I can't know that we do anything wrong, but the (felt, not measured) numbers feel like they are too large to be explained by purely biological reasons. (Yes, is this by no means scientific. And that bothers me; but I just don't know any numbers).
Also the articles I linked to here mention things that deter some women which I've observed in Perl community, for example endless discussions that sometimes end in insults (seen on p5p and on some IRC channels) and the very competitive nature of XP here on perlmonks.
I'm not saying that we're doing anything wrong a priori, but assuming that we do everything right because we haven't measured that we're doing anything wrong is too easy, IMHO. | [reply] |
Go watch a predominantly female staff somewhere and then come back speaking about competitiveness! Not speaking about insults.
The "less competitive nature" of women, their lower tolerance to or lower likelihood to inflict verbal abuse is pure propaganda.
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Of course women are competitive - the differences aren't in the fact of competitiveness, but in the way we do it.
Being a woman working and often studying in a primarily male culture, I am acutely aware of the differences. For one, women don't tend to joke-via-insult the way men do. For men, mutual insults are often a way of establishing equality and collegiality: "you can't get one over me". For women, negative statements are often meant exactly as they are said. They are carefully worded to either provide constructive criticism or a genuine put-down. We're all human, so we can translate from one style of communication to the other (male to female), but it takes work.
For instance, the other day thezip(?) wrestled dhoss to the ground after riding him through hill and dale. I have two younger half-brothers who used to nearly kill each other wrestling - sometimes in anger, but sometimes also just for fun. Why two people would think almost killing each other is "fun" is beyond me. I got the impression that most people in the CB thought it great fun to watch dhoss and thezip go at it. For me to feel comfortable, I had to think back to my younger brothers and just accept that it is a view of the world I don't (and probably never will) "get".
Best, beth
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