DIX~Oh god. Muh feminism.
This is so retarded.
Men have greater chances of being channeled into hard science from childhood; women do not (as much) - think toys, which is more 'engineeringy': Legos or Barbies?
Are you saying 1)girls don't play with lego 2)there is a fucking correlation between what toys you have in your early childhood to what profession you end up pursuing?
Engineering is an "old boys club."
What does this even mean? Maybe you have a point but I don't fucking know what you're talking about
The public perception of engineering is not amenable to women.
So? Do you want us to dress engineers up in pink and give them all fake tits? Is it amenable to men? No, it's just engineering and doesn't try to appeal to either gender in particular
The public perception of engineering is wrong.
No!!! Engineering is a tough field to get into regardless of gender, people know this. Pretty much everyone considers engineering to be a very respectable degree, and rightfully so. The perception of engineering is just what it should be.
You seem to feel like every profession should have a 50/50 split of genders. This is just stupid. The thing that you should care about is whether there is equal opportunity for a man and a women to get into any given profession. If a women wants to be an engineer, then she has the opportunity (even better than a man I'd argue, as people have above) to go out and become just that. Males and females are different, don't know why society is trying to abolish this idea. Women aren't entering the mentioned fields because they don't want to, not because they can't.
I could continue this rant forever but fuck it I'm done, this shit just pisses me off like no other.
I don't understand this new NS formatting, so I'm just going to reply to this all at once.
First of all, I'm a man, I'm not a declared feminist, and my views are supported by arguably the highest organization in engineering. The point isn't that there needs to be a 50/50 split of genders, and that's not what I said. What I said was that diversity plays a role in successful problem solving. That's ALL DIVERSITY, not just gender. Diversity is more than gender or the color of one's skin - it's about perspective, background, and what you bring to a discussion when approaching a multifaceted problem.
So now, that's besides the point. Why are there no women in engineering?
My weakest point is probably that men are funneled into engineering from childhood, and I'll concede that many girls do play with Legos. However, while I don't have a source it's probably entirely true that more boys than girls play with toys like Legos, enabling them to think analytically and solve problems. Dolls don't do shit.
Engineering is an "old boys club." Engineering is full of old white men. What women feels comfortable going into a profession like that?
And finally, no, it's not. People don't understand that engineering doesn't suck. The vast majority of people don't understand the scope of engineering. Additionally, most people (in general) don't have engineering "role models" that they can look up to to guide them into the field. Women are especially lacking in this regard.
It may be semi true that women aren't entering the field because they don't want to. That is not the answer. They are certainly capable of entering the field, so why don't they? That's the question at hand.