Data Suggests CoC + Outreachy Hasn't Helped Increase Female Participation In Debian

[moilami]

This whole "diversity is needed" is just bullshit political agenda. A code does not care how you identify yourself.

[reavertm]

So, before Qutreachy, were women and trans people banned from contributing to Debian?

[AsuMagic]

Reading the article and the comments here I wonder why I had to put so much work into my master thesis. Apparently all I had to do was just dig out some numbers and jump directly into conclusions. No need to spent copious amounts of time and effort into statistical analysis and trying to filter out hidden causal connections. Hell, I there's not even a need for gathering any measure of statistical mass at all. A single sample is enough to extrapolate to the entire world.

But, but, but, it's fewer women now! From the blog post: "The figures are absolute number of women, they are not weighted by the overall number of developers"
So do we even know whether the population of Debian developers as a whole grew or shrank in the same time frame? Nope. That alone could easily explain fewer women. Fewer people -> fewer women. End of story.

There could also be other factors, that weren't looked at. Did any cultural changes occur in the same time frame? Maybe Debian has become a worse place for women despite the efforts of CoC and Outreachy? Maybe adopting a CoC and spending money on diversity programs actually triggered an adverse reaction in the male developer community because e.g. they envy paid female developers?

The numbers tell practially nothing. We don't know if the percentage of female developers changed at all. And if that did indeed shrink (which we cannot presume) we would still not know if the CoC or Outreachy had any influence. It would be possible that the percentage did shrink but it would have shrunk even more without a CoC. Who knows? We don't. As the blog post says "This is not a rigorous study and I make no claim that these figures are statistically significant." One cannot conclude anything from that.

i'm just as amazed. what kind of clown does one have to be to even attempt to draw *any* sort of conclusion from this data? any kind of idiot should be able to see that you can make this data say anything you want. consider 2008-2013 instead of 2004-2013 for the first time span. the average "women per year" over that period is... zero.
i can't tell if the article from that guy is trolling or just sheer incompetence. what would be the point of showing data you know to be entirely irrelevant?

[chocolate]

What I personally find paradoxical about these initiatives is that, if I were a target individual, I would find them condescending and feel disincentivized. Here, since you are too weak, we are forcing a welcoming environment and making waves about it. I think that sane people will just recognize them as such and leave. It's stressful.

Why is being agnostic so difficult? I think a truly welcoming environment would be one where these things don't even need to be discussed, where it's natural for things to be... agnostic.

SJWs tend to not accept that, when differences in career preference remain in individuals who have grown up having equal opportunities, it's simply a "natural", emergent asymmetry. It may still be caused by imagery and traditions, but it's out of scope.
The best you can do is to be agnostic, so that an individual who does not conform to that imagery and those traditions will find their way with as little friction as possible.

Have a nice weekend.

[Alexmitter]

Well you would be surprised how many females were in IT decades ago before annoying nerd men alienated them away. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_computing

People with passion for their job alienate woman, clear.

[Alexmitter]

So, before Qutreachy, were women and trans people banned from contributing to Debian?

No, but they were risking dangers such as being "misgendered" or treated like a normal human being with horrible things like criticism.

[Volta]

Maybe women are simply too clever, and prefer not to waste their personal free time contributing to some project for free?

Or dumber and they have no clue how to participate? There are far less women in paid project, so your question doesn't stand.

[Volta]

Well you would be surprised how many females were in IT decades ago before annoying nerd men alienated them away. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_computing

As a typical housewife you have no clue about reality. Men are just much better in IT. You can start your own female project and prove me wrong, but I'm feeling I'll be laughing hard after seeing the end result. Ps. I love beautiful, sporty, smart, open women in case you would accuse me of hating women.

[AsuMagic]

No, but they were risking dangers such as being "misgendered" or treated like a normal human being with horrible things like criticism.

yes because (on purpose) misgendering is absolutely the only kind of shit they get
LOL

[Lanz]

Hey Debian, women are allowed to like different things than men. No amount of social engineering or propaganda should be undertaken to try to tell women what to like. Women are suited to different roles than men, and the whole point of modern society is such that individuals can specialize in order to achieve better economic outcomes and suit their interests rather than having to focus on survival.