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- cross-posted to:
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Almost one in five men in IT explain why fewer females work in the profession by arguing that “women are naturally less well suited to tech roles than men.”
Feel free to check the calendar. No, we have not set the DeLorean for 1985. It is still 2023, yet anyone familiar with the industry over the last 30 years may feel a sense of déjà vu when reading the findings of a report by The Fawcett Society charity and telecoms biz Virgin Media O2.
The survey of nearly 1,500 workers in tech, those who have just left the industry, and women qualified in sciences, technology, or math, also found that a “tech bro” work culture of sexism forced more than 40 percent of women in the sector to think about leaving their role at least once a week.
Additionally, the study found 72 percent of women in tech have experienced at least one form of sexism at work. This includes being paid less than male colleagues (22 percent) and having their skills and abilities questioned (20 percent). Almost a third of women in tech highlighted a gender bias in recruitment, and 14 percent said they were made to feel uncomfortable because of their gender during the application process.
In my ten years in the SWE industry I have never met anyone who thought or said that women were not capable, the fuck is this shit?? I have multiple women as part of my dev team and they are equally respected
One in five is mind blowing to me, who are these pathetic fucking bigots? I have no doubt there are many because people suck but in every job I’ve had I worked with women devs. Maybe it’s because I’m in the PNW
So, this may be part of the answer, but I’ve had similar experiences to you, except for one startup where just about everyone was like that. Place was basically a frat house - its office was right on the water (which was awesome) and they literally had a bunch of binoculars for oggling women paddleboarding and shit (which was not awesome)
It might be that most of us don’t experience this behavior because it’s condensed into companies that encourage this behavior? I’m no sociologist, but that seems to jive with what I know about echo chambers and whatnot
I think you might be right. I was at a conference one time where there was a super creepy presenter that made a whole bunch of “brogrammer” jokes. He was not asked to return and lots of people walked out of his talk.
Yeah I wouldn’t be surprised if people like that find companies with similar cultures and just all stay there so they can be shitty together
That’s partly it; the PNW does seem more open minded most times; but I bet the other part is you’re a guy.
This isn’t the sort of thing women tend to talk about with men, for obvious reasons. I bet those women on your dev team have some stories, if you could get them to open up about it.
My experience with it as a male is there’s cultural factors at certain workplaces which is why it’s such a sensitive topic for the employer. Like I work with a lot of engineers first or 2nd generation immigrants, incredibly diverse workplace, and a lot of times it’s cultural practices from “back home” where there were more strict traditional gender roles. A lot of them are self-aware of this and realize it’s programming, it’s not always some malicious thing, it can come out of the ways to show courtesy to women which in translation can be condescending. They’ve made it clear from leadership they don’t put up with repeated behavior that makes people uncomfortable though, people have been let go for it. What happens is the more subtle stuff you might not notice unless someone is open about it.