What do girls want? (after being socialized for their entire young lives to only express and develop interests in traditionally "feminine" pursuits) might turn out to be a quite different question from What's the best way to encourage girls to see themselves as being equally capable as boys in technical areas?"
There seems to be a popular notion that "feminine" traits are innate and universal to people with a "feminine identity", rather than the product of culture with socialization that treats female people consistently differently than male people from birth. However if you think about things that prepare someone for technical success, so-called "feminine" traits like caring about your appearance more than is actually necessary (makeup and jewelry serve no real purpose and take time and money) or being uncomfortable with conflict (bias for cooperation vs competition, people seeing assertive women as aggressive) are not good things that will help you be equal to or surpass your male peers in technical pursuits.
I can understand why it's uncomfortable to imply that the concept of "femininity" is not a positive one when it comes to tech (the creator of this probably disagrees with my assesment). But I hope we can continue to question the validity of "feminine" social constructs while also creating products like this, which bridge the gap after socialization has taken its toll.
I actually read it right before writing that comment above! It was the primary motivating factor for me providing some examples of how I've noticed that femininity can be negative in regards to tech.
That all being said, I don't knock anyone as an individual for liking what they like. I also recognize that there are reasons for the disparity of women in tech other than gender role conformity due to socialization. It's just one I think deserves more credit than it gets.
> But I hope we can continue to question the validity of "feminine" social constructs while also creating products like this, which bridge the gap after socialization has taken its toll.
Yep, just because this product doesn't fix all society's problems related to pushing gender norms on children doesn't mean it's not worth doing.
Maybe by giving girls what they want in order to get the damn thing into their hands, this product is exposing them to technical challenges that will improve their confidence, causing them to see themselves as being equally capable as boys in technical areas?
