[mcphilip]

Anecdotal evidence: I started off in nursing school with an intent to get a master's before ultimately finishing with CS. The nursing school I went to was well respected and made great efforts to make male students feel 'normal' in the female dominated area. They didn't aggressively recruit males at that point, but we were seen as valuable and worth including.

I'd like to think that females could have a similar experience in CS degrees at some point.

[paulwithap]

I absolutely agree with you. Obviously, no one should ever feel like they aren't welcome in a field because of their gender. I just don't see the point of making giant, obsessive efforts to push a group of people into a field and then patting ourselves on the back when our plan works, and we don't feel so guilty anymore.

[vacri]

The problem is that when nursing does things to make males feel welcome, female constituents pretty much all go "okay, cool". When software engineering does things to make females feel welcome, half the male constituents bleat endlessly about how unfair it is. Much of the noise made is this declaration of victimhood, and it's generally this noise that makes molehill efforts into 'giant obsessive' mountain issues.