Sexism, racism, discrimination, etc. the list goes on and on. We've all heard the casual jokes and jibes towards a person for their background or looks, and everyone has a little bit of bias in them somewhere. Usually this isn't a problem, but when there's gender inequality dominating the tech world, things have to change. The sex ratio in the technology industry shouldn't be so obviously inclined towards males. Sure, in certain regions, women simply do not have the same access to proper education required in the tech department as men, so companies like Google have established workshops to broaden their diversity within the corporation. However, this is just another example of the society that grants men with better opportunity, because despite such programs, any real improvement has yet to be revealed concerning the unjust situation (Manjoo). Employees should be hired based on their actual skill, rather than their gender.
For instance, one woman, who was hanging out with some male IT workers, was told, "You're female, you're physically incapable of understanding science." Ouch. She remained present long enough to hear the same group of men proudly discussing how they would purposely "sabotage" any female candidate's chances for a job with them. Another woman was told by a peer that, "Men's brains just work more logically." She then commented on her company's "male privilege." Many of her male coworkers were constantly earning promotions they had never expressed any effort or interest for, while she had, and earned wages twice as much as her (Tiku).
Of course, these views do not apply to everyone. 56 year old, male Robert Harker works as a Linux systems administrator in Silicon Valley and strongly disapproves of the sexism that occurs among the men in his work place. He states his disappointment in men and feels the need to apologize to women on the behalf of the male population, "I thought we were better than that. And now I find that I have to apologize for my gender" (Tiku).
There's typically a general awareness of existing prejudice in the labor force amongst it's workers, whether it is directed towards race or sex, but the knowledge means nothing if no appropriate actions are taken to balance the biased environment. Instilled judgement of a person because of society's impossible standards is only one of human nature's many flaws, but it's one that can be corrected. Nobody should automatically be given a disadvantage for being born differently.
