Tech Women: Not Victims of Discrimination

Huh?

I stayed after high school to help with the family business. This negatively affected the scholastic and athletic scholarships I was offered. That particular life choice affected my career path... bigtime!

"If true, what can be done to improve a woman's career path?" Make better choices. No kids, no husband or wife, no vacations... no real personal life. Long hours studying, and longer hours applying what you have learned or figured out. 100% investment of your blood, sweat and tears will result in an even better career path.

Is a better career path really worth all of that? It wasn't to me. My revealed life choice resulted in my parents being able to realize a lifelong dream, and if I had it to do over again I would do the same thing tomorrow.

That is, after all, why it is called a life choice. What is important to you is what you should choose. After you choose, don't whine about it not being fair.

Well, a hysterectomy might "improve a woman's career path" if she wants to put career first. Equal rights do not imply equal abilities or ambitions. That false connection has been promoted by the most androgynous women to give themselves an unfair advantage. People with gender-atypical talents have always managed to break the occupational stereotypes, and have always encountered some skepticism and resistance along the way. However, any extreme talent has to overcome interference from people whose skills are more political than technical. That does not prove that societal expectations are the only thing keeping the statistics skewed.

People have always divided occupations into gender-specific groups, even if not always the same way. This does make it awkward for someone whose real talent is atypical, but overall, it has many benefits. It lets people gather in same-sex groups for part of the day, giving us a break from the barnyard dance. It reduces the education we need. It raises productivity while giving us a wider variety of relationships. It keeps us inter-dependent for more than straight sex. Where there are differences in average physical or mental ability between the sexes, it usually takes advantage of that.

Men have been lambasted for being more inclined to violence, but almost nothing has been said about women's propensity for manipulating information and relationships. Many demands for "equality" are prime examples of just that. The feminist movement began when the question of nature vs nurture was wide open. Since then, Sociobiology has had great success at revealing our real inner workings, while feminism has devolved into a sexist cult. All we hear about are rights for homosexuals, but much of the debate is driven by bisexuals, who naturally think that everyone has a choice in gender orientation, and so assume that it is only culture affecting gender-related statistics. We can't legislate away normal heterosexual behaviour, which makes us symbiotic, not identical.

If you took the question seriously and respectfully, in consideration of the service that women provide bearing and caring for children, then I guess a program to help women enter the career path at 40+ and/or to make that late entry socially acceptable would be appropriate.

Given the comments here, a 40+ program for males would be a good idea too!

I'm a male and I have made choices that limited my advancement too. I don't regret it for a minute.

I see college classmates of mine who are now director of this, senior vice-president of that and I can only wish them the best. I know those are not easy paths and many sacrifices must be made to get there.

I like what I am doing, I do not dread the start of every work day, I go home in the evening (sometimes late but oh well) and I leave the office at the office. I don't have an electronic leash from the office, although my boss could call me if it was really important. I make a decent enough salary to live comfortably in the middle-class without worrying about whether I can pay all my bills or not and still manage to sock away 14% of my salary into the 401k. My only debt is last seven years of my home mortgage.

Works for me.

I think the concensus here (and the findings on that link) is that more women than men on average, prefer to NOT join the rat race of top academia, and that more often than not, even those that do, define success differently. There are always very good reasons for making these choices.

I recommend Deborah Tannen's book "You just don't understand" and her follow up book about communication between men and women to find out how the glass ceiling is and is not defined. One thing is for sure though....everybody has an opinion on the subject, and most have not done any research to back that opinion up. I applaud this study for doing just that.

I heartily second that recommendation. Ms. Tannen cuts through a lot of PC attitudes and tells it like it is, with great understanding of all sides of controversies like this.