A Request to Women Working in Tech

[noahgibbs]

A friend recently said something about which, as Shanna's father, I feel conflicted.

She said that as a woman working in technology, she wouldn't recommend that other women enter the field. She's a system administrator. So, while she's not a computer programmer like myself, she's in a very similar field with mostly similar interpersonal dynamics. That is to say, what she says almost certainly applies to my field if it applies to hers. And as an actual woman working in technology, her experience is going to be significantly more accurate than my from-the-outside impressions.

I'm not going to repeat her reasons here. Rather, I'd be very curious whether other women working in technical fields, especially system administration and/or programming, felt the same way. Anybody care to comment? When you comment, please let me know what you do/did in technology. For some of you, I'll know offhand. For many of you, I'll have forgotten. For anybody who comments, there may be other readers who don't know/remember.

Anonymous comments are turned on here. Technically I *do* log IPs and I don't see a quick way to turn it off just for this post, but you have my word that I won't attempt to match up anybody anonymous here with any specific person. If you're really worried for some reason, there are many fine technical measures to make that tracking ineffective at finding you.

Comments

[rightkindofme.livejournal.com]

I am probably reading you wrong, but I feel fussy so I'm going to respond to you. Yes, things will be different in 15 years. I still want to know how things actually are for women rather than seeing things through a Pollyanna type lens. I want women to feel comfortable speaking their truth and not feel shut down. I kind of read your comment as, "Yeah that's your experience but things will be different so don't rain on someone else's parade" and that bothers me.

There is the possibility that in 15 years things will magically be 100% welcoming to women, I'm not holding my breath. I will encourage my daughter to go into tech if she wants to but I want her to do so knowing she is fighting an uphill battle if it exists.

As for traditionally male industries: I worked as a theatre tech for a few years. I got a lot of sexist, nasty treatment. It really wasn't worthwhile for me. Yes, it is better than it used to be. It still isn't good enough.

[dangerpudding.livejournal.com]

FWIW, my read of the "in 15 years things will be different" comment - at least the initial one - isn't "in 15 years things won't be sexist" but rather noting that what I (and spaghettisquash) do for a living wasn't really even a glimmer in anyone's eye when I was 2 years old - so encouraging an interest in it may have little/nothing to do with where things up. More "in 15 years, knowing how to program may be like knowing how to breathe"... I am seeing an awful lot of english majors and the like taking programming classes right now.

[spaghettisquash.livejournal.com]

I am totally happy to discuss my experiences in a non-public post (I picked out a few incidents in my post in March about why I was quitting my job). I do not actually believe that people in non-gender-normative jobs will not be punished by their peers for doing so at any point in my lifetime. The US military is actually putting energy into their problem - private industry tends to ignore the elephant in the room. My hope is that the military will set a good example on this front.

It clear that some of these commenters do not actually experience sexism (or do not notice the sexism that surrounds them), and that is awesome! I am happy for them. Honestly, if I knew what I was getting into I would have found a different field to work in. Some days, I do not want to be an example of a woman that can man up.

Some people think that IT is not better than it used to be (ie, it improved in the 80s and declined in the late 90s, so we are not at 60s level of hostility). It varies a lot; dangerpudding's new job sounds amazingly awesome. Most of my jobs have been on par with the rest of her career.

[kest]

I too have worked in entertainment tech in the past (including theatre, nightclubs, etc.) and I did get a lot of sexist treatment here in the bay area. Then I spent six months working in NYC and it was astounding to me how different that industry could be - I saw little to no sexism while I was there, and crews frequently had multiple women on them with no problems. The stuff I used to hear here...'oh women can't handle road cases, they aren't strong enough'...there, if the roadcases are extra heavy they just put two people on them and no one raises an eyebrow because there's plenty of people around to get the truck unloaded. But they also abused their crews less in other ways - the union is very strong there, so even if you're working outside the union, they are very careful about things like four hour minimums, always making sure you get your break, conscientiously tracking overtime, and so forth, where as here there is a lot of pressure to work through breaks because 'we've got to get this done' and so forth. Anyway, it changed my perspective a lot, both in that it isn't me, it's definitely them, and in that a lot of what you get is what you stand up for - it's self perpetuating if everyone just accepts it as the standard operating procedure, but if enough people demand change it will happen. And that industries and companies that, in general, treat their employees well will be more likely to treat women well. That said, I haven't done any work in the entertainment industry in awhile, because it *isn't* worthwhile for me - it's not just work, it's a battle, and I'm not sure it's a battle I personally really want to fight right now.

[rightkindofme.livejournal.com]

:) Good to hear that the other coast does it better. To be fair, the main reason I left theatre is because I am a somewhat extreme morning person. I just couldn't do the hours. The fact that I was at my crankiest during peak work hours meant I was completely unwilling to put up with the stupid sexist crap and I was more bothered than I would have been at a civilized hour of the day.

Amusingly, it wasn't being able to lift things where I got the most shit. It was one boss asking me nearly daily "Have you been trained on this" after I had been working there for three years. (He would ask me if I knew how to use a hand drill when I was one of two people in the place who had been trained on *all* of the equipment.) This would have been less annoying if he didn't assume that every guy who walked through the door was fine with a bandsaw. It was another boss who would continually ask if I was PMSing when I told him that what he wanted me to do was unreasonable. (Sorry dude I can't do 25 hours of work in two days. I really can't.)

But despite all that it was the hours that really drove me out. :) I liked the job overall.

[noirem.livejournal.com]

There's a quote I like, originally from the bible but I picked it up from West Wing: Sufficient unto the day are the evils therein. Don't borrow trouble. And yes, I merely meant that things will be different. Better? Worse? Who knows. But I think that backing away from teaching Shanna to program from an early age because it's an awful field for women now is the wrong thing to worry about.

You guys are very conscientiously raising her to be her own person and I have faith in your ability to communicate that some people are assholes and assholes congregate with other assholes so you tend to find a lot of them together and to pick her assholes.

That said, I think it's good that Noah is now conciously looking for this particular form of misogyny in the world around him as being aware of it -> noticing when it happens -> being able to say "that's not okay" -> less misogyny in 15-20 years when Shanna may be looking for a career in programming or sys-admin or any field where similarly conscientious men have been telling other men to be people and not assholes. But I figured that was a given so I didn't mention it in my first resposne :o)

Also, don't discount the power of Barbie with her name spelt in binary across her bright pink shirt to change the hearts and minds of an industry.*

*yes, that was tongue-in-cheek.