Black Girls Code: A cool campaign to reduce gender/race imbalances in coding | Hacker News Reader

Black Girls Code: A cool campaign to reduce gender/race imbalances in coding

indiegogo.com

5 pointsGigamouse15 comments

Let's face it, coding is full of white dudes. These guys trying to change that

Sometimes I think "black" are more racists than others. Even title of this project is racist, and we are talking about differences... I'm not american and I cant be objective, it's just my "outside" opinion. Why "black girls" only? Poor black girls somehow better than poor white girls? Why not just "Girls code" (if it's really just about genders)? Isn't it racism?

It isn't racism to fill holes left by racism. Quite the opposite, in fact.

This particular service isn't focused on black girls for the purpose of being racist or exclusionary.

The short and easy answer is analyzing racial representation and statistical disparity. Certain groups can be vastly over-represented or under-represented relative to their populations, and the reasons for these are always complex. In the software industry, women are under-represented, this is a fact. With black women in technology, figures are probably even further under-represented. Why? I don't know, ask an expert.

One day, a black female software dev/tech/entrepreneur/sympathizer saw this disparity and decided to do something about it. Maybe she saw social patterns, or had personal experiences that could relate better to this particular group.

Your comments about race and racism are extremely uninformed.

And anyway I don't think it's a reason to create difference in learning programm. All these stats... It's a shame for any foundation to be racist in this way.

It isn't just about gender though. It's about gender and race. The factors that lead to discrimination overlap and intersect.

Based on the numbers given on that page 16% of female CS grads are black, but given the US population is only 12% black doesn't that mean that black female CS grads are over-represented compared to non-black females ?

Seems to be a pretty good indicator that it's the gender issue that needs addressing and not the racial one.

Considering all the smart but disenfranchised white boys I knew growing up in rural oaklahoma who gave up on programming because no one supported their bizarre interest in something other than NASCAR, and ended up working at Walmart, I think we have bigger problems that transcend race and sex. But I'm not opposed to campaigns like this, even if they are based on neandrethalic logic and all this time and effort would be better spent finding a general solution to the problem of poor people staying poor while openings for coders go unfilled.

It's really great to see these fundraising platforms being used to make a difference in peoples lives in addition to building more tangible products.

Is there any data these things actually do any good?

Maybe blacks and women just don't like computer programming. Why do we have to "socially engineer" them to do so?

> Maybe blacks and women just don't like computer programming.

Maybe black women have fewer opportunities to learn computer programming.

I learned programming on the net, so everyone has the same opportunity for sure :-)

Not necessarily. Maybe they don't have a computer at home; maybe they don't have reliable access to the internet. The more likely a person lives in poverty, the more likely the above is true. The more likely a person is female and black, the more likely a person lives in poverty.

Access to a computer is more a geographical / social (=community) problem, then a gender or racial problem.

If i'm not mistaking, you have social programs to get people cheap internet access / computers (we have in our country (belgium)).

But i don't know how it really is, but according to my experience, girls just don't code (much), it's the same generalisation as girls don't game (except games like 'The Sims').

And if they have any interest, it's more in design, then coding. Of my Informatics class (4 girls of 20 guys), none of them actually ended up programming...

I'm curious about the results of your program, pre and after about how much girls are really coding and are getting interested in it (and doing it after hours, for example).

None the less, it's a great initiative and i hope you have a success :)

If i generalise 2 jobs by gender:

- coding = guys

- nursing / children care = girls

Like the first response: Girls Code, would be a better initiative, in my subjective personal opinion.

PS. Fighting against racism, is mixing a lot of races together. Not splitting them up in a class with just one race... You're actually giving a bad example by not mixing races, other races can also live in poverty, you know ;-)

Nothing is stopping you from actively recruiting "black" girls, but with this title, you're excluding a lot of other girls who could benefit from this program, but aren't black. They won't even try to join if they see your programs title and might feel offended. All your pupils will be influenced to hang out with only other black people :-)

> PS. Fighting against racism, is mixing a lot of races together.

The program serves highly segregated communities, your suggestion is rather a non-starter.

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