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Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by matt_wulfeck on Wednesday April 20, 2016 @07:55PM (#11538661)
my personal observation over the years says that the vast majority of new female engineers have come from foreign countries. Or are American citizens who immigrated here after middle school.

We're celebrating a narrowing gender gap, but American women seem to be largely left out.

Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by home_boi on Wednesday April 20, 2016 @08:52PM (#11538886)
Weirdly enough, these foreign female engineers never complain about "culture problems" even though they make up the majority of female engineers.
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by clementangerine on Thursday April 21, 2016 @08:32AM (#11541542)
They definitely do; I've had plenty of private conversations with non-American women in CS about sexism. I think Americans are just more likely to be openly vocal about it.
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by kevinwang on Thursday April 21, 2016 @02:42AM (#11540103)
But just because you don't hear them complain doesn't mean that there aren't problems.
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by Apocryphon on Wednesday April 20, 2016 @08:14PM (#11538743)
I wonder which of these other nations are. Perhaps their engineering cultures are more gender-egalitarian than ours.
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by hackinthebochs on Wednesday April 20, 2016 @08:41PM (#11538853)
The best explanation I've seen is that in countries with high economic insecurity, people are motivated to work at lucrative careers with low barriers to entry, despite their lack of inherent interest. Programming is top of the list almost everywhere. The survival instinct surely is egalitarian.

But in countries with less economic insecurity this motivation to work in a field without an inherent interest simply isn't there. Perhaps this motivation is different across genders in wealthier countries (men are more likely to go into fields they don't like), or men simply like technical fields at higher rates.

Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by user_0001 on Wednesday April 20, 2016 @08:44PM (#11538864)
Equally as important, perhaps they do not have it drilled into them that beauty is all they should aim for. Everything they see is that women should be (model level) beautiful. Should flaunt their women-ness.

Advertising, makeup, dolls, television, films play a bigger part than the so called sexism that exists in engineering cultures

Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by toomanybeersies on Wednesday April 20, 2016 @11:27PM (#11539466)
Even in male dominated fields this applies.

There are pink hammers, pink calculators, and plenty of other pink tools that would otherwise not be gendered. A black handled hammer isn't masculine, it's gender neutral, it's functional.

You can't simply be a woman, who is in the tech industry, you have to be a "woman in tech"

Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by ae_keji on Wednesday April 20, 2016 @09:22PM (#11539016)
The fact that makeup exists speaks a lot about our culture and how it views women.
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by thaumasiotes on Thursday April 21, 2016 @04:13AM (#11540371)
Since it exists in every culture that has ever been known to man, it's not actually possible to draw conclusions in the normal way, by comparing a culture with makeup to one without. You can make claims about what it would mean for a culture not to use makeup, but if you do you should realize that those claims are, in their entirety, just some random junk you made up.
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by ae_keji on Thursday April 21, 2016 @08:27PM (#11546285)
I was inferring global human culture, we didn't really develop in vacuums. And pardon my wording, I meant species, but I felt that'd imply that women were biologically disposed to wear makeup, which obviously I don't believe is true(maybe social factors caused by biology, but none still relevant in the 21st century).

More importantly, you're right though, I have zero evidence backing this up, or going against it. I just don't feel like it's very right.

Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by oldmanjay on Thursday April 21, 2016 @12:18AM (#11539668)
Culture does not have a view, as abstract concepts cannot themselves conceptualize
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by meowface on Wednesday April 20, 2016 @10:27PM (#11539226)
Are you saying makeup doesn't exist in Eastern Europe?
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by ae_keji on Thursday April 21, 2016 @08:31PM (#11546302)
Well, it exists everywhere, but so does sexism.
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by gozur88 on Thursday April 21, 2016 @10:13PM (#11546622)
So... it doesn't have anything to do with our culture at all, then?
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by ae_keji on Saturday April 23, 2016 @09:41AM (#11555487)
Human culture, I guess if you step back far enough. I say culture because I don't think makeup is tied to genetics.
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by meowface on Thursday April 21, 2016 @10:56PM (#11546792)
What evidence do you have that makeup is actually linked to sexism at all?
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by ae_keji on Saturday April 23, 2016 @09:41AM (#11555486)
That women wear it daily while it doesn't even cross most guy's minds. Also that women wear it, and are expected to wear it, to look better while, again, the concept rarely crosses most men's minds.
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by meowface on Saturday April 23, 2016 @08:39PM (#11558051)
If it doesn't cross guys' minds but it does cross their minds, isn't it a reasonable explanation that they personally notice the effects and like how it looks on them?
Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by kaitai on Thursday April 21, 2016 @09:19AM (#11541856)
It's not really about egalitarianism per se, it's about what roles women are expected/allowed to take, and what roles men are expected/allowed to take. The decision that engineering or programming is a "male" role is a fairly arbitrary one that we've made in the US.

In some countries programming is seen as a good job for women because it's an indoor job, maybe you can be in a predominantly female environment, it involves typing, it's not that prestigious so you're not fighting to climb a career ladder. It's a commodity job so you can enter and leave the workforce as necessary to deal with family issues.

None of these things is really about the work that needs to be done, unless we're talking about work that absolutely requires upper body strength. It's all just framing, perception, almost marketing. That's why I find the gender essentialist stuff nonsense. Why is being a top chef a male job and a home cook a female job? Because one requires bluster? You will often find that in countries with fabulously successful women programmers, mathematicians, scientists, engineers, these jobs are just considered jobs rather than Magical Jobs for Extraordinarily Smart Ninja Rockstars.

Re:Three teen sisters who win medals in coding competitions by surfmike on Thursday April 21, 2016 @12:58AM (#11539788)
Totally anecdotal, but I seem to meet disproportionately many woman engineers from Russia and Iran.