5 ms·

How many more instances of this happening do we need before people believe there's actually a problem in society surrounding sexism? Honestly I expect to see e

How many more instances of this happening do we need before people believe there's actually a problem in society surrounding sexism? Honestly I expect to see equivocation more than indictment in the comments section here.

savanaly 9y ago
Do comments like this help the situation in any meaningful way either, though?
- JoachimSchipper 9y ago
  Any discussion of gender (or race, or ...) on HN tends to degrade into, well, look around in an hour. It would be good to change that.
- tomlock 9y ago
  If you want, let me know if you think my comment helps or not and why, and we can talk about it.
mirimir 9y ago
Its more than sexism. It's misogyny. Or sarcastic emulation of misogyny, for trolling. Which has the same impact on targets. However, it's hard to know how prevalent these attitudes and behavior are. Because observations aren't independent. One asshole posts on some chan about a fun target, and then his friends compete with each other. And it could even be scripted.
- tomlock 9y ago
  Or it could be a pattern repeated over thousands of years that requires serious intervention.
- b6 9y ago
  > misogyny I keep seeing this word being used, and I don't think it's apt. I don't think we're seeing "dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women", much less "hatred of women". I think it's much closer to the truth to say that people everywhere are extremely interested in and enamored of women, but that women provide some kind of easy target for expression of bad feelings or trolling. As a former troll, I can say nobody really wants to mess with Eric Lu because there's just no troll juice there. A guy would just laugh at those "mean" comments. I certainly have laughed at comments like that. Nobody wants to troll me because the comments just can't get any purchase. So, please, let's stop with the myth that people hate women. People love women, guys have been dying for women since forever, and it's certainly not because they have contempt for them or hate them. There's clearly a discriminatory thing going on here, but its root is not hatred of women.
  - tomlock 9y ago
    >A guy would just laugh at those "mean" comments. >People love women What are these statements based on? Meanwhile, the vast majority of domestic violence victims, and the victims of murders where the assailant was in a relationship with the murderer, are women. This idea that "people love women" is not reality based. Plenty of men have spoken out about how toxic and awful online culture can be. It's not too hard to find examples.
    - b6 9y ago
      > What are these statements based on? I have personally laughed at comments much worse than those in the post, directed at me, and so have my friends. All my male friends and my dad and my friends' dads and so forth love women -- they would die for women. What I'm trying to say is, people bring out this word "misogyny" to make a claim about the origin of a problem, when the origin is unclear, or at least much more complicated than "hatred of women". Let's just agree about the clear evidence that there is discriminatory behavior and not insist on absolute certainty as to why it is happening.
      - MarinReiter 9y ago
        Wew lad, I can't believe I'm saying this, but you either don't understand women or don't understand love. Women dont want you to die for them. That's your own need for chivalrious purpose, you selfishly romanticizing your own (or your male friends') sacrifice. I dont know if you've ever had someone sacrificing themselves for you, but lemme tell you first hand, it's not nice, and it makes you feel like shit. Women, and everyone for that matter, are adults, so they don't need someone sacrificing themselves for them. Why would you die for someone, when that person is capable of complete independance? The "love you to death" love isn't really love, it's obsession, and it's unhealthy. And it's either "women are an easy target for trolling" or "people love women". I dont know what kind of twisted love makes you harass your object of desire online. I can think of a million different ways to harass Eric. Everyday men are also harassed online, usually for not being "masculine" enough. So why are people more likely to harass Julia or Rachel and not Eric?
yason 9y ago
I don't think this is anything new at all in itself. Chats, anonymous comments, forums, public walls, etc just allow these weirdos to express themselves out of that place of theirs that is unattached to reality. Already in the 90's there were a few handfuls of pesterers of the similar kind on IRC. There would've been more but IRC was such a nerdy tool underground that only a few of them ever found themselves there. But the phenomenon has there for a long time: it's just that before internet there were few places where you could do this in public. I think most of the similar chatter must have happened between male friends of young age, hanging out and exchanging comments on hot-looking passer-bys and maybe wooing after some or alternatively yelling bitchy remarks. Even this wouldn't be tolerated in better parts of the town. But on the internet, all you need is a text input box.
dazc 9y ago
Do people not believe there's actually a problem in society?
- tomlock 9y ago
  There are plenty of people out there who think the legal inequalities faced by women are now completely removed, and everything is therefore ok. Not only is that an incorrect premise, but its an incorrect conclusion - women face significant societal obstacles and pain just because they're women.
  - guy98238710 9y ago
    So do men (hint: children are more important than money). This case might not be sexism though. It looks like they have a bias in their experiment that skews the results.
tziki 9y ago
Perhaps because according to studies men are actually more likely to experience online harrasment? http://www.pewinternet.org/2017/07/11/online-harassment-2017/ http://www.pewinternet.org/2017/07/11/online-harassment-2017...
- tomlock 9y ago
  Your interjection here isn't answering a question I asked. Are you saying that because men are more likely to face harassment, that women are not harassed more when they present as women online?
  - tziki 9y ago
    I think it answers the question quite well. Since men are harrassed more online, they tend to be unsympathetical when women complain of online harrasment, knowing women already experience somewhat less harrasment than men.
    - tomlock 9y ago
      Sorry, what question did I ask that you think this report is answering?
      - tziki 9y ago
        "Why isn't HN condemning the harrassment here more unequivocally?"
        tomlock 9y ago
        That's not what I asked.
        tziki 9y ago
        The only direct question in your original comment is a rhetorical one. Do you really expect people to answer to that and not to your further comment wondering about the disparity between your expectation and reality? Either you have people replying to your rhetorical question and generating exactly zero discussion of value, or explaining to you why your expectation differs from reality. Clearly no one will do the first.
randyrand 9y ago
I don't think you could find many people that disagree that men and women are treated differently in many aspects of life. I think people disagree on the severity of the problem and what more should be done about it, if anything.
_pmf_ 9y ago
> How many more instances of this happening do we need before people believe there's actually a problem in society surrounding sexism? I believe there is rampant sexism; what I don't believe is that the approach of treating all men as potential rapists and claiming that masculinity is toxic is working out (in fact, I think it exacerbates the problem; practically all mass shootings are a result of boys/men being systematically imbued with toxic shame). But yeah, go wear those pussy hats if it makes you feel good.
salvar 9y ago
There always seems to be a good crowd of people that start with the assumption that there is actually no problem in society with sexism, and therefore there must be some other explanation. That's when the "But what if" and "Maybe the sample was" get dragged out.

savanaly 9y ago

Do comments like this help the situation in any meaningful way either, though?

JoachimSchipper 9y ago
Any discussion of gender (or race, or ...) on HN tends to degrade into, well, look around in an hour. It would be good to change that.
tomlock 9y ago
If you want, let me know if you think my comment helps or not and why, and we can talk about it.

mirimir 9y ago

Its more than sexism. It's misogyny. Or sarcastic emulation of misogyny, for trolling. Which has the same impact on targets. However, it's hard to know how prevalent these attitudes and behavior are. Because observations aren't independent. One asshole posts on some chan about a fun target, and then his friends compete with each other. And it could even be scripted.

tomlock 9y ago
Or it could be a pattern repeated over thousands of years that requires serious intervention.
b6 9y ago
> misogyny I keep seeing this word being used, and I don't think it's apt. I don't think we're seeing "dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women", much less "hatred of women". I think it's much closer to the truth to say that people everywhere are extremely interested in and enamored of women, but that women provide some kind of easy target for expression of bad feelings or trolling. As a former troll, I can say nobody really wants to mess with Eric Lu because there's just no troll juice there. A guy would just laugh at those "mean" comments. I certainly have laughed at comments like that. Nobody wants to troll me because the comments just can't get any purchase. So, please, let's stop with the myth that people hate women. People love women, guys have been dying for women since forever, and it's certainly not because they have contempt for them or hate them. There's clearly a discriminatory thing going on here, but its root is not hatred of women.
- tomlock 9y ago
  >A guy would just laugh at those "mean" comments. >People love women What are these statements based on? Meanwhile, the vast majority of domestic violence victims, and the victims of murders where the assailant was in a relationship with the murderer, are women. This idea that "people love women" is not reality based. Plenty of men have spoken out about how toxic and awful online culture can be. It's not too hard to find examples.
  - b6 9y ago
    > What are these statements based on? I have personally laughed at comments much worse than those in the post, directed at me, and so have my friends. All my male friends and my dad and my friends' dads and so forth love women -- they would die for women. What I'm trying to say is, people bring out this word "misogyny" to make a claim about the origin of a problem, when the origin is unclear, or at least much more complicated than "hatred of women". Let's just agree about the clear evidence that there is discriminatory behavior and not insist on absolute certainty as to why it is happening.
    - MarinReiter 9y ago
      Wew lad, I can't believe I'm saying this, but you either don't understand women or don't understand love. Women dont want you to die for them. That's your own need for chivalrious purpose, you selfishly romanticizing your own (or your male friends') sacrifice. I dont know if you've ever had someone sacrificing themselves for you, but lemme tell you first hand, it's not nice, and it makes you feel like shit. Women, and everyone for that matter, are adults, so they don't need someone sacrificing themselves for them. Why would you die for someone, when that person is capable of complete independance? The "love you to death" love isn't really love, it's obsession, and it's unhealthy. And it's either "women are an easy target for trolling" or "people love women". I dont know what kind of twisted love makes you harass your object of desire online. I can think of a million different ways to harass Eric. Everyday men are also harassed online, usually for not being "masculine" enough. So why are people more likely to harass Julia or Rachel and not Eric?

yason 9y ago

I don't think this is anything new at all in itself. Chats, anonymous comments, forums, public walls, etc just allow these weirdos to express themselves out of that place of theirs that is unattached to reality. Already in the 90's there were a few handfuls of pesterers of the similar kind on IRC. There would've been more but IRC was such a nerdy tool underground that only a few of them ever found themselves there. But the phenomenon has there for a long time: it's just that before internet there were few places where you could do this in public. I think most of the similar chatter must have happened between male friends of young age, hanging out and exchanging comments on hot-looking passer-bys and maybe wooing after some or alternatively yelling bitchy remarks. Even this wouldn't be tolerated in better parts of the town. But on the internet, all you need is a text input box.

dazc 9y ago

Do people not believe there's actually a problem in society?

tomlock 9y ago
There are plenty of people out there who think the legal inequalities faced by women are now completely removed, and everything is therefore ok. Not only is that an incorrect premise, but its an incorrect conclusion - women face significant societal obstacles and pain just because they're women.
- guy98238710 9y ago
  So do men (hint: children are more important than money). This case might not be sexism though. It looks like they have a bias in their experiment that skews the results.

tziki 9y ago

Perhaps because according to studies men are actually more likely to experience online harrasment? http://www.pewinternet.org/2017/07/11/online-harassment-2017/ http://www.pewinternet.org/2017/07/11/online-harassment-2017...

tomlock 9y ago
Your interjection here isn't answering a question I asked. Are you saying that because men are more likely to face harassment, that women are not harassed more when they present as women online?
- tziki 9y ago
  I think it answers the question quite well. Since men are harrassed more online, they tend to be unsympathetical when women complain of online harrasment, knowing women already experience somewhat less harrasment than men.
  - tomlock 9y ago
    Sorry, what question did I ask that you think this report is answering?
    - tziki 9y ago
      "Why isn't HN condemning the harrassment here more unequivocally?"
      - tomlock 9y ago
        That's not what I asked.
        tziki 9y ago
        The only direct question in your original comment is a rhetorical one. Do you really expect people to answer to that and not to your further comment wondering about the disparity between your expectation and reality? Either you have people replying to your rhetorical question and generating exactly zero discussion of value, or explaining to you why your expectation differs from reality. Clearly no one will do the first.

randyrand 9y ago

I don't think you could find many people that disagree that men and women are treated differently in many aspects of life. I think people disagree on the severity of the problem and what more should be done about it, if anything.

_pmf_ 9y ago

> How many more instances of this happening do we need before people believe there's actually a problem in society surrounding sexism? I believe there is rampant sexism; what I don't believe is that the approach of treating all men as potential rapists and claiming that masculinity is toxic is working out (in fact, I think it exacerbates the problem; practically all mass shootings are a result of boys/men being systematically imbued with toxic shame). But yeah, go wear those pussy hats if it makes you feel good.

salvar 9y ago

There always seems to be a good crowd of people that start with the assumption that there is actually no problem in society with sexism, and therefore there must be some other explanation. That's when the "But what if" and "Maybe the sample was" get dragged out.