[jmincey]

"Avie Tevanian is white?"
Ah, you caught me; I was just about to correct that but you beat me to it. (Of course, this all depends on one's definition of white and race really has no biological or anthropological meaning but rather is a social term.)
"The men will likely draw a technically correct yet ugly bike, but the women may draw a nicer looking one that may or may not be correct."
This is most astonishing. So men are genetically worse as artists than women? And women are genetically less technical than men? Do you really hold with such nonsense?

[d00d]

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This is most astonishing. So men are genetically worse as artists than women? And women are genetically less technical than men? Do you really hold with such nonsense?

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So does CNN.

[d00d]

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Let's not fall in the sample size trap. Let's look at the industry overall then.

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I thought we were talking about Apple.

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You don't deny, do you, that (1) sexism exists and (2) it has existed throughout history in varying degrees and (3) that this has unjustly denied to women the rights which men have long enjoyed?

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Of course not.

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If you don't deny this, then the only thing for us to discuss in this congenial debate is how deep the tentacles of sexism extend in its applications or manifestations.

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We were talking about one very specific accusation.
I won't quote or comment on your history lesson; it has no bearing on the very specific issue you brought up (is Apple sexually or racially discriminatory?).

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How far down do we have to drill before we can find women in numbers which correspond roughly to their population, even allowing for those who choose to be homemakers? Why do we see women in no greater numbers in the executive and VP ranks than we do in the board room, whether in Apple Computer or elsewhere?
Anyone care to guess why? Lack of educated women? Lack of experienced or skilled women? No. Here's a hint -- it begins with an S.

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Well, Jeff, that's a very nice opinion, but I don't see the backup. I'll give you that the current state of affairs is certainly the result of sexism (or culture depending upon how you wish to view it) in the past. However, I'm not convinced that the current state is because of present sexism, rather it's a latent effect of past culture. As someone pointed out, the ages of board members correspond with a less gender neutral time. The response time for a cultural change is not instaneous. We're in the middle of a good trend right now and I'm not prepared to unequivocably say that sexism is as rampant in corporations as it was in the past. It'll take some time for the remnants of the past to work themselves out.
All that painfully said (and I really don't want to go on and on with it, so I'm going to try to ignore any commentary on that front), what does that have to do with Apple? Do you have a specific charge to make or are you going to just keep pointing out that there isn't a single woman on their board (because absolutes like all and none are exciting!)?

[jmincey]

Thanks for linking the CNN article. It's commonly known that there are differences in the human brain which can be traced to the fault line between gender. Women apparently have more connections and communication between their two hemispheres than men do and the theory is that they are better able to synthesize data from disparate sources than men while men might be better able to focus on a single specific task. However, this is speculation. Establishing differences in the brain is one thing; establishing how this translates in human ability and behavior is another. Don't fuse the two.
Humans and chimpanzees have more than 98 percent of their DNA in common; so clearly there is more to our attitudes and behavior than genetics, (or we would all be arboreal).
Concluding from brain differences that women are more artistic than men or that men are more mechanical is a dangerous business -- besides which there have been many prominent women in the field of technology and computers, (no small trick given that the field is not exactly friendly to them and that apparently Apple is no exception).

[zarmanto]

Good grief... why do you have such an ax to grind, Jeff? First of all, I'd like to say that I am most emphatically not sexist. That said, can I just ask you to please calm down for a second, and look more closely at your own arguments?

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You pick 12 qualified people, what are the odds they will ALL be from the same gender? You tell me.

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Okay... let's test that. If you don't mind, I'm going to pick Donald Trump's favorite criteria as a qualification... net worth. The following page lists the top twenty-five billionaires in the world:
Forbes.com: Forbes World's Richest People
The first twelve? All men. Of course, let's not make the mistakes of certain (ahem) previous posts, and limit our sample size to only twelve... the very next two on the list are women, so let's look more closely at them. Well, both of them appear to be Walton's. Could that be family money, I wonder? Let's read a couple of bios... Ah, yes; the Wal-Mart fortune. And both women appear to be "not active in company." (sic) What about the rest of the top twenty-five? Ah! There's one more woman! Let's look at her bio... I could be wrong, but that sounds a lot like family money too. Oh no! There must be some kind of a conspiracy to prevent women from making money!......

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No, but the sexism theory surely does!

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No it doesn't... as you yourself pointed out, women have been voting for 188 years now. Thus, based upon your own standards, there should have already been at least one female president within our lifetimes, (or perhaps even before our lifetimes, for that matter) because the female voting population is most assuredly a force to be reckoned with -- just ask any politician. (Of course, with Hilary shooting for 2008, we might just see a woman in the high office yet... though, I sincerely hope that some other women vie for the democratic nomination against her. Hilary scares the bejeebis out of me! /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif )
(The rest of the three pages of posts appear to be more of the same -- with some fairly amusing bouts between Derik and Jeff -- so let's skip to the point, shall we?)
Now listen... I'm not saying that women can't become billionaires on their own, or that women can't become CEOs of huge companies... rather, what I'm saying is that most women who would have reached the point in life where they might have reached that goal chose other goals early in life, such as raising a family or supporting a husbands aspirations to success. And those few women of our generation who are following the "Women's Liberation" goals towards a successful career of their own simply haven't reached that stage in their life yet. It's not male sexism that you're fighting against, Jeff... it's females with traditional values.
And just to reiterate... I am not sexist. However, I do believe that there are differences in the genders -- and not just physically. That's not sexism; that's just common sense. As an example: Generally speaking, boys are wired to like football and boxing. (Before you flame these statements, let me stress that these are only generalities... I'm very aware that there are exceptions to every rule... and in those particular examples, I happen to be one of them. That said, let's get back to the analogy...) Generally speaking, girls are wired to like stuffed animals and baby dolls. Just off-hand, which personality do you see as someone who is more likely to grow up to be a billionaire, or a CEO? I'm certainly no statistician... but I would hazard a guess, that the personality factor alone makes the pool of qualified female applicants to Apple's board very small indeed. So tell me, do you honestly believe that it's sexist to say that men and women have differing personalities? Or is that merely an unbiased view of the available facts?
Something tells me that you've already decided what you believe, Jeff -- but rumor has it, people are more likely to make errors in judgment when they're truly passionate about their cause. As I'm sure you can infer from my post count, I'm not exactly the most passionate poster in this thread -- or even this forum, for that matter -- while you, on the other hand... Just something to think about.

[d00d]

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no small trick given that the field is not exactly friendly to them and that apparently Apple is no exception

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I thought you said serving on Apple's board didn't require that the person be technical.

[jmincey]

Zarmanto, this would be a most interesting topic of discussion, but to respond to your last post would require that I go off topic more than I have done already so I want to exercise rare discipline and bring this issue back to its application to Apple (as Derik has been urging us to do).
Speaking of which, to Derik, yes, I've been saying that the composition of boards does not depend on a single area of expertise but -- to the contrary -- requires that many be represented. But above I was speaking of the technical field or industry and not to the specific disciplines within it (of which the technical is only one).
Obviously the high tech industry still requires the expertise of non-technical areas such as management, finance and accounting, planning, production, marketing, sales, etc, and I see no reason why very capable women could not bring this contribution to the Apple executive team and board.

[leroybrown]

This is a logical fallacy:

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To Derik and Bastion, among others. Let's not fall in the sample size trap. Let's look at the industry overall then. You don't deny, do you, that (1) sexism exists and (2) it has existed throughout history in varying degrees and (3) that this has unjustly denied to women the rights which men have long enjoyed?

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Historical evidence of discrimination by itself doesn't prove that discrimination is currently to blame for the current state of events.
Why?
1. After anti-discrimination laws went into effect, the "wage gap" shrank to about 25% and has remained there for several years.
2. Cultural/biological (i.e. lifestyle) choices.
It is a plausible explanation that labor laws have gotten rid of the lion's share of wage discrimination in this country, and that other personal choices are to blame for the apparent wage gap.
You continue to ignore cultural and biological considerations surrounding career choices. Is it best for both parents to work when children are young? No. The most convenient choice is that the woman stay home - first to recouperate from childbirth, and then because of the mother-child bond. I have seen dozens of women decide not to return to work after the 6 weeks of maternity leave, even if it means reduced family income. I'd guess that you don't have kids. (I didn't want to return to work either, but guys only get a couple of days off for events like childbirth. Talk about sexism.)
But I suspect you will say that these maternal instincts are culturally-imposed sexism. Children should probably be aseptically raised by nannies, eh? To be honest with you, were my wife able to earn more than me, I would happily be a stay-at-home dad. I've done it before and enjoyed it immensely.
Going back to the wage gap: The Department of Labor statistics, to which you are most likely referring, ignore experience - actually they ignore pretty much everything about the job environment except job type and wage earned. I find it rich that in my work environment we are 75% women, yet because of EEOC we are asked to give women preferential treatment in the hiring process. Is that necessary? No: we are already more than there. (I'm in a realitively low-wage field too, so we're contributing to the wage gap by hiring more women - that makes a guy proud!)
Coming back to the DOL statistics: the DOL itself attributes 60% of the difference (15% of the 25% gap) to either job type or education/experience. The remaining 10% is unaccounted for, but they say it's often assumed to be discrimination. They do not offer proof of discrimination. When it occurs, people can prosecute, but we aren't overwhelmed by wage discrimination cases... Other studies attribute it more or less entirely to those two categories.
Sure, you're bound to find anecdotal evidence of some descrimination in the work place, but you are making assumptions that are not founded on actual facts when you claim that it's systemic. Is it sexism that keeps males from attaining a 50% representation in child care positions? In the library? In schools? (Is it sexism that has female porn starlets earning more than male porn stars? /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif)
Women who aren't trying to raise families earn as much as males. (The average woman spends 10 years less in the workforce than the average man.) There are actually some decent reasons supporting the view that lifestyle choices are the reason for the wage gap - read "Why Men Earn More" by Warren Farrell. He makes a decent case.
Point 2: You continue to ignore cultural and biological considerations surrounding career choices. Is it best for both parents to work when children are young - or should children be aseptically raised by nannies? Often, the most convenient choice is that the woman stay home - first to recuperate from childbirth, and then often enough because of the mother-child bond (even the mothers I know who return to work would more often than not prefer to stay with their children). I have seen dozens of women decide not to return to work after the 6 weeks of maternity leave, even if it means reduced family income. I'd guess that you don't have kids. (I didn't want to return to work either, but guys only get a couple of days off for events like childbirth. Talk about sexism.) To be honest with you, were my wife able to earn more than me, I would happily be a stay-at-home dad. I've done it before and enjoyed it immensely.
But I suspect you will say that these maternal instincts are culturally-imposed sexism. Unfortunately, that suggests that you see a homemaker as a poor professional choice.

[zarmanto]

Hey Derik! Did you see that? He dismissed my entire argument out of hand, (implicity validating it in full, I might add) and he cited your intervention as his excuse!
Kewl.

[wnurse]

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On that topic, how many woman presidents has the US had till now?
Your probability theory applies here?

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Actually, his conclusion applies. By and large, we are still a sexist society. Do you know why there hasn't been a female president? Not because one isn't qualified, but becuase every female knows that they aren't going to win. Same with black presidend and hispanic president. Any black person that runs for president knows he's not going to win. You run to raise your profile, not win really. The only person who has a chance in winning is a white male. Hilary will soon test our theory on the electability of women. Will be a very interesting test (Also, Hilary might be first female either elected or rejected based on merit alone)... conservatives hate her so much, they wouldn't even bother to notice anything else (like she is a woman). Liberals like her so much, they might just vote for her to piss of Hannity, Savage, Rush and Bill O'Reilly.
Hmmm, come to think of it, she might not be a good test for electability of women. Maybe later down the road, we need a non-controversial woman to run for president to really determine if men would ever vote for a woman.

[bastion]

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To Derik and Bastion, among others. Let's not fall in the sample size trap. Let's look at the industry overall then. You don't deny, do you, that (1) sexism exists and (2) it has existed throughout history in varying degrees and (3) that this has unjustly denied to women the rights which men have long enjoyed?

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You've just broadened the topic quite a bit, though. I was under the impression we were talking about the composition of Apple's board of directors and the possible factors contributing to that composition. I wouldn't even consider denying any of the questions you asked just then. And I'll even admit quite readily that sexism is almost certain to have played a role in the makeup of Apple's board. But it's not necessarily sexism in the final selection process. It's much more likely that the documentable sexism (from both men and women) in all the stages before one becomes a credible candidate for a board seat has had a significant filtering effect.

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Wages -- even for comparable positions (and controlling for variables of education and experience) -- still favor men by a wide margin.

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In most positions, wages favor men by factor within the margin of error when experience is taken into account. Sexism has certainly made it more difficult for women to gain that experience in many roles, but again you seem to be looking to fix a problem without addressing the upstream cause.

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How far down do we have to drill before we can find women in numbers which correspond roughly to their population?

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You want a serious answer? You have to go back to the point where grade-school courses become elective. The instant kids are given a choice about what classes they take, they start gender-selecting themselves driven by a whole host of factors including societal, familial and peer pressure.

[pkeene]

This is very OT but, sorry Jeff, I've tried to resist but I can't.

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I'm too bogged down at work to do a Google search for citations for this however.

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... followed by 31 (at last count) posts to this thread. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
Back OT. I would like to protest the fact no women appear to be represented in this thread.
Peter

[Mississauga]

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I would like to protest the fact no women appear to be represented in this thread.

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So much for that earlier statement of probability, eh? /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

[d00d]

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So much for that earlier statement of probability, eh?

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No, clearly Macworld is biased against women.
/forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif