here seem to be the fundamental ones which I find hardest to answer
The why's are always the hardest to answer
and that's what makes the answers the most interesting.
because firstly I think equality of opportunity is important
Absolutely 100% agree with that. And if anyone can prove they have been denied a job because of their sex, they have a case for sexual discrimination.
This is why these initiatives are bad... we're sending mixed messages to men... "you shouldn't discriminate against women" whilst discriminatinged against them by giving women a leg up.
Clearly you're not one who's been unduly influenced by these kinds of expectations
It's not that I've not been influenced it's a case of kids aren't an option. I've never had to choose between family and career. Had I had to make that choice I suspect things would have been a bit different.
I agree though that it is surprising in this day and age kids are shocked by women being fire fighters etc. and I agree, that should be addressed.
And the right approach is to educate kids early on about this stuff, but we need to separate this from other parts of the social justice warrior agenda to be sure we stop their indoctrination in those areas (such as the transgender/non-binary BS).
secondly I feel that having a more diverse selection of people offering services is good for the public.
Yes it is good for the public and I know there is a demand for female tradies. Not just from women, but other vulnerable groups as well who may not feel comfortable with burly blokes in their house. I saw this as a market need and it is paying off.
Basically if the people doing the work are representative of the customers, the workers are more likely to provide innovations that the customers need.
I agree that for a target market, understanding that market and it's needs can help immensely when developing product, but in others the sex of the client is irrelevant. Civil engineering for example. The sex of the client is irrelevant (what would women want a bridge to do that men don't?).
But I do think this is a bit of a red herring because you can gain insight without employing anyone from your target market or having direct personal experience of it.
Extremely good question. I have no idea. In tech they make a deal about the fact that the first computer programmer was female, and programming used to be a job for ladies
Ada Lovelace and yes, some people make a deal about her, but personally the people I look up to in software engineering are all men because they dominate the fields that interest me (mainly game development).
You mention in your next post the fact that girls are good at maths early on and that this is a trait required for software engineering. Agreed. I'm good at maths. I was encouraged by my parents (as was my female cousin who also went on to be a software engineer). But it's not enough to be good at a trait or two.
To stay at the top takes dedication (long hours, the perpetual hamster wheel of new skills and so on) and for the most part it is a rather solitary pursuit. Yes there are teams but for the most part you're given a task and you get into your own head space to get it done. Take a look around a lot of software companies and nearly everyone is there with their headphones on. It's not a very social environment. These factors alone are for somewhat incompatible with traits common in women (you lot tell us we talk to much - yes, because we like to socialise and chat, and given a choice between work or family/friends we choose family/friends which means we're unlikely to be as dedicated as men as we prioritise out time differently). I could handle these issues early on, but as I've gotten older I've wanted to spend less time focusing on work and not be away from family and friends so much. Hence, my job and I were no longer compatible.
Once you start to look at jobs in this way it's quite easy to see why there is sexual inequity. Throw in the physical attributes that are ideally required and it rounds out the picture nicely.
With the current crop of feminists, in their distorted view, men and women are equal in every way and this is simply not the case. We never were, we never will be and we shouldn't try to achieve equity in every walk of life because it's detrimental to society and business. We're complimentary, we're designed to fulfil different roles and we should never lose sight of that.
You also need to consider the issue I've mentioned previously which is the frequency with which sexual harassment claims arise from women. This is bad for all women because it will create sexism. In the face of this potential threat, men will close ranks and when faced with a choice between hiring a women who presents a possible future problem (and I know not all women do) and hiring a man... they're going to pick the bloke.
That's not to say that just men are at risk from this type of woman. Long story short I nearly lost my career to a hard line feminist who accused me a physcially assaulting her. When it was clear that wasn't going to go her way she went on the sick with stress and tried to the sue the company.
Some of these people are dangerous schemers who won't think twice about trying to ruin someone if it benefits their agenda.
Fundamentally though everyone should have an equal shot, and I think for the most part these days, they do have that equal shot at the hiring decision.
But overall I think we should stop worrying about it, educate kids that they can do anything (within reason) and sit back and see what happens. There will always be anomalies like me and the other women who are in the trades, but we are just that... anomalies, and that's OK because most women are not cut out for this type of work, it's dirty, grimy, physically demanding, quite uncomfortable at times and there is great potential for broken finger nails, couple that with the plaster dust that dries your hair out on contact and well... you've got to be pretty crazy to do it in my opinion, but I love it