Goodman has had plenty of non-comedic roles. 10 Cloverfield Lane, Trumbo, The Monuments Men, Flight, The Trouble With the Curve, Argo, etc...

He started in comedy and then moved into drama. Which is fine, but fat women generally aren't given the same opportunities. Melissa McCarthy, Rebel Wilson, Roseanne Barr, Amy Schumer (who isn't nearly as fat as the other three, but also isn't as thin as most Hollywood leading ladies), Kirstie Alley...

I picked him as an example because the first website I found listed him as the comic relief in the show. I never watched Lost. When I heard about the crazy plot twists, I resolved to wait for the show to finish and then ask if they tied up all of the storylines and bizarre clues neatly in the end. I heard more discontent than praise for the series finale, so I never watched it.

Neville is comic relief. He manages to do some heroic things in the last few books, but mostly he's the fat kid that makes a fool of himself. The black African robed wizard is a bit part. Hagrid may qualify as the exception.

If you've got a film like Underworld, or Mission: Impossible, The Hobbit, or The Avengers, it's implicit that there is escapism and I don't expect slim people that are unattractive to be on the cast, let alone fat people.

But think of police procedurals and court dramas. Think of horror stories where the viewer is supposed to identify with the victims, and it's supposed to feel real. Not "A crazy killer just cut loose in a school for fashion models!" If someone wants to make that movie, it's fine. But don't build a setting with what is supposed to be a normal group of people living normal lives that encounter some monster, and then make Chris Evans and Amber Heard the ugliest people on the entire cast.

I didn't say we need 50% of technology workers to be women. But I am saying that sexism is not yet a solved issue in education or in the tech industry, and I think it's reducing the number of women in the field. I'm open to the possibility that when sexism is not an issue in education or in technology work, women still pursue the field less often than men do on average.

But we're not there yet. We have women losing interest in the field at school and especially dropping out of careers because of discrimination, harassment, and other similar treatment. And that kind of thing has a ripple effect - fewer mentors for other women interested in the field are available, and there are stories of mistreatment.

So the value of many of Damore's points are undercut by that. He points out that women are more vulnerable to stress. Enduring sex-based harassment and mistreatment while most of your colleagues do not would cause additional stress, so how many women with stress problems are simply more susceptible to stress and how many are in fact reacting the same way a man would to higher stress in their environment? I don't know the answer, but he doesn't even raise the possibility.

Damore points out that women tend to focus more on work and life balance for the sake of family, and it hurts their career prospects. But there again, I took plenty of time off for the birth of my kids and my male colleagues with children did the same, and we rearrange our work schedules for medical appointments, award ceremonies, recitals, chaperoning field trips, etc... and nobody ever used that as an excuse to deny us a raise or give a promotion to someone else. So how many women with a faltering career due to a work and life balance are actually just being punished for being women, while their male colleagues with the same balance climb the ranks?

And again, there are enough stories of harassment and sexual harassment floating around that I'm confident some portion are true. I'm sure some are fabricated and some are exaggerated, but hysterical theatrics aren't restricted to women - I've worked with delusional narcissistic men too. Most likely, a big portion of those accusations hold up - and that means a lot of people are being driven out for reasons wholly unrelated to intelligence, competence, and work ethic.

We're not even a hundred years out from women's suffrage in most of the world. It's too early to call this topic settled.

It's conversion therapy if you're demanding that the fat people be consistently cast as romantic leads. And admittedly, I'm sure there are people demanding that.

But most fat people, including me, just want to see fat people that are regular people. Who are the fat characters in Harry Potter? The Dursleys (obnoxious idiots) or Dolores Umbrage (obnoxious sadist). Who's the fat character in NCIS? House? The West Wing? None. Who's the fat character in Lost? Hurley, the comic relief. etc... etc... Disney animated films? Ursula (villain), Maid Marian's helper (comic relief), Pumba (comic relief), Governor Ratcliffe (villain) - The Princess & The Frog was conspicuous for having two relatively important characters that were fat. CSI had the fat medical examiner (if I remember right).

I accept that most of the population views the fatties as the ugly half. That's fine. But I take issue at being the absent half, the incompetent half, the evil half, the stupid half.

As much as this topic interests me, I'm not sure it's "news for nerds".

Hollywood is more tolerant of chubby or fat guys in dramatic roles than women: John Goodman, Alec Baldwin, Bryan Cox, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Brendan Gleeson, Tom Hanks, etc.... even Jonah Hill and Jack Black have been cast in serious roles as fat guys. For fat women, typically if they're in the film or television they are the comic relief and the humor revolves partly around their size.

As you said, Hollywood is interested in making money and even among men the great majority of primary characters in film and television roles are slim, attractive, and athletic. But I still think an imbalance exists.

We still have consistent, reliable, measurable sexism in the technology industry. So that is almost certainly a factor in the way that Title 9 had a lesser impact in this industry than in others. For whatever reason, the fights against sexism in law and medicine made progress faster than they did in ours.

When we've eliminated that as a factor for decades and there is still a trend in favor of one sex, then we have interesting data. Until then, James Damore's arguments are shots in the dark.

There are problem thousands or tens of thousands of reasonable white guys here, liberal or conservative.

But the whole debate over what James Damore wrote has seen the lunatic fringe come out of the woodwork to insult anyone criticizing what he wrote on any grounds, and attacking women in general.

I'm open to the possibility that some of what he wrote is correct. But I don't expect much of an intelligent debate on the subject here... or on 4chan, or on Twitter or Reddit.

If you go back far enough, women weren't permitted to be veterinarians. So they had a minority position in the field due to sexism.

Since it isn't even a hundred years since women gained the right to vote in most of the world, I'd say it's too early to say sexism is a solved problem. It's entirely possible women will become the majority of engineers naturally (i.e. without diversification programs and other boosts) if sexism is eradicated.

It only makes sense to focus on jobs with high pay, right? Men don't work in daycare as often as women, either - but I've never seen a daycare employee driving around in a Mercedes, either.

Running a nail salon business is different. That can be lot more profitable than working in one.

I'm not saying women definitely should be a half or even a third of engineers. But I think as long as there is still measurable sexism in the industry, we're comparing two uneven things - men who choose to be engineers and don't deal with sexism at work, and women who choose to be engineers or who might choose to be engineers and some non-zero attrition rate in education and in their career due to sexism. When we've had a hundred years of sexism-free society and women are still 20% or less of engineers, then we can declare that the difference is innate to the sexes and stop studying it.

I'm not saying all men in the industry are treated fairly. I'm just saying that if women are more likely to be mistreated specifically because of their gender and unrelated to all other factors, it will cause more problems for them on average than men experience.

But we have a smoke screen around neuroticism. If you're mistreated on your job - ignored, shouted down, harassed, sexually harassed, passed over for fairly earned promotions - you're more likely to develop nervous problems.

So Damore's argument that neuroticism is a factor implicitly assumes that sexism is a completely solved issue in the industry. If he's wrong - and I would contend he is - then he's confusing an effect with a cause.

The same argument could be made to keep women out of law and medicine. Until Title 9 laws in the US in 1972, women were less than 10% of the students for either profession and even less of the practicing professionals. In 1974 they were 22% of the students. Today they're 50%.

If sexism wasn't "solved" in law and medicine until the last few decades, why is tech any different?

Maybe you should post the question to a website with fewer trolls. I suggest 4chan.