[bethling]

I've been called a bitch to my face during architectural debates. I've had responses to my technical comments come back as "whatever, sudo make me a sandwich". Been asked while doing interviews, "Oh wait you're not HR?" I've gone to many presentations contain sexist images, etc. Throughout my career I've been constantly had to deal with implications that I don't belong - and that my opinions can be dismissed..

Yet, somehow I manage to keep the perspective that technology isn't populated by sexist assholes - sure the ones that are there stand out and make up a lot of the things that come to mind when I'm stressed. But really it's a small percentage [even though that small percentage can really get to you].

Try to keep the same perspective about women, the vast majority of us aren't "bitches".

[youngnerd112]

Trust me I try....but being a nerd and a racial minority it is hard to keep a straight mind when nine out of ten women look the other way when you try to approach them to start a conversation.

I dont think you have been in a situation where "Can I buy you a drink" is replied with a "you're ugly ...go away".

[adrianpike]

I don't know you, so I can only make assumptions and extrapolations from what you've revealed here, but it sounds to me like you're crossing up "let's have a conversation" and "let me buy you a drink so we can go play some horizontal mambo." Now it's totally possible that you just want to chat, but "can I buy you a drink" is often interpreted as the latter.

As lots of us on HN trend towards the geekier side of life, social cues sometimes don't come as naturally to us as they do to many others - it takes time and effort to not be socially awkward, but it's 100% worth it.

The next time something like that happens, try reviewing exactly what happened, how things might have been misinterpreted, and how you can learn & grow from it.

Also keep in mind that there are lots of people who _are_ jerks, but gender has nothing to do with it.

Most importantly, don't let it bias you, and keep your chin up!

[youngnerd1121]

Thanks for the kind words man!...My situation is actually not as hopeless as I am leading people to believe here.

The point I was trying to make was that a bunch of negative experiences with women when you are young leaves very deep scars and these scars manifest themselves as unconscious biases so much that whenever you see a beautiful woman (who will most probably reject you if you tried!) you are automatically biased against her.My brain does this to me so often even though I think I am logical than most other people.

Now I will make another point that is also controversial.(someone needs to say these things!)

See when you grow your skills interacting with women a point comes when the things you cant change matter much more than the things you can, so much that the situation seems pretty helpless.

So at that point even if I bought really expensive clothes and bought myself a mercedes or say became a really smooth talker, how women respond to me would only marginally improve as compared to the non-possible changes such as changing my race to become white...changing my height to become six feet tall etc.

So no matter what I do a six feet tall white guy or a good looking muscular black guy will always have significantly higher odds of attracting a given woman over me.

The more you approach the limit the more you begin to see this brutal truth of the dating world.The things that matter most are things you are born with and this sometimes causes you develop significantly negative feelings towards women as a whole.

[mattgreenrocks]

> The things that matter most are things you are born with and this sometimes causes you develop significantly negative feelings towards women as a whole.

Wrong. You're suffering from confirmation bias.

Guys obsess about money and looks to prove their worth to females, but most of that shit doesn't matter, actually. (It's held against you if you're severely deficient, of course.)

What does? A strong sense of self-identity, confidence, the ability to be both a risk-taker and a stable provider, and, more generally, being an interesting person. These are much harder to work on, so you don't hear as much talk about them. You need to be able to enjoy your life without a girlfriend. You need to have something you love to talk about, and, preferably something you can be good at.

Suck up your pride, ask for help, and start working toward taking responsibility for more of your life.

[miritum]

I find it sad that the dating world has come up in this discussion. While I understand where the points came from, I don't believe that anyone's perception of anyone else as a potential sexual/romantic partner has a place in a discussion about the working world. Whether or not women are attracted to a particular person, to a particular programmer, or to the stereotype of a "programmer", has no bearing on their ability to program.

[roguecoder]

Nope, but I bet she's be in a situation where men expected her to drop everything to make herself sexually available for a stranger.

Everyone wants to be seen as desirable, but it is not an entire gender's fault that the specific women you've approached don't respond to your advances. It may seem counter-intuitive, but the best way I've found to get dates is to treat women like interesting people instead of potential dates, while putting effort into making myself conventionally attractive (working out, getting regular hair cuts, careful grooming, conversational techniques). It's a lot of work, but it's been more effective than deciding the problem is women. Women talk to each other: the friend you make today has a bunch of friends she can set you up with tomorrow. I mean, if the problem is "all women" you might as well give up.

Plus, in the meantime I've met a bunch of interesting people and had interesting conversations I'd otherwise have missed out on because I was only considering women as potential romantic partners. It is possible to have fulfilling intellectual, emotional and social relationships that have nothing to do with sex. If you do care exclusively about sex, I recommend escorts or online hookups.

[youngnerd112]

Although I fully agree with what the advice you are giving me.....I think you are wrongly viewing my motivations being primarily sexual...and the point is that most women do it too!

[roguecoder]

So, about 20% of college-aged women and 20% of college-aged men enjoy casual sex based on superficial characteristics. They tend to populate bars. Because you mentioned offering to buy women a drink I had, perhaps unfairly, assumed that was your target market.

If you are interested in relationships, those 20% are unlikely to provide them. I think online dating is a much better choice: I know several friends, including married friends, who met on OkCupid.

The problem I have observed is that nerds assume the problem is women. It's like if you're linking in a common library and it's failing to load: what's more likely, that there's a bug in the library that thousands of other people use or that you accidentally linked against the debug version? Someday I'll get around to writing my "How to Hack Dating: an iterative approach to acquiring relationships" book. Lean Startup principles apply surprisingly well.

[Tichy]

While saying such things is really ugly (I don't want to defend such women), maybe it could help you a little to think about the asymmetry in dating. Attractive women get approached all the time, a feeling most men probably can't begin to appreciate. If you are a programmer, compare it to the emails from recruiters you get all the time... There are certainly lots of such emails that I have taken to delete without reply now.

[youngnerd112]

yes...but when you get a lot of rejections from recruiters dont you console yourself by saying/fantasizing that one day when you are truly successful you will ignore all recruiters and maybe get one or two out of a job...if you see all the threads on HN about recruiters people are easily biased against recruiters.

We are all human beings with weakly rational brains.Only thing wrong here is that it is not socially acceptable to be biased against women!

[wlievens]

He's not talking about rejections from recruiters... he's talking about getting too many crappy recruitment mails.

I get about 5 mails per week pimping some junior job to me that would probably pay 40% less than my current job. I don't reply to these emails because these people haven't done their homework.

The poster above you is saying that maybe that's how attractive women fail...