> Very simple: As a first approximation, we are concerned about women being marginalized from positions of power, not about them being underrepresented in any particular profession.
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I think that's all I need to know here. So feminists think that it's okay to go into an industry and demand that there be more women because it is a "powerful industry"? And somehow those of us who support Damore are the unreasonable ones?
What? No! After researchers having established, with thorough researched that's available for all to see, that women have been marginalized from positions of power -- which includes the tech industry, where women participation, in the US, has been declining in the past three decades or so -- we feminists demand that the practice stop. That's all.
You literally just stated that you are interested in the tech industry because it is a "powerful" industry, and you feel that women have been historically marginalized from positions of power. Consequently, you feel that females are entitled to obtain these positions in order to "balance this power distribution". Am I correct?
No, you are certainly not correct, although right now I would be happy to balance the very unequal distribution of knowledge you and I have on this subject (although I am far from being an expert myself), because I feel like Richard Dawkins debating evolution with some Christian from Kansas who insists there is no evidence for evolution because that's what they read on a Christian website that scientifically debunks evolution. Seriously, you are so engaged with a topic that you clearly haven't even bothered to read a couple of Wikipedia articles about.
We want the marginalization of women from power, that has been going for centuries, to end. In other words, we want society to lift its hand from the scale against women.
To fight sexism. The problem is this discussion is that you clearly don't have the first clue as to what sexism is, in spite of me having provided links for you to learn what it is that you're arguing about. But just to explain a bit: 1. sexism isn't misogyny; 2. it isn't a concerted conspiracy against women, either. It is the name given to the social dynamics by which discrimination (often unconscious and perhaps even benevolent) causes women to have less power in society. I don't know exactly what "BS terms" mean to you other than terms you haven't bothered to look up in the links I provided.
So what exactly does the tech industry have to do? You said you're only interested in tech because it is powerful. It seems to me that you feel that you think it is reasonable to demand positions in the tech industry independent of qualification because it will help rectify your imagined "power imbalance".
You're giving extremely vague and hand wavy responses like "remove the hand from the scale against women" And other flowery phrases that mean nothing.
> So what exactly does the tech industry have to do?
That's a very difficult question about policy, and one that I do not have a strong opinion about (though happy to discuss). Experts believe that certain diversity programs are effective, and so I think we should defer to them to try them.
> It seems to me that you feel that you think it is reasonable to demand positions in the tech industry independent of qualification because it will help rectify your imagined "power imbalance".
The problem -- like that of affirmative action -- is that the state of affairs is one when women have already been discriminated against. For example, for a long time women were prevented from studying a lot of professions, and their lack of knowledge was then used against them. We are at a place where things are much more subtle. One thing is clear: if women are somehow deterred at any stage, then that deterrence must be removed. When it comes to affirmative action, the debate gets more heated, but it may help to realize that hiring underqualified people is already very common, so at the very least, underqualified women should not be hired at a lower rate than underqualified men. Now we get to more contentious grounds. I think it is fair to prefer a woman over a man, with otherwise equal qualifications.
> And other flowery phrases that mean nothing.
They don't mean nothing, but they do require a much more precise study of things.
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I think that's all I need to know here. So feminists think that it's okay to go into an industry and demand that there be more women because it is a "powerful industry"? And somehow those of us who support Damore are the unreasonable ones?