I recently read this blog post by Lea Verou, a Research Assistant at MIT and an Invited Expert in the W3C CSS Working Group. She talks about how many outspoken women in tech paint a bleak picture of sexism in the industry, but she doesn’t feel it to be true for herself. She’s never felt less respected or unfairly treated due to her gender. She goes into how sometimes people can be quick to assume any criticism is due to their gender, and not their abilities.
This blog post spoke to me because it reflects exactly how I feel about these issues. It doesn’t mean sexism never happens, but it does mean that there’s no reason to fear going into tech as a woman . I myself have never felt ‘lesser’ among my coworkers, or not respected. The ratio of men to women at my workplace and on my team is about 10:1, but that’s really something I’ve just gotten used to over the years. My university’s Computer Science department had the same ratio. I’ve found myself becoming more an
Sometimes when I say this to other women in tech, they ask, “What about microagressions? Haven’t you felt belittled by men at work from time to time, even unintentionally?” I’ve thought about this a lot, and determined that it’s not fair–to myself or to my coworkers–to attribute these things to being a woman. When I am talked over in a meeting, I think it’s fairer to attribute that to my quietness. I know that I’m a quiet person, and I’m not as assertive as I could be. I’m working on handling those situatio