I think the programmer example is a much better example than the transgender example. If you are ostacized and disciminated for your choice, you are not "free to choose". It's "free to choose" in the same sense that everyone is "free to choose" to commit crime, with the risk of being put into prison for your choice.
The "woman in programming" example is much better. Woman in programming started declining basically the moment computer games entered the market, since computer games are marketed primarily to males (outside of mobile, but that influence is fairly new). If we just simplify the whole problem to this one influence, woman are not programmers because of the marketing of "children toys". Is that bad, something we have to change? Nobody is really prevented from choosing to do certain freetime activities, to get exerience and motivation. They are just notpushed towards it. Still it leads to an unequal outcome.
Firstly, I think you are implicitly assuming that there's nothing dissuading women from being programmers--that if they join the industry, things go perfectly smoothly for them.
That's far from the case, in my experience.
Secondly, nowadays, men and women both play games at roughly the same rate (with women playing a little more by some metrics), but that doesn't seem to have improved the chances of women entering the programming industry. What is the explanation for that (besides that it's "new", which isn't really the case anymore)? Like many people, I got into programming as a result of video games--but I find it hard to believe that that alone is responsible for the entirety of the observed difference in behavior.
Finally, what is your explanation for the huge increase in the proportion of women in biology?
I don't think that computer games explain the entire phenomenon, they are just one major factor that I chose to focus on.
It is true that the gender imbalance in gaming has mostly smoothed out, but until that happened the software industry already turned mostly male. And even if nobody intends to erect barriers, in a group that's heavily skewed towards one demographic everything starts to cater towards that demographic, pushing everyone else away. So unsettling the balance once for long enough may be enough to explain where we are today.
>Finally, what is your explanation for the huge increase in the proportion of women in biology?
Playing games is different from programming, and marketing games to boys is different from marketing computer science to girls.
I don't know why less girls choose computer science than do boys, but I don't think it can be so heavily linked to gaming. The gaming community is actually sometimes far harsher on girls than the comp sci community, yet girls continue to choose gaming. In the gaming community, a girl is either a "thot" or she beats out every male who plays against her. If you're neither of these things the community still believes you're one of them and will react to you/attack you accordingly, usually defaulting to calling you a "thot".
In comp sci, the barrier is more about socializing. It may be a stereotype but I have noticed that many males in comp sci are the less socially-gifted ones. It is often not possible for a female to join such a group of males because they are scared of her. Other than that, the comp sci world in academia is far less disgusting than the gaming world and far less hostile. It's about avoidance instead of outright attack.
It could just be that girls enjoy programming less than boys do. I'm not saying that's definitely the case, I'm saying it seems more likely than not.
The "woman in programming" example is much better. Woman in programming started declining basically the moment computer games entered the market, since computer games are marketed primarily to males (outside of mobile, but that influence is fairly new). If we just simplify the whole problem to this one influence, woman are not programmers because of the marketing of "children toys". Is that bad, something we have to change? Nobody is really prevented from choosing to do certain freetime activities, to get exerience and motivation. They are just notpushed towards it. Still it leads to an unequal outcome.