Uber Manager Told Female Engineer That 'Sexism is Systemic in Tech' (theguardian.com) 272
Sam Levin, writing for The Guardian: Uber is facing yet another discrimination scandal after a manager who was recruiting a female engineer defended the company by saying "sexism is systemic in tech." On 14 March, an engineering manager at Uber tried to recruit Kamilah Taylor, a senior software engineer at another Silicon Valley company, for a developer position at the San Francisco ride-hailing startup, which is struggling to recover from a major sexual harassment controversy. Taylor, who provided copies of her LinkedIn messages with the Guardian, responded by saying: "In light of Uber's questionable business practices and sexism, I have no interest in joining." Taylor was stunned by the reply she received from Uber. The manager, who is a woman, wrote: "I understand your concern. I just want to say that sexism is systemic in tech and other industries. I've met some of the most inspiring people here."
Hmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
That sounds like the recruiter is agreeing/commiserating with her. Nothing to see here?
Re:Hmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hmmm... (Score:4, Insightful)
did not sound like she was justifying it, just making a (sadly) honest statement.
True. But the problem is that she didn't rebuke what's happened; she just said "Deal with it."
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I just want to say that sexism is systemic in tech and other industries. I've met some of the most inspiring people here."
In other words: "Deal with it"
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Eh, more like
In other words: "You aren't going to find anything better, everyone else is just as bad. There's some good people here."
But at this point we're really sticking words in her mouth.
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yeah, "Deal with it".
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In other words: "You aren't going to find anything better, everyone else is just as bad.
But she didn't say that. She never said it was "just as bad" everywhere/anywhere else, she just said it is common in tech.
Anyway, I think sexism is common in the tech industry only in the vacuous sense that it is common in all industries. I have seen zero evidence that tech companies are more sexist than construction companies, manufacturing companies, law firms, etc.
Re: Hmmm... (Score:2)
Re: Hmmm... (Score:2)
Re:Hmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
IMHO, at that point, the woman has turned down the job offer herself, so the job application is over. So what the HR manager says after that is irrelevant to discrimination claim.
Now maybe that's not the IDEAL statement to make or stance to project, but it's not job discrimination.
There are laws against ACTUAL job discrimination, not laws against statements which don't maximally promote the official ideology.
Companies which fall in latter category are highly likely to also violate the actual law, but such cases must be proven on their own merits by victims with actual standing re: specific law.
That said, don't use Uber, folks. For many other reasons as well.
The obvious (Score:2)
The woman was not an "applicant"... She was actively RECRUITED by Uber thru LinkedIn.
Doesn't that fact actually discount a large portion of the current claims of sexism?
Re: The obvious (Score:3)
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The woman was not an "applicant"... She was actively RECRUITED by Uber thru LinkedIn.
Doesn't that fact actually discount a large portion of the current claims of sexism?
Only if both things were mutually exclusive. They are not. Welcome to logic 101.
Re:Hmmm... (Score:4, Insightful)
It's just one more "Raising Awareness Moment" rammed into the eyeballs of the reader. Or a attempt to threaten a lawsuit and then settle.
There hasn't been a Friday night fight for a while (Score:2)
Yes, this story is odd... almost if the "scandal" is ginned-up so as to generate Yet Another Story Of Workplace Sexism And Why Something MUST BE DONE NOW (And BTW, Trump Grabs Pussies). It's just one more "Raising Awareness Moment" rammed into the eyeballs of the reader. Or a attempt to threaten a lawsuit and then settle.
There hasn't been a Friday night fight for a while - it looks like it's back.
There used to be an article every week to inspire angry virgins to go around screaming SJW!!!!
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The issue is location Sexism in tech is far prevalent in the West then in the East. The problem is all the big name tech companies are based in the West, while the normal established boring tech companies are in the East. However working tech in the east you see a higher percentage of female working tech. In my departments the ratio is 50/50 male to female (granted it is higher than normal), and the higher level positions in my department are male. In the East coast there is sexism in tech, but it isn't
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I think it may be due to most of the tech jobs centered around long time established companies with older employees, who are married and have children, and are less invested in looking at the opposite sex as something relieve their primal instincts.
This does not agree with what I've seen. I've been to training classes and to conferences in addition to my own workplace, and the vast majority of men in tech are married, and they act like thirteen year old boys fictionally bragging about fictional exploits and talking about various women and what they would like to do to or with them in their own fantasy worlds. They do not generally do this in front of women, but they do it plenty when women aren't around, and it's much worse in the conference setting
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It's notable because people on Slashdot keep saying that there is me sexism in tech and that complaints about Uber might be fake.
Sadly this is the stage of the debate we are at.
Re: Hmmm... (Score:2)
As a broad description, the manager is probably right, but not every tech-oriented company mistreats women. Sexism need not, and should not, be endemic in the high tech industry or any high tech company.
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The manager, who is a woman, wrote: "I understand your concern. I just want to say that sexism is systemic in tech and other industries. I've met some of the most inspiring people here."
Re: Hmmm... (Score:2)
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pretty soon they will stop even reading the title. thats gonna be fun.
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The titles are usually clickbait, and you know more about the subject before you read it.
If you subconsciously believed 2% of it, now you've polluted your input stream!
Never read the title. Never.
The HR Manager, who like 76% of HRMs is female (Score:5, Funny)
The HR Manager, who like 76% of HRMs in the US is female, said "sexism is systemic".
You got that right.
Re:The HR Manager, who like 76% of HRMs is female (Score:5, Funny)
Please stop (Score:5, Insightful)
Why? (Score:4, Funny)
Please stop putting a "sexism in tech" story on the front page. three times a week.
Why? Are you a snowflake? Were you triggered? Do you need a safe space where you don't have to see any articles that are offensive to you?
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I'm really enjoying watching Uber's culture getting its well-earned raking. That alone is worth every article.
As to sexism, there's plenty of new things to say, but each discussion is hijacked by the same 2 or 3 arguments taking place.
But more seriously, every social movement and major event gets its own sea of scrutiny and discussion and ties in to current events. This is tech's sexism moment, and we're in the middle of an unresolved problem. We already did mobile, iPods, Web 2.0, Microsoft vs Linux, Java
Because you say so? (Score:4, Interesting)
0.70c on the dollar has been debunked over and over again. Discrimination in the workplace has been illegal since I was a kid in the 70s. This includes discrimination against women. Currently 64% of all Doctorates, 61% of all Masters degrees, 58% of all Bachelors, and 57% of all Associated degrees go to women. Women are more likely to get hired for a job when put against a man with the same credentials, and even higher when you compare ethnicity. A Hispanic/Black woman will be hired 80% of the time over a Hispanic/Black male. Women have more scholarships, higher rate of approvals for education grants, and higher rate of student loans. Non Whites have the same advantages. The only people getting "screwed" by the system currently are white males. The rest is a fabrication based on repeated propaganda (lies).
Do a web search for stats yourself, I'm tired of providing citations. People with agenda will deny they exist regardless, and if you are curious they are easy enough to find.
Sadly, this has made it a place where people no longer believe real issues. When everything is an "ism", nothing is an "ism".
The country is not going to be competitive in the future because identity politics is isolating people into fact averse gangs, each using their own type of thuggery to get "theirs".
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must be why them and the "SJW" kind get along. get rid of anything i dont like or ill cry.
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... To too many women, sexism just means "anything I don't like".
I don't like being groped.
I don't like people assuming credit for my work.
I don't like having pornography shoved in my face.
I don't like the automatic assumption that I'm not an engineer.
You have a problem with that?
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When the promotions or layoffs happen everyone cares.
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Discrimination in the workplace has been illegal since I was a kid in the 70s. This includes discrimination against women.
Oh I see, it's illegal so it doesn't ever happen. That's why I also never see anyone going over the speed limit. True story.
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Discrimination in the workplace has been illegal since I was a kid in the 70s. This includes discrimination against women.
Oh I see, it's illegal so it doesn't ever happen. That's why I also never see anyone going over the speed limit. True story.
What a moronic statement. What It means that there should be plenty of court cases proving that discrimination exists if it was true. You see, those cases with guilty verdicts would be something we call facts. Facts are used to form valid opinions, and of course debate a position. The more fact you have, the better your opinion and the better one can debate their position.
In the case of people speeding, we do have these things called facts. Millions upon millions of tickets are on record proving that s
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You need to get out more if you think that. Her screed on how fucked American Capitalism was compared with Russian Nobility was not prophetic it was about looking back at the dreams of a lost past. It was about how little jailbait Digby was born into the right class to fuck a "great man" and end up ruling over the serfs by right of bloodline.
Anything that compares 1950s Hollywood to Communism (the dig at 20th Century Fox) is something should be considere
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You didn't read the book either. Don't attempt to critique me on things I never wrote. There is no character Digby in "Atlas Shrugged." Yes, I know Fountainhead too, but it was an earlier work not as fully developed.
How do I know you didn't read it? Because you are not even near the mark on my comment regarding a delusional person claiming reality is false and their fantasy is real. It's about 1200 pages, and I highly recommend it. I have read Heinlein too, but he's was not a Philosopher.
Typo - Dagby not Digby (Score:2)
Having read a bit about them he was a thousand times the philosopher of "bring in the Russian nobility to replace Capitalism" Rand. She was living in a system many times better than the one she wanted, and railing against it. You guys should read a bit of European history to immunise yourself against vile shit like Rand.
So say the 9/11 was faked fruitcake (Score:2)
You still appear to be full of shit you are just better at making it look credible via a bit of misdirection into areas outside of IT.
If you are so scared of a woman taking your job then maybe you should get better at doing it instead of wasting time trying to put them down.
Re:Because you say so? (Score:5, Insightful)
And men are under representing in nursing and child care.. so what? People are going to choose career paths that interest them. Not being 50/50 is not evidence of a problem.
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Except usually Men in nursing and child care are welcomed openly in the work place, at least in the city I live in. It's not the same in the tech industry... hence the complaints.
More bullshit (Score:3, Informative)
Nearly 80% of the field is women. Men report being ridiculed by both patients and their female coworkers. Since women practice hypergamy men are not seen as much more than dating toys by most women in the field. Citations can easily be found. [google.com]
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The women who choose software engineering as a career path are consistently saying that it's a problem.
Can you cite any evidence that more women engineers file gender discrimination or sexual harassment complaints than the average for other professions?
Anecdote: In my company, we have had several sexual harassment complaints about our shipping dept and our sales dept, but zero about any of our engineers.
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I actually was accused of sexual harassment in my workplace decades ago. My professional and social encouragement to a new female engineer who didn't speak English as a native language was misinterpreted by a manager who was sensitive to harassment issues. It took direct testimony by several other junior engineers in other work groups with whom I collaborated to clear the charge, which had been encouraged by that manager directly to the new employee. It took roughly a decade to re-establish a good relations
Prove it! (Score:3, Insightful)
Women _CHOOSING_ not to obtain a degree in Software is the problem. That is not sexism, that is a fact with statistics to back the fact. Women are getting far more degrees than men, but are choosing degrees in Psychology, Medical Doctors, Law, Political Science, Journalism, and other fields not related to Software.
Prove to us that you are correct, show me the College discrimination that keeps women away from STEM. I searched, there is no such thing as institutional sexism in College prohibiting women fro
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Why do women choose not to do tech degrees any more? Those courses used to be more popular in the 70s and 80s. The must be a reason.
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"Any more" is a complete misnomer. When people claim the "good ole days" they neglect the fact that most women were busy at home raising families. The majority could not afford to work, or could not afford to work full time. Single and wealthy women worked full time, not usually women with families.
The State was not the primary path for raising kids in the 70s and early 80s, parents were. Due to both social pressure to put women into the workplace and another fine program pushing self happiness as the n
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So, when somebody points out that more women used to get more tech degrees than do now, your response is that it is because in the good ole days women were at home raising families.
That is so fucking stupid, man. So fucking stupid.
You probably don't even realize it. You'll even say things that stupid as long as it seems to shade or obscure your emasculated overcompensating sexism.
Did it ever occur to you that being at home raising families might have actually gotten in the way of having tech careers, and th
BS (Score:4, Insightful)
Your second and third sentences have no basis in reality. There was a massive push to social welfare programs to assist women with College in the later 80s and 90s. This includes assistance with child care so that Single Moms (a massively grown demographic) could go to College and not worry about their kids. Hence the disparity we have today which has 61% of all College students being women. You can't be so delusional that you believe moving women up to 61% of all college students is the result of a year, or even a few years. Then again, it seems like you really can be that delusional.
Re: Prove it! (Score:2)
Or maybe back then, there was almost no expectation that software devs would spend 60+ hours a week at work, so people who (quite reasonably) want to care for children or parents could do that after working hours.
What social supports do you think were withdrawn since the 70s or 80s?
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Why do women choose not to do tech degrees any more? Those courses used to be more popular in the 70s and 80s. The must be a reason.
Because once the computer became personal computer (instead of a main frame), very socially awkward people (predominantly male) fell in love with them. The women would look around, see handful of class mates absolutely in love with these computer things and then felt out of place because they were not as passionate about computers/programming as these other guys. Since they felt out of place they left to a field where they could feel roughly as passionate about it as their peers.
Other men in the classes wou
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Also, there is a difference between "not being socially sensitive" and actually being an actively overbearing asshole. A lot of these guys are genuinely sexist at such a deep lever that they don't even see women as real humans. And that leads to actively dangerous and scary behavior.
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0.70c on the dollar has been debunked over and over again.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
The thing that struck home is a survey of STEM new grads, that shows a ~0.7 disparity as well. Seems like that's the most apples to apples comparison there could be, before things like family and work home balance start to factor in.
I guess she could be lying about all of her data though.
Interesting that she did note the observed effect of "devaluation" (as more women move into the field, both the wage discrepancy *AND* the wages decrease). Presumably this is similar to the effect of right-to-work law changes on union jobs strongholds, right? Which is not really that different than the H1b discussion.
I'm not trying justifying discrimination, but just observing that apparently the laws of economics don't give a rats ass about what basis discrimination occurs. Discrimination will help some
Fair point and observation (Score:2)
Asian males are penalized on the ACT and SAT for their race.
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Please stop putting a "sexism in tech" story on the front page.
It's a major problem in technology that really needs to be addressed if this country is going to be competitive in the future. It's unfortunate that it's so inflammatory, but it needs to be addressed.
I think the manager was agreeing with you, so I don't really see the story here.
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Correct. It needs to be addressed. And putting it on the front page of tech sites keeps it from getting pushed to the side like it has been for far too long.
That HR manager was trying to persuade the engineer that she wasn't going to find a compan
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Correct. It needs to be addressed. And putting it on the front page of tech sites keeps it from getting pushed to the side like it has been for far too long.
Or putting it front and center on tech sites might cause women who would otherwise be interested in going into tech fields to avoid them, because they don't want to go into a field where they think they will be discriminated against, thus leading to fewer women in such fields, thus leading to more accusations of sexism in those fields, and so on the circle goes. If I was a cynic (well, more of a cynic), I might even think that all these "tech is sexist!" stories are deliberately intended to keep women away
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you know if you dont like your job, and you plan on leaving for "bullying" you can go and punch the dude in the face that is "bullying" you and it will no longer be a problem, and it would alleviate all mental duress.
Re: Please stop (Score:2)
You got the nail on the head. One of the strongest contributors to the success of a company is aggressive competition. However, it's hard to keep that competition from leaking over to competition within the company, and that internal competition often manifests as arrogance and mistreatment of others. Sometimes that is explicitly group-oriented -- sexism, racism, or other -isms -- and sometimes it is just prima donnas being jerks to the rest of the team.
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The "problem" is that women, on average, aren't as interested in tech as men.
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Please stop putting a "sexism in tech" story on the front page.
It's a major problem in technology that really needs to be addressed if this country is going to be competitive in the future.
I would like to point out that sexism in Southeast Asia is significantly higher than in the US. Sexism has nothing to do with why jobs are being outsourced.
It's unfortunate that it's so inflammatory, but it needs to be addressed.
I believe it's become inflammatory because men keep being told that it's their fault when another man is sexist. I do not tolerate sexist behavior and being told it's my fault is very frustrating because the reality is that it's an HR and management failure.
Re: Please stop (Score:3)
It's our fault because the Patriarchy is a hive mind that all men are connected to from birth.
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The standard you walk past, is the standard you accept.
Almost always but not always.
As for getting blamed for what others do when you were not even there, sucks, but you should have got used to that way back in school when your entire class was blamed for something one kid did.
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It's a major problem in technology that really needs to be addressed if this country is going to be competitive in the future. It's unfortunate that it's so inflammatory, but it needs to be addressed.
Somehow I doubt it's particularly bad in the US tech industry compared to other countries, maybe there's more lawsuits but that's the American way. Anyway I think there's two quite different forms of sexism:
1. The belief that one sex is much better at something than the other by nature of their sex.
2. Inappropriate sexual comments/jokes/propositions that belong in locker rooms or on Tinder.
I'm pretty sure the first one is mostly dead and buried in the western world, at least I've never met anyone that has h
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If you were a sysadmin and saw the shit people say in IRC while at work, you might have a different perspective! People say that shit even when they know all their network traffic is logged, imagine what they say to her when she's cornered in the break room with nobody else there!
If only programmers were a bunch of laughing happy buddha bros, if only!
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I'm pretty sure the first one is mostly dead and buried in the western world, at least I've never met anyone that has hinted to a natural order where doctors, engineers and mechanics are men and nurses, secretaries and hairdressers are women
Clearly you've never met my uncle.
The second kind, well IT tends to attract people who are short on social antennas. Not that they're particularly wanted, but they don't get work in "people jobs" but as long as they can operate a computer they can do a tech job. That oft
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That's only true because barbering is men's work according to those types.
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It's a major problem in technology
Can you cite any evidence that sexism is worse in technology than in other industries?
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Can you cite any evidence that sexism is worse in technology than in other industries?
Why? OP never claimed that it is worse, just that it is a serious problem.
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everything is different when viewed through their rose colored glasses. i wouldn't get yourself too worked up about it. you or i will not change their minds.
Smart people (Score:2)
Working outside their area of expertise.
Say what you like but as a manager or supervisory type, HR better be your friend, or you will be hammered in court. And fired.
The dumb was/is strong in these Uber managers. Makes me want to buy another car just to say no to Uber.
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Working outside their area of expertise.
Say what you like but as a manager or supervisory type, HR better be your friend, or you will be hammered in court. And fired.
The dumb was/is strong in these Uber managers. Makes me want to buy another car just to say no to Uber.
HR is never your friend. Never.
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HR's job is to protect the company from the employee. If that makes HR the friend of the employee depends somewhat on the amount of loyalty the employee has. If the employee and the employer are friends, and even teammates, then HR surely is the employees friend and teammate.
Not that that describes most of the workplaces I've seen, but there is no law of physics preventing it.
Uber issue, not a tech issue (Score:5, Interesting)
I've been in IT for nearly 25 years and I've always worked shoulder to shoulder with women and men alike. Uber has an HR and a culture issue. This isn't a widespread tech industry issue.
Re:Uber issue, not a tech issue (Score:5, Insightful)
Your anecdote isn't data. It's nice that you've worked for progressive companies and that you yourself are good about working with women, but it's absolutely a systemic issue. Story after story after story confirms it.
Rather, I think you and the companies you work for are outliers. Congratulations on that; I hope you keep your streak.
Re: Uber issue, not a tech issue (Score:3)
I've worked for just as many big companies as small mom and pop shops. Maybe it's just a north east / mid-atlantic thing, but this has never been an issue here. I'm sure there is anecdotal evidence to the contrary.
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Your anecdote isn't data. ... it's absolutely a systemic issue. anecdote after anecdote confirms it.
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I've been in IT for nearly 25 years and I've always worked shoulder to shoulder with women and men alike. Uber has an HR and a culture issue. This isn't a widespread tech industry issue.
WTF? Your anecdote if it's even true is well and truly out of the ordinary for the tech industry. You don't even need to look to the industry why, you can see why just be peeking into a university IT lecture.
Kudos to you and your workplace for having gender equality. But that is far from the norm.
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I've had more female bosses and supervisors than male. I've always had at least one female co-worker on my team. I think I'm up to ~20 years of IT experience now, and I started out as a contractor visiting a wide variety of sites before I started taking corporate cubical gigs.
The problems have been with socially awkward guys, not with misogyny or institutionalized sexism. And even those problems started waning in the early 2000s as employers had more and more potential employees to choose from and could
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Well im an electrician, ill say that atleast 99% of us are male. and we talk shit to eachother. the FEW good females that are in this career talk shit and can brush said shit talking off. the ones that dont make it. usually say sexism.
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As many others have said, your experience is not the norm. I have been doing IT since 1996. I have worked with one female sysadmin and two female DBAs. Other than that, most of the women in "IT" have all been in PM and other non-technical roles.
My current company employees ~5000 people. Our CEO and General Counsel are women, in addition to countless Managing Directors. We have equality programs up the wazoo, including for LGBT and every race except us "white" people. We are not a tech company per se,
Sexism is systematic in tech (Score:4, Insightful)
I've worked in technology for a few years. When I was a floor technician assembling stuff Sexism was less pervasive since there was more gender equality.
When I shifted to IT (network / system admin) it was 99% guys and was quite shocked how nerds could have such filthy mouths and that a lot of the guys had a bizzare nerd bravado I never experienced until entering IT.
More women need to be in hand on tech roles and stop going into sales, client relations, office administration, etc.... When entering the tech industry.
Until then nerd bravado Sexism will remain pervasive.
An easy temp gap fix would be to put these guys back into the sub basement where their conversations can't be overheard anymore. :)
What's wrong? (Score:4, Funny)
-Nigel Tufnel
What was wrong with the comments? (Score:2)
May as well join? (Score:2)
You may as well join our company -- sure it sucks, but you're not going to get better anywhere else.
Yeah, that's not an endorsement.
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I was going to write something similar. Just because it is unpleasant doesn't make it untrue.
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This is pretty much what I was thinking as well after reading TFA. Tried clicking around to see if maybe it just clipped it off in the summary, but that's all that was posted of the conversation.
Though I'm not entirely sure it would necessarily help Uber's image at this point, it would at least be nice to know the remainder of the message. If nothing else so I could know how angry I'm supposed to be.
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alt-wrong. thats hilarious. thank you.
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HAHAHA so youre saying clinton didnt get elected because of sexism now? you have to be fucking retarded. how many reason are you people going to come up with as to why she didnt win. SHE DIDNT WIN STOP CRYING. its been 6 fucking months!
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Such protestations as yours notwithstanding, the reasons why things happen do in fact matter.
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Important shit was happening in the world today.
So what are you doing whining on the internet about an article you don't like? Get out there and do something, or do your standards only apply to other people?
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True, that; once you've landed in a discrimination scandal, there is no way to bail yourself out.
Never discrimination scandal. Never.