The Google Firing

[fil]

I bet you wouldn't have to change that much about this case to have a situation where he wasn't fired.

The main problems were 1) The content of the document and 2) the wide internal dissemination of it. Those are the things that would need to be changed, and even on 2) if one of my employees wrote that and only disseminated it to my workgroup (4 women, 6 men), he'd have been fired, and I work for a company with extremely similar workplace policies to Google's.

What if you were having a discussion of gender in tech amongst your workgroup, and one of the men said:
1) What if the gender imbalance in programming is largely because women are just less interested in it, and prefer other fields? There seems to be a fair amount of research indicating this could be a significant factor.
2) If that's the case, is it possible that programs trying to induce more women to go into a field they're not interested in might backfire in various ways?

Is just saying 1 & 2 a firing offense? What if they were written in an email?

What if it was a woman who said (or wrote) 1 & 2 rather than a man? Does that change the scenario?

 

[Horatio]

That's a completely different scenario. In the context of a discussion, it would probably be fine. If it was written in an email, and was as selectively sourced as the Manifestbro document, it may be actionable, especially if anyone found the content offensive. I'd kick it up to HR and my manager immediately in that case.

 

[fil]

That's a completely different scenario. In the context of a discussion, it would probably be fine. If it was written in an email, and was as selectively sourced as the Manifestbro document, it may be actionable, especially if anyone found the content offensive. I'd kick it up to HR and my manager immediately in that case.

Even if it were a woman who authored it?

 

[Deleted member 4603]

That's a completely different scenario. In the context of a discussion, it would probably be fine. If it was written in an email, and was as selectively sourced as the Manifestbro document, it may be actionable, especially if anyone found the content offensive. I'd kick it up to HR and my manager immediately in that case.

Even if it were a woman who authored it?

Yes, because even women are capable of sexual harrassment, or bone-headed ideas or beliefs, just as capable of making mistakes in how they communicate, etc. I'd say probably "less often guilty of such," but it can and does happen.

You are starting from the most innocuous of "borderline" comments / conversations, which is not really indicative of what happened with this guy.

 

[Horatio]

That's a completely different scenario. In the context of a discussion, it would probably be fine. If it was written in an email, and was as selectively sourced as the Manifestbro document, it may be actionable, especially if anyone found the content offensive. I'd kick it up to HR and my manager immediately in that case.

Even if it were a woman who authored it?

Probably, though I have a lot of difficulty imagining any woman on my team writing such a thing, so it's a difficult hypothetical to parse.

 

[fil]

That's a completely different scenario. In the context of a discussion, it would probably be fine. If it was written in an email, and was as selectively sourced as the Manifestbro document, it may be actionable, especially if anyone found the content offensive. I'd kick it up to HR and my manager immediately in that case.

Even if it were a woman who authored it?

Yes, because even women are capable of sexual harrassment, or bone-headed ideas or beliefs, just as capable of making mistakes in how they communicate, etc. I'd say probably "less often guilty of such," but it can and does happen.
You are starting from the most innocuous of "borderline" comments / conversations, which is not really indicative of what happened with this guy.

I was trying to scope out where Horatio saw the limits, so the example case was borderline on purpose.

One thing to think about is the "reasonable person" standard. This is part of the reason for asking the question with genders reversed.

For example, say at a veterinary medicine conference, if one of the women (women dominate veterinary medicine in the US) made a comment that veterinary medicine has fewer men because of lack of interest, and that programs intended to increase male participation in the field might backfire in various ways: it's hard to imagine that many judges/juries would think that this rose to the level of creating a hostile environment for the male veterinarians present. My impression is that there seems to be a hyper-sensitivity in the tech field right now, perhaps to the point that frank discussion is impossible. On the one hand, one can simply say that it's wise that such controversial topics simply be avoided in a work context. On the other hand, it could be argued that if frank discussion is impossible, actually coming up with effective solutions (or even assessing what the problem is) will be difficult.

 

[fil]

That's a completely different scenario. In the context of a discussion, it would probably be fine. If it was written in an email, and was as selectively sourced as the Manifestbro document, it may be actionable, especially if anyone found the content offensive. I'd kick it up to HR and my manager immediately in that case.

Even if it were a woman who authored it?

Probably, though I have a lot of difficulty imagining any woman on my team writing such a thing, so it's a difficult hypothetical to parse.

You don't think that if you asked 100 women why women are underrepresented in programming, that even one of them would respond that part of the reason is that not as many are interested? That's certainly not in line with my experience. What do you think women say when asked why women dominate fields like veterinary medicine or psychology?

 

[papadage]

That's a completely different scenario. In the context of a discussion, it would probably be fine. If it was written in an email, and was as selectively sourced as the Manifestbro document, it may be actionable, especially if anyone found the content offensive. I'd kick it up to HR and my manager immediately in that case.

Even if it were a woman who authored it?

Yes, because even women are capable of sexual harrassment, or bone-headed ideas or beliefs, just as capable of making mistakes in how they communicate, etc. I'd say probably "less often guilty of such," but it can and does happen.
You are starting from the most innocuous of "borderline" comments / conversations, which is not really indicative of what happened with this guy.

I was trying to scope out where Horatio saw the limits, so the example case was borderline on purpose.

One thing to think about is the "reasonable person" standard. This is part of the reason for asking the question with genders reversed.

For example, say at a veterinary medicine conference, if one of the women (women dominate veterinary medicine in the US) made a comment that veterinary medicine has fewer men because of lack of interest, and that programs intended to increase male participation in the field might backfire in various ways: it's hard to imagine that many judges/juries would think that this rose to the level of creating a hostile environment for the male veterinarians present. My impression is that there seems to be a hyper-sensitivity in the tech field right now, perhaps to the point that frank discussion is impossible. On the one hand, one can simply say that it's wise that such controversial topics simply be avoided in a work context. On the other hand, it could be argued that if frank discussion is impossible, actually coming up with effective solutions (or even assessing what the problem is) will be difficult.

Does veterinary medicine have a big reputation problem with sexism, but purposeful and structural? That informs a lot of the issue.

The guy basically hit almost every red line but saying "women are inferior" in black and white instead of dog whistling , and he did it purposefully.

 

[Megalodon]

The main problems were 1) The content of the document and 2) the wide internal dissemination of it. Those are the things that would need to be changed, and even on 2) if one of my employees wrote that and only disseminated it to my workgroup (4 women, 6 men), he'd have been fired, and I work for a company with extremely similar workplace policies to Google's.

The policies are likely similar on paper but they allow discretion and I think Google falls below your expectations for doing the right thing without pressure. Silicon valley is really bad at this. I'm not saying they shouldn't have fired him, I'm saying they should have but couldn't be relied on. Google's reputation here is rather poor.

 

[Horatio]

You don't think that if you asked 100 women why women are underrepresented in programming, that even one of them would respond that part of the reason is that not as many are interested?

It's certainly possible, and there are lots of anti-women women in the world (e.g. Ann Coulter).

 

[YourHero]

You don't think that if you asked 100 women why women are underrepresented in programming, that even one of them would respond that part of the reason is that not as many are interested?

It's certainly possible, and there are lots of anti-women women in the world (e.g. Ann Coulter).

In fil's example saying imbalance is not 100% due to sexism is anti-women? I can see how it can be counter-productive in a very broad context but anti-women seems a bit much.

 

[fil]

You don't think that if you asked 100 women why women are underrepresented in programming, that even one of them would respond that part of the reason is that not as many are interested?

It's certainly possible, and there are lots of anti-women women in the world (e.g. Ann Coulter).

Why is it anti-woman to point out that women may (on average, in a statistical sense) be more interested in some fields than others, and not anti-man to say the same thing about men?

Why do _you_ think veterinary medicine and psychology are dominated by women?

And again, I think a lot of you are way up on a high-horse thinking your personal choice of (tech) profession is the "right" one, and everyone else should be envious. Again, a lot of programming jobs are really crappy jobs, and there are perfectly good reasons why a lot of people (both male and female) who have the capability to be programmers choose to do something else.

 

[Jehos]

You don't think that if you asked 100 women why women are underrepresented in programming, that even one of them would respond that part of the reason is that not as many are interested?

It's certainly possible, and there are lots of anti-women women in the world (e.g. Ann Coulter).

Why is it anti-woman to point out that women may (on average, in a statistical sense) be more interested in some fields than others, and not anti-man to say the same thing about men?

Because the statistics don't match the actual preference.

Women and men reach rough parity in all the career fields adjacent to tech--math, science, etc. Women reach rough parity with men in countries where the sexist barriers have been removed. Finally, the women who actually are in tech consistently report rampant sexism. Based on all that, it's much more reasonable to assume that women aren't entering tech because they're being kept out, not because they don't want to be there.

Consequently, it's fair to call out sexist dipshits who try to claim the statistics prove women just don't want to be there as the sexist dipshits they are. Especially when they start parroting "men's rights" bullshit.

 

[Horatio]

Why do _you_ think veterinary medicine and psychology are dominated by women?

Don't know, don't care.

And again, I think a lot of you are way up on a high-horse thinking your personal choice of (tech) profession is the "right" one, and everyone else should be envious.

Not sure what this has to do with anything.

Again, a lot of programming jobs are really crappy jobs

Not so much at the Big 4.

 

[RisingTide]

You don't think that if you asked 100 women why women are underrepresented in programming, that even one of them would respond that part of the reason is that not as many are interested?

It's certainly possible, and there are lots of anti-women women in the world (e.g. Ann Coulter).

Why is it anti-woman to point out that women may (on average, in a statistical sense) be more interested in some fields than others, and not anti-man to say the same thing about men?

Why do _you_ think veterinary medicine and psychology are dominated by women?

And again, I think a lot of you are way up on a high-horse thinking your personal choice of (tech) profession is the "right" one, and everyone else should be envious. Again, a lot of programming jobs are really crappy jobs, and there are perfectly good reasons why a lot of people (both male and female) who have the capability to be programmers choose to do something else.

Yeah, but that's not what the memo actually said. He more or less suggested that women were biologically incapable of being successful in technology. I don't see any way how you could write that about your peers in any large company and not face repercussions. And I would say that if veterinary medicine had the same issues with men as tech seems to with women, that's a problem too, and maybe veterinary medicine has a culture that is anti-men. But in any event, these are not mutually exclusive things - tech can have a corrosive culture that is shit to women, and veterinary medicine can have shit culture that's bad for men. I don't know about veterinary medicine, but there are certainly plenty of people (women even!) who are willing to go on the record about how they feel tech companies treat women poorly.

But even all that aside, I don't understand how anyone can think you can write a widely distributed essay basically suggesting that a significant number of your coworkers are biologically incapable of being successful in their chosen field, and not face any repercussions.

 

[YourHero]

Because the statistics don't match the actual preference.

Citation?

Women reach rough parity with men in countries where the sexist barriers have been removed.

This was disproven the last time you brought it up in this thread. There is an inverse between sexist barriers removed and women in science. (more specifically the TE part of STEM)

 

[RisingTide]

Because the statistics don't match the actual preference.

Citation?

Women reach rough parity with men in countries where the sexist barriers have been removed.

This was disproven the last time you brought it up in this thread. There is an inverse between sexist barriers removed and women in science.

Good thing we have guys like James Damore to explain it all to us then, right?

 

[YourHero]

Good thing we have guys like James Damore to explain it all to us then, right?

Even better we have people that misrepresent it to such a grand degree that he gets lots of attention for it.

 

[Jehos]

Because the statistics don't match the actual preference.

Citation?

Proven in the main part of my post that you conveniently cut out.

Women reach rough parity with men in countries where the sexist barriers have been removed.

This was disproven the last time you brought it up in this thread. There is an inverse between sexist barriers removed and women in science. (more specifically the TE part of STEM)

You fundamentally misunderstood that whole discussion (which incidentally I didn't bring up).

Good thing we have guys like James Damore to explain it all to us then, right?

Even better we have people that misrepresent it to such a grand degree that he gets lots of attention for it.

Yeah, the real problem with Damore is he's just misunderstood.

 

[YourHero]

Proven in the main part of my post that you conveniently cut out.

Where were the statistics in that again?

You fundamentally misunderstood that whole discussion (which incidentally I didn't bring up).

Yes, that the most progressive and developed countries are secretly the most sexist.

Yeah, the real problem with Damore is he's just misunderstood.

misrepresent != misunderstood

There seems to be an odd binary conversation style here...where you are either 100% against or 100% for, with absolutely nothing in between.

EDIT: Seriously though. A real problem is that he is getting attention at all. What he wrote is only slightly credible, but the backlash is disproportionate to what he wrote. Makes him a martyr or some other bullshit. I know it makes us feel good to say "fuck that guy", but in reality the response should have been something like what ROAF wrote in the Girl Scouts thread.

I think you've misunderstood the consensus. The consensus is not that there definitely aren't intrinsic differences which might explain some part of gender disparity. Instead the consensus is that there definitely are large extrinsic factors, that in other disciplines where efforts have been made to reduce those extrinsic factors the gender disparity has reduced, and that it's unproductive to the point of deliberate sexism to worry about possible intrinsic differences while large-scale extrinsic factors haven't been addressed.

 

[Jehos]

misrepresent != misunderstood

LOL, what does that even mean? That the media fully understood that he's right but they're intentionally obfuscating the truths he told to make him look bad?

There seems to be an odd binary conversation style here...where you are either 100% against or 100% for, with absolutely nothing in between.

There's not much grey area about whether Damore is a bigot. He is. What grey area do you see there?

 

[RisingTide]

Good thing we have guys like James Damore to explain it all to us then, right?

Even better we have people that misrepresent it to such a grand degree that he gets lots of attention for it.

Explain to me what part of it I'm not getting - he wrote a widely circulated memo criticizing Google's diversity efforts and suggested that the real reason women don't succeed in tech is not because the culture is corrosive (even though there are plenty of women suggesting it is), but because women are biologically predisposed to prefer other things.

Maybe I'm just not forward thinking enough, but I can't imagine that writing and widely distributing something suggesting a group of of my colleagues have traits that make them less biologically suited to the job is going to go over well. That's ignoring the fact that my colleagues aren't just people plucked at random across the population at large, but rather people who have actively chosen to pursue a career in technology and many have actively suggested the culture in tech companies can be sexist or exclusionary.

 

[Solomonoff's Secret]

Women and men reach rough parity in all the career fields adjacent to tech--math, science, etc.

When you break down further, as science is uselessly vague, there is a lot of imbalance. Women dominate in psychology and are a majority in biology. Men dominate in math and physics. While there may be (close to) parity on the whole, and I doubt that, clearly there isn't parity in each field.

Women reach rough parity with men in countries where the sexist barriers have been removed.

We saw evidence that this statement is false. However, I am not convinced either way by that evidence because in societies that oppress women more, women would be oppressed not just in tech so it isn't clear whether oppression would lead to less or greater representation in tech, fixing overall rates of male and female employment.

Finally, the women who actually are in tech consistently report rampant sexism. Based on all that, it's much more reasonable to assume that women aren't entering tech because they're being kept out, not because they don't want to be there.

But as above, you have to consider sexism in tech relative to other fields. Is tech really worse than average? With all this awareness and condemnation of Damore, I find it hard to believe.

 

[blargh]

But even all that aside, I don't understand how anyone can think you can write a widely distributed essay basically suggesting that a significant number of your coworkers are biologically incapable of being successful in their chosen field, and not face any repercussions.

Damore keeps doubling-down this crap, too -- recently comparing the proposition that women can be successful engineers to "assum[ing] that Santa Claus is real."

https://twitter.com/Fired4Truth/status/899319849297494016

 

[Solomonoff's Secret]

Damore keeps doubling-down this crap, too -- recently comparing the proposition that women can be successful engineers to "assum[ing] that Santa Claus is real."

https://twitter.com/Fired4Truth/status/899319849297494016

Don't be disingenuous, that's obviously a misread of what he said. His thesis was that certain diversity programs were pointless, largely because of women's preference. That is the most reasonable candidate for what he believes those programs are wrongly assuming.

 

[fil]

Why do _you_ think veterinary medicine and psychology are dominated by women?

Don't know, don't care.

Seems clear you don't have much interest in the issues being discussed then. Why should only your personal field be relevant? If your goal is 50:50 representation everywhere you have to work on changing both fields where men are overrepresented and those where they are underrepresented.

And again, I think a lot of you are way up on a high-horse thinking your personal choice of (tech) profession is the "right" one, and everyone else should be envious.

Not sure what this has to do with anything.

There's an underlying assumption in almost all the discussion here that tech jobs are some kind of big prize, and anyone would be crazy not to want them. It seems anathema for many here to even consider an alternative view.

Again, a lot of programming jobs are really crappy jobs

Not so much at the Big 4.

That depends very much on your metric. When you consider associated cost of living, time wasted commuting, hours worked, work environment, stress, work-life balance etc, it's pretty easy for people smart enough to get those kind of jobs (these people have lots of options, especially if they have any social skills whatsoever) to decide they'd rather do something else. What you're left with are people who really like that kind of stuff, or who think it's critical for them to emigrate to the US, or who simply don't have sufficient social skills for many other lines of work.

 

[RisingTide]

Damore keeps doubling-down this crap, too -- recently comparing the proposition that women can be successful engineers to "assum[ing] that Santa Claus is real."

https://twitter.com/Fired4Truth/status/899319849297494016

Don't be disingenuous, that's obviously a misread of what he said. His thesis was that certain diversity programs were pointless, largely because of women's preference. That is the most reasonable candidate for what he believes those programs are wrongly assuming.

Yeah, but even if we accept the premise that these intrinsic "preferences" are a) legitimate and b) meaningful, I'm not sure we are even remotely near the point where such "preferences" are the only (or even a primary) reason we don't see more women in leadership roles in technology (or in business generally)

 

[Jehos]

Women and men reach rough parity in all the career fields adjacent to tech--math, science, etc.

When you break down further, as science is uselessly vague, there is a lot of imbalance. Women dominate in psychology and are a majority in biology. Men dominate in math and physics. While there may be (close to) parity on the whole, and I doubt that, clearly there isn't parity in each field.

True. And the idea that you can be genetically disposed to one field of hard science but not another strains credulity.

Finally, the women who actually are in tech consistently report rampant sexism. Based on all that, it's much more reasonable to assume that women aren't entering tech because they're being kept out, not because they don't want to be there.

But as above, you have to consider sexism in tech relative to other fields. Is tech really worse than average? With all this awareness and condemnation of Damore, I find it hard to believe.

Yes, tech is really worse than average. All this awareness and condemnation of Damore is *because* it's so much worse. If the sexism didn't exist in tech, one lunatic writing a sexist screed wouldn't be any more newsworthy than the lunatics writing screeds about chemtrails.

 

[Solomonoff's Secret]

There's an underlying assumption in almost all the discussion here that tech jobs are some kind of big prize, and anyone would be crazy not to want them. It seems anathema for many here to even consider an alternative view.

The original discussion was about software and those jobs are a big prize. Generally the pay and benefits are great. The market is hot so it's easy to find jobs quickly throughout the country. They aren't uniquely great but they certainly are better than most jobs, particularly female-dominated ones such as teaching and nursing. So it makes sense to focus disproportionately on tech, although of course we should study imbalances in other fields not just to address them but to identify causes, which might transcend the particular field.

 

[YourHero]

misrepresent != misunderstood

LOL, what does that even mean? That the media fully understood that he's right but they're intentionally obfuscating the truths he told to make him look bad?

It means that what he actually wrote was reduced to "lady brains just cant do tech" or "genetically inferior". Which depending on your ideological biases is what you would infer from what he actually wrote.

Which makes other people who don't share your/our biases MORE interested in what he has to say. Gave him a giant megaphone, which could have been cut off at the pass with a less biased review.

There seems to be an odd binary conversation style here...where you are either 100% against or 100% for, with absolutely nothing in between.

There's not much grey area about whether Damore is a bigot. He is. What grey area do you see there?

This might be part of the issue...I don't give a crap about Damore the person; you do. I don't need to castigate him to be against (mostly) what he wrote; you do.

Him, being/not being a bigot has nothing to do with my response. You need him to be a bigot to dismiss what he wrote; I don't.

 

[Solomonoff's Secret]

Yeah, but even if we accept the premise that these intrinsic "preferences" are a) legitimate and b) meaningful, I'm not sure we are even remotely near the point where such "preferences" are the only (or even a primary) reason we don't see more women in leadership roles in technology (or in business generally)

Of course, it's a great leap. Damore is riding his wave of infamy. But ultimately who cares about him? That's not the interesting discussion.

Yes, tech is really worse than average. All this awareness and condemnation of Damore is *because* it's so much worse. If the sexism didn't exist in tech, one lunatic writing a sexist screed wouldn't be any more newsworthy than the lunatics writing screeds about chemtrails.

Calling him a lunatic is dismissive and doesn't do any "side" any favors. And there are other likely explanations for the story being so big, such as techies being very sensitive to this issue and the story going viral on social media and embarrassing Google, forcing it to take action. Is there hard data showing sexism in tech is worse instead of being perceived as worse?

 

[YourHero]

Damore keeps doubling-down this crap, too -- recently comparing the proposition that women can be successful engineers to "assum[ing] that Santa Claus is real."

https://twitter.com/Fired4Truth/status/899319849297494016

Don't be disingenuous, that's obviously a misread of what he said. His thesis was that certain diversity programs were pointless, largely because of women's preference. That is the most reasonable candidate for what he believes those programs are wrongly assuming.

Yeah, but even if we accept the premise that these intrinsic "preferences" are a) legitimate and b) meaningful, I'm not sure we are even remotely near the point where such "preferences" are the only (or even a primary) reason we don't see more women in leadership roles in technology (or in business generally)

On this I agree 100%. This guy would be a non-issue if this was the only thing that is going on in this thread.

The thing I disagree with is the need to be disingenuous. The Streisand effect.

 

[Jehos]

Calling him a lunatic is dismissive and doesn't do any "side" any favors. And there are other likely explanations for the story being so big, such as techies being very sensitive to this issue and the story going viral on social media and embarrassing Google, forcing it to take action.

See, the great thing about society is that you can call ranting bigots "lunatics" because nobody wants them. There's no moral obligation to be a bigot apologist because bigotry is an immoral act. I hope Damore learns and I hope he changes, but he's messed up in the head if he thought his manifesto was in any way appropriate. Lun-a-tic.

Is there hard data showing sexism in tech is worse instead of being perceived as worse?

Yes, the huge gender imbalance.

We found this quacking, feathered thing floating in a pond in a group of ducks. It looks just like the ducks it's with. You're asking me to do genetic testing on it. Fuck that.

 

[fil]

There's an underlying assumption in almost all the discussion here that tech jobs are some kind of big prize, and anyone would be crazy not to want them. It seems anathema for many here to even consider an alternative view.

The original discussion was about software and those jobs are a big prize.

For you perhaps. What many here really have trouble getting their heads around is that other people might value different things.

Generally the pay and benefits are great. The market is hot so it's easy to find jobs quickly throughout the country. They aren't uniquely great but they certainly are better than most jobs, particularly female-dominated ones such as teaching ...

I can give you numerous examples just from my own personal experience of people who have left tech jobs to go into teaching. Their reasons vary, but are often to do with work-life balance, wanting to work closely with and help other people, and not liking the stress and crap work environment of most tech jobs. You're welcome to tell them they're all wrong, but their view is every bit as valid as yours. They think your type of job is not just a little crappy, it's so crappy it's worth spending years training up to do something else.

Open your mind. Not everyone values what you do.

So it makes sense to focus disproportionately on tech, although of course we should study imbalances in other fields not just to address them but to identify causes, which might transcend the particular field.

There are some good reasons to focus on tech (and I agree sexism is likely worse in tech), but IMHO a lot of the focus should be on creating a better work environment, making tech jobs amenable to work-life balance etc.

 

[Jehos]

There's an underlying assumption in almost all the discussion here that tech jobs are some kind of big prize, and anyone would be crazy not to want them. It seems anathema for many here to even consider an alternative view.

The original discussion was about software and those jobs are a big prize.

For you perhaps. What many here really have trouble getting their heads around is that other people might value different things.

Generally the pay and benefits are great. The market is hot so it's easy to find jobs quickly throughout the country. They aren't uniquely great but they certainly are better than most jobs, particularly female-dominated ones such as teaching ...

I can give you numerous examples just from my own personal experience of people who have left tech jobs to go into teaching. Their reasons vary, but are often to do with work-life balance, wanting to work closely with and help other people, and not liking the stress and crap work environment of most tech jobs. You're welcome to tell them they're all wrong, but their view is every bit as valid as yours. They think your type of job is not just a little crappy, it's so crappy it's worth spending years training up to do something else.

Open your mind. Not everyone values what you do.

So it makes sense to focus disproportionately on tech, although of course we should study imbalances in other fields not just to address them but to identify causes, which might transcend the particular field.

There are some good reasons to focus on tech (and I agree sexism is likely worse in tech), but IMHO a lot of the focus should be on creating a better work environment, making tech jobs amenable to work-life balance etc.

I think we can all agree that in aggregate, we agree on the value of money. That's why the economy works. While "quality of life" holds different value for different people, software jobs inarguably pay better than teaching. Society values software developers more highly than teachers, hence the pay gap. Whether the money is "worth it" to any individual is irrelevant.

 

[Megalodon]

I can give you numerous examples just from my own personal experience of people who have left tech jobs to go into teaching.

Well if you think that's relevant information you should listen to the women saying they're leaving tech because of problems like harassment and lack of advancement because women get worse performance reviews for the same work.

 

[Solomonoff's Secret]

See, the great thing about society is that you can call ranting bigots "lunatics" because nobody wants them. There's no moral obligation to be a bigot apologist because bigotry is an immoral act. I hope Damore learns and I hope he changes, but he's messed up in the head if he thought his manifesto was in any way appropriate. Lun-a-tic.

You might want to look up that word before you continue using it.

Yes, the huge gender imbalance.

That evidence is rather thin, given that by that rationale some of the worst sexism would have to be perpetrated by people who are among the most sensitive toward it. What distinguishes this gender imbalance from others or are all indicative of sexism?

 

[Jehos]

Yes, the huge gender imbalance.

That evidence is rather thin. What distinguishes this gender imbalance from others or are all indicative of sexism?

Gender imbalances are indicative of sexism until proven otherwise.

 

[fil]

I can give you numerous examples just from my own personal experience of people who have left tech jobs to go into teaching.

Well if you think that's relevant information you should listen to the women saying they're leaving tech because of problems like harassment and lack of advancement because women get worse performance reviews for the same work.

No doubt sexism can make things even worse, but my examples are both men and women.

 

[fil]

There's an underlying assumption in almost all the discussion here that tech jobs are some kind of big prize, and anyone would be crazy not to want them. It seems anathema for many here to even consider an alternative view.

The original discussion was about software and those jobs are a big prize.

For you perhaps. What many here really have trouble getting their heads around is that other people might value different things.

Generally the pay and benefits are great. The market is hot so it's easy to find jobs quickly throughout the country. They aren't uniquely great but they certainly are better than most jobs, particularly female-dominated ones such as teaching ...

I can give you numerous examples just from my own personal experience of people who have left tech jobs to go into teaching. Their reasons vary, but are often to do with work-life balance, wanting to work closely with and help other people, and not liking the stress and crap work environment of most tech jobs. You're welcome to tell them they're all wrong, but their view is every bit as valid as yours. They think your type of job is not just a little crappy, it's so crappy it's worth spending years training up to do something else.

Open your mind. Not everyone values what you do.

So it makes sense to focus disproportionately on tech, although of course we should study imbalances in other fields not just to address them but to identify causes, which might transcend the particular field.

There are some good reasons to focus on tech (and I agree sexism is likely worse in tech), but IMHO a lot of the focus should be on creating a better work environment, making tech jobs amenable to work-life balance etc.

I think we can all agree that in aggregate, we agree on the value of money.

People agree that money buys stuff, but don't agree on the relative worth of buying stuff compared to other factors. Even a 40 hour a week job consumes a huge fraction of your life, and some people want more from life than just maximizing how much stuff they could buy.

software jobs inarguably pay better than teaching.

You do know how supply and demand works, right? Garbage collecting pays higher than teaching too. A big part of the reason is that people want to teach - they think it's a valuable thing to do, (partly) independent of what it pays.

Programming jobs pay a lot because if they didn't not enough people would be willing to do them (given visa limits).