3 ms·

You're prejudiced across two genders? Yes, that's much better.

logfromblammo 9y ago
My high school cliques were the nerds and the band. Generally speaking, the nerds were not attractive people, maxing out at about a "6". Our group identity mostly came from our self-perceived intelligence, dedication, and skill. So when an obvious candidate for the dolls clique presents himself or herself as a nerd, I know I am not the only one who might question their "qualifications". The hot bodies had far better options for clique membership, so we tended to get paranoid whenever one showed up. What do they want from us? Why would they choose to hang out with us? Most people didn't like us, so we held our noses, lowered our standards, and made do with liking each other. Out in the real world, it turns out that being a nerd any time after 1970 can make you quite a lot of money from jobs that require knowledge of math, science, technology, and engineering: our presumed forte. Because of that money, one of the motives for hanging out with nerds could be to get at some of it. It's bad enough when the broheimer partyboys crash our con, but if the pro cosplayers and booth babes also turn out to be more than just eye candy, that means the nerdity wasn't about being smart, but was actually just being ugly, awkward losers with no social value. That hurts, psychologically. It might feel like every time we make something nice for ourselves, the beautiful people just strut right in and take it away from us. So yeah, I'm prejudiced too. It comes from a lifetime of the pretty and popular people being inhumanly rude to me and "my people". If you must insist on being born beautiful, at least do me the courtesy of making yourself morbidly obese, or giving yourself some disfiguring scars, before pretending to be an insider of my social caste. If you can't shim yourself down below a "7", you're just going to make us feel suspicious and uncomfortable.
- ZenoArrow 9y ago
  > "It's bad enough when the broheimer partyboys crash our con, but if the pro cosplayers and booth babes also turn out to be more than just eye candy, that means the nerdity wasn't about being smart, but was actually just being ugly, awkward losers with no social value. That hurts, psychologically." Do you not see that the issue isn't really "them", but that it's rather about perceived self-worth? If others put you down and made you feel like you lacked social value, I'm sorry, I wouldn't wish that on anybody, but your perceived value is something you have some degree of control of, as it's up to you how you wish to view yourself. I fundamentally disagree with putting numbers on attractiveness, or even putting it on a scale, but let's say for the sake of argument that I'm not expecting a modelling contract any time soon. That doesn't mean I can't be friends with people who are "better" looking than me, or that I can't see them as my peers. If you've got something interesting to say, it's all good.
  - logfromblammo 9y ago
    Perhaps you have never been ugly enough, or fat enough, or black enough, or xeno enough to catch flak from the beautiful people. But I have had enough of it that I simply avoid being out in public. I know what I'm worth to me, but I also know that "society" doesn't want me hanging around where I can be seen. That's fine with me, because apparently society is full of nasty people and those who tacitly support their nastiness--people who are ugly on the inside, and people who find it easier to live with ugly on the inside than ugly on the outside. I certainly could be friends with people much more attractive than myself, but it is rather unlikely that we would ever meet in the first place. And it certainly would be awkward if we went to a party together, and they eventually realized I wasn't allowed through the front door. Or if I did make it in, and then everyone else left, because the party was no longer cool. Or if someone made an insulting joke at my expense, loudly enough for everyone to hear, and they had to either let it go or get involved in a public fracas. These things have actually happened; I am not just imagining things that might happen. You can be as sorry as you like, but that won't make the human track marks out there any more accepting, or me any more trusting. The only people I feel safe around by default are those who so obviously have something wrong with them that I know that we must share the experience of being crapped on. Everyone else has to prove they are not secretly a jerk trying to pull one over on the nerds. There's nothing you can do about it, really. Some people are cruel, and it's enough for you to not be one of them.
    - AnimalMuppet 9y ago
      There are two issues here. One is the "beautiful people" issue, where the people are playing a social game, and if they come to hang out with normal people, they are doing it for some way that it's going to advance them in their manipulative social game. Why should any of the non-"beautiful people" want anything to do with that? The only way we should is if we're dumb enough to want to play their game, because we haven't figured out that it's a game that we're going to lose at. Your instincts to run away are spot on. But the other issue is, we've got our own communities. Maybe we're part of a community where we care about software, for example. Well, in that community, sure, be careful of people who are trying to use you. But if someone with good physical looks comes around, judge them by their software knowledge (or actual desire to learn); don't judge them (positively or negatively) by their looks.
- ryandrake 9y ago
  How do you know your suspicions are warranted? It sounds like you could simply be letting people's outward appearance cloud your estimation of who is genuinely interested in a topic. This attitude is so weird to me. I play in a local poker group with 80 or so regular members. We get all kinds, both genders, an age range from probably 20 to 80, and a diverse mix of races. The only commonality is we all share an interest in the game. We have veteran players and also see new people show up all the time. When a new player happens to also be, for example, a beautiful woman, nobody is going to care as long as she also knows how to play (even knowing how to play is optional, we'll help you learn). In fact, as a player, if you do assume someone is a phony just because they are good looking, that's a pretty reliable way to lose your money at the table. The only people unwelcome are assholes and people who intend to cheat. Those folks can get lost. I've never felt "suspicious" of someone who wanted to join and have fun, regardless of their appearance.
- daxorid 9y ago
  Honest curiosity, how do you feel about Marketers, Salespeople, and Recruiters (people usually associated with good looks and high-level social skills) joining HN en masse and commenting regularly over the last few years?
  - logfromblammo 9y ago
    Envious, mostly. I can't exactly blame the dice if I got a lower Charisma roll than theirs. It's a mistake to believe that society should be fair when it is so heavily influenced by random factors. I don't interact with that type very much in person, as they tend to ignore or rebuff me when I approach them, and they only engage or approach me when they think they can make money by doing so. So they're sort of like animatronic people, I guess? You have to buy a ticket, but then they just read to you from a script. I'm old enough now to know that nothing stays the same forever. Slashdot got sold to Dice. The H in HN got diluted. So what? I can't control it, so I just enjoy it for what it is while it lasts, and will drift away whenever it no longer feels right.
- pnopnopno 9y ago
  I think you should wonder how you can be taken seriously while assigning numbers like that. You are a person, they are people, this girl we're talking about is a person. Not a 6 or 7 or 8 or whatever. In the end, the talk here goes everywhere but fails to mention that bunnie vouched for sexyhacker. The point being that the maker guy knowingly posted something he knew was a lie. The issue could have been skin colour, nationality, anything.
  - logfromblammo 9y ago
    You can rank anything by any arbitrary metric and divide the population into deciles, even subjective judgments of attractiveness. People get ranked and sorted all the time. IQ, FICA, GPA, etc. It doesn't make them any less human; it just quantifies the discussion. She's a person all right, and likely more attractive than I am in the opinion of any judge you may care to ask. And that's part of the reason why someone wrote an article about her, and we're here discussing it, and why I am a faceless pseudonymous nobody that can only aspire to an upvote or two on HN. I'm irrationally prejudiced against attractive people. That's somewhat rare for them, so might be disturbing. But it doesn't matter much, as my opinion doesn't really count for anything anyway. I have no power to act on that prejudice. Attractive people get all kinds of preferential treatment from people that can actually make a difference in their lives, so they don't particularly need some sour-grapes ugly to like them, too. I may give an unattractive person more slack, simply because everyone needs to feel like they belong to some community, and mine might just be the only one willing to accept them. Attractive folk need to do more to signal their commitment, just because they have so many more options. But that's not a high bar for me. Sexyhacker has hacked hardware, and proved it on video, so that's quite enough to consider herself a real hacker, in my opinion. If she were ugly, though, I might just take her word for it. In the end, that's my problem, not hers, and nobody should be trying to make their problems into hers by tearing her down with unwarranted libels.

My high school cliques were the nerds and the band. Generally speaking, the nerds were not attractive people, maxing out at about a "6". Our group identity mostly came from our self-perceived intelligence, dedication, and skill. So when an obvious candidate for the dolls clique presents himself or herself as a nerd, I know I am not the only one who might question their "qualifications". The hot bodies had far better options for clique membership, so we tended to get paranoid whenever one showed up. What do they want from us? Why would they choose to hang out with us? Most people didn't like us, so we held our noses, lowered our standards, and made do with liking each other. Out in the real world, it turns out that being a nerd any time after 1970 can make you quite a lot of money from jobs that require knowledge of math, science, technology, and engineering: our presumed forte. Because of that money, one of the motives for hanging out with nerds could be to get at some of it. It's bad enough when the broheimer partyboys crash our con, but if the pro cosplayers and booth babes also turn out to be more than just eye candy, that means the nerdity wasn't about being smart, but was actually just being ugly, awkward losers with no social value. That hurts, psychologically. It might feel like every time we make something nice for ourselves, the beautiful people just strut right in and take it away from us. So yeah, I'm prejudiced too. It comes from a lifetime of the pretty and popular people being inhumanly rude to me and "my people". If you must insist on being born beautiful, at least do me the courtesy of making yourself morbidly obese, or giving yourself some disfiguring scars, before pretending to be an insider of my social caste. If you can't shim yourself down below a "7", you're just going to make us feel suspicious and uncomfortable.

ZenoArrow 9y ago
> "It's bad enough when the broheimer partyboys crash our con, but if the pro cosplayers and booth babes also turn out to be more than just eye candy, that means the nerdity wasn't about being smart, but was actually just being ugly, awkward losers with no social value. That hurts, psychologically." Do you not see that the issue isn't really "them", but that it's rather about perceived self-worth? If others put you down and made you feel like you lacked social value, I'm sorry, I wouldn't wish that on anybody, but your perceived value is something you have some degree of control of, as it's up to you how you wish to view yourself. I fundamentally disagree with putting numbers on attractiveness, or even putting it on a scale, but let's say for the sake of argument that I'm not expecting a modelling contract any time soon. That doesn't mean I can't be friends with people who are "better" looking than me, or that I can't see them as my peers. If you've got something interesting to say, it's all good.
- logfromblammo 9y ago
  Perhaps you have never been ugly enough, or fat enough, or black enough, or xeno enough to catch flak from the beautiful people. But I have had enough of it that I simply avoid being out in public. I know what I'm worth to me, but I also know that "society" doesn't want me hanging around where I can be seen. That's fine with me, because apparently society is full of nasty people and those who tacitly support their nastiness--people who are ugly on the inside, and people who find it easier to live with ugly on the inside than ugly on the outside. I certainly could be friends with people much more attractive than myself, but it is rather unlikely that we would ever meet in the first place. And it certainly would be awkward if we went to a party together, and they eventually realized I wasn't allowed through the front door. Or if I did make it in, and then everyone else left, because the party was no longer cool. Or if someone made an insulting joke at my expense, loudly enough for everyone to hear, and they had to either let it go or get involved in a public fracas. These things have actually happened; I am not just imagining things that might happen. You can be as sorry as you like, but that won't make the human track marks out there any more accepting, or me any more trusting. The only people I feel safe around by default are those who so obviously have something wrong with them that I know that we must share the experience of being crapped on. Everyone else has to prove they are not secretly a jerk trying to pull one over on the nerds. There's nothing you can do about it, really. Some people are cruel, and it's enough for you to not be one of them.
  - AnimalMuppet 9y ago
    There are two issues here. One is the "beautiful people" issue, where the people are playing a social game, and if they come to hang out with normal people, they are doing it for some way that it's going to advance them in their manipulative social game. Why should any of the non-"beautiful people" want anything to do with that? The only way we should is if we're dumb enough to want to play their game, because we haven't figured out that it's a game that we're going to lose at. Your instincts to run away are spot on. But the other issue is, we've got our own communities. Maybe we're part of a community where we care about software, for example. Well, in that community, sure, be careful of people who are trying to use you. But if someone with good physical looks comes around, judge them by their software knowledge (or actual desire to learn); don't judge them (positively or negatively) by their looks.
ryandrake 9y ago
How do you know your suspicions are warranted? It sounds like you could simply be letting people's outward appearance cloud your estimation of who is genuinely interested in a topic. This attitude is so weird to me. I play in a local poker group with 80 or so regular members. We get all kinds, both genders, an age range from probably 20 to 80, and a diverse mix of races. The only commonality is we all share an interest in the game. We have veteran players and also see new people show up all the time. When a new player happens to also be, for example, a beautiful woman, nobody is going to care as long as she also knows how to play (even knowing how to play is optional, we'll help you learn). In fact, as a player, if you do assume someone is a phony just because they are good looking, that's a pretty reliable way to lose your money at the table. The only people unwelcome are assholes and people who intend to cheat. Those folks can get lost. I've never felt "suspicious" of someone who wanted to join and have fun, regardless of their appearance.
daxorid 9y ago
Honest curiosity, how do you feel about Marketers, Salespeople, and Recruiters (people usually associated with good looks and high-level social skills) joining HN en masse and commenting regularly over the last few years?
- logfromblammo 9y ago
  Envious, mostly. I can't exactly blame the dice if I got a lower Charisma roll than theirs. It's a mistake to believe that society should be fair when it is so heavily influenced by random factors. I don't interact with that type very much in person, as they tend to ignore or rebuff me when I approach them, and they only engage or approach me when they think they can make money by doing so. So they're sort of like animatronic people, I guess? You have to buy a ticket, but then they just read to you from a script. I'm old enough now to know that nothing stays the same forever. Slashdot got sold to Dice. The H in HN got diluted. So what? I can't control it, so I just enjoy it for what it is while it lasts, and will drift away whenever it no longer feels right.
pnopnopno 9y ago
I think you should wonder how you can be taken seriously while assigning numbers like that. You are a person, they are people, this girl we're talking about is a person. Not a 6 or 7 or 8 or whatever. In the end, the talk here goes everywhere but fails to mention that bunnie vouched for sexyhacker. The point being that the maker guy knowingly posted something he knew was a lie. The issue could have been skin colour, nationality, anything.
- logfromblammo 9y ago
  You can rank anything by any arbitrary metric and divide the population into deciles, even subjective judgments of attractiveness. People get ranked and sorted all the time. IQ, FICA, GPA, etc. It doesn't make them any less human; it just quantifies the discussion. She's a person all right, and likely more attractive than I am in the opinion of any judge you may care to ask. And that's part of the reason why someone wrote an article about her, and we're here discussing it, and why I am a faceless pseudonymous nobody that can only aspire to an upvote or two on HN. I'm irrationally prejudiced against attractive people. That's somewhat rare for them, so might be disturbing. But it doesn't matter much, as my opinion doesn't really count for anything anyway. I have no power to act on that prejudice. Attractive people get all kinds of preferential treatment from people that can actually make a difference in their lives, so they don't particularly need some sour-grapes ugly to like them, too. I may give an unattractive person more slack, simply because everyone needs to feel like they belong to some community, and mine might just be the only one willing to accept them. Attractive folk need to do more to signal their commitment, just because they have so many more options. But that's not a high bar for me. Sexyhacker has hacked hardware, and proved it on video, so that's quite enough to consider herself a real hacker, in my opinion. If she were ugly, though, I might just take her word for it. In the end, that's my problem, not hers, and nobody should be trying to make their problems into hers by tearing her down with unwarranted libels.