{"id":4199,"date":"2012-05-25T12:48:07","date_gmt":"2012-05-25T20:48:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/?p=4199"},"modified":"2012-05-28T15:07:47","modified_gmt":"2012-05-28T23:07:47","slug":"thoughts-from-think-out-louds-women-in-tech-radio-broadcast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/2012\/05\/25\/thoughts-from-think-out-louds-women-in-tech-radio-broadcast\/","title":{"rendered":"Thoughts from Think Out Loud&#8217;s Women in Tech radio broadcast"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I was on the radio program <a href=\"http:\/\/www.opb.org\/thinkoutloud\/shows\/women-tech\/\" title=\"Think Out Loud: Women in Tech\">Think Out Loud<\/a> here in Portland this morning. Before getting on the radio, I prepared a few things to say and wanted to share a longer form of what I was thinking. <\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve been <a href=\"http:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/category\/womenintech\/\">blogging more about women&#8217;s issues<\/a> in relation to open source community and technology more generally. The experience is finally something that&#8217;s pretty fun &#8212; because there is finally research, success stories and a real sense of optimism among my friends and colleagues.<\/p>\n<p>This is in no small part because of the wonderful experiences I&#8217;ve had working in open source and on <a href=\"http:\/\/postgresql.org\">PostgreSQL<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>If you want to listen in, there&#8217;s a tiny link to download an mp3, or listen to the stream <a href=\"http:\/\/www.opb.org\/thinkoutloud\/shows\/women-tech\/\">at the top of this page<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The index card I brought into the studio with me had the following on it: <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The first step &#8211; admit we&#8217;ve got a problem\n<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/opensourcebridge.org\">Open Source Bridge<\/a>\n<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/meta.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/Gender_gap\">gender gap<\/a> vs cut programs 4 mentors\n<\/li>\n<li>more brogrammers than women\n<\/li>\n<li>solutions: environment, community inviting, make friends, training\/programming at Etsy\/Python\n<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/adainitiative.org\">Ada Initiative<\/a>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I was pretty happy to hit most of those points.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s some writing I&#8217;ve done previously that&#8217;s directly relevant to the topic of the show:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.oreillynet.com\/pub\/a\/womenintech\/2007\/09\/28\/to-sir-with-love-how-to-get-more-women-involved-in-open-source.html\">To sir with love, how to get more women involved in open source<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/2012\/05\/11\/what-i-mean-when-i-say-i-would-like-more-women-in-the-software-industry\/\">What I mean when I say I would like more women in the software industry<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And for some rough background on the <b>causes<\/b> of the lack of women, I have an <a href=\"http:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/2008\/04\/02\/women-who-code-where-are-they\/\">old blog post about a few of the reasons researchers point to<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Here are some of the thoughts I wrote down last night before going into the studio:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Resources<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/mitpress.mit.edu\/catalog\/item\/default.asp?ttype=2&#038;tid=8515\">Unlocking the clubhouse<\/a> &#8211; Jane Margolis &#8211; which includes specific actions universities should take\n<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/flosspols.org\/\">FLOSSPOLS study<\/a> &#8211; which includes specific policy recommendations based on research\n<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/geekfeminism.wikia.com\" title=\"Geek Feminism Wiki\">Geek Feminism Wiki<\/a>\n<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/adaintiative.org\/\" title=\"Ada Initiative\">Ada Initiative<\/a>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Difference in Perception<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/www.flosspols.org_deliverables_FLOSSPOLS-D16-Gender_Integrated_Report_of_Findings.pdf-2.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/www.flosspols.org_deliverables_FLOSSPOLS-D16-Gender_Integrated_Report_of_Findings.pdf-2-300x225.png\" alt=\"\" title=\"www.flosspols.org_deliverables_FLOSSPOLS-D16-Gender_Integrated_Report_of_Findings.pdf-2\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-4201\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/www.flosspols.org_deliverables_FLOSSPOLS-D16-Gender_Integrated_Report_of_Findings.pdf-2-300x225.png 300w, https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/www.flosspols.org_deliverables_FLOSSPOLS-D16-Gender_Integrated_Report_of_Findings.pdf-2-399x300.png 399w, https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/www.flosspols.org_deliverables_FLOSSPOLS-D16-Gender_Integrated_Report_of_Findings.pdf-2.png 587w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Brogrammer<\/strong><br \/>\nIt\u2019s a funny term. Do I think people who fit that description exist? Sure they do. I\u2019ve spent a lot of time in the open source community. And I\u2019d even say that I\u2019ve met more guys who fit some part of the stereotype than there are women. But that says more about how few women there are than anything else.<\/p>\n<p><strong>More about me<\/strong><br \/>\nI\u2019m an open source conference organizer and Postgres major contributor, and I\u2019m an advisor to the <a href=\"http:\/\/adainitiative.org\">Ada Initiative<\/a>, supporting women in open source software.<\/p>\n<p>I love open source community and spend most of my free time volunteering for <a href=\"http:\/\/postgresql.org\">Postgres<\/a>. I start conferences like <a href=\"http:\/\/opensourcebridge.org\">Open Source Bridge<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/postgresopen.org\">Postgres Open<\/a> because I want to see more people getting together and working on open source. <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/2009\/04\/29\/whats-changed-portland-as-an-example-of-increasing-womens-participation\/\">Three years ago I was writing blog posts<\/a> about how many women I now see in the open source community &#8211; running events, writing code and just showing up. We have a long way to go to achieve gender balance, but it\u2019s now common to see 15-20% women at local technical events. When I first started attending events in 1999, I was often the only woman.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The research<\/strong><br \/>\nOnly 2-10% of open source contributors are women and only <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/society\/2012\/mar\/08\/equality-usa\">10% of business executives worldwide are women<\/a>. The research out there says that while there\u2019s some overt sexism, but another problem women face is a \u201cdeath by a 1000 cuts\u201d problem. Lots of small incidents that add up to most women feeling like they don\u2019t belong in STEM careers &#8211; science technology engineering and math. <\/p>\n<p><em>Unlocking the Clubhouse<\/em> talks about this. There\u2019s a feeling a woman gets when she walks into a clubhouse for men, that tells her she doesn\u2019t belong. And this book addresses what we can do about it. The book offers suggestions for changing this environment at Universities based on research with women and ethnic minorities. Suggestions include encouraging women to join study groups, changing shared spaces to welcome women and carefully finding ways for women to maintain their own identity, rather than becoming \u201cone of the guys\u201d. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Code of conduct<\/strong><br \/>\nOne of the things that the Ada Initiative and Geek Feminism wiki have done is help people and organizations think through and document their playbook for incidents. We now have <a href=\"http:\/\/adainitiative.org\/2011\/12\/example-conference-anti-harassment-policy-turns-one-year-old\/\">a template for a code of conduct<\/a>, resources for learning more about feminism and detailed instructions for how to support women. <\/p>\n<p>These are essentially playbooks for what women can expect from conference organizers if they experience a harassing or worse situation. <\/p>\n<p>The truth is, many people do not know how to respond when they see harassment, or are themselves harassed. So giving people a guideline, talking it through and making it public helps set a tone that\u2019s much better.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What can I do to help?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/geekfeminism.wikia.com\/wiki\/Resources_for_allies\">Resources for Allies<\/a>&#8221; is a good start.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What resources are there for support of Women in Tech?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Check out <a href=\"http:\/\/geekchick77.dreamwidth.org\/1387.html\">Jessamyn&#8217;s list<\/a>! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I was on the radio program Think Out Loud here in Portland this morning. Before getting on the radio, I prepared a few things to say and wanted to share a longer form of what I was thinking. I&#8217;ve been &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/2012\/05\/25\/thoughts-from-think-out-louds-women-in-tech-radio-broadcast\/\">Continue reading &rarr;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4199","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-postgresql","category-womenintech"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4199","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4199"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4199\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4221,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4199\/revisions\/4221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4199"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4199"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chesnok.com\/daily\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}