occam

False perceptions

I was going through the presentation “code of our own” that talked about woman and code and different ways of learning programming. Under the pictures of slide 14 it says:

“Boys tend to be incompetent together and figure stuff out in the early teenage years without shame. Consider starting a band as an example. Girls are socially rewarded at that age for demonstrating competence, maturity, not looking stupid. We can work on that skill now, as adults, with respect.”

Beside the wide range of very different (social) issues mentioned here, (the major one being puberty?!), the named incompetence between teenage boys made me wonder about the perception.

So how did some nerdy boys from the 80’s learn all the fancy assembler skills, cracking game copy protections and writing code? Short answer: With a friend.

If i ask around in my male coder circles, the majority of people had the following introduction into the world of computers.

1. First encounter: Father got a computer, a class mate’s father had a computer etc…
2. Playing around with the machine, being interested in the machine itself and what it can do. Reading manuals and books, spending hours and hours in front of it.
3. Play around with the computer together with a good friend. This usually became a major peak in the learning curve and you often exchanged experiences, new features, functions and other findings.

After one or two years of programming in different languages, you gained enough basic knowledge about the computer, how it works and how everything builds upon each other. This became the base for every new learning process in the future.

These two years are usually filled with exchange. With, “can you try if this runs on your computer?”, “did you try this version?”, “did you notice this feature?”. Developing software always involved other people, even so the coding itself was something you did alone at night - the lack of distractions helps to concentrate.

The presentation also mentions the fear of exposing the “not knowing” to a larger group of people. This totally applies for all genders and might be the main reason for learning with a good friend - because you could ask the questions and exchange without any embarrassment.

I totally see that working in a small group is a very efficient way of learning. Writing an application together, to have a specific task that everyone can work on. I spent the last week at a wonderful hacker squat. The exchange is always astonishing, to inspire each other, to share and gain knowledge, to meet new people. It’s no surprise that hackerspaces become so successful.

However, in the context of the current discourse of woman in open source, i sincerely ask for more differentiations. I totally agree with the existence of all issues. But there are multiple questions to ask:

• What are gender issues?
• What are social issues?
• What are group issues?
• What are the specific issues with “male hackers” and their behaviors?

A clear separation is needed. I fear that in the process of getting more genders into the IT world, we might build up more walls between them. Please, let us tear them down instead.

ps: Yes, i am afraid i did not see the related actual talk of that presentation :(