[hagios]

There is a LOT of blatant sexism in the tech sector. The more specialized you get, the worse things get. It's a pretty well documented problem (e.g. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2012/08/sexual_harassm... for a collection of security related anecdotes). This kind of culture turns away lots of tremendously talented people, and those who choose to endure a culture which seems to be slanted against them generally either end up targets or else silent lurkers.

It's absolutely accurate to call the general reaction 'denial.' People who complain who are on the receiving end of the harassment are 'overly sensitive' and those who aren't who speak up against the status quo are 'apologists' and 'white knights.' It's difficult to address a mindset which a majority of a community is complicit in at best, or active defenders of at worst.

[protomyth]

"It's a pretty well documented problem (e.g. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2012/08/sexual_harassm.... for a collection of security related anecdotes"

At this point, I'd say it was the opposite of well documented and that's a problem. We do not have the statistics on this since it is not being reported to law enforcement or another body that collects these statistics. Does tech have more incidents than lawyers, plumbers, or actors? Don't know and I wish I did. I believe that it is a problem, but I cannot point to finding or study.

[belorn]

Thank god, someone that gets it.

We are technologist. Many of us are academics. If someone writes or talks about how a compiler is slow, the community will demand more than anecdotes. We expect numbers, tested theories, and verified results. When people come to us with anecdotes, we often use "less than nice" ways to disregard what they say. hmm, I see parallels...

There looks to be a number of excellent evidence to prove that there is a gender equality issue in IT, but there is no scientific research on what the causes are. Is it the general culture in the world and IT has the same level as other industries? Is it because of the question/answer culture of engineers, which is an aspect currently being researched in regard to gender equality. Is it a lack of respect for women in the IT field?

I can think of plentiful number of ways to test those concept, work that anthropology might want to do if we asked them. We could also pay them to do it. Maybe that could be someones kickstarter project?

I have a strong conviction that if someone would bring scientific data on the issue on what the causes are and how to fix them, in a verifiable way, few would object. Can a strong worded policy document have an statistic proven effect in discourage sexism in a conference? If you think so, verify it with data. Get 10 conference to do it, and collect data from it and 10 other without any such document. If its verifyable, every conference should adapt one after that. Do you think negative IRC comments is the problem? Switch a number of projects to a moderated communication channel and test the concept. Compare a unmoderated IRC with a project page like stackoverflow. Bring data, do some science, show it to the community. Its the exact same thing we expect from anyone else when they want to do changes to the things the community care about.