[juridatenshi]

I was alluding to groups (in person or online) that are limited to only a specific minority audience, usually with the intent of creating a space where those people will feel safe to speak freely. For example, the Devchix mailing list is only open to women-identified people.

[tiredofcareer]

Not trolling, I'm genuinely asking:

Would you consider it sexist if someone started a developer list only for people that identify as male? Would you consider it racist if white people started a conference where only white people could attend?

I can't make the leap to consider female-only developer lists not sexist or exclusionary without setting aside hesitation regarding the concept since my brain wants to consider it a double standard. Even in the face of privilege, another concept I can't really wrap my head around, but which even daring to question or seek explanation of inflicts the wrath of people who hate my privilege. (Nothing has come easy to me in my white male life. Nothing. I hate when people tell me I'm privileged, as it makes me feel like life is pretty hopeless, given the painful career and personal life I've experienced thus far. My life should be easier if I am privileged, right?)

As a man, I'd look down on a male-only mailing list, just like I somewhat look down on female-only mailing lists. How about a mailing list for human beings? I just don't get it. Why do we have to identify so hard with what we are?

Maybe I have a different perspective on privilege because I'm fat and ugly, and only the attractive white men get it, or something. But seriously, if I have privilege, how do I take advantage of it? Is there something I have to do to make it happen? Because I'd sure like to see it since everybody tells me I have it.

(I genuinely loathe "oh, you're a white male, life must be easy for you," just as much as you surely hate people snubbing your gender. I wasn't born into money. I wasn't born attractive. I wasn't born in a great town. I have a felony conviction. This is my second career. I've had to claw my way to success just like everybody else.)

---

EDIT: Thanks for having a shot at this, men. I'm interested in OP's answer.

[theorique]

Would you consider it sexist if someone started a developer list only for people that identify as male? Would you consider it racist if white people started a conference where only white people could attend?

From the perspective of contemporary social justice theory, such things would indeed be considered sexist and/or racist because they are used to support privilege, whereas a women-only context or Black-only context would be used to deconstruct privilege.

(Some people consider this standpoint is completely insane, while others consider it a self-evident truth.)

[tiredofcareer]

You rephrased my comment's discussion of privilege and wrote it back to me. The parenthetical is what I'm asking about.

[theorique]

My personal answer would depend on whether I were talking candidly with my buddies at the bar, or taking a mandatory seminar in order to get rubber stamped for "diversity education" for my HR file.

[tiredofcareer]

I'm intrigued that you'd give a different answer for each scenario.

[theorique]

You need to know your audience, and know what they are prepared to hear. No sense in risking your career over a meaningless political point.

[isaacsanders]

Sexism, Racism, etc. are characterized by the systematic and societal nature to the discrimination. It would not be sexist to have a women only list, because they do not systematically discriminate against men in society. A men only list would be, because there is systematic discrimination against women, even if the members of the list were themselves not being discriminatory.

[newnewnew]

This is horseshit. When Asian parents tell their daughters not to date black guys, that is racist. It doesn't matter that Asians are 5% of the American population and not in a position of cultural power.

Marxists have been twisting the language to enhance their own power for too long.

[jackowayed]

The difference is that there is systematic injustice against women in our industry (and in society more broadly). One thing that can help fix this is by creating female spaces that help support women in the industry while being fre from overly-male culture that is the norm in our industry.

Here's a previous comment I've written in response to this question: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5340455

[tiredofcareer]

The portions of my comment where I discuss privilege are the clues that I already knew that; that doesn't really answer my question. Your linked comment sort of does, but not exactly.

I still don't see it. This sentence is going to sound like I'm marginalizing women, but I have no other way to phrase it, so I'll just be blunt: do women want to be treated equally or do women want to be treated specially? Based on the winds of the industry, I sort of expected the former and don't see the place of female-only mailing lists in the world of that.

[grannyg00se]

The "oh, you're a white male, life must be easy for you" statement is a generalization and it's almost always offensive to directly attribute a generalization to a specific person. Nobody should go to any particular person and say "you have/are this because you belong to this general demographic". That's ignorant and in most circles would be considered rude. I think you have all the right in the world to loathe that kind of comment.

But in the big picture, there are established privileges for the majority. Not everybody benefits all the time. But there are subtle benefits that often go unnoticed.

I'm not an expert, but from what I've seen minority groups usually want to be treated equally but aren't, given the current pervasive environment. So they create their own environments in the meantime. All the while trying to change the primary environment so that eventually the segregated environments won't be necessary. Personally I'd prefer no segregated environments for any minorities, because I fear they reinforce the idea of segregation ,amplify difference, and encourage resentment. But I understand how it might be nice to have somewhere to get away from the primary environment from time to time.

[tiredofcareer]

I guess I see "you're a man, and therefore likely to discriminate against and marginalize me and therefore I cannot have you on my mailing list" as pretty much the same thing as "you're a woman, and I can pay you less". The magnitude of the likelihood is just different, is what we're saying. Is that fairly accurate?

> Personally I'd prefer no segregated environments for any minorities, because I fear they reinforce the idea of segregation ,amplify difference, and encourage resentment.

This is exactly where I am coming from. To the T.

[grannyg00se]

"you're a man, and therefore likely to discriminate against and marginalize me and therefore I cannot have you on my mailing list"

I think you're still too focused on the individual level here. It's not meant as a personal rejection. It's more like "We are a minority and need a place to get away from all of that sometimes".

Try to think of it as getting away from the troubles and stress that come with being a minority in the environment, rather than a way to get away from specific people.

And that is why a male only hacker group (for example) wouldn't look good. There would be no minority environment to try to get away from. The group would be excluding females simply because they are females. In order to be less offensive, there must be some other reason for the exclusion. A mailing list that only allows men suffering from erectile dysfunction probably wouldn't raise too much scorn from anybody.

So for any minority-only group, the trick is to accept that there are legitimate difficulties inherent with being part of that minority. Sometimes it takes effort to see things that way, especially if you are supposed to be part of the majority and see no benefit from it.

[jackowayed]

I think that a lot of people hold very strongly the ethic "one should never treat someone differently based on their gender" extremely strongly even at the expense of other valuable ethics like "we should strive for a society where women are equal to men".

As a result, people frequently come to ask "how could a group that excludes men possibly be ok, especially as a solution to 'sexism'?" The answer is that ethics are not as simple as "X is always bad". Ethics conflict, and then you have to weigh which one it's better to relax in that situation.

Even if you don't agree in this case, I hope most people can acknowledge that a reasonable person who believes that gender should not dictate what one can and cannot do can weigh the pros and cons and determine that the harm of excluding men from certain spaces is outweighed by the good of giving women a safe space where they feel more comfortable speaking and connecting, which may have the power to help erode the gender inequality in our industry and society.

It's a case of competing ethics, both of which most people support, that reasonable people can come down on either side of.

[unimpressive]

I think that, and feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, women want to be treated specially until it is sustainable to treat them equally.

If that makes sense.

EDIT: But the phrasing of that dichotomy I think misses what is really being asked here. If you accept that these passive aggressive acts are a sort of negative reinforcement brought on by neglecting to think about women as people. Then the request would be to keep women in mind while you go about your activities.

[rmrfrmrf]

> Maybe I have a different perspective on privilege because I'm fat and ugly, and only the attractive white men get it, or something. But seriously, if I have privilege, how do I take advantage of it? Is there something I have to do to make it happen? Because I'd sure like to see it since everybody tells me I have it.

Playing "Oppression Olympics" is a common derailing tactic, just FYI. Your personal experiences don't change the difficulties that women face in tech.

[tiredofcareer]

Searching for a Geek Feminism Wiki term to apply to my argument, so you can minimize it and mock it once it's categorized in its little box? Your comment reminds me of those people -- and I've seen this in person -- that hit Wikipedia's "list of fallacies" looking for a fallacy to point out since they can't come up with a decent counterpoint on their own. Your comment history tells me all I need to know about my expectations of reasonable discourse with you. You might as well rename to GeekFeminismWikiSearchBot, but that username wouldn't fit on Hacker News.

"Oppression Olympics" wasn't remotely what I was doing, and if you took the time to read it carefully, you'd see that. Particularly and emphatically the portion that you took the time to quote. (Hint: "You say I have privilege and I don't see it" is not even on the same page of the map as "I go through more than you do". I was presenting a "maybe" scenario to explain away my not seeing privilege, not saying "good Lord the world hates me because I'm ugly, how dare you feel bad for having a vagina!")

[Anechoic]

Would you consider it sexist if someone started a developer list only for people that identify as male?

It really depends on the context. If the list was started just to encourage juvenile behavior, than yes. If it was started to address real issues that were specific to male developers (perhaps paternity leave/care issues), than no.

There are mens groups in a number of occupations where men are underrepresented (primary school and nursing being the most prominent).

[vacri]

The problem is one of what happens on existing lists. Devs who openly identify as female face more hostility (technical and otherwise) than those who identify as male or are not identified. The idea of a women's only list is to avoid that hostility and provide a place where they can talk tech without the negative inputs.

If the same thing were happening to men, then having an exclusive list would be appropriate there as well.

I'm also a white male and still earning nowhere near average wage despite hitting 40 recently, but I'm not blind to having less obstacles to overcome. The thing to remember is that social wealth is not a zero-sum game - we all gain when someone grows.

[tiredofcareer]

My female partner (I'm bisexual, before someone goes through my history and writes "but you said you're gay, liar!!!!" like the pedantic asshole I know that's reading this) read your comment and said:

"Women are the most hostile people I know in groups. That seems counterintuitive."

She said that, not me. I'd say it but the repercussions of doing so should be fairly obvious.

[vacri]

That you branded me a pedantic arsehole over some bullshit words you put in my mouth before you even finished commenting shows that you've got a major fucking chip on your shoulder and aren't worth listening to.

[tiredofcareer]

Sorry that it wasn't clear. I meant someone else from the collective 'you' reading it. I'll try to edit it appropriately.

(Better? Really, sorry, I tried to word that one right because I didn't mean it for you and had a feeling you'd take it that way. I didn't mean to offend you. The ambiguity of English sucks. Assume benefit of the doubt?)

[mkr-hn]

edit: Hi, sorry about this tree. Wildly off-topic and unproductive. Page down a bit until you find something interesting.

[tiredofcareer]

Name a community where that's a barrier to entry.

[mattraibert]

I appreciate this comment. You're taking a real risk in articulating your point of view on a very complicated issue. And it's helpful that your point of view is shared by many people in our community. I'm not going to explicitly address your question, but rather I'm going to try to explain what I think privilege means.

As a disclaimer, I'm a programmer, and neither a feminist thinker nor a writer. I'm writing this as an ally. I also have quite a bit of privilege myself. So forgive me (and call me out) if don't make sense or sound ignorant or condescending.

I think you're saying that when someone says, "you have male-privilege," you hear "life must be easy for you." Privilege doesn't mean that you don't also suffer from other forms oppression or discrimination, and it definitely doesn't mean that you have it easy. You mention that you are discriminated against because you are "fat and ugly." It sounds like you've suffered from very real oppression -- every bit as legitimate as the OP's story.

I feel that part of the misunderstanding comes from the difference between the common and jargon meanings. In this context, "privilege" is a jargon word coming from feminist and social justice philosophy.

In common speech, if I say someone is privileged, the implication is that this person is well-off in some way. I imagine a person with money and political influence -- someone who has benefited wildly from their privilege. But in the jargon, it refers to "a set of opportunities, benefits and advantages that some people get and others don’t." (definition quoted from the blog post linked below) Someone recently told me the story of a black stock-trader who noticed he was being passed up for job promotions. When he investigated, he found that his white colleagues were playing golf together -- and becoming friends -- at an all-white country club. The bosses were not intentionally promoting white employees, but, because of the racist policies of an unrelated institution, the white traders got the privilege to build these friendships with their superiors.

I found this blog post really helpful. It gives a very non-judgemental and helpful introduction to privilege: https://sindeloke.wordpress.com/2010/01/13/37/

Here's an excerpt:

"Having privilege isn’t something you can usually change, but that’s okay, because it’s not something you should be ashamed of, or feel bad about. Being told you have privilege, or that you’re privileged, isn’t an insult. It’s a reminder! The key to privilege isn’t worrying about having it, or trying to deny it, or apologize for it, or get rid of it. It’s just paying attention to it, and knowing what it means for you and the people around you. Having privilege is like having big feet. No one hates you for having big feet! They just want you to remember to be careful where you walk."

I hope this helps.