On Aug 22, 1:23 am, "Chris Messina" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > I don't want to get off topic,
Why not? It adds to the diversity. :) > but my belief is that higher diversity > leads to higher quality I apsolutely agree, and that was the point of my previous post. > I furthermore believe (and have experienced) that a little mindfulness > and effort will go a long way to relieving the "white boy club" > syndrome I've mentioned. Sadly, too many white boy organizers don't > make any extra effort to reach outside their sphere of awareness or > work to bring in or make accommodations for people who are not like > them, thereby perpetuating the cycle. What can I say? Some people like > to mate within the family tree, others are more comfortable "branching > out". Well, the point of my latest post -- although consciously obscured in order to provoke a response, I admit -- was exactly that the lack of diversity isn't necessary a sign of the "white boy club" syndrome. It might be unintuitive to people who live in countries -- like UK and US -- where the racial and cultural diversity is so obvious everywhere on the streets, but where I live you would really have a hard time finding a person who is not white; not because of some racial intolerance, but simply because there is next to none existing in the general population as well. When I visit London for a couple of days I literally see more non-white people than I see for the rest of the year combined. The lack of women is, admittedly, a different topic, but I think that it accurately reflects the status quo in the high-tech industry in general. The female attendees at the conference tended to be designers and journalists, with the female speaker being a lawyer; in Croatia, all kinds of engineering have always been primarily "boys' work", and this should be changed on a much wider social basis than a single conference. My other point is that if you try to "force" diversity by catering to a single element (e.g. we lack women in hi-tech; let's focus on them) you may easily slip into the exact opposite to your intentions, a "positive action" leading to single-mindedness. I think that we should accept the current situation and work to improve it by providing a healthy, diverse mindset, instead of focusing on underserved minorities. For example, when organizing a conference, we should try finding the most interesting speakers available in the community, regarding of their gender, race or color. So while our conference was mostly male and essentially white-only, we had exactly the diversity that can be found in our society: there were Muslims, Jews, gay people, and even people from the countries we were up until recently in war with. And none of them was chosen on any other basis except their merit in their respective fields. Berislav --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. To post to this group, send email to coworking@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
