2 ms·

I'm trying not to implicitly disagree or agree with either side. The point here regards the meta discussion about disagreement and arguers not respecting and tr

by imh 9y ago

I'm trying not to implicitly disagree or agree with either side. The point here regards the meta discussion about disagreement and arguers not respecting and trying to understand the other side before jumping on them. I'll try to clarify what I meant more concretely. The parent commenter in that thread seemed to think that any good person who knew the context would understand why it was bad. The next comment didn't see why it was bad, so the first person decided the next must not be a good person. Had they examined the other premise (context), they would have seen that lack of context is more likely. Of course there are other buried premises and assumptions, and all of those are more likely in some way imprecise or something rather than the next commenter simply being a bad person. Even in the most extreme cases, miscommunication happens all the damned time. Fixing those instead of deciding you're better/smarter/whatever is where I think those discussions should go. The point is how the disagreement looked from the point of view of the person making those comments. I figured my own point of view isn't relevant to the meta-discussion.

Mz 9y ago
One framing that would avoid the implication: "Even if you agree that the picture is crass (etc) due to being from Playboy, a much more likely and respectful explanation is that the asker simply did not know the history of it." There may be others. It is incredibly hard to sidestep the wider cultural framing that women exist solely as sex objects, they are prey and men are predators. It is a problem space I have thought long and hard about. I think my statement that your statement implicitly agrees with certain things is accurate. However, it wasn't intended to accuse you, personally, of anything. The degree to which it does so is an error on my part. It is late. I am tired. Etc. I wholly agree with you that jumping to accusations was poor form. I did not witness that particular discussion of the Lena test photo, but I have seen such discussions before on HN. They tend to be incredibly uncharitable. This is really common when anything vaguely related to sex enters discussion. I do my best to respectfully critique it. I am aware sex is a very sensitive subject. But the subtext of most such derails is that all heterosexual sex is inherently abusive of women. I really think that needs all the gentle, kind push back humanity can muster. I do what little I can. Best.
- imh 9y ago
  That's fair. Communication is hard. I edited my original comment along the lines of your suggestion. I hope that it's still clear and concise and now does a better job of not taking sides. I think sometimes I go overboard in trying to empathize with the side I disagree with and end up appearing to agree with it.
  - Mz 9y ago
    :-)

by imh 9y ago

Mz 9y ago

One framing that would avoid the implication: "Even if you agree that the picture is crass (etc) due to being from Playboy, a much more likely and respectful explanation is that the asker simply did not know the history of it." There may be others. It is incredibly hard to sidestep the wider cultural framing that women exist solely as sex objects, they are prey and men are predators. It is a problem space I have thought long and hard about. I think my statement that your statement implicitly agrees with certain things is accurate. However, it wasn't intended to accuse you, personally, of anything. The degree to which it does so is an error on my part. It is late. I am tired. Etc. I wholly agree with you that jumping to accusations was poor form. I did not witness that particular discussion of the Lena test photo, but I have seen such discussions before on HN. They tend to be incredibly uncharitable. This is really common when anything vaguely related to sex enters discussion. I do my best to respectfully critique it. I am aware sex is a very sensitive subject. But the subtext of most such derails is that all heterosexual sex is inherently abusive of women. I really think that needs all the gentle, kind push back humanity can muster. I do what little I can. Best.

imh 9y ago
That's fair. Communication is hard. I edited my original comment along the lines of your suggestion. I hope that it's still clear and concise and now does a better job of not taking sides. I think sometimes I go overboard in trying to empathize with the side I disagree with and end up appearing to agree with it.
- Mz 9y ago
  :-)