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I still don't like how rude Linus is. I'll never like how rude Linus is. But his explanation of mRNA is nicely done. Hope somebody reading it learns something

I still don't like how rude Linus is. I'll never like how rude Linus is. But his explanation of mRNA is nicely done. Hope somebody reading it learns something and realizes they've been lied to. Maybe even gets vaccinated. That'd be worth a mean email or two.

rektide 5y ago
The world has always seemed far ruder & far more off-base. In every circumstance. Linus isn't always a good role model for how to behave, but it is enormously relieving sometimes, in a world that feels batshit insane, to hear someone else processing-out-loud their strong reactions.
- jiggawatts 5y ago
  Most people prefer to be lied to by someone pleasant than have their stupidity accurately and bluntly laid bare. That's the short of it. I've never seen a Linus rant be a personal attack. Every time, he's pointing out that someone who ought to know better is being dangerously stupid to the detriment of a great many others. Some people take offence at this -- even if they're not the target of Linus' ire -- because they mistakenly believe that everyone has the right to be treated nicely by others irrespective of their bad behaviour.
  - antiterra 5y ago
    Honest and direct feedback is one thing, belittling people for not fully understanding an edge case can be counterproductive. Linus is also not immune to mistakes, and he admits to having a general lack of understanding of the emotions of others.
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    > I've never seen a Linus rant be a personal attack. He called for someone to be 'retroactively aborted'. > they mistakenly believe that everyone has the right to be treated nicely Everyone should have the right to be treated reasonably nicely, even if they misbehave, unless there's some kind of threat to life or some other extreme that obviously never comes up in the context of software development.
    - beprogrammed 5y ago
      > He called for someone to be 'retroactively aborted'. Oof, if I was that person I'd be taking a good hard look at myself, he's rarely wrong.
      - rektide 5y ago
        This Linus comment in particular makes me very very ashamed of writing "In every circumstance.". This is the comment in question[1]. Linus obviously could have gone & seen who the original author was. And this is not a defense. But the person he was talking shit about was no longer around. He was talking about some old code, that some other maintainer was having to deal with, in some shitty crap ass situation that everyone was stranded in, ships smashing against the shore, &c. While again I'd emphasize the "not a role model" aspect, I again can empathize with how batshit upside down the rest of the world seemed at this point. But overwhelmingly yeah, this is a not good look, this is really discouraging to hear. Which is sad, because, you know, typically when Linus is hammering it out, giving a big corporation the middle finger or what not, it's like: thank god, a decent human being (who is not easily ignorable like the rest of us) is finally saying it true. But it's still an incredibly uncool way to phrase it all. Worst possible form of sound byte to be able to relay & parrot around. [1] https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/7/6/495 https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/7/6/495
        jiggawatts 5y ago
        Reminds me of one of the most popular radio personalities where I live. Let's just say that he's got a strong personality with some rough edges, but he's very entertaining on air. I've gravitated to whatever channel he's currently on after being fired from the last one for his behaviour or comments. But think about it: They hired him specifically for his personality, because he's a cash cow, and then... what? Fired him for it? Did they not listen to his wildly popular show on the previous channel he was on? Did they not know what they were getting themselves into? Did they somehow miss the fact that he was available for hire only because his previous channel fired him? Who is to blame here? The idiot that got a big cat as a pet, or the cat for being a wild animal? PS: Jeremy Clarkson being fired from Top Gear is a similar situation. He's a fantastically entertaining TV personality precisely because of his personality. I strongly believe that people like Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, and Linus Torvalds are necessary. You can't convince everyone to play along nicely with kind words alone. Sometimes you have to knock some heads together, and the type of people that do that, well... they're the type that will happily knock heads. It's a package deal.
burnte 5y ago
It's not always appropriate, but sometimes a verbal kick in the ass is useful. Shame is a powerful motivator. Shame used to keep the majority of racists and morons quiet in public, and slowly they were dying out since it was so hard to find their fellows. We need to make willful ignorance shameful again. And when you're dealing with things that endanger lives, I have no room for politeness, myself.
selcuka 5y ago
To be fair he started with the word "please".
eyelidlessness 5y ago
I normally find his replies offputting and yes, rude. I don’t even find this one rude. Exasperated for sure, as much as many of us feel confronting bullshit that’s killed an absurdly large number of people that could have lived longer and kept more of us in isolation longer than we should have been. I rarely feel this way, but I wish I had the grace and patience and fortitude to express this the way Linus Torvalds did.
- landemva 5y ago
  "kept more of us in isolation longer than we should have been." That was your politicians and your choice. My family went to Florida last November because it was open w/o masks. Don't play the pretend guilt trip about lockups, when nearly all healthy people recover and then have the antibodies. NY politicians forced known C19 carriers into long term care for elderly, causing mass death in this older vulnerable population. Indictments pending??
  - eyelidlessness 5y ago
    Hey you maybe read too much into my comment? I didn’t stay home because any government said so, I did it because it was the best way to keep my community and myself safe. I did so longer than was necessary because people like your family kept going out to socialize, prolonging the wave of infections. If I got infected I probably wouldn’t have been in much danger other than a yucky cold that made me feel crappy (but I don’t know that, it could have been quite worse). I stayed home to ensure I wasn’t spreading it to people who wouldn’t be so fortunate, or to people who have no choice but to be out in the world but might spread it to their family who might not be so fortunate. No pretend, no trip, yes guilt. The people who kept the infection pipeline going kept killing people and kept millions of other people inside and isolated from the people we love because we’re not that selfish.
  - ViViDboarder 5y ago
    Miami-Dade county: 18,474 deaths per 100k San Francisco county: 63 deaths per 100k That’s an accounting of the cost associated by not locking things down. What we have yet to see is what the economic impact is. However, the city of San Francisco has a budget surplus right now since economically we did better than expected.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
systemvoltage 5y ago
I find his rudeness hilarious and never serious.
flowerlad 5y ago
> I still don't like how rude Linus is. I'll never like how rude Linus is. He must be doing something right, because 30 years after its first release Linux isn't just thriving, it is dominating the world. And on the side he also managed to release another little something which we now know as git. There is no personal invective in his message. He only attacked the message, not the messenger.
beprogrammed 5y ago
Just to stand as a counter point I like rude Linus. I feel it's actually less rude and more just straight facts.
tandr 5y ago
> how rude Linus is. In general, or you can point exact wording in his letter which you consider "rude", sorry?
- ivraatiems 5y ago
  In general, but I also think his tone here specifically is rude. There's some ALL CAPS YELLING, implications the person he's responding to is an idiot, etc. This is par for the Linus course.

rektide 5y ago

The world has always seemed far ruder & far more off-base. In every circumstance. Linus isn't always a good role model for how to behave, but it is enormously relieving sometimes, in a world that feels batshit insane, to hear someone else processing-out-loud their strong reactions.

jiggawatts 5y ago
Most people prefer to be lied to by someone pleasant than have their stupidity accurately and bluntly laid bare. That's the short of it. I've never seen a Linus rant be a personal attack. Every time, he's pointing out that someone who ought to know better is being dangerously stupid to the detriment of a great many others. Some people take offence at this -- even if they're not the target of Linus' ire -- because they mistakenly believe that everyone has the right to be treated nicely by others irrespective of their bad behaviour.
- antiterra 5y ago
  Honest and direct feedback is one thing, belittling people for not fully understanding an edge case can be counterproductive. Linus is also not immune to mistakes, and he admits to having a general lack of understanding of the emotions of others.
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  > I've never seen a Linus rant be a personal attack. He called for someone to be 'retroactively aborted'. > they mistakenly believe that everyone has the right to be treated nicely Everyone should have the right to be treated reasonably nicely, even if they misbehave, unless there's some kind of threat to life or some other extreme that obviously never comes up in the context of software development.
  - beprogrammed 5y ago
    > He called for someone to be 'retroactively aborted'. Oof, if I was that person I'd be taking a good hard look at myself, he's rarely wrong.
    - rektide 5y ago
      This Linus comment in particular makes me very very ashamed of writing "In every circumstance.". This is the comment in question[1]. Linus obviously could have gone & seen who the original author was. And this is not a defense. But the person he was talking shit about was no longer around. He was talking about some old code, that some other maintainer was having to deal with, in some shitty crap ass situation that everyone was stranded in, ships smashing against the shore, &c. While again I'd emphasize the "not a role model" aspect, I again can empathize with how batshit upside down the rest of the world seemed at this point. But overwhelmingly yeah, this is a not good look, this is really discouraging to hear. Which is sad, because, you know, typically when Linus is hammering it out, giving a big corporation the middle finger or what not, it's like: thank god, a decent human being (who is not easily ignorable like the rest of us) is finally saying it true. But it's still an incredibly uncool way to phrase it all. Worst possible form of sound byte to be able to relay & parrot around. [1] https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/7/6/495 https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/7/6/495
      - jiggawatts 5y ago
        Reminds me of one of the most popular radio personalities where I live. Let's just say that he's got a strong personality with some rough edges, but he's very entertaining on air. I've gravitated to whatever channel he's currently on after being fired from the last one for his behaviour or comments. But think about it: They hired him specifically for his personality, because he's a cash cow, and then... what? Fired him for it? Did they not listen to his wildly popular show on the previous channel he was on? Did they not know what they were getting themselves into? Did they somehow miss the fact that he was available for hire only because his previous channel fired him? Who is to blame here? The idiot that got a big cat as a pet, or the cat for being a wild animal? PS: Jeremy Clarkson being fired from Top Gear is a similar situation. He's a fantastically entertaining TV personality precisely because of his personality. I strongly believe that people like Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, and Linus Torvalds are necessary. You can't convince everyone to play along nicely with kind words alone. Sometimes you have to knock some heads together, and the type of people that do that, well... they're the type that will happily knock heads. It's a package deal.

burnte 5y ago

It's not always appropriate, but sometimes a verbal kick in the ass is useful. Shame is a powerful motivator. Shame used to keep the majority of racists and morons quiet in public, and slowly they were dying out since it was so hard to find their fellows. We need to make willful ignorance shameful again. And when you're dealing with things that endanger lives, I have no room for politeness, myself.

selcuka 5y ago

To be fair he started with the word "please".

eyelidlessness 5y ago

I normally find his replies offputting and yes, rude. I don’t even find this one rude. Exasperated for sure, as much as many of us feel confronting bullshit that’s killed an absurdly large number of people that could have lived longer and kept more of us in isolation longer than we should have been. I rarely feel this way, but I wish I had the grace and patience and fortitude to express this the way Linus Torvalds did.

landemva 5y ago
"kept more of us in isolation longer than we should have been." That was your politicians and your choice. My family went to Florida last November because it was open w/o masks. Don't play the pretend guilt trip about lockups, when nearly all healthy people recover and then have the antibodies. NY politicians forced known C19 carriers into long term care for elderly, causing mass death in this older vulnerable population. Indictments pending??
- eyelidlessness 5y ago
  Hey you maybe read too much into my comment? I didn’t stay home because any government said so, I did it because it was the best way to keep my community and myself safe. I did so longer than was necessary because people like your family kept going out to socialize, prolonging the wave of infections. If I got infected I probably wouldn’t have been in much danger other than a yucky cold that made me feel crappy (but I don’t know that, it could have been quite worse). I stayed home to ensure I wasn’t spreading it to people who wouldn’t be so fortunate, or to people who have no choice but to be out in the world but might spread it to their family who might not be so fortunate. No pretend, no trip, yes guilt. The people who kept the infection pipeline going kept killing people and kept millions of other people inside and isolated from the people we love because we’re not that selfish.
- ViViDboarder 5y ago
  Miami-Dade county: 18,474 deaths per 100k San Francisco county: 63 deaths per 100k That’s an accounting of the cost associated by not locking things down. What we have yet to see is what the economic impact is. However, the city of San Francisco has a budget surplus right now since economically we did better than expected.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

systemvoltage 5y ago

I find his rudeness hilarious and never serious.

flowerlad 5y ago

> I still don't like how rude Linus is. I'll never like how rude Linus is. He must be doing something right, because 30 years after its first release Linux isn't just thriving, it is dominating the world. And on the side he also managed to release another little something which we now know as git. There is no personal invective in his message. He only attacked the message, not the messenger.

beprogrammed 5y ago

Just to stand as a counter point I like rude Linus. I feel it's actually less rude and more just straight facts.

tandr 5y ago

> how rude Linus is. In general, or you can point exact wording in his letter which you consider "rude", sorry?

ivraatiems 5y ago
In general, but I also think his tone here specifically is rude. There's some ALL CAPS YELLING, implications the person he's responding to is an idiot, etc. This is par for the Linus course.