[DoreenMichele]

I don't personally think it's necessarily important for there to be "as many women in STEM as men." But I do think those women who want to be there shouldn't be de facto run out by sexist practices.

I was a full-time wife and mom for a lot of years. I don't self identify as a feminist. But, post divorce, I've found that sexism has been a real issue in establishing an adequate income to support myself and my sons.

So I think society still has work to do. It's very problematic to deny people a means to support themselves and then act like their poverty is due to laziness or the like. That kind of "fuck you" has been known to foment bloody revolution.

[qaq]

Do you think a stay home dad with equal employment gap would have an easier time rejoining a workforce ?

[DoreenMichele]

I have no idea. But I'm willing to guess he faces lower odds of being asked for a date by senior personnel in the better-paid department he would like to work in, thereby de facto closing doors in my face.

[qaq]

I am not trying to argue sexism/bias does not exist but from my experience any gaps in employment are a flag used to filter out candidates so in this particular scenario that might be the main problem to overcome.

[bitL]

That's super disgusting if that happened to you :( Maybe at some point we need to stop interacting in person completely and instead use gender-less avatars with their own voices so that we can bypass both sexual harassment as well as trying to land better positions by our own physical attractiveness.

[bobwaycott]

I do--speaking as a single-dad who spent a few years working as a consultant and would never work more than 6 months out of the year (I always took time off during school breaks, summers, etc.). When I've applied for jobs over the years, I've never once been asked to explain those gaps. Of course, they were rarely longer than 6 months ... but there were quite a few of them. I've never even had the impression an employer has ever looked at those employment gaps before.

Hell, when I started my career--as a single father--I had no experience beyond what I'd done learning how to program on my own ... and I still had relatively few questions asked beyond me proving in an interview that I knew what I was talking about.

[qaq]

6 month gap when working as consultant is hardly comparable to say 6 year gap.

[bobwaycott]

Yep. I specifically called out that the gaps were quite short.

[dgzl]

If you're comfortable, could you describe some of your experiences facing sexism? Did you experience this after you released information that you're a divorced parent?

[DoreenMichele]

I have a Certificate in GIS. I worked at a Fortune 500 company for over 5 years in a Pink Collar Ghetto department. I wanted a job in the IT department, where jobs generally paid better.

In all the years I worked there, I met only one person who knew what GIS was without me having to explain it. He was a senior programmer in the department I wanted a job in.

He asked me for a date, thereby making it vastly less likely that I would be able to work there (in his department).

I'm sure he stopped to think about whether or not it would tank his career to date me. No, it wouldn't.

I'm equally sure he didn't bother to wonder how the question would impact my future at the company.

(I'm sure he also never wondered what my educational background might do for the company. I imagine he would have wondered if I could do something for his department if he hadn't been thinking of me as a sex object.)

I also appear to be the only woman to have ever spent time on the leader board of HN. Over the course of nine+ years, I've established exactly one useful contact through HN.

I've been endlessly mocked for thinking I could use HN to network and put up with endless crap that I don't really want to get into.

A piece of my writing hit the front page in January. It got more than 60k page views.

This did not result in a single tip or new Patreon supporter.

Instead, someone wrote me around the same time about a two month old comment where I talked about being suicidal over the sexism I face on HN. He offered to do a fundraiser for me out of sympathy.

I wrote back and said I would rather be taken seriously for my work and pointed him to the piece with 60k+ page views. He didn't reply to that.

I am routinely treated like a charity case, not like someone with something of value to offer that's worth money.

I'm on day six of a fast that is partly rooted in waiting for a deposit I expected Friday and still don't have and partly rooted in my inability to figure out how to turn my skills into money because I have the wrong bits between my legs to get taken seriously and paid for my work.

[throwaway770210]

I too have been discriminated against due to my gender.

One of the first jobs I took (in IT) was for a large regional airline. After I had worked there for about a year, a position opened up that would have amounted to a promotion, both in pay and position. I had both the experience for the position, as well as a good reputation in the company. Further, my supervisor (with whom I had a good relationship) was in charge of the hiring effort, so I figured I had a pretty good in. Ultimately I was passed over for the position because my supervisor was a socially awkward man who used his position in the company to hire attractive women in hopes that they might one day sleep with him. He ended up hiring an (attractive) woman that worked nearby in accounting. She had no IT experience. I left because of this, and he hired two additional (unqualified) women this way before he got a little too touchy-feely and ended up fired.

I'm a man, in case you're wondering.

About ten years later I was working for a large healthcare provider. A position opened up for a senior software engineer and most of the software engineers in my department applied for it. Ultimately the head of IT ended up hiring an (attractive) data scientist from a different department, who had no experience in project management or software engineering. Everyone thought it was super weird until it came to light that he had hired her because she was his mistress and he was looking for a way to spend more time with her without arousing suspicion. He was also fired.

More years later, I put in a very competitive bid for some programming work with a company whom I had previously done contract programming work and had a good relationship with. Ultimately they selected someone else for the contract. Since I knew the owners, I contacted them directly to ask if there were anything I could have done to improve my bid. They explained to me that because they were a minority owned business (women) and were both of under-represented orientations (they were both lesbians) that they needed to select a contractor that reflected that, so they paid nearly twice as much to a small startup whom they had heard was also owned by lesbians. The project failed and they ended up paying almost three times as my bid.

Nobody I mentioned ended up ruined. The first two moved on to other jobs. The company that paid three times as much? Still around. They all paid a penalty for their bad decisions, though. Some people never do. Some people are just awful and life rewards them for it. It's not fair, but all you can really do is move on, try again, and do your best not to get bitter about the cards you've been dealt. I hope things get better for you.

[aeredhel]

You weren't particularly discriminated against due to your gender but rather fell a victim of both incompetence and immaturity.

Whether actual gender discrimination is also incompetence and/or immaturity is up to discussion. But it seems to still be acceptable in some places in the US. I hope Western Europe is doing better, but I don't know.

[repolfx]

How does that work?

I don't think asking job candidates out on dates is especially smart or professional, but the comments here seem backwards.

If a man asks a woman out on a date, that means he DOES want to spend more time with her ... like at work. Even if the woman were to say no, he might still want to give her the job, just because he likes her. This is discrimination to the woman's advantage should she choose to take it.

If a man refuses to hire another man because he'd rather hire a woman so he can try to date her, that means he does NOT want to spend time with that man. This is to the man's disadvantage.

There is clear discrimination in both these stories, against the men and in favour of the women. DoreenMichele may have felt she couldn't work with a man who asked her out on a date, but plenty of people do manage it. And of course men can ask women out on dates without perceiving them as "sex objects", that's itself a kind of bizarre assumption or even insult to men. Men and women date successfully all the time without objectification coming into it.

[vminkov]

Doreen, what jobs do men with similar to your skills get? What skills do you work on to improve your chances? Do you believe you have expressed well enough to the requiter your willingness to contribute and help move the organization further?

On a side note, I come from a place where we had communism and as a consequence women in science are marginally a majority (the country is Bulgaria). The vast majority (80%) of the IT reqruiters here are female and despite of that they still target, interview and hire 90% of the times male candidates. I really wish I could tell if the cause is prejudice or merit, but I can't.

[educationdata]

I think you are wrong to claim current business practice as "sexist". Ideally, it would be nice for single parenting be as easy as traditional family, but in reality, nobody is entitled to easy life.

Traditionally, people can also help each other through big family, church and other local communities. The new generation does not want to be involved in any of these. Now they want the government and their employers to bear more responsibility to support their personal life.

[jhanschoo]

What evidence do you have that current business practice that parent comment is facing and calling "sexist" is not sexist? Parent comment does not elaborate on the sexism she faces. You should be comfortable saying this only if you know that every aspect of current business practice is not sexist.

[educationdata]

What evidence do you have that current business practice that parent comment is facing and calling "sexist" is not sexist?

~ Do you have any evidence showing single dads get better treatment than single moms?

[jhanschoo]

> evidence showing single dads get better treatment than single moms?

This is not the question that needs to be shown; while parent comment is indeed a single mom, she cited sexism as the obstacle. This is not necessarily due to her particular circumstance as a single mom but may refer to discrimination that all women face.

Sexism is easier to show, due to the intense research on it. Not knowing a priori her experience, every year research comes out of some think tank about gendered discrimination in the workplace; a google search should return results.

[bobwaycott]

Single dad here. Not just some guy who isn't married and had kids. I've had custody for the better part of the last 15 years.

During my time as a single dad, I began my career in in programming. I started working for others. I now work for myself. In that time ...

- Zero female superiors have asked me on a date.

- Zero female coworkers have asked me on a date.

- Zero female coworkers have commented on or complimented my appearance--I'm no Brad Pitt, mind you, but I also don't look like someone took a hatchet to a picket fence. The closest I've gotten to a female commenting on my appearance is someone saying she thought I looked a little like Mark Wahlberg.

- Zero comments have ever been made when I've shown up late due to something kid-related (like school being delayed and dropping them off at school 2 hours later than normal).

- Zero comments have ever been made when I leave earlier than everyone else for something kid-related (like picking them up from school).

- Zero comments have ever been made when I've missed entire days due to something kid-related (like a kid being sick, or a school holiday (which I've always taken as work-from-home days so I could be with them)).

- Zero comments have ever been made when I've taken a break mid-day to attend a school function. I do the function, come back asap, and get back to work without a hiccup.

- I've never been asked if or how kids (or being a single parent) might impact my work.

- I demand a higher salary explicitly because I have kids to support, want to provide them a good life, and I have never had that questioned.

- I have never once been asked to compromise when I say I cannot do something because it conflicts with my parenting, my kids' activities, or something I've planned to do with them. When I say I have something to do with my kids, that ends the conversation, because I do not have a partner who can do these things and they know this.

- I have never once had a client question if my kids will get in the way of 6-figure contracts.

- I have never once had a client complain or ask me to compromise when I decline to do something or cannot get to something because it interferes with my kids or parenting.

- I've never been denied a raise when I've asked for it, despite the fact that I openly do not compromise my time with my kids.

- I have never been denied a promotion when I've sought after them, despite the fact that I openly do not compromise my time with my kids.

I could continue to dig deeper if you'd like.

[bobwaycott]

> Traditionally, people can also help each other through big family, church and other local communities. The new generation does not want to be involved in any of these. Now they want the government and their employers to bear more responsibility to support their personal life.

This comment reeks of being an outsider who does not have the slightest clue what being a single parent is like.

Your notions of these "traditional" means of people helping each other are anchored in a past that does not strongly exist in many areas today.

- Big family => what if you don't have one of those? what if family is far away?

- Church => what if you're not religious? what if (gasp!) church isn't terribly fond of single parents--especially single mothers--and treat them in a way that denigrates their humanity because they happen to be unwed parents?

- Local communities => like what? single parent groups? homeless shelters? something else? Most of these kinds of communities offer emotional or social support in some degree--say, people you can talk to about the struggles of being a single parent--but they cannot help you put food on the table, provide clothing and shelter, or buy diapers. That's what having a job is for! Single parents don't want to wind up in a homeless shelter because they cannot afford to support their children.

I don't know what this new generation is in your eyes, but having been and known an awful lot of single parents over the last 15 years, I've never seen any of them want the government or their employers to bear responsibility to support their personal life. What they want is a fair shake at the job market, to be treated like everyone else, to have a bit of flexibility when their kids need it, and to never have their kids brought up as a liability in their employment lives. I've never seen a single parent believe they're entitled to an easy life. I've seen a lot of single parents struggle with navigating society and job markets that seem to want to ignore the reality of single parenthood.

Every single mother I've known has been hit on, asked on dates, had overt sexual advances made toward them physically and verbally--hey, she's a single mom, so you know she puts out, right?--had comments made toward them about their kids, experience a complete lack of flexibility when it comes to pay and schedule ... and a host of other things that directly contradict my own experience for 15 years as a single father. I think it's pretty fair to call out the inherent sexism in the general job market--and even in tech specifically. It's pretty ridiculous.