[rbanffy]

Don't get me wrong (the comment was really rude and insensitive) but I'd like to explore this social context for a second. How would, say, a jockey react to a remark such as "you are too tall to be a jockey". Being tall is usually considered a desirable trait, yet, I can easily imagine a jockey would be upset with such a comment. I know the context is much more complicated when attractiveness of women becomes the topic mostly because of our civilization's poor history of gender inequality, but it would be interesting to explore the borders of this space of offensive social assumptions. I have, myself, heard I'm "too white to be Brazilian" and that left me somewhat confused.

[thaumaturgy]

Just ... just, stop. Please. There is absolutely no way that armchair analysis of gender stereotypes in an industry is going to be an insightful discussion, because it's a discussion that really shouldn't even be happening.

You know what I never hear when I go climbing? "Wow, those girls don't look like climbers." I'm helping on the periphery of a project right now to open a small co-op bouldering gym in my town, there's a "core" group of people making it happen, we got together to figure out the building layout and wall design, and half the people there were women. The person negotiating the lease for the commercial space is a woman. Not once have I overheard even a single mention of gender there.

You know what I never hear when I play Ultimate? "Wow, she runs fast for a girl." Again, nobody cares. People show up, they play, they hang out together, they go home.

One of the strongest people doing go (weiqi / badul) lessons online right now is a woman, Haylee. Not a single, "oh, she doesn't look like a go player". Instead, nothing but piles and piles of enthusiasm for every one of her videos. She's becoming a niche celebrity.

The outlier is the software industry. It's full of people that feel they have some kind of special insight into the anthropological origins of gender relations in a technical context, or some such bullshit. This entire thing should be a non-issue. I can't believe an ad for some company is getting this much attention just because one of the ads featured a young woman. It's stupid.

Damn I wish tech would just get over itself and start treating eachother like fellow people.

[pen2l]

> The outlier is the software industry.

You are very badly informed if you think it's just the software industry. I had a brief time at a place with mostly mechanical engineering work and the group of 40'ish people (100% men) were the most misogynistic men I have ever met in my life. Sexism in tech pales in comparison to the daily comments that flew in that office. I am very sure there is much worse sexism going on in other industries besides tech -- why tech gets pretty much all the attention, I'm not sure.

> It's full of people that feel they have some kind of special insight into the anthropological origins of gender relations in a technical context, or some such bullshit.

Actually, the friends I've made in the tech industry are some of the smartest. I actually do happen to think that for some reason system administrators are usually very smart folks (but that's just my observations).

> This entire thing should be a non-issue. I can't believe an ad for some company is getting this much attention just because one of the ads featured a young woman. It's stupid.

It is a non-issue. It's just a few nutcases on Facebook who made those comments. The bigger problem is the opportunistic attempt to make a story out of this. It's an easy sell, so the players involved are really taking it to town.

[thaumaturgy]

> You are very badly informed if you think it's just the software industry.

You're right. There was a lot of the same during my stint in electronics QA too. I probably should have said "tech industry" instead, although that's a bit broad and vague. Automotive repair shops tend to have a bit of a problem too.

> Actually, the friends I've made in the tech industry are some of the smartest.

I won't disagree there, but "smart" doesn't really correlate with "depth of knowledge". So, no, they don't really have a special insight, because they lack domain knowledge in fields outside their expertise. It seems to be a problem in tech specifically that, because someone is really good at understanding systems in one particular context, they start to believe that makes them as knowledgeable as the professionals in other contexts.

HN and Reddit both in particular exhibit that sort of behavior a lot.

(I realize the irony in saying that I've got some kind of special insight into the behavior of people on HN and Reddit... I'm stupidly becoming a data point in my own argument.)

> It's just a few nutcases on Facebook

I wish.

[rbanffy]

Is is stupid and that's why I wanted to explore the broader demeaning stereotype issue. By looking at the broader issue, we have the chance to avoid some of our triggers that the gender stereotype in tech sensitizes and have an actual discussion that gives us insights into the specific issues we need to solve, because, stupid as they are, they are real.

[erroneousfunk]

"You're too white to be a Brazilian" and "you're too tall to be a jockey," while in poor taste to say, do have explanations behind them. Brazilians are usually descended from black African slaves, native South Americans, Southern Europeans, etc. Many people forget about German and other East/North European ancestries. Jockeys are usually very small, so the horse can carry less weight and run faster.

"You're too attractive to be an engineer" makes no sense at all. It baffles me that you'd try to compare the statements.