Date: Sun, 07 Feb 1999 19:18:13 -0700 From: Wes Peters <wes@softweyr.com> To: Sue Blake <sue@welearn.com.au> Cc: Jeroen Ruigrok/Asmodai <asmodai@wxs.nl>, Licia <licia@o-o.org>, chat@FreeBSD.ORG, Nicole Harrington <nicole@nmhtech.com>, "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Women in FreeBSD ( was Re: Is there a reseller program?) Message-ID: <36BE4965.E2CDC046@softweyr.com> References: <Pine.BSF.4.05.9902070015070.29940-100000@o-o> <XFMail.990207112132.asmodai@wxs.nl> <19990207222432.36384@welearn.com.au>
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Sue Blake wrote:
>
> On the occasions I've been an employee, people have had a lot of
> trouble working out where to slot me in. It's like there's a slot at
> the bottom and a slot at the top, but nobody wants to see unusual
> people working at the benches like a Normal. It's OK to be an expert,
> to train people, to write about it, to boss people around and spend
> money, to present papers at prestigious national and international
> events, or to change policies that affect the working lives of
> millions; it's not OK to do the actual bloody work.
>
> I have no reason to put this down to being a woman, but it has happened
> most in situations where I was the only woman in the workplace, or in
> the whole industry, the only anglo-looking member of the Buddhist
> society, or the only recorder player in the symphony orchestra, the
> only FreeBSD user, or soemthing like that. Suddenly someone spots a
> spuriously wonderful talent, and instantly Cinderella becomes Mother
> Theresa and can't say fuck any more.
>
> It seems that any people who are different from others in a field are
> more easily accepted as exceptional people than as human beings with
> the standard range of skills and weaknesses. Think also of sports
> people belonging to racial minorities, university undergraduates older
> than 30, and the many blind musicians who have average talent. Treating
> someone as a god doesn't necessarily mean you can really handle them
> being there. Nor does it do much to help them.
>
> I don't know if this is what other women experience or what happens in
> IT, or not (no data to go on), but if it is, it's just part of a
> broader human nature stuffup. It's also yet another reason why we must
> get our numbers up quickly. When we're allowed to find our own level
> and fail a bit just like everyone else, we will be starting to succeed.
I think you've hit on an important point here, Sue. It's never quite
comfortable being "odd man out," or in this case "odd woman out." My
office has 17 software engineers, of which 3 are female. They are all
pretty much just a part of the team, and bring different talents and
abilities, just like the 14 males. They are different enough that we
don't have any sort of "women's caucus," as are the men. The groups
that naturally form in any human group tend to form more along the
lines of sense of humor, education, etc. I don't think this would
happen quite so well if there were only one woman on the engineering
team, or in the office, she'd always be treated differently.
So, let's all go out and recruit more female FreeBSD contributors, so
we can get around to treating the lot of them as badly as we treat
each other right now. ;^)
> Meanwhile, it looks like a larger than expected proportion of us,
> regardless of gender, are united by our mutual interest in women :-)
Women fascinate me; they always have. And I'm not even looking for
a date. I have 1.2 women at home with me now, and have a date with
1 every Tuesday night, when .2 is at my parent's house for the
evening. ;^)
--
"Where am I, and what am I doing in this handbasket?"
Wes Peters Softweyr LLC
http://www.softweyr.com/~softweyr wes@softweyr.com
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