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comment by _refugee_
_refugee_  ·  3718 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Crypto-Patriarchy: The problem of Bitcoin's male domination

    why is one allowed to tell the girl who wants to design clothing that she is wrong for wanting that because it enforces THE PATRIARCHY and she should force herself into STEM fields because it's the 'progressive' thing to do, when what she wants to do is design clothes?

Answer: one isn't. This is as anti-feminist as not allowing girls into STEM fields. Unfortuntately, some splinter groups of "feminism" say these things. However, feminism and other equal rights movements are about giving girls the choice to do whatever it is they want, not "anything that advances women in various fields."





OftenBen  ·  3718 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Gotcha. So, moving forward then, how do we address issues of gender inequality (and by extension general minority) in professional settings in a mature manner that doesn't disregard history, but also doesn't use it as an excuse to bully, exact revenge, or create new artificial 'majority' positions?

Edit* to include a more on topic question.

Since we agree no one person is 'at fault' for the current lack of women involved in BTC, whose responsibility is it to promote more even representation? Where are these women to come from who would be interested and invested in such a thing?

_refugee_  ·  3718 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  

The thing is, we don't know the difference between women and minorities who don't get involved in a certain field (using "field" loosely to include bitcoin) as opposed to those who have been discouraged from that field via societal pressures or even direct discrimination. It is mentioned elsewhere in this thread that it has been shown that job/class candidates with equal grades, degrees, and schools, but different genders, have different acceptance ratios. We are assuming that Bitcoin probably holds true to this standard as well. After all, there is no logical reason that women wouldn't be about as equally interested in Bitcoin. There is no such thing as a field that men are naturally drawn to vs. that women are naturally drawn to. I do not believe that women are naturally "nurterers" any more so than men, for instance; I do not believe that women are naturally drawn more to teaching or to teaching the youth, even though they tend to be overrepresented in lower education (but underrepresented in upper education, where, by the way, there is more associated prestige - hmmmmmm).

Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that these women already exist in respect to Bitcoin, but for some reason or another have opted out of exploring their interest. So, whose responsibility is it to promose more even representation? Why, if it is society's fault, then it is society's responsiblity, which means in turn it is everyone's responsibility to promote more even representation. You do this by treating women and minorities as equals. Every day, every time you interact with them. You do this by respecting individuals of the LGBT spectrum; instead of asking men about their wife when you see a wedding band, ask about their "spouse." (That's just a very small example; it doesn't apply directly but I wanted to point out, it's not just women. It's not just the visible minorities. It's the LGBT crew too, and I mean every letter of that spectrum.) You do this by monitoring your thoughts as well as your actions and you do this realizing that you are not perfect and probably don't realize ways in which you may be discriminating (which the privilege article should help any reader realize) and looking for those and trying to stop those.

You do it by speaking up when you hear other people discriminating in the workplace. Or when you see it.

There are 2 women on my company's senior leadership panel or whatever they call themselves, and 6 men. All are white. I got an opportunity to talk one-on-one with one of the women and I told her I wanted to see more women. I told her I knew that this was as much a product of availability as anything else but I told her that as a woman, it would be more comforting to me to see a more equal distribution. And she told me she also wanted to see more diversity; more color, more LGBT people. I realize that in order for someone to get to senior leadership, they need to climb up the lower rungs first - I'm willing to do that. I know that it's nothing against the 6 men who got to those positions, that they may not be racist in any way at all, and she assured me that they were actually quite accepting of minorities and so on. I don't have a problem with all those old white men. I have a problem with the fact that the given standard for senior leadership is "old white man." I want to change that. I'm willing to do it myself.

Blind interviews if you have to, if we're talking about jobs. Blind and non-vocal. Of course, that's not really possible.

It should be a sad fact that it was no small comfort to me that when I got my first job, all my interviews were conducted over the phone, and not face-to-face. I repeatedly turned to this fact as reassurance that I had indeed earned my position, inasmuch as I could. I'm not a Person of Color (PoC) but I do know we judge people based on their appearance, especially women. I was glad to know it wasn't a factor with me.

Meadester  ·  3717 days ago  ·  link  ·  

    Blind interviews if you have to, if we're talking about jobs. Blind and non-vocal

Blind and non-vocal is exactly how it works with bitcoin. In the vast majority of cases bitcoins are bought, sold, or used to buy and sell products buy people who have no idea of each other's race, sex, or other superficial characteristics. Anyone claiming discrimination in the bitcoin world is just wallowing in their own sense of victimhood, or trying to promote the idea of victimhood for others in order to be a white knight, like the author of the blog originally linked to.

_refugee_  ·  3715 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Oh, is that right ? Again, remember we're talking about people who show up in the Bitcoin culture - the original article is also about a Bitcoin meet-up/social gathering of some sort.

Meadester  ·  3712 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I did overgeneralize. I may have been overly blunt in the way I stated my case too. I'm sure there are cases, in face to face Bitcoin meetups of women and others who don't fit the typical "tech geek" mold being not treated properly. The post you linked to seems to be an example of that and she may have some legitimate complaints, but by her own admission she experienced some minor discomfort not life-shattering trauma. She has not let it keep her away from future Bitcoin meetups and urges other women not to let it keep them away either.

My point was that it is possible to succeed in the Bitcoin world without ever going to a meetup, in fact hardly ever leaving your home (not that I'd recommend that). So the culture of the meet ups is really only slightly relevant, especially since any splinter group that wants to could organize their own.