> I remember my own struggles to break into the tech business, many years ago now. Although white and "privileged", i.e. no cultural barriers to entry, I found it very tough and had to jump through hoops, work my way up from semi-tech to actual development positions
Imagine you actually had cultural barriers to entry to deal with as well.
Imagine you actually had cultural barriers to entry to deal with as well.
Have you considered that the non-Americans that are successful in SV had much larger barriers to break, including learning new languages, and dealing with visa hassle?
For example my girl friend was deported the other day because a border guard (wrongly) though she didn't have the right visas to enter the country we are living in when we returned from holidays. No native has to deal with this kind of administrative nightmare.
Sure. Isn't it the case that relatively few of those folks are successful, even though there absolutely are those who succeed spectacularly?
That seems analogous to what's being claimed here: that the deck is stacked against minority applicants, not that it's impossible for them to be successful (and certainly there are quite a few who are successful).
Imagine you actually had cultural barriers to entry to deal with as well.