Comment You have a double standard ... (Score 1) 289
... perhaps you don't even realize it. Women are participating, women are interested, but only the women that: a) are looking for the attention that you get from participating in a field with a high ratio of men to women (yes, I know I'm going to catch it for that statement) or b) women who are determined to ignore insults, condescending behavior, being slighted, and propositions from Tom, Dick *and* Harry, to be active in a field that interests them.
I have been working in hardware support for a number of years, for very large companies with household names (who will remain nameless) and for smaller companies that you may not have heard of. But my experience was much the same. BOTH men AND women looked at me very skeptically when I announced to them that I was there to repair their workstation, their server, their printer, whatever. Every now and then a woman would give me a smile and said it was nice to see a woman in the field. More often than not, though, they wanted to know what my credentials were before they felt comfortable to let me do my job.
So think about it, if you're at work and a twenty-something redhead appears to replace your hard drive, how would YOU react? And now that the open source community needs to expand its user base, you're asking where all the women are? We are non-verbally (and verbally) reminded that this is a man's field, (ok maybe not by you, but I'm sure you can think of a friend who has not treated a woman colleague as an equal)... Perhaps you should think more seriously about how much you encourage/allow the women you know to participate, as equals, in your interests (and theirs).
I have been working in hardware support for a number of years, for very large companies with household names (who will remain nameless) and for smaller companies that you may not have heard of. But my experience was much the same. BOTH men AND women looked at me very skeptically when I announced to them that I was there to repair their workstation, their server, their printer, whatever. Every now and then a woman would give me a smile and said it was nice to see a woman in the field. More often than not, though, they wanted to know what my credentials were before they felt comfortable to let me do my job.
So think about it, if you're at work and a twenty-something redhead appears to replace your hard drive, how would YOU react? And now that the open source community needs to expand its user base, you're asking where all the women are? We are non-verbally (and verbally) reminded that this is a man's field, (ok maybe not by you, but I'm sure you can think of a friend who has not treated a woman colleague as an equal)... Perhaps you should think more seriously about how much you encourage/allow the women you know to participate, as equals, in your interests (and theirs).
