Does anyone else find the author's stylistic choice of the generic 'her' throughout this article a little weird? I'm all for using language to erode stereotypes about the types of people involved in tech enterprise, so in theory I should applaud TechCrunch here, but I feel like the use of the female pronoun in an article describing a hypothetical CEO as a failed product is perhaps a step in the wrong direction.
One woman to another, might I remind you of the ill effects of arbitrarily mandating what is and is not healthy for all ladies! Your concern is noted but thankfully my constitution is such that I can certainly participate in a dialogue about the use of the female pronoun in this particular article and the tacit conclusions a casual reader might draw from it.
The constitution doesn't excuse you from flinging poo at the writing style of a highly prolific and well-known writer for his choice of always using the feminine pronoun, regardless of the conclusions drawn therein. All you are attempting to do is downgrade the quality of the article because of something birthed from your own ignorance of the writer and your own insecurity.
At what point do you think "protecting" women by constantly attempting to create drama where none was intended at all (especially considering the author) is helping women feel more welcome to your industry? If "she" is not allowed to fail, then "she" is not accepted as an equal to the "he" that is able to fail with spectacular results. See how easy it is to spin intention against you based on null opinions?
Why not simply use a neutral descriptor instead of a gendered one? If it is true that the author is as committed to the female pronoun as you suggest he is, isn't it therefore implied that he would only encourage such thoughtfulness at the intersection of language, gender, perception, failure, objectification and technology?
Why not simply use a neutral descriptor instead of a gendered one?
Because English doesn't really have gender-neutral, singular pronouns? You're down to artificial sounding language full of "one" and "they" and "their" or using invented pronouns that aren't in widespread use.
In order to reach your goal of "using language to erode stereotypes about the types of people involved in tech enterprise", would it be better to reserve the use of "him" for failures and "her" for success?
I then suggest you are promoting a biased view. Some people alternate between him and her, some just refer to the person in a way that does not indicate the sex (this CEO, the founder...)
Somehow, I prefer the latter, because it's simply trying to present arguments without reference to sex, instead of "using language to erode stereotypes about the types of people involved in tech enterprise", which could also be called "performing propaganda using newspeak" (and that is less politically correct of course)
EDIT: as noted below, «If "she" is not allowed to fail, then "she" is not accepted as an equal to the "he" is able to fail with spectacular results.» - spot on
I certainly would not advocate using 'him' for failure and 'her' for success.
I definitely would prefer to see neutral descriptors used in articles like these (as I implied downthread); when I wrote "using language to erode stereotypes" I intended it to be taken as an author alternating between pronouns in a single work.
I used to try to write completely gender-neutral, using such things like "s/he" or "his or her" or "one," since "they" feels a little off to me. Unfortunately, the English language offers no easy way to do this, so now days I alternate between the genders, and I've found it to be effective when there are two heroes to the story, one "he" and one "she."
"[Company] is looking to grow our team with energetic software engineers ready to take on the hardest challenges of their career. Day-to-day responsibilities include challenging and interesting work on algorithms, databases, web technologies, human-computer interaction, scalability and systems architecture."
This position sounds stimulating. Perhaps some ladies are also motivated to pursue careers more for passion than profit?
An established area of research -- ethnology, and related fields like ethnomathematics and ethnography -- exists in social science disciplines to generate qualitative data in response to exactly these kinds of questions.
And that evidence is? The IAT researchers' bibliography goes back to the mid-'80s. Have they found any correlation between changing unconscious associations and changing socioeconomic disparities over the past 20+ years?
I must assume you are referring to the bibliography of Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People, although perhaps not, as the publishing dates of sources likely relevant to your query go back to at least the 1920s -- ex. Bogardus (1928, 1925). If you haven't accessed this bibliography I heartily recommend that you do, as cursory examination of the sources included therein reveals a multitude that would likely address both your first and second challenges.
