The invisibility of programming as a career

(written by lawrence krubner, however indented passages are often quotes). You can contact lawrence at: lawrence@krubner.com, or follow me on Twitter.

Interesting:

I personally feel qualified to take on the title of “hacker” because of my early in life and broad experiences with programming, but simultaneously feel that I’ll never truly be one because I don’t fit the stereotype and am okay with that: I wear dresses and heels instead of hoodies and sneakers, I keep a regular sleep schedule, and most of all, I’m not male. I feel like I might be earning extra respect because of my extra years of experience, but I find that advantage extremely unfair to the many spectacular “non-hacker” software engineers out there. Actually, I might not even be getting that advantage—I didn’t notice I was a “hacker” for so long, so why would anyone else see it? I have to wonder how many other women who’ve been programming for the past 10 years also were, or still are, unable to notice it.

It’s important to understand that the underrepresentation of women among “hackers” doesn’t mean women had the option to become them but were uninterested. The issues of invisibility and sexism illustrated above have systematically been leaving women behind or even pushing them out of the pool. I don’t have all the answers about how to “get 13 year old girls interested in computers”, but I know that it has to start with the field becoming visible to them. The issues surrounding women who did not have these opportunities at a young age compound on top of the issues that I mentioned the woman “hacker” faces. In addition to being unable to self-identify with the “hacker” stereotype, starting to write code at a later age necessitates working twice as hard to “catch up” to the “hacker”. Actually, doubling up on the work is becoming increasingly necessary not just to compete with the “hacker”, but also to succeed at all as a software engineer. Many women, and “non-hacker” men, really spend the time needed to catch up: an impressive achievement. Unfortunately, some of these hard-working “latecomers” face imposter syndrome in the face of the desirable the “hacker” stereotype—we simply haven’t figured out time travel yet, so they still feel powerless compared to the stereotype.

The prevalence of the “hacker” stereotype hurts those who don’t identify with it, such as women; in turn, this hurts everyone. “Hacker” doesn’t equate to the best software engineer, the best founder, or much of anything other than having benefited from a longer period of time to gain experience—extra time that may or may not have been used effectively to gain additional knowledge. But that’s not the really disappointing part: it’s the alienating connotations the term carries. Those who haven’t been given the title of “hacker” are often ignored or pull themselves out of the competitive pool because it’s a term they can never earn as the time frame for doing so has passed. This rejection might even discourage bright minds from seeking to start an equivalent “hacker” training at a time some might call years too late. Wouldn’t it be better for everyone if the people from all backgrounds were given the opportunity to succeed on merit and grow without overcoming unnecessary hurdles instead of focusing all our energy on the exclusionary “hacker” stereotype?

Post external references

  1. 1
    http://blog.lizdenys.com/2014/01/03/i-do-not-feel-like-a-hacker/
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