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english_optimist

Listed below are comments made by english_optimist between Tuesday, 6th May 2008 and Tuesday, 6th May 2008.

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Women and technology 5:23pm on 06 May 2008 I very much agree with Geldie. And I also observe the parrallels with female-dominated industries or professions which dont attract the same analysis or suggestions of under-representation regarding how few men work therin. From my own experience as an IT professional, I have seen women in this business for as long as I've been in it. However, womens paths take a different route, very few come in as tecs and those that do seem to have an accelerated career path toward management over and above male counterparts, mainly because companies are under pressure to have 'representation' of women in the roles of responsibity. Personally, all the women I know in IT earn much more than their male counter parts (of equivalent age/experience) so from my perspective it's preposterous to suggest there is some inequity. Fewer numbers doesnt equate to discrimination by default.

In fact the IT departments of larger companies seem to be top-heavy with female managers - where I work for example, tecs are all male, the managerial roles however, are around two-thirds female. Could one argue that a disproportionate number of managers are female or that men are being kept in the lower paid roles?

Further more, as previously mentioned, many female dominated areas dont recieve attention or efforts to increase numbers of men, for example nursing, midwifery, teaching, HR, all areas that are vastly female dominated. It's curious that if an area is male dominated, terms like 'under-representation' and 'bias' and 'discrimination' are always used, yet if an area is female dominated, we just accept it as being OK (and why not!) - it's a social preconception that there must always be an agenda of prejudice or discrimination if women (apparently) arent making their mark on traditionaly male areas.

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