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HOWTO Encourage Women in Linux
HOWTO Encourage Women in Linux
Val Henson
2002−10−29
Revision History
Revision 1.1
2002−10−29
Revised by: VH
Minor rewrites, typo fixes
Revision 1.0
2002−10−25
Revised by: JYG
Fixed validation errors, added license, abstract, versioning, etc.
Revision .9
2002−10−01
Revised by: VH
Initial version
Copyright (c) 2002 Val Henson This document may be reproduced or distributed in any form, without prior
permission, provided that all such copies or distributions include this copyright statement and the warranty
disclaimer contained in this paragraph. This document is provided on an "AS IS" basis only, with no
warranties, express or implied. All usage of the information in this document is at your own risk.
HOWTO Encourage Women in Linux
Table of Contents
1. Introduction. ....................................................................................................................................................1
1.1. Audience. ..........................................................................................................................................1
1.2. What problem? Sexism is dead!. ......................................................................................................2
1.3. About the author. ..............................................................................................................................2
2. Why are there so few women in Linux?. .......................................................................................................4
2.1. Women are less confident. ................................................................................................................5
2.2. Women have fewer opportunities for friendship or mentoring. .......................................................5
2.3. Women are discouraged from an early age. ......................................................................................6
2.4. Computing perceived as non−social. ................................................................................................6
2.5. Lack of female role models. ..............................................................................................................7
2.6. Games, classes aimed towards men. .................................................................................................7
2.7. Advertising, media say computers are for men. ...............................................................................7
2.8. Life−work balance more important to women .................................................................................7
2.9. Reasons women avoid Linux specifically.. .......................................................................................8
3. Do's and don't's of encouraging women in Linux. .......................................................................................9
3.1. Don't tell sexist jokes. .......................................................................................................................9
3.2. Do protest sexist jokes. .....................................................................................................................9
3.3. Don't call people bitches. ..................................................................................................................9
3.4. Do show some respect. ...................................................................................................................10
3.5. Don't take the keyboard away. ........................................................................................................10
3.6. Do give directions and explain them clearly.. .................................................................................10
3.7. Don't make sexual advances towards women. ................................................................................10
3.8. Do act friendly. ...............................................................................................................................11
3.9. Don't complain about the lack of women in computing. ................................................................11
3.10. Do encourage women in computing. ............................................................................................12
3.11. Don't stare and point when women arrive ....................................................................................12
3.12. Do treat new arrivals politely. .......................................................................................................12
3.13. Don't treat women stereotypically. ...............................................................................................12
3.14. Do treat women as normal people. ...............................................................................................13
3.15. Don't criticize too much. ...............................................................................................................13
3.16. Do compliment. ............................................................................................................................13
3.17. Don't invite only male speakers. ...................................................................................................14
3.18. Do ask women to speak. ...............................................................................................................14
3.19. Don't micro−specialize. ................................................................................................................14
3.20. Do discuss broader topics. ............................................................................................................14
3.21. Don't make your meetings hard to attend. ....................................................................................15
3.22. Do make meetings easy to attend.. ................................................................................................15
3.23. Don't make new people feel unwelcome. .....................................................................................15
3.24. Do help new people get involved.. ................................................................................................15
3.25. Don't underestimate girlfriends or wives. .....................................................................................15
3.26. Do treat girlfriends and wives as independent people. .................................................................16
4. But I don't do that!. ......................................................................................................................................17
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HOWTO Encourage Women in Linux
Table of Contents
A. LinuxChix. ....................................................................................................................................................18
ii
 
1. Introduction
At the 2002 Ottawa Linux Symposium, I hosted a LinuxChix Birds Of a Feather session. During the BOF and
throughout the conference, I heard the same set of questions:
"My girlfriend hates Windows, how can I encourage her to use Linux?"
"Almost no women attend my local LUG. How can I fix this?"
"Why aren't there more women in open source?"
Clearly, people in the Linux community would like for more women to be involved in Linux, but most people
don't know why so few women are involved or how to change that. This HOWTO is an effort to summarize
the explanations, recommendations, and opinions of the women who already are interested and active in
Linux. This document began with the verbatim recommendations of the women who attended the LinuxChix
BOF, and was added to by many more women in the months following the original BOF. In other words, this
HOWTO represents the feelings and opinions of real women involved in Linux. While we represent the
women who "made it," we still have fairly important insights into why other women left or never entered the
Linux community, as well as being keenly aware of the pressures which are currently pushing us out of the
community.
In this HOWTO, we'll talk about why women stay out of computing in general, why they stay away from
Linux in particular, and what you can do to help encourage women in Linux. We hope that this HOWTO will
result in more women using, installing, and developing Linux.
1.1. Audience
This document is intended mainly for the male Linux enthusiast who would like to see more women involved
in Linux. Its secondary audience is both men and women who have been too busy having fun with Linux and
computers to sit down and think about why most women don't share their interests. We hope you'll come away
from this HOWTO with some understanding of why women stay away from Linux and with a few ideas about
what you can do to reverse that trend.
This HOWTO is not directed towards people who aren't concerned about the lack of women in Linux, or think
that women are better off staying away from Linux. If you don't already believe that women are being driven
away from Linux and computers by external causes, this HOWTO probably won't convince you otherwise
(although it may give you some interesting avenues of research to follow up on).
This HOWTO is definitely not intended to help male Linux geeks find female Linux geeks to date. The
central paradox of women and Linux is this: often, the people most anxious for more women in Linux are also
the people most likely to accidentally drive them away. Frequently, men who want more women in Linux
solely so they have a better chance of finding a girlfriend end up acting in ways that end up driving women
away instead! This HOWTO will try to explain which behaviors drive women away from Linux and which
behaviors encourage them.
1. Introduction
1
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HOWTO Encourage Women in Linux
1.2. What problem? Sexism is dead!
A sentiment I hear frequently: "What problem? There's no problem! Sexism is dead! Women are staying out
of Linux because they want to!" If you feel this way, you may change your opinion by the time you finish
reading this HOWTO. I also used to believe that sexism was dead. Shortly after joining several women in
computing mailing lists, I realized how wrong I was. Week after week, women have new stories about how
they were discriminated against and insulted because they were women. These stories aren't decades old, nor
do they involve people who grew up when sexism was more acceptable. These are day−to−day experiences of
today's women, in modern settings, who are being driven out of their chosen profession by sexism. This isn't
theoretical−−many women actually leave the field of computers entirely because of blatantly sexist incidents
involving superiors at work or at school.
Read the links below for my favorite example of modern−day sexism:
Initial post to the Sydney LUG mailing list, by a woman:
Follow−up posts diagnosing the problem as "over−stressed female":
Gee, surprise, these two responses are enough to drive her away:
Hysterically funny and heroic response from another woman:
Despite the pointed sarcasm, obnoxious man still doesn't get it:
A perfect response from a man who does get it:
Sexism is alive and well, and it is driving women out of Linux. You can argue that the Linux users joking
about "over−stressed females" in the above posts are ignorant, or stupid, or well−meaning, or should in some
way not be labeled sexist, but the result of their actions is that women are leaving Linux, something we would
like to prevent.
1.3. About the author
Val Henson is a Linux kernel developer, an active member of LinuxChix, and female. Her interests include
operating systems research, women and computer science, and fine beer. Many other women collaborated
1. Introduction
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