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Comment by ue_ | Hacker News Reader

I really do not mean to be confrontational, as I understand that this is a charged topic on all sides, but I'd like to ask why making tech more diverse (in terms of race or gender) is preferable.

My first instinct would be to say that if it's more diverse, women or racial minorities are more likely to come into tech because they might feel more comfortable there. But then we're back at square one: why do we want them to come?

Please make no mistake, I'm not saying that diversity is bad, but I don't see why it's good either, and further why it must be pursued.

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I want to work with the best people. Many of the best people are female. Some of these women don't want to work an an environment where they are the only woman and since they are excellent, they choose to work in places that already have female engineers.

Also, I generally prefer to work in places with a diverse mix of people as well. Given two job opportunities that are roughly equal, I'll choose the more diverse one because it's more interesting.

A while ago, I got an MBA. MBA classes are extremely collaborative and a lot of the learning comes from the other students, rather than the lecturer. Most good schools very deliberately to ensure that the student body is as diverse as possible because otherwise learning is stifled: if ALL the students are investment bankers, then the class doesn't really learn much about other businesses. I see work environments similarly.

Bold question but worth asking for sure.

1) Equal opportunity for everyone regardless of race, gender, age, sexuality etc is just the right thing to do

2) The data suggests diversity matters commercially/financially, even if your interests are selfish.

http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/organization/our-...

http://www.catalyst.org/knowledge/diversity-matters

A) I see the tech industry shaping the future for the world. The world is comprised of a diverse group of people. How can a narrow group of people understand the needs of everyone?

B) There are a shortage of labor in tech

> I see the tech industry shaping the future for the world. The world is comprised of a diverse group of people. How can a narrow group of people understand the needs of everyone?

People should build tech that they find interesting. It's not our job as engineers to try to save the world. I program because I find it inherently fascinating. If other people benefit from my work, great. If not, great.

> There are a shortage of labor in tech

When programmer salaries rival those of upper management then we can say there's a shortage. Right now there's a desire to maximize executive salaries while minimizing programmer costs. That what "women in tech" is really about.

I agree the shortage is artificial but the other part makes little sense. The parent comment didn't say save the world. It said understand their needs: also called marketing. From startups to incumbents, they make money by figuring out what people want or need then building it. Needs/wants are incredibly diverse across a diverse set of people. So, shouldn't there be diversity in marketing and product development side of tech to avoid missing good opportunities or getting on paths that were obviously bad (to another group in company).

> People should build tech that they find interesting. It's not our job as engineers to try to save the world. I program because I find it inherently fascinating. If other people benefit from my work, great. If not, great.

This is one of the attitudes that I dislike the most among certain parts of the tech industry. (I work pretty much exclusively in open source, where this is particularly strong.) Our work has real consequences for real people. Our decisions in setting the direction of projects, products and companies end up being good for some people and bad for others.

Sure, I program because I find it fascinating - but to ignore the broader social context of what we do is just selfish.

(FWIW, one of the other attitudes that I also hate among certain parts of our industry is that "engineers should try to save the world". That's just plain arrogant.)

We definitely disagree there. For me creating technology is like creating art. Sure some artists may have a mainstream social agenda but some may just be weirdos who need to paint to stay sane :) I don't see it as my or anyone else's place to dictate what a creative individual's motivation should be.

I'll also say as a user, some of my favorite projects started off as mad science type things that weren't created to push an agenda or social cause (some were though).

Simple answer... people of all races and genders are smart and creative, so why limit the pool of talent to a small subset of all people?

That doesn't describe what's happening. What is happening is that people look at the race/gender/etc. makeup of companies and compare to an ideal makeup. When the makeup doesn't match the ideal, they infer that some groups are underrepresented. There doesn't appear to be anyone asking, "how does ideal representation compare to what's realistically possible?"

Why is equal representation of races and genders not realistically possible?

>Why is equal representation of races and genders not realistically possible?

Because, realistically, to achieve equal representation, people would have to forced into careers they are not interested in.

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