Too technical for ladies? Sexist comment at India Digital Summit is just frustrating

Sexism in the technology industry is something that has been written and talked about at various points. While tech giants like Google and Apple have come out to support coding programmes for girls in the US, that hardly means the problem has stopped or that this is an ideal solution. In India, the situation is no different when it comes to technology and women industry leaders. A class example of this would be a recent remark made by one of the lady speaker at an ongoing Digital India Summit. According to one Twitter user Kanika Bains, the lady asked if the talk was getting too technical for the women in the crowd. It’s not clear which session was being referred to or who actually made the remark. Check out the tweet below:

So lady speaker says 'are we getting too technical for you, especially the ladies?' Tht was my cue to walk out midtalk. #IndiaDigitalSummit

— Kanika Bains (@KanikaBains) January 15, 2015

While we can’t we verify the remark, it’s not surprising if something of this nature was said. If you’ve ever attended phone launches, where an actress is a brand ambassador inevitably one of the questions asked by the brand ambassador is whether the phone is available in many colours, because you know for women, the colour of the phone must be the most important thing. And it’s not just smartphone launches, but also car shows where good-looking women and girls are often the props, happy to pose and smile for photos along with the car. As this Guardian piece pointed out in 2012, while the Detroit Auto Show has many women models posing with the cars, and wants to sell cars to women, only “few women occupy senior positions at the car firms in the US and even fewer in Europe and Asia.” Perhaps the most classic moment for sexism in technology was last year when Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella commented that women shouldn’t ask for a raise but rather let ‘good karma’ get them what is due. He had said, “It’s not really about asking for the raise, but knowing and having faith that the system will actually give you the right raises as you go along.” As we had noted then that 'good karma' theory was all bull given that numbers clearly show that technology companies Silicon Valley many more men than women. A report in The New York Times noted that , “Women make up only 16 percent of directors at Fortune 500 companies, 4 percent of chief executives at Standard & Poor’s 500 companies and 10 percent of chief financial officers at S. & P. 500 companies.” More so, a Telegraph report points out that female bosses only earn around three quarters as much as their male counterparts. So yes, sexism in the job sector is definitely alive and kicking and more so in tech companies. As to the ’too technical for ladies’ remark, this is definitely one that we women might have heard at some point in our lives, you know because girls can’t do maths. To hear these ideas get repeated at a Digital Conference and that too by another leader, is just downright sad and frustrating.