Should the computing industry care about social and political issues?
I'm not sure why this is even a controversial question. Why wouldn't we care about the issues faced by the other people in our field? This is our industry, this is our field, this is how we spend the majority of our days... why wouldn't we want to try to eliminate the embedded prejudice?
Writing about these particular issues really stresses me out. Because I'm female and come from a lower class family, I feel like I'm expected to have strong feelings about these issues and to be somewhat aggressive about it. Well, I definitely do have strong feelings but I typically shy away from discussing them unless prodded. I do not want my thoughts discarded because I've been written off as just another bitter and envious person.
I think the computing industry is a scary place for women right now. On one hand we are made to feel unfit for the job, and on the other hand we are made to feel guilty for having the job.
Being made to feel unfit for the job is not a new thing for me. In fact, it started in grade school. I remember one particular situation: we were learning about negative integers and I tried to help my peer. He told me there was no way I could be right because I was a girl and girls aren't good at math. These situations still happen, and it's over a decade later. This summer at work, I was told by a fellow intern that I should probably rethink studying Programming Languages in graduate school because "it's the hardest research area", and you guessed it, I'm female.
Being made to feel guilty for having the job is very new to me. My first experience with the feeling came only a few months ago, when I was bombarded by comments like, "you only got this job because you're female", "you have more opportunities because you're female", or "you'll get into grad school because you're female." At first I was shocked and just blew it off, ignoring the sources of the comments (because they also were the type to prefer Nano to Vim...), but the comments did not stop. Finally, after three months of their beligerent comments seeping into my mind, I started to feel guilty. I started to feel like I had an unfair advantage because of my gender and that I should recognize my privilege as a female and actively take a stand against it.
What.
I'll get back to why this is wrong. First, I think it's important to note that this idea isn't new or specific to my place of work. Many people hold the opinion that the gender diversity problem in the computing industry is not a result of discrimination, but rather is a result of women being uninterested in the industry, emanating the idea that women are actually on the other side of the discrimination.
That's bullshit.
1) Women are not uninterested. Who even came up with this nonsense? The same person that came up with the idea that women aren't good at math or coding? The same person who explained the previous question by saying women have too many emotions that affect their professionalism? There's really nothing for me to say besides pointing out how nonsensical it is. Everybody has emotions. Whether or not you let it affect your work is less related to your gender and more related to your personality characteristics. Not all women let their emotions affect their work, just like not all men are able to stop their emotions from affecting their work.
2) Discrimination against women is undeniable. Please refer to previous paragraph.
Back to why this idea is wrong.
After a lot of conflicting thoughts, introspection, and
discussions with some friends back here at Notre Dame, I
realized that I shouldn't feel guilty. In fact, those
unsagacious opinions of my fellow interns shed light
on their own introspections, or lack thereof.
Privilege being taken away can feel like discrimination. For centuries, men have been given the upperhand. There is no way to deny this... Women's Suffrage had to be a thing. The computing industry was/is already helping the men in the field- to level the playing field is to remove those undue advantages. Women's initiatives in STEM are a direct response to environments that favor men and are oppressive to women, and while on the surface can look discriminatory, they are actually anti-discriminatory and equality-driven in nature. It's foolish to feel guilty for finally being given the chance to achieve equality. It's not fair to say that women are on the other side of the gender discrimination in the computing industry because of the initiatives that try to bring women into the field. It's also not fair to say we are gaining undue advantages from these initiatives. These initiatives are what give women an actual chance in the field. The fact that some men still cannot understand the importance of these initiatives, or the importance of having women in the computing industry altogether, really just illuminates the need for these exact initiatives.
I'm not saying that every woman shares my experiences. I'm also not saying that every man is sexist. What I am trying to say is that gender discrimintation is real and it is scary. But what's even scarier is how some people are still viewing the industry with rose-colored lenses and are unable to see the prejudice. As a result, I think it is indeed the industry's duty to try and eliminate these prejudices. There is no reason not to.
I want to point out that my overall experience at Notre Dame lacks much of the discussed discrimination. I am very lucky and grateful for my experiences here, but it still doesn't really compensate for my overall experience as a female in the computing industry, which I think is quite sad.