back to article Can you ethically suggest a woman pursue a career in tech?

Over the last few years we’ve watched parents, educators and mentors everywhere working hard to get women into science, technology engineering and maths careers. Those efforts are succeeding: the number of women going studying engineering at the tertiary level has begun to arc upward. This is a good thing. But we also know …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    This should be fun. Got my bottle of bleach ready feel I may need a good long drink,

    1. Version 1.0 Silver badge

      @ brain bleach

      Upvote on that and I'll stand us both another round. I do wonder sometimes if El Reg doesn't post these stories to do a little "research" on the commentards.

      But it's a worthy discussion point from some angles - when I got into this industry I did think along similar lines but back then the question was "Does a working class boy stand a chance of climbing the corporate ladder in the UK?"

      Times change, but it doesn't matter if all you've got is time.

    2. Geoffrey W

      Why would you want to kill yourself because of a lot of silly reactionary comments and logical fallacies? Try a glass of your favourite tipple instead of bleach.

      1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        "Try a glass of your favourite tipple instead of bleach."

        Maybe bleach is his favourite tipple.

    3. Starace

      Hand the bleach to the author of this rubbish.

      After all he's the one thinking that poor helpless women are somehow utterly unable to do anything for themselves without his (particularly condescending) help. Even down to language like 'inviting' women into the tech industry. It's deeply insulting.

      In his own special way he's just as bad as the people he complains about, maybe worse as his actions are actively hypocritical.

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Oh, the irony...

      This article is soooo much funnier when you realise the author was once accused of harassment by nerdy feminists https://geekfeminism.org/2011/01/30/powerful-people-mark-pesces-linux-conf-au-keynote/

  2. Solarflare

    "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

    Oh, I'm sorry Johnny, you've been working realy hard ever since you've joined the company and you're probably our best worker...unfortunately you don't have ovaries, so you will always be paid less than your female coworkers, you male scum

    What a bright future we have to look forward to!

    1. AMBxx Silver badge

      Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

      Well said sir.

      Teachers are mostly women, Opticians about 65%, Dentists 50%+, Doctors over 50% women in University at the moment.

      What do all these careers have in common? Excellent opportunities for flexible working and/or holidays during school holidays. Women are making very sensible choices regarding careers. Perhaps IT with long hours and firm deadlines isn't so good if you plan on raising your own children rather than having the state do all your childcare? Sadly the women doing the bleating are in high paying jobs and can afford to employ someone to look after their kids (typically another woman on minimum wage).

      1. A Non e-mouse Silver badge
        Flame

        Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

        What do all these careers have in common? Excellent opportunities for flexible working and/or holidays during school holidays. Women are making very sensible choices regarding careers. Perhaps IT with long hours and firm deadlines isn't so good if you plan on raising your own children rather than having the state do all your childcare? Sadly the women doing the bleating are in high paying jobs and can

        You do know what you've done there? Perpetuated the stereotype that women are the "home makers" and men are the "bread winners". Why can't the woman go to work and husband stay at home and look after the kids?

        Or what about lesbian couples? Or maybe people just want to get home at a sane time and spend time with their significant other without coming home and falling asleep 'cause they're working 12 hour days?

        Life has taught me to value diversity: Men, women, black, white, straight, gay, etc.. Everyone has something to contribute. I don't think I'd want to work in an office of straight white males.

        1. Known Hero

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          @ A Non e-mouse

          Everyone has something to contribute. I don't think I'd want to work in an office of straight white males.

          Well I'm guessing as I am a straight white male with straight white male co-workers, then I guess you don't like me, not sure what I did to offend you though .....

          1. Paul 195

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            I'm a straight white male, and working in an environment consisting of only more of the same is going to get pretty dull. I don't think Esme has anything against you personally, or indeed against straight white males in general. It's just that in certain environments we do seem to form an overwhelming (>90%) majority, and that's not a good sign.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

              I live in a country and in a system where the balance has tipped the other way. It is a tech profession, and I have been the only male in a female environment, with several layers of female bosses. There was no harassment of the only remaining male (all those women are married with small children), but the lack of interest in the skills and knowledge of the core technologies was pervasive and became unbearable. Hiring policy? At the first opportunity of hiring a second man into the system the boss hired another woman.

              My experience was not that the feminists sought equality. They sought dominance. Early retirement was my way out,

              1. mattje

                Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

                "Hiring policy? At the first opportunity of hiring a second man into the system the boss hired another woman."

                Now you know how many women must feel

                "My experience was not that the feminists sought equality. They sought dominance."

                Ditto. Change "women" and "feminists" for men in your statements and that has been the status quo for human existence.

                To the privileged, equality seems like oppression

        2. Charlie Clark Silver badge

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          Perpetuated the stereotype that women are the "home makers" and men are the "bread winners".

          That's a side-effect of the lack of childcare. Seeing as women who have children will have to take time off work at least to give birth, failing to provide childcare is what needs fixing. Otherwise, there are lots of reasons why women generally prefer the non-technical trades.

        3. VinceH

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          @A non e-mouse

          You do know what you've done there? Perpetuated the stereotype that women are the "home makers" and men are the "bread winners".

          The article itself does that right after the bit where it suggests positive discrimination:

          " We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better, offer them the flexibility that comes with shouldering the lion’s share of the childcare and housework."

        4. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          I don't think I'd want to work in an office of straight white males.

          I'm tired of *being* a straight white male... Wait, that didn't sound right...

        5. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          > Everyone has something to contribute. I don't think I'd want to work in an office of straight white males.

          That is either distinctly not everyone, or you mean to imply that you would not want to work with people who have something to contribute simply because of their sex, appearance, and attraction. That is insane either way,

          Also, caring about the visible diversity of your co-workers is insulting; they are individuals, not sprinkles who will look better if they are different colours or flavours.

      2. Tom Paine

        Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

        Perhaps IT should treat employees decently, the same way as other industries, rather than expecting tired, error-prone and unproductive employees to work a couple of extra hours for free every day? (Work out your hourly rate, and consider that that's how much free money you're handing your CEO for every hour of unpaid overtime you do -- just so he can buy a new Bentley. Why do it?)

      3. Paper

        Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

        "What do all these careers have in common? Excellent opportunities for flexible working and/or holidays during school holidays."

        Don't you feel men should be helping out a bit more around the house and with the kids? Then women wouldn't be forced to choose between career or kids. I'm a man BTW.

    2. Voland's right hand Silver badge

      Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

      So let me ask again: when these women graduate, with their new STEM credentials, can we in all honesty invite them to work in the tech industry?

      This sounds and is very American oriented.

      I would suggest banning ALL fraternities and sororities to start with. You cannot have a non-sexist culture if you start student higher education by "rushing" them into what is the mother of all sexist indoctrinations (I am pretty sure that this idea alone has gotten me on the no-fly list).

      Elsewhere around the world there are a few remnants mostly in humanities and management related disciplines (f.e. the eponymous "fuck a pig's head" clubs in some British universities). The STEM field however is pretty much indoctrination and typecasting free and that shows - just walk into any Eastern European university CS or Math department. The ladies are at 50%+ and they are pretty ones too (Fnarr... Fnarr..). If you take a short walk to the Biology building you will find "positive action" entrance criteria to even up the ratio so that the males are not sub-20%. And so on.

      1. Kristian Walsh Silver badge

        Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

        I do agree with you that the US university culture is where this starts. Segregating adults by sex seems an odd way of running "societies", especially when most of these adults have been brought up in a culture that regards sexuality of all kinds as something vaguely sinful.

        When you add the typical autism-spectrum lack of social awareness that runs through the "technology" industry, and then hand these guys a few million dollars of power, it's not surprising that Silicon Valley is a cesspool of misogyny and sexual harassment.

        Of course, part of the unique problem of startups is that the big investors only trust a certain type of person: white, male, under 30 and a monomaniac with zero regard for anyone else but themselves (they'll say "focussed and disruptive", but let's not mince words). Basically, VCs are selecting for dicks, and then acting surprised when the guy they gave money to acts like a complete dick.

        1. Tom Paine

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          I'm sure the US fraternity / sorority systems doesn't help, but it's fatuous to suggest that's the only cause; uif it was, there wouldn't be problems for women in tech in countries with sane educational systems. And there are.

        2. disgruntled yank

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          First, what proportion of American university students join fraternities or sororities? My impression is that it varies quite a bit: taking some fairly well-known schools, Stanford, Georgia Tech, and UIUC are all around 25%, the University of Washington about 16%, University of California Berkeley under 10%. Harvard is bringing a lot of pressure on its fraternities and sororities now.

          "especially when most of these adults have been brought up in a culture that regards sexuality of all kinds as something vaguely sinful" Really? Has college recruitment fallen off to the extent that they've built a time machine to recruit from the 1950s?

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            "especially when most of these adults have been brought up in a culture that regards sexuality of all kinds as something vaguely sinful" Really? Has college recruitment fallen off to the extent that they've built a time machine to recruit from the 1950s?

            No, he's just referring to the USA, which is horribly regressive in terms of sexual attitudes.

            It's the white "christian" men running things, and their attitudes towards sexual equality are stuck in the 18th century,

        3. bombastic bob Silver badge
          IT Angle

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          "Silicon Valley is a cesspool of misogyny and sexual harassment."

          I question the validity of your assumption, especially if your primary information source is more like a Late Night Comedy News show.

          At least one source quoted by the article mentioned that its analysis was "not peer reviewed". So a couple of colleges do a survey, on a limited number of people, most likely with some pre-supposed conclusions in mind, and quite possibly with survey questions written in a way that made such a conclusion easier. AND they came up with "the expected" conclusions.

          2016 was _NOT_ a good year for accurate surveys, was it? (think a couple of elections in UK and in USA that surprised the survey takers).

          And keep in mind, if you define 'sexual harassment' as calling the mailman a "mailman" or referring to a woman as "Miss" instead of "Ms." or "being mean to the girl" in a legitimately deserved performance criticism, yotta yotta yotta... its like defining "racisim" as DISAGREEING with a minority-raced politician, ya know? And at THAT point, when the definition is _SO_ senseless, and the emotional manipulation _SO_ blatant, that people just say "meh" and ignore even LEGITIMATE situations of sexual harassment, because they're SICK of it being "everywhere" according to the definition.

          And if a woman goes into a company with a "misogyny" chip on her shoulder, you _KNOW_ she's a harassment lawsuit risk, so _WHY_ hire her?

          And where's the IT angle here, anyway?

        4. P. Lee

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          I spent a year at a US (ok, Texas) university and I have to say, "juvenile" is how I would describe it.

          I also found it weird how social groups tended to be single-sex, almost as if everyone was fourteen years old. Having said that, I've found Australia to be similar - is it a big country thing or an isolated country thing?

          IT is split into tech and management. The tech side requires extreme focus on details, long hours and pedantry. It basically self-selects for those veering to one end of "the spectrum" and these characteristics are somewhat damaging to relationship-building. The only people who can stick it out are those not interested in relationships. Only those people not interested in relationships can stick being around those people not interested in relationships.

          I couldn't ethically recommend the industry to men, never mind women. In my experience, its women who hold the social fabric together, though I accept that may be from my viewpoint at the end of the spectrum!

          However, I do have to come back on the article author. Smartphones are not about relationships. Bring up a copy of "Scramble with Friends" and then take a look at a on-armed bandit machine. See any similarities? It's about advertising and using gambling techniques to keep people using their phones so they can shove more adverts at them. My wife spends far more time playing scramble with the retired lady across the street from us, than actually talking to her. How many times have you seen families at restaurants all with their phones out, or at least with the kids on devices rather than the family talking all together? Is that a really good pitch for "the soft feminine side" of IT or is it "the soft feminine side" as viewed by a sociopath with an advertising plan?

          IT is really, really rubbish at relationships. At its very best, it works as a telephone for videophone - that's when the computer gets out of the way. As soon as a third party starts injecting content, things go downhill, but that's not all. My family think I'm a broken record and maybe I'm old-fashioned but I think you should interact with those people who made the effort to be in the same physical space as you, rather than typing "LOL" to someone who is probably also ignoring those who are around them. I hate smartphones for that. They should go into a bucket as soon as you step through the door at home.

          Am I the only one who's family is often so wrapped up in "social" media, that they ignore each other?

          1. Pedigree-Pete
            Pint

            "They should go into a bucket as soon as you step through the door at home"

            @P.Lee and especially when you walk through your local pub/bar door. Why did you bother if you're just going to play with your fondleslab/phone? :) PP

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

        "This sounds and is very American oriented."

        Silicon Valley is not representative of all workplaces in America. Brogrammer culture isn't typically welcome in what they call fly-over country. The middle section of the country isn't as cool as the ubran hives on the coats, but the cost of living is much lower and people are a hell of a lot nicer.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

      @solarflare - that's an exact mirror image of how it feels to be a woman in most workplaces. So if you don't like the idea of being of men being treated unfairly at work due to their gender, why would you imagine women would like the idea and experience any better? It's easy to be snarky,but much harder to say ro do something constructive.

      Achieving equality is both complex and hard - it isn't a simple case of passing laws, having meetings and corssing our fingers and hoping for the best. And unwontedly confrontational language doesn't help, either. Men in general are neither scum nor the enemy - they're part of the problem, and women are the other part of the problem, because it's men and women that make up society, and it's our society that has for so long treated women much less well than men, in general.

      That's not to say that men don't get a raw deal in some respects too, but the whole point of feminism is to work toward a fairer and more equal society for all, so that everyone can have a chance to try for whatever profession they like and be treated fairly within it, according to their ability at it, and NOT be sidelined or paid less well because they are a particular gender.

      My grandmother was born into a world in which, legally, she was a chattel. Watching Life on Mars was like watching my childhood, I well remember men behaving just like those portrayed in that programme, and it made the world a scary place to be in. Sure, things are somewhat better now, but as has been pointed out, a minority of men still think its acceptable to behave abhorently toward women and too many people (not just men) stand by and let them get away with it without comment. This needs to change. And if we'd achieved equality, then there would be no pay gap between men and women, but there still is.

      We - ALL of us, irrespective of gender - need to work at changing society bit by bit, in our daily lives as much as by conventional politics - to make it clear that all human beings in our society should be treated equally in the workplace, and should not have to live in fear due to their gender, or feel themselves restricted as to what they can do with tehir lives simply because of their gender.

      1. Solarflare

        Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

        @ Esme

        I'm afraid you may have misunderstood something. The difference is that the article paints 'paying women more' as something that *should* be done. Currently there is a rhetoric that women are paid less, one that has been debunked many times and has been shown to be illegal. This article wants us to *legally pay women more than men based upon their gender*. The reasoning behind that is largely irrelevant, it would be discrimination.

        You don't teach people and society to be equal to one another by unfairly discriminating against other parties. Women certainly *should* be paid the exact same amount for a job as a male counterpart, currently that is the law and I fully support it.

        1. This post has been deleted by its author

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            Actual derived data? You mean comparing the median of male and female incomes without accounting for differences in career choice, working hours or willingness to work overtime? Because when you do account for these things, the wage gap essentially disappears.

            By and large, men and women working the same job get paid the same wage.

            You should probably watch this quick summary.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            No, it hasn't.

            Women and men earn the same ( well, pretty much the same, there's a 2% discrepancy, but that's not what people are bleating on about ).

            People who take time out of their careers (ie: women taking a few years out to raise kids) are paid less than people who don't, because they have less experience.

            People who work part time earn less than those who work full time.

            As both of those groups tend in general to be women, so the statistics can be presented to make it look like women are paid less than men, even though it isn't true.

          3. graeme leggett Silver badge

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            As fullfact summarize it

            "The gender pay gap is 9.4% per hour for full time employees in the UK, or £1.30 per hour. It isn’t true just for part-time work or every individual age group, and the size of the gap varies across different types of job."

            https://fullfact.org/economy/UK_gender_pay_gap/

            1. NinjasFTW

              Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

              And that study doesn't take into account the role.

              It is based on picking 100 random women and men and comparing the average wage.

              It doesn't take into account pretty important factors such as job, experience, education etc.

              Can we at least compare apples with apples please?

              If we are going to pull random stats out of the air we can say that men are 20 times more likely to die at work so maybe they deserve an extra £1.30 an hour

              http://www.healthsafetynews.co.uk/entries/commentary/male-workers-20-times-more-likely-than-females-to-die-at-work-

          4. DavCrav

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            ""One that has been debunked* many times". *For value debunked, substitute attempts have been made to discredit using circular logic and post hoc/faulty causality. Actual derived data supports the opposite. Facts. They're a thing."

            Fine, I'll bite. The 'gender pay gap' (in the UK) is:

            1) negative for part-time work;

            2) negative for under-30s;

            3) positive for over 30s if you look at the so-called undifferentiated wage rate, i.e., not taking into account what the person does, but negligible (around 2-3% IIRC, which is statistically significant, but in light of 2) is likely a legacy issue) when differentiated.

            (1) and 2) above were undifferentiated.)

            Facts. They're a thing.

        2. Tom Paine

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          Currently there is a rhetoric that women are paid less, one that has been debunked many times

          coughBOLLOCKScough

          http://www.equalpayportal.co.uk/statistics/

          1. 8Ace

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            Ah the gender pay gap... median hourly rate for women must be equal to that for men, otherwise there is only one logical conclusion .. discrimination, nothing else can possibly explain this !

            Absolute bollocks, see didn't even need the cough.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            If you take the raw stats, women get paid less than men.

            The reason is because women tend to want to take breaks in their careers to have children. The only solution is obvious - ban women from taking time off work to look after kids.

            As that's not something anybody wants, lets stop pretending that women are paid less than men.

            Actually, pre-career-break women earn more than their male counterparts.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

              If we assume that women are more likely to want a career break - then is it fair that taking a short career break can affect your long term pay and status over your whole lifetime to such an extent?

              So it isn't really good enough to say "well women take career breaks", if we make it so difficult for those who do take a career break (men and women) to get back into the jobs market. It shouldn't be impossible to regain a couple of years lost ground over a 40+ year career.

              If you make something really hard (getting back into professional life) then it is inevitable that people "choose" to do something else (decide not to bother or take a lower paid position with more flexibility).

          3. caffeine addict

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            @Tom Paine

            As that page states, ONS figures currently show a wage gap of 9% for full time workers regardless of job, field, or expertise. That doesn't show a wage gap for like for like jobs.

          4. Hans 1
            Paris Hilton

            Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

            >coughBOLLOCKScough

            >http://www.equalpayportal.co.uk/statistics/

            I am surprised at the number of misogynists on here, tbh ... 'was commenting yesterday on Mrs! Yahoo! where some brain-dead, because he could name two female CEO's that had failed, made it sound like women cannot run companies.

            Now, when it comes to equal pay (please read to the end before you downvote) ... how often have you been invited (as in, she pays) to dinner by a woman ? St Valentine's, what does she get you and what does she expect FROM you ? When I see St Valentine's ads, I know it's that expensive time of the year again ... with Xmas ... the periods where you really have to ask yourself how much you need to spend for her to feel "special" ... she does not have that problem ... This crap all STEMs from the pay gap, our society needs to evolve and it is, slowly ... paying women more will speed up that evolution and seriously, I cannot wait.

            As for parenting, may I ask, what kind of father does not take a day off work when the young breed is sick ? Yes, the dick-head! Over the course of her life, a woman will have 2 kids, on average, so will get post partum leave twice in her 40 or 50 year career, even in less evolved societies like the states, this only has little effect on her productivity as a whole. In more advanced societies, e.g. Scandinavia, the father gets the same "post partum" leave, so there the difference is moot. Western countries are all slowwwwly following suit, except the US, of course ...

            It is much more pleasant to work with males and females ... over the course of my career, I have met both male and female bastards, far fewer female bastards, simply because there are more males in my work env .... anyway, bastards do not have a specific gender, skin color, origin, religion, whatever ...

            Come on, it is fun, we want more women in our cubicles ...and we want to pay them better ... in the end, your Mrs will also get her share ...

        3. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          @solarflare -No, I didn't misunderstand the article, I was replying directly to your earlier post. But that said, I've yet to see any serious study of pay that shows women earning the same as men for equal work, here in the UK, for the population as a whole. Yes, there are indivual cases where what SHOULD be happening IS happening - but overall, it's still the case that if you're born female, chances are strongly in favour of it being the case that you'll end up being paid less for whatever you do than if you were male - this even according to government data, and they've a vested interest in trying to show that things are headed the right way (hey, any government that manages to properly square this particular circle will gain a heck of a lot of kudos, and potentially votes, if they succeed!).

          We can agree that deliberate unfair discrimination based on gender is a bad thing under any circumstances, but right here and now it's women that are more commonly discriminated against in a multitude of ways. However - pragmatic equality for ALL is what I want.

        4. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          >Women certainly *should* be paid the exact same amount for a job as a male counterpart, currently that is the law and I fully support it.

          Not sure I support it like that. Remove the gender from the statement. A person should be paid the same as another person doing the same role, given the same qualifications, experience, time in role and performance. Should person A get the same pay rise as person B if they are less experienced or worse at their job just because they are a different gender?

          Its far too complex to be just pay men and women the same.

        5. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          "women certainly *should* be paid the exact same amount for a job as a male counterpart, currently that is the law and I fully support it."

          There is a big flaw in that argument - people's salaries are often not simply based on the job they do, salaries are generally based on how well their employers thinks they can/will do that job - therefore even within men, salaries vary widely among men 'doing the same job'. Here in lies the problem, where employers tend to sterotype women - assuming they won't perform well or not recognising their contribution and not giving them the same bell curve of salaries as men.

          Statistically, if you take the bell curve of mens salaries for a given job, and superimpose womens salaries onto that, you are likely to find that proportionally far fewer women are in the upper end of that bell curve - the distrbution is still massively skewed for them toward the lower end.

          This is what needs fixing - women need to be paid according to an unbiassed evalation of their ability and performance. Certainly many of the women I have worked with deserved great salaries and promotions having displayed outstanding ability... and of course one or two definitely deserved to be paid lower salaries having failed to perform.

          [disclaimer - the company I work at goes to great lengths to promote equality, and women have a lot of opportunity to make the best of themselves. I recognise that this is sadly lacking in many other companies]

        6. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

          > Currently there is a rhetoric that women are paid less

          It is not a "rhetoric", it is quite a thing and those of us who have worked in management positions know it is as easy to verify as it is hard to rectify. :-(

          For a sound-bite, Twitter-era, attention-deficient audience, the following infographic should suffice: http://ec.europa.eu/justice/gender-equality/files/gender_pay_gap/gpg_eu_factsheet_2015_en.pdf.

      2. Dazed and Confused

        Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

        @Esme, I spent most of the 80s working in semiconductor research, there were lots of women scientist and engineers in the labs where I worked, perhaps not half but no shortage at all. Nor were there a shortage of them being promoted to being team leaders, managers and on upwards.

        At the end of the 80s start of the 90s I worked for a large US IT company in technical support. There were no shortages of women engineers working there. Later I worked with the lab teams both in the UK and the US and again, no shortage of women.

        In the last 20 years though I've seen the number of women working in support going down rather than up. In the SW development groups there seem to be more, perhaps still a little less than 20 years back, but not like in the support side.

        I don't know why this is the case, why is it that women are now less inclined to enter the business than they once were.

        All I know is that my wife who was a great Unix support engineer just ceased to be interested in the technology, then chose to leave to raise the family, something she said she had no wish to do when younger. I suspect that a number of her contemporaries made a similar choice. Ultimately it wasn't helped by fact that the flexible working that the company were happy to give just didn't fit with customers expectations which made life difficult.

      3. jelabarre59

        Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

        That's not to say that men don't get a raw deal in some respects too, but the whole point of feminism is to work toward a fairer and more equal society for all,

        Sorry, it *used* to be the point of it. Somehow the SJWs got control of it, and twisted it to where anyone is OK so long as they're not male, or even worse a straight white male. The whole purpose of the equal-rights movement was to attain equality regardless of gender, orientation, race, etc. I'd like to see that movement come back, not this twisted reverse-racism we see now.

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

      25 up, 0 down. Wow. What a lot of typical male arseholes there are here.

      Thing is, increasing numbers of employers realise that, apart from reasons of basic decency and ethics, and being a much more pleasant environment, a diverse and woman-friendly workplace is much more productive. There's also the long term issue that the bros ensuring women are chased out of IT by misogyny are artificially manipulating their pay (by reducing the supply of labour - supply and demand, innit.) Employers tend not to like paying 30% more than they need to. So yuk it up while you can, MRA twats, you'll be unemployed or at least on significantly reduced pay in ten to twenty years time. And good riddance to the lot of you.

    5. Paper

      Re: "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

      "We need to promote women disproportionately, pay them equally or better..."

      That doesn't sound like equality to me. Why don't we also promote People of Colour, LGBTQ+ persons, older persons, indigenous persons, disabled persons, etc? I'm a gay guy, but even I don't really see the benefit of preferencing oppressed people over the majority. What we want is equal oppertunities and equal access to the same wages and perks that are assumed to our white straight male counterparts. Equal treatement, not special treatment!

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