GNOME 2.15.3 has been released. This is a development release, en route to GNOME 2.16, scheduled for September 2006. Release notes and download instructions are listed in the release anouncement. In the meantime, GNOME needs girls.
GNOME 2.15.3 has been released. This is a development release, en route to GNOME 2.16, scheduled for September 2006. Release notes and download instructions are listed in the release anouncement. In the meantime, GNOME needs girls.
Well I, for one, am greatly suprised. I mean I got in this field to meet women.
I did something I’ve never done before: instantly give you +5. Best comment I have seen in *ages*!
Hi, my name is Eugenia. 33, f, Bay Area. Looking for friendship, possibly more. Oh, I like Gnome too. Don’t tell my husband.
Edited 2006-06-16 20:46
If I could mod you up to a million I would…lmfao.
Its women, not girls. I guess the 13 year old cheer squad can sign up, but they are wanting to incorporate “Women.”
Its like saying Gnome is made of “Boys.” Now some younger people are involved because the community is not agist, but WTF osnews, its “Women.”
* sigh *
What are you talking about? The most handsome people in Gnome community are Havoc and Nat. Both younger than me. In other words, “boys”.
Heehee
Yeah, problem is, they’re all straight – oh, and Miguel de Icaza looks like my cousin; so sure, maybe in Kansas, that might been seen as a turn on, but in my neck of the woods, it would be classed as creepy.
Its murpheys law, all the good men are either straight, taken, or overseas, far, far away.
It’s a simple alliteration, I’m sure. I don’t think it’s any reason to release the hounds. “GNOME needs girls” has a much better ring to it than “GNOME needs women” or “GNOME needs females”.
I’m starting to get tired of reverse discrimination. I had a good friend of mine get turned down from MIT even with a 1550 SAT and an extremely well-rounded resume (at 18!) for his age. Lots of activities, etc. I then found out later that the admission “quota” so to speak (however you want to put it) hadn’t been met for minorities, so instead of my friend getting in, some guy with a 1300 SAT and no qualifications/effort put into it, got in. Why? Because he was a minority.
Now, the reasoning behind this kind of thing was sound, just the implimentation doesn’t work. You may be wondering why I cite this example. I’m getting tired of being discriminated against for not being female. Say you want about male stereotypes and so forth, but there isn’t a damn thing I can do about the way things work in reality. Let’s face it, if you’re a good looking female, you’ll get hired places that otherwise you wouldn’t just based on looks. A guy with the same resume, would get turned down. Heck, I see it all the time where guys with MUCH better resumes (and personalities!) get turned down.
This isn’t a slam against women, at all, nor am I trying to be a pig. I’m not accusing women of doing anything wrong, they aren’t. It’s our way of “correcting” the injustices women have had occur to them. There is no denying that it has/is occuring. The problem is, our solution *SUCKS* and it really screws over people who have absolutely nothing to do with the problem, and it *helps* the people who are PART of the problem.
Now, to the current issue:
“BOSTON, Mass – June 13, 2006 – The GNOME Foundation is offering USD$9000 to female students in order to promote the participation of women in GNOME-related development.”
“Vincent Untz, member of the GNOME Foundation board and coordinator of the GNOME team for Google’s “Summer of Code” program, explained: “Many women have the skills required to contribute to Free Software projects like GNOME, but may not see an opportunity to start working with us. By initiating this program, not only do we want to highlight the issue, but we also hope that this opportunity will help more women to get involved in the long term.””
This is funny. One of the absolute wonders of OSS programming, is ANYBODY can get involved. It doesn’t matter if you’re female, you have 7 legs, you speak from your ass..whatever… there are no barriers to entry other than technical ability, the equipment you need, and connectivity. So now we are offering money to women to come do what they already CAN do, and there is already NO discrimination! Basically, offering this money is like saying “we want more chicks, so we’ll bribe you to come code.” As far as I’m concerned *that* is sexist.
There are lots of problems in society concerning race, gender, etc. Let’s fix them properly, NOT contribute to them by reinforcing people who take advantage of those particular attributes. Use that money to help support any developers, male or female, whatever race – based on what they do/contribute. Don’t just give it away to people for being female. You’re just discriminating in reverse, and you’re further reinforcing sexism.
Yuck, sorry for the rant, but this has gotten absurd now. We need to fix the problems, help those who need it, and reinforce gender equality, racial equality, etc. Throwing money at a certain group of people for one of their attributes does the opposite. Sucks.
Since I can’t use edit (wtf guys, stop changing everything around!) I’d like to make an addition..
“Let’s face it, if you’re a good looking female, you’ll get hired places that otherwise you wouldn’t just based on looks. A guy with the same resume, would get turned down. Heck, I see it all the time where guys with MUCH better resumes (and personalities!) get turned down. ”
I forgot to mention, females with the same resume, but without supermodel looks (or better resume) would get turned down too.
“Edit” works fine on osnews. There is a 20min window to make your editing. I just used it above.
It’s not even 20 mins since I posted, and I still can’t use it. I click the little chain (direct link for comment) and there is NO edit button.
The “Edit” link is not where you looked. It’s at the link bar below your existing comment. In the main comment’s page.
http://corenode.com/~ormandj/images/screenshots/noedit.png
Where?
Do you read what I write or you still have your own mind on things? I told you, the “Edit” link is in the MAIN page of comments, NOT in the “direct link” page of your comment. It’s in this page http://www.osnews.com/comment.php?news_id=14914 (for 20 mins)
Edit:
I am very unhappy making off topic comments on a story. In the future, if you have a problem, email the osnews team and don’t comment off topic that can spur other off topic replies like I had to do in your case.
Edited 2006-06-16 21:11
I’m not going to reply what I think about that, because I’ll end up banned. So sure, whatever you say. It’s just hard to prove if I can’t show there is no edit. Anyways, since you still keep blasting me and treating me like a child, I’ll take a screenshot of this comment, on the “main” page of comments. Perhaps being a bit more clear might help? Way to treat somebody who didn’t try to upset you… if it was that big of a deal you could have just mailed me to discuss it there, or asked me POLITELY. It’s not like I set out to irritate anybody. Screenshot will follow, then I’m done.
http://corenode.com/~ormandj/images/screenshots/noedit2.png
See? Hasn’t been 20 minutes since the post, no edit button.
You’re really talking to the wrong person if you’re looking for politeness, or any good manners for that matter.
That’s because Adam had to remove some links from the bar in the threaded versions, because then they don’t fit in some cases. The “Edit” function works in the DEFAULT view of osnews, and that’s the flat view. Originally, the threaded version was even discouraged from using it.
Ok, thanks, that’s all I was looking for. I wasn’t doing something wrong, and I wasn’t trying to insult anybody – I just didn’t know threaded view created such problems, and it isn’t listed anywhere I can see. Forgive me..
http://corenode.com/~ormandj/images/screenshots/noedit3.png
Same problem, flat mode..
Now, that’s a real bug, and I think it has to do with the fact that you don’t use the default timezone (so the server thinks that 20 minutes have passed). I will tell Adam.
Ok, and feel free to delete all these extra threads. I’ll leave the screenshots up at the current URLs. Sorry again to have bothered you.
There is no edit link in threaded view, hasn’t been for some time time now. I’ve emailed Adam about it before.
This is funny. One of the absolute wonders of OSS programming, is ANYBODY can get involved. It doesn’t matter if you’re female, you have 7 legs, you speak from your ass..whatever… there are no barriers to entry other than technical ability, the equipment you need, and connectivity. So now we are offering money to women to come do what they already CAN do, and there is already NO discrimination!
Read the section “What problem? Sexism is dead!” in Val Henson’s “HOWTO Encourage Women in Linux”:
http://infohost.nmt.edu/~val/howto.html#i__145605744_143
Now come back here and tell me again that there’s no discrimination.
Sexist discrimination happens all over the place in free software projects. Behind the partial anonymity of IRC and mailing lists, people will say all sorts of things they would never say in the workplace. People will blame “female logic” or “her time of the month” for problems a woman has. Women are faced with unwanted sexual advances, or, if they’re not particularly attractive, are ridiculed for their looks.
I have seen all of this happen many, many times. This is overt sexism, and something has to be done about it.
I can cite many such examples. As I said, sexism is still there, and it still occurs. Did you read my comment?
“Now come back here and tell me again that there’s no discrimination. ”
I never said there is *no* discrimination. I said OSS is free of discrimination, as in the model behind it. There is nothing about OSS development that discriminates. There might be people involved in OSS that do, but does throwing 9000 bucks at females fix that? No. That was my point.
“Sexist discrimination happens all over the place in free software projects. Behind the partial anonymity of IRC and mailing lists, people will say all sorts of things they would never say in the workplace. People will blame “female logic” or “her time of the month” for problems a woman has. Women are faced with unwanted sexual advances, or, if they’re not particularly attractive, are ridiculed for their looks.”
Half of this I already said. Guess what, people say all kinds of bad things about men too. What’s the point? I’ve seen “sexist pig” used against a man who told a woman her code was too buggy to be made part of the main trunk of a project I was working on. Guess what, her code was, it was sloppy. That doesn’t make the guy who told her so a sexist pig. Of COURSE people act like idiots. NOTHING we can do about that. However, we can start leading by example, instead of supporting the PROBLEM by tossing money around in discriminitory ways.
“I have seen all of this happen many, many times. This is overt sexism, and something has to be done about it.”
Well, while you’re off fixing anti-female sexism, why don’t you fix insulting behavior, bad hygene, and the various other issues of humankind. Hint: you can’t. The only thing we can do is make the environment condusive to *good* people, and giving people 9 grand for being female doesn’t do that. It invites the women who take advantage of being female to get places. THOSE are the true enemies of the women who “if they’re not particularly attractive, are ridiculed for their looks”. Oddly enough, most of *that* occurs by other women, at least in my experience. You want to encourage the good women to be involved in the project. Run some campaign that you want to encourage fair treatment, and you’re looking for really good coders, no matter their race/sex/whatever. Offer 9 grand to be split amongst them. Then, any women who want – can apply – and all get equal chances at the money. Same for men. Solve the PROBLEM, don’t treat the symptoms.
I can cite many such examples. As I said, sexism is still there, and it still occurs. Did you read my comment?
Yes, I read it all. And I definitely read the part I quoted, in which you said “there is already NO discrimination!” And now in this comment:
I never said there is *no* discrimination.
Wow. Well, all right, you followed up with this:
I said OSS is free of discrimination, as in the model behind it. There is nothing about OSS development that discriminates.
Well, whoop-dee-doo. There’s nothing in capitalism that discriminates, but we have discrimination in for-profit companies. Do the ideals of free software discriminate against women? Not that I can tell. Do the principles of open source discriminate against women? It doesn’t seem so.
Is there actual discrimination in free software projects? Yes, and that’s what matters. Who cares if the ideals aren’t discriminating. The communities are.
We have to change people’s attitudes. The outreach program is not a complete solution, but it has the potential to give a quick infusion of an under-represented and discriminated-against group of people. In bold, so it’s clear:
Groups of people are better able to defend themselves against discriminatory attacks than individuals.
<snip snip>
“Yes, I read it all. And I definitely read the part I quoted, in which you said “there is already NO discrimination!” And now in this comment:”
<snip snip>
Don’t take things out of context, I clarified that part. I was referring to the OSS model itself. Singular cases of everything occur. For every woman discriminated against, there are minorities, men, whatever – you name it discriminated against too.
“Well, whoop-dee-doo. There’s nothing in capitalism that discriminates, but we have discrimination in for-profit companies. Do the ideals of free software discriminate against women? Not that I can tell. Do the principles of open source discriminate against women? It doesn’t seem so. ”
That was my point. #1 – I have already openly admitted there are cases here and there of all kinds of discrimination. What’s your point? It’s not the model that’s flawed..
#2 – I was speaking about the principles, and you’ve just restated what I said. Ok.
“Is there actual discrimination in free software projects? Yes, and that’s what matters. Who cares if the ideals aren’t discriminating. The communities are.”
Give me a break! Are you a utopianist? There will ALWAYS be discrimination. The problem is when it is endorsed. It used to be, in fact the government backed it. That’s been going away over the years, now we’ve gotten reverse discrimination in some cases. See my first post example. Discrimination is going to occur as long as human beings are flawed (always…) The key is making the environment poor for those who discriminate, and pleasent for those who are fair. THAT is what matters.
Oh, and about the communities discriminating, no thanks. That’s not true. One or two individuals might, but it’s not communities as a whole. Point to me where everybody in the OSOL project is discriminating. Sorry, you can’t.
“We have to change people’s attitudes. The outreach program is not a complete solution, but it has the potential to give a quick infusion of an under-represented and discriminated-against group of people. In bold, so it’s clear: Groups of people are better able to defend themselves against discriminatory attacks than individuals.”
Uh…
It has the potential to get money-whore women involved who are only after the gain in wealth. Do you really want them? It’s not even close to a solution, it’s a treatment of a symptom, and it’s not even a good one at that. You’re just discriminating against men, straight up and no regret.
“Groups of people are better able to defend themselves against discriminatory attacks than individuals.”
Oh really? What does this have to do with OSS communities? Do you need a “support group” when you get called a bad name on the internet? Why the heck do you need some group to defend yourself? You don’t have to defend yourself at all. If people are jerks in OSS, then their project probably sucks, and you don’t want to be working on it anyways. The whole point of OSS is for people who enjoy what they are doing to be able to share code freely with each other and work together in a harmonious group. If the group is full of pigs, feminists, racists, whatever – don’t participate. There are PLENTY of great projects out there needing people, men/women/black/white/whatever, who are lovely people. Join one of those projects.
So you’re telling me that women need to be paid to join GNOME because they need a group to defend themselves against the sexist pig men in the GNOME project? Sounds like a fundamental problem with GNOME itself, and not one paying off some females is going to fix.
Yikes, if you’re female or male it matters not – you’re really giving a bad impression of yourself – and I for one certainly wouldn’t want to work with you on a project. If you happened to be female, I suppose you’d call me sexist pig?
Your whole argument is based on a flawed premise. You seem to believe that the lack of overt discrimination is what creates an equal society. But that’s far from the truth. In actuality, inequality breeds discrimination which perpetuates inequality.
In a world where women had equal standing with men, we would not need affirmative action. Women engineers would encourage their daughters to go into engineering, and the equillibrium would maintain itself. But we do not live in such a world. We live in a world where the very fact that women are rare in engineering socializes people to see women scientists and engineers as anomalies, which affects their behavior towards women.
Two psychological and sociological factors are to blame. First, our actions are deeply affected by our subconscious precepts. This isn’t some frou-frou hippy idea (I’m an engineer, I don’t do frou-frou), it’s a matter of psychological fact. If we see women in engineering and science as anomalies, we will act discriminatorily towards them. Moreover, women, who are socialized by the same forces as men, will discriminate against themselves, for reasons that are not consciously obvious to them. Second, our foundational influences come from our parents. If our parents are conditioned to see women in science as anomalies, they will be less likely to encourage their daughters to pursue the field.
Together, these two factors perpetuate our current equillibrium, even in the abscence of overt discrimination. Of course, one could argue that an equillibrium is an equillibrium, and the means are more important than the ends. While this is true in a way, it also neglects the fact that the means aren’t just about what you do now, but about what you have done. The current equillibrium exists because overt discrimination against women existed in the past. While men may not be contributing to the maintainence of the discriminatory equillibrium now, they are still benefiting from it. Is that a just society? Where sons enjoy status because of the crimes of their fathers? From that perspective, it makes strong sense to commit some minor injustices (reverse discrimination), in order to reach a new, more equitable, equillibrium.
“Your whole argument is based on a flawed premise. You seem to believe that the lack of overt discrimination is what creates an equal society. But that’s far from the truth. In actuality, inequality breeds discrimination which perpetuates inequality.”
Uh, no? I never said that. I said people, humans – will never treat each other *equally*. Just like we will never stop hurting each other, this isn’t utopia. Your arguments are based on a utopian viewpoint, that’s fine – it’s also not realistic. It has nothing to do with sexism/racism/whatever being hidden or non-hidden. It makes no difference if it’s out in the open or behind closed doors. We all know it occurs sometimes, but it occurs BOTH ways. Don’t think for a second female management is any more likely to hire a man for a job than male management is to hire a female. It works both ways, maybe you need to wake up and smell the coffee?
“In a world where women had equal standing with men, we would not need affirmative action. Women engineers would encourage their daughters to go into engineering, and the equillibrium would maintain itself. But we do not live in such a world. We live in a world where the very fact that women are rare in engineering socializes people to see women scientists and engineers as anomalies, which affects their behavior towards women.”
Uh, how is it not equal? I hear women talking trash about men, just as disgustingly as men talking trash about women (for their gender.) There are stereotypes working in *both* directions. Exactly how are women discriminated against socially now? I don’t see any laws, government actions, requirements, etc that prevent women from taking an engineering spot, over a man. There might be some situations where sexism does exist (as it ALWAYS will) but the vast majority of employeers do not discriminate anymore. The big abusers got wiped out following the women’s rights movement. Now in the “Sensitive” era, it’s almost been exterminated.
“Two psychological and sociological factors are to blame. First, our actions are deeply affected by our subconscious precepts. This isn’t some frou-frou hippy idea (I’m an engineer, I don’t do frou-frou), it’s a matter of psychological fact. If we see women in engineering and science as anomalies, we will act discriminatorily towards them.”
I hope you never attempt a career at psychology, stick to engineering, you have absolutely no clue what you’re talking about. At all. That is no fact, and I challenge you to back it up. You don’t discriminate against people because they are different, you discriminate against people because YOU have a flawed view/stereotype of them. It has nothing to do with being different or not. Hitler didn’t discriminate against *** people because they were “different”, he discriminated against them because he was a SICK man and had STRANGE views of the world, and in general his mind was warped and his vision distorted.
I have green eyes, and most of the pacific islanders here in Hawaii have brown eyes. That makes me different. Guess what! They don’t discriminate against me. I won’t even get into the fact that being Greek, I have light skin, and that’s hardly the norm in Hawaii. Yet somehow, I’m not discriminated against. Nor do I discriminate against others, no matter how different they are. This is a *PERSONAL CHOICE*, it has nothing to do with innate differences. You’re yet again stereotyping and trying to assign “rules” to things based on attributes. This IS discrimination…..
“Together, these two factors perpetuate our current equillibrium, even in the abscence of overt discrimination. Of course, one could argue that an equillibrium is an equillibrium, and the means are more important than the ends. While this is true in a way, it also neglects the fact that the means aren’t just about what you do now, but about what you have done. The current equillibrium exists because overt discrimination against women existed in the past. While men may not be contributing to the maintainence of the discriminatory equillibrium now, they are still benefiting from it. Is that a just society? Where sons enjoy status because of the crimes of their fathers? From that perspective, it makes strong sense to commit some minor injustices (reverse discrimination), in order to reach a new, more equitable, equillibrium.”
Do you want to say discrimination and equillibrium again? You didn’t say it enough yet. Beyond your over-use of two words you seem fond of, and the almost non-sensical way you wrote that last paragraph, I’m going to give it a shot.
You’re saying because people before our time discriminated against women, the fact that I’m male means I’m benefitting from it now? Somehow I’m enjoying comforts/etc because I’m male, because some guys were jerks to women before I was born? You’re insane. I’m enjoying status for the “crimes” of my father? This would earn you a swift kick in the butt off a bridge where I’m from.
So, to summarize, you think we should compensate women now for the unjust acts that happened in the past, at the expense of men because men are right now enjoying the fruits of discrimination in the past? Boy, you really have a skewed perspective. I don’t know what world you live on, but I’m glad it’s not mine.
I’m done with this conversation, unless you’re going to back up your so-called “facts”, as well as your mythological psychology. I’m not psychologist either, but I did grow up with the advisor to the surgeon general on psychiatry, and I picked up a few things here and there. One thing was the “BS Detector”, and it’s buzzing loudly as you proclaim your psychological facts.
We all know it occurs sometimes, but it occurs BOTH ways. Don’t think for a second female management is any more likely to hire a man for a job than male management is to hire a female.
Yes, but since the majority of people in decision-making positions are males, more females get screwed over by “inevitable unfairness” then males. This is a consequence of your own argument!
Anyway, I don’t think we can make a society in which no discrimination exists. I do think we can make a society in which the discrimination that does exist doesn’t overwhelmingly hurt women versus men.
Uh, how is it not equal? I hear women talking trash about men, just as disgustingly as men talking trash about women (for their gender.) There are stereotypes working in *both* directions.
I’m uninterested in stereotypes or trash talking. Those things, while distasteful, don’t really have a deep social or economic impact. What does have an impact is the fact that women are substantially underrepresented in high-paying jobs, so much so that the averge woman’s salary is much less than an average man’s salary.
Exactly how are women discriminated against socially now?
Women are discriminated against on multiple levels. Starting at birth, girls are treated differently than boys, and pushed in different directions than boys. It only gets worse as they mature. Just because it’s not government sponsored or systematic doesn’t mean its not epidemic.
The big abusers got wiped out following the women’s rights movement.
The malicious abusers were mostly wiped out, in some places. However, the biggest abusers aren’t malicious. The moment some mother decides to push her daughter into literature instead of engineering is an act of discrimination. It’s not a malicious act, but its an act that is created by the inequality of achivement that exists today between men and women.
I hope you never attempt a career at psychology, stick to engineering… general his mind was warped and his vision distorted.
You misunderstood my point completely. I didn’t say you discriminate against people who are different from you (though you do). I said your actions may be discriminatory based on discriminatory precepts, even if you are not consciously trying to discriminate. This is a very well-understood phenomenon in psychology. One manifestation of it, the “self fulfilling prophecy”, shows that teachers will act in a way as to encourage high achievement in a student that he has been told shows high promise, while not acting in that way towards students that he has been told show low promise.
Heck, even Business 101 classes will teach you that preconceptions can have major impacts on training. One study took a group of women who had all scored similarly on a pre-qual exam, and put them through two similar training courses (in a factory environment). For one group, the management told the trainers that the subjects had scored particularly highly on the pre-qual, and for the other group, the management told the trainers that the subjects had scored low on the pre-qual. When the women were given aptitude tests after training, the ones that had been positively recommended performed much better than the ones that hadn’t. Everything else was the same — except the trainers’ preconceptions about the people they were training.
You have to wonder, why are there so few women in science and engineering, when so many of the previous barriers have been broken down? In the absence of such barriers, you’d think that women would enter the field at the same rate as men, all else being equal. Therefore, something is responsible. That something could either be biology, or socialization. There is scant evidence for the biology argument, and a lot more evidence for the socialization argument.
Put simply, women aren’t entering engineering and science because they don’t want to. But they don’t want to, because society, from their own parents to their friends to their teachers to the media, give them the idea that they don’t belong there.
Nor do I discriminate against others, no matter how different they are. This is a *PERSONAL CHOICE*, it has nothing to do with innate differences.
Bullshit. There is an article about this very topic in the June ’06 issue of Scientific American. It shows that even people who “choose” not to discriminate still show discriminatory behavior when tested. At the deepest levels, it’s not a choice, it’s socialization. That’s why studies show that even young children hold discriminatory views favoring their own race. The same article points out how studies show that hispanic children perceive themselves positively relative to black children, but negatively relative to white children. Are you telling me that they choose to perceive the world that way?
You’re saying because people before our time discriminated against women, the fact that I’m male means I’m benefitting from it now?
Don’t give me the “before our time” bullshit. Society has memory, and people pass their lot in life from generation to generation. When all the women in your population are homemakers, because they are forced to be, the next generation isn’t going to achieve a normal distribution of professions just because the overt discriminatory measures were taken away.
You criticized my use of the word “equillibrium”, but failed to see that I used it because it’s the crux of your argument. Your argument is predicated on a belief that in the abscence of instituational discrimination, society will reach an equillibrium that is, in some way, “fair” (in the sense that while discrimination might exist, it impacts each side equally). You assume that even though discrimination has moved society to a point that could be considered unjust, that when that discrimination is removed, some magical force will return it to a point that can be considered just. My assertion is that there is no such force, but rather, the forces within society cause it to maintain the status quo, or equillibriate at the unjust position.
Somehow I’m enjoying comforts/etc because I’m male, because some guys were jerks to women before I was born? You’re insane.
You seem to think the “jerk” issue is my problem. It’s not. I couldn’t care less about sensitivity, or feelings, or whatever. It’s the economics that’s my problem. We as males have the privelege of competing with only half the population for jobs in science and engineering, because our ancestors relegated women to secondary positions, and they remain there to this day.
So, to summarize, you think we should compensate women now for the unjust acts that happened in the past, at the expense of men because men are right now enjoying the fruits of discrimination in the past?
It has nothing to do with compensation. My interest is in an equitable society. Our current society, for women, is not an equitable one. Men enjoy advantages in our current society (they make more money, get more respect, etc), that they would not had women in the past not been discriminated against. While they aren’t the direct cause of the problem, it’s also not fair for them to keep something that was earned unjustly by their predecessors.
PS) I am, of course, merely humoring you in your claims that no overt sources of discrimination exist. I don’t feel like arguing that point, but I do suggest you spend some time in the deep South. Lot’s of girls around here are taught to value finding a husband and being a good wife more than finding achievement for themselves. Strangely, finding a good wife and being a good husband are not values taught to boys…
Edited 2006-06-17 03:15
Just wanted to clear up one point, we’re not going to see eye to eye on this, so no point in arguing further as you’ve not substanciated anything.
“PS) I am, of course, merely humoring you in your claims that no overt sources of discrimination exist. I don’t feel like arguing that point, but I do suggest you spend some time in the deep South. Lot’s of girls around here are taught to value finding a husband and being a good wife more than finding achievement for themselves. Strangely, finding a good wife and being a good husband are not values taught to boys..”
I guess you missed the fact I grew up in the “deep south”. You must have also missed the fact that most of us that grew up there (men) ARE taught to value a “good wife”. That is, the non-poverty stricken regions. The only point I’d argue beyond this is simply that teaching women to value a good husband is exactly what you are complaining about, that somehow women are conditioned to be a certain way.
Apparently you haven’t looked around lately, there are more women running the show in households now than there are men (speaking about non-poverty stricken areas, yet again.) Growing up, it was the reverse, but now I can’t go out without getting told how to live my life within 25 minutes of meeting someone. No thanks.
Say you want about male stereotypes and so forth, but there isn’t a damn thing I can do about the way things work in reality. Let’s face it, if you’re a good looking female, you’ll get hired places that otherwise you wouldn’t just based on looks.
Unless you’re applying for a secretarial position, studies show that good looking people of both sexes are less likely to get hired than plain looking people. But you don’t see me bitching about it
There are lots of problems in society concerning race, gender, etc. Let’s fix them properly, NOT contribute to them by reinforcing people who take advantage of those particular attributes.
For every girl who takes “advantage” of being a girl, there are a dozen that are cheated out of opportunities because of it. This cheating can be malicious or it can be innocent, but it happens all the time.
When I went to high school, I was in a robotics club (which incidentally was all male). Every year, we’d do a little community event where we’d set up robots and Mindstorms legos for local kids to play with. I remember teaching a group of fifth-sixth graders how to program the Mindstorms. There was an even mix of girls and boys at these events. Fast forward five or six years, and I can guarantee you that almost none of the girls that attended these events went to engineering school, while at least several of the boys did. Why? Socialization. These kids went on to middle-school and high-school, and society convinced them that girls weren’t suited for doing certain things.
The “just even the playing field and let nature take its course” side of the argument is theoretically correct, but their implementation strategy is deeply flawed. They think “evening the playing field” just means removing all overt forms of discrimentation. But it’s not just the overt discrimination that preserves the status quo. The implicit socialization of society has an enormous effect on people, and anybody who thinks otherwise needs to take a couple of courses in human pyschology. Truely evening the playing field would mean getting rid of the social influences that push girls away from engineering. But that’s an impossible feat, and would require mass brain-washing and intrusive regulation. The only alternative that solves the problem is what we have: affirmative action. Push girls towards science and engineering, and hope you can balance out the factors you can’t control.
Your post is wrong on several points.
There are no quotas at M.I.T, quotas for minorities is illegal and has already been ruled so by the Supreme Court. However, it is legal and common practice for top universities to analyze an individual applicant on a holistic approach… and race/gender can and is a factor in certain situations.
I am sure M.I.T admits white males with lower qualifications than certain under-represented minorities, I know Berkeley does — because their applications are handled on an individual basis.
Female applicants at America’s top schools tend to have better grades and credentials than male applicants, although, I am not sure if this is true at M.I.T. Top colleges tend to have an even number of men and women, because they descriminate against female applicants.
There is a problem when the majority of the population of the planet are female, and yet only 2 percent of Gnome developers are females. That is obvious socialization.
There is still bias in the “open” media against women, just today I saw a commercial for the popular “Axe” brand of cleaning products. The commercial asks “questionable hook-up” after showing an image of a female body builder, and the premis is Axe products can “scrub” away the embarassment. A female would just about never be embarassed about having sex with a male body builder — this is open sexism in Today’s society.
Edited 2006-06-18 15:27
Sorry for over-simplifying the MIT issue, I didn’t deem it necessary to give a 50 page essay on what occured.
“However, it is legal and common practice for top universities to analyze an individual applicant on a holistic approach… and race/gender can and is a factor in certain situations. ”
Call it what you will, and try to explain it how you will, but there is basically a quota system in place – officially or not. The same was true at my old university, they were turning away a lot of people in order to boost the international presence in the student body. They had lots of “reasons” for this, but it basically boiled down to a quota.
“Female applicants at America’s top schools tend to have better grades and credentials than male applicants, although, I am not sure if this is true at M.I.T. Top colleges tend to have an even number of men and women, because they descriminate against female applicants. ”
It isn’t because they are descriminating, it’s because they are trying to display an “equal” admission practice. This is what came out of all the “equality for everyone” crud. It’s the same thing that basically screwed over my friend. You call it a holistic approach – I call it a quota system. Universities attempt to balance men/females simply because public perception is there is a bias as soon as one of the two groups grows larger than the other. This is a product of strange thinking that somehow the genders should be “equal” in everything, when clearly they are not.
Now, going by your logic of socialization, this strikes me as odd. You think because 2% of gnome devs are females, it’s a product of the society they group up in. Yet, you are arguing females score higher/have better credentials than males when graduating college. Is that socialization too? Seems to me if they are coming out “smarter” by our social standards, and have better scores overall, they should be at least as proficient as men in CS. I know many women in my CS courses were. I also know most of them switched majors because they didn’t enjoy programming. It wasn’t because the professors made life tough on them, they constantly had the better scores, etc. They just plain didn’t like it. In “modern thinking” they call this socialization, somehow some people somewhere in those women’s lives influenced them to not like CS.
Why then would they have attempted a CS degree? Why then would they be as good as the men at programming? Why then, would they choose to switch majors because they *didn’t enjoy programming*?
Where I come from, this is just an innate trait of women. There are of course some women who enjoy programming, and they do it for a living. Then there are women who prefer other types of jobs, maybe flying helicopters or being in construction, or god forbid – doing secretarial work. The same goes for men. There are obvious differences in our gender, physical differences, chemical differences, and developmental differences – why is it so hard for people to accept that we might just possibly be born with certain tendancies? Why is *everything* a product of socialization?
Some things are, there is no doubting that. Men used to be the hunters, women the child-bearing cooks long long ago. This was for survival reasons, the men did the dangerous things while the women were relatively safe – it ensured the continuance of the tribes. There is still some bias from waaaaaay back then – it never completely disappeared. I make no arguments about that. In the current world we live in, however, things have gotten a LOT more open to looking beyond gender. Younger people generally do not see females as inferior in any way. I’m telling you, females have really even become dominate in a lot of relationships with the 30 and less crowd. I can count the number of men I know who are allowed to go out to a local outdoor bar (Gordon Biersch) with me on Wednesday nights to listen to our *friends* play live music. It ends at 10. Yet all of the men I’m friends with who have relationships are simply “not allowed” to come out. This doesn’t exactly sound like overbearing men holding back women. Maybe it’s like that for the 60 y/os, but it’s certainly not like that for the 30s and under. Soon they’ll be the ones in all the management positions, and a lot of the incidents that occur now will no longer exist.
“There is still bias in the “open” media against women, just today I saw a commercial for the popular “Axe” brand of cleaning products. The commercial asks “questionable hook-up” after showing an image of a female body builder, and the premis is Axe products can “scrub” away the embarassment. A female would just about never be embarassed about having sex with a male body builder — this is open sexism in Today’s society. ”
I can’t believe you’re using that example. Axe is OBVIOUSLY marketted in a sexist way. It’s so over-the-top I don’t know how you could have missed the point. Did you really think that commercial was a serious demonstration of Axe’s effects? It’s a cologne appealing to men making an OBVIOUSLY gross exaggeration/joke. Haven’t you ever seen “Desperate Housewives”? Hell, have you ever seen any soap opera/sitcom? The men are always these stupid loser idiots who lie cheat and scam, the women are always super intelligent super-spies who track their husbands and all ther infidelities, and while they are doing this they cheat with Juan, the idiot gardener who’s 18 and buff as can be. You can cite a million examples one way or the other about gender bias on television, and it really makes me lose my respect for you.
Oh, and about your ill-thought comment about embarassment with sex w/ a body builder. Women in general do NOT like body builders. Are you living in an isolation center or something?
Again, I’m not saying sexism doesn’t occur, of course it does – so does murder, rape, etc. It’s just not the same issue it used to be, and throwing money at people to make a 50/50 split, is the wrong answer. You yourself said it.
I clicked your name and saw you have your website linked “Corenode.com”, you say you are a fledgling data-center; fledgling means inexperienced.
Why would I trust my data to a company that is inexperienced.
That is all.
I clicked on your name and saw you have very few comments, and most of them are trolling attempts. Why would I care what an insignificant troll, operating under the anonyminity of the internet, had to say? Oh, and try checking the dictionary for the definition of “fledgling”. Apparently you’ve gotten your English mixed up.
I will answer your question, however. Read the article linked on our front page. That’s why you should trust your data to a company that has just started. Just started meaning only 2 years of operation. The business may be relatively new, but the people behind it aren’t. What exactly is confusing to you?
Concerning my company, if you have any further questions or comments, please use the “Contact Us” form, or give us a call. This has nothing to do with OSNews, and you would be better served to talk with us directly.
Cheers,
David
Using GNOME to meet women. I haven’t heard of that one yet. Maybe I’ll give it a shot sometime (“Hey baby, want to see my desktop environment?”).
i guess gnome goes on my “do not support” list, which means i don’t report any bugs i find, and definitely don’t contribute any code.
There might be too few women in software development, but I don’t really see WHY there must be more women. Will it improve software? Will it make it better? What’s the advantage? I’m not bashing women here (I wouldn’t dare, I have way too many female friends for that, they’d kill me
), I’m just asking a legitimate question.
The GNOME team OR wants booth babes, OR they can’t get a girl and try this route. Pick one.
Or, they want women to give birth to 10 children each that they will all be nurtured with Gnome, and eventually Linux will get more market share than Windows by the year 2020.
Or, they want women to give birth to 10 children each that they will all be nurtured with Gnome, and eventually Linux will get more market share than Windows by the year 2020.
Hahaha!
Hmm.. Perhaps the next step is offer cash rewards for each linux indoctrinated kid? Perhaps some agreement with Bountiful? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bountiful%2C_British_Columbia
Honestly though, open source projects are not always friendly places for women. There are no extra barriers to entry like some more traditional workplaces, but disparaging remarks on IRC and such are quite common (a problem which Jess Hall from KDE spoke up about a while ago). That said, this initiative is absolutely the wrong way to go about fixing it. Giving out sponsorships like this will just fuel resentment. The only way is to have a tough policy for offensive people on IRC channels and mailing lists to keep their idiocy to a minimum.
One of the roots of the problem is that some (a minority) geeks are just socially incompetent and harbour a bitterness against women so they have no idea how to interact normally with them.
Just remember that women are no less sexistic than men are.
Women are not victims, no matter what some might like you to think.
One of the roots of the problem is that some (a minority) geeks are just socially incompetent and harbour a bitterness against women so they have no idea how to interact normally with them.
It must be an extreme minority. I’ve never met such ‘geeks’. However, it’s never a problem to find men capable of sexist jokes, nor finding women capable of sexist jokes.
The main problem is lack of humouristic sense on the part of both sexes.
EDIT: Changed tags
Edited 2006-06-17 02:10
OP: “One of the roots of the problem is that some (a minority) geeks are just socially incompetent and harbour a bitterness against women so they have no idea how to interact normally with them.”
You: It must be an extreme minority. I’ve never met such ‘geeks’. However, it’s never a problem to find men capable of sexist jokes, nor finding women capable of sexist jokes. ”
Heh, right. I’ve seen thousands of socially incompetent people (not just geeks) but I’ve only met a few with bitterness against women. Those few, I almost can’t blame, they got burned REALLY badly by women in their lives. It’s not right for them to generalize that anger at *all* women, but put in their shoes, most people would do the same. Even if the genders were reversed.
That being said, I think most geeks IDOLIZE women, quite the opposite of being bitter. They might not have the social skills to come off as James Bond, they might be awkward and nerdy and shy and etc – but i REALLY do not see the bitterness. I see almost creepy idolization, as if women are gods. Oh well.
wondering why it is my comment gets the axe, yet there is discussion on meeting, and editing. at least my comment was on topic.
BSD needs boys? Qt needs queers? TeX needs trannies?
Alliteration or not, it’s just rude. This is not Thom’s personal blog, as much as I sometimes think otherwise, and as such, the editors need to hold themselves to a higher standard. No respectable newspaper would have published a sentence like that, and OS News shouldn’t have either.
>This is not Thom’s personal blog
OSNews is sorta of a tech blog, run by enthusiasts who don’t get paid. If sometimes we need to have some fun, we do.
The same is true for me. Eugenia, perhaps you want to try creating a test account without admin privileges, and seeing if the edit functionality is there?
I suppose it’s possible that the feature is disabled for ormandj and me in particular, although that’s extremely unlikely. My guess is that it’s admin-only and since you only use an admin account, you’ve never noticed the bug.
oh man you have windows media player on your quicklaunch! and you show it in public!
soon the villagers with the torches will show up at your door
It’s there by default. This is a workstation, I don’t try to make it “pretty”, it isn’t even mine. If you’ll notice, I’m connected to an IBM os/370 mainframe (TSO/ISPF) doing COBOL programming, while also working on Lotus Notes integration for a client. If having WMP in the quicklaunch of a *CLIENT’S* machine makes me a loser while doing all that, I’m not sure what to say.
PS – Not by choice am I using these things, I hate LN and IBM mainframes.
Especially OS/VS COBOL, yuck.
To bring this back on topic, can any (one) woman respond to this thread who is capable of doing COBOL (OS/VS) programming? Now, we know this is because during that era of education, women were actively discouraged from participating in computer/science related fields.
Ok, how about this, somebody setup a 9000$ fund and ask for OS/VS COBOL programmers who are female. See how many women *learn* COBOL to get that money. My bet, not many.
This isn’t the correct way to go about things. Better would be to start with working on education, making sure women are just as accepted and treated just as fairly at school, so they have the equal opportunity to get a CS/whatever education. Oh, wait, they already are? Damn. Niche cases aside, I think you’ll see (due to enormous lawsuits) there aren’t very many schools around still practicing discriminitory behaviour. Minority/female/whatever, are treated as well (if not better – such has been my experience) than the white male. Yes, again, you can find niche cases, but things aren’t corrupt like they used to be in the 60s/70s.
My CS courses had far more females than males, actually. UT Dallas (http://utdallas.edu). In fact, it had far more international females in the CS program than you would believe. Apparently it’s the hot thing for Indian females to come study. I remember one specific occasion where a Indian female professor gave a female indian a 100 for a final course grade on a class she had never attended and didn’t do the final project. Yes, there was a complaint, and it got handled via administration – but it occured. Again, niche case, overall – things were fair.
Again, let’s stop attacking the symptoms, and start correcting the causes. Throwing money at people never fixes anything, don’t be silly.
One thing a lot of people fail to point out, is that in modern times, where equality for gender/race has gotten MUCH better, the people *seeking* these kinds of degrees have dropped in numbers. I mean really, why would any intelligent person seek a degree in CS right now? So they can get an entry level job if they are *lucky* and earn 30k a year for 10 years of their life? You’d have to REALLY love CS to do that. Of course women aren’t applying themselves in these fields, they are *smart*. If I did things over again, I would have never wasted my time on CS. Thank god I got a MIS degree, at least that’s useful.
Does being an uber-geek coder slaving away in their room at odd hours for *fun* coding with people across the net appeal to women? I don’t know – I’m not female – I’m asking seriously. It appeals to a fair number of guys (of course some aren’t this socially inept, but a lot are – and if you work on OSS – you’re going to deal with them).
All of this being said, in the dealing I’ve had with the OSOL community, there are women partcipating, and they are really, and I mean really smart. They have nice jobs, and they are doing what they love. Most women I know have no interest in the computer, and when I offer to teach them things, they just ask me to do whatever it is so they can get on with their lives.
Perhaps it’s time to quit trying to shove things down people’s throats when they don’t have any interest, just because of stupid statistics that have no bearing on reality.
Why don’t women go into open source (in particular) or computer science (in general)? Because most women who have the aptitude to learn computer science could just as easily go into medicine, law, or business.
Consider a college student who is choosing between law and science. This student can have a job that involves talking to people on a regular basis, earning buckets of money, and eventually the student will be practically self-employed without risking income stability. Or the student can either be micromanaged to death or will have to take the risk of working for a startup, which means working too hard to have a family, and, if the company goes bankrupt, getting nothing out of it.
The situation is even worse for scientists in other disciplines, who may spend years working as postdocs, earning less money than they previously paid in college tuition for the privilege of slaving away in a lab until they can publish a paper and maybe get a professorship — although those are very hard to come by. These people are brilliant; they could all be doctors and earning a six-figure salary (yes, they will have to pay malpractice insurance, but no doctor is being bankrupted from malpractice insurance). And yet they choose to slave away.
What would any sane, rational person choose? The former, of course. Yet a lot of men — and a few women — go into science anyway, because money and stability and family mean less to them than having the job of their dreams, even if they still hate going to work in the morning.
Far fewer women make that choice than men, and when you think about it, how can you blame them? Aren’t we the stupid ones, for taking jobs that are so drastically underpaying us? (When you adjust for IQ and level of education, science is the lowest-paid profession in the US.) What right do we have to tell women that they should wait to have kids until they’re 40, just because they’re good at math?
I’m generalizing, but I’m not being facetious. Outreach programs like this are great; there must be three women somewhere who would like to work for GNOME. But, while some men may consider science to be the ultimate profession, the market clearly thinks otherwise, and it’s awfully presumptuous of us to assume that we must be right.
in my opinion, having some girls would really improve things because one way or another, women do have a different point of view of things.
using a quite male subject as example, you can compare animes written by men and women
using a more general subject, music lyrics
i can’t really say if it will improve software, but will make it a little different nevertheless
but i think the real reason is that the gnome team wants booth babes
EDIT: man what a mess of comment, and by the way, edit is working here [brazil/gmt-3]
Edited 2006-06-16 23:20
Thom needs boys.
Sorry but IMO “girls” “adds” to the young male geek image & also therefore IMO does the opposite for the campaign by saying that in the geek world women dont exist – there are just these “girls” .
& BTW I agree to the “reverse” sexism … there are real answers out there .
BTW why does the women & GNOME logo have to be violett ?
Fortunatly its not pink .. even worse .
It just seems to be empowering the view that its a male “geek” OSS world “out” there .
That there are geeks & then there are women … maybe Im making sense .
BTW Eugenia Id love to have up-modded for sense of humour (your very 1st comment)
They can really spend the money better – like on adds for women in IT .. whatever ..
They could have a min number of female SoC participants (sorry discrimination again .. damn it) which have GNOME mentors – that seems a lot better than giving away money .
Money might be an incentive to work but it shouldnt be the biggest motivation IMO .
“Women in IT” sounds better than “Getting geek girls to code”
Valueble project but money wasted IMO .
BTW GNOME 2.15.3 was released … maybe somebody noticed that bit as well
“Women in IT” sounds better than “Getting geek girls to code”
I actually like the latter better =D Besides, IMHO, it’s just stupid to complain about the use of a specific word. The word “women” doesn’t include girls, and I still consider myself a girl. If you wanted correctness, you’d need to use “females”, but that sounds stupid.
Don’t get me wrong; I don’t mean to attack any of you. After all, I come here often enough.
But at the same time, you (as in the OSNews staff) should recognize your own popularity, and act accordingly. I’m all for having fun, but using language which implies that half of the world’s population might as well be below the age of majority — or at least that GNOME is only recruiting secondary-school students — is just inappropriate.
…and I am actually planning to participate in their project =)
“There might be too few women in software development, but I don’t really see WHY there must be more women.”
We don’t need more women as much as we need fewer moronic men. That would then lead to more women in this field.
“wants booth babes”
You are confusing the gaming industry with real software development.
Edited 2006-06-17 11:07
we need fewer moronic men. That would then lead to more women in this field.
“wants booth babes”
You are confusing the gaming industry with real software development.
Sum up those statements and it sounds like you’re volunteering to commit suicide. Please just change industries, it’s not worth it.
Great way to introduce discrimination into what was otherwise a gender-free environment, way to go Gnome!
Excuse my sarcasm, we all deal with discrimination every day in society and I for one have enjoyed the level playing field which the internet and remote (pretty much anonymous) environment provides.
Am I male, female, white, black, purple? Skinny, fat, ugly, attractive? French, Chinese, American, Indian?
You have only my nic to help you guess, I choose to tell you I’m a “Mr” after that it’s pure speculation.
So I find this bounty ironic, and it’s my personal opinion that it’s a really stupid idea to allow PC to seep into the virtual domain. If this were Microsoft they’d be accused of an insideous agenda, using PC as a marketing tool to gain headlines.
Maybe if I change my name to “Dead-eye Goldburg” I can qualify for Gnome’s next bounty, as there aren’t nearly enough J E W-I S H Cowboy’s contributing to the project
Edited 2006-06-17 12:14
Why is J E W-I S H filtered by the swear filter?
Edited 2006-06-17 12:15
Why is J E W-I S H filtered by the swear filter?
Because unfortunatly, we had some idiot long ago using it to isnult people. So we took this measure– this was even from before we made posting a members-only thing. We need to fix that.
In KDE we got at least a few girls for the Google SoC. No need for special programs 😉