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The Middle East Beats the West In Female Tech Founders
PolygamousRanchKid writes with this except from the Economist: "Only 10% of internet entrepreneurs across the world are women, according to Startup Compass, a firm that tracks such things. Except in Amman and other Middle Eastern cities, it seems. There, the share of women entrepreneurs is said to average 35% — an estimate seemingly confirmed by the mix of the sexes at 'Mix'n'Mentor,' a recent gathering in the Jordanian capital organised by Wamda, an online publication for start-ups. Reasons abound, and they are not always positive, says Nina Curley, Wamda's editor. Although more than half of university graduates in many Middle Eastern countries (51% in Jordan) are women, the workforce is dominated by men (women provide only 21% of it overall, and a paltry 16% in Jordan). The internet, however, is a new space that is more meritocratic and not as heavily male. The technology also lets entrepreneurs work from home, making it easier to raise children."
Seems that the cultural contribution of the West that Middle Eastern women should wear less hijabs and more bikinis has not, surprisingly, been a primary vector for women to reach equality in high-status tech roles.
Perhaps the secular plan should be filled-out a little better in implementation, before being forwarded as an essential requirement to leave behind their primitive religion, with all the benefits that seems to be failing to entail.
Says the person who uses arabic numerals instead of the more cultured roman ones.
And the U.S. beats the world in sending drones to kill people.
Point?
You have a case of obviously asymmetrical warfare, and you attack the necessities of what's available on their side of the economic asymmetry, and praise the means of death we use on the rich side of the asymmetry.
If we had a war where one side had muskets and the other arrows, you'd probably be praising the innovativeness in killing of the guys with muskets and reserving special outrage for the "savages" using killing-by-arrow...
Oh wait.
Yes, you definitely aren't alone, demographically or historically. Still, remains unarguable fact you're all ridiculous hypocrites.
Up to about the years 1200-1400 the Arab world was pretty cool. While we Europeans were living in an age appropriately designated the Dark Ages much of the Arab world was doing cool math, Cool science, Exploration, trade, arts, and medicine. They were fairly tolerant of other religions and were one of the few bright spots on this planet. Then around 800 years ago it all seems to have gone wrong. "Trouble in the Middle East" has been a newspaper headline since the invention of the newspaper. Personally I would love to know what changed 800 years ago as it might give a clue as to how to make it right again. Maybe lots of female internet entrepreneurs is a step in that direction. I wonder if there were more female entrepreneurs in the middle east 1000 years ago?
So all I can say is good luck!
I don't know, it is still a pretty popular one.
Here's a preliminary list... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_inventions_in_the_medieval_Islamic_world
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1te01rfEF0g
In particular the part you are interested in starts at 23:45, though the overall segment starts at around 19:20.
The short version? Religious fundamentalism.
Says the person who uses arabic numerals instead of the more cultured roman ones.
Except, of course, that the name is somewhat of a misnomer; since they actually come from India, and are known as "Hindu numbers" in the middle east.
In Britain, feminists are campaigning for this practice to be made part of the law, and the government are supporting it. I wrote about it in this article.
Michael Reed, freelance tech writer.
Even though we call the numbers we use in the west 'arabic', they are actually hindu.
Pakistan, a fairly radical islamic country had a female head of state before the vast majority of western democracies... Just sayin'.
I'm confused ... help me out here.
Men have testicles, which means we have significantly higher levels of testosterone coursing through our veins compared to women.
Now, testosterone gives rise to certain characteristics:
* men are larger, stronger and faster than women
* men also have a much higher libido (sex drive)
* however testosterone means that men also more violent, aggressive and risk-taking
Given all this, shouldn't men get LIGHTER sentences than women for most crimes?
On the one hand, how can a society chemically castrate men for sex offences, and on the other hand deny lighter sentences due to hormonal influence?
Meanwhile, women have successfully used PMS (menstruation) as a legal defense
Even the government-funded Australian Institute of Criminology has written about PMS as a legal defence (PDF)
Can anyone explain the double-standards to me? Anyone?
This is interesting. It may be the harsher conditions that limit options, and part of it is likely class. Part of it may be the acceptance of over-the-top misogynistic behavior in some Western tech communities is constrained by tighter constraints on speech overall. The US is doing terribly at inclusion of women in cs and engineering. The percentage of women in engineering and in CS peaked in the eighties and continues to decrease. Microsoft being cool with a rape joke for Xbox One and the widespread acceptance of rape not only as a trope for every female character in gaming but also as a trivializing verb is part of the problem. Gender hate speech in tech culture is a problem in the West, I do not know if it is a problem in tech forums in other languages. The same sexual repression that harms women may have a minor positive secondary effect in the prohibition of the explicitly sexually violent language. In India, for decades nearly half the engineering classes have been female. So there is a significant pipeline issue. If women are 50% of the graduates and 35% of start-ups, well that is better than the numbers here. (About 14% in EE last year, about 3% of start-ups.) Another possible explanation is that these are places where rape is more endemic and there are more women is start-ups. The happy idea that the internet is a gender-free meritocracy is funny to anyone with access to a search engine. However, if some people are actually prevented from traveling alone outdoors, either by law in Saudi or by threat of rape, then doing your own start-up is one of fewer employment options. So women may be driven to this. Constraints on women working with men in some cultures may mean that there can be no situations where one woman gets a team of men. A college education is much more of a luxury good in these countries. A much much smaller percentage of the population has a college degree. Thus, those with those degrees are more likely to have access to capital to have a start-up; even if it is as simple as having housing, health insurance and subsidized Internet. This is interesting. There are many possible explanations. Perhaps we could learn something applicable locally.
Please come up with an innovation that is less the MM [ftfy] years old please.
Just two off the top of my head for which we still use names derived from the Arabic, Chemistry and Algebra. There are plenty more of course.
Many people of all religions still "pay a tax" today. That being a weaker grasp of science limits their success in the modern world. Be it getting a tech job or just getting duped by bad food and medicine.
Personally I would love to know what changed 800 years ago as it might give a clue as to how to make it right again.
Part one of your question: What could have possibly caused change 800 years ago in the Arab world?
Pulled off Wikipedia
Reconquista (718-1492)
People's Crusade (1195–1196)
First (1095–1099) and Immediate Aftermath
Second (1147–1149)
Wendish (1147–1162)
Third (1187–1192)
Northern crusades (1193–1290)
German (1195–1198)
Fourth (1202–1204)
Albigensian Crusade (1208–1241)
Fifth (1217–1221)
Sixth (1228–1229)
Seventh (1248–1254)
Eighth (1270)
Ninth (1271–1272) and aftermath in the Middle East and North Africa
Nicropolis (1396)
Hussite (1420–1431)
Varna (1444)
Seige of Belgrade (1456)
Arguably many more 'secular crusades' right up to the present day.
Part two of your question: How to make it right again?
I hope the answer is now self evident. :)
Except, of course, that the name is somewhat of a misnomer; since they actually come from India, and are known as "Hindu numbers" in the middle east.
Except of course we lifted it directly from the Arabs (who use a system developed from Hindu numerals) as evidenced by the fact that we still write our numbers backward. (Ie. from small to large in Arabic right to left direction.) Which is the opposite of how we [used] to speak our numbers, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen ... four'n'twenty
I've just been highlighting this fact in teaching why *nix, r, w, x run 4, 2, 1 instead of the other way round (the first 8 binary numbers thus forming a truth table).
Breastpounding of this being a western influence aside, if the times for women to be tech founders in the ME is now, then as a result it will be more popular and more will do it (and this is all good) but that does not mean it is a lasting effect, it could level out much lower than in the west or it could level out much higher, only time will tell - but for now we should be happy for the people who now have one more choice of path to make their life better.
Large percentages of the ME men, (yes, even in fairly tame countries like Jordan) have been shunted off to jihadism or the armies that attempt to control it. So they have had a decade of war (or closer to two decades), with disproportionate male losses.
Meanwhile the women start "companies", although the story says "Many firms run by women entrepreneurs deal with what are labelled female issues (weddings, parenting advice, recipes, and web businesses)". So other than keeping other women entertained, these are hardly the same thing as running industry, developing resources or running banks.
If you count these empty-afternoon enterprises as business you have to realize that this kind of stuff doesn't even get counted in the west. (And in the US you can't even tell except by inspecting first names if businesses are owned by men or women, gender tagging business licenses just isn't done).
It seems likely, when when the ME men settle down and stop trying to force Islam on the world, they will start forcing it on their families, and this "trend" of female entrepreneurship will disappear.
When you can look at a news photo of an Arab street and see 50/50 ratio of men to women (instead of 100males to 1), call me. Because until then, all the filling of afternoons while the children are at school with pretend companies means nothing.
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Please tell me you didn't cite a television show as part of your argument!!!
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the Internet is mostly ruled by the clueless, and they gang up against the occasional visitor who tries to fix things
Since you hide behind the same name as the people you lament, and several thousand others posting here, how would anyone know the relative percentage of clueless vs cluefull?
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I wonder is this could be one factor:
In societies where male and female normally interact with each other at all ages, males with poor social skills in general might gravitate towards fields that are dominated by interactions with machines or technology rather than people. Therefore women perceive the male community in these fields as hostile.
In societies with gender segregation, everyone has poor skills interacting the the opposite sex, so technology is the same as every other occupation.
Another thing the west does is force black people to play in professional sports. Today a black man is not allowed to do anything but play mother fuckin basketball. Do you have any idea how demeaning it is for a proud black man to be forced to play what is essentially a children's game day after day. 'No negro you are not allowed to program computers, your moneky ass has to play basket ball day in and day out.' I really hate the west and our racism. Make some cracker play some bball once in a while. Black men are sick of it. We also don't allow women to start 'high tech' computer companies. The only people who are allowed to take math and science classes are East Asians. I really think there aught to b a law saying that only black people can study math. All east asian should b forced to make a living playing professional sports. All Whites and arabs should be killewd. Wites bcause they are all racists, and arabs bcause they are anit-semitic.
No, but seriously we should have a commision to determine exactly how many people of every possible race / demographic are doing one pathicular thing, and then coorelate it to the world population as a whole. If these numbers don't exactly match up there neeeds to be an uproar on NPR. Personally I have found that there is a disturbing lack of female transgendered caucasian thirld world banana republic dictators. I can therefore only logically conlude that the 'third world' is systematically undermining the efforts of white transgendered females to take over and rule their countries.
I have a friend from Korea, he told me, "My grandpa always forced my mom to eat at a separate table from the men, until she started making the money. Then she didn't give him any until she could eat at the normal table." Now that tradition has disappeared from Korea.
Making money is one potential road towards equality.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Use of arrows, as opposed to muskets, doesn't require you to find civilians to use them on. You can stick an error in the eye of a soldier just as well as some kid eating lunch or shopping or watching a marathon.
"Asymmetric warfare" is hit and run tactics on military and governmental targets by guerrilla forces. Blowing civilians up is plain old terrorism. Sometimes guerrillas use terror tactics as well. That just makes them assholes too.
Please don't try and suggest to me that because we won't throw stones at them instead of bullets that they're now entitled to blow up women and children.
Which is not to say that I agree with the "wall it off" sentiment, but I'm not buying that it is their "only weapon, so they have to use it". They don't have to do anything, they particularly don't have to blow themselves or anyone else up.
I live in a third-world country where there is a similar phenomenon.
We have a huge number of female entrepreneurs here - many of them are extremely successful even by Western standards, and many more earn a Western wage in a poor country, which gives them an extremely comfortable standard of living.
What is the secret? It's largely down to motivation. The concept of family is extremely important here - much more so for women than for men. If a woman gets pregnant and has a child, the husband/boyfriend can leave without any financial consequences, and few social consequences.
Women in general (in this country) are much more driven to help their parents, sibilings, children and extended family than their male equivalents (on average, of course). Men are still generally the biggest wage earners, and hold the top positions in most big companies, but women rule the world of small and family businesses.
I am not saying it is fair or correct, but the absence of sexual equality and a benefits system here has had some interesting consequences. I'm not trying to give my opinion about sexual politics, just commenting on how things work here from my day-to-day personal experience. Counter-intuitively, inequality here has led to a large group of middle class female entrepreneurs. Perhaps a similar effect is in action in the Middle East.
Middle eastern countries are a somewhat diverse bunch in terms of overall attitudes. I can imagine quite a large difference in how well women do overall in say somewhere like Lebanon vs Saudi Arabia.
I didn't notice any links in the TFA, but they only really mentioned (vaguely) stuff from Jordan. I don't think Jordan is at the Saudi end of the scale here.
He's stupid. The main reason is because boys don't get pregnant. Think about it. Who pays the cost if the perp runs away and the girl finds herself pregnant? If the perp is the girl, the perp bears most of the cost.
Fact is most of us boys don't want our "girl friend" to go to jail if its consensual. quote: "In most instances, the boys don't want to get the woman in trouble and are reluctant to tell authorities what happened. "
In fact it might be that exposure to the US criminal "justice" system might be far more traumatic and scarring than a MILF's "abuse" of us.
These achievements where not made in a vacuum Algebra for example being a development on earlier Greek and possibly Chinese work.
Of course ... human knowledge always progresses by out standing on the shoulders of earlier generations. And as regards Algebra and number theory, my understanding that it is Indian, even more than Greek mathematicians, who influenced Arabic scholars.
[T]he whole history of the "Islamic golden age" is more properly titled the Arabic golden age ...
Which term I employed elsewhere.
Well in any number of ways. Not only do we have Christian mobs skinning Hypatia, but it has been argued [citation needed] that one of the effects of the crusades was to shift the Islamic world from a relatively tolerant and free-thinking culture to one of defensive belligerence and fundamentalism. And in turn the adoption of this defensive posture re-inscribes the danger fanaticism poses to the growth of human knowledge.
Your assertion on Islam versus Christianity might be true on a certain level. I am a Chrisitan from India. The Hindu beliefs I carry - which were not imposed by anyone - are far more stronger than whatever Christianity has tried to impose. India and the polytheist Hindu philosophy with its 33 1/3 million gods always found space for new religions. We absorbed any new god, compared to other Abrahamic and monotheist religions who felt a "new god" stole the thunder and the adherents had to be blocked/killed/raped/pillaged. This is the reason Hindu philosophy shines over others when it comes to tolerance and acceptance. Even the most rabid Hindu nationalists are tame compared to the Islamic and far right Christian counterparts. They are angry pussy cats rather than feral dogs. But if I follow your assertion fully, I have no answer why the science and technological development starting with European renaissance escaped India and China. May be everything is cyclical, a paradigm shift might be underway, India's young population - 65% is under age of 30, bodes well for the future unless we pick a dumb war with China or Pakistan.
Tat Tvam Asi
Oh and I meant to write, the point of the post was not to claim Arabic invention ex nihilio of these disciplines, but to address the ignorant notion implied by the GP, that for the past 2000 (ahem ..) years, Islamic culture has been barbaric in comparison to that of Europe.
In many (Most? All?) states in the US, women can dump their child off at any hospital or fire department and not have any more legal responsibility ever. On the other hand, not only will the state financially come after any man who is the biological father and not raising the child themselves, they even go after men who are not the biological father, but were conned by the the biological mother into thinking they were for a while.
It has nothing to do with unemployment.
It has everything to do with attitude.
In the Middle East, the male species think that they are the KING, that they should be served by others, that their women are slaves.
Or to put it more succinctly, in the Middle East, most of the males can be categorized as "Male Chauvinist Pigs".
I am not being inflammatory, I am speaking the truth. I am from the Middle East myself, and I am sick and tired of watching lazy men sitting their twiddling their fucking thumbs while their women (mother, wives, daughters) working non-stops, just to feed the family.
That is why I moved out of the Middle East when I was a young chap, for I do not want to have any association with those lazy religious fucktards.
Everywhere I go, from Pakistan to Afghanistan to the Middle East, I see them lazy religious fucktards everywhere.
And finally, I have left Islam and converted to Christianity, because the stone-age viewpoint of Islam goes counter to the world I am living in.
Do you even know what and where France is ?
"The Middle East Beats the West In Female Tech Founders" I did not expect that.
So you went from one stone age religion, to a slightly older stone age religion? And you feel better about yourself for it?
There is a higher percentage of female CEOs in the "third world" also. Cheap domestic help may be the biggest contributor.
SLOWER TRAFFIC KEEP RIGHT
Seems to me all that happened before Islam. Islam seems to have put the brakes on mid-east progress.
This is some of the most sexist bullshit I've ever seen on Slashdot, and that is saying something. Why don't we equally discount businesses having to do with sports, car enthusiasts, video games, power tools and tech gadgets? A business is a business, and if they are making money then it counts. Just because it is a traditionally "female issue" doesn't make it any less useful to society. Guess what? Half of consumers are female, and they vote with their wallets what is important to them.
Sure: http://owningyourshit.blogspot.co.uk/2013_04_01_archive.html
That is where the US was just over 50 years ago. We had a male labor shortage during the world wars and when the men came home and the fighting stopped, the women didn't go home. They started attending college for home economics so they could get jobs as teachers, decorators, party planners, institution management, and other "soft" jobs.
Once the fighting stops and the men go home, you won't see things go back to the way they were. Societies do not change overnight. You do not wake up one morning and redefine an entire social structure. It took us the better part of a century and we can expect it to take them just as long.
BTW, there are plenty of people in the U.S. "filing afternoons while the children are at school" and the money those companies make is not pretend. You can knock things like wedding planning all you want, but the reality is that brides are willing to pay people thousands of dollars to show up for an afternoon's work. You and I may think the work is stupid and silly, but the money is real. A friend of mine's wife is a wedding planner and it is insane how much money she gets paid just for in-law wrangling.
Why don't we equally discount businesses having to do with sports, car enthusiasts, video games, power tools and tech gadgets?
We do. If guys were only involved in those businesses, and women ran the banks, hospitals, factories, research labs, etc. then I would be very sad as a guy.
By the very same (terrible, mind you) reasoning you would have to say that men are also coerced and cajoled into accepting traditional intercourse. So what's the story, are men and women mutually raping each other?
One need only look at Mohammed's wife to be unsurprised that even today, Muslim businesswomen aren't exactly unheard of. Sure, there are oppressive countries, but that's government, not a core facet of Islam.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
France: Soon to be known as 'western greater Germany'.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
I think the proper name would then be "Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation" at that point.
If you want to apply for those programs clearly you would have to reveal your gender.
But to simply file for a business license, no gender information is requested.
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That you can toll the internet and find the odd exception, merely proves the rule.
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but to address the ignorant notion implied by the GP, that for the past 2000 (ahem ..) years
The OP specified "the Middle East" not "Islamic culture" so your "ahem" is unwarranted. And considering AC's "Please come up with an innovation that is less the 2000 years old please" was referring to Arabic numerals, it has nothing to do with Islamic culture since they were developed before Islam began.
Presumably he left to a more reformed Christianity...wonder why he didn't think about some of the more reformed islamist groups out there (the ones that value women's equality and acceptance of outsiders, they do exist...)
...in bed
when you lock your women in the basement.
Pakistan beats the US in number of female heads of state.
Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.