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Comment by thevardanian | Hacker News Reader

That wasn't even the point of my whole argument. All I'm saying is that perhaps women don't want those jobs in the first place. Then what will you do? I mean that is the whole assumption of this argument right? That women want these jobs, but are unable to participate in them because of discrimination. What if that assumption is wrong?

You can push for diversity all you want, but what if that's just not how people behave? Again watch the documentary I think Norwegian society is a far better a case study for Gender issues than anywhere else on the planet.

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No, that was never an assumption of the argument.

That clearly is the assumption of the argument. That women don't have enough opportunities and thus are underrepresented in the work force. Whether that opportunity refers to discrimination, encouragement, etc. is irrelevant to what I'm saying. What if women are underrepresented because they simply don't want the jobs?

In a society where women are not treated equally, you're dodging the real issue to argue about something that's not relevant.

.... what women want isn't relevant?

Vigorously arguing about "what women want" in the face of today's known discrimination against women in tech is not relevant.

Not to mention misrepresenting what "the argument" is about, but I guess you've already moved on from that.

Except we do not live in a society where women are not treated equally.

I understood your argument, it's just a bad argument. You presented no evidence to support your claim so I'm not sure what you want me to refute. Yes, perhaps the current employment representation perfectly reflects what jobs women want. And perhaps men just really like killing themselves. Resolving gender issues sure is easy when we just assume hypotheticals are true.

I think you are missing the point of the argument for encouraging diversity. Discrimination is one aspect yes, but there's a lot to be said for encouraging young women to explore these fields just by having a visible number of women in those roles.

To me it would be wildly inconceivable for predisposition to certain jobs to be an inherent biological trait rather than something shaped by society.

"To me it would be wildly inconceivable for predisposition to certain jobs to be an inherent biological trait rather than something shaped by society."

Doesn't really matter what would inconceivable to you. What matters if that's the reality of the situation. Watch the documentary it addresses it.

It really doesn't. I'm not arguing there aren't inherent differences in the sexes, I'm asking you why you think the current representation of gender in the workforce is correct. As far as I'm aware there's no evidence to suggest the current state of representation is the most natural. I skimmed through the video you linked and saw no convincing evidence, but if there's something I missed please link me to it.

"I'm not arguing there aren't inherent differences in the sexes, I'm asking you why you think the current representation of gender in the workforce is correct."

No. I'm saying we don't know whether the current representation is the "most natural", but what if it is?

Furthermore if you had looked through the video you would have realized that the entire basis of the documentary is an attempt to answer why labor force participation often becomes gender segregated. You say that it's because of lack of "encouragement", but maybe there's something else at play.

> perhaps men just really like killing themselves

Please don't talk like this.

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