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Men Overran a Job Fair for Women in Tech
(www.wired.com)
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this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2023
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As a woman who used to work in tech, I would like to point out that you are missing some very key details here. The expectations placed on women in tech are much stricter, much more demeaning, and much more harsh than those placed on men. I had an employer while I was a contractor decide not to renew my contract because I "didn't smile enough" and "wasn't friendly enough", and this was not an expectation placed on my male coworkers. The contracting agency I was working through tried to argue in my defense, but the employer was allowed to discontinue my contract at any time for any reason. Unfortunately, the contracting agency didn't have any other positions open for me, so I was just out of a job.
In just about every tech job I've had, it was made explicitly clear to me that behaving and interacting with others in the same manner as my male coworkers was not acceptable. I was hired with the implicit understanding that, in addition to providing my labor and expertise, I was required to present myself as feminine, demure, and almost submissive to any men I worked with, even if I was their supervisor.
Women need more help getting jobs in the tech industry because they are more likely than their male counterparts to lose jobs to sexism, unequal expectations, sexual harassment, and hostile work environments. This job fair was not allowed to officially exclude men, so it would be helpful for male tech workers to acknowledge and understand their inherent advantages and refrain from interfering with opportunities aimed at helping women in the industry.
While I do think that the situation is not as bad now (basically in any company I worked, the episodes you mentioned are unthinkable), I am fully aware that gender roles are still a thing and sexism in tech is quite widespread.
I do agree with this. BUT, you can make the same argument with other oppressed categories (for example, foreigners, who have way less contractual power due to the inherent threat of losing visa), and that's a big part of my argument here. From my own observations (i.e., the video in the article and some educated guess), it's not just "men" who rushed this conference, it is men from other oppressed categories. So this leads to us start measuring who is more oppressed, which sounds like a futile if not detrimental exercise, exactly because the same dynamics that lead to women being fired due to hostile workplace lead to old people (even men) to be pushed out, or to foreigners to be paid less. Not all men are privilege by virtue of being men, because more discrimination than just gender is at play.
I agree with this as well, and I have absolutely no problem with events aimed to help women getting into tech. What I have a problem with is the inability to ask questions and to think of these people who wasted 600$ bucks for 0 chances of a job as anything else than males, now that the fact happened. This to me seems an intentional way of ignoring other dynamics that exist in the workplace (racism, for example), producing an overall shortsighted analysis. It seems to me detrimental to the overall improvement of the society as well because ultimately the women at that conference might have way more in common with some of those men than they have with the successful woman speaking at that same conference, and forcing the distinction you are making instead suggests otherwise, creating fragmentation among the workforce in place of union and solidarity.
Admittedly, my sympathies for some of the foreign workers is a bit more limited. One of the worst jobs I had was working as a contracted project manager at Google for an India-based contracting company. The team in India that I was supervising was extremely difficult to work with and my boss and coworkers that were all either H1B visa employees or over-staying expired student visas actively contributed to the problems I was having. There were a few times that my project failed to meet adequate performance metrics because the team in India refused to complete tasks that I had created for them and my supervisor did very little to back me up in that situation.
The other side of the coin for the foreign worker situation is that the mega-conglomerates like Google, Apple, etc. specifically hire foreign workers and H1B visa employees because they will work for less pay and minimal to no benefits unlike American college graduates that have student loans to pay off and nowhere else to go. I have a couple of friends still in the tech industry, and they are frequently undercut and out-competed by foreign workers that can accept lower pay and worse benefits as it is a temporary situation for them. I have much more sympathy for those that are actively immigrating and assimilating, but the ones who work on H1B visas or other similar contracts are part of the problem that drive down wages and benefits for everyone else. If they were working in genuine solidarity with American workers, I would feel very differently about it, but as it stands, the vast majority of foreign tech workers I have interacted with have been people abusing the visa systems and dragging down the market for everyone else. In some ways, they are victims, but they also help to perpetuate many of the worst problems in the industry.
California recently passed legislation that now protects social caste against discrimination because the massive Indian population in the tech industry has been horribly discriminatory and brutal to Indians from lower castes. It's also worth pointing out that many of the H1B visas and more temporary workers are from the upper castes and they intend on moving back to India after making enough money and the ones who are truly immigrating are usually from the lower castes and are working under green cards. The workers from the lower castes are also much less likely to be tech workers in the first place because they did not have access to education in India. All of this to say: there are injustices that foreign workers face, but for foreign workers in the tech industry, I'm more inclined to believe that they are among those that are part of the problem.
(Not to mention the fact that some of the worst sexism I have dealt with was from Indian workers from upper castes.)
I can't comment on your personal experience. I can only say that I know that in certain countries, India for example, the rat race is unimaginable and some people would do anything to get out.
I would hardly consider this a privilege to be honest, as it is still way better compared to companies that now specifically want to hire women to boost their diversity numbers (let's face it, mostly for purely marketing purpose). I can see your point of view, mind you, but this to me already feels like inter-class war.
This is very common to be honest, beside the tech sector, and I agree with you. However, these in my opinion are manifestations of a bigger, higher level problem, not the problem itself. Similarly the case with women who actually accept jobs after being asked if they intend to have kids (illegal in many places, I believe). The problem here is that higher order needs prevail sometimes (or you don't have enough education/awareness to even understand that you would be part of a problem), leading to effectively workers undermining other workers (you make the good case for salary undercutting, which then becomes a cliche' talking point for any xenophobic, right wing party, right?).
All of this to say, it is a complex issue, and if anything shows that there is tons to do in the tech field which is one with super low rate of unionization, to build a common class consciousness. I simply hope that we can look at this as obstacles to overcome, not at reasons to change course.
I can imagine that, although my experience (working with a UK company with many Indians) has been completely positive so far. Not to talk about people from Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, which I consider - in my limited experience - some of the nicest people I have ever met.
EDIT:
I want to add in any case, I have to admit that this is a far more interesting conversation compared to what the article leads to by itself. I would have loved some more in depth reflection on the different categories of workers, the competition created, the impact of layoffs, etc.
It is a profoundly complex issue, and that's what makes much of this comment section so frustrating. Many of the arguments here are very reductionist and fail to account for detail or nuance. In this particular case, I have a hard time excusing the behavior of the accused interlopers given that this is a women's conference that has been a recurring event for quite some time and has always been a women's conference.
Lack of education or not, I don't think it's unreasonable to ask professionals to act professionally and refrain from attending events not intended for them. I think there's a significant amount of leeway being given to the men/foreign workers who showed up at the women's conference as if they cannot be expected to regulate their behavior in a professional context. It's the same kind of hand-waving and excuses that perpetuate the good ol' boys' club that the tech industry already is. It is irksome that people here aren't realizing that the arguments they are making about exclusivity or discrimination are the same arguments frequently used to excuse the misogyny and sexual harassment that is so ubiquitous in the tech industry to begin with.
A bit of a nit, but consider there has always been a percentage of men to this conference. Reading online, between 5-10%. So it's not like it's a first for men to be there.
Oh no, that's not the point. My point is more along the line of "maybe they are in such conditions where they can't afford the luxury of giving up potential opportunities to respect dynamics which are on a more abstract level compared to the immediate needs". Then I would also argue that going there is a huge waste of 600$ and will give 0 chances, but that's another topic.