[eridius]

If you can't recognize that men have a vast amount of privilege compared to women, then I don't really know what to say.

Last year a man named Geordie Tait posted an article called "To My Someday Daughter"[1]. It's quite long, but definitely worth reading. The context is gaming, but the central thesis is sexism. One quote from the article that really opened my eyes to how radically different men and women view the world comes from section 7 of the article. It's a quote by Gavin de Becker, and it says

"Men and women live in different worlds. At core, men are afraid women will laugh at them, while at core, women are afraid men will kill them."

And according to my girlfriend, this is not even the slightest bit exaggerated.

[1]: http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/misc/22786_To_My_Someday_...

[pifflesnort]

> If you can't recognize that men have a vast amount of privilege compared to women, then I don't really know what to say.

The locally-defined concept of "male privilege" is quite possibly the least productive gender generalization to use in a conversation about gender equality.

This -- along with redefinitions of vocabulary to justify offense (see the comment about 'female' being offensive), and truisms that assert that any opposition to preferred policy is opposition to gender equality (see the reference to Lewis's law, or your own murder quote), are why these conversations are so pointlessly and ridiculously laden in rhetorical nonsense as to be useless.

> "Men and women live in different worlds. At core, men are afraid women will laugh at them, while at core, women are afraid men will kill them." And according to my girlfriend, this is not even the slightest bit exaggerated.

According to my wife, this is ridiculous and your girlfriend should adopt a more fact-based view of the world.

I looked it up. From 2000 to 2010, there were 128,971 male victims of murder in the US. There were 35,777 female victims.

http://projects.wsj.com/murderdata

To use your own rhetorical approach: if you disagree with me, "then I don't really know what to say". (sarcasm intended).

[jmj42]

> The locally-defined concept of "male privilege" is quite possibly the least productive gender generalization to use in a conversation about gender equality.

Well, let's clear it up then: "Male privilege refers to the social theory that men have unearned social, economic, and political advantages or rights that are granted to them solely on the basis of their sex, and which are usually denied to women."

It's actually a fairly useful generalization, and most understand what's implied by the use of the term. Of course the real problem isn't the use of rhetoric, it's the outright dismissal of the argument because rhetoric or faux outrage was used to make a point (or, as in my original comment, _real_ outrage).

I'm sorry to say, but we're past the time to be calm, cool, and collected. It's time to get angry, and it's time to put and end to gender inequality. Especially in tech, where we claim to hold ourselves to a higher moral standard.

[pifflesnort]

> Well, let's clear it up then: "Male privilege refers to the social theory that men have unearned social, economic, and political advantages or rights that are granted to them solely on the basis of their sex, and which are usually denied to women."

The useful part is "... which are usually denied to women". The rest is just divisive stereotyping.

> It's actually a fairly useful generalization, and most understand what's implied by the use of the term.

Useful how, exactly? Other than stoking the flames of online discourse, and writing off viewpoints by using "privilege" as a rhetorical bat, I don't see much that can be usefully garnered by pulling the trigger on that particular weapon.

> It's time to get angry, and it's time to put and end to gender inequality. Especially in tech, where we claim to hold ourselves to a higher moral standard.

As far as I can tell, you're getting angry at the wrong people, for the wrong reasons.

You really think the tech industry is responsible for clueless mouth breathers telling your daughters that technology is 'boy stuff'?

I'd look at the educational system and the magazine rack at the supermarket. By the time someone gets to the technology industry, they've already been subjected to a lifetime of indoctrination and have missed out on critical educational opportunities. We're not paid to be educators or social crusaders; we're here to write software, design hardware, and ship products.

We do need to have access to better candidates, and one way to do that is by broadening the pool to draw from, but divisive adults playing at identity politics won't help with that problem.

[jmj42]

>Useful how, exactly?

As a two word phrase which everyone understands to mean the social theory that men have unearned social, economic, and political advantages or rights that are granted to them solely on the basis of their sex, and which are usually denied to women.

> As far as I can tell, you're getting angry at the wrong people, for the wrong reasons.

>You really think the tech industry is responsible for clueless mouth breathers telling your daughters that technology is 'boy stuff'?

Directly no, but by saying it's not our job to deal with the problem, you're just as culpable. So long as there are people in this industry, or any other, who refuse to address gender issues because it's not our job, or there's nothing I can do about it, then those are the people I should be getting angry at. By refusing to acknowledge the problem and addressing it directly, we allow the problem to continue.

As an industry that embrases diversity (gender; racial; social) but suffers from a lack of it, regardless of blame, it's on us to stand up to society and find solutions. We should be social crusaders. By being a members of the society in which the problem exists, it _is_ our responsibility to work to correct it.

My job is not "to write software, design hardware, and ship products," from the moment my daughters were born my job is educator, and social advocate. Shipping products: That's just what I do to pay the bills. Don't get me wrong, I love what I do for a living. I still get excited about new toys (we have new equipment showing up next week), cool projects, being involved in cutting-edge research, but at the end of the day, it's all meaningless. None of it compares to the glow in my daughters eyes two years ago when she opened the Mindtorms kit she got for christmas, or the excitement _she_ has when she pulls out the erector set with some grand new idea.

So, yeah, _my_ job is to educate and crusade.

[pifflesnort]

> As a two word phrase which everyone understands to mean the social theory that men have unearned social, economic, and political advantages or rights that are granted to them solely on the basis of their sex, and which are usually denied to women.

How do you think people react to hearing that what they perceive (often rightfully) as hard-earned success was, in your eyes, unearned?

It's not a productive line of discussion.

> So, yeah, _my_ job is to educate and crusade.

Using divisive and emotional rhetoric just makes people stop listening.

I'd be interested in sponsoring, hosting, or otherwise contributing to non-gendered youth programs that were welcoming to girls and boys.

I don't even know where to start, but I do know that the Ada Initiative's divisive identity politics and concern-trolling aren't something I agree with, and disagreement with their organization doesn't make me a "male privileged" moral bankrupt individual.

[jmj42]

> How do you think people react to hearing that what they perceive (often rightfully) as hard-earned success was, in your eyes, unearned?

Ahh, but that's the guts of male privilege isn't it. Their hard-earned success was much easier to come by than a women whose achieved the same level of success. That's what privilege means. It was easier for man to gain that success than their women counterpart. Perhaps not so rhetorical after all. It just stings. Sometimes the truth does that. And sometimes, the only way to break through the denial of an issue is to take a hard stance.

This _is_ an emotional issue. It's people's lives we're talking about. As young women, it's emotional for my daughters. As a father, it's emotional for me. As developers who want to "expand the talent pool", it's emotional for the industry. As people who wish to be blind to gender, it's emotional for society.

> I'd be interested in sponsoring, hosting, or otherwise contributing to non-gendered youth programs

That's great. I'm involved in several myself, including the STEM outreach program at our schools. That doesn't mean that programs targeted at young girls aren't necessary. These "gendered" programs are as much about counter-acting the social pressure the keeps them out of STEM as they are about introducing and developing interest in STEM generally.

Now, I don't know anything about the Ada Initiative, so I'll leave that alone, but will say this, as I said before, ignoring the problem may not make you morally bankrupt, but it does make you complicit in others bankruptcy.

[cosmez]

Gender problems depends a lot on where are you living.

That's not the case where i live in, why? because we do not care about such things, treat woman and man the same way. unlike the old american racism, in modern countries there are no laws that discriminate girls.. why should we teach our daughters to fight for something that's not a problem?

Education is all we need, why should they hide their code? they should be proud of it

[eridius]

Where do you live? I have an extremely hard time believing that there is no gender inequality where you live. Far more likely is simply that you're blind to the inequality, having grown up immersed in male privilege.

[cosmez]

Mexico, it looks like you're taking this too personal, keep calm and happy coding :)

[johnbm]

Like most things the Ada Initiative does, this makes no sense once you scratch past the surface.

Even if women risk more criticism as newbies, the risk still exists for everyone, and solving it for part of the group only is discrimination.

If Github really cared about intimidation, they would offer a free private repo to new users as a promo, or perhaps have a $1/month micro plan. Instead they accept a small minority of users for free who wouldn't have paid anyway and score good will PR points.

And if the Ada Initiative cared about making women a part of the community, then they would recognize that those women will want to collaborate in private with men too, who should be given the same opportunity to experiment in private.

Modern feminists are the biggest sexists around, they keep acting like women can't compete with men on equal ground, even in a place as anonymous as the internet.

Have you ever noticed how the people complaining the loudest about online abuse are always the ones with the biggest pictures of themselves on their blogs? Featuring their lovely blue hair, tattoos, piercings, shot in their Pinterest-approved bedrooms? It's princesses all over again, and most women can see through the bullshit too.