[Yapc-na-organizers] Free conference passes for women

[Dave Rolsky]

On Mon, 17 Aug 2009, Joshua wrote:

> To me it feels a little like "ladies night" that bars have, but in
> some ways it does seem like a good idea too:
> http://jaoo.dk/aarhus-2009/women/
>
> Depending on how the development community takes the JAOO offer,
> could/should we consider something similar for YAPCs?

I don't think there's any reason _not_ to do this. It's certainly a nice 
idea, and there's little cost to giving it a shot.

However, I don't think that this alone will make a big change in how many 
women attend our conferences. YAPC and the Perl workshops are all _very_ 
cheap, so price cannot be the thing keeping women away.

I suspect what keeps women away is some combination of (in no particular 
order):

* Lack of self-confidence - "I'm not good enough to go hang out with 
'real' geeks"

* Real and/or expected assholery from the community - "I don't want to 
hang out with a bunch of jerks" and "I'm sure people who go to conferences 
are all socially retarded dipshits"

* Lack of interest - "I program to make money, and when I go home I'm 
done"

I'd also point out that these sorts of reasons can apply to men as well.

While we can't do much about lack of interest, I think the first two could 
possibly be addressed a bit, possibly with some good advertising. Of 
course, the question then is _where_ to do said advertising.


-dave

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