you were wondering about my paradox) are nearly incompetent. I'll be surprised, though pleasantly, if we get another woman sysadmin this decade. Shame I'm not in college; I'd like to meet some

Re:would be interesting to compare to other measur

[NitsujTPU]

Don't you feel it sexist that you're willing to say, essentially, that women are better than men?

Isn't this what people were supposedly fighting against in the first place?

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Kris_B_04]

Oh, and fwiw, I HATE windows and microsoft...
But let's not go there...

Re:Unpleasant environment

[sillypixie]

My experience while getting my degree was that first and second year girls were descended upon by third & fourth year geeks looking for dates and willing to do assignments for a girl would would go out with them. None of those girls graduated from the program I was in - they all flunked out on the tests because they didn't understand the material.

I see equal opportunity blame in that situation -- a lack of intellectual pride both on the part of the girls and the guys.

I have also had to endure the insanity of having a really smart guy ask if you want to be his partner for the year in a class, only to have him show up at the first meeting with a finished assignment and a picnic basket containing a romantic dinner. It is a really difficult situation to deal with. On the one hand, the guy has made a nice and very sincere effort to please you. Unfortunately, that doesn't measure much against the facts that (a) he never actually asked you out, so you didn't get a chance to understand what kind of 'partnership' he was really hoping for, (b) he obviously didn't then and never did think you were capable of doing the assignment, (c) he assumed that you were the type of person who would gladly get out of work, and (d) he didn't mind that fact, as long as you went out with him. And he wondered why I wasn't bursting with admiration at his display of programming prowess.

Did you really see a lot of girls brazenly manipulating their way through a computer degree? It's hard for me to imagine. The women I graduated with knew their stuff, and would gladly prove it when challenged.

Pix

CS is math for very small values of math

[metamatic]

Computer Science is a highly specialized and limited subset of mathematics, mostly involving things like set theory, boolean algebra, lambda calculus and the occasional bit of vector and matrix math and basic geometry.

It's quite possible to be good at the bits of math that are actually relevant to computer science, and be completely hopeless at the rest of it.

For instance, I always had trouble with integrals. I was struggling to deal with physics, because I couldn't comprehend path integrals, and couldn't follow the mathematics for things like quantum theory and fluid dynamics. I could cope with special relativity, but general relativity was about to kick my ass. So I switched to Computer Science. Never saw another big hairy integral.

I'd say the only bit of CS math I couldn't cope with was in the denotational semantics course. Which was just fine, as nobody actually uses that crap in the real world anyway. FFTs are tricky too, but as long as you know what they are and what you use them for, you're highly unlikely to need to derive the algorithm yourself.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Kris_B_04]

LOL
But why did you post as an Anonymous Coward?

Girls in CS... female POV

[phorm]

I hope you don't find this harassing, but: one thing I would ask about would be your goals from your given education. I'm a guy, but as with many I got an education/job in IT due to the fact that I was good at it, and (less now than previous) enjoyed it in general. In the workplace however I am semi-aggressive. I keep tabs on job market and watch for what I could/should be worth, and I've hopped up the ladder a few times. The next hop I'm looking at working overseas, but that looks to require hitting the books again.

In opposition to myself, the women I know that have taken up educations/careers in IT seem to be more sedentary. One of my friends has a job where I swear there are warning signs that they may one day let her go, but she seems to hang on to them in some weird sense of loyalty or something else I'm unsure of. Other geek girls I know (some whom I've dated) seem to have also ended up in the lower job bracket. Some of them are certainly as smart as I am if not moreso, yet they show less interest in ladder-climbing.


So I do wonder, what do women in IT have as goals in life and/or employment? Personally I'd love to meet more women in the field, but for some reason it bothers to see that most lack the personal ambition that many of my counterparts exhibit.

To be fair though, I do know a number of male IT works that lack ambition as well, and it could just be that the lesser number of female IT workers make it seem that they are less ambitious overall.


p.s. Don't sweat the math too much, formulas you might need to know, but you can keep those around on reference sheets and generally if you're in IT you can get the computer to do the rest of the work for you :-D

Re:Girls in CS... female POV

[Hannah E. Davis]

Hmm... I'm not overly ambitious, but I want to live comfortably and do work that I enjoy, so I intend to strive for whatever kind of job will let me do that.

Currently, I intend to become a programmer, ideally one with a fair amount of influence, on a project that I find fun and interesting. I like to code, and I'd rather do something enjoyable than get promoted and end up doing boring paperwork/administration for the rest of my life, no matter how good the pay is.

My alternate plan is to go on for a masters and maybe even a phD and do academic research (and/or become a prof, but I'm not sure how I feel about having to fail people and ruin their lives), but I may never do that if I find a fun coding job first.

Does that make any sense?

Common sense is right here in front of you

[Chris Burke]

That's your common sense theory?

My "common-sense" theory is based on reading the comments by male CS students/professionals in this thread, the number saying women don't want to be in computers, that gender differences mean women won't be as good in computers, that the gender gap is natural like evolution, and of course it has nothing to do with men discouraging women from entering computer fields.

So right here on the pages of /., we have both 1) CS males denying the theory of causation in the article and 2) doing exactly what the article says.

What does common sense say about that? "Of course women aren't being discouraged from the field of CS by men, just that I as a male in CS think women can't do the job as well and don't want to do the job -- of course it's just their own choice when they drop out".

My real experience is that the number of women in introductory classes started high, and halved every semester until you were lucky if there was one women, even more lucky two, in a graduate course. From working with and grading the papers of these student or meeting them in office hours, I saw every bit of evidence I need to see that women are just as capable and just as motivated to study CS as men. No, I can't look into their heads and know why they left the program, but certainly a few have told me flat out that they are discouraged by the lack of role models. Which pisses me off, because I know we've lost some excellent minds.

As far as every other profession -- they have had exactly this problem! Women in medicine? Today a woman doctor isn't unusual at all, but it certainly was thirty years ago! Women had to break into the field and prove their worthiness to be a doctor instead of a nurse. Once there were prominent women doctors, and women teaching in medical schools, and the stereotypes that discouraged women were torn down, then yes you started to see more women join.

It has always been this way, whenever a new group starts to compete for jobs with the established. Whether that was European immigrants, freed slaves, or women after WWII, those who had previously had exclusive rights to some field believed they were entitled to those fields and the others would be inherently inferior, and only after time and great effort were these situations changed.

Common sense says that CS and IT and engineering are no different than any other field, and the stubborn refusal of men to accept women is both the cause of the continuing discrepancy, and a dinosaur of the last century.

What can we do?

[falconfighter]

What more can really be done to encourage more women into CS related fields?

Re:Unpleasant environment

[Pxtl]

Well, like most people the sample size in my class was pretty small. There was one girl who got through it on sheer hard work, a couple who tried to slack through and washed out, one who took an extra year (but pretty much got all her work done by favours) and one very nice hardworking girl who always seemed to be in the best engineering groups... but usually ended up writing the report.

Now that I think about it, the guys weren't much better - we were all pathetic slackers there.

Rational Choice

[Ancil]

Here come a thousand theories regarding which external factors are driving women away from careers in computer science, physics, biochemistry, and similar "slide-rule jobs".

Allow me to submit one explanation which is based on economics rather than blind emotion:

Women are less likely to pursue a career in Computer Science because of rational self-interest, and not due to external factors.

That being the case, there is no "fix" needed, because nothing is "broken". To the extent that we are already encouraging women to enter the "hard" sciences through preferences and affirmative action, we are doing those women a disservice.

The elephant standing in the corner which no on wants to mention is childbirth. Women are far more likely than men to desire an extended leave of absence from their field -- think five or ten years.

Let's try to list some careers which you can set aside for the better part of a decade, then re-enter without too much trouble and without taking a huge hit in earnings. Here are a few off the top of my head: teacher, nurse, receptionist, administrative assistant.

How about some careers where the techonology moves so fast that taking five or ten years off means you basically have to start over at square one: computer programmer, electrical engineer, CEO, neurosurgeon.

Anyone noticing a pattern here? Feminists talk a lot about giving women "choices", but wow do they ever get upset when those women make choices they don't like! In that whole four-page article, not once was it suggested that perhaps Computer Science is not actually a college major which fits with many womens' long-term goals. Goals which include childrearing and taking an extended leave of absence from their career.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Caspian]

Oh, good. That's very rare in an "IT" department. Every place I've worked, the folks in "IT" were the ones mandating Windows and Dells all over, IE only (no Firefox/Netscape/Opera/etc.) and crappy corporate antivirus programs like Norton/McAfee/Symantec instead of AVG/Avast!/etc.

Right now, in addition to tech consulting, I'm doing some temp work (technical manuals) at a place whose "IT" folks have locked down all the (Windows, IBM) workstations; they have only IE available. I'd put Firefox on this thing, but of course I'd have to break into Administrator to do that, and they'd can (and probably prosecute) me for that.

So you can imagine I'm kind of leery when I hear "IT". This sort of behavior has been repeated at many places I've worked in the past.

girls...

[serenarae]

We exist, but maybe didn't actually get that CS degree. I made it about halfway through my school's program and then got tired of being stared at. I hold a helpdesk job now making a reasonable sum of money... but I work with about 250 guys, and maybe 20 chicks. Needless to say, that staring situation still exists. But I suppose my point here, is that maybe people shouldn't rely on grad statistics, and should rely on the actual amount of women holding IT positions :)

OSS

[TheLink]

The barriers of entry are pretty low in the OSS world. If you're a good programmer you can take OSS code and run with it.

If you don't like the culture of a particular OSS project you are free to go start your own project. Sure, you may still need other people to help, but if you are doing good work, people might still go help you out.

I suggest that in many fields it's the exceptionals who make a significant difference in the advancement of the field

And in CS and programming, I claim that a particular form of intelligence is a major requirement.

I gather that the variation of intelligence in male humans is much greater than for the females. There are more really stupid males than really stupid females. But there are more really smart males than really smart females too.

So even in a pure meritocracy there would be fewer female humans in the top ranks of CS or OSS.

The problem BEGINS in High School!

[ClickOnThis]

Personally I think people are making a big fuss over the wrong thing. If someone is really interested in something they won't get discouraged that easily.

Part of the experience of a high-school education is discovering what interests you. That can't happen if you're discouraged from even looking. And I think that young women may be discouraged from doing so in many ways.

I'm not in the US, but from what I hear it seems that in the US, it's common for male geeks/nerds to get discriminated against in high school (even physical abuse). But they still go do geeky stuff anyway.

Hmm. Perhaps because a boy geek is perceived as a mildly eccentric target for ridicule, whereas a girl geek is an anathema to her peers at that age. Or maybe a boy's rising levels of testosterone make him feel better than a girl would about doing stuff alone.

The real tragedy here is that many crucial career choices can be made at this age, including ones that determine whether a student can pursue a career in mathematical or physical fields or not. For example, the perception that mathematics is a "boy's" subject can discourage girls from continuing to study it in high school. And that closes many career doors. Probably forever.

(I have heard that this perception does not exist in some parts of the world. For example, in Iceland: at the risk of grossly over-simplifying the picture, mathematics is actually perceived as a "girl's" subject, whereas the boys want to finish high school so they can go out and help their fathers on the fishing boats.)

I think the solution is to debunk the perceptions that young people can have about these fields, to warn them about "closing doors" to their future, and to encourage them to discover their aptitudes, whatever they may be.

Re:The problem BEGINS in High School!

[lrucker]

I wasn't even picked on in high school. I don't think I even registered to the sort of girls who'd do that - but then, we weren't even in the same classes. I was in physics and calculus (and those classes had a fairly even male/female ratio); they were in home ech. None of my friends would have cared what some twit in a home ech class thought.

Re:The problem BEGINS in High School!

[pembo13]

Part of the experience of a high-school education is discovering what interests you. That can't happen if you're discouraged from even looking. And I think that young women may be discouraged from doing so in many ways.

How exactly are they being discourged?

Re:Daughters

[bookhappy]

I think you are right on the money. Why on earth would one want a job where you have to compete with people happy to make a few hundre dollars a week. Maybe... just maybe... women are smarter and have figured out which side of the bread substitute the icky wax is on. Grandma.

As a female in Computer Science

[Anonymous Coward]

I enjoy programming and enjoy being a geek. But if you ask me to choose my career again, maybe I'd think about it.
My biggest fear is by giving birth to a baby (I don't have one yet but plan to do so in a few years), I'll no longer be able to work that hard and my career would basically be ruined. But I definitely want a baby no matter what, maybe I should have chosen a career where not that many deadlines need be met?
Well, maybe it's just me.

Re:As a female in Computer Science

[mclaincausey]

Actually, programming/SWEng lend themselves perfectly to having a child if any fields do. You can telecommute easily--there's no need for you to physically be at the office.

Transexuals and Terminology

[SeanDuggan]

One of my programmer friends is a transsexual, and she was wondering aloud to me the other day if some of her position and esteem as a programmer are leftover benefits from having been male. (In which case, she ought exploit them for all they're worth.)
Somehow I can't rid my head of the scenario of someone with incompatible cables walking in and asking for a gender-bender and your co-worker's head snapping up...
Horribly non-PC, I know.

I honestly don't remember any real bias against the females in our CS classes, although it probably helped that almost every one of them was extremely attractive, so they never lacked for people wanting to help. *sigh* Now Short Christy ran into troubles, but that was due to her standing about 5 foot and having the general appearance of a vapid 14-year-old at first glance. Once she got people listening, they took her seriously, but it took some work getting them to listen.

Irony

[Chris Burke]

This whole thread is filled with endless examples of the following irony.

[male computer scientist]: "It's not that there are [male dominated] societal attitudes that discourage women from entering CS, it's that women by nature are not designed to be interested in or successfull at CS!"

Look, there are very real artificial barriers set up before women attempting enter computer fields, and most of the attempts by men here to deny these barriers simply prove they exist.

Tear down those barriers, for starters by losing your own attitude, and if the resulting mix of men-women is 60:40 then you'll have a point.

Re:Irony

[Hannah E. Davis]

What are the barriers? Honestly, I want to know.

As a 3rd year female computer science student who even has a co-op job lined up for the winter term, I certainly haven't come up against any yet.

Seriously, everyone keeps talking about "very real artificial barriers set up before women attempting to enter computer fields", and you'd think that I would have noticed at least a few of 'em by now.

Re:Irony

[Chris Burke]

Well if you haven't run into any, then bully for you. If you've never run into a man in a position of authority who thinks you don't belong, then that's awesome, times may be changing for the better. If you don't find the persistent anti-women-in-tech attitudes expressed in this very slashdot thread from your potential peers discouraging in the least, then rock on. If you never -- knowingly or otherwise -- face such attitudes during a job interview, then I'll be happy for you. Only when there are enough successfull women in the industry will these fools finally realize saying women don't belong in tech is as stupid as saying they don't belong in medicine or business, via exactly the same process that those fields went through.

Yet avoiding every sign of the Good Ol' Boys industry you're going into is atypical in my conversations with women in tech. Pretty much every woman I know has run into it. Most chose to push on knowing they'll automatically be thought less of, ready to push harder to make up for that. Some were really discouraged, and left the field, indeed agreeing with their antagonists that it "wasn't for them".

I'll take your story as a positive sign, though. Maybe it's location, maybe things have gotten better in the few years since I left school. Either way, I do think it's inevitable. Just frustrating and annoying to see the sexist attitudes of my supposedly intelligent peers in the meantime.

So What

[vmalloc_]

If women want to get into Wiccan studies instead of intelligent things like CS then you know what, more power to them. I don't want to work with a bunch of goofs that don't have the drive for this industry, CS has already got too many of them in the male department. If anything this ratio has helped to keep down the level of politically correct bullshit we've had to deal with. There's a lot of minorities in CS and it would be pointless to cherry pick on the basis of being a woman because you wouldn't have enough programmers, so the end result is that people are chosen based on their ability instead of how big of a token they are going to be.

If you think that statement makes me a sexist mysoginspellingwhatever, then I'd like to point out there's more women in college than men, so you're a womensogynist whos picking on the minority and you should be working to equalize the college entry numbers to 50/50 (something I would never call for, for one obvious reason and for another considerably more principled one). Go ahead hypocrite get to work.

Maybe more CS majors should bathe

[VaderPi]

My wife would sometimes wait for me outside of some of my CS classes, and she said that the odor coming off of some of the students that went by, as they left the class, was repulsive. It has been her guess all along that poor hygiene among the male CS majors is a strong contributor to the low percentage of women in the program. Apparently, women are more sensitive to such things.

I never really noticed the body odor, but I wonder what that says about me. At least my wife has never complained about my body odor.

It's worse than that...

[Belial6]

"Raise girls to be princesses and moms, and you get women who's highest goals are domestic crap and social climbing." It's worse than that. Most little girls are raised to be prostitutes, and THAT is where the problem is. Irrelevent of gender, there is a huge portion of our population that would give up working immediatly if they could have a steady flow of income without it. Most of these people would be more than happy to shake their dirty bits to keep that steady flow of income. This becomes even more pronounced if society joins in on the mass denial of what they are doing.

Now, historically, given that due to various reasons, men have controlled the wealth, and women have controlled the sex. Women are in a greater position to exachange sex, and more importantly the implication that sex could happen, for cash, goods, and most importantly, preferential treatment.

Now, given that the group "women" is a subset of the group "people", a large portion of them will use sex to avoid work. This happens not because they are women, but because they are people, and being a woman gives them the choice.

Unfortunatly, this is taugh to our children. As children, little boy know to get rich they need to make money. As children, little girls know that to get rich, they can make money, or marry a rich man. This leads to a general feeling that financial things will work themselves out, and thus the kind of behaviour that that belief generates.

When half of the women know that they don't HAVE to work to keep a good lifestyle, is it suprising that there are less of them going into fields that require hard work and planning?

*sniff*

[halivar]

I always cry at weddings.

How many women put code on SourceForge?

[Animats]

That's a measure of who wants to program.

Re:How many women put code on SourceForge?

[Kris_B_04]

I haven't because I worry that I will be laughed right off the board. Maybe because I'm a "girl"?

Seriously, it is a great resource and when I create something that I feel will be helpful to others (and not something that is protected by the copy rights of my company) I will probably do so.

Q.E.D.

[Maitri]

Wow - that is a mature response that demonstrates exactly how emotionally mature a geek guy can be. Way to prove your point.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[PietjeJantje]

Well said. You're a typical introvert (like me), who make up 1/3rd of the population. Introverts make excellent programmers, this has nothing to do with nerds or apes on a rock. (Me, I've been into computers since I was a kid, but I've always disliked the self-proclaimed nerd-thing. These people don't seem to understand they are just like the suits, only wearing other 'uniforms'.) Still, that leaves the question why there are so few woman programmers. Like you said, it came from within, but what makes you different from all the women who aren't programmers?

A good primer on the Nature/Nurture debate

[I Have No Nym]

Since the thread is now in the throes of "no penis = not good at math" and "it's just their personal choice," I would point to Susan Oyama, a developmental systems researcher. She has a nice speech here about how dividing the world into "nature" and "nurture" basically turns individual persons into puppets. Larry Summers would have us believe that it's "nature" that pulls the strings. Others think it's "nurture." This really belittles individuals and glosses over very important interactions between agents and their environments. Anyway, here's her speech: http://www.metanexus.net/metanexus_online/printer_ friendly.asp?9344

Re:No... It is all environmental

[vertinox]

I didn't say they would behave just like boys (they'd still have desires to mate and what not with opposite sex), but more accordindly than if you treated them as a mob mentality. Of course most humans would act better if they acted like an individual rather than a person of a group following trends.

Really??

[olddotter]

My anecdotal evidence shows a growing number of women in computer science or related fields. I was in college from 1988 to 1992, and when I venture back onto an engineering campus I am shocked at the number of women in CS labs or CS classes.

I just got back from ApacheCon where I would say that 10% of the attendees were women. Granted thats not much, but it is much more than I expected at an apache con. What really surprised me was the number of women at apache con that were redheads.... Too bad I had a wife and child at home! ;-)

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Kris_B_04]

Oh yes, I found out the hard way that money isn't everything. It does help, I'll grant you that, but looking forward to coming to work every morning, now that is .. how do the commercials say? "Priceless!" And thank you for the compliment! :) Kris

Re:would be interesting to compare to other measur

[buddyglass]

Where did I say (or imply) women are "better" than men? If we assume that the gender gap in undergraduate admissions is not due to overt discrimination against men, then it is most likely due to a difference in the number of qualified applicants. Generally speaking, what two measures do colleges look at when evaluating applicants? Test scores and class rank (i.e. grades). From an examination of test scores, we see that men perform as well (if not better) than women. So then, the likely cause is grades. If we suppose that men, as a group, are aproximately equally as "intelligent" as women, why are their grades not up to par?

My personal theory is that for whatever reasons (be they neurological or environmental) women are (as a group) better suited to jumping through the various hoops high school typically requires. Concentrating. Completing homework assignments that are, most of the time, pretty damn boring. Taking the time to properly prepare for exams. Etc.

I freely admit, though, that some of the above may be colored by my personal experience. I went to a selective high school that focused mainly on math and science. Not to toot my own horn, but I also took the AHSME and scored well enough to progress to the AIME. My SATs were in the high 1500s, and that's before the scoring system was re-centered. And yet, I consistently made worse grades than some of my female classmates, who were, I can honestly say, less naturally gifted than I was. Why? Because they completed every homework assignment and studied adequately for each exam. I, on the other hand, was lucky if I completed half my problem sets, and almost never devoted the time I should have to preparing for exams.

Clearly there are slackers and hard workers among both men and women, but at my school, among those in the top academic tier, females fell into the "hard worker" category almost as a rule. The men were a split. There were some "hard workers" and some "slackers" who only managed to eke their way into that category by virtue of natural giftedness.

victims?

[rbk303]

What's this now? They are forced out of Computer Science because people think they are stepping out of their societal roles?

I thought women were the masters of their own choices. Anyone strong enough to endure childbirth should be strong enough to tell anyone who frowns upon their career choice to shove it, right?

Exotic dancers do that all the time.

How about this: girls on the whole just don't like the subject. Can we say that? without them being all victimized all over again? Can we once again make them the mistresses of their own destinies by just saying they CHOSE to not be computer majors? Please?

BTW, any women reading this... You are not victims.

k? k.

Re:victims?

[k1t10]

I don't think we are victims really, it's just that heaps of chicks who do choose to work in IT get treated like an alien species, and the amount of guys that treat me like an air head because I've got blond hair and stiletto heels pisses me off. That said - I think a lot of guys in the industry probably treat their male co-workers as is they're mentally retarded too and it's probably not only directed at me. There are heaps of ppl in their industry that simply know everything.

I feel I have to reply to this...

[cr0sh]

You sound like what I could have become (actually, I probably would have turned out far worse). I am not that comfortable around strangers, especially females, in social situations. Please note that I say this as someone in his early-30's who is married.

Yeah, you heard right - I am married, to a wonderful woman who has had the fortitude to stick it out with me (and put up with my strangeness) for over 10 years, now. In that time, she (and, in thier own way, her family) have helped to change me from the extreme introverted geek that I was, into the more socially-less-awkward, but still somewhat-introverted geek that I am today.

I would have to say, knowing how I was then, and knowing how I am now, that your biggest issue had to be that you just didn't say "Hi, my name is Cally, how are you doing?". I know how this is: you are shy, you may feel that she will ignore what you say/ask/do, you may feel she will reject you outright. You may think you won't express yourself right, or that something will go wrong, or, or, or...

Stop being so analytical about this - if you have to, smoke the skunk (or down the 40 - or both), and try again. Remember, the worst she can say is "No". It isn't the end of the world (and yes, I know it may feel like it is). It is going to be an awkward thing now, that you saw her for a while, that eye contact was made, that something may have been there but you and her let it float too long. Maybe, just saying something to her will help...

Hey - you just have a need for one of those books on her shelf. It doesn't matter which one. Go up to her office/cube and ask to borrow one. Tell her you are needing to know how to pull some arcane/obscure SQL trick using Oracle or some such bull. Ask her if you can borrow one of her books, and which one she would reccommend. This might get your foot in the door to conversation. Try to find out what interests her (what is she doing there - talk about work, at first). Ask her about projects. Be interested in what she does. If something piques your interest, ask her about that, or tell her "Hey, that is interesting - would you like to discuss it over lunch with me?".

A couple of things could happen here. If she is still interested in you beyond "work aquaintance" status, you might get a lunch thing going. This is a good thing. Go with it. After a few times, work up into meeting up for a time out at night or on the weekend (movies, dinner, hanging out at the comic book shop, whatever - one of the first dates I had with my wife involved sneaking into a resort hotel in the middle of the day).

If she turns you down, ask to borrow the book anyhow - she may still let you, then you will have to return it at some point (another potential in-point to talk again). If you do this a few times, and still are not able to simple walk (or whatever) to go get lunch, there may be another reason, and you should move on (unfortunately). Don't let it effect how you treat her at work, continue to be a professional. Just realize that she isn't dating material, and move on (don't confront her about it, it could possibly blow up into a sexual harrassment thing).

I can't tell you exactly how I got from point A to point B - most of it was a bunch of little changes, and a lot of luck. I know inside me I am still the socially awkward geek I have always been. Somewhere along the way though I have built up, through the patience of my (now) wife, an abstraction layer between the what I really am and the real world. It isn't perfect, it fails me at times. Something I do know, and is difficult to admit, is that being married has made me more able (though less than normal, still) to be able to speak socially with females, since I don't have to worry about moving beyond a certain point. I feel that I might still fall flat if I ever had to go beyond that point, though. However, I honestly do know for a certainty that would be the case.

I know I haven't offered too much here - but seriously, go talk to that girl. Just say "Hi". Talk - that is all it is. I know it sounds difficult - I can feel how I would have felt, back when I was in your shoes many years ago. Just talk. Be yourself, and quit being angry. Just talk. In some way or another, she will talk back.

Re:Not Suprising...

[bookhappy]

Said by a person who obviously doesn't know squat about test design. GIGO. Grandma.

Geek + geek = bad

[PFI_Optix]

It's been my experience that putting two geeks together is a bad idea. They never clean, never cook, and if they manage to reproduce before irradiating one or both during a home "experiment", the resulting ubergeek would have no hope of mating within the species, much less actually reproducing. So for the sake of the geek race, keep fresh genes coming in. Geek inbreeding is a bad thing.

Lots of reasons why this is...

[Ismene]

Of course none of us are shocked at this. I think part of the reason why there are less girls in IT is they are actively discouraged from going into this field. I can hear all the naysayers: "Not in this day and age, by golly." Yes, in this day and age. By school, by family, and by society in general.

I am female, and I have been on a computer since I was a wee one. Worked my way through BBSes, the scary USENET world, and coding (my father started me off on BASIC when I was in grade 3). Now - one would think I would have ended up a compsci major. Well no. For various reasons, I started off as a science major - which made me unhappy so I tried to switch over to CompSci. The Compsci department was fine with that- they would let me in, BUT I had to get approval for one math course (because I didn't have the prereq). Happily, I went off to the math department and was told by the head of the Math Department at an unamed university that "girls were not good at math", and therefore, he wouldn't let me in. So, I ended up in the humanities.

I was lucky, I managed to keep up my skills on the side and eventually got a job as a systems librarian. But, I wonder how many girls gave up.

I also find that families aren't friendly to women learning technology - often giving boys the techy toys and encouraging them to learn, whereas girls are told that's not feminine (in more than verbal words). Luckily, my dad only had girls, and so I got a very nice well-rounded education. (That means, I can be a sysadmin, check my own oil, AND know which lipstick goes with my wine-coloured top). ;-)

Re:Lots of reasons why this is...

[SlothB77]

Doesn't every college have a 'let's get more woman in science and math' program set up by the various diversicrats roaming untamed at our nation's higher institutions? Look at the measures harvard has taken this year! Something like $50 mill and a seat just below the dean whose main function is to beancount gender? They aren't alone. i think there are plenty of forces at work actively encouraging woman to go into comp sci. I will admit the MTV does work as a counterforce.

Re:Lots of reasons why this is...

[Ismene]

Yes, there are plenty of programs to encourage women into IT, but whose to stop a professor from maintaining a "No Girls Allowed in the Clubhouse" sign. Yes, I could have complained to the Human rights office at the time - I know that NOW. I didn't know that then, I thought I just had to suck it up and switch into something else.

Re:would be interesting to compare to other measur

[NitsujTPU]

Wow, sorry to misread your post.

It sounds as though our experiences are largely the same. I had very similar performance, but did not believe that I would be accepted into a good college. I went to an OK undergrad institution, worked for a while... it sucked.

I returned to grad school and, well, I'm getting into a good PhD program in the Fall.

Failing people

[phorm]

I'm not sure how I feel about having to fail people and ruin their lives

I know a few people that managed to make it through their IT classes but never really had an aptitude/drive in the actual IT field. They generally end up in call-centres or other jobs that also house people of much lesser education (in other words, the education got them nothing).

Failing somebody who isn't cut out for IT or doesn't have the drive to become a good worker isn't necessarily a bad thing, I know a few people who went on the alternate/better jobs that they were likely more suited to.

As for becoming a programmer with influence... not always an easy thing. My current (and previous) job involves a mix of programming, hardware, and system administration. In most situations management still calls the shots, and it's rather painful in the coding arena having to fix the systems that we hired out to a contractor for (when I was capable of doing them myself at less expense/time/headache) and/or seeing projects almost come to fruition only to die in the final stages due to a change of company direction.

Not that there aren't good coding jobs, but I've found that the best is a mix of coding and sysadminning... at the very least I get to pull machines apart every now and again which gives my eyes a rest from screenwatching... and I have a growing collection of hard-drive magnets.

Oooh, anecdata!

[I Have No Nym]

"I have seen two children, one a boy, and one a girl from the same family and similar in age that will behave VERY differently about certain things." Wow, two whole kids. Nice anecdata! Would you like an honorary degree in sociology or child development to go with your keen observational powers? Really. It's not that girls are steered away from instrutmental or complicated things from the very moment of birth. Different colors and different levels of snuggles, even in the hospital, aren't the first signs of a massive degree of cultural firepower that repeatedly beats girls down. Nope. Nothing to see here. Really, deep down, girls don't go into CS primarily because they just suck. It's genetic. /sarcasm. If that's your salt, you probably have high blood pressure.

Re:would be interesting to compare to other measur

[buddyglass]

I went to an upper-tier state school for undergrad, then entered an upper-tier PhD program immediately afterward. I flaked out after two years and escaped with a M.S. Now I'm working. And yes, some of the time it sucks. You might think success in a PhD program is determined largely by "natural giftedness". In my experience, that's not the case. Natural giftedness is obviously a component, but the students who tend to succeed are typically those who are disciplined enough to "make it happen".

Occam's Razor

[FattyBoeBatty]

For a bunch of blokes that are way to eager to pride themselves on the value of science and logical thought, I'm always blown away at how you all will literally bend over backwards to try and contort gender issues fit within your P.C. mentality.

Guess what, men and women are significantly different. And that's okay. Women love to communicate and nurture. Men love to solve problems, compete, and get laid. It's like this in virtually every society around the world, and it's been that way since the beginning of time.

SIDETRACK Now, let me already congratulate the reply to this that will use the anecdotal example that contradicts this. Hooray, there are exceptions. Acknowledged. However, those outliers are statistically insignificant and I'm talking about the vast majority which explains the results in this article. /SIDETRACK

I majored in EE/CS and psychology, and I saw both sides of the coin. And I know you all have seen it, too. For instance, women say about 7,000 words per day, compared to men who speak about 2,000. Women even start speaking sooner than men. Men (albeit later in life), will excel in advanced math, logic, and competition.

Ever see a woman's face when she sees a baby? Her eyes light up and she forgets everything around her. Ever watched a man's eyes when he walks by a scantily clad hottie or encounters a VCR that needs to be programmed? His eyes light up and he forgets everything around him.

Men and women are different. Stop trying to invent complicated explanations to convince yourself otherwise, and enjoy the diversity. It's not a bad thing.

-Fatty

Re:Thoughts of a guy on seeing a girl in his CS cl

[emjaycue]

That's purely theoretical. Part of the spec on this program was that g.hotness is never less than -9 in the real world. This function exceeds spec in this regard.

Development will take under advisement as to whether the program can be made more efficient by simply dropping the if clause.

BUG CLOSED AS WITHIN SPEC.

Maturity, really?

[ThePedanticPrick]

Your male co-workers might just be more polite because of sexual-harassment laws; they may still be just as immature as ever.

Re:Parent is anecdotal BS

[Caspian]

"IT" != geek.

"IT" people are management types. They run Windows. They read industry journals, and they love Dell. They ridicule Mac OS X since it has such a low market share. They usually can't code at all, but when they can, it's usually something like Visual BASIC and/or MS Access. Most of them use MSIE and only MSIE, and many of them enforce this preference as a policy on all company equipment, citing vague "compatibility" or "industry standard" reasons (if they even bother to justify their decision at all). The few who don't use MSIE disproportionately use Netscape (since it's an old name that they remember from back in the day, and-- importantly-- it's made by a company (very important to an "IT" type).

Geeks hate management types. They run some form of Un*xlike system (quite possibly Mac OS X) wherever they can. They read SlashDot; they don't give a good god damn what Dell's stock price is. They hack Perl. They use Firefox, Opera, or... well... anything but MSIE.

Totally different worlds, totally different demographics. There are plenty of female "IT" folks and plenty of athletic, outgoing "IT" folks; these people are not, however, "geeks".

"IT people" and "geeks" both specialize in using computers. Then again, peeping toms and astronomers both specialize in using telescopes.

Re:Unpleasant environment

[Bob Uhl]

Well, it's not surprising: many geeks don't have much time for others unless they're interested in them somehow (for learning, entertainment, employment, friendship, what-have-you), so naturally they'd see 'friendly interaction' as an expression of interest, and since it's impossible for men & women to be friends (see When Harry Mey Sally), the obvious conclusion follows...

The really sad thing is that I suspect that if the geek didn't come on so strongly then he might actually stand a chance. And when I write 'he' I really mean s/h/m/...

Intimidation?

[gabe_ee]

What bothered me about this article were quotes like this:

"Still, she found it 'really intimidating' when men used terms she didn't know and talked about complicated programs they wrote in their free time."

I remember those kids in college who spent their weekends working on their own programs too. I wasn't one (and I'm male). I love my software job, but I find that it usually fulfills my creative programming drive.

Anyway, my point is that there are both women AND men who are (academically) intimidated by the uber-geeks in college. It's not like all guys in CS spend every waking hour breathing Dew and Pizza in front of the linux box. Pinpointing this "intimidation" as something that chases only women away seems shallow.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[aristotle-dude]

That's wonderful to hear. Don't give Caspian much credance.

Most of the people I work with in IT are married and many of us have interests outside of IT like music for example. We have several people who are musicians and I happen to be a vocalist. Singing is something I enjoy because of how it makes me feel and how it affects the emotions of others.

I think we need more women in IT because quite frankly, most of my fellow males tend to have one track minds whereas women can think both linearly and non-linearly. I find it to be quite refreshing when I work with a female collegue on a project compared to guys who cannot grasp the big picture or visualize several alternative approaches at the same time. Brainstorming is a lot of fun.

I don't think men are born with these one track minds but rather many of them are trained to think that way from an early age. I was encouraged to be creative and to use my imagination. Part of this stemmed from growing up poor in a rural area. We did not have money for the latest toys and there were very few children my age around where I lived so I ended up making friends with girls mostly.

Huh?

[PhotoGuy]

Computer geeks have to date computer geeks? Do phychology graduates only date psychology graduates? Just seems a bit short sighted to assume that people in computing science are so pathetic that they could only hope to date within their own discipline.

The one thing that is relevant, is that people in computing (but also in other disciplines) can be passionate about learning, and people who are such, seem to be drawn to others with a similar passion. But to assume it has to be in computing is pretty narrow minded.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[DianeOfTheMoon]

I am not a feminist. I just happen to be happy what I'm doing. Programming. I did not go into this field because there are so few women. I did it because I enjoy it. I was always really good at it and loved the challenges that came from something that changes nearly every day.

You know, taking a sexist view (I know, I know), I look at programming as the creation and maintainince of complex systems with sometimes unpredictable behavour, and managing it's social interaction with other similar systems in an environment where anything goes and they sometimes don't play nice.

Sound like anything else women typically do? I don't know many others, but most other female programmers I know have been head and shoulders above the men, simply from a "see the forest from the trees" point of view.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Hannah E. Davis]

A bit more "anecdotal evidence":

I am...
1. Not overweight (130-140 pounds -- I'm 5'8", so I look slim)
2. Not ugly. Perhaps not hot, but not ugly. A slightly *ahem* decorated webcam shot can be found here
3. Not bi or lesbian. I even have a boyfriend, and he's a geek too.
4. Not transgendered.

Hey... wait... this was all just a trick to make us post our pictures, wasn't it?

In any case, like the parent, I read obsessively before I discovered computers, and I've always been a bit of a loner. Sure, I was bullied in elementary school for being a bit different, but I was different by choice, not by necessity. People often don't even realize I'm a geek unless I'm really showing it -- if I'm not clothed in ubersexy ThinkGeek swag (as I am currently), I usually end up looking more like an arts student with my long flowing skirts and knit legwarmers.

Programming and Knitting

[Fortun L'Escrot]

There might be a decline in female CS majors, but where are they going?

Are they going into other fields of study that share traits and skills with CS? or not?

Funny enough, in a linguistics class, my syntax prof gave us this rumor, that apparently women that knit or sow or engage tasks involving repetitive hand-eye coordination are not only also awesome at syntax, morphology, and phonology (the parts of linguistics that are the most rule based) but they make really great programmers. or at least that there is a strong correlation. between the two sets of activities (that of being a competent programmer and that of being a knitter).

Re:Programming and Knitting

[Kris_B_04]

I hate knitting and sewing.....

Re:Programming and Knitting

[Fortun L'Escrot]

I hate knitting and sewing.....

then you dont count ;)

still i would be interested to know what fields the majority of women really enjoy and then to break those down a little bit to find any structural differences. clearly content in each field is going to be different....but in programming an important skill is problem solving in terms of being able to properly define a problem, then to design an effective (preferably elegant) solution and finally to implement/execute this solution. things to note when programming though are the scope and scale of the problems you deal with. when you drive a car you are dealing with the road, the signs, the other cars, and the people in the car (sometimes giving you directions). each one of those things is a problem and the process of paying attention to each is an act of problem solving but at a much different scale than the nitty-gritty systems programming level.

it is my belief that some people are just more inclined to deal with the smaller or more abstract things. others tend to prefer the big picture, and the more concrete. so maybe the reason the majority of women do not go into CS is that 1) they might prefer the big picture or 2) CS is taught with a heavy bias towards smaller and more abstract which is a turn off for people that relate better to the bigger picture.

if that's the case, then maybe CS should be taught as just another kind of problem solving skill akin to paying attention to the road when driving. maybe the reason people can learn to drive quicker than they can learn to code is that they relate quicker to the objects involved in driving a car...

Re:Why most geeks are male

[aristotle-dude]

Hey... wait... this was all just a trick to make us post our pictures, wasn't it?

I think it was. :)

What a Dad Thinks

[ajnsue]

People, in general, feel they are succesful and find things rewarding if they are praised for their accomplishments. In general women learn and develop more elaborate interpersonal skills at a younger age - and are rewarded for it. The complexity of the personal dynamics my daughters show when playing with girlfriends is staggering (well at least when compared to that of an adult male.)
CS is definitely a field where social skills - while useful - will not be rewarded as well as they would in management or other professions.
Women are no less capable of handling the intellectual requirements of CS - its the lack of reward for social skills (that they are traditionally praised for) that I think might make them feel less inclined. "...I know I can do it, its just not rewarding..." This is why I feel those that do persist in CS tend to be drawn to engineering sales, program management and leadership.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Twisted64]

You know, I would think that if your post was further up the page, your link there would undergo a heavier slashdotting than the article :)

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Kris_B_04]

*blush* Why thank you! :)

Re:Parent is anecdotal BS

[aristotle-dude]

Will you please stop copying and pasting the same response multiple times?

Repeating the same fallacy will not make it any more true.

Don't *have* to, but. . .

[JSBiff]

It might be nice (or not) to date another computer geek. You'd at least have something in common. How much do I have in common with an Art History major? Or even a physics or engineering major? An Engineering major I *might* have more in common with, as I think CompSci tends to be fairly closely aligned with Engineering and Mathematics curriculum.

I think, fundamentally, though, that people tend to spend the most time with people in their own discipline. Your opportunities to meet people are largely (though not solely) influenced by your academic and professional activities.

So, more women in computing means more chances to meet women that would potentially be interesting to me. Sure, I try to meet people outside my discipline as much as possible, but the fact remains that a large part of my interactions with other computer people almost always tend to be men. Go to a computer conference lately (like a Linux users expo)? You're going to mostly meet men there, and the few women who are at them seem to be mostly already in a relationship.

A lot of relationships over the years have been formed by people who were in college classes together. If there are few women in my computer science classes, and computer science classes are a majority of my classes, that reduces my chance to meet women who might be more compatible with/interested in me. Sure, there are still general ed classes, you can still go flirt in the library, gym, or student union building. But some of us aren't the best at flirting with strangers, and do better in a situation like a class where you have some potential to interact with people that is provided by the structure of the class.

You're right, you don't have to date someone in your discipline, and you could even make an argument that perhaps looking outside your discipline is a superior way to meet people. But, some of us would at least like to have more of an oportunity. . .

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Kris_B_04]

Oh dear.
I checked, and the web page stats says the IT Page has been hit over 800 times since I posted that note...

That's more hits than we have had in one year...

*sigh*

Re:Why most geeks are male

[yet another coward]

I am not a feminist. I just happen to be happy what I'm doing. Programming. I did not go into this field because there are so few women. I did it because I enjoy it. I was always really good at it and loved the challenges that came from something that changes nearly every day.

Feminism is now often placed in opposition to liberty for women. I think I understand why you did it, but the cultural phenomenon is strange. It is unfortunate that many women who desire freedom and successfully pursue their goals dissociate themselves from feminism.

Mega-Flamebait Warning!!!!

[EraserMouseMan]

I shouldn't have to demand respect or work harder to get it just because I am a girl.
I never said work "harder". I just said that you'll get the respect you deserve if you're good at what you do. Not because somebody mandated that you should be respected.

Geeze, I hate that. The fact is that we are all different. I would feel uncomfortable being in an Interior Design major. I just wouldn't fit in. Those girls would be talking about all that pretty/artsy colors and patterns and furniture styles. If I thought like you I suppose that I would be on some ID forum somewhere talking about how ID majors need to make use of more CAD software and pattern/color matching automation software so that it wouldn't be so tough for me to fit in. And they should also have at least 50% type-A personality male nerdy professors so that concepts would get explained compatible with my nerdy thought process (at the expense of those girls who don't relate to my analytical thought-process). Because after all I should be able to be any type of personality whatsoever and feel like I fit in and learn just as efficiently.

Nerdy math analytical types tend to gravitate to technical fields. And you just want to walk into their universe and tell them who they should associate with and relate to. That's what it amounts to. We have no problem with girls in our field. But it just wouldn't be right to force those nerds to look at her in any sort of unnatural way. If she's a flirty social butterfly that cares more about her pretty background than whether the proper programming techniques are used the guess what? She'll be known for that. If she's a special type of girl who could care less about all those typical girly things but is a darn good and productive programmer, guess what? She'll be known for that. If she's a total girly girl and is also a great programmer then guess what? She'll be known for that. And she'll even find special niche jobs that a typical guy would never fit into and she'll make a killing.

While I'm on my soap box I might as well put forth this assumption. If a lab full of analytical, math, geek girls were all in a lab cranking out awesome code and were really in the groove and a girly girl came in and wanted to know their opinion on how her cute new slashdot T-shirt matches her skirt, guess what they'd do? They'd do exactly what they guys would do. They'd look up real quick and say, "Oh yea, cool!" Then they'd put their heads back down and continue working. She'd sit down next to a focused geek girl and say, "Guess who asked me out tonight?" . . . 10 seconds later . . . "Uh, what was that? Sorry I was in the zone." "Yea guess who I'm going out with tonight?" And so on. She'd feel kinda out of place because what they care about is NOT what she cares about.

So should all the geek guys/girl go to personality tolerance classes so that all personality types will feel like they "fit in"?

That's BS!


The funny thing to me is (and I know I'm gonna get slaughtered for this highly shauvenistic comment) guys never complain about crap like this. Have you ever heard of a guy complaining about not being able to get into an all-girl field? Nope. Why?
Because if the guy wants to be a cook he sucks it up and learns to be successful at it.
If he wants to be an interior designer he sucks it up and learns to be successful at it.
If he wants to be a beautitian he sucks it up and learns to be successful at it.
If he wants to be a clothing designer he sucks it up and learns to be successful at it.
If he wants to be a male fashion runway coach he sucks it up and learns to be successful at it.
He doesn't sit around and whine about hard it is to get into a girl's field.

If you want to be a successful techie, guess what? Suck it up and get good at it! As my headhunter always tells me, "Performance creates opportunity." It's that simple. If there's a barrier in your way, remove it!

Be successful on your own merit. Not because some

Re:Mega-Flamebait Warning!!!!

[Maitri]

As I said before, I am not arguing affirmative action. I simply disagree with your opinion that all a women needs to be respected in the field is skill - THAT is what I think is unfair. I have seen plenty of instances where skill isn't enough. In my personal experience, about 50% to 75% of geek guys put women into two categories. The first is the cute fluffy bunny category. If a girl is at all caring about all those "typical girly things" (that make the geek guy all uncomfortable) then she gets put into the social butterfly crowd. The second category is the "one of the guys crowd." These are the girls that the guy geeks don't have to go outside of their own experiences to relate to. Most guy geeks do the on/off - 0/1 - black/white thing with women. There is no inbetween - you are either a bit of fluff or one of the guys. Either way - the women isn't respected for what she is. A social butterfly isn't respected for her mind at all (for example, I say something intelligent they ask where I read it, couldn't have come up with it on my own) and one-of-guys isn't really considered a female being and is certainly not considered datable (which used to annoy me but I actually think might not be a bad thing now...). Why is it that science nerds can agree that biodiversity is a pretty good thing but you ask computer geeks to try to relate to people who are different than they are and they start yelling about how unfair it is? Heaven forbid these types try to understand any view point other than their own. Imagine how much more usable and useful programs would be to the person using them if the programmer could come out of their own experience and try to understand the person they are programming for...

Re:Mega-Flamebait Warning!!!!

[arose]

Most guy geeks do the on/off - 0/1 - black/white thing with women.

You are the one doing stereotyping here.

Re:Mega-Flamebait Warning!!!!

[Maitri]

Sheesh - I did preface that with "In my personal experience" and "50-75%." I didn't ever say everyone. I have met some really great geeks - and it sounds like you might be one of them since you seem to think that girls should be respected for their skill. I was pointing out that quite a few people aren't like that though...

Re:Mega-Flamebait Warning!!!!

[EraserMouseMan]

Yea, you'd be cool too. Because you're fiesty. I like it when a girl sticks up for herself. It's cool.

I had a girlfriend who was a girl geek and she was my favorite girlfriend. She ended up breaking up with me because she thought my family didn't like her and that was really important to her. I respect that. But I still miss her sometimes.

When I was in college I became really good friends with one of only 3 Comp Sci girls in the major. There's something extra cool about a girl that understands guy geeks. And I think only a girl geek has that extra insight. Know what I mean?

There's a girl in the hardware department where I work and she's got her Oracle cert and she's learning other technologies that us developers are using. But for some reason my boss and my bosses boss don't view her as a good fit for our team. I'm cool with her though and I'd like to see her on our team someday. She's got the talent and the desire. Plus she's quiet but she's fun when you get her out of her shell. Lol. Anyways. It was fun sparing with you!

Re:Mega-Flamebait Warning!!!!

[arose]

You see most of them are exactly the same--their personal expierence suggests that 50-75% of all girls fall either into the "cute fluffy bunny" category or the "one of the guys crowd" category. I'm simply too far out of social life to bother with such filters. :-/

Genetics! Yes, I said it.

[ellcry]

"The argument of many computer scientists is that women who study science or technology, because they are defying social expectations, are in an uncomfortable position to begin with. So they are more likely to be dissuaded from pursuing computer science if they are exposed to an unpleasant environment, bad teaching, and negative stereotypes like the image of the male hacker"

Am I a male chauvinist? Am I a sexist megalomaniac consumed with notions of male superiority? Am I an idealist who builds hopelessly complex, politically correct, and nonsensical arguments [like the above quote] to justify the realities of nature?

Human beings of different race and sex are different, each with characteristic strengths and weaknesses. Why people feel the intrinsic need to homogenize humans, perhaps to their irrational beliefs ...is irritating. They are grossly underrepresented because they are genetically equipped to accelerate at other things!

People who fight for equality* are either ethnocentric, biggoted, racist, or sexist [perhaps all three]. Their inability to accept different means they can't stand difference. Hence, they verbally mongrolize the entire human race.
Stop pussyfooting around rationality.

Why is the above moderated as insightful?

[jotaeleemeese]

It is clearly hateful, and beyond question trollish (i.e it should be lurking with -1 where it belongs).

I will refer to my 4 colleagues and myself, all top notch geeks (I will spare the modesty here).

One of us goes skiing every year to exotic locations in Europe, speaks 4 languages and is pasionate about horse riding.

The other one is an expert in martial arts and yoga, has travelled to several exotic places and worked overseas.

Another one has worked in many different countries, speaks 4 languages and is an expert in calssical music, chess, Oh yes, he runs 10k races to keep fit.

Another one is a reading vulture, expert in astronomy, SciFi, passionate about economis and politics.

And another one is certainly a gadget freak, but he can afford it after a succesful carrer that allows him to travel all around Europe.

In 15 years working on this industry I have never mete anybody that even remotely meets the stereotype above.

I think you should read less about geeks and go out and meet more of them.

Re:You are absolutely wrong.

[Arthur B.]

Just to be sure I said specialization not socialization. I am offering an explanation which I think is simple. It does not make it true, but it's refutable. Unless you can point me to studies showing that I'm wrong ( instead of telling me "There are no studies") I will keep followig Occam's razor and assume there are natural trends in the way different gender think and perceive the world. I think this initial disparity is enhanced by society. If I were to hire a Computer Scientist for eg I would look at his education and estimate his level. The fact that I believe I will get more men applications than women does NOT mean I will prefer a man over a woman.

What a load of sexist tosh.

[jotaeleemeese]

Women since time immemorial have been first stopped, later discouraged and ridiculed to pursue any interests on their own, but specially any technical knowledge.

I have seen it all my life, males that are patronizing, sexiest, and frankly hostile in occassions to any women on their little male preserve. I had a boss that thought he could close deals with female clients by "pleasing" them as he used to put it. I knew of another guy that would send females to the worst hotels in economy class while all the boys were travelling business class and staying in 5 star hotels.

And that is for starters only, in most companies where policies are not in place to ensure there is no discrimination against women, women doing the same job will earn less and the real differences between sexes, like the little detail of women being the ones that give birth, in some places can be punished with summary dismissal.

There is absolutely no physical difference that would explain why women do not pursue technical carriers. In many countries they are better at science and maths until around 12 or 13 years old and then something happens, it is like if society notices that they are starting to become fully grown women and in that moment the door is shut close and any attempt to solve an equation or write a computer program is met with derision.

The first programmers were women, and they served with distinction, probing that in a virgin field where there were no misnconceptions, they could excell as anybody.

It is the macho attitude justyfing things based on hypotetical "natural differences" (that normally, oh coincidence, put women in positions of disadvantage or servitude) what stop women's progress, not any "differences" as you put it.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[BitchKapoor]

It's really sad that we females have to be stuck into a stereo type just to be good at something that is normally reserved for Geeks. In fact, I would have to say that I have met few "Geeks" as defined by Caspian, I have met many handsome, interesting, fun and exciting men who are in the computer field.

I agree, the "geek" stereotype presented is a worst-case situation, far from reality. I, too, would have to say that I am no mutant, and my friends in the computing field generally correspond with the description you've given rather than Caspian's. But the geek stereotype does occasionally occur, just barely often enough to substantiate it as more than a myth. The sad part is that it's most often self-inflicted amongst geeks, as by Caspian above. In my case, this stereotype has singlehandedly resulted in my having zero confidence with women. Sure, guys tell me I'm a real catch, girls tell me I'm cute and intelligent and all that--heck, one very attractive girl was so afraid to admit how much she liked me because she figured I could get any girl and hers was a lost cause--but deep down, I have my doubts, I just feel like people are lying to me, being "nice;" all I believe is the stereotype: that I have no value as a male. Consequently, I don't even try, I just assume the only possible outcomes of asking out a girl I'm interested in would be "no" and "sexual harassment!" (and no, I'm not a misogynist who believes women throw that around lightly, I've just been brainwashed into thinking it would be warranted in my case--"everyone knows no one would want a geek like me!"). I've never had a girlfriend, I've never been the initiator for the handful of dates of I've been on, and it's very difficult to change. I'm sorry for talking about myself so much, but it's very frustrating the way our stereotypes degrade our self-esteem, and I think that has a lot to do with why the computing field can be so tense when it comes to gender relations. I am not asking for pity, I only seek reform for the good of the community as a whole.

Wonderful.

[jotaeleemeese]

You work in a system that, for its eternal shame, only manages to produce 2% of female students (that are brave enough to mingle with people truly believing that such imbalance is down to "natural differences").

Then you proceed to claim that women can't do analytical thinking as well as men (of course, this is old Victorian era knowledge).

What an amazing teorethical whatever you are you are...

You are failing to criticize a social and educational system that is clearly broken. The almost complete barring of female students in whatever you are studying can't be down to "natural differences" (of which we have no probe but your anecdotical sexist evidence).

You may have a fact.

[jotaeleemeese]

What you are providing is a lousy explanation, as it was clearly and succintly explained by the other poster.

I will rework his main point: it is unbelievable that people that in general can be considered rational and intelligent spouse the views you are ejaculating without realizing the final implications.

Amazing, amuzing and disturbing.

the steve rule

[m3rr]

Not only are there more men, but most of them are named Steve.

Trinity?

[Servo]

What? You mean the Trinity character from the Matrix hasn't inspired young hot women wearing pleather bodysuits to hack into the IRS and become Computer Science majors?

Too bad

[penglust]

I started as a student intern at the Unisys Unix facility in Salt Lake City in 1986. In 1988 I graduated and was hired as a engineer. Between this time and when I left in 1992 we had a number of women software engineers. As far as I could tell there were a higher percentage of good ones than the percentage of good guys.

This was probably before or just as the "sexual harassment" crap started happening in the industry. As a rule they fit in very well with the guys. I got a few "good" jokes from a couple of them. They sometimes had a different way of addressing issues and I did learn something from this. I got a little hot under the collar with one of them for leaving in the middle of problems to deal with her teen age daughter a little too often. I also dated one of them and found out that this is not a good idea.

I think the industry has lost a lot that the software engineering environment is almost exclusivly male these days.

Re:would be interesting to compare to other measur

[NitsujTPU]

No way man. I learned that lesson. Most of the students here regard me firmly as a top student, including several professors. I do research, I have publications, and I'm pretty prolific for a masters student.

My biggest shortcoming (the one that I'm looking at right now) is a failure to scale back projects to fit. I always "go for the gold." Now, I've got a professor waiting on me because she wants to give me a good grade, but my project isn't QUITE done. I'm trying to convince the same to do a paper on this (and the result is good) and to try to get submission done in... 2 weeks? Ack.

This comes after a group project that bombed because other group members weren't into the don't sleep for a week thing, and a semester project that rocked, but was also a week late (got a high grade, but pretty much was redeemed by a result that REALLY changes the way that a particular task is looked at).

Perhaps you guys make lousy first impressions?

[geekPrincess]

Let me preface this by saying I love CS guys once I got to know them, but.... I'm a cute girl. I'm a social girl. But until I consistently did better on tests in all my CS classes than 90% of the guys, you guys treated me like I was some drooling idiot... even after getting me to help you with your homework! No, I don't spend my spare time at home coding when I could be socializing. No, I'm not up on every bit of breaking news in the tech world. And CS guys seem to equate social activity with mental deficiency. So take it easy on the girls in your first/second year CS classes, and maybe less of them will change majors.... I'm too stubborn to let you guys push me around, but early on I considered changing majors to something where my classmates weren't so condescending...

Womanless Computer Science AP Class

[alien3456]

Our CompSci AP (AB) in my high school has 5 males including myself. There was a girl, but she switched classes after the first month. Also, she was nerdier and geekier than any guy in there.

Common Sense Wins Out

[sithmat]

This push to create perfect 50-50 splits in every discipline is ridicous. The goal should not be equal numbers of males and females in different fields. The goal should be removing any barriers to success for males and females in different fields. Maybe biology plays a role, and maybe it doesn't. The best way to ensure that the right of all individuals to choose a career of their choice is met is to break down the barriers that exist. If ten years from now, the computer science male-female ratio is 80/20, but those 20% of females have just as good a chance of being promoted as the 80% of males individually, that will be a far greater success than having a 50/50 split where females are at a disadvantage in getting promotions compared to their male colleagues. There has been far too much emphasis on equal numbers and not enough on ignoring numbers and simply working to remove barriers preventing people from making it in their chosen fields.

48%

[Mark_MF-WN]

You're a little backawards. It's not about a negative attitude in CS towards women, it's about a negative attitude in women towards CS.

Just look at how many people have mentioned fat greasy computer nerds in this thread. Women aren't down with that. They prefer fields without any associations with being fat and/or greasy.

Their loss...

[scott_karana]

CS is not exactly a bad career move, and I personal enjoy it.
It's their loss, really...

Re:Why most geeks are male

[deserttrail]

The OP forgot to include one thing:

5. Taken.

Re:Unpleasant environment

[sillypixie]

I guess that it is also possible that there were more "favors" done than I knew. I was pretty damn naive back then (-:

Math, CSCI, and Race

[mister_llah]

It does seem to be part of the math community, as well. A former girlfriend of mine is a math major, she had similar complaints to yours (and to my CSCI pal)... it isn't from the professors, she had said, but rather the students.

===

My aforementioned friend in CSCI never complained about the patronization as being racial, however, I noticed that the indian students were most often the ones patronizing (this is likely due to cultural differences)... (it might also have to be due to statistics, my university's grad level CSCI program is proably ~80% indian)...

Even high school is too late.

[Malkin]

Perhaps because a boy geek is perceived as a mildly eccentric target for ridicule, whereas a girl geek is an anathema to her peers at that age.

When I was a teenager, I went to a science/math/tech focused high school, so I was sheltered from a lot of this. Even so, there were only two girls in my AP Computer Science course (including myself). It was already too late.

You know what got me interested in computer science? Games. It always goes back to games. Nobody decides to be a computer science major because she really digs Quicken. You've got to be passionate about this stuff, and nothing makes people passionate about computers like games do. If you have more girls playing games, you will have more girls going into computer science. That's all there is to it.

And don't even try to feed me that girls-just-aren't-interested-in-games bullshit. The fact that gamer gender ratios vary widely by country is a strong indicator that this is a societal construct, rather than a biological one. So, nobody is going to get very far with that argument around me.

Re:Even high school is too late.

[ClickOnThis]

And don't even try to feed me that girls-just-aren't-interested-in-games bullshit. The fact that gamer gender ratios vary widely by country is a strong indicator that this is a societal construct, rather than a biological one. So, nobody is going to get very far with that argument around me.

This thread has long gone cold, but I hope you see my reply. I couldn't agree with you more! I'm a member of the "other" gender and I'm in favour of anything that will allow young people to discover their potential, and learn to be skeptical about the gender myths that surround various professions.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Prune]

Allright, I'll be modded down for the following but I don't care, even if I have no karma to spare...

Sigh... You express disdain to being stuck in a stereotype, yet you post a link to your photo, which virtually no guy but vain Adonis himself would do. Though on the surface it was intended to support your argument, it really comes dangerously close to compliment fishing -- a successful exercise at that, given the responses you've gotten. The problem I'm concerned with overuse of political correctness instead of common sense. The fact is that overall, there are significant neurological (and thus psychological) differences between the sexes. There are two separate issues which, for some reason, seem to blur in the eyes of PC do-gooders. One is the individual: obviously an individual should not be stereotyped but looked at based on his or her talents/skills/abilities. But when looking at populations or groups it's a different matter, as statistics come into play. PC-prone people assume differences in, for example, enrollment in various disciplines are due to purely social factors. In fact, there's no scientific evidence to suggest this. When making decisions based on statistics on groups, it is inappropriate to discount potential biological differences; otherwise, wrong desisions are made. This goes beyond the issue of sexes.

There's a great analogy to this in the case of race and affirmative action in the US. Most politicians and laymen seem to believe the PC-correct Lewontin argument that intra-racial variation is much greater than inter-racial variation, thus race is not a valid taxonomic construct. This is in fact scientifically incorrect (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewontin's_Fallacy for a summary and link to the relevant research) because Lewontin only looked variations of individual genotypes/phenotypes, whereas cluster analysis reveals these aren't independent variables. Most scientist, however, are careful in choosing their words when discussing such issues with the public due to worry of bein politically incorrect. I'm not aware of research that applies this type of statistical analysis to the sexes instead of races, but I have no doubt that the general principle will remain the same and distinct clusters will emerge from the statistics, as was the case with races.

In closing, let me seal my reputation as a sexist and get modded down by giving you a rating of 7 for looks. It may not be a compliment, but at least it is honest.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Prune]

Posting your picture is compliment fishing. How's that breaking out of the 'girl' stereotype?

Your reasoning is not sound.

[Ivan Matveitch]

Suppose that the privileged male establishment tries to exclude women, but has negligible effect, and women instead tend to stay away for other reasons. This hypothetical situation demonstrates the possibility of an exogenous gender gap.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[oudzeeman]

cut your hair short and you'd look just like a skinny geek guy

Today's newspaper

[ml0fl1n]

Right here in my home town (Denver) the Rocky Mountain News had a story germane to this discussion -- http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/tech/article /0,2777,DRMN_23910_4325336,00.html is the story, and the website for the women in the calendar. Could the article have been more timely?

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Hannah E. Davis]

Uh, dude, I may not be exactly the same as a "normal"/stereotypical girl, but that doesn't mean I have to be the complete opposite and refrain from behaviour that even guys exhibit online.

However, in this particular situation, I posted a link to my picture because the parent of my post did the same thing, and I was echoing her words in order to suggest that she is not the only geek girl who exhibits those traits.

As a male CS graduate..

[lorcha]

I have to say I hate math, too. I found it to be both hard and useless. I failed Calc II and Calc III. Incidentally, my wife is much better at math than I am.

If it makes you feel any better, in the 5 years since I graduated, I have not once used calculus. But pay attention during linear algebra. Good luck on your final tomorrow.

And it's not always bad...

[junkgoof]

In my Mech eng year there were about 80 guys and about ten girls. We were a pretty close group, everyone knew everyone, and there was no stalking or drooling. The girls who dated within the class generally dated (or rejected) guys who would not have looked at them twice if they were in a more balanced program (nice, good looking, fun guys dating plain girls with major personality defects). I had a girlfriend in college, and I, and others, had female friends as well.

I can think of male friends who took minors in psychology and other easy programs where they could do little work and meet members of the opposite sex. I can think of some fairly geeky guys who would show up at the cafeteria with three or four girls from their classes, they were pretty happy (and doing less competitive programs, more free time). The bad side was having to take subjective courses that tended to have crappy teachers...

Are rude geeks an American thing? Most geeks I know here in Canada are shy but not psychotic (OK, very shy in some cases "no, I could not go to your place I might MEET PEOPLE!").

As geek girl in visual effects....

[switchbaby]

....people always assume I'm an animator. They never, ever ask. Actually, I'm a shaderwriter (develop plugins, too) and when I explain what I do, there's usually a little silence, and then the inevitable statements of "why did you choose that"? There are absolutely no words to describe how exhausting it is to always be the tiny minority in users' group meetings or at E3 or at Siggraph. It doesn't mean I don't go -- I can't help myself -- the field is fascinating! -- and I'd never stop attending because of this, but I get tired of being isolated during the social hour because the guys just don't know how to talk to women. And to make it clear, I don't stand there, waiting for someone to talk to me; I take the initiative. I walk up to folks. I've made some good contacts and good friends. But I am just so freaking sick of booth babes.....of exotic dancers as appropriate entertainment at social functions...of cool CG being described in sexual terms. I love what I do and I don't want to do anything else, but believe me, I'm not staying in it because the environment is fantastic. It's really gotten better over the years, but there's quite a bit to go before I'll be completely relaxed.

Re:Unpleasant environment

[stalebread]

it was part of the geek meritocracy--the guys won't talk to you until you prove yourself, and then you won't be able to get them to go away.

Men also have to deal with the geek meritocracy. I started my freshman year of college as a non-geek and slowly transformed over the years. One of my neighbors in the dorm was a full-blown geek from the very beginning and he admitted that when he first met me, he thought I was 'useless.' I must have eventually proved my geekworthiness because we're now good friends.

What's so wrong about gender differences?

[pembo13]

Why are people always so worried about gender differences? I just don't see what is so wrong about one sex being generally better than something at another.

MySpace

[Archades54]

just give them myspace and a digital camera.
you'll get 80% female usage.

Re:Dude. Women don't like being treated as objects

[Shajenko42]

Anything like this?

Where is the data?

[Malkin]

What, exactly, is your evidence that men perform better in technical skills than women -- even on average? Do you have any studies that are able to remove cultural influences? Name one, by all means. Produce the data!

You don't have it, because it doesn't exist.

People used to think that women were incapable of all manner of intellectual pursuits. In some of these fields, women now outnumber men at the undergraduate level. So, what makes you so damn confident that you're right? You're just guessing. If history is any indicator, you're probably wrong.

And if you're not wrong, it's irrelevant. Even if there was a vast gap in ability, there are so many completely inept male programmers out there that there is easily room for hundreds more female programmers. I know. I've interviewed some of these guys. Woah boy, it's a shame they couldn't make a career out of growing chiapets.

Re:Where is the data?

[Arthur B.]

Hum, I observed the number of girls in scientific studies that generally require more analytical skills. Actually there were more girls in that order in biology, chemistry, physics, maths and last computer-science. I don't have access to statistics but this is my observation. My proposed explanation is that girls on average are less inclined for these tasks. This doesn't contradict what we know about biology. Yes, it's nothing more than a guess, and you are right, history has tended to disprove such statements. But it's not a formal invalidation. It's irrelevant to say "they are so many inept male programmers", sure there are, in any field there will be under average and above average. Now if you ask me, I do think social pressure has a role to, has it is in my opinion an emulation of evolution, it provides the same effects except in a much finer way.

ObSimpsons

[Atario]

Marge: Well, most women will tell you that you're a fool to think you can change a man. But those women are quitters! When I first met your father, he was loud, oafish, and rude. But I worked hard, and now he's a whole different person.
Lisa: Mom?
Marge: (forcefully) He's a whole different person, Lisa.

You mean, "Who needs girls in CS?"

[raehl]

This is a non-problem. I put this in the same category as "Why arn't there any black people in northern michigan?" Is it because Northern Michigan hates black people? Of course not - it's because black people don't want to go there! There's no jobs, and it's freaking cold!

The question not being asked here is, why would you want to get a CS degree? CS doesn't exist in a vacuum - computers are tools to solve other problems. If you're a woman, and you are smart enough to use computers, why not major in biology, and use computers to solve biology problems? Or major in chemistry, and use computers to solve chemistry problems? Or major in any of several engineering fields? You don't need to know how operating systems or cache management or machine code works to write useful programs.

Women don't participate in CS because women don't want to. Men major in CS because:

1) They think it will make them lots of money
2) They REALLY REALLY REALLY like computers.
3) They are social idiots and CS ain't a bad career for people who don't like people.

Maybe, just maybe, girls don't major in CS because they have other things they'd rather major in, that better match their interests and talents, both intelletual AND social?

I've met several women who are proficient at computers. Only one of them majored in computing - the rest all majored in something else, whether it be chemistry, biology, technical writing, or graphics design. They didn't pass on CS or drop out of CS because of bias, they did so because of better options for them. Of the women I knew who dropped out of CS, they dropped out either because they were dumb (the same as all the guys who drop out of CS), or because they were BORED OUT OF THEIR SKULLS. They took a chem or bio or english elective and liked that better. About half-and-half. Contrast that with many of the men in CS - how many of them even have the option of doing something else? There are many, many men in CS who are in CS because they have no idea what else they can do, because they were socially stunted, and instead of being pushed to do girly things, were allowed to spend those career-forming high school years staring at their monitor and occasionally watching Star Trek.

Oh, forgot one reason: INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS

[raehl]

Foreign contries are more likely to export males to be educated abroad (this IS a social problem), and especially in CS, they skew the numbers.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[indiechild]

I don't understand why you got modded flamebait. Most of what you said is true -- it's not PC and it doesn't fit the conventional wisdom, but it's true. I'd mod you Insightful.

I don't think any of the women I've known in IT could be classified as "geeks", so I'm not sure if female geeks would tend to be overweight or unattractive.

BTW if you're as fascinated by this topic as I am, I suggest you read up on "fast seduction" and PUAs (pick up artists) if you haven't already done so. A lot of interesting material there.

Re:We don't give rights. Women have them.

[theStorminMormon]

1. The idea the women never need men to give them rights because they already have them is silly. If women already have their rights, no changes need to be made. But the genuine "I can vote if I want to" vs. the hypothetical "I am equal to males inalienably" requires those in political power to change the system. Thus in extremely patriarchal societies (Taliban) it does require either outside force (male or female) or changes in the male-dominated ruling class to level the playing field. This isn't sexist, it's real life. It's not as though women could vote to give themselves the right to vote - this was a bill voted on in Congress by men.

2. If we already have all those rights inalienably - why are you bothering to debate? Doesn't this imply that nothing needs to be changed? You're contradicting yourself because you fail to distinguish between theory and reality.

3. Your physiological arguments are all essentially meaningless unless we're talking about a "rib-having contest" or a "chromosome-having contest" (e.g., a woman as tall and as conditioned as Bryant or O'neal could go dunk for dunk in the NBA, pitting lithe track stars against line-backers is ludicrous, wouldn't you pit similarly sized and conditioned female linebackers against male linebackers?

What world do you live in? Do you think that gender is just some binary on/off switch? Like people are born and the only difference is an X or a Y chromosome? As if that's just some label that has no further implications other than "this one is called 'girl', this one is called 'boy'"? There are evolutionary differences between males and females because they are specialized for different tasks. Your point about a girl as tall as Bryant or O'neal is ludicrous and only shows how far removed you are from reality. In the first place there aren't that many women who have the height of Bryant or O'Neal. Otherwise the WNBA would be full of them. This isn't rocket science, dude, just watch ESPN. Women ARE shorter than men on average. In the second place you're flat out WRONG to say that if you got a woman of that height you could train her to be just as athletic. Seriously dude, what planet do you live on? Women have less body muscle and can not put on as much muscle as men no matter how you train them. The only way for a woman to compete with a man of the same height is through serious use of steroids and large doses of testosterone.

And you know what - even that wouldn't be enough. Women have wider hips. If you take a man and a woman of the same height and some muscle mass the man will STILL run faster because his skeletal structure is better optimized for it.

That was the whole point of the NBA linebacker vs. woman track star analogy. Women can't achieve that body type. Sure, maybe a very small proportion could. But you've got enough men who are huge, muscular and relatively fast to fill professional and college rosters in hundreds, if not thousands of teams across the country.

I know this is offensive to your politics and that what I'm saying isn't politically correct, but that's just a measure of how ridiculous the equal rights movement is. If you want to try and override the influence of millions of years of evolution and get women and men to have no physiological differences that's one thing. But to pretend that they don't exist is just plain stupid. I'm sorry to rain on your parade, but this emperor's got no clothes on.

4. I think your examples of women being different problem-solvers is a pretty good argument for why they need to be in all fields of science and not the ones "we give them the right" to be in.

This point makes no sense. We both claim to believe it's sexist to think that we need to "give them the right" to be in one career or another. The difference is that I follow through with this logic. I assume that women are intelligent, rationale, self-determining creatures. I assume that, unless I'm shown evidence otherwise, if a woman doesn't want to

RE: Child Molester

[TheJOsh!(tm)]

This one really gets to me. I was a camp councillor for the city park district when I was 16 and they put me in charge of the 8 and 9 year old kids. I'm a guy, and I've always been taller/heavier than most of the people around me, so i never got the "ooo! look at the cute little kid" attention when I was younger..

anyway, when my 14 year old junior councillor chicks would walk around with the cute little 7 & 8 year olds on their backs or hips I decided that I was going to even the score; I carried around the larger kids. it was a lot of fun, some times i'd be carrying one (or two or three) around and i'd get mobbed by the others wanting me to pick them up too. no one ever pays attention to the (physically) bigger kids and people tend to be harder on them because they look older.

that lasted all of a week before I got pulled into the boss' office and told that I couldn't pick the children up anymore because the city was worried about potential lawsuits. did anything happen to the girls? no. they got to pick the kids up, they got to hug them, swing them around and play. i got the feeling that I wasn't even allowed to touch them anymore.

men in childcare aren't just discriminated against, in some cases they are falsely accused of molestation which at best turns into an investigation that literally never gets closed and at worst can ruin their entire life. I babysat for neighbourhood kids from when I was 11 to 16, but after that I just couldn't do it anymore. I got paranoid about it, like everyone thought I was some dirty lech.

not cool at all.

Yeah, blame *us* for *their* laziness

[elrous0]

Don't dare blame them for majoring in crap like "Women's Studies" instead of science and engineering fields.

-Eric

As another geeky girl

[dptalia]

I rarely notice when they try to hit on me! I am oblivious to most of the subtle attemps. I worked at a company for 3 years and on the day I left one of the guys asked why I'd always blown him off - I never noticed there was anything to blow off! Oops....

Thoughts from one of those "geek girls"

[kamundse]

Since I started in computer science, I have heard the whole "how do we get more women" dicussion too many times to count. Personally, I think the whole thing is a lot of noise over a non-issue. Every reason they site for why women might not stay in CS never affected me or most of the women I know in computers. I never felt like I was defying the norm or that it was weird to be the only girl in a class full of boys. In fact, the reality of my gender is just not something on the forefront of my mind as I go through each day. It really is a non-issue. Bad teachers, well they can turn anyone off a subject, not just girls.

My question is, why are we so interested in trying to make people who aren't interested in the field get into it anyway? I mean, after those girls graduate from college because we've convinced them to go through this major, then what? I don't think they are going to stay in the industry very long. Let's be honest, it takes a particular mindset to really enjoy programming, and not everyone has it. This is true of every profession. Where is the big push to get more men into Early Childhood Education? Do you realize that nearly all preschool teachers are women? Maybe we need to change the educational system so that more men will be attracted to that major. Until I see people doing studies and mobilizing around this horrible gender gap in majors like Early Childhood, I am not going to waste too much time trying to change Computer Science either.

Another girl 'geek' weighing in...

[ireth]

I'm a college freshman right now, and I have a few reasons I haven't leapt into computer science. The biggest and hairiest of these is that I have simply not had enough education in math/logic to be able to look at a CS career as a viable option. My teachers have, over the years, been either terrible or supremely unhelpful. I tried to get A+ certification in high school and ended up leaving the program because the teachers simply would not, or could not, help me understand the material, no matter how many different times I asked, no matter how many different ways I asked.

I am, unfortunately, not one of those types who is able to intuit my way through programs, to learn from reading a book, or to have something tossed brusquely at me and be able to parse it. I'm not sure where the fall-through has been over the years of my education, but my math and logic courses in my schools have been repeatedly incomprehensible in the way that they were presented, both to me and to many of the other girls around me. The thing is, when I got a tutor who spoke my language, the material was lots of fun. I really enjoy math/logic/programming when I get it, but the language used to teach it (and the base skills of years before, in elementary, middle, and high school) has been confusing. The feeling of frustration when I am sitting in a class and knowing that if the teacher (who has always been a 'he' save twice in my student career) explained it a little differently, I would be getting it instead of sitting there feeling like I was beating my head against a wall... it's terrible to sit there for an entire semester not understanding, and knowing that if it was explained a different way, you COULD.

So, like I said in the beginning, I'm afraid that if I take CS now (unable to afford a tutor anymore), I will have that same experience of just not being able to get it, the way that it's explained. I'm sick of feeling futile and frustrated and looked down upon. CS is interesting, but it's just not worth the furious struggle that it would take to become a fluent professional for me. I don't know how many other girls share my experience, but I suspect that there's more than one out there... it starts at an elementary school level, folks, not at a college one.

Re:Why most geeks are male

[Sun Rider]

All this seems to be an American thing, I taught an introduction to computing course at Mexico to 3 groups at a Technological Institute, one of them oriented to an Informatics degree. Half the group were female. Nothing particular about it. And nowhere do I see something like a social stigma for being interested in computers.

I've read in China almost all of the current political leaders have degrees in Engineering.

I think all this comes from the warrior mentality peoples of Germanic origen have had thoughout their history.

Re:Thoughts of a guy on seeing a girl in his CS cl

[Busy]

Hotness only has to be better than -10 !? Ewwww...

both ways

[SteelRat]

I find it interesting that it is always the guy that is characterized as lacking of social skills, when there are examples such as this that show up routinely.

Call it what you want, but I give the lack of ability to get a clue and lack of ability to give one one blanket ruling: social retardation that either sex can enjoy.

Women are not welcome

[sandarB]

In my experience as a female computer engineer, there are many environments where women are not welcome, especially women who are not propperly submissive to all the men they work with. (Maybe a little bitterness is oozing through.) This has not always been my experience, and some environments are more gender neutral. However, had I known what an uphill battle I would be fighting, I wouldn't have gone into engineering. I'm not trying to prove anything, I am just trying to have a career, and be relativley successful. If a young woman were to ask me about a career in computer science, I would probably discourage her, as would 90% of my friends who are female engineers. As a female, there is frequently an assumption of incompetance, and inferiority, which my male counterparts claim to not experience. So, here I am working with all these men of inferior intellect, who are paid twice as much as me, are my bosses, (yes, I have four bosses, bossing me around), and make my work environment very difficult. In fact, I am bossed around my men at work so much, I am unwilling to date, because men I date want to boss me around too. (They want to "Be the MAN.") Argh!