3 ms·

That's not it. None of those problems are caused by elitism for a language. Advocating and language elitism are symptoms of larger ideas. Attacking elitism in

• kristopolous 6y ago
  Elitism for idealism is exactly what it is. That's exactly the problem. It's all about trying to avoid haphazardly creating cults. People don't really set out to create cults, they arise out of a set of reasonable intentions that can manifest as toxic institutions. People want things to be utilized, relied upon, popular, talked about, exciting, enjoyed, make people feel special, etc. All good, as long as we're being careful. I just described Jim Jones, heavens gate and astrophysics or an entertaining movie. Being careful about culture is important. We want to have robust, healthy, long lasting, respectable institutions in computing. To be simplistic, snobbery isn't a good fit
  • yepthatsreality 6y ago
    Good luck with fighting it. As the author said, no one cares.
    • kristopolous 6y ago
      I recently started a book on this topic. Hopefully it'll be something I'm proud of. I know there's more writers than readers so that's really my only expectation. Thanks
      • yepthatsreality 6y ago
        I look forward to see said results and encourage any change that could happen. My previous comment isn't meant to be curt, but honestly the author of the article did not propose a solution so in essence this article comes off as no more than a complain. Which is equivalent to complaining about "X person should have used Y language". > The elitist fucktards that create these social classes do so because it makes them feel important. This is from the article, do we honestly believe that these things are created by the people saying them intentionally? As we just discussed this isn't a phenomenon, it organically happens inside of human organization. I'm curious what level of social posturing and manners is required to avoid it. Is the solution to have "social-justice warriors"-like people patrolling Twitter and work platforms and correcting them? Especially in the notion of public platforms on the internet, a lot of things are often taken out of context. Not every comment about "X language should be used" is a malicious elitism.
        • kristopolous 6y ago
          If I can successfully describe things that's the only win I can hope to achieve Curative steps I think take much longer. Science has had to deal with this stuff constantly. In say medicine, there's always quackery spontaneously arising somewhere. It can take the form of well funded startups like theranos, mainstream established companies like purdue or what we usually think of, the supposed miracle cure person with the bad website and YouTube channel. Luckily medicine is continually creating a pretty solid culture that stamps that stuff out pretty quickly. Not as quick as we want, sure, but it's track record on the whole is getting better. Certainly not free from criticism but the people in medicine are clearly aware of the tendancies. Variation and a lack of agency over results appears to play a key role in susceptibility to these patterns. In computing we have for the most part not even acknowledged it's possible. One of the key promises of these patterns is more agency and less variation. It's what everyone is reaching for and this make it fertile ground for toxic institutions with fundamentally undeliverable promises. People chase the ideals hoping for the promises. Everyone gets screwed