4 ms·

The ML based guessing of people's genders sounds extremely tactless. You'd think given the demographics of their userbase Twitter would've known better.

by knolax 6y ago

leoh 6y ago
Although it was never ideal, it was probably implemented and reviewed years before thorough discussions and considerations about gender. Even as recently as 5-10 years ago it was hardly discussed. Things have changed drastically the last few years (for the best IMHO).
0xy 6y ago
Tactless? You should see what Google and Facebook's ad targeting ML will guess about you.
- londons_explore 6y ago
  The stuff you can visibly see they've guessed about you is a tiny drip compared to what they've guessed about you but have no way to display. Most vendors now simply a guess 128 floats about you as a vector which encodes your gender, your love of stars, your favourite foods, and how much you're itching to buy a deck chair... The vendors themselves don't really know what's in the vector, apart from the fact it helps them predict ads. They couldn't explain it if they tried - nobody could - it's all generated by stochastic ML methods.
  - Eridrus 6y ago
    > They couldn't explain it if they tried - nobody could - it's all generated by stochastic ML methods. This isn't true. These systems are not unknowable. It's just generally not worthwhile to figure out what these encode, but it is doable.
tinus_hn 6y ago
Not the entire world consists of ‘did you just assume my gender’ people. Most people don’t care at all. Stereotypes exist because they model people pretty well. If you enter that your gender is unicorn you probably just get slightly more generic ads. Here’s a scary thought: if you walk the street everyone who sees you will assume your gender.
- pasabagi 6y ago
  Eh - if you're trans and experiencing dysphoria it can be pretty painful when people misgender you. The whole 'did you assume my gender' thing is a sort of weird take on the fact that yes, it is pretty hurtful when somebody's going through a really hard and vulnerable time in their lives, then some douchebag is determined to make a political point that a complete stranger is 'really' x, or y. It's also just really bizarre and rude. Imagine referring to a cis woman with a beard as an 'it', or 'he'. For whatever reason, people go out of their way to commit this kind of absurd faux-pas with trans people.
  - abjKT26nO8 6y ago
    > It's also just really bizarre and rude. Imagine referring to a cis woman with a beard as an 'it', or 'he'. I do that sometimes, unintentionally (regardless of the person in question having a beard or not). It's just that gender in language is most of the time redundant and it only introduces noise into conversation. For most topics, the gender of the persons involved is irrelevant. But many languages force you to choose one, which just creates confusion if this piece of information is crucial or if it's just this bloat that the language forced you to include in your sentence. Oh, and genders are much more prevalent in my native language. English is actually better than most languages in this respect. But let's go a step further and just get rid of it. I've heard the Swedes chose to move to "person/thing" pronouns, as opposed to "male/female/thing". In my native language, verbs change their forms based on subject's gender. And then when you have sentences like "if I were in your shoes, I would verb", my brain tells me to assume the gender of the other speaker when I say verb. I mean, it's only logical: if I were in your shoes, I would be of your gender. But the language works otherwise. It's just stupid. As to people's reactions to my occasional misnamings, most people don't care at all, some are amused. Because, really, this part of language is ridiculous. And making an issue out of it is immature.
    - sascha_sl 6y ago
      Oh C'mon, have some empathy. Of course cis people are just going to be amused to mildly annoyed. Trans people however are in a daily grind to be recognized. From personal experience, it always depends how deliberate a misgendering is, once with subsequent correction stings but is fine, not putting in any effort is quite uncomfortable and deliberately doing the opposite is "fuck off and never talk to me again" territory. The later happens not as infrequently as you might think, so the second might be misunderstood for the the later (and really, it costs nothing to not make people feel like trash). While most people will eventually be recognized - at least if they fit within the binary somewhere and medically transition - a few will not, and almost nobody will on the long way there. To insist it is not a big deal because you can't relate, that is immature.

The ML based guessing of people's genders sounds extremely tactless. You'd think given the demographics of their userbase Twitter would've known better.

by knolax 6y ago

The ML based guessing of people's genders sounds extremely tactless. You'd think given the demographics of their userbase Twitter would've known better.

leoh 6y ago

Although it was never ideal, it was probably implemented and reviewed years before thorough discussions and considerations about gender. Even as recently as 5-10 years ago it was hardly discussed. Things have changed drastically the last few years (for the best IMHO).

0xy 6y ago

Tactless? You should see what Google and Facebook's ad targeting ML will guess about you.

londons_explore 6y ago
The stuff you can visibly see they've guessed about you is a tiny drip compared to what they've guessed about you but have no way to display. Most vendors now simply a guess 128 floats about you as a vector which encodes your gender, your love of stars, your favourite foods, and how much you're itching to buy a deck chair... The vendors themselves don't really know what's in the vector, apart from the fact it helps them predict ads. They couldn't explain it if they tried - nobody could - it's all generated by stochastic ML methods.
- Eridrus 6y ago
  > They couldn't explain it if they tried - nobody could - it's all generated by stochastic ML methods. This isn't true. These systems are not unknowable. It's just generally not worthwhile to figure out what these encode, but it is doable.

tinus_hn 6y ago

Not the entire world consists of ‘did you just assume my gender’ people. Most people don’t care at all. Stereotypes exist because they model people pretty well. If you enter that your gender is unicorn you probably just get slightly more generic ads. Here’s a scary thought: if you walk the street everyone who sees you will assume your gender.

pasabagi 6y ago
Eh - if you're trans and experiencing dysphoria it can be pretty painful when people misgender you. The whole 'did you assume my gender' thing is a sort of weird take on the fact that yes, it is pretty hurtful when somebody's going through a really hard and vulnerable time in their lives, then some douchebag is determined to make a political point that a complete stranger is 'really' x, or y. It's also just really bizarre and rude. Imagine referring to a cis woman with a beard as an 'it', or 'he'. For whatever reason, people go out of their way to commit this kind of absurd faux-pas with trans people.
- abjKT26nO8 6y ago
  > It's also just really bizarre and rude. Imagine referring to a cis woman with a beard as an 'it', or 'he'. I do that sometimes, unintentionally (regardless of the person in question having a beard or not). It's just that gender in language is most of the time redundant and it only introduces noise into conversation. For most topics, the gender of the persons involved is irrelevant. But many languages force you to choose one, which just creates confusion if this piece of information is crucial or if it's just this bloat that the language forced you to include in your sentence. Oh, and genders are much more prevalent in my native language. English is actually better than most languages in this respect. But let's go a step further and just get rid of it. I've heard the Swedes chose to move to "person/thing" pronouns, as opposed to "male/female/thing". In my native language, verbs change their forms based on subject's gender. And then when you have sentences like "if I were in your shoes, I would verb", my brain tells me to assume the gender of the other speaker when I say verb. I mean, it's only logical: if I were in your shoes, I would be of your gender. But the language works otherwise. It's just stupid. As to people's reactions to my occasional misnamings, most people don't care at all, some are amused. Because, really, this part of language is ridiculous. And making an issue out of it is immature.
  - sascha_sl 6y ago
    Oh C'mon, have some empathy. Of course cis people are just going to be amused to mildly annoyed. Trans people however are in a daily grind to be recognized. From personal experience, it always depends how deliberate a misgendering is, once with subsequent correction stings but is fine, not putting in any effort is quite uncomfortable and deliberately doing the opposite is "fuck off and never talk to me again" territory. The later happens not as infrequently as you might think, so the second might be misunderstood for the the later (and really, it costs nothing to not make people feel like trash). While most people will eventually be recognized - at least if they fit within the binary somewhere and medically transition - a few will not, and almost nobody will on the long way there. To insist it is not a big deal because you can't relate, that is immature.