# Sci-Fi posters put women off tech jobs!



## SFF Chronicles News (Oct 20, 2013)

*16th December 2009 04:05 AM*

David Allen

When you look around the IT dept at work you will notice a distinct lack of women working there, this of course has nothing to do with working with technology, what it does have to with is the type of person already working there.
According to a recent survey, one of the main reasons for the lack of women in the industry is more to do with science fiction than computer science.
For women there is nothing more off putting in the work place than empty games machines, coke cans and science fiction posters, amazing as it may seem science fiction gets into the places that other genres fail to reach.
However, on this occasion it seems that by displaying the love of sci-fi publically it has a detrimental effect on encouraging women into the IT industry.


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## AlexanderSen (Feb 8, 2014)

Just feeling like being in a debative mood so: Correlation does not mean causation!

Now is that because it is more of a male testosterone driven environment which fosters sci-fi? Or is it because sci-fi repels women? 

I would say it is more to do with it being a testosterone driven environment which creates a love of sci-fi VS the sci-fi environment repelling women, as there are women to be know to be in sci-fi like Ursula K Le Guin, Susanna Collins, and many other female writers, thus if there are women who like sci-fi the chances are that it is the testosterone driven attitude which repels women not sci-fi itself. 

I am sure you can find a lot of women who like sci-fi if you know where to look.


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## Teresa Edgerton (Feb 8, 2014)

SFF Chronicles News said:


> empty games machines, coke cans and science fiction posters



I'm guessing it's the _combination_ of all these, making the break room look more like a frat house than a place where both men and women are welcome to relax.



			
				AlexanderSen said:
			
		

> I am sure you can find a lot of women who like sci-fi if you know where to look.



Like this forum, for instance.


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## Idyllic (Mar 20, 2014)

This smells funny.



Teresa Edgerton said:


> I'm guessing it's the _combination_ of all these, making the break room look more like a frat house than a place where both men and women are welcome to relax.



Going to have to agree with this, since I'm part of the crowd that's "scared off" by science fiction.

Experiences will vary environment to environment (I know some women, especially those who are older, who've had _horrid _experiences), but the men in class are mostly friendly. They're really no worse than the type of people you meet working in retail, and I'd love to have more science fiction around.

I can imagine I'd be pretty put off by a work environment where the messiest and crudest of them were allowed free reign, though. I feel terrible when I let my own kitchen fall into disarray, so a chronically messy workplace would similarly affect my mood and productivity.

If this is to be taken at face value, though... oh well. They couldn't have been that committed to the work in the first place, and this is just separating the wheat from the chaff.


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## Mirannan (Mar 21, 2014)

Idyllic - It's "free rein". Tsk tsk. BTW, I'm not a natural grammar nazi, but on a board devoted to creative writing...


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## Idyllic (Mar 21, 2014)

Mirannan said:


> Idyllic - It's "free rein". Tsk tsk. BTW, I'm not a natural grammar nazi, but on a board devoted to creative writing...



A board for creative writing sounds more like a place for worrying about having something worth saying than about being able to speak without error. A forum post isn't a novel and errors are taken care of during editing.


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## Mirannan (Mar 23, 2014)

Idyllic - Let's agree to disagree. IMHO minor things like that have at least the potential to annoy readers and thus get in the way of one's storytelling. Sure, it doesn't really matter all that much in a forum post, but best not to let oneself get into bad habits...

And by the way, such things as "free reign" and "loose" when you mean "lose" are just the sort of errors that tend not to get picked up. Computer spellcheckers don't spot them, for a start.

After all that - I've just noticed that you are very new. Welcome to Chrons!


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## Brian G Turner (Mar 23, 2014)

Welcome to chronicles, Idyllic, and apologies for the rude start - I think Mirannan has confused you with someone else to playfully spar with, and it's not typical on the forums. 

Why not post in the Introductions section, so you can get a more friendly welcome to the forums?


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## Ursa major (Mar 23, 2014)

Idyllic said:


> A board for creative writing sounds more like a place for worrying about having something worth saying than about being able to speak without error. A forum post isn't a novel and errors are taken care of during editing.


Exactly.


(If it helps, think of the short life expectancy of the original grammar nazis, who, when meeting members of the Schutzstaffel, insisted that SS should be written as ß. )


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## chrispenycate (Mar 23, 2014)

Mirannan – you know me, I _am_ a grammar nazi, and I don't correct homophones or punctuation except in _critiques_, apart from a couple of bloomers from hopewrites who specifically gave me permission when she first joined.

Idyllic – Welcome in. People are generally friendly and polite here (they'd darn well better be. The ones who aren't are called 'mods', and make sure), so it's not worth getting prickly about supposed criticisms.

My, don't I sound moralistic?

I'm glad to say the existence of a Y chromosome is becoming less important in the workplace. When I went to university, sometime in the late bronze age, they were getting over the 'what's the use in educating them; they'll just get married and drop out to have kids? Teach her to type, which will feed her even while putting her in the presence of enough males to snag a husband,' mentality was on the wane, while a long way from being extinct (it hasn't completely died out yet, even in the affluent west , and there are places where the situation is worse than I ever knew), but the, I don't know, 'mustn't get your pretty little hands dirty with anything practical' philosophy was replacing it. I went to a science and technology college, and there were less than 5% of the population female. And none of the profs. We had to raid the Royal colleges of music, art and (believe it or not) needlework for companionship, female rôles in plays and soprano singing voices.

I put the shortage of hard SF female writers down to the education system of this time. There might have been lots of good female brains wallowing in the technological potentials of the future if it hadn't been for career advisors pointing out the unlikelyhood of anyone employing a female science graduate, or the relative salaries to be gained in law or politics, and diverting them to letters. It could have been their names on the posters.

There seemed to be a belief that the ability to lactate replaced the capacity for logical reason with 'intuition', a dangerous illogic. Never mind the Einstein had claimed that every one of his major advances had started as intuition, backed up later by mathematics; 'true' science slogged forth step by arduous step, establishing each position solidly before moving on to the next, without any conceptual leaps, and female brains were ill adapted to this task. The fact that enough individual cases completely invalidated this hypothesis didn't seem to worry anybody except the negligible population of female researchers.

Nor is it true that all women are neat and tidy workers, any more than that there are no fastidious male researchers.  In IT, as in other branches, there are the OCD members who iron their socks and align pencils, and are thoroughly ragged by the 'only in actual coding is precision something to be sought after' set, both available in all genders. I do not claim the 'you're a woman, you make the coffee and do the washing up' bunch is extinct yet, nor sympathise with them, but things are getting very slowly better. And it's up to the next generation to keep the progress advancing (come on, boys, think how much more fun it'll be to have girls working alongside, and pick up those cans and put them in the recycling).


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## Dave (Mar 24, 2014)

These stereotypes are perpetuated by TV soaps and comedy. Off the top of my head, I'm thinking of 'The Big Bang Theory', 'Spaced' and 'The IT Crowd' where the 'geeks' are always male and the 'normal' comedy foils are primarily female. Very rarely in a drama would the scientist be a woman, unless she is a forensic scientist.

I have a friend whose wife has a PhD. If they get a phone call from someone selling something it is_ always _assumed that he is the Doctor in the house.


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## Mouse (Mar 24, 2014)

Dave said:


> These stereotypes are perpetuated by TV soaps and comedy. Off the top of my head, I'm thinking of 'The Big Bang Theory', 'Spaced' and 'The IT Crowd' where the 'geeks' are always male and the 'normal' comedy foils are primarily female. Very rarely in a drama would the scientist be a woman, unless she is a forensic scientist.



This is one of the things* I hate about The Big Bang Theory. Even after they introduced Bernadette and Amy, there were still no geeky women. Penny doesn't even seem to know any pop culture stuff, like the Hulk or Buffy. There are _no_ women into comics, none of them like sci-fi or fantasy. Even that woman who Raj meets _in_ the comic store was only in there by accident! 

The only thing that show does really well, is Raj (after they got rid of the awful 'can't speak to women' crap), for daring to make him feminine _and_ straight.


*the other being Sheldon, who is _vile_.


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## Jo Zebedee (Mar 29, 2014)

Oh, I like Sheldon. I have to agree, though - there is, in general, a dearth of geeky girls. 

As a voctional trainer, specialising in training women managers, there is still a bias towards traditional roles. Some of this is perpetuated at school age - more to do with peer pressure than the schools, I think - but I wonder if we do actually give credence to the notion the different sexes are, perhaps, tuned in differenly? (Awaits fiery ball of flame) 

There are ten kids in my daughters' generation - 5 boys, 5 girls. Now, one of the boys is into drama, and my daughter is vastly into minecraft, but, by and large, get them together and the girls will be the ones playing with cute, small animals and the boys be the ones playing with the cars and mecccano. I know Lego got rubbished for making a girls' range, but my kid loves them. She also likes the Hobbit ones but has no interest at all in the construction ones.


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## Mouse (Mar 29, 2014)

springs said:


> There are ten kids in my daughters' generation - 5 boys, 5 girls. Now, one of the boys is into drama, and my daughter is vastly into minecraft, but, by and large, get them together and the girls will be the ones playing with cute, small animals and the boys be the ones playing with the cars and mecccano. I know Lego got rubbished for making a girls' range, but my kid loves them. She also likes the Hobbit ones but has no interest at all in the construction ones.



As always, _I_ think it depends on the person, not the gender. I played with cars and dinosaurs when I was a kid. My brother had a My Little Pony he used to play with (and I remember getting a _massive_ b*llocking off mum cos I wouldn't let him borrow a pony dress for her!) So... *shrugs*

I still need to read this book so that I can give more brainy answers to these sorts of things, rather than publicly announce my bro played with ponies.


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## tinkerdan (Mar 31, 2014)

I read this and laughed so hard my side ached.

Then I thought about possible 1950 posters with BEM with long tentacles and scantily clad women and thought that that might do it. But I have a feeling that's not what he's talking about.

In the mid eighties I worked with a college doing cyclotron research and our IT (not sure they called them that) was a woman.

In fact, way back when punch-cards were used and banks were just getting the notion that computers might help them my sister studied to become a keypunch operator and took a job with the bank.  What she experienced was the discovery that those positions could make good money suddenly brought a flood of male applicants who eventually squeezed out the initially all female group.

I think a similar thing happened way back when women were the first telephone operators and had men eventually squeezing them out of positions.

It might be more logical to conclude that we still tend to favor male applicants for these types of jobs. The type of logic in the OP quote is rather archaic and sounds like the usual hand waving obfuscation that occurs when trying to justify why there are no women working somewhere.


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## SFF Fan (Apr 3, 2014)

I do think the issue is a lot more complicated. But this may play a role; not the "messiness" of some programmers per se but just being in an environment where you feel like the odd one out.

I remember wanting to join a reading club at my elementary school when I was a kid. It had about 20 - 25 members, all of whom were female. The moment I saw this I backed out, embarrassed. (Not that I thought there was anything wrong with that, and I was kind of a feminine boy at that age, but as an 11 year old it would have been embarrassing socially).

I'm certainly not suggesting that adult women think like 11 year old boys in this way, only that it's easier to feel more comfortable moving somewhere, or joining something, when there are people like you there. Once that barrier is broken, it becomes a lot easier.



springs said:


> There are ten kids in my daughters' generation - 5 boys, 5 girls. Now, one of the boys is into drama, and my daughter is vastly into minecraft, but, by and large, get them together and the girls will be the ones playing with cute, small animals and the boys be the ones playing with the cars and mecccano.



Hey, a lot of the members of these forums were probably into both as a kid.  The combination of world-building and putting yourself into another character's head and all that.


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## Parson (Apr 3, 2014)

*Springs:

*I will join you in awaiting the flame, but I agree that you are describing what is (Boys tend to ______ and girls tend to ___________ . Now I don't know what causes this. I do know that there is more than one theory out there. But I think that it is helpful to describe what is, even while hoping for what should be. 

And what is, is that boys tend to be more in tech and mayhem, and girls more into social and catty.


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## Mouse (Apr 3, 2014)

I'm not a fan of* the 'girls tend to X and boys tend to Y' argument. For myself, I find it quite insulting. The world's not made up of neat little boxes people fit in to.







*understatement


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## SFF Fan (Apr 3, 2014)

Mouse said:


> I'm not a fan of* the 'girls tend to X and boys tend to Y' argument. For myself, I find it quite insulting. The world's not made up of neat little boxes people fit in to.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Yeah, and not only that, but it's often used to hand wave away problems that are not totally (or perhaps not even at all) biological in origin.

Don't get me wrong, there is a place for talking about biological (and social) sex differences. It's when people try to use "science" to steer social agendas (like defending a skewed sex ratio, as if it had only one cause) that I get antsy.

This goes for a lot of people who use a Marxist view of the world to evaluate every _social _phenomenon too, as opposed to simply using it as one (though a perfectly legitimate and insightful) lens. Stopping scientific research/discussion because one doesn't trust the human race to deal with the findings maturely sounds pretty cynical to me. (The thought that _everyone _is motivated by nothing but personal or political reasons, ironically, simplifies the complex human mind such people worry about others simplifing.)

But there is also such a thing as justifying your own pressures using what people_ call _science...but is really, you guessed it, also a personal emotional motivation. Usually it's not conscious sexism. These people (normally men) are usually just uncomfortable facing up to the fact that there is prejuduce against women in society. Not because they are weak minded, but because it tends to be hard for men (who don't experience much sexism, besides a heightened sense of social distrust in some situations) to see. No one likes being blamed for something they don't think is a problem (especially if they are not individually responsible for it).

You can spot such people easily because they tend to simply things. "But science shows...", they often begin, and then usually don't talk about any other factors, or quote journalists who are often just looking for a story - and are unschooled at interpreting scientific findings in a nuanced way. Women are not immune to this way of thinking, but those women who are interested in science are usually more acutely aware of the prejudice that exists in the field.


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## Jo Zebedee (Apr 3, 2014)

SFF Fan said:


> Y
> 
> 
> 
> Hey, a lot of the members of these forums were probably into both as a kid.  The combination of world-building and putting yourself into another character's head and all that.



And I was one of them.  of course it's not as simplistic as boys will be boys etc but I also think discounting gender preferences - whether learned, peer-led or natural - is, perhaps, a little limited.


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## hopewrites (Apr 3, 2014)

I would say that the only way one would have grounds to say that the IT field isnt cut out for "women" is if the only women in it were in the process (or had under gone the process) of transitioning their gender to fit the roll.

Since this is not the case (I know plenty of women in the IT field, so many so that I'm not sure where these "stats" are coming from) I have to wonder what brought the topic up at all?

A rash of women calling IT hotlines in hopes of a date?
No? 
What then?


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## SFF Fan (Apr 4, 2014)

springs said:


> And I was one of them.  of course it's not as simplistic as boys will be boys etc but I also think discounting gender preferences - whether learned, peer-led or natural - is, perhaps, a little limited.



Oh, that was just an observation about the sorts of people who enjoy speculative fiction; I am not saying that you are wrong about these trends. They're not really what I'm interested in anyway, not from a moral point of view. I, at least, don't think it's important to achieve a 50/50 ratio if women as a whole genuinely don't _want _to go into STEM careers.

But the fact is people _do_ use the existence of gender differences to hand wave misogyny in STEM fields (say) away, or at least to majorly downplay it. The two are seperate issues, and since society is something we (for the time being) have more control over I don't think it is moral to say "heh, a lot of it is just preference anyway" and not focus on the influence of prejudice. Biology is going to have its say anyway, to a certain extent no matter what we do; people who care about fighting sexism have to make sure we have ours. (Which should not be geared towards making a 50/50 ratio for its own sake, but making sure that people are free to choose and that talent is not wasted.)

Of course, it's only fair to not assume that people are being prejudiced, but when evidence suggests it we should focus on it, even when there are other factors at play.


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## Toby Frost (Apr 4, 2014)

I didn't mean to get into this discussion, but I must say that this seems like a rather sweeping generalisation:



> However, on this occasion it seems that by displaying the love of sci-fi publically it has a detrimental effect on encouraging women into the IT industry.



I'd be interested to know what these offices are like. If they are full of Boris Vallejo paintings of Conan and Dejah Thoris, then it would make sense. But the only IT departments I've ever know were full of wires, and had no pictures apart from the "inspiring" ones that the company makes you put up. Perhaps it's the thought of being trapped in a basement with the characters from The IT Crowd. That would put anyone off.


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## TitaniumTi (Apr 18, 2014)

I'm a woman who works in an IT-related field, after a series a career-shifts following job opportunities. There is not a science fiction poster in sight, and fashion is the most popular topic of conversation in my workplace (well, second to gossip).

I frequently encounter the nerd stereotype, which may be true of me , but is definitely not true of my IT colleagues.

I am particularly irritated by some non-IT colleagues who take pride in not understanding computing and maths "because" they're arts graduates, as if that precludes making any effort to understand technical topics.

Curiosity and a tendency to become deeply absorbed in details are traits that help me in my IT work; these traits also lead me to enjoy literature, from Dickens to Virginia Woolf via Jane Austen.


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## Michael Colton (Jul 21, 2014)

Does anyone have a link to the survey? Surveys mean little if you cannot examine the methodology behind it such as standard deviation, control variables, subjects, wording of questions, method of survey (internet, in-person, phone, etc.). Generally speaking, if a survey is conducted over the internet it is unscientific.


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## Mirannan (Jul 21, 2014)

Sodice said:


> Does anyone have a link to the survey? Surveys mean little if you cannot examine the methodology behind it such as standard deviation, control variables, subjects, wording of questions, method of survey (internet, in-person, phone, etc.). Generally speaking, if a survey is conducted over the internet it is unscientific.



Yup. Sampling bias, if nothing else. Although that particular part of the problem might be going away. The reason being the rather high proportion of people now connected to the Internet.

Mouse: Two words in that are rather important. Being the words "tend to". The difference in average level of interest in various things between the sexes is undeniable, although I don't see that as any reason why individuals who buck the trend should be penalised because of it. I don't have any problem with women who have welding as a hobby; equally, men who like flower arranging. (To take a couple of semi-random examples.)


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## Michael Colton (Jul 21, 2014)

Mirannan said:


> The reason being the rather high proportion of people now connected to the Internet.



It will still have the problem of subject verification. There is no way to guarantee that the person responding to the survey is who they say they are, so the data can never be used rigorously. Anyone can respond to a survey from another person's IP or some form of registered account. But that will not stop journalists using it in vague terms for a daily news story, obviously.



Mirannan said:


> The difference in average level of interest in various things between the sexes is undeniable, although I don't see that as any reason why individuals who buck the trend should be penalised because of it. I don't have any problem with women who have welding as a hobby; equally, men who like flower arranging. (To take a couple of semi-random examples.)



This varies greatly by culture, generation, and a vast variety of socioeconomic variables.


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## Vertigo (Jul 21, 2014)

I have never been able to explain this adequately. I have been teaching commercial software courses (in C++) since 1985 and I have never once in all that time taught a course with more women than men. My courses range from 3 or 4 delegates up to 15 to 20 and it is very rare for me to find more than 2 or 3 female delegates. Frequently there will be none. Also the statistics are the same whether at the client's own site or a remote site (it was once suggested that women are less likely to want to travel away for a course). All in all I would say the number of female delegates runs at maybe 5%, certainly less than 10%. I have always found this particularly annoying since, in my experience, women tend to be better at software than men.


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## Mirannan (Jul 21, 2014)

Sodice: Indeed. I believe calligraphy was quite popular with samurai, for example - and they were hardly effeminate. But I'm thinking of current Western norms here.


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## Michael Colton (Jul 21, 2014)

Mirannan said:


> Sodice: Indeed. I believe calligraphy was quite popular with samurai, for example - and they were hardly effeminate. But I'm thinking of current Western norms here.



Sure. My point was simply that even our norms are quite variable and can be largely attributed to cultural trends. A simplistic example would be how exaggerated masculinity is not seen as a universally appealing quality in men as it once was. While still a dominant trend, it is not as hegemonic. It is more common for men to get manicures, groom themselves a bit more fastidiously, not feel required to be obsessed with vehicles and sports, etc. The 'geek' norms have become more culturally acceptable, and so forth.

I was merely trying to point out that it is a misstep to attribute many of these cultural things as specifically having to do with differentiation between genders rather than differentiation in how cultures treat or form gender norms.


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## Vertigo (Jul 21, 2014)

There was an interesting study done a while ago (and it certainly is not conclusive) in which a number of toys - dolls and mechanical stuff like trucks - were put out in a chimpanzee (I think) enclosure and all the female chimps grabbed the dolls and 'nursed' them and the male chimps grabbed the mechanical toys and (if I remember correctly) proceeded to take them apart. I saw this 'experiment' redone on a TV documentary a few years back. Interesting though I wouldn't want to jump to any conclusions.

There is no doubt there are more physiological differences between men and women than just the difference in sex. And I agree separating out those differences and the cultural ones will always be difficult if not impossible.


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## Michael Colton (Jul 21, 2014)

Vertigo said:


> There was an interesting study done a while ago (and it certainly is not conclusive) in which a number of toys - dolls and mechanical stuff like trucks - were put out in a chimpanzee (I think) enclosure and all the female chimps grabbed the dolls and 'nursed' them and the male chimps grabbed the mechanical toys and (if I remember correctly) proceeded to take them apart. I saw this 'experiment' redone on a TV documentary a few years back. Interesting though I wouldn't want to jump to any conclusions.
> 
> There is no doubt there are more physiological differences between men and women than just the difference in sex. And I agree separating out those differences and the cultural ones will always be difficult if not impossible.



The primary distinction between the physiological differences (of which there happen to be very few, relatively speaking) and the cultural ones is that the physiological have a tendency to be largely inconsequential in modern society whereas the cultural ones heavily structure society as a whole.


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## Vertigo (Jul 21, 2014)

I agree completely but that almost makes it even harder to figure which are genuinely physiological. However there are some significant ones when we look at modern society. For example it is proven that women have better multitasking skills; they achieve this by readily moving tasks between the two halves of the brain in ways that men simply cannot do. Maybe that is one of the reasons why I have found women to be particularly good at software. However I do think that the particular issues raised by this thread are more down to cultural differences that physiological ones.


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## Michael Colton (Jul 21, 2014)

Vertigo said:


> I agree completely but that almost makes it even harder to figure which are genuinely physiological. However there are some significant ones when we look at modern society. For example it is proven that women have better multitasking skills; they achieve this by readily moving tasks between the two halves of the brain in ways that men simply cannot do. Maybe that is one of the reasons why I have found women to be particularly good at software. However I do think that the particular issues raised by this thread are more down to cultural differences that physiological ones.



And even examples such as the multitasking one, there are certainly biological males who are good at multitasking and biological females who are not which then limits the relevance of such a distinction to virtually null. And then you have the question of succinctly defining 'multitasking,' qualifying what it means to be considered 'good' at it, and deciding what relevance that differentiation could or should have for society.

The physiological differences that can be applied universally are nearly nonexistent. Broad categorizations of gender structures are culturally infused rather than physiologically - the physiological aspects of sex are often simply used as reinforcement for the cultural gender norms already established. John Stuart Mill pointed this out in a limited fashion in 1869 when he questioned why there should be cultural importance placed on the varying muscular capacities between the sexes.

And then on top of all this, there is the whole topic of there being more than two sexes such as intersex folks. That would obviously add a whole different layer of complexity to the issue, as would all of the other topics of discussion that fall out of the traditional binary categorization.

But yes, I think we essentially agree.


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## Mirannan (Jul 21, 2014)

Sodice: An excellent illustration of your point is that the gender conventions regarding colour (pink and blue, specifically) were reversed in the early 1920s. Pink was a boys' colour during WWI.


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## Michael Colton (Jul 21, 2014)

Mirannan said:


> Sodice: An excellent illustration of your point is that the gender conventions regarding colour (pink and blue, specifically) were reversed in the early 1920s. Pink was a boys' colour during WWI.



Or that Franklin Delano Roosevelt looking like this as a young boy was not considered odd at all.


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## tinkerdan (Jul 22, 2014)

So About the OP:
Does anyone know where it originates from.
I Can't seem to find any 2009 references that bring this to light.
And although there was a game designer by this name; other than that I wouldn't know where to start.

Using posters as a scapegoat seems like a good idea since experience tells me that there were probably some male members of IT who had some troubling ideas about women in their profession. We had an engineer where I work who thought that women were not wired properly mentally to become engineers and this was only two years ago.


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## wam (Jul 22, 2014)

Out of interest, when did the "geek" thing get applied to the IT/computer section and were there women in the field before that? I'd guess that there would be mostly male workers through the 60s simply because that was the state of technical and electrical trades at the time. Somewhere between the 70s and 90s (before PC/Packaged software) there was a gap for software skills with fair sized companies. There was no "geek" image and the IT department would either have stacks of printed reports or spares and parts (or both). There would generally be no personal decoration. I don't know it there was any increase in the amount of women in the field but that's about the time that politicians started complaining about the lack of women (especially) taking an interest in sciences. Now they say girls are more likely to do well in sciences that boys, maybe there will be a change. 
I don't think it's the image of an IT department putting women off but I don't think you'll see the posters in a modern IT department either.


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## Vertigo (Jul 22, 2014)

Well as I mentioned earlier, I started teaching software in the mid '80s and at that time there were hardly any women attending the courses I taught and I can't say it has changed even marginally since then; I still see hardly any women on my courses. Actually it's possible that there are _less_ now than when I started, certainly not more. I would also say (somewhat less categorically) that there are even fewer women working in hardware than in software. Again I don't know why except for cultural peer pressure.


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## Michael Colton (Jul 22, 2014)

Vertigo said:


> Well as I mentioned earlier, I started teaching software in the mid '80s and at that time there were hardly any women attending the courses I taught and I can't say it has changed even marginally since then; I still see hardly any women on my courses. Actually it's possible that there are _less_ now than when I started, certainly not more. I would also say (somewhat less categorically) that there are even fewer women working in hardware than in software. Again I don't know why except for cultural peer pressure.



I have heard the exact same thing from other computer scientists and software engineers that I know. As well as physicists, mathematicians, and analytic philosophers. The double-bind of these situations is that it is often the case when a woman does enter the fields, there is an inordinate amount of pressure, awkwardness (either in distaste or the reverse, fawning), and other unfortunate experiences that she will have to deal with. I am fortunate that my field is often quite diverse.


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## Vertigo (Jul 22, 2014)

Yes you're quite right, I'm sure it ends up becoming self-perpetuating.


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## tinkerdan (Jul 22, 2014)

Back in the late 60's my sister trained using punch cards and there were many women training then they went to work for the banks.

My guess is that just as with other technical professions, getting started left room for women and after getting established women were squeezed out. By squeezed out I mean that men were offered more money and that was one less inducement for women to apply.

As I mentioned before during the 80's I worked at the MSU Cyclotron where one of the heads of the IT department was a woman as far as I know she may still be there.


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## Dave (Jul 22, 2014)

Bletchley Park was almost completed staffed with women doing the calculations and decoding, and setting the bombes; the donkey work, but the heads of department, the mathematicians and Post Office engineers were all male. As tinkerdan says, banks used women to run the punched cards and data tape systems. However, that was the same in all professions at that time. 

When my school got a Commodore PET in 1977 it was all boys who took Computer Studies; the girls were not interested. It was the boys fighting to get time on the new toy. Some of my peers wrote games and sold them for actual real money - they were all male. I'm sure that was not a problem with my school because we had such a high proportion of girls taking Physics that inspectors came to find out why. Therefore, there has to have been a more all-encompassing reason why the girls did not get as excited about the computer and programming it.


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## JoanDrake (Jul 23, 2014)

Mouse said:


> This is one of the things* I hate about The Big Bang Theory. Even after they introduced Bernadette and Amy, there were still no geeky women. Penny doesn't even seem to know any pop culture stuff, like the Hulk or Buffy. There are _no_ women into comics, none of them like sci-fi or fantasy. Even that woman who Raj meets _in_ the comic store was only in there by accident!
> 
> The only thing that show does really well, is Raj (after they got rid of the awful 'can't speak to women' crap), for daring to make him feminine _and_ straight.
> 
> ...




I HATE that show. The only real and true actual rocket scientist I know is probably the most socially graceful person I've ever met too. He's worked with some of the most advanced mathematics luminaries in the world, yet you would never know it to speak to him. He just appears a charming ,interesting and sophisticated person, very approachable and without an ounce of pretension. If we had stereotypes where a bunch of Aframs sat around eating watermelon and playing dice all day everyone would go crazy, but we act like physicists are these airy-fairy sorts who can't speak to women, are obsessed with comic books and know nothing of the real world. 


And Sheldon isn't a geek, he's just a jerk. Everybody used to go on about how all the Seinfeld characters were unlikable, but at least they weren't downright MEAN.


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## Vertigo (Jul 23, 2014)

I have to agree with you one hundred percent on this, Joan. However we do seem to be in a minority. I've never understood its attraction, I just find it immensely painful to watch.


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## Michael Colton (Jul 23, 2014)

While it may not be a very nice way to put it, the most common criticism for The Big Bang Theory that I hear is that it is 'blackface for geeks.' I myself have only seen one episode, but most of the self-described geeks or nerds I know characterize it that way.


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## Ravenna (Jul 27, 2014)

SFF Chronicles News said:


> *16th December 2009 04:05 AM*
> 
> David Allen
> 
> ...



Perhaps I can use this reason in the future, if I want to resign myself? 



Coke cans can be found in any office-job though, not just the IT-industry. Lol at this survey.


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## Dave (Oct 20, 2014)

Dave said:


> ...there has to have been a more all-encompassing reason why the girls did not get as excited about the computer and programming it.


This graph has been posted on Reddit a couple of days ago and discussed on Twitter:






I think that whatever the problem was, it began in 1984. Isn't that when Microsoft released PC DOS 3.1?


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## Ray McCarthy (Oct 21, 2014)

I think it was when it became mugs game of insane specs, negatively long hours, moving goal posts, total mismanagement etc.
I wish over the last 30 years I hadn't been involved in Software or PCs. I think all those other careers are smarter.


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## tinkerdan (Oct 21, 2014)

@Dave
Did you listen to the npr broadcast that accompanied that graph?
Though they came up with one plausible scenario I think they were short sighted.
Their thought was that the new toy the pc was brought into the homes and placed with the boys and not girls-which is somewhat true.[giving boys a better chance.]
But at the same time salaries for computer science were beginning to rise and there was a renewed interest in getting a piece of that pie.
We still had inequity in wages between men an women.
So giving the boys a jump-start with almost an assurance that they would get the higher wages would have flooded that field with new interest so that even the women with high scores in mathematics could not keep up and had less incentive to do so.

All of the above though kicks this back to 1977 seven year earlier when all those college students were teens and the first personal computers were coming out in 1976 and 1977. Which is not really mentioned in the broadcast.
The commodore the apple and the tsr-80 end up in the hands of the young male enthusiasts giving them a technical advantage. In 1977 few people would bat an eye at the possibility of the exclusion of young girls in the enjoyment of this hobbyist activity.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014/10/17/356944145/episode-576-when-women-stopped-coding


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## The Bravest Newbie (Dec 14, 2014)

Well this might explain why only 5% of my beloved EVE online's player base is female.


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