[TriLUG] The biggest deterrent for women in tech

Danielle Danielle at whitrel.com
Wed May 1 22:27:38 EDT 2013


On 2013-05-01 18:47, bak wrote:

> I found Fine's _Delusions of Gender_ and Jordan-Young's _Brain Storm_
> to be very effective at getting to the root of the neuroscience 
> behind
> "men and women have different brains". Fascinating reads.

Added on my Kindle now. I'm certain I shall find them interesting; a 
year ago I took Anthropology 440 at UNC to satisfy a core requirement 
because the topic of the course, Gender and Culture, interested me.

> There isn't much, if any, evidence to support strong claims made by
> folks talking about "traditionally this way" and "naturally
> different".

I certainly agree, and my own lived experience agrees. I enjoy, if we 
can call it that, the unique individual perspective of experiencing 
working as a SysAdmin in both sides of the binary: I am a transgender 
individual who transitioned from male to female (a trans woman) in the 
midst of my career. I observed that when I was perceived by my coworkers 
as a cis[1] man I was privileged with far more automatic acceptance than 
when I came to be perceived by my coworkers as a cis woman. In my 
employment since transition, in order to have acceptance of my technical 
ability, I have had to prove myself to a level that I would subsequently 
realize was higher than what subsequently hired male coworkers were held 
(and, often, whom I trained/mentored.)

I know that I am incredibly fortunate with my current management, who 
does a fantastic job of recognizing my professional performance and 
accomplishments. This has helped to erase disadvantages I suffered over 
the years, such as being the victim of a 33% pay gap in my immediately 
previous job (state employment; I was reorged into a position with 
higher duties and my management was distinctly hostile to my attempts to 
negotiate for an adjustment of my salary commensurate with my new duties 
and level of performance thereof) but it does not erase the opportunity 
cost of that disadvantage - the lost cumulative benefits to pension 
savings, etc.

I hasten to add here that I am very much aware of my privilege. In 
spite of several axes on which I face oppression - a lesbian, trans 
woman in tech - I have significant axes of privilege that largely serve 
to mitigate the effect of the oppression in my life. As trans* people 
go, I consider myself among the 1% - having a level of income and 
standard of living that few others are likely to ever obtain or regain. 
This is why I'm comfortable being "out but reserved" about this fact of 
my history - I will discuss it when germane, which I feel it is here.

[1] This might be an obscure term in this context, but it is far from 
new; it is the opposite of trans.



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