I am a woman, and I work in software development, so I'm assuming I fit in your group called "women in tech". I have no idea what insults, abuse, threats, contempt, ridicule, disdain, and disregard I apparently have been routinely facing.
If "women in tech" did suffer so severely on a daily basis, it would not be relevant to Richards. Her job description seems to be "Developer Evangelist". I'm not sure what that specifically means, but I do know it isn't technical, and thus she isn't a "woman in tech".
Even if you do consider her a "woman in tech", the abuse Richards suffered while wrong is not something routinely faced by "women in tech". I understand that genitalia aren't generally supposed to be discussed at professional conferences, but am finding it very hard to see why this is an issue of harassment towards "women in tech" when no women were in the conversation at all. Since Richards felt it was, she was entitled to follow up with the conference leaders, and ask that they handle the situation appropriately, which she did. At this point in time, she could have enjoyed the rest of PyCon and gone home without suffering any abuse at all, happy that she spoke up about the conversation that she took offense to.
Instead she publicly posted the photos of the men who dared discuss genitalia amongst themselves in her presence in order to shame them. This is when she opened her self to (and received) abuse. She had already had the situation handled by the conference organizers, and thus had already spoken up about it without any abuse at all.
It is unfortunate that Richards received the huge storms of abuse that she did. But she chose to handle the situation in a way that invited that abuse, when there were clear ways to "speak up" that would not have resulted in such abuse.
This has everything to do with reacting to situations in a professional manner, and nothing to do with "women in tech" being able to speak up about legitimate sexual harassment.
If "women in tech" did suffer so severely on a daily basis, it would not be relevant to Richards. Her job description seems to be "Developer Evangelist". I'm not sure what that specifically means, but I do know it isn't technical, and thus she isn't a "woman in tech".
Even if you do consider her a "woman in tech", the abuse Richards suffered while wrong is not something routinely faced by "women in tech". I understand that genitalia aren't generally supposed to be discussed at professional conferences, but am finding it very hard to see why this is an issue of harassment towards "women in tech" when no women were in the conversation at all. Since Richards felt it was, she was entitled to follow up with the conference leaders, and ask that they handle the situation appropriately, which she did. At this point in time, she could have enjoyed the rest of PyCon and gone home without suffering any abuse at all, happy that she spoke up about the conversation that she took offense to.
Instead she publicly posted the photos of the men who dared discuss genitalia amongst themselves in her presence in order to shame them. This is when she opened her self to (and received) abuse. She had already had the situation handled by the conference organizers, and thus had already spoken up about it without any abuse at all.
It is unfortunate that Richards received the huge storms of abuse that she did. But she chose to handle the situation in a way that invited that abuse, when there were clear ways to "speak up" that would not have resulted in such abuse.
This has everything to do with reacting to situations in a professional manner, and nothing to do with "women in tech" being able to speak up about legitimate sexual harassment.