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In China's Booming Tech Scene, Women Battle Sexism and Conservative Values (reuters.com)

In recent years, even as China's tech industry has boomed, many women say they make far less than their male counterpart for the same job. An anonymous reader shares a report: Reuters spoke to more than a dozen women -- and some men -- in the sector, from entry-level employees to executives, who described an industry where female engineers and coders battle against ingrained biases favoring men. "The traditional view is simply to think that women aren't suitable to be programmers," said Chen Bin, a former Microsoft engineer and the Beijing-based founder of Teach Girls Coding, a campaign to get more women into the sector. "Things are better now than ten years ago, but overall the number of women getting into tech is really small," he said.

China is not the only country where the tech industry has faced heat over a lack of diversity in the workplace. But unlike U.S. peers that have faced legal action over discrimination, including Uber, Alphabet's Google and Microsoft, Chinese technology companies are relatively opaque about gender issues. Most give little data on hiring and none of the industry leaders share the diversity reports that are now customary in the United States, shedding doubt on whether women in Chinese firms hold a comparable number of technical or leadership roles.

11 of 225 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Why the comparison? by Khyber · · Score: 2, Insightful

    " Remember #gamergate?"

    Yes, and I remember it started with a woman who made a game sleeping around with game reviewers, and getting outed for it by none other than one of her exes.

    Apparently, you failed to be present at the beginning of the whole thing, so you're brainwashed by the false narratives put forth by Zoe Quinn, Anita Sarkeesian, and more.

    --
    Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
  2. Re:Why the comparison? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yes, damn that Gamergate crowd for demanding that games be reviewed on their merit and not on the basis of what sexual favours the developer has offered the reviewer.

    And yes, you should be moderated to -1 for your comment that misrepresents Gamergate. You apparently don't even know what it was about and seem to believe it was about Anita Sarkeesian. It's clear that you have preconceived ideas about Gamergate and have decided that gamers are a bunch of misogynists without even investigating what happened.

    Obviously you assume that, in any situation involving a woman, the woman is always innocent and the men are always guilty. It is you who is the sexist.

  3. evidence? by ooloorie · · Score: 3, Insightful

    "The traditional view is simply to think that women aren't suitable to be programmers," said Chen Bin, a former Microsoft engineer and the Beijing-based founder of Teach Girls Coding, a campaign to get more women into the sector. "Things are better now than ten years ago, but overall the number of women getting into tech is really small," he said.

    So she is actually saying that women choose not to go into coding. There is no evidence that once they do, they are evaluated or treated unfairly.

    1. Re:evidence? by Cipheron · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Actually Gender equal nations see bigger STEM gender gaps than sexist hellholes do.

      e.g. in nations which don't provide many social avenues or financial support, such as *Algeria* you have near-equality in STEM graduates (41% female). That drops off a lot in nations with good social welfare systems. *Because* women have more choice. More women doing STEM classes isn't necessarily a sign that the society is providing well for women in general. Mainly because things like Engineering and Computer Science aren't just a course you do, they're a lifelong commitment to keeping your skills up to date. e.g. a Comp Sci person is going to be dedicating unpaid hours FOR LIFE to keep up. Women generally want more work/life balance than that allows. e.g. doing a job where you can't "clock out" and have to keep studying after-hours for your whole life, just to tread water, isn't a great idea if you plan to start a family later. Computer Science is the kind of thing that completely dominates your life if you choose it as a career path, you have to be 100% focused on that or you fall behind. e.g. you have to be near-autistic about it to even think about starting. Women are just more *balanced* than men and less of them are one-track obsessive idiots, so less women go into obsessive niche careers. That's not a "problem" for women.

  4. Stop posting this shit. by Iamthecheese · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Just stop.

    --
    If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
  5. Re:What "conservative values" are they battling? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Sexism isn't a conservative value you twat.

    No, but sexism is generally associated with conservatives because they are less open-minded by definition of wanting to conserve the status quo and not being willing to experiment with change.

  6. Re: Now would be an ideal time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    Iâ(TM)ve never heard of anyone that described themself as alt-right that didnâ(TM)t enshrine free speech as one of the foremost things they wish to preserve.

  7. Re:Why the comparison? by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Insightful

    According to your own link she had received a similar jail sentence to the accused, and much larger fines. Since the accused's conviction is still pending revocation then presumably this is not the end of the compensation he will receive (I don't know about Finland but in the UK there is compensation for wrongful imprisonment, loss of earnings, consequential losses etc. from the state).

    Presumably there will also be a review to determine what went wrong and to prevent it happening again. Those involved may be sanctioned. This is far from over.

    Look, mistakes are going to be made in any criminal justice system. It's impossible to have a 100% perfect system. A single anecdote is worthless though, what we need to see is data showing how often this happens. It's also important to look at how the situation is corrected, so it might be useful to know how quickly his conviction will be removed and what the total amount of compensation will be.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  8. Re:What "conservative values" are they battling? by sinij · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Sexism associated with conservatives by non-conservatives. The same is true for racism, despotism, corruption, cronyism... I recommend skepticism unless backed by evidence.

  9. Re:This is sexism I actually believe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Where is the line between fabricated sexism and actual sexism?

    Fabricated sexism: Women complaining about being paid less for 35 hours than men get paid for 48 hours.

    Actual sexism: Paying men the same for 48 hours as women get paid for 35 hours.

  10. Re:Why the comparison? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    None of these stories are about Finland

    So? When did it have to be only from Finland?

    and all of them actually support my point!

    Which is what, exactly? You said many things in your posts. Be specific.

    Texas story: Allegation made, no actual complaint or charges, at most it's a civil matter (slander) so why would there be criminal charges?

    The claim wasn't she had to be charged or not.

    The GP quoted this from you: "Presumably there will also be a review to determine what went wrong and to prevent it happening again."

    So the citation is to demonstrate that there's this woman who did something bad, but there would be no charges and, presumably, NO further review to prevent it from happening again.

    The same goes for your response to the other cases.

    That you claim "the system works" for the ex-boyfriend would actually support HIS point that no review is being done (because people like you say the system works, implying we don't need reviews or improvements)