A woman in engineering should know that just because things have been probable in the past does not mean they will in the future

For a guy growing around computers it has also been pretty lonely, more girls would have been welcome at any stage...

> A woman in engineering should know that just because things have been probable in the past does not mean they will in the future

I don't think I would tell someone what they "should" know. That 'knowledge' seems like an unlikely possibility: I think it probable that significant discrimination against women in tech will (very unfortunately) continue for another generation, at least. One signal to me is that many reject it in every way: Denial, anger, etc.

I agree I shouldn't have to tell anyone, because it is pretty standard knowledge "things change"

I would say there is no significant discrimination of women in tech

I would say that there is a significant lack of interest of women for tech

If anything there is positive discrimination in hiring for example, my manager already said if there are men and women applying, women will have the advantage. I guess they always had, it is just they are/were very fewer compared to men. Other example is my previous manager always available and keen to help the female colleagues, and busy for the male

The only thing you could point out would be biased education even though women outperform men in all areas from basic to university, which gives them more choice

And who can blame anyone, the majority of IT/Dev jobs are booring. Fill your head with technical knowledge, that in a couple of years is completely useless. Looks cool but useless. If I had the opportunity and and reasonable salary I would definitely change for something more in the areas of history philosophy politics...

Just take a look at all the comments here. What you don't see is that I've been downvoted a ton as well, and in at least one comment that I think was removed, was called a cancer.

Remember that HN isn't representative of tech, and commenters aren't representative of readers. It's great that you speak up, and that you do it reasonably and respectfully.

Thank you!

Speaking from the other side of that perspective — being one of a few women in a CS program can be a very uncomfortable experience, especially a decade or two ago.

I don't ascribe completely to this philosophy. Also, I wrote "they" in my original comment.

You did write they. Which is why I called it out when I saw what I presumed was a presumed he (apparently you wrote it in another comment, so I was wrong in this specific case... the threading/timeline made that unclear).

Regardless of your philosophy, the constant presumption of male hood is all over on HN if you're sensitive to watch for it. I don't know what your philosophy is, but the pattern absolutely is difficult for some people. So whether you ascribe to it or not, it is emblematic of the male-dominated culture that makes CS less appealing to women.

I think this is an overly negative attitude.

Note that I've worked for multiple very successful computer scientist women. They have no tolerance for folks who sit around and complain about the unfairness. It's clear their confidence, ego, and drive, allowed them to succeed.

I slipped when I said he in the second comment. I normally prefer to not state the gender of people (to avoid the presumption of malehood) but I don't think it's as dire as you make out.

> I've worked for multiple very successful computer scientist women.

To make sure I read it right: I don't think you're suggesting that there are proportionally many non-male computer scientists, just that you've known a few.

> They have no tolerance for folks who sit around and complain about the unfairness. It's clear their confidence, ego, and drive, allowed them to succeed.

Isn't that a baseless insult? People can point out problems without 'sitting around', and they can 'sit around' without pointing out problems, and in fact the latter seems more likely to me: people who want to 'sit around' don't act in ways that create more emotional stress and work for themselves, and that threaten their employment. It's also a common response to shut down people who have legitimate concerns: Attack them, change the subject to them.

Accepting your characterization of these women you worked for, perhaps they are selected for those characteristics, because others could not survive. Many women have quietly endured discrimination, sexual harassment, and sexual assault as the only way to survive in their careers; look at the movie industry, for example. If your industry is selecting for 'success' like that, then there is something morally wrong (and you are losing a lot of talent). Discrimination, harassment, and assault should be stopped, and if someone points out that it's happening, that helps.

Also, many men succeed in tech without exceptional confidence, ego, and drive. The standard should be the same for non-men (just imagine being non-binary in tech).

> I think this is an overly negative attitude.

Why don't we see what women in tech think? Why talk about them in the third person? Probably because there are very few here on HN. Is that coincidence?

EDIT: Slight rewording, to minimize inflammation

I'm trying to make sense of this. From the content I'm going to presume you're male, otherwise you'd be discussing from a female perspective instead of speaking for a select few based upon your understanding of their world.

In either case, whether or not their perspective is to want to make room for others doesn't mean that all women feel that way. I've had quite a few talk about this exact kind of experience including former mentors and managers of mine (I've also been lucky to work for some kick ass women). They tell me that they have to prove even more, dress/act more masculine, etc to be taken seriously. This isn't just one woman who has told me this either. This is quite a few over a 15 year period.

Staying gender neutral is an easy way to create room and make it feel less skewed, especially when the context is a senior leader (aka glass ceiling). I know you did with your original they, so I'm talking more generally here rather than this specific instance. The last year has had an outpouring of people's experiences being different in all these respects, and stories in business are easy to find. This week is also the Society of Women Engineer's conference where there's talks on navigating these kinds of environments. Perhaps you might find it interesting to attend and hear. It's available virtually.

I'm not making this out to be dire.. it's quite minor. But that doesn't mean minor things don't add up when you're an outsider. Being a gay man, I've seen that change in language over time to be less presumptive. I don't get offended when people ask about my wife (they'd be right the majority of the time!), but it is nice when people make room for my spouse to not be female.

"Successful women in computer science are universally thick skinned, confident and driven, and would not have succeeded if it were not for those qualities."

This appears to me to make the opposite point that you think it does.

nope it doesn't. those are necessary but not sufficient skills for success in this field.

Really? And why is that? And for men too? I doubt that.

Your observation of a small number of successful women in computer science who aren't bothered by gender bias is entirely consistent with hordes of other women who've been chased away. This is a classic case of Survivorship Bias:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias