Re: [all candidates] lack of women in Debian

[Lucas Nussbaum <lucas@debian.org>]

On 19/03/13 at 21:43 +0100, Gerfried Fuchs wrote:
> * Lucas Nussbaum <lucas@debian.org> [2013-03-19 07:44:32 CET]:
> > But it's also about how we see our project. I would like Debian to be
> > a very welcoming project, and I hate the fact that it's harder for some
> > groups to get involved.
> 
>  Given that the context of this statement is "lack of women in Debian",
> why do you believe that it's harder for women to get involved?

Let's split the process of getting involved into several steps:

Step 0: Alice knows nothing about Debian
Step 1: Alice is "exposed" to Debian
Step 2: Alice would like to contribute to Debian
Step 3: Alice starts contributing to Debian

Going from Step 0 to Step 1 is less likely for women, because there are
fewer women in situations to be "exposed" to Debian (studying CS, IT
jobs, etc.). And there's not much we can do (as Debian) for that.

Going from Step 1 to Step 2 is also less likely for women, because the
prospect of getting involved in a project with so few women might be a
bit frightening.

I don't see why going from Step 2 to Step 3 would be less likely for
women. One could also point out that women tend to get more help (for
good or bad reasons) when they ask for help.

So, maybe I should have said "less likely" rather than "harder".
However, for some other groups, it might be "harder". For example, it's
harder for non-native english speakers to be involved in Debian, because
contributing to Debian requires some english knowledge.

Lucas