March 31, 2014 at 9:10 am
There is a tendency to fall into a 'us and them' mentality when people take these distinctions too seriously Not everyone or every group falls into this trap, but it does happen. And this occurs even if the group conists of a variety of supportive people from 'mainstream' categoies, its concept tends to be viewing through the lens of categories (even if done for good intentions). Hence, the categories remain. Unfortunately (at least in political contexts) people see the categories first before the underlying issues, and plenty of people (on all sides of the issues) manipulate those perceptions.
Of course the principle of free association allows anyone to form a group for whatever reason they want, but you will never eliminated discrimination by codifying it.
...
-- FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers --
March 31, 2014 at 9:21 am
skeleton567 (3/31/2014)
Separate minority groups by definition tend to separate further instead of aiding acceptance. Especially in technology, get in there and prove your competency instead of emphasizing differences. I worked for one ethnic minority supervisor in my career, and remember him not as a minority but as incompetent. He didn't last long and probably hurt the stereotype of his ethnicity in the long run. Socialy and professionally, there are always going to stereotypes, so the best one can do is to prove you don't match yours.
Great hypothesis, never works. Opportunity and coping almost never has something to do with competency. It's opportunity and acceptance that are big issues. Quite often there are challenges to showing your ability that have nothing to do with your skill.
Technology, like most other professions, is not a meritocracy. Almost always it has something to do with your network and who you know, and who likes you. These groups are often geared to help that.
March 31, 2014 at 9:24 am
Gary Varga (3/31/2014)
I think that these groups are great as long as their long term task is to make their own existence redundant (even if we believe that this may never happen). Why do I say this? Simply because they exist because they need to. Those that have agreed with my sentiment do not want to be separated from the majorities themselves but feel that the have been excluded by the majority (or by a small group that exist within the majority). That is a shame and it must be the long term goal for these groups to invalidate themselves.
Perhaps, but people are always struggling to become part of the mainstream and we'll never include everyone in the mainstream. There will always be challenges for groups. While some might become less necessary, other groups will be needed.
The key, IMHO, is that these groups evolve to keep helping their members. The purpose can't be for the group to succeed and grow, but that the members succeed and grow.
March 31, 2014 at 9:25 am
SQLRNNR (3/31/2014)
Eric M Russell (3/31/2014)
If one of my daughters expressed a desire to pursue a career in technology, I would encourage her with no reservations.I would do the same. If she wanted to be a stay at home mom, I'd support her in that as well. If she wanted to be a street sweeper on the other hand, I'd try to encourage her to do something different. The same applies to my sons (just swap stay at home mom for stay at home dad).
+1
March 31, 2014 at 9:33 am
skeleton567 (3/31/2014)
Pardon me, but it appears that we have fallen into exactly the situation here that I described. We're all talking about men/women, majority/minority, etc instead of what should be the key goal of professional organizations, that of improving competency and sharing insights. And this further illustrates my original thought that splintering into subgroups based on some irrelevant classification tends to muddy the water relative to the main focus of IT professionals, that being, again, competency in the profession.
It's not an irrelevant classification, it's one that is impacted. A large professional organization is good, and it helps the profession. PASS has helped here. However it also doesn't serve it's various groups, like women. There are entirely too many jerks in this business that still think women aren't as competent, and don't deserve the same opportunities, regardless of their skills.
The same could be said for people in these other "irrelevant classifications". Your example alone seems to imply some distrust of at least some ethnic minority because he/she was incompetent. Extending that to any other instance of that ethnic group would be wrong, but people make these judgements every day.
They always will. That's why the groups are needed.
March 31, 2014 at 9:53 am
Come on, Steve. You sound like the one who is 'impacted' this morning. Get over it. Don't try to twist my comments. What I pointed out was that REGARDLESS OF ETHNICITY, SEXUALITY, or whatever, there was an incompetency that was the REAL problem. In this same group we had other people of minority status that were among the best and brightest and most productive. It would have been a loss to us all if they had gone off on their own due to, and I repeat myself, IRRELEVANT difference.
Rick
Disaster Recovery = Backup ( Backup ( Your Backup ) )
March 31, 2014 at 10:02 am
skeleton567 (3/31/2014)
Come on, Steve. You sound like the one who is 'impacted' this morning. Get over it. Don't try to twist my comments. What I pointed out was that REGARDLESS OF ETHNICITY, SEXUALITY, or whatever, there was an incompetency that was the REAL problem. In this same group we had other people of minority status that were among the best and brightest and most productive. It would have been a loss to us all if they had gone off on their own due to, and I repeat myself, IRRELEVANT difference.
I think there's also a risk of encouraging good workers to leave if majority groups refuse to accept that they are different. There's a balance to be struck. We don't want to segregate people based on, well, anything. On the other side, we don't want to treat everyone as 'equals' if that means forcibly upcasting everyone as instances of the superclass 'Human' and ignoring all of their unique methods. (I'm not suggesting that's what you're doing by the way). There's diversity amongst our colleagues which is great. We have different ways of thinking and different cultures etc that make both our products better and our friendships with our colleagues more rewarding.
nb in case you can't tell I recently did a training course on object orientation 😀
Ben
^ Thats me!
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March 31, 2014 at 10:03 am
I think one of the things being missed here with regard to the WIT group. It isn't just a group to support women who are in technology careers, but to help encourage women to pursue STEM careers, careers that many women feel are closed to them or they are discouraged from pursuing them, that they are not smart or competent enough to succeed.
March 31, 2014 at 10:10 am
Steve Jones - SSC Editor (3/31/2014)There are entirely too many jerks in this business that still think women aren't as competent, and don't deserve the same opportunities, regardless of their skills.
Some women are not competent in technology. Some are very competent. Far more men are incompetent in technology simply because there are still more men in technology than women.
Special interest groups do not cause prejudiced people to wake up and realize they are wrong. They do cause non-prejudiced people outside the group to feel like they are being discriminated against. Therefore the assumption that they help eliminate discrimination is incorrect.
If I understand correctly your point is not about making discrimination go away, it is about helping women, or other groups, succeed in technology. Their (all groups!) success benefits all of us.
Using females only, the answer is two fold.
First, we need to attack the discrimination that occurs in our school systems. We still push females into "soft" classes instead of science and math. Rarely do schools put as much effort into helping girls do well in those areas as they do for boys. In fairness each school is different, some probably do a great job in helping girls understand the opportunities available to them. Overall we (humans in general) still devalue females. We don't need to get into how some countries treate girls, including denying them education at all.
If we want females to succeed in technology we need to start teaching them basic skills as early as we do males. Our species needs to stop devaluing them.
Second, those females that are already out of school need to be given fair opportunities. I can't speak to whether that happens or not. I believe some companies do, and some probably don't. Males in technology need to recognize that females are different than males, and those differences are an advantage! Females would benefit from recognizing that males are different as well. Mostly we ALL need to understand that just because one person is deficient does NOT have any bearing on any other individual in that group.
Dave
March 31, 2014 at 10:12 am
Hey, I had to stop and look up that STEM thing. New to me, so I am still learning today, at 71 years old!
one comment I'm 'gonna' ( as our illustrious prez says ) add is to reiterate what my wife long ago used to say: 'I want to be known for what is between my ears, not what is between my legs.'
I think that applies also to skin color, ethnicity, whatever.
Rick
Disaster Recovery = Backup ( Backup ( Your Backup ) )
March 31, 2014 at 10:17 am
Lynn Pettis (3/31/2014)
I think one of the things being missed here with regard to the WIT group. It isn't just a group to support women who are in technology careers, but to help encourage women to pursue STEM careers, careers that many women feel are closed to them or they are discouraged from pursuing them, that they are not smart or competent enough to succeed.
That is a good thing! It all comes down to "why" we feel these groups are necessary, and how the groups are used.
Dave
March 31, 2014 at 10:18 am
Steve Jones - SSC Editor (3/31/2014)
There are entirely too many jerks in this business that still think women aren't as competent, and don't deserve the same opportunities, regardless of their skills.
And some (I hope a very small minority) who are a little more extreme and vocal... http://www.destructoid.com/bioware-writer-s-vagina-versus-the-internet-222206.phtml
I remember showing up at an Oracle conference a few years ago. The name tag I was given read "Mr G. Shaw". "Oh, I'm sorry," said the person at check in, "are you here in your husband's stead?" :ermm:
Gail Shaw
Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability
March 31, 2014 at 10:21 am
skeleton567 (3/31/2014)
Hey, I had to stop and look up that STEM thing. New to me, so I am still learning today, at 71 years old!one comment I'm 'gonna' ( as our illustrious prez says ) add is to reiterate what my wife long ago used to say: 'I want to be known for what is between my ears, not what is between my legs.'
I think that applies also to skin color, ethnicity, whatever.
That's a brilliant quote! And I totally agree with your assessment.
'what is between the ears' varies so much from person to person and is influenced by a huge number of factors. And the end of the day though, that is what counts.
One of the great benefits of the WIT group is helping people who aren't presently in a STEM career to realise for themselves that what is between their ears is valuable. Sometimes that's one of the biggest issues for a minority group is a person's own realisation that they can excel in a particular field.
Ben
^ Thats me!
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March 31, 2014 at 10:29 am
I wonder if we might encourage people to enter technology professions, not on the basis of their race or gender, but on the basis of their socioeconomic status?
Race and gender classifications seem rather dated and inaccurate to me.
March 31, 2014 at 10:41 am
"I wonder if we might encourage people to enter technology professions, not on the basis of their race or gender, but on the basis of their socioeconomic status?"
Wow, that really is pretty goofy. Sounds like programmer's logic to me. What you failed to mention is whether socioeconomic status would be required to be high or low.
I admit that when I won my first job as a programmer trainee, my socioeconomic status was pretty low, but I got the job based on aptitude and willingness to put in the time to learn on my own while working. It paid off with a quite successful 42-year IT career. Nothing to do with sex, ethnicity. I set my goal to double my 'economic status' (income) in three years, and I made it with a couple months to spare. And nobody did it for me. I didn't join any organizations to promote my cause. Just worked hard, stayed late at work to learn more, studied manuals after I went to bed, whatever it took. And that was all before we had even dumb terminals, or PC's or internet.
Rick
Disaster Recovery = Backup ( Backup ( Your Backup ) )
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