A Look at How Indian Women Have Persevered Through Several Obstacles To Contribute to the Open Source Community (factordaily.com) 274
A fascinating story of how Indian women have persevered through various roadblocks, including cultural, to actively contribute to the open source community. An excerpt from the story: As Vaishali Thakker, a 23-year old open source programmer looked over the hall filled with around 200 people, she didn't know how to react to what she had just heard. Thakker was one of the five women on the stage at PyCon India 2017, a conference on the use of the Python programming language, in New Delhi. The topic of the discussion was "Women in open source." As the women started discussing the open source projects they had been working on, the challenges and so on, someone from the audience got up and drew the attention of the gathering to the wi-fi hotspots in the hall. They were named "Shut the fk up" and "Feminism sucks." "It was right on our faces," remembers Thakker. For their part, the organisers were upset and even warned the audience. But the event had no code of conduct for anyone to really penalise or expel the culprits.
"It's disheartening when you're talking about the problem, someone is actually giving a proof that it (gender bias) indeed is a problem. In a way, I found it funny, because how stupid can you be to give the proof that the problem actually exists," says Thakker. And how. It's just been three years in her coding career but she is familiar with the high wall that gender stereotyping puts up in the world of software scripting. More so in her chosen field of coding. Thakker is among a small -- but fast-growing -- set of women coders from India shaping the future of several open source platforms globally including the Linux kernel, the core software program behind the world's biggest eponymous open source software.
"It's disheartening when you're talking about the problem, someone is actually giving a proof that it (gender bias) indeed is a problem. In a way, I found it funny, because how stupid can you be to give the proof that the problem actually exists," says Thakker. And how. It's just been three years in her coding career but she is familiar with the high wall that gender stereotyping puts up in the world of software scripting. More so in her chosen field of coding. Thakker is among a small -- but fast-growing -- set of women coders from India shaping the future of several open source platforms globally including the Linux kernel, the core software program behind the world's biggest eponymous open source software.
Another /. flamebait to quickly harvest clicks (Score:2, Insightful)
This one's got everything: Indians, women, feminism, Python, gender quotas. Oh boy am I sure looking forward to all the constructive discussions that will take place here!
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While this place is full of Asperger neck beards who haven't a clue why women run away from them, you do have a point.
Indian Women have overcome a lot! (Score:5, Insightful)
Sexism so prevalent that they had to outlaw revealing the gender of a baby before birth to avoid termination of female babies
Women getting burned alive, splashed with acid or murdered outright because their dowries were not big enough
Rape at the drop of the hat, many times gang rapes
Lower healthcare standards
Etc.
And they overcame all of this and achieved the ultimate goal...contributing to the Open Source Movement.
LOL!
Re:Indian Women have overcome a lot! (Score:4, Funny)
Contributing to Open Source is Gods work.
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Needs more Trump and a dash of Bitcoins and you have the perfect /. article.
Very mature... (Score:3)
Do all open source developers have the maturity of two year-olds? It would appear so from the wifi hijinks at the conference.
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Perhaps you should be more tender to your wife?
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Why does this story make you feel shame? They just complained about it happening, which is perfectly reasonable and clearly not intended to shame the entire community... Yet you feel it's shaming.
It's it an attempt to silence the complaints by misrepresenting them? Or perhaps you want to trick people into thinking they are being attacked in order to enjoy a collective defence.
Re:Very mature... (Score:4, Insightful)
No, this "stuff" bothers me because these are supposed to be professionals at this conference.
Act like a professional, and show some tact.
Re: Very mature... (Score:5)
I have my doubts about this.
I find it hard to believe that a room filled with techies, people that are typically glued to their wireless devices (phones, tablets, laptops), just never noticed the conference WiFi SSID were those insulting phrases... Are we to believe they all just clicked to join a WiFi network called "Shut the f$ck up" and thought nothing of it?
No.
The more likely explanation is that someone in the room set their WiFi device to an ad hoc mode and set their SSID to the offensive term. I find it hard to believe someone cracked into their WiFi APs, reset the SSIDs, and no one noticed it until one guy stood up and pointed it out in the middle of the talk.
Re: Very mature... (Score:4, Insightful)
Does TFA imply that it was the official hotspots? The impression I get from the summary suggests it was ad-hoc networks, as you suggest.
It's really sad how some guys feel so threatened by women wanting to write software. And I do mean sad, both for the women affected and for the guys who clearly have some pretty deep issues of their own.
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It's really sad how some guys feel so threatened by women wanting to write software
Except it's not that people are threatened by women wanting to write software. They are threatened by activists trying to shoehorn "equality of outcome", often using forced affirmative action type policies that completely go counter to the merit based systems we have.
If women want to write software, they are welcomed to do so.
If they want to talk about how OSS is unfriendly to them wanting to impose Codes of Conduct and forced equality of outcome on dev rosters, they are free to do so. But we're also free
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Are you really suggesting that the people who created these wifi networks are just worried about the Code of Conduct that didn't exist (it says so right in the summary)?
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Are you really suggesting that the people who created these wifi networks are just worried about the Code of Conduct that didn't exist (it says so right in the summary)?
Are you really suggesting that the people who created these wifi networks were threatened by women contributing to open source ?
What a dumb question. I'm talking of the overall climate brought by "activists" in the general of OSS software, just as you were with your "Threatened" comment.
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This climate is mostly just people like you complaining about it.
This story is a great example. Genuine complaint, no one tried to blame all men or the open source community or anyone other than the specific perpetrators and the organisers for not tackling it.
Yet here you are, trying to make it about you and complaining about some straw misandrist. It's literally just in your head.
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This climate is mostly just people like you complaining about it.
Funny, I was going to say this climate is mostly just people like you amplifying non-events into massive drama.
This story is a great example. Genuine complaint, no one tried to blame all men or the open source community or anyone other than the specific perpetrators and the organisers for not tackling it.
This story is a great example. Something as benign and innucuous as people setting a SSID on their phones made the "news". Something that would have safely ended with just ignoring it otherwise.
Yet here you are, trying to make it about you and complaining about some straw misandrist. It's literally just in your head.
Yet here you are, trying to make it about you and complaining about some straw misogynist. It's literally just in your head.
My god, it's like having a combative attitude helps no one.
Re: Very mature... (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, the person described in this article was born a woman in India, so her experience might be a little different than your "12 Years A Nerd" experience as a male in America.
Maybe I'm in the wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
But I really couldn't give two shits what's between someone's legs when reading their code. The only bit that really matters is how good the code is.
Re:Maybe I'm in the wrong (Score:5, Funny)
But I really couldn't give two shits what's between someone's legs when reading their code.
You'd care when reading my code. 10 minutes and you'll be thinking, "What a dick!"
All men vs. "some men" (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:All men vs. "some men" (Score:5, Insightful)
Where did you see the words 'all men' anywhere in the summary or article? You seem to be inventing a claim that was never made so you don't have to listen.
Re:All men vs. "some men" (Score:5, Insightful)
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My advice is to just ignore the people saying things like "all men", and just assume that when people say "men" they are just being a little careless or talking with previously established context. It's not always the case, but you would be surprised how often it is and you end up having an engaging, interesting debate rather than hung up on trolls and slightly poor choice of words.
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My advice is to just ignore the people saying things like "all men", and just assume that when people say "men" they are just being a little careless or talking with previously established context. It's not always the case, but you would be surprised how often it is and you end up having an engaging, interesting debate rather than hung up on trolls and slightly poor choice of words.
It's understandable, but it's not right and it needs to be challenged. My wife was recently at a conference, and around her table were only women. As they were talking, one of the other women commented that she accepted everyone... "except men... I hate men," she said. Nobody else at the table agreed with this woman, but nobody said anything or spoke up about it either. They just let it pass.
I say, don't get bent out of shape about it, but point it out.
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A good long awkward silence when someone says that sort of thing is pretty effective.
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Where did you see the words 'all men' anywhere in the summary or article? You seem to be inventing a claim that was never made so you don't have to listen.
Wait, why does he have to listen in the first place ? He doesn't have to listen, and he doesn't need a reason to not care or listen.
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The title should have been: "A Look at How One Group of Indian Women Have Persevered Through Several Obstacles To Contribute to the Open Source Community"
It's a small thing, and wouldn't have reduced the effect of the article, but the title as it is comes off as stereotyping and arrogant, as stereotyping often is.
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Shut up you cry baby.
That comment is neither helpful, nor appropriate for this discussion.
Re:All men vs. "some men" + and some women (Score:5, Interesting)
I recall being in a car (back in india) where the wife of my friend, who I had mostly respected, a staunch feminist, was in a discussion with my friend, her spouse. A short while into the discussion, see grabbed an apply my friend was eating and threw it out the window, "focus on me when I am talking" she said. I thought it was odd but hey, I will just shut up, nonetheless it stuck in my head. Few years later, they did end up having a divorce when this incident just popped in my thoughts. The whole process was bit of a feminist from hell. A bunch of feminist organizations backed her up initially, until they realized she was abusing the rights they had fought for every women, as an example, she falsely accused the family of this individual of demanding dowry. A severe crime in India, this is the only crime where legally, "you are guilty and must prove your innocence". It finally all settled after she has extorted a lot of dough from her in-laws and husband.
This lady did a lot of harm to feminism. Only silver lining, when the dust settled she was not welcomed at a lot of these organizations, nonetheless all those who witnessed had a mental stereotype of a feminist. It took few years for me to evaluate that my sole example was actually a bad person and this is not what feminism stands for.
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Even if 10 or 20% of men are the culprits, I can see how that presents a significant barrier to all women wanting to enter the field. However, that's still "some men." When people claim the problem is "men," then I'd rather just tune out. The fact is, I don't behave like that, I'd speak out against that behavior if I saw it, but I just don't see it in the environments I frequent. Somehow I still get lumped in as part of the problem because I'm male. Whatever... I stopped listening when I was supposed to fix a problem I have zero control over.
I think that the issue you mention is that so many women identify first as women, while most men identify as individuals. Thia causes some problems later, when there s an assumption that men also identify as an overarching group. A female coder (see the female mentioned first?) is likely to assume that coders who happen to to be male will also identify first as their gender.
So all men have named those WiFi spots as "Feminism Sucks" or "Shut the Fuck Up"
What is unfortunate is that it is pointed out as a
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Ridiculing the bad behavior works much better. I don't know how many women were at this conference, but I would spread the word around to the ladies that they were to connect only to the "Feminism Sucks" WiFi, and leave the Shut the Fuck Up wifi to the men. Put it in a few PowerPoints, and print out some notes to sit at the tables.
Bullies wither when under ridicule
Or you know, instead, join in on the fun. Make up your own WiFi SSIDs like "NoPatriarchyAllowed" and "ArmPitHairisGreat" and poke fun both at the concept of using SSIDs to discuss and poke fun at yourself, showing you're actually open to exchange.
You'll get more people on your side if you stop being combatitive and instead act as if you're "part of the group". The more you push back against people, even by trying to "ridicule them", the more push back you'll suffer yourself.
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I think that the issue you mention is that so many women identify first as women, while most men identify as individuals.
Wow - that's an impressive bit of stereotyping and victim-blaming rolled into a single sentence.
But I'm sure you have plenty of cherry-picked anecdotes to support your position.
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Well, ... running Slackware 0.9x or was it 0.8 ... don't remember (was mid 1993). ... I liked the name.
my first linux machine was called Cunilinux
No idea if that is anti feminist or sexist
Female, Indian, and a Python programmer (Score:2)
Re:Female, Indian, and a Python programmer (Score:5, Funny)
Well it's no wonder. Python is a racist language what with it's dependence on white space.
The best way to get gender equality (Score:5, Interesting)
...is to stop talking about gender and "gendered" issues as if they are not just created by this polarizing talk of gender all the time. Gender doesn't matter. Only code does. No one online knows you're a man, woman, brown, red, purple, with 1 leg or a missing eye until you bring it up.
Let's face it, "Women in Open Source" as a talk is like a magnet to anyone looking to troll you and just get a rise out of you. Same as bringing in any other physical carateristics you have. People just perceive it as you trying to get attention, and the people who are more apt at giving you attention won't give you the positive kind.
If you send a patch to a Open source projet with your e-mail being vthakker@something.com, no one can even tell if you're a man or woman unless you bring it up.
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...is to stop talking about gender and "gendered" issues as if they are not just created by this polarizing talk of gender all the time.
Not talking about a problem doesn't make it go away. And as this article, and many like it, show, a problem DOES exist.
Gender doesn't matter. Only code does.
I agree. The problem is that "some men" haven't got the memo, or refuse to acknowledge it.
In light of the recent examples about both childish men and extreme pseudo-feminists, conference organizers and scholars should perhaps clarify event titles and objectives, e.g. a conference called "Sexism in Open Source (debating about a problem)", instead of the more broad "Women in Open Source (w
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And how is either relevant to the quality of open source? How does either promote or improve open source? The point is, why the fuck should I care whether it's men or women writing open source software, designing open source hardware or doing anything else open source?
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Not talking about a problem doesn't make it go away. And as this article, and many like it, show, a problem DOES exist.
My point is talking about it creates the problem in the first place. "Oh we have a problem because there's not 50% women on your OSS project". No we don't.
Want to submit a patch ? Go ahead. Want to submit a rant about how sexist our hetero-normative patriarchal developer roster is ? Go elsewhere, you're a troll.
Want to get a talk going about the struggles of women in OSS ? Hint : Talk about code instead. Women would do better in the coding arena if they spent their "Con" time discussing code and codi
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My point is talking about it creates the problem in the first place. "Oh we have a problem because there's not 50% women on your OSS project". No we don't.
Precisely. That's why I also mentioned pseudo-feminists; they are the ones complaining about strict 50/50 gender distribution in projects which, completely agree, has nothing to do with quality of code. The problem is not you, me, or any other guy that understands this and looks beyond wheter a developer is male or female; the problem are all those butt-hurt basement-dweller child-men that don't.
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The problem is not you, me, or any other guy that understands this and looks beyond wheter a developer is male or female; the problem are all those butt-hurt basement-dweller child-men that don't.
Except I have yet to see these "basement-dweller child-men". I see a whole lot of women trying to use their gender as a shield against criticism of their work though, and then calling their critics "Sexists" and "Mysoginists".
Are there men who still think women are simply incapable of coding ? I'd believe it if you showed me a mailing list or forum post.
Are these men an actual systemic or even individual problem at all ? I personally don't think so, and the fact it's always even hard to get any evidence
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"pron" oops.
This pr0n is prone. ;)
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So, your "solution" is to force all women to police their writings to avoid revealing their first name. Always sign with initials + last name only (oh wait, if you're Russian, that's not enough, the last name has a feminine modifier, so have to lie about last name too), make sure never to let slip they're female.
And then have the gall to proclaim "gender doesn't matter"?
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Or someone self-identifies (by supplying their first name, as you do in informal settings), and suddenly people start behaving differently (and not in a good way) because that first name contained the information that that someone is female.
Which one is more likely, you think?
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Or someone self-identifies (by supplying their first name, as you do in informal settings), and suddenly people start behaving differently (and not in a good way) because that first name contained the information that that someone is female.
Which one is more likely, you think?
Any proof this is actually happening, or is that just a strawman ?
Sarah Sharp ring any bells ? She tried to make things about her and her feelings, basically telling everyone else they were the problem, instead of realising that maybe she was the problem.
No one cared about her being "Sarah" and submitting code to the Kernel. People cared when she started making a fuss over the community being "toxic" and "unwelcoming to women".
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Hypothetically, let's say you're a woman contributing anonymously to an open source project and someone else on the project knows you're a woman (it's sometimes a small world, after all) and points it out. Maybe they didn't even intend anything by it, but it just happened to come up one time. Then let's say, after that, a certain group of influential people on the project started treating you differently and started rejecting your pull requests, etc.
If that actually happened, shouldn't you be able to tell
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* The best way to get gender equality is to stop talking about gender and "gendered" issues as if they are not just created by this polarizing talk of gender all the time.
Well, not talking about them before didn't do anything to solve them so uh the best way of stopping it is to keep on not talking about it.
Yes, what a plan.
Basically, you don't like women getting all uppity and the implication that someone in your community might have done something wrong, viz:
If you send a patch to a Open source projet wi
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Whoops [iza.org]
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The only "whoops" is that it shows a gap in experience and skill of applicants of minority group, which means that they are getting jobs based on their minority status, rather than their actual experience/skillset.
This is actually a good proof that Affirmative Action is indeed bad overall and more proof that pure meritocracy (and thus equality of opportunity) is the stronger model.
Want to compete ? Do it on skills and experience, not on skin color and genitals.
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So, when John Smith, Paul Jones, and Vincent Miller contribute to an open source project, it's no big deal; when Sarah Brown contributes, having a feminine name is "trying to get attention" and polarizing and political
You missed the point if that is what you got out of my post.
If vmiller@, pjones@, jsmith@ or sbrown@ all submit patches, the only important thing is the content of the patch. If sbrown@ also includes a rant about how *SHE* struggles to get patches accepted because "BROGRAMMERS HATE MY GENITALS", she's going to get push back and is just an attention seeker looking to deflect what is probably very bad code (and even if it isn't, she's being a drama queen and thus toxic to the project's community).
This would
Re:The best way to get gender equality (Score:5, Insightful)
They were at a conference. It's pretty hard to hide your gender when you meet people in person, face to face, or stand on a stage.
Your argument reminds me of the argument for wearing the burka. Don't complain about men's behaviour, just cover your body and avoid doing anything to make them horny like showing me then your eyes. If bad things happen it's your fault for not covering up enough and ramming your gender in men's faces.
Eponymous open source software? (Score:2)
including the Linux kernel, the core software program behind the world's biggest eponymous open source software.
What open source software, aside from possibly Linux, a mashup of the original developer's name (LINus) and the thing he was trying to recreate (UniX), is named after it's original author?
Is there a Mr. Containers? Ms. Drupal? Mrs. Apache? I've scan the list of books at O'Reilly and none jumps out as being named after their creator, the defining requirement for considering something as eponymous [merriam-webster.com] last I checked.
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The internal name of systemd was "project shitbrain".
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I'm pretty sure the internal name of systemd was "Project Microsoft LCF".
Re: Eponymous open source software? (Score:2)
Was his girlfriend involved in the project? I suspect not.
Eponymous doesn't mean 'named after someone, anyone' - where is the relationship? Ian's (romantic?) relationship with his girlfriend Debra doesn't create a relationship between Debra and the Debian Distribution project.
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Anyone can be the eponym for anything, there doesn't need to be a relation, Tesla cars are eponymous of the scientist, but Nikola has nothing to do with the company.
What does this prove, really? (Score:2)
Is this proof of gender bias globally or a localized gender bias in India?
Also let's not lose sight of the fact that the conference room at a programming conference in India was full of men (presumably) listening to five women talk about the struggles women programmers face in open source projects.
I contend the issue may not be as wide-spread as some would have you believe, the packed conference room points to a general sensitivity/openness to the issue.
200 people (Score:2)
As Vaishali Thakker, a 23-year old open source programmer looked over the hall filled with around 200 people, she didn't know how to react to what she had just heard. Thakker was one of the five women on the stage at PyCon India 2017, a conference on the use of the Python programming language, in New Delhi. The topic of the discussion was "Women in open source."
200 (mostly?) men fill a conference room to hear five women talk about "Women in open source".
I suspect the hall was filled because it was the only session that guaranteed there would at least be women presenting, if not attending.
This isn't sexism ... (Score:3, Interesting)
... this is infantilism and/or bullying.
Given, gender/sex is the vector by which it is put in effect, but stuff like this shouldn't even be discussed. Find the hotpotters, kick them out, no reimbursement, if they raise a stink, call the police and press charges.
This isn't generic sexism, it's beyond that IMHO. I also think it's a problem if we slap the term sexism on to *everything*, like a 55 year old billionaire grabbing the crotch of a woman. It dilutes the term and causes it to lose any useful meaning.
My 2 cents.
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Given, gender/sex is the vector by which it is put in effect, but stuff like this shouldn't even be discussed. Find the hotpotters, kick them out, no reimbursement, if they raise a stink, call the police and press charges.
Overreact much ? This is exactly what the trolls want. Whatever happened to "Do not feed the Trolls".
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This isn't sexism
No, it literally is. Attacking women because they're women. ... this is infantilism and/or bullying.
You know that that and sexism aren't mutually exclusive, right?
The only obstacle to contributing to open source (Score:2)
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The only obstacle to contributing to open source is not having an internet connection
I more or less get where you're going with that, but it is a bit more complex than internet vs. no internet. I have relatively quick internet and a good computer, but I'm not a very good contributor to OSS. I'm pretty technically literate, but my coding skills basically end at some basic batch/shell scripts and tweaking HTML. I simply don't have the mind to do it, and in college I got stuck in entry level classes for VB, Java, and assembler, with C++ in high school - and I hated every minute of every one of
Summary vs Article (Score:5, Informative)
I'm not saying it's all good and sexism is over, but this is being characterized as flamebait by a lot of comments, and it repeatedly contains things like:
“Biases are there because at many places some people feel women aren’t good enough to code. But I haven’t encountered any such bias because the Linux kernel community is really good,” she adds.
And this woman stating directly that having a baby was a bigger barrier than any of her male counterparts, but her modern office in India was very accommodating:
“Sometimes I feel, when they (women) are in this field they are more aggressive because they want to prove that they are as good as their male counterparts,” she says, adding she has not faced gender bias at work yet.
“I don’t have any complaints. I feel girls are not short on talent, it’s just that they have to stick around. Sometimes it becomes difficult if you have a maternity leave, you’re disconnected for six months from everything and you cannot complain about it because the child needs you,” she says.
How did she cope? “I took my child to office with me, and my office supported that,” Deshpande-Dalal says.
Those parts quoted in the article certainly exist and are important, but you know, RTFA.
This Snowflake should try and be less sensitive .. (Score:2)
Meanwhile at home... (Score:2)
and... (Score:5, Insightful)
and....I don't care.
Can they program? What kewl things did they hack?
This is not a dating site. This is a tech conference. Get with the program.
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I'm pretty certain every movement, ism, belief, and so on, is or will eventually become, plagued with extremists. And everyone else who do not consider themselves part of that group, will judge that group by the actions and words of those extremists. Worse still, is that those who are judging the group by the actions of the group's extremists, are a group in of themselves, and are thus prone to having extremist members within them (eg: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]).
Re:Feminism (Score:5, Informative)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Feminism is a range of political movements, ideologies, and social movements that share a common goal: to define, establish, and achieve political, economic, personal, and social equality of sexes. This includes seeking to establish educational and professional opportunities for women that are equal to those for men.
Re:Feminism (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes and the Democratic Republic of North Korea is democratic. If feminism was about "equality of the sexes" then mission accomplished across the board. The movement and ideology is irrelevant in the western world. There is no end goal for feminism because it isn't about equality in opportunity or legality. It's about women supremacy and getting back at men for history which is why we see the BBC males taking pay cuts for no reason other than the long debunked gender pay gap myth and virtue signaling despite reports stating that there was no discrimination. Feminism is about equal outcomes which is contrary to meritocracy and why we see the bar lowered in many areas to get more women in. Feminism is about treating women different because being in the same room as men is oppressive. Lowering the bar, vengeful practices, and segregation is not equality!
Even you assume there are not educational and professional opportunities for women equal to men yet I haven't seen a single male only scholarship for STEM ( I bet you can't find one either) nor have I seen any male affirmative action in STEM. The favoritism is toward women so the institution can check their little quota box and feel smug about it and we see that with younger women making more [time.com] and are preferred over men for STEM faculty [cornell.edu]. I have seen more opportunity for women these days than men. What are you talking about other than the outcomes you don't like?
Men and women are different so personal and social "equality" is code for "we want more because equality of outcome using bad measures". Using bad measures (gender pay gap) to promote bad policy (vindictive practices) and treating women different (lower standard and segregation) will never achieve "equality" in any true sense of the word. Forcing equal outcomes is the antithesis of a free society.
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"the manner of the posturing used against it."
Yes because nothing screams religion like unquestioning loyalty and subservience... How dare I have an opinion outside of the Holy Doctrine of Feminist Faith.
In the time before Men and Patriarchy it was good. The evilness of Masculinity has turned Sister against Sister! But fear not and harken oh Ally! The Holy Matriarchy has a plan for you, oh dear emasculated Ally. Dare not question the Holy Doctrine of Feminist Faith! Exorcise any criticism or skepticism you
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Do you believe that the sexes should be treated equally, that women should have the same political, legal, social and economic rights as men?
Yes or no will do.
Re:Feminism (Score:4, Interesting)
Do you believe that the sexes should be treated equally, that women should have the same political, legal, social and economic rights as men?
Yes or no will do.
Yes
Do you believe that the sexes should have 50% equal representation in every political, legal, social, economic sector of activity ?
Yes or no answer will do.
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If you mean equal outcomes, then no I do not believe in that garbage. Otherwise. yes the difference is that I think we have it. Name a legal, political, social or economic right that women do not have.
Does the law apply equally to men and women? Yes. Check legal.
Do woman have suffrage and can hold political office? Yes. Check political.
Do women have the same civil rights, freedom of speech, property rights, and equal access to social goods and services as men? Yes. Check social. In fact they have access to
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Does the law apply equally to men and women? Yes. Check legal.
AHA CHECKMATE! You're wrong.
Men receive on average longer sentences, up to 63% longer sentences and are twice as likely to get convicted (sauce : https://www.law.umich.edu/newsandinfo/features/Pages/starr_gender_disparities.aspx [umich.edu]).
Male privilege is real!
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"fuckstick ... about ... feminism"
Did you just assume the masculinity of my feminine penis?
Re:Feminism (Score:4, Insightful)
Feminism is cancer.
In certain cases it might be, just like chauvinism and any other standpoint taken to the extreme. In the end we should be treating all people with the same respect we would want for ourselves, no matter their biological, religious or cultural differences. Those who seek to make a negative example of someone's differences is not a very respectable person.
Re:Feminism (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree but it just seems that 'feminism' has been soiled by too many extremists that it has lost all sense pragmatism or direction. There are places that absolutely need feminism and if western feminism tried to help those countries and those women I think many more would respect the movement and ideology. Instead of addressing real issues in the world we get diatribes about video games and movies.
Feminism may not be cancer but it is infected with a malignancy that, IMO, is terminal to any redeeming quality.
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So there are loud mouths. Big deal? Why should an entire movement, and a movement, I might add that by and large has seen women gain a great deal since the days when they were chattel with few political or legal rights independent of their fathers, brothers or husbands. So what if the odd kook gets on the nightly news? Is it fair to damn any movement by the cranks, because if it is, well, there's this minority of American conservatism that's awfully loud and hold ridiculous positions. Shall I be free to def
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You missed my point. "There are too many loud mouths that the movement has lost all sense of pragmatism and direction".
I am not going to address your whataboutism or false equivalency.
Perhaps you should pay less attention to the attention whores in any movement, and look at what the majority of the movement is about.
Because what the majority of the movement is about, in my opinion, has been overtaken by the loud mouths that has derided any noble cause it may have had. How many times do I have to hear about the gender pay gap before I recognize that the movement has been overtaken by loud mouth idiots devoid of principle because they basta
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Re:Feminism (Score:5, Insightful)
The entire movement isn't rendered obsolete because several vocal sub-communities are taking extreme views. Any small community basically becomes more extreme in its views over time [wikipedia.org] if it isn't exposed to reality. The problem is systemic in various causes ranging from feminism to atheism, various theisms (fundamental Christianity/Islam/Judaism/etc.), charitable organisations, environment-conscious groups, animal welfare (PETA), etc. This doesn't render any of the causes lost, it simply means they need to fight harder to drown out the voices of those more extreme sects.
You should never yield a movement because extreme people come in every so often. You also may want to reconsider automatic judgement of someone based on a particular view (such as a perceived gender pay gap) as in their case they might be right, even if they might be wrongly attempting to generalise.
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Kind of sad that you dismiss the desire of women - comprising fifty-plus percent of the human race - to be treated as human beings with equal rights.
That's what feminism is. It's not about diminution of rights for males. It's about trying to ensure that there's a level playing field.
This is not a radical idea....countries which have taken steps to try to address gender imbalances often do better, as witness much of northern Europe. Ditto for treating people of different (in this case, mostly black/brown)
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Feminism != women.
There are plenty of women that do not like feminism and stand against it. Feminists do not speak for woman. That is a degrading and undermines the individual by taking away their autonomy and voice by tribalism and group identity. Treat women as individuals that can decide, act, and speak in their own self interest. Anything less is soft bigotry of low expectations.
Re:Brilliant! (Score:5, Insightful)
Or it's just like the commenters [slashdot.org] who see someone reporting harassment and immediately bleat "that can't possibly be true" based on a few examples of people making false claims.
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Or it's just like the commenters [slashdot.org] who see someone reporting harassment and immediately bleat "that can't possibly be true" based on a few examples of people making false claims.
Everyone and anyone can report harassement. If it's true, you'll have no issues producing evidence of it. And if you're being exposed as a massive fraud over something, people will have no qualms in assuming you're also lying about the harassement claim you're using to deflect from the valid criticism you're receiving.
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someone reporting harassment and immediately bleat "that can't possibly be true" based on a few examples of people making false claims.
So in the absence of them actually presenting any proof at all of harassment but engaging in actual shady actions, I'm automatically in the wrong. Well fuck me for expecting the bare minimum of proof.
How's that listen and believing working out for you? Maybe some #metooing will make you feel better. Right up until you find out that the person making the claim against you is also best friends with the reporter doing the story.
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Shady actions by Vaishali Thakker or others mentioned in TFA? I see no evidence of any.
You assume people are lying, assuming that the actions of a few attention-seekers apply to every woman who speaks about harassment. In other words, you believe in a conspiracy. That's what I object to.
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You assume people are lying, assuming that the actions of a few attention-seekers apply to every woman who speaks about harassment. In other words, you believe in a conspiracy. That's what I object to.
Nice assumption. Too bad that's not how reality works, reality expects evidence and/or proof, something that she hasn't offered(much like the post I made above). And in the current state of "omg I'm being harassed because I'm *insert thing*" and it over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and over again being a case where mean comments don't equal harassment. Anyone who actually cares about that, gets tired of it well...quickly.
The only thing you seem to object to is someone expe
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Yet you have no trouble calling her a liar without offering any evidence of your own.
Using your reasoning: because of Hans Reiser's murder conviction, any programmer who claims to be not guilty of murder is lying.
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Yet you have no trouble calling her a liar without offering any evidence of your own.
Using your reasoning: because of Hans Reiser's murder conviction, any programmer who claims to be not guilty of murder is lying.
There was proof that Hans Reiser murdered is wife.
You know, what people keep asking for. Evidence. Proof.
That's the beauty of innocent until proven guilty. No one is guilty of murder unless you can prove that they are actually guilty of it.
Same for harassement. No one is guilty of harassement until we get proof of harassement. She might or might not be lying, that's besides the point. The point is harassement needs evidence of it existing.
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Proof is necessary if she accuses someone in particular. A discussion of harassment in general is perfectly possible without making a court case out of it. People discuss tons of topics every day without having to offer proof for their assertions, I don't see why this topic has to be held to a different standard.
By holding discussion of this topic to a different standard, you're trying to stifle the discussion. And there's far too much of that going on already. A group of people wants to keep pretending the
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Proof is necessary if she accuses someone in particular. A discussion of harassment in general is perfectly possible without making a court case out of it.
I'm not going to have a discussion about harassement that is not occuring. That's a waste of everyone's time.
People discuss tons of topics every day without having to offer proof for their assertions, I don't see why this topic has to be held to a different standard.
Call it the "Is this really an issue" standard. Yes, every topic is weighted against it.
By holding discussion of this topic to a different standard, you're trying to stifle the discussion.
Except we're not stiffling discussion by holding it to a different standard. We don't want to talk about things that simply do not happen, and thus require no tangible action or discussion.
Show us why it's a problem, and then we'll talk about it.
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Harassment is occurring. CNN story [cnn.com]. #metoo. Countless other stories published in the past few years.
Not all of these stories end with a lawsuit. That doesn't make them lies.
Claiming that harassment isn't an issue (which is what you're doing) is stifling the discussion, and perpetrating the problem.
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Countless other stories published in the past few years.
The problem is that blogging in recent years pushes the narrative of harassement, but is it really there ? So sure you can link a ton of stuff (and seriously, #metoo is the WORST example you could come up with, talk about a massive witch hunt), but is it just strawmans or actual harassement ?
There was a metric ton of articles in 2013 and again in 2015 recounting how poor Sarah Sharp was "abused" on the LKML. Then it ended up being that she was just being a drama queen and created the whole situation herse
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I have no idea what you're going on about so I'm going to restrict myself directly to criticising your bizarrue use/em of italics.