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> technical merit was now taking a back seat to a political agenda I think we read different posts. AFAICT, the project is going to get the help of an intern

> technical merit was now taking a back seat to a political agenda I think we read different posts. AFAICT, the project is going to get the help of an intern at no or little cost, but he got emotional because he opposes attempts to get underrepresented groups involved. His post was purely political, with no concern for what is best for the project.

naasking 9y ago
You can only read it that way if you ignore the fact that this same agenda is being pushed everywhere else. See my other post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16994302 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16994302
- bachmeier 9y ago
  I have to judge the words I read at the link I click.
  - naasking 9y ago
    Well if you're free to ignore all context, then you can cast anyone resisting the status quo as a bad actor.
    - youdontknowtho 9y ago
      Is that really the case though or are the people "resisting the status quo" actually feigning offense over "discrimination" because they resent the fact that their position is widely accepted as immoral? (Racism or sexism.) They refuse to argue their actual point... minorities should not receive benefits because they do not deserve benefits for one reason or another...because those reasons are also considered unnacceptable to express by most people.
      - naasking 9y ago
        Well if you're free to ignore the principle of charity, then you can ascribe any sort of unethical motives to your opponents. I could just as easily argue that such anti-discrimination efforts are really driven by white-people hate, and accuse them of refusing to address this point. And how you feel right now at that over the top statement is exactly how your opponents feel when you make the contrary claim. Absent some expressed inconsistency, you take people at their word. As I've explained elsewhere in this thread, there's nothing inconsistent with what the LLVM dev has said, and it's fully justifiable from ethical principles. Maybe he is being disingenuous, but that doesn't make the argument itself wrong.
- dnomad 9y ago
  That post is something else. Are we really believe that an internship for Pacific Islanders constitutes a plot against White Men? At least you didn't go all "Cultural Marxism" like Damore. I do hope that this is the hill that the anti-diversity agenda chooses to die on. The logic here is so transparently hypocritical, self-serving and stupid that I suspect it will really crystallize the "sides" involved here. Similar to the notion that gays didn't really lack the right to marry or that "all lives matter", the argument betrays a kind malicious rejection of equality and justice that really demonstrates in a very clear way what these people are really about. So I say, go for it. Protest against every attempt to include minorities. Resign when they announce the next "Women in Technology" event. Raise hell if some damn SJW dares to include a Code of Conduct that forbids sexual harassment. It will be very interesting to see where this strategy takes you.
  - naasking 9y ago
    > The logic here is so transparently hypocritical, self-serving and stupid that I suspect it will really crystallize the "sides" involved here [...] So I say, go for it. Protest against every attempt to include minorities. See, this isn't being charitable to those who disagree with you, and your attitude is a big problem with why these issues just get more inflammatory. Consider the fact that people who oppose such efforts aren't your enemy, they simply disagree with your allegedly infallible logic. Few people are actually against "minorities". In the end, the smallest minority is the individual. This is why discrimination any basis is wrong, because the individual's experience, advantages and disadvantages are not dictated by whatever group they belong to. Privilege is a statistical metric, but individual experience is not causally dictated by such metrics. Group-specific efforts wouldn't be so controversial if they weren't pushing a narrative that denies this basic fact. This should be obvious from the outcry you'd get from trying to organize, say, a male-only tech event, or an Asian-only tech event. Might seem silly given the demographics in these industries, but you'd get serious blowback just from the effort.
    - dnomad 9y ago
      > This is why discrimination any basis is wrong, because the individual's experience, advantages and disadvantages are not dictated by whatever group they belong to. Privilege is a statistical metric, but individual experience is not causally dictated by such metrics. But this is nonsense. How can any reasonable person believe that one's "group" has absolutely no impact on one's life experiences? You're literally saying "one individual's experience as a member of X group has no impact on one's individual experience." Does that really parse in your head? Look, there's no there there and you can devise silly rationalizations all day. The only thing that matters are the ends. The end goal is to keep those people away, right? The end goal is to make sure absolutely nothing changes, right? People should just be honest about their aims and end goals and we can skip the endless rationalizations. I find it all a bit too theatrical. Like internships for Pacific Islanders are absolutely harmless. They literally cause zero harm. There are few things in this world absolutely harmless but this is one of them. But here they are being protested as discrimination! It turns out any attempt to be inclusive is decried as some betrayal of "individual experience," whatever that actually means and we get flamboyant resignations in response. It's a bold strategy, Cotton. Let's see if it pays off.

naasking 9y ago

You can only read it that way if you ignore the fact that this same agenda is being pushed everywhere else. See my other post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16994302 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16994302

bachmeier 9y ago
I have to judge the words I read at the link I click.
- naasking 9y ago
  Well if you're free to ignore all context, then you can cast anyone resisting the status quo as a bad actor.
  - youdontknowtho 9y ago
    Is that really the case though or are the people "resisting the status quo" actually feigning offense over "discrimination" because they resent the fact that their position is widely accepted as immoral? (Racism or sexism.) They refuse to argue their actual point... minorities should not receive benefits because they do not deserve benefits for one reason or another...because those reasons are also considered unnacceptable to express by most people.
    - naasking 9y ago
      Well if you're free to ignore the principle of charity, then you can ascribe any sort of unethical motives to your opponents. I could just as easily argue that such anti-discrimination efforts are really driven by white-people hate, and accuse them of refusing to address this point. And how you feel right now at that over the top statement is exactly how your opponents feel when you make the contrary claim. Absent some expressed inconsistency, you take people at their word. As I've explained elsewhere in this thread, there's nothing inconsistent with what the LLVM dev has said, and it's fully justifiable from ethical principles. Maybe he is being disingenuous, but that doesn't make the argument itself wrong.
dnomad 9y ago
That post is something else. Are we really believe that an internship for Pacific Islanders constitutes a plot against White Men? At least you didn't go all "Cultural Marxism" like Damore. I do hope that this is the hill that the anti-diversity agenda chooses to die on. The logic here is so transparently hypocritical, self-serving and stupid that I suspect it will really crystallize the "sides" involved here. Similar to the notion that gays didn't really lack the right to marry or that "all lives matter", the argument betrays a kind malicious rejection of equality and justice that really demonstrates in a very clear way what these people are really about. So I say, go for it. Protest against every attempt to include minorities. Resign when they announce the next "Women in Technology" event. Raise hell if some damn SJW dares to include a Code of Conduct that forbids sexual harassment. It will be very interesting to see where this strategy takes you.
- naasking 9y ago
  > The logic here is so transparently hypocritical, self-serving and stupid that I suspect it will really crystallize the "sides" involved here [...] So I say, go for it. Protest against every attempt to include minorities. See, this isn't being charitable to those who disagree with you, and your attitude is a big problem with why these issues just get more inflammatory. Consider the fact that people who oppose such efforts aren't your enemy, they simply disagree with your allegedly infallible logic. Few people are actually against "minorities". In the end, the smallest minority is the individual. This is why discrimination any basis is wrong, because the individual's experience, advantages and disadvantages are not dictated by whatever group they belong to. Privilege is a statistical metric, but individual experience is not causally dictated by such metrics. Group-specific efforts wouldn't be so controversial if they weren't pushing a narrative that denies this basic fact. This should be obvious from the outcry you'd get from trying to organize, say, a male-only tech event, or an Asian-only tech event. Might seem silly given the demographics in these industries, but you'd get serious blowback just from the effort.
  - dnomad 9y ago
    > This is why discrimination any basis is wrong, because the individual's experience, advantages and disadvantages are not dictated by whatever group they belong to. Privilege is a statistical metric, but individual experience is not causally dictated by such metrics. But this is nonsense. How can any reasonable person believe that one's "group" has absolutely no impact on one's life experiences? You're literally saying "one individual's experience as a member of X group has no impact on one's individual experience." Does that really parse in your head? Look, there's no there there and you can devise silly rationalizations all day. The only thing that matters are the ends. The end goal is to keep those people away, right? The end goal is to make sure absolutely nothing changes, right? People should just be honest about their aims and end goals and we can skip the endless rationalizations. I find it all a bit too theatrical. Like internships for Pacific Islanders are absolutely harmless. They literally cause zero harm. There are few things in this world absolutely harmless but this is one of them. But here they are being protested as discrimination! It turns out any attempt to be inclusive is decried as some betrayal of "individual experience," whatever that actually means and we get flamboyant resignations in response. It's a bold strategy, Cotton. Let's see if it pays off.