It would be nice if the attitude of this society would shift toward a realistic one, namely, women and men are different. It is clearly documented that estrogen and testosterone as well as other hormones in characteristic blood levels differing between those of the sexes have major differences in their actions on the development of neurons and their connections as well as their growth and maintenance.
It is probably quite true that society plays a large role in the development of a person, but the genetics still play a huge role. I don't care how much someone alters the environment of an apple seed; it is never going to become an orange tree.
I am not pretending to know why these differences in the joys/prowess/interest in computing may exist more in a majority of men (picture overlapping gaussian curves), but I do say that they do exist and very well may represent a difference of hardware. Obviously, there a some women who do well in high school math contests against men, but they are definitely in the minority.
Borg says that women are oppressed by their male counterparts throughout their respective years of growing up. She forgets that a beauty of computing (gaming, writing code, etc.) is that it can be done without competition in the privacy of one's own home. Just because John told Lisa she can't program worth a darn (a rare scenario, I suspect) she can always go home and work on a computer herself. (If this is where one wants to argue that parents don't buy computers for girls as often as they do for boys, I will not continue; there will always be another argument for whatever answer I return.)
Finally, in response to the statement, "The other piece is the image of people who go into this field. The image is 'geeks, gadgets, and greed.' It's people who you don't want to be like," I would like to say that this should make either sex shun from the field of computing. What male in his right mind would adopt a lifestyle of near celibacy if it were not for the strong interest of and realization of beauty behind computing. Quite a number of replies to this article show that people who have gained the most from computers over the years were just people with an interest in it and had a computer. Nothing was said about attemting to gain an image of any sort.
Slashdot Mirror
It would be nice if the attitude of this society would shift toward a realistic one, namely, women and men are different. It is clearly documented that estrogen and testosterone as well as other hormones in characteristic blood levels differing between those of the sexes have major differences in their actions on the development of neurons and their connections as well as their growth and maintenance.
It is probably quite true that society plays a large role in the development of a person, but the genetics still play a huge role. I don't care how much someone alters the environment of an apple seed; it is never going to become an orange tree.
I am not pretending to know why these differences in the joys/prowess/interest in computing may exist more in a majority of men (picture overlapping gaussian curves), but I do say that they do exist and very well may represent a difference of hardware. Obviously, there a some women who do well in high school math contests against men, but they are definitely in the minority.
Borg says that women are oppressed by their male counterparts throughout their respective years of growing up. She forgets that a beauty of computing (gaming, writing code, etc.) is that it can be done without competition in the privacy of one's own home. Just because John told Lisa she can't program worth a darn (a rare scenario, I suspect) she can always go home and work on a computer herself. (If this is where one wants to argue that parents don't buy computers for girls as often as they do for boys, I will not continue; there will always be another argument for whatever answer I return.)
Finally, in response to the statement, "The other piece is the image of people who go into this field. The image is 'geeks, gadgets, and greed.' It's people who you don't want to be like," I would like to say that this should make either sex shun from the field of computing. What male in his right mind would adopt a lifestyle of near celibacy if it were not for the strong interest of and realization of beauty behind computing. Quite a number of replies to this article show that people who have gained the most from computers over the years were just people with an interest in it and had a computer. Nothing was said about attemting to gain an image of any sort.