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While GitHub seemingly handled her employment poorly, this person sounds horrible to work with: >Was politely calling out a data scientist on a problematic and

While GitHub seemingly handled her employment poorly, this person sounds horrible to work with: >Was politely calling out a data scientist on a problematic and transphobic survey answer a demonstration of lack of empathy? How presumptuous. Ever thought that maybe the person putting it together didn't know any better? What does framing oneself as the victim accomplish here? In addition, this is hilariously ironic given that GitHub employed (still employs?) people who actively promote racism against white men (and women): http://www.businessinsider.com/github-the-full-inside-story-2016-2 http://www.businessinsider.com/github-the-full-inside-story-...

ivraatiems 9y ago
Do you think this person is unusual in her communication style? She posted the complete text of the "problem" comment. If you got that message from a colleague, would you consider it unacceptable? Why or why not? If yes, what could she have said that would have made it OK? How would you answer her core question of whether or not the comment she made is appropriate?
- Dirlewanger 9y ago
  I'm disgusted at her reflection that the question was transphobic, not that she commented on the difference. Whether the data scientist overreacted or not is irrelevant.
  - ivraatiems 9y ago
    It's not irrelevant because it's the reason she was fired, and hence the reason the post exists. The fact that you disagree with her assertion about the question seems to be the irrelevant thing to me.
    - Dirlewanger 9y ago
      No, it is irrelevant. The fact that the incident got her fired is a failing with GitHub's management and dearth of communication. Playing the victim card and shitting on the data scientist is misguided.
      - ivraatiems 9y ago
        But it seems to me that if GitHub failed her in its practices, she was a victim. Why wouldn't she be?
  - dcole2929 9y ago
    Calling a comment transphobic in no way implies that the speaker of that comment is transhpobic. It is a description of what's been said. The same way if someone was to say something that could possibly be construed as racist. If someone points that out and says hey that statement is racist, that's not calling that person racist. They might be. They might not, but that statement in and of itself implies no assertion on that actual person. In short, calling the statement in question transphobic is correct.
    - fenwick67 9y ago
      Intent is the difference between being transphobic and being ignorant. The survey question was ignorant.
      - roguecoder 9y ago
        How silly it sounds to anthropomorphize the question that way should tell you that you are wrong in this case. A question doesn't have a brain to be ignorant with, nor does it have intentions of any sort: once someone has written it down, it just is. In TDD, do we talk about a unit test succeeding because I intended for it to fail and it did? No, we say it failed because the actual result is red. I didn't fail, but the test sure did. Intention doesn't change the impact of communication; if the intent doesn't match the actual outcome, what it means is that the author probably wanted to change it.
    - Sorreah 9y ago
      >Calling a comment transphobic in no way implies that the speaker of that comment is transhpobic. Then what does it imply, that the comment has a phobia of or holds hate for trans people? If I call your post autistic, does that not imply I think less of you for making it?
- fenwick67 9y ago
  Re-structure the question and switch gender out for cake flavors. "What flavor of cake do you prefer? Chocolate, vanilla, or sheetcake?" the feedback coming back as... "'Sheetcake' is not a flavor. Sheetcake may be vanilla, chocolate, red velvet, lemon-poppyseed... If you want to know if a survey respondent likes sheetcake, you need to explicitly ask that question." ... it does seem kinda grating but not overtly so. It could have been nicer but also could have been more rude.
  - ivraatiems 9y ago
    I completely agree. I know and have worked with many people who communicate that way. I'd probably prefer it if they didn't, but I also don't generally have a problem when they do. I would feel that the explanation was unnecessarily pedantic and perhaps the slightest bit disrespectful in its assumption that I didn't know what I was talking about, but I would assume that was unintentional. It's interesting that the reaction from this data scientist individual came back so extremely negative.
  - sgt 9y ago
    The more I think of it, this whole thing is like something out of Portlandia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portlandia_(TV_series) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portlandia_(TV_series)
thsowers 9y ago
Just think it's worth mentioning that she doesn't seem to present evidence that the data scientist was "transphobic". She seems to discount the possibility the data scientist was unaware of how to properly ask that question on surveys (as am I). Perhaps she had more personal experience with the data scientist in question to justify this claim, but that should of been included here.
- ivraatiems 9y ago
  > Just think it's worth mentioning that she doesn't seem to present evidence that the data scientist was "transphobic". She doesn't say they were. She says the question as phrased was. That's a big difference.
  - thsowers 9y ago
    You are correct, thank you for pointing that out. However, she is still assuming that the question was phrased in a "Transphobic" way. Perhaps she reads it like that, but I doubt that was the authors (or questions) intention. Perhaps i'm wrong
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - ivraatiems 9y ago
      I think it's not an assumption so much as an observation based on her definition of transphobia. This is the point I'm trying to get at throughout this thread: Github says she was fired for the way she conveyed her beliefs, and not what they were. I disagree. Those who do agree seem to be mainly those who disagree with her beliefs. I'm trying to understand that disconnect.
    - s73ver 9y ago
      I don’t think anyone, including the author, thought that the intention of the question was to be transphobic. That doesn’t mean it’s not a transphobic question, though. Especially when the point of the survey was to gauge engagement in Open Source by marginalized people, having such a mistake can be seen as pretty tone deaf, and imply that the company really doesn’t care.
vdnkh 9y ago
This was also the line that stuck out to me. I've had some personal experiences with coworkers in my recent career that has turned me on to issues of harassment in the workplace; I understood the issues before, but it wasn't until it affected someone close did I actually care. As I've been more involved I've seen how fast those active in making workplaces safer/more inclusive outpace those who merely empathize and understand. It's unfair and rude to assign a label to those who aren't completely up-to-date with these new practices, and is in fact counterproductive - you turn off to those whose support you want when you speak down to them as such. This is what makes people afraid of what to say, and makes you look like a "crazy liberal SJW". Calling a survey maker who didn't know "transgender" wasn't a gender is an objective lack of empathy, which makes Github here sound like they really have a point.
- s73ver 9y ago
  But... she didn’t. She pointed out that the question was a bad one, and that the question itself (not the writer of the question, just the question) was transphobic. Further, she provided the straightforward, no none sense feedback that most people here advocate for, especially when the issues of someone like Linus’ gruffness and straight up meanness comes up. Here we have a story of someone doing just that, without the meanness, and everyone is dog piling on her.
  - specialist 9y ago
    Whatever the perceived tone, what Caroline didn't do was suggest improvements, provide examples. It was a teachable moment.
    - s73ver 9y ago
      She absolutely did. She said specifically that it should be a separate question. At some point, I have to wonder whether or not the people who are complaining about these easily debunked things are discussing the topic in good faith.
    - dragonwriter 9y ago
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
roywiggins 9y ago
> I was very disappointed at this 101 mistake, and sadly opened an issue referencing the question. The body of my issue read: > "'Transgender' is not a gender. Transgender people may be male, female, gender queer, non-binary... If you want to know if a survey respondent is transgender, you need to explicitly ask that question." She was disappointed. She explained her problem with the survey in a non-judgmental way- "This question is based on a false premise, the correct way to ask this question is X". I don't see how she could have handled this particular interaction any better.
- btym 9y ago
  Agreed. That was an entirely reasonable and professional comment. It briefly states the problem, demonstrates it, and offers a solution.
- georgespencer 9y ago
  As someone who has a naturally terse communication style and who does not react emotionally to people who send emails like e.g. "Send it" instead of "Send it to me, thanks.", I have had to train myself to realise that any form of text communication conveys tone with huge imprecision. If you didn't see someone smiling at you in the corridor and then you send an email to them saying "Yep" the entire tone of the email changes vs. if you saw the person, grinned, said hi and then sent the exact same email. It's not fair, and bright people very often feel like morons adding exclamation points and smiley faces made out of punctuation to their written comms. but trust me when I say that it can TOTALLY obviate a whole bunch of grief and is, I think, incumbent on you the communicator to improve just as much as it's incumbent on the recipient to not react emotionally.
- cholantesh 9y ago
  Thought I was alone on this. I think she read it poorly, and to call it a 101 mistake that she 'sadly' had to correct seems a bit unfair to the data scientist. But none of that comes across in her comment, which is extremely professional. EDIT: Just saw your comment below (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14704575 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14704575). Makes perfect sense, and I see her point now.
- 9y ago

ivraatiems 9y ago

Do you think this person is unusual in her communication style? She posted the complete text of the "problem" comment. If you got that message from a colleague, would you consider it unacceptable? Why or why not? If yes, what could she have said that would have made it OK? How would you answer her core question of whether or not the comment she made is appropriate?

Dirlewanger 9y ago
I'm disgusted at her reflection that the question was transphobic, not that she commented on the difference. Whether the data scientist overreacted or not is irrelevant.
- ivraatiems 9y ago
  It's not irrelevant because it's the reason she was fired, and hence the reason the post exists. The fact that you disagree with her assertion about the question seems to be the irrelevant thing to me.
  - Dirlewanger 9y ago
    No, it is irrelevant. The fact that the incident got her fired is a failing with GitHub's management and dearth of communication. Playing the victim card and shitting on the data scientist is misguided.
    - ivraatiems 9y ago
      But it seems to me that if GitHub failed her in its practices, she was a victim. Why wouldn't she be?
- dcole2929 9y ago
  Calling a comment transphobic in no way implies that the speaker of that comment is transhpobic. It is a description of what's been said. The same way if someone was to say something that could possibly be construed as racist. If someone points that out and says hey that statement is racist, that's not calling that person racist. They might be. They might not, but that statement in and of itself implies no assertion on that actual person. In short, calling the statement in question transphobic is correct.
  - fenwick67 9y ago
    Intent is the difference between being transphobic and being ignorant. The survey question was ignorant.
    - roguecoder 9y ago
      How silly it sounds to anthropomorphize the question that way should tell you that you are wrong in this case. A question doesn't have a brain to be ignorant with, nor does it have intentions of any sort: once someone has written it down, it just is. In TDD, do we talk about a unit test succeeding because I intended for it to fail and it did? No, we say it failed because the actual result is red. I didn't fail, but the test sure did. Intention doesn't change the impact of communication; if the intent doesn't match the actual outcome, what it means is that the author probably wanted to change it.
  - Sorreah 9y ago
    >Calling a comment transphobic in no way implies that the speaker of that comment is transhpobic. Then what does it imply, that the comment has a phobia of or holds hate for trans people? If I call your post autistic, does that not imply I think less of you for making it?
fenwick67 9y ago
Re-structure the question and switch gender out for cake flavors. "What flavor of cake do you prefer? Chocolate, vanilla, or sheetcake?" the feedback coming back as... "'Sheetcake' is not a flavor. Sheetcake may be vanilla, chocolate, red velvet, lemon-poppyseed... If you want to know if a survey respondent likes sheetcake, you need to explicitly ask that question." ... it does seem kinda grating but not overtly so. It could have been nicer but also could have been more rude.
- ivraatiems 9y ago
  I completely agree. I know and have worked with many people who communicate that way. I'd probably prefer it if they didn't, but I also don't generally have a problem when they do. I would feel that the explanation was unnecessarily pedantic and perhaps the slightest bit disrespectful in its assumption that I didn't know what I was talking about, but I would assume that was unintentional. It's interesting that the reaction from this data scientist individual came back so extremely negative.
- sgt 9y ago
  The more I think of it, this whole thing is like something out of Portlandia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portlandia_(TV_series) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portlandia_(TV_series)

thsowers 9y ago

Just think it's worth mentioning that she doesn't seem to present evidence that the data scientist was "transphobic". She seems to discount the possibility the data scientist was unaware of how to properly ask that question on surveys (as am I). Perhaps she had more personal experience with the data scientist in question to justify this claim, but that should of been included here.

ivraatiems 9y ago
> Just think it's worth mentioning that she doesn't seem to present evidence that the data scientist was "transphobic". She doesn't say they were. She says the question as phrased was. That's a big difference.
- thsowers 9y ago
  You are correct, thank you for pointing that out. However, she is still assuming that the question was phrased in a "Transphobic" way. Perhaps she reads it like that, but I doubt that was the authors (or questions) intention. Perhaps i'm wrong
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - ivraatiems 9y ago
    I think it's not an assumption so much as an observation based on her definition of transphobia. This is the point I'm trying to get at throughout this thread: Github says she was fired for the way she conveyed her beliefs, and not what they were. I disagree. Those who do agree seem to be mainly those who disagree with her beliefs. I'm trying to understand that disconnect.
  - s73ver 9y ago
    I don’t think anyone, including the author, thought that the intention of the question was to be transphobic. That doesn’t mean it’s not a transphobic question, though. Especially when the point of the survey was to gauge engagement in Open Source by marginalized people, having such a mistake can be seen as pretty tone deaf, and imply that the company really doesn’t care.

vdnkh 9y ago

This was also the line that stuck out to me. I've had some personal experiences with coworkers in my recent career that has turned me on to issues of harassment in the workplace; I understood the issues before, but it wasn't until it affected someone close did I actually care. As I've been more involved I've seen how fast those active in making workplaces safer/more inclusive outpace those who merely empathize and understand. It's unfair and rude to assign a label to those who aren't completely up-to-date with these new practices, and is in fact counterproductive - you turn off to those whose support you want when you speak down to them as such. This is what makes people afraid of what to say, and makes you look like a "crazy liberal SJW". Calling a survey maker who didn't know "transgender" wasn't a gender is an objective lack of empathy, which makes Github here sound like they really have a point.

s73ver 9y ago
But... she didn’t. She pointed out that the question was a bad one, and that the question itself (not the writer of the question, just the question) was transphobic. Further, she provided the straightforward, no none sense feedback that most people here advocate for, especially when the issues of someone like Linus’ gruffness and straight up meanness comes up. Here we have a story of someone doing just that, without the meanness, and everyone is dog piling on her.
- specialist 9y ago
  Whatever the perceived tone, what Caroline didn't do was suggest improvements, provide examples. It was a teachable moment.
  - s73ver 9y ago
    She absolutely did. She said specifically that it should be a separate question. At some point, I have to wonder whether or not the people who are complaining about these easily debunked things are discussing the topic in good faith.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

roywiggins 9y ago

> I was very disappointed at this 101 mistake, and sadly opened an issue referencing the question. The body of my issue read: > "'Transgender' is not a gender. Transgender people may be male, female, gender queer, non-binary... If you want to know if a survey respondent is transgender, you need to explicitly ask that question." She was disappointed. She explained her problem with the survey in a non-judgmental way- "This question is based on a false premise, the correct way to ask this question is X". I don't see how she could have handled this particular interaction any better.

btym 9y ago
Agreed. That was an entirely reasonable and professional comment. It briefly states the problem, demonstrates it, and offers a solution.
georgespencer 9y ago
As someone who has a naturally terse communication style and who does not react emotionally to people who send emails like e.g. "Send it" instead of "Send it to me, thanks.", I have had to train myself to realise that any form of text communication conveys tone with huge imprecision. If you didn't see someone smiling at you in the corridor and then you send an email to them saying "Yep" the entire tone of the email changes vs. if you saw the person, grinned, said hi and then sent the exact same email. It's not fair, and bright people very often feel like morons adding exclamation points and smiley faces made out of punctuation to their written comms. but trust me when I say that it can TOTALLY obviate a whole bunch of grief and is, I think, incumbent on you the communicator to improve just as much as it's incumbent on the recipient to not react emotionally.
cholantesh 9y ago
Thought I was alone on this. I think she read it poorly, and to call it a 101 mistake that she 'sadly' had to correct seems a bit unfair to the data scientist. But none of that comes across in her comment, which is extremely professional. EDIT: Just saw your comment below (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14704575 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14704575). Makes perfect sense, and I see her point now.
9y ago