I'm a woman in software. I'm fairly junior, I have only been doing this for a few years now.
I have used Rust a few and did not participate in the survey, but I did participate in the Python user survey, because at least 50% of my time is working with Python.
My workplace is mostly men- in fact I am the only woman in our USA office. And I agree that I would prefer to work somewhere with more women, or more representation of women.
Representation isn't exactly linear either. If women in dev jobs at a company write blog posts for the company, for instance, that gives me a higher opinion of the company.
Finally, the majority of women who are in the community are likely a silent majority. I hardly ever make pull requests for packages I patch because of bad experiences I've had, I don't comment on message boards, and on HN I don't use my real name either.
I'd blame that, for me personally, on bad or frustrating experiences. And it's fine if the community acts that way, and it's fine if myself and other women choose to stay quiet.
> I'd blame that, for me personally, on bad or frustrating experiences. And it's fine if the community acts that way
Wait, why is it fine if the community acts in a way that provides bad or frustrating experiences for specific categories of people (in this case, minorities in comparison to the overall population of that group, which women are in software development)?
If someone said "I'm black and I interact with the community less because of bad or frustrating experiences", we probably wouldn't say that's okay, so I'm wondering why you feel it's okay for the community to act that way towards you as a woman? Or did I misinterpret?
> Apparently answering an anonymous survey is either too much trouble for women to bother with
Comments like this are what put people off. Trying to find out why women or other minorities are not participating is constructive and useful, but not when you frame the problem as their fault.
I agree the GP comment was worded a little weirdly, but I'm not sure it actually is trying to frame the problem as their fault. Later portions, such as:
> Why should companies be expected to hire women developers when it appears there are so few? The places with more than a few women developers also attract more, making it even more difficult for other companies to hire them. I am exasperated every time someone asserts that it isn't a pipeline problem. Based on these results there just aren't any out there at scale.
Seem to indicate to me they view it more as the quoted industry numbers are wrong, at a minimum misleading (e.g. maybe female developers are much more likely to be relegated to junior positions or not have or feel they have the freedom to explore less mainstream solutions).
In any case, it's an interesting question. Why are there major discrepancies between what is reported by the industry for gender involvement and by community driven efforts?
Finally, I think it's worth noting that in a comment where the author felt the need to not only post it anonymously, but explain that they felt the need to do so, you picked out one sentence, chose a negative interpretation of it, and then called out the original comment for attibuting blame to women when the comment clearly ended with the sentiment "we need to make it easier for women to enter the industry." That doesn't exactly foster good discussion. :/
