Yes, male nurses face weird moments in life - but as you say it's mostly from other men. That has nothing to do with being a woman in the tech industry who get to listen to cracks about "being on the rag" or PMSing when they're aggressive.

Next time you're with a female coworker, notice how often you and the other men in the group look at her chest. Notice how often she ignores this and how completely oblivious the other men are that she's overlooking their behavior. If you don't believe me - and if you know this woman well enough - ask her.

You'd be surprised the shit women deal with.

I appreciate (more now than when i initially wrote my comment) that you're trying to take folks through the uncanny valley. My concern is that the 'ick' feeling you get from the uncanny valley relies upon the perception of the viewer. People who deny that sexism is a problem aren't going to follow you into the valley. They deny that there's a valley there at all.

With the mode that you've chosen to make your point I don't see how to address the criticisms from folks who deny sexism simply by saying "this guy is complaining about nothing, or perceived slights and imputed discomforts that aren't real, just the same way that women in the tech industry do!"

> Next time you're with a female coworker...

This kind of gets to the heart of the matter though doesn't it? Given the gender disparity in programming, most devs don't have female coworkers who aren't also separated by some other sort of cultural distinction (e.g. engineering vs. biz).

> ...notice how often you and the other men in the group look at her chest.

I will admit to having created awkward situations (that have gone unacknowledged by either me or female friend) by inadvertently doing this. Super, super awkward.

> You'd be surprised the shit women deal with.

I'm not surprised simply because my entire university career was spent in two different worlds. There was the computational linguistics world which was 50/50 gender split, and there were no weird unspoken assumption that dudes are better at compling than women are. And then there was the comp sci world, where my female friends from comp ling would get hit on in incredibly passive-aggressive ways, had group projects fall apart because a guy in the group was pissed off that my friend wouldn't go out with them, and the gender disparity was 1 (or maybe 2) girls out of a classroom of 40.

One of the reasons I think programming should be taught outside of computer science departments is to get away with the cultural assumptions and baggage that engineering fields like CS carry. That is also the reason why I currently work for journalists along side a journalism school. There are women out there who are interested in learning how to program, build tools, sift data and all manner of technical analytical tasks, they're just not in computer science. And frankly, i'm glad they're not.

I'm not sure, but I think you're being too general. I'd rather state this:

  You'd be surprised by the shit *attractive* women have to deal with.

Edit: I expected the downvotes, but please reply, do you disagree with the stated facts (i.e. does you experience differ from mine), or with the manner they were stated in?

But seriously, in my experience good looks do help in getting you hired in tech. I've thought about it a lot and I think it's because men (perhaps less attractive men) like being the superior of an attractive man. It somehow increases their own feeling of "primal status" to be telling somebody attractive what to do. Ridiculous, I know, but I think it's true. :) You should really have processes in place to prevent frivolous hiring of attractive men. ;)

After you're hired I don't know though...

If I'm reading this correctly, you're saying sexism is not a problem at all in the real world. Did I make a mistake in reading your comment?

Sexism? Just a bunch of people who live practically perfect lives, and have no problems, and are bored, so they create some.

I'm slowly finding this conversation too Orwellian. Why do you care about what I think?!? I might be a phedophile, a rasist, but as long as I'm not hurting other people, I'm better that 99% of the world population. I find some people (so far only women) attractive, therefore I'd like to have sex with them, if I got a chance (I don't actively seek such chances, because sex with most women is boring, in my experience, unless (my) emotions are evolved). I don't make sexual comments at work, not because I would think they are inappropriate per se (I wouldn't make comments about someone being fat either, not because I think it's unappropriate, but because I don't want to hurt their feelings even more without good reason), but because at work, I like to focus on work.

Edit: to put things into perspective: my grandmother was born in 1930s. There were 8 children. One died very young. Her father was killed by nazi collaborators. He had a job. Her mother didn't. She had to support a family of 7, I don't know how. They made a drink out of tree bark, because coffee wasn't available.

My grandmother smiles more that most people I see commuting daily on the London subway. When people say, "we have a crisis", it makes me smile and think how deluded they are...

So, no, "sexism" is not the problem, the problem is "anti-sexism."

Most of us have wondered if our bulge was big enough - imagine if it was judged daily, by every oncoming woman, in every meeting. Imagine if you were constantly teased about getting a boner, and people acted as if it were normal.

I imagine some people around here aren't very good at imagining, are too literal, and hence react badly to this sort of thing.

Maybe women perceive men as being sexually discriminating because they only receive sexual comments from men. When I try to think about it, I (as a man) also receive much more sexual comments from men. Maybe it is simply that men are much more open talking about sex, and when we do it with everybody, men and women alike, but when women hear it, they think it has something to do with them being women...

I don't know if I'm correct, generally, but in my social circles, we joke about sexual stuff a lot. (With friends, of course, not at workplace.)

Basically some other women will often be just as discouraging and as sexist as some men. They will reinforce the same strict gender stereotypes for the same illogical reasons as the men.

What if they are just voicing their opinions?!?

I had a girlfriend that was very "stereotypical" - I practically had to beg her after every meal no to go to the kitchen to clean up, but to stay with me at the table and just talk and relax. Is she wrong by being who she is, just because she is "reinforcing illogical stereotypes"?

People are different. Be yourself, hang out with people who accept you for who you are. Let other people be.

Your girlfriend was probably quite satisfied with a kitchen that had been promptly cleaned and that made her happy. However if she ever voiced the opinion, 'You should help me clean up', to your younger sister then that wouldn't seem okay to me.

Or is minority status merely a red herring?

I've had to put up with quite a lot from women of all kinds and I'm not even that attractive.

I'm not going to say more, since I will get called a pussy and a bitch.

But lets please stop pretending that only men are perverts and that all sexual discrimination and indecent behavior towards other people comes from men.

And you are obviously a "nice guy."

Knowtheory cited the case of male nursing precisely because it's a dissimilar example to women in tech. His critique is that it's not enough just to swap gender roles, because we carry along all of the mental and cultural baggage associated with masculinity and femininity. When we recontextualize gender roles, we're not really understanding the contrary perspective with any depth.

Put another way, there's a difference being a man in women's shoes and being a woman in women's shoes.

Anways, thanks for taking the time to write the article - it was enjoyable to read and thought provoking. I'm always appreciate of articles that try to promote understanding instead of enforcement.

Thanks for pointing this out :)

Honestly, in my lifetime, I have heard maybe hundreds of jokes about PMS from women, and maybe 2 from men.

I dunno what I'm saying anymore, this topic is remarkably frustrating for me as a man because I can see where women are coming from, they don't want to feel like the minority even though they are and I don't necessarily see anything wrong with the way men "socialize" with each other but it is also a deterrent for women in joining our industry.

Another point to raise. What if women wanted in on men's football? Casting away the physical disparity and only considering the cultural implications, I could see this very same kind of interaction happening - the only difference is, in our industry the barrier to entry is an intellectual one but we still bring all of our gender-assigned cultural baggage along with us...

You're not going to get them on board either by making the absurdist claim, or by trying to hook their sympathy through a post like this.

Pretty absurd, but we deal with it.

1. I agree, hypocrisy is ridiculous - I workout 6 days a week, am deeply engrained in programming, and have females everywhere (in my industry and outside of it) constantly staring at me, or making comments about my "nice ass". Does it bother me? No. But that leads into my second point...

2. Gender roles and cultures are very different, I agree that there is a problem but it's hard to pin-point it because honestly, passive-aggressive geeks that aren't getting laid just embarrass me as a man when I see them try to interact with women and the women that are bitching and moaning about sexism are doing exactly that: bitching and moaning.

I don't have a solution for this, boys will be boys and girls will be girls - our industry has a history of being a place for the socially awkward and inept to collect. There is a correlation there even if not all members fit the stereotype.

[EDIT] I'm a dude btw

If the last paragraph of your comment is your attempt at "reversing the gender dynamics" I think you have it all backwards, reversing the wrong thing. You could write another essay in the OP's style about what it's like being a female in the "macho man" dominated nursing profession. Makes sense to me.

Not adding anything other than a data point here. My wife used to be a nurse for deafblind teenagers. She prefers male company so was friends with the few men there. I used to ask her about this topic, and while the men weren't being sexually harassed, there was more to it than the above.

The key things the men seemed to face was social exclusion (that is, women are engaged in "women talk" or women are socializing together outside of work and not including the men) and regulatory sexism (male attendees weren't allowed to bathe female residents or attend to any of their hygiene needs).

I thought this was pretty interesting because while it didn't seem like they had that bad a time, the social exclusion and the 'like sticking with like' aspects do ring true to what I've heard from women in the tech industry. That is.. even if the men aren't overtly harassing the women, there's an element of 'boys stick together and do boy things' which the women at my wife's workplace also fostered.

No judgments or anything here, just a datapoint! :)