Kill Process Read Online Free Page B

I falter. Shit. The confidence I felt an hour ago when I yelled at Daniel evaporates in a heartbeat.
    Logically I know none of the men in this room are going to hit me, threaten me, or lock me in a closet. I’ve analyzed the profiles of all the people I work with to make sure, and occasionally tweaked the job requisition system to nudge any risk factors far away from me. Even if these men possessed any of those tendencies, they aren’t going to surface here, threatening my well-being in the professional work environment at Tomo. In spite of all that, the sympathetic nervous system doesn’t take orders from the neocortex, and all the logic in the world is powerless against the flood of fight-or-flight hormones raging through my body.
    I glance at the chairs along one wall, there for when the room is overflowing. The room is not full now, of course, although these are the only seats near the door. If I take a seat along the wall while there’s still empty seats at the table, I’m telling the people in the room I don’t care enough to sit at the table and I’m not engaged.
    I once remarked to a friend that the cost of building homes for the homeless would be cheaper than dealing with the social impact of homelessness. She said lacking a home was the symptom of homelessness, and the causes went far deeper: mental problems, substance abuse issues, social support. What seemed like a simple problem was quite complex.
    In this moment of hesitation, I’m overwhelmed by the complexity of my issues. Having one hand is nothing at all compared to the warring factions inside my mind: Sit at the table to show you care. Don’t let anyone between you and the exit.
    I’m a woman in tech, an amputee, an abuse survivor. The intersectionality kills me.
    Carl, a senior marketing manager, looks up at me from his corner seat at the front of the table. Maybe I’ve gone pale, or perhaps he notices my shaking. He stands and moves his stuff. “I’m going to be presenting, Angie. Take my seat.”
    Carl may be a good guy despite his career choice.
    “Thanks,” I mumble, and slip into the chair as unobtrusively as possible. I’m embarrassed and thankful. I wipe a fine sheen of sweat from my forehead, and avoid looking at anyone at the table. I can’t avoid the gaze of my boss, Daniel, directly across and clueless of what transpired. He’s probably still wondering why I was pissed about the maternity leave party.
    Down the table, three other people from marketing are present, along with a designer and two UI engineers, including Sarah, the technical lead for our new web browser. There’s no one from backend engineering except me. Tomo as a company thinks first and foremost about how things look. That I’m present at this meeting is only because I’ve spent the last two years indoctrinating Daniel into the importance of involving all the stakeholders. I hate these meetings, yet being here seems to be the only way to ward off the worst of the stupid technical decisions.
    One last person enters and Carl nods to them.
    “Let’s get started, everyone,” Carl says, and thumbs through slides on his phone, which are displayed on the wall behind him. “One of our top user complaints is about privacy.” The slide contains a pie chart of customer issues. “The number one complaint is concern over who can view their posts, followed closely by concern over the use of their personal data for advertising.”
    Carl is stating the obvious to anyone who works in social networking. Advertising is how Tomo makes nearly all of its revenue, and those dollars are dependent on accurately targeting users.
    Usually this is good. If the band The Strokes tours the country and wants to advertise tickets to fans who live in Sacramento, California, they can do it with Tomo. Their fans perceive it as a feature, not advertising. I’ve read feedback from users who said “I love Tomo’s concert alerts!” when we have no such alerts. The band pays two bucks a