[tgamba]

I see a lot of comments by privileged straight males on here. As usual, you just don't get it; you have not spent one second trying to put yourself in another's shoes.

I am a gay man who has been in the internet industry since 1996. From my long experience, about 50% of coders are macho, taciturn, unhelpful frat bros who make anyone who is not a member of their boys club most unwelcome.

My career (and surely the career of the article writer and anyone else who is not a bro) came as a result of the other 50%, talented, generous men and women whose shared their expertise and encouraged me. I certainly did not pull myself up by my own bootstraps; without that assistance I would not be where I am today, which is team lead.

So for those who "abhor" the argument laid out in this article, for once, for just once, SHUT UP, LISTEN to what is being said, and consider how it you might be a carrier of the "racist, sexist and classist" attitudes being called out.

[menacingly]

Do you mean "SHUT UP, LISTEN, then come to the expected conclusion"?

Expressing thought on the subject doesn't mean one hasn't listened, so it seems like the only way to pass this test.

[allhailkatt]

Seconded.

If you're just looking at "work hard", you're not seeing other people need to work harder, and overcome a terrifying amount of uncertainty, to get to the same place.

[nanodano]

> My career (and surely the career of the article writer and anyone else who is not a bro) came as a result of the other 50%, talented, generous men and women whose shared their expertise and encouraged me.

I guess the difference is that some people don't need the encouragement of others in order to succeed. Many great programmers are self taught and self motivated. How has being gay made it harder to learn to program? Did people tell you gays weren't allowed? Did they tell you to quit because gays aren't good at coding? Did they ask you, "Wait, you're a programmer, and you're GAY!?" Did other programmers make fun of you for being gay? Was the encouragement you got specifically about being gay? Is it because you are gay that you needed the extra encouragement? Just trying to understand...

[allhailkatt]

Bullshit. At some point, someone encouraged you to succeed.

Maybe it was when you grew up and were encouraged by any given authority figure to do something, maybe it was finding common ground talking about your wife instead of your husband, maybe it was when you didn't need to wonder whether you were turned down for skill or skin color, maybe it was when you knew someone was interested in you not your tits, but you were encouraged.

Personally, I'm going to encourage you to actually listen to other people's perspectives instead of challenging them to justify their life experiences.

[nanodano]

> maybe it was finding common ground talking about your wife instead of your husband, maybe it was when you didn't need to wonder whether you were turned down for skill or skin color

And maybe I am a self-taught gay Puerto Rican who disagrees that gay people need special encouragement in order to succeed.

[allhailkatt]

Fair enough, mu apologies for getting all Reddit-y.

I'm in the camp that at some point, everyone needs help. The unfortunate fact is, a lot of people aren't going to get the same amount of help, or even help at the right time, and they're going to fail as a result. Worse, they're not going to realize they could have done better.

When we're talking about continuing to try, and being positive and always working towards a solution, part of the conversation should ideally be that getting to that place involves something different for different people. Fair?

[megkadams]

I think you are magical and great.

[crimsonalucard]

>From my long experience, about 50% of coders are macho, taciturn, unhelpful frat bros who make anyone who is not a member of their boys club most unwelcome.

I think this is partly because your gay. A lot of gay people have a sort of lisp and effeminate manner that advertises their sexuality and many straight men can notice this. It's not that the straight men are trying to discriminate, but their is a certain level of subconscious discomfort that will make it much harder (not impossible) for you to be one of the boys.

Of course not all men are like this, and it's possible for men who are like this to get over it. Please keep in mind though, I doubt that there's a deliberate action to exclude you... It's similar to how an 80 year old man is excluded from hanging out with teenage high school girls. It's not deliberate, you just don't fit in by your nature.

[menacingly]

I'm going to assume that this post is coming from a place of social ineptitude and not malice, but just about everything you've said is insensitive, over-generalizing, frowned-upon, and kind of just untrue.

Honestly, I'm perhaps one of the least "progressive" people in this community, and I think it's pretty uninformed to think your comment is going to be helpful or describes an OK way to behave.

[kazinator]

> everything you've said is insensitive, over-generalizing, frowned-upon, and kind of just untrue.

To be somewhat fair, the grandparent posting makes it clear that its comments apply to 50%.

[crimsonalucard]

I'm fully aware that it's frowned upon. There is definitely no malice intended. Perhaps there is a bit of social ineptitude, but this is the internet.

Let's put it this way. What I said is a generalization, and I framed it as a generalization. In no way did I say it applies to all people. But generalizations illustrate fuzzy truths that are as the adjective aptly states: general.

The parent poster also said something very general. He said that, and I quote: "50% of coders are macho, taciturn, unhelpful frat bros who make anyone who is not a member of their boys club most unwelcome."

There are two ways I could interpret what he said. I could say what the typical millennial would say when he/she encounters anything slightly sexist/racist and tell him that just about everything he said is insensitive, over-generalizing, frowned-upon, and kind of just untrue.

Or I can see things from his perspective and realize that although he is stereotyping, he is definitely illustrating a generality that is a fuzzy aspect of the truth. As a straight male myself perhaps I can say something to help him see things from a straight males' perspective. Of course I would be giving him another generality but a fuzzy truth is still a type of truth.

I want to change what it means to be progressive. The reality of this world is that things are rarely ever fair, but the meaning of "progressive" has become twisted in recent decades. Progressive has come to mean not only treating all people equally, but to state that all races, sexes and people are equal in mental and physical ability. This is not true. European people are taller, asians are shorter... what black magic enforces the attribute that while physical qualities may be extremely different for all peoples, intelligence remains identical across racial boundaries?

This is not a pretty picture but to say that all are equal is to deny reality. Can we be progressive without denying reality?

Take the following stereotype, for example: Men are generally physically stronger then women and thus better suited for jobs that require more physical strength.

I've literally met "progressive" people who deny this reality. This is borderline insanity in the name of progressiveness. We've gone too far.

I support progressiveness, I support equality in judgement and treatment, but I cannot deny and I cannot unsee the reality of the unbalanced universe we live in.

I want to mention that I have had one instance in my life, being a straight male where I have become bros with a gay male. From my perspective we were just bros, his perspective was different. But that is besides the point. I just want to say that I am in a good position to sympathize with both the stereotypical "macho straight male" and the gay male, so it is of my opinion that it would be highly unwise for the parent poster to dismiss what I say too quickly.

[menacingly]

Your initial post made me worry that someone with perhaps an empathy disorder was about to see a small mob gathering outside their home.

I wish you had expanded originally, because I totally agree that GP made a similarly unfair generalization.

In fact, I often wonder why it's constantly reiterated that I could never ever understand the experiences of an "out" group, but those groups regularly purport to understand mine.

[crimsonalucard]

>I wish you had expanded originally, because I totally agree that GP made a similarly unfair generalization.

I don't think you fully understood what I'm saying. I don't believe the GP's generalization was unfair. I believe he made a very accurate generalization. I believe his generalization is just about as accurate as my generalization. I'm just explaining the reasoning behind what he is observing and letting him know that it is not the result of intentional discrimination.

[menacingly]

I felt as a I typed it that "unfair" wasn't the word I was looking for, but that's about all the investment I made in it. Something like "rounding error taken in aggregate", but your wording clarifies well.

Honestly, I don't bump into the 90s sitcom gay guy much, so that strikes me as inaccurate first, but I also don't have much experience with these infamous bros to know how wrong that is either.

Now I'm wondering if my inability to see these bros makes me likely to be one, like a trout thinking "what fish, dude? all I see are my friends"

[ralusek]

But, that user's post was saying that their experience WAS negatively affected simply by virtue of being gay. Your comment doesn't do anything other than affirm their interpretation regarding how they were treated and why they were treated that way.

[crimsonalucard]

Yes it does. What of it?

[supreme_sublime]

I honestly wondered if you were a poe. I was laughing until I realized you are being serious.

Since 1996 programming has been about 50% frat bros? Really? The quintessential "nerd" job? I couldn't disagree with you more. While I haven't been in the industry that long, how I got into programming was through online forums, where I found incredibly helpful and nice people who didn't know anything about me. Even when they did find out I was pretty young (13ish), they didn't treat me much differently. While I didn't usually get explicit encouragement, I did get help, for no other reason than I wanted to learn and showed that by asking as little as possible to be able to get by.

That's a beautiful thing about the internet, the anonymity allows anyone to be anything and to cut through other people's (potential) biases.

I'll be honest, I have had a good life. I have good parents and friends. I'm immensely grateful for them giving me as good of a start as one could ask for. However, as I said in another post, I was swimming against the stream. My parents thought I was wasting my time, my friends would (and still do) poke fun at me for being a "nerd". So yes, I was lucky that I was born into a stable home with parents who cared about me. It wasn't "all me", I had strangers help me learn, I happened to stumble across the right communities. We all stand on the shoulders of giants.

What do you do with the hand you were given? Do you think "Oh well, all is lost, I was born black and gay. I can only do something with my life if people encourage me"? Utterly ridiculous, a toxic and disgusting worldview. The soft bigotry of low expectations. You cannot control anyone other than yourself. There are plenty of genuinely unfortunate/discriminated against people, the question becomes, how do you respond? Do you give up? Or do you persevere?

[jjeaff]

So, your argument is that you are also a white male, like most other brogrammers, but you understand discrimination because you were treated nice while being anonymous online?

[supreme_sublime]

My argument is that programmers have never cared who you are. Only that you wanted to learn. That you are encouraging people to doubt the limits of their own potential and their reception into programming by making it out to be some horrible occupation that only bigots and homophobes go into.

Why would women want to join such a horrible and sexist place if that's their impression? Especially since it isn't the reality. I've come across a few assholes, but they were assholes to everyone. If you have a chip on your shoulder constantly to think "Someone may not like me because I'm x" you're handicapping yourself. Instead seek out the good people, who are the vast majority. Stop with the identity politics and who is the most discriminated or offended and get to coding.

[jjeaff]

>My argument is that programmers have never cared who you are.

I think the chorus of opinions from female regular programmers all the way to the highest echelons of the tech hierarchy (a la Marissa Mayer) expressing their concern that tech is a 'boy's club' and that the environment is not accepting of diversity is a pretty clear sign that something is up.

Telling people to stop their whining and get to work is easy to say when you have not been on the receiving end of discrimination.

[supreme_sublime]

Ah yes, Marissa Mayer, a woman who became the CEO of a company. So oppressed by the "boys club".

https://medium.com/@marlene.jaeckel/the-empress-has-no-cloth...

She definitely agrees with you.

Women who actually code and are revered in their community like Sandi Metz definitely are outspoken about it.

Women I work with definitely seem to feel disrespected and let down by me.

To act as if people who are activists and speak about these things don't have an agenda, is ridiculous. It is a well paying, cushy job that is becoming more prestigious. Of course it burns activists that other women won't do what they want them to do. Why isn't there a movement to get more women working on oil rigs? That's a pretty male dominated field as well that has a pretty similar salary to programming.

I'm perfectly fine with more women being in programming, I think that's an opinion most men in the industry share. I just don't feel I have an obligation to treat them any differently to anyone else. If someone wants to learn, I'm happy to teach.