Yup. I'm tired of hearing that a) everybody in software looks like me, and b) what we look like is somehow important. Both of these statements are false.

>The percentage that is straight, white, male and US born in my personal ex coworker network is probably around 20%.

If true, you have to realize you're an outlier. Statistically the industry is still predominately white and male even in silicon valley.

Well, I've been around a long time and worked at a lot of places. Still far from a scientific sample, of course.

Do you have any statistics to show? Honest question!

You're of course right that the industry is predominately male. 80/20 is about what I've seen.

As for white, maybe, but the proportion is definitely lower than the ~75% white proportion of the US population, which I suppose makes whites underrepresented, unless I've misunderstood that concept? And many of those whites are, like myself, immigrants.

Well for starters you're using statistics on the US as a whole and not, say, urban or California statistics which is where most of the tech is represented.

I think you may have just moved the argument goalposts :)

But, yeah, the question of which population the SV workforce "should" be measured against is hopelessly confused.

The local population is in large part imported by SV, so that definition feels circular. US CS graduates? To some extent SV recruits from the whole planet, so world wide CS graduates?

I could go on. One thing is clear: There is a ton of possible definitions to choose from to cherry pick support for any point you may want to make.

To me, the important measure is if a competent person can get a good job and career in the industry. I'm not sure how to measure that, but I'm convinced we to better than most!