Being a woman in business, especially in the tech industry, is hard but gets easier as you grow older: you get isolated, pointed out, 'discussed' and I've had clients marvel at my technical prowess, as if it were some magical gift endowed to but a few women. It took me years to learn to cope, and to have the confidence to say, it's not about me. It's about whoever is saying those things. Every day I am the sole woman in my workplace and that's OK. Most of our customers couldn't give a damn, as long as we fix those bugs and make new features. It's hardest in public, I avoid industry meet-ups, but I'm also very reserved as a person which is probably more related, and why I speak anonymously online. It's hard to read these articles and then see maybe 95% (99.5%?) of the commenters are men. It makes me the 'other' and it's awkward but I love what I do and I love HN because in my workplace, the men around me don't give it a moments thought that I'm the 'other' and I know that the majority of the men here are also the same when it comes down to it.<p>Sandberg has a right to her own opinions about how things work for her as a leader and a parent. Just like everyone here has their own opinion about pretty much everything.
I'm just a young male and my views are obviously not perfect. But I've always thought that if Sheryl Sandberg was not rich, she would've had a completely different view of the world women live in.<p>In lean-in, she paints this rosy world in which ambitious women can achieve whatever they want to. Reality is, most people (men included) just don't have the financial freedom, support system, recognition etc. to take huge risks. Even when we take risks, statistically, we fail most of the time.<p>Most men and women never grew up in a family where both their parents are successful. Heck, many American kids grow up in broken families with parents divorced. Sheryl has had a lot of institutional support that she could take for granted.<p>Of course, this does not mean women should not have the freedom to do what they want. In fact, I really want to see more women focus on smarts and take leadership positions in the hard stuff (military, congress etc.).<p>But, just because things worked out for Sheryl, she's talking through a lens of privilege and success. Unfortunately, these lenses are not readily available.
The author waits until the very last paragraph before acknowledging:<p>"Gender differences can sometimes be symptoms of oppression and subordination."<p>And that's true. Oppression, subordination, etc exist. And so do innate differences between men and women. There doesn't have to be a hard-and-fast dichotomy here.<p>I think the author is right to criticize Sandberg, since Sandberg apparently says:<p>"A truly equal world would be one where women ran half our countries and companies and men ran half our homes."<p>which is contradicted by the research mentioned in the article. To take Sandberg's position would be sticking to one half of the dichotomy that I am alleging is a false one.<p>That said, I think perhaps this author underestimates the extent to which oppresion exists and to which gender roles are contingent (i.e. not innate). Or, at least, the tone of the article could lead to that sort of interpretation. IMHO, better to put that acknowledgement up front rather than at the end of the article.
Both this article and the book its describing seem to mistake
possible explanation for definitive or even probable explanation.<p>The article notes that the gender differences are smaller in less developed societies and the authors conjecture that actualization could be the cause. Sure. It could be. It could also be that less developed societies generally have less specialization and fewer members, and thus less hierarchical groups, meaning that women don't feel the need to conform to a social strata within their society.<p>All three explanations seem possible to me. Given this, I'm barely more informed than when I started. I'd have liked this piece to put in a little more sweat in actual verification and less hand-wavy brainstorming.
I always wince whenever I see a person espousing any inherent gender differences or preferences, because they are consistently ripped to pieces.<p>I actually think it's valuable to examine if, when X occupation is 80% male, does that mean that 80% of the people entering the occupation are men?<p>Do the women:<p>- drop out (possibly sexist work requirements, hours etc.),<p>- get pushed out (obvious sexism),<p>- or are there just a small number of them pursuing that path to begin with?<p>And if it's the latter, is this actually an issue? And if it is, is it the fault of the industry, or does the problem start with girls not finding science (for example) very interesting at eight?
<p><pre><code> Throughout the world, women tend to be more nurturing,
risk averse and emotionally expressive, while men are
usually more competitive, risk taking, and emotionally
flat.
</code></pre>
The article seems to imply that since the world has a persistent bias toward men in terms of competition and risk, that this is the normal state of affairs.<p>Would these results hold in a matriarchal society? Is the causation genetic (unlikely in my estimation) or just cultural?<p>If the causation lies in cultural norms, wouldn't a "Lean-In" type push shift the line over time?
My experience is obviously is anecdotal, but nonetheless I learnt this from my daughter.<p>When she was about 3 my wife and I were discussing a birthday gift. My wife wanted to get her a kitchen play set (stove, dishes, etc) and I disagreed, purely on gender role grounds.<p>A week later we were visiting with my sister, whose daughter did have one of these play sets. My daughter spent the entire visit playing with that set, and asked for one when we left. My wife looked smug.<p>In retrospect my thinking was dumb. My own life experience should have clued me in. Most of Western society is built to cater for the white male. Those who aren't are told that 'success' is dependant on behaving more like a white male. That is only true if there is only one type of success, the white male type.
Another way to frame it is to postulate, if gender roles tend to persist and even increase along with wealth, why are our political and economic systems configured to be so "masculine."<p>For example, the US has a very low proportion of elected representatives who are women, in relation to other developed countries.<p>If you take this article at face value, the involvement statistic could be an indicator of how we conduct our political affairs, more than an indicator of women's empowerment.
Phil Greenspun's review of <i>Lean In</i>:<p><a href="http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/2013/05/12/lean-in/" rel="nofollow">http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/2013/05/12/lean-in/</a>
So women really just prefer to not work, take care of the kids and the house. And they're totally comfortable with generally being poorer and less powerful.<p>Ya right.<p>Really disappointing to see pg link to this.
>Wealth, freedom, and education empower men and women to be who they are.<p>What if wealth just frees people from the necessity of subsistence labor efficiency enough that they can indulge themselves with arbitrary rule-following and role enforcement and not starve to death?<p>I'm not sure if a culture can afford much moral policing overhead until it reaches a certain point.
Better title: "What 'Lean In' <i>May</i> Misunderstand About Gender Differences"<p>This study shows that more questioning and investigation should happen, it most certainly does not "prove" that women are e.g. inherently less interested in engineering. The title is conjecture, Sandberg may be totally correct.<p>Interesting study tho, nice to see this complicated question get investigated more.
I thought this was a great article until I got to the very bottom: CHRISTINA HOFF SOMMERS is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.<p>Very little comes out of the AEI that I have any respect for. I am now paranoid that this article is a stalking horse for conservative "save the nukular family gays are destroying marriage drop bombs on brown people" values.