Just for a second imagine a men-only conference for developers. Shit-storm would be stronger than anything you've ever seen.
While I agree that IT industry is generally dominated by white men (no racism implied, I simply haven't seen a single black programmer yet), such events might be useful for women, but still would be interesting for me as a man to attend. I'd like to know what's going on on the other side of this whole situation. How are we going to bring equality here if we are separating ourselves from each other? I recently visited a conference in Moscow (Highload++), and there wasn't a single woman presenting. That's just sad. In the company I work for right now, there are probably about 10 women writing code vs over a 1000 men.
> [...]such events might be useful for women, but still would be interesting for me as a man to attend.
I think you're being petty here.
Its like when a boy owns an arsenal of toys and he can't possibly play with all of them so he inevitably casts some out, and his baby brother comes and picks one up from that pile, and suddenly THAT toy was the boys FAVOURITE toy and the boy cries and screams to his mother, and mom is like yeah, technically it’s your toy, but you have so many and look little jimmy doesn’t have any why dont you let him play with that one, but the kid keeps crying over the injustice of having his best toy taken away and so mom reasons with little jimmy, and jimmy is a kind-hearted boy so he relents the toy and the spoiled brother gets the toy back and makes a show of lathering it with the adoration befitting its special status but even though he wont admit it he never gave a shit about that toy anyway and is secretly relieved when mom and little jimmy finally go to the next room because he can now put down the toy and return to his iPad games without losing face.
So perhaps one day those 10 women at your company might like to eat lunch together and talk about their experiences, much like how there are probably many lunch tables with 10 men at them at your company. It's not everyday, it's a special event.
"If you are thinking about starting a startup or are in the midst of running one, we hope hearing stories from other women will inspire you to take the leap (or keep going!)."
This wording would seem to imply that the conference attendance, or at least the expected audience is restricted to women. The invitation request (https://news.ycombinator.com/ffc) doesn't explicitly state it one way or the other, but does have a field for "Gender".
I think they're just trying to attract more women, not disqualify men. From my experience, women engineers are super chill about this stuff. When I was in college, I used to get emails all the time from the womens society of engineers or something, inviting me to events and stuff.
Perhaps I'm more introverted than you are, but there is no way you could get me to go to a conference whose invitation and description excludes the possibility of my gender (or race, or other delineating characteristic) being interested in learning from female founders.
Then again, if prospective female founders are benefiting from my not being there, so be it. I assume there are several other ones I can go to, Startup School seems like the nearest gender-nonspecific equivalent.
Ironically, one of the hurdles that women have to face is that 'default' language is male. If you feel so ostracised that the term 'other women' is all that is necessary to completely turn you off going to a conference, imagine what it must be like for women surrounded by a swamp of male pronouns and references in this sector.
I agree, and can imagine. There is little irony in this, as I am a member of a community (Asian males) that is usually marginalized and heavily ridiculed in mainstream American culture. I have frequently been the oddball in a room who feels out of place and has a funny accent that people laugh at. Not every male who hangs out here is necessarily rich, successful, and white as you seem to imagine.
Anyway, none of this changes the fact that I wouldn't feel particularly comfortable going to said conference, and I imagine neither would most men. If this effect is intended, it's perfectly fine by me (as I have made clear in my comment, and have even laid out a viable alternative).
"Perhaps I'm more introverted than you are, but there is no way you could get me to go to a conference whose invitation and description excludes the possibility of my gender (or race, or other delineating characteristic) being interested in learning from female founders."
There are some events I avoid because of the language being all about men and the speakers all being male. It's just never intentional when that happens. We're not so different, you & I.
>I think they're just trying to attract more women, not disqualify men.
They may not explicitly disqualify men from attending, but the language on the site and the proceeding application form makes it very clear who they want, and do not want, there.
To be clear though, I don't care one way or another. I find these type of events to be laughable at best, but they're only a small part of this bizarre, gender war fueled narrative we're having pushed into the IT industry every day by online "journalists" who've never even been a part of it.
