Re: Perl's Glory Days Are Behind It, But It Isn't Going Anywhere

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On 07/02/13 13:49, Shlomi Fish wrote:
> Before I answer your question, let me add that I think we should train
> potential female (and male) contributors to not give up so easily after running
> into a potential difficulty.

I have no idea how you "train" potential contributors to not give up but 
you don't do it by being an arse.  Studies show that boys are encouraged 
to keep trying, and girls are often told "oh, let me do it for you" from 
very, very young ages.  That seems like training potential female 
contributors to give up and after a lifetime of that kind of training I 
don't see it as very surprising that some women are likely to stumble 
and give up rather than be tenacious. Sad, but not surprising.

However, having said that, we're not held to what we learned as 
children.  There are many professions which require tenacity, such as 
athletics, law, business management...; and so women can and do learn 
such skills.  It's just worth understanding that some women are coming 
into learning such skills at a disadvantage to those men who were lucky 
enough to be taught them for the majority of their lives.

There's another key difference that should be recognised, and the 
situation isn't that there is a dire shortage of women who know Perl 
(25-30% of Perl programmers out in business), there's a dire shortage of 
women involved in the Perl community. (between 2 and 6%)  The tenacious 
women are learning Perl, they're just doing so for work. *Not for fun. *

I suspect that when there are people who are approaching the Perl 
community in an attempt to try to learn to program, or who already know 
how to program and want to learn Perl, we have to *compete with other 
**fun**pursuits.*  When the few bad apples in the community are allowed 
to behave badly towards them, that's not fun. *If learning Perl isn't 
**fun**, they won't stay.*  Why would they?  There are other, more fun 
things to do than be insulted, treated badly, harassed or otherwise in 
pursuit of something you thought could be cool.  This is a problem for 
Perl and, in my opinion, for programming in general - *programming is 
not competing as well against **other fun pursuits*.

It's also worth noting that when people flame others on mailing lists, 
or abuse others in IRC channels, active contributors also go away.  You 
can lose up to 25% of your project just from one long flame-war. *People 
are in open source for fun*.  Take the fun away, make it worse than 
work, and lots of them won't stay.  It's easy to find entertainment on 
line these days that doesn't involve dealing with people who are being 
arses.

Telling people that they have to have a thick skin, in order to have 
fun, will not work into the future.  Knowing Perl or being a developer 
in a lot of open source is no longer enough of a hallowed destination 
that it's sufficient reward for weathering the abuse between newbie and 
achievement.  Perl (and a lot of open source) needs new developers more 
than it needs developers with thick skins. *Getting a thick skin isn't 
fun.*  It doesn't matter what you had to go through.

> It's inevitable to face hardship and abuse, because even I, as a guy, faced
> them, and still do, and have to know how to overcome them.

Yes, men face abuse too. The abuse men face is rarely gendered. Women 
may face worse abuse if their gender is known than you likely have any 
idea about.  Regardless, strangely enough, *abuse is not fun* regardless 
of your gender.  Some people will stick through it, but I can't blame 
the people who don't.

> I think trying to restructure a so-called-hostile community is like making the
> mountain come to Muhammad. On the other hand, a single motivated person with
> some amount of creative thinking, and who is not willing to give up can make a
> world of a difference.

*Hostile communities are not fun* for people who don't want to show off 
how much of an arse they can be.   If we want people to come to learn 
Perl and participate in the Perl community, because *Perl is fun* (and 
as a language I really believe it is) then we need to make sure 
that*participating in the Perl community is fun*. Or at least we need to 
make sure that participating doesn't suck.

Yes, individual motivated people can change things, they do all the 
time.  People who stand against hostile behaviour and work to welcome 
and encourage all potential contributors are changing things.  People 
who encourage involvement and shared decision making are changing 
things.  People who make sure that their actions are*increasing the 
level of fun* rather than sucking it out, are changing things.

> On Thu, 07 Feb 2013 11:54:29 +1100
> Jacinta Richardson <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Feminists (and there are both male and female feminists) are not at
>> fault for pointing out that lots of entrenched behaviour is not okay.
>> It just isn't.  Things like using soft porn in slides should be
>> obviously not okay.  But things like asking a woman who's turned up to
>> your tech group if she's there because her boyfriend is, or who her
>> boyfriend is, or even if she has a boyfriend, is also not okay.
> Why not? While you shouldn't ask a woman if she has a boyfriend right at the
> beginning of the conversation, it's not such a bad question to ask later on.

Really?

Do you have any idea how creepy it is to turn up to a gathering for the 
first time, as a woman, and have numerous guys try to work into the 
conversation a question on what your relationship status is? Can't you 
just assume that women are there for technical reasons and not to be hit 
on endlessly, because that's what asking a woman about her relationship 
status is, it's a precursor to hitting on her, not just polite 
conversation.  Having that conversation every time I attend new 
technology gatherings (where I'm not previously known) is tedious and - 
guess what?! *It's not fun*.

After she's been going a few times, and you've established a rapport - 
if you do, *maybe* you could ask her then, although if she wants you to 
know she'll probably have said.

Safer questions:

* How are you?
* What got you interested into <technical topic>?
* Is this your first time here?
* Do you work with <technical topic>?
* What do you do?
* Have you been to any <similar technical groups>?
* Have you heard about <upcoming conference>?
* Would you be interested in giving a talk yourself at <technical group>?

see, all of these are the same kinds of questions that you could ask a 
new man visiting.  It's not that hard; if you wouldn't find it of dire 
important to know the sexuality and relationship status of a new person 
because they're a man, then forgo trying to find that out from a new 
person just because they're a woman.

*Have fun!*

     Jacinta

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    <div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 07/02/13 13:49, Shlomi Fish wrote:<br>
    </div>
    <blockquote
      cite="mid:[email protected]"
      type="cite">
      <pre wrap="">Before I answer your question, let me add that I think we should train
potential female (and male) contributors to not give up so easily after running
into a potential difficulty.</pre>
    </blockquote>
    <br>
    I have no idea how you "train" potential contributors to not give up
    but you don't do it by being an arse.  Studies show that boys are
    encouraged to keep trying, and girls are often told "oh, let me do
    it for you" from very, very young ages.  That seems like training
    potential female contributors to give up and after a lifetime of
    that kind of training I don't see it as very surprising that some
    women are likely to stumble and give up rather than be tenacious. 
    Sad, but not surprising.<br>
    <br>
    However, having said that, we're not held to what we learned as
    children.  There are many professions which require tenacity, such
    as athletics, law, business management...; and so women can and do
    learn such skills.  It's just worth understanding that some women
    are coming into learning such skills at a disadvantage to those men
    who were lucky enough to be taught them for the majority of their
    lives.<br>
    <br>
    There's another key difference that should be recognised, and the
    situation isn't that there is a dire shortage of women who know Perl
    (25-30% of Perl programmers out in business), there's a dire
    shortage of women involved in the Perl community. (between 2 and
    6%)  The tenacious women are learning Perl, they're just doing so
    for work.  <b>Not for fun.  </b><br>
    <br>
    I suspect that when there are people who are approaching the Perl
    community in an attempt to try to learn to program, or who already
    know how to program and want to learn Perl, we have to <b>compete
      with other </b><b>fun</b><b> pursuits.</b>  When the few bad
    apples in the community are allowed to behave badly towards them,
    that's not fun. <b> If learning Perl isn't </b><b>fun</b><b>, they
      won't stay.</b>  Why would they?  There are other, more fun things
    to do than be insulted, treated badly, harassed or otherwise in
    pursuit of something you thought could be cool.  This is a problem
    for Perl and, in my opinion, for programming in general - <b>programming
      is not competing as well against </b><b>other fun pursuits</b>.<br>
    <br>
    It's also worth noting that when people flame others on mailing
    lists, or abuse others in IRC channels, active contributors also go
    away.  You can lose up to 25% of your project just from one long
    flame-war.  <b>People are in open source for fun</b>.  Take the fun
    away, make it worse than work, and lots of them won't stay.  It's
    easy to find entertainment on line these days that doesn't involve
    dealing with people who are being arses.<br>
    <br>
    Telling people that they have to have a thick skin, in order to have
    fun, will not work into the future.  Knowing Perl or being a
    developer in a lot of open source is no longer enough of a hallowed
    destination that it's sufficient reward for weathering the abuse
    between newbie and achievement.  Perl (and a lot of open source)
    needs new developers more than it needs developers with thick
    skins.  <b>Getting a thick skin isn't fun.</b>  It doesn't matter
    what you had to go through.<br>
    <br>
    <blockquote
      cite="mid:[email protected]"
      type="cite">
      <pre wrap="">It's inevitable to face hardship and abuse, because even I, as a guy, faced
them, and still do, and have to know how to overcome them.</pre>
    </blockquote>
    <br>
    Yes, men face abuse too. The abuse men face is rarely gendered. 
    Women may face worse abuse if their gender is known than you likely
    have any idea about.  Regardless, strangely enough, <b>abuse is not
      fun</b> regardless of your gender.  Some people will stick through
    it, but I can't blame the people who don't.<br>
    <br>
    <blockquote
      cite="mid:[email protected]"
      type="cite">
      <pre wrap="">I think trying to restructure a so-called-hostile community is like making the
mountain come to Muhammad. On the other hand, a single motivated person with
some amount of creative thinking, and who is not willing to give up can make a
world of a difference.</pre>
    </blockquote>
    <br>
    <b>Hostile communities are not fun</b> for people who don't want to
    show off how much of an arse they can be.   If we want people to
    come to learn Perl and participate in the Perl community, because <b>Perl
      is fun</b> (and as a language I really believe it is) then we need
    to make sure that<b> participating in the Perl community is fun</b>. 
    Or at least we need to make sure that participating doesn't suck.  <br>
    <br>
    Yes, individual motivated people can change things, they do all the
    time.  People who stand against hostile behaviour and work to
    welcome and encourage all potential contributors are changing
    things.  People who encourage involvement and shared decision making
    are changing things.  People who make sure that their actions are<b>
      increasing the level of fun</b> rather than sucking it out, are
    changing things.<br>
    <br>
    <blockquote
      cite="mid:[email protected]"
      type="cite">
      <pre wrap="">On Thu, 07 Feb 2013 11:54:29 +1100
Jacinta Richardson <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:[email protected]">&lt;[email protected]&gt;</a> wrote:
</pre>
    </blockquote>
    <blockquote
      cite="mid:[email protected]"
      type="cite">
      <blockquote type="cite">
        <pre wrap="">Feminists (and there are both male and female feminists) are not at 
fault for pointing out that lots of entrenched behaviour is not okay.  
It just isn't.  Things like using soft porn in slides should be 
obviously not okay.  But things like asking a woman who's turned up to 
your tech group if she's there because her boyfriend is, or who her 
boyfriend is, or even if she has a boyfriend, is also not okay. 
</pre>
      </blockquote>
      <pre wrap="">
Why not? While you shouldn't ask a woman if she has a boyfriend right at the
beginning of the conversation, it's not such a bad question to ask later on.
</pre>
    </blockquote>
    <br>
    Really?<br>
    <br>
    Do you have any idea how creepy it is to turn up to a gathering for
    the first time, as a woman, and have numerous guys try to work into
    the conversation a question on what your relationship status is? 
    Can't you just assume that women are there for technical reasons and
    not to be hit on endlessly, because that's what asking a woman about
    her relationship status is, it's a precursor to hitting on her, not
    just polite conversation.  Having that conversation every time I
    attend new technology gatherings (where I'm not previously known) is
    tedious and - guess what?! <b>It's not fun</b>.<br>
    <br>
    After she's been going a few times, and you've established a rapport
    - if you do, *maybe* you could ask her then, although if she wants
    you to know she'll probably have said.<br>
    <br>
    Safer questions:<br>
    <br>
    * How are you?<br>
    * What got you interested into &lt;technical topic&gt;?<br>
    * Is this your first time here?<br>
    * Do you work with &lt;technical topic&gt;?<br>
    * What do you do?<br>
    * Have you been to any &lt;similar technical groups&gt;?<br>
    * Have you heard about &lt;upcoming conference&gt;?<br>
    * Would you be interested in giving a talk yourself at &lt;technical
    group&gt;?<br>
    <br>
    see, all of these are the same kinds of questions that you could ask
    a new man visiting.  It's not that hard; if you wouldn't find it of
    dire important to know the sexuality and relationship status of a
    new person because they're a man, then forgo trying to find that out
    from a new person just because they're a woman. <br>
    <br>
    <b>Have fun!</b><br>
    <br>
        Jacinta<br>
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