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The tweets go on to chastize the conference for being held at a “Christian university”. It is worth noting: I am a Christian. I would challenge that I am in the

The tweets go on to chastize the conference for being held at a “Christian university”. It is worth noting: I am a Christian. I would challenge that I am in the minority among most conference attendees. Be interesting to know if that last line is true.

asplake 10y ago
Would it matter either way? The "worth noting" rider risks obscuring the apparent deep irony of the first sentence
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
tnone 10y ago
Probably, especially if you limit it to practicing Christians. You know the diversity brigade doesn't really want people like that to attend. This is starting to look more and more like someone's personal hangups turned into vendetta, using the nearest available excuses and target.
- pluma 10y ago
  I'm atheist and think that religion is outright harmful so I'm somewhat aware of people's expressed or apparent religious beliefs. In my experience vocal Christians (as in: people mentioning Jesus, prayer or other church-related activities in person or on Twitter) are the minority, at least when it comes to JS conference speakers. So much so that they stick out as much as e.g. a Muslim wearing a hijab. That said, even as a "militant" atheist I wouldn't mind having a Christian university as the conference venue or having Christian speakers -- as long as they don't try to use the talk/event as a means to force their ideologies on others. If anything, I'd find it interesting, because it's a place and a kind of person I would not actively seek out otherwise (i.e. outside the technical/conference context). A few people I follow on Twitter or outspoken Christians or even Mormons. Yes, I find their religious gobbledegook annoying (but I'm sure they'd find my atheist rants equally unpleasant) but if they have enough interesting things to say otherwise, I'm willing to put up with that no matter how much it offends my sensibilities. I'd hope this is the norm, but apparently "diversity" these days often means "no disagreeable persons" and being a white Christian heterosexual cis-man is borderline offensive in itself.
- youdontknowtho 10y ago
  Yeah, it's too bad that religion has been pushed underground in America. Maybe one day, if we are lucky, we'll 44 Christian presidents in a row. Diversity brigade? I grew up in a majority religious area. You can keep your indignation, friend. When religious people have the ability to, they get all kinds of "hung up" on "available excuses and targets".
ajdlinux 10y ago
Anecdata - out of the ~30 people on my team, there's about 4 or 5 practising Christians that I know of (myself being one of them). There's probably about the same number of "vocal, militant" atheists and most of the rest I strongly suspect are agnostic/atheist. I'm in a relatively "progressive" part of Australia - in the parts of the Australian tech community I'm involved with, I'd say that last statement is definitely true.
throwanem 10y ago
My experience suggests so. My experience also includes a case, at a very high-end tech company which I hesitate to name, where I saw a colleague derided as mentally ill, to her face, because she spoke of her faith without shame. Nobody seemed to see a problem with that. In such a light, I wouldn't be surprised if there are more Christians in the industry than are immediately obvious.
- alessioalex 10y ago
  I'm not from the US, but Eastern Europe. We are more conservative, but in the recent years that's been my experience as well. If you speak about your religion you usually get shit on.
  - nazgob 10y ago
    Really? I get shit for being atheist in EE. I guess we two could co-exist normally ;)
iuguy 10y ago
I can't speak for Nodevember, but as far as I'm aware, we have one openly practicing Christian working on 44CON. Not sure how many in other conferences in the UK, but I expect the number to be smaller than the number of Atheists and Agnostics by far. Also in the UK the dominant sect of Christianity is Church of England, which in the UK is very casual compared to the Catholic church.
- jgrahamc 10y ago
  Also in the UK the dominant sect of Christianity is Church of England, which in the UK is very casual compared to the Catholic church. Agreed. I was baptised in a CofE church etc. However, there are probably lots of people in the UK who have a vague connection to the CofE without calling themselves Christian. I was mostly interested in the number of practicing Christians in tech. My guess is those people keep their faith pretty quiet.
swsieber 10y ago
It probably is? Unless of course it's a smaller, local conference. In which case it would be representative of the local population. So expect a lot of Mormons in a Utah based conference. OTOH, I bet numbers are probably higher than you might think. Not every Christian is outspoken, and religion seems to be pretty openly hated on - I could see a large % of religious people just being quiet to avoid contention OR because they aren't really practicing.
sjwright 10y ago
I don't see how anyone's religion is any more important at a tech conference than which football team they follow. Neither football nor religion ever seem to get mentioned at any conferences I've attended. If someone is spending time at a tech conference intensely focused on how many people in the room happen to believe in the same god(s) as them, they might be the ones with the problem.
- jgrahamc 10y ago
  I agree. I wouldn't want people doing that.
bogomipz 10y ago
So while a Christian University is willing to be accommodating to a tech conference without regards to anyones religious views the reverse of that is not true. This is in a tweet about inclusivity?
ubertaco 10y ago
Speaking as a practicing-Christian developer in the US "Bible Belt" area: my experience leads me to believe so, though mileage may vary by group. In the startup where I work currently, all 4 devs are practicing Christians/Catholics (myself included). In circles where I generally interact with other developers, (slack channels and in person), the assumption tends to be some form of irreligious/secular ideology, although generally those areas are more "true secular" -- that is, "sure, okay, believe what you want, that's your business." In the internet at large, I tend to get some form of condescension or general dismissal for mentioning my faith in anything but an almost-apologetic tone. But that's the internet, and frankly people can say whatever they want to me online. The thing that's more frightening to me is when that dismissal starts to cross from internet snark and jabs into active sort of "retribution" or (ironically) "witch hunts", trying to shut people's career opportunities down on the basis of their belief systems. Look, everyone has a worldview, because everyone observes the world around them and arrives at conclusions. And given how complex any given worldview must be when brought in contact with reality, and how many people there are in the world with such different realities and experiences, you're just not going to be on the same page as everyone. In fact, you're virtually guaranteed not to be on the exact same page as anyone. Intellectual and emotional maturity, at least in my view, requires the capability to look at another person's point of view and try to understand it -- and if you can't, then pare down to what's germaine to the subject at hand. I don't have to agree with my Muslim coworker about Jesus's divinity, but I do have to try to cooperate with him in deciding whether we should upgrade our codebase to Angular 2. I may want us to agree about Jesus's divinity (and indeed, for religious reasons I may believe this is my life's central issue -- which I do), but if I mention the subject to him, it should be in another context where such issues are more germaine, and it should be in a way that grants him the intellectual respect to decline the conversation and disagree with me. Just as I would not topically-hijack a work-focused meeting to try to convert my coworkers, I would hope not to be denied participation in such a meeting because of the unrelated issue of my beliefs.

asplake 10y ago

Would it matter either way? The "worth noting" rider risks obscuring the apparent deep irony of the first sentence

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

tnone 10y ago

Probably, especially if you limit it to practicing Christians. You know the diversity brigade doesn't really want people like that to attend. This is starting to look more and more like someone's personal hangups turned into vendetta, using the nearest available excuses and target.

pluma 10y ago
I'm atheist and think that religion is outright harmful so I'm somewhat aware of people's expressed or apparent religious beliefs. In my experience vocal Christians (as in: people mentioning Jesus, prayer or other church-related activities in person or on Twitter) are the minority, at least when it comes to JS conference speakers. So much so that they stick out as much as e.g. a Muslim wearing a hijab. That said, even as a "militant" atheist I wouldn't mind having a Christian university as the conference venue or having Christian speakers -- as long as they don't try to use the talk/event as a means to force their ideologies on others. If anything, I'd find it interesting, because it's a place and a kind of person I would not actively seek out otherwise (i.e. outside the technical/conference context). A few people I follow on Twitter or outspoken Christians or even Mormons. Yes, I find their religious gobbledegook annoying (but I'm sure they'd find my atheist rants equally unpleasant) but if they have enough interesting things to say otherwise, I'm willing to put up with that no matter how much it offends my sensibilities. I'd hope this is the norm, but apparently "diversity" these days often means "no disagreeable persons" and being a white Christian heterosexual cis-man is borderline offensive in itself.
youdontknowtho 10y ago
Yeah, it's too bad that religion has been pushed underground in America. Maybe one day, if we are lucky, we'll 44 Christian presidents in a row. Diversity brigade? I grew up in a majority religious area. You can keep your indignation, friend. When religious people have the ability to, they get all kinds of "hung up" on "available excuses and targets".

ajdlinux 10y ago

Anecdata - out of the ~30 people on my team, there's about 4 or 5 practising Christians that I know of (myself being one of them). There's probably about the same number of "vocal, militant" atheists and most of the rest I strongly suspect are agnostic/atheist. I'm in a relatively "progressive" part of Australia - in the parts of the Australian tech community I'm involved with, I'd say that last statement is definitely true.

throwanem 10y ago

My experience suggests so. My experience also includes a case, at a very high-end tech company which I hesitate to name, where I saw a colleague derided as mentally ill, to her face, because she spoke of her faith without shame. Nobody seemed to see a problem with that. In such a light, I wouldn't be surprised if there are more Christians in the industry than are immediately obvious.

alessioalex 10y ago
I'm not from the US, but Eastern Europe. We are more conservative, but in the recent years that's been my experience as well. If you speak about your religion you usually get shit on.
- nazgob 10y ago
  Really? I get shit for being atheist in EE. I guess we two could co-exist normally ;)

iuguy 10y ago

I can't speak for Nodevember, but as far as I'm aware, we have one openly practicing Christian working on 44CON. Not sure how many in other conferences in the UK, but I expect the number to be smaller than the number of Atheists and Agnostics by far. Also in the UK the dominant sect of Christianity is Church of England, which in the UK is very casual compared to the Catholic church.

jgrahamc 10y ago
Also in the UK the dominant sect of Christianity is Church of England, which in the UK is very casual compared to the Catholic church. Agreed. I was baptised in a CofE church etc. However, there are probably lots of people in the UK who have a vague connection to the CofE without calling themselves Christian. I was mostly interested in the number of practicing Christians in tech. My guess is those people keep their faith pretty quiet.

swsieber 10y ago

It probably is? Unless of course it's a smaller, local conference. In which case it would be representative of the local population. So expect a lot of Mormons in a Utah based conference. OTOH, I bet numbers are probably higher than you might think. Not every Christian is outspoken, and religion seems to be pretty openly hated on - I could see a large % of religious people just being quiet to avoid contention OR because they aren't really practicing.

sjwright 10y ago

I don't see how anyone's religion is any more important at a tech conference than which football team they follow. Neither football nor religion ever seem to get mentioned at any conferences I've attended. If someone is spending time at a tech conference intensely focused on how many people in the room happen to believe in the same god(s) as them, they might be the ones with the problem.

jgrahamc 10y ago
I agree. I wouldn't want people doing that.

bogomipz 10y ago

So while a Christian University is willing to be accommodating to a tech conference without regards to anyones religious views the reverse of that is not true. This is in a tweet about inclusivity?

ubertaco 10y ago

Speaking as a practicing-Christian developer in the US "Bible Belt" area: my experience leads me to believe so, though mileage may vary by group. In the startup where I work currently, all 4 devs are practicing Christians/Catholics (myself included). In circles where I generally interact with other developers, (slack channels and in person), the assumption tends to be some form of irreligious/secular ideology, although generally those areas are more "true secular" -- that is, "sure, okay, believe what you want, that's your business." In the internet at large, I tend to get some form of condescension or general dismissal for mentioning my faith in anything but an almost-apologetic tone. But that's the internet, and frankly people can say whatever they want to me online. The thing that's more frightening to me is when that dismissal starts to cross from internet snark and jabs into active sort of "retribution" or (ironically) "witch hunts", trying to shut people's career opportunities down on the basis of their belief systems. Look, everyone has a worldview, because everyone observes the world around them and arrives at conclusions. And given how complex any given worldview must be when brought in contact with reality, and how many people there are in the world with such different realities and experiences, you're just not going to be on the same page as everyone. In fact, you're virtually guaranteed not to be on the exact same page as anyone. Intellectual and emotional maturity, at least in my view, requires the capability to look at another person's point of view and try to understand it -- and if you can't, then pare down to what's germaine to the subject at hand. I don't have to agree with my Muslim coworker about Jesus's divinity, but I do have to try to cooperate with him in deciding whether we should upgrade our codebase to Angular 2. I may want us to agree about Jesus's divinity (and indeed, for religious reasons I may believe this is my life's central issue -- which I do), but if I mention the subject to him, it should be in another context where such issues are more germaine, and it should be in a way that grants him the intellectual respect to decline the conversation and disagree with me. Just as I would not topically-hijack a work-focused meeting to try to convert my coworkers, I would hope not to be denied participation in such a meeting because of the unrelated issue of my beliefs.